Now, the widely respected Barna Research Group has released the results of an in-depth study which found that while 25 percent of American adults have been divorced at least once, the divorce rate is even higher (27 percent) among self-identified "born again" Christians and higher yet (29 percent) among Baptists. While the Barna research did not distinguish among the various types of Baptists (from the more conservative Southern Baptists to the more liberal American or Northern Baptists), clearly, the divorce rate among self-identified Baptists is at least as high, if not higher, than most other religious groups in the nation.

Why is this so, and how is it related to the 1998 Southern Baptist doctrinal statement?

Baptist leaders began to feel that their people were increasingly honoring more with lip service than with life action the traditional sexual teachings of biblical Christianity--no premarital sex, for example. They also began to realize that some of the so-called traditional teachings on sex were less than biblical.

As a result, their preaching began to change.

For instance, the traditional double standard which resulted in one standard of chastity for young women (virginity), and another for young men ("boys will be boys"), is now explicitly rejected from pulpits, as pastors have helped their people more fully understand that God has one standard for sexual purity--sex only within the confines of matrimony between a man and a woman.

Meanwhile, Southern Baptists have thought more about the biblical command that the husband love his wife as Christ loved the church. That means the husband is to give himself sacrificially to her--and the wife is to respect her husband and "to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband."