Of going to church and living longer

AS A child growing up in rural Northern Cape, Sundays were spent in the Dutch Reformed Church, whether it was 40°C or not.

My parents obviously knew then what a new study suggests. Regular attendance at church seems to make you live longer.

Researchers studied data of nearly 75 000 middle-age female nurses in the United States.

The participants answered questions about whether they attended religious services regularly every four years between 1992 and 2012, and about other aspects of their lives over the years.

The researchers found that women who went to church more than once a week had a 33% lower risk of dying during the study period, compared with those who said they never went.

Less-frequent attendance was also associated with a lower risk of death, as women who attended church once a week or less than weekly had a 26% and 13% lower risk of death, respectively.

Women who regularly attended religious services also had higher rates of social support and optimism, had lower rates of depression and were less likely to smoke.

Going to church could have a number of additional benefits that could, in turn, improve longevity, but the researchers were not able to examine them with the available data.

Attendance could promote self-discipline and a sense of meaning and purpose in life, or it could provide an experi- ence of the transcendent, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health professor of epidemiology, Tyler J VanderWeele said.

Vander Weele led the new research, which was published in the journal Jama Internal Medicine.

“Our study suggests that for health, the benefits outweigh the potentially negative effects such as guilt, anxiety or intolerance,” Vander Weele said.

The study did not explore the association in men though.

Previous research suggests that male churchgoers also benefit, though their decrease in death rate is not as large as among women, VanderWeele said.

Religion and spirituality may be an underappreciated resource that physicians could explore with their patients as appropriate, the researchers suggested.