According to Forbes, 73% of young adults feel alone sometimes or always.
But Christians have a unique kind of opportunity to find genuine community and friendships. When you live life for Jesus, you have the ultimate comfort that he’s always alongside you. So why are you still feeling lonely?
In this short, punchy book, you’ll explore specific reasons why you and many others in Gen Z are fighting loneliness—even as Christians. After each compelling diagnosis of what fuels detachment, you’ll unpack a solution rooted in God’s design for relationships and community.
You’ll see...
Why We’re Feeling Lonely (and What We Can Do About It) is written by Shelby Abbott, who has served in ministry with young adults for over two decades.
Great for giving away in young-adult ministry contexts.
(Review written for 'Why We’re Feeling Lonely (and What We Can Do About It)')
It is important to note that this book is written to young adults and college students. As someone who is a volunteer leader with the college and career girls at my church, I was really interested in checking this out to understand some problems they may be facing. I appreciated the thoughts on how we are so connected digitally, yet loneliness plagues so many. Many long for genuine friendships and connections. This book explains issues that are keeping us lonely.
Me reading it in my 30s, lots of it seemed basic, but I think this book would be extremely helpful for the targeted age group. The pressures of our current society create many new hurdles and temptations for them, including mental health struggles like depression and anxiety, unlimited access to content on their phones, and a lack of depth in friendships.
I think this book would make for a great discussion with a group of college students, whether through a campus ministry or a local church young adult group. It is less than 200 pages and includes reflection questions at the end of each chapter.
(Review written for 'Why We’re Feeling Lonely (and What We Can Do About It)')
This was a great read! Loneliness is a serious issue and we must be proactive about fighting it or we’ll get swallowed up. Shelby gives lots of practical ways to combat this and I think this is a great and well-rounded read for the topic!
(Review written for 'Why We’re Feeling Lonely (and What We Can Do About It)')
This short book touches on several of the things feeding into our modern loneliness problem. Abbott addresses the “solutions” we often turn to in an attempt to numb the pain of loneliness—solutions that ultimately aggravate the problem or are sinful responses that lead to shame and guilt. Throughout the book, Abbott points readers to Christ.
My thoughts:
I appreciated much of what Abbott said, but none of it was particularly new to me. I realize I’m not his target audience, ...as I’m in my late twenties with a husband and children, and the book is very much aimed at college-aged students and young adults. Overall, I found the content fairly basic, though I could see it being helpful for those who are newer to this topic.
He does offer some good practical advice, such as being plugged into a local church and cultivating deep, authentic relationships where vulnerability is possible. One area of concern for me, however, was his chapter on what he calls “gospel empathy” as the solution to polarization and anger. In the previous chapter, Abbott discusses how polarized our culture has become and how this has damaged communities and relationships. He makes some helpful points about humility while still holding to truth, but I found some of his language in this section to be a bit concerning.
His emphasis on empathy as the solution felt slightly off to me. While I think he makes some good observations, I disagree that empathy itself is the solution. I believe compassion would have been a better and more precise term. That said, the book remains very generalized and geared toward a young adult audience, and overall, it wasn’t one of my favorites.
*I received a copy of this book for my honest thoughts.
