DIVORCE IN CANADA

  • Divorce was made much easier by an act of the Canadian Parliament in 1969, and no-fault divorce was approved in 1987. In 1968 there were 11,000 divorces; in 1993 there were 78,000.

  • The average Canadian marriage lasts 12 years. The divorce rate is highest in Ontario, lowest in Newfoundland.

  • 49% of common-law relationships last less than 3 years.

  • Only 30% of broken marriages had high levels of conflict.

  • 10 years after divorce, 60% of children have not seen their father for over a year.

  • 40% of divorced fathers do not pay child support.

  • Single-parent families make up 10% of Canadian families, but account for 46% of the children living in poverty.

  • In the US, according to a Barna survey, 23% of the general population, 27% of those who claim to be evangelicals and 30% of those who claim to be fundamentalists are divorced. 87% of evangelicals who divorced did so after accepting Christ.

  • A Statistics Canada survey in September 1998 showed that weekly churchgoers are one-and-a-half times more likely to describe themselves as happily married than the general population.

    Source: the November/December 1998 issue of Faith Today ("Divorce: Can we do better?")

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