A survey conducted by church-run Radio Veritas showed that more Filipinos believe that being married is not necessary before living together.
Based on the result of the Veritas Truth Survey on common law partnership, 45 percent believes that being married is not necessary before living together while 40 percent would agree that couples should get married first before living together.
The remaining 15 percent are still undecided when asked the question: "Should couples get married first before living together; and not engage in a common-law partnership arrangement?"
The survey results also reveal that more adult (40-60 years old) and elderly (61 years old and above) respondents believe that couples should be married first before living together.
For adults, 48 percent says couples should be married first before living together; 29 percent says that being married is not necessary before living together, and 23 percent were undecided.
For elderly respondents 61 percent says couples should be married first before living together; 33 percent says that being married is not necessary before living together; and 6 percent were undecided.
While for younger respondents such as teens (13-20 years old) and young adults (21-39 years old); living together before marriage was acceptable at 51 percent for teens (versus 34 percent who were against living together before marriage) and 58 percent for young adults (versus 21 percent who were against living together before marriage).
Fifteen percent of teens and 21 percent of young adults remained undecided.
Fr. Anton Pascual, Radio Veritas President, sees these survey results as a challenge in the Church's ongoing mission to evangelize the Catholic Faithful most especially nominal Catholics on the beauty of the sacrament of marriage.
"To instill the importance of the sacrament of marriage should be our response to the findings of our Veritas Truth Survey. As a wake-up call to this social reality on the respondents' perception towards common law partnership, we should evangelize our Catholic faithful on the transcendental value of marriage which places God in the union between husband and wife," he said in a statement.
Conducted from Jan. 1 to 31, 2022, the survey used a stratified sample of 1,200 respondents nationwide for a +/- 3% margin of error gathered through a text-based and online data gathering process.