Soul Mates

W. Bradford Wilcox and Nicholas Wolfinger offer a provocative portrait of the influence of churches on sex, childbearing, relationships, and marriage among African Americans and Latinos. Through widely conducted surveys and detailed interviews, they discover a link between religion and happier, stabler relationships among black and Latino couples. Yet they also find that religion does not so profoundly effect the sexual conduct and childbearing patterns for Latinos, and still less for African Americans. Wilcox and Wolfinger show that black Protestant, Catholic, and Latin Protestant churches serving these two communities promote a "code of decency" encompassing hard work, temperance, and personal responsibility, as well as an ethic based on the Golden Rule. These two codes have had demonstrably positive effects for both married and unmarried minority couples; however, these church-supported codes of decency are no longer as clearly connected as they once were to sexual conduct, childbearing and marriage. Dramatic changes in sexual behavior and family life have left many clergy and religious leaders in black and Latino churches skittish about confronting issues directly related to sex, marriage and family structure. Moreover, black and Latino believers are especially likely to connect their faith to non-family-related matters, such as racial justice or community empowerment, rather than to their sexual conduct and marital status. Soul Mates provides critical insight into the effect of religion on black and Latino relationships as well as concrete strategies for pastoral leaders.