This book features a unique research project: it spans fifty years. It seeks to replicate in 2025 findings from research in 1975 asking this question: What makes our relationships meaningful, satisfying, or fulfilling? Look for answers from the expertise of social scientists and the wisdom of ordinary people. The original research centers on four relational qualities: communication openness, being oneself, interpersonal security and warmth, and personal support and growth. The new research replicates three of these qualities and identifies ten themes, seven of which are new: communication, being oneself, and growth along with connection, mutuality, enjoyment, time, work, presence, and transcendence. A follow-up research project discovers that ordinary people’s relationships as a whole are meaningful, satisfying, fulfilling, and quite healthy overall. Perhaps most astonishingly, in their personal relationships, they do well on all four qualities and ten themes, including practical ways each quality and theme is expressed. Within the book, readers will also find thought-provoking quotations, vignettes, reflections, and case studies drawn from responses of family members, friends, and colleagues.

Available from Amazon at this link: https://a.co/d/iW2Jmx3 and from Wipf & Stock at this link: https://wipfandstock.com/9798385265534/what-makes-our-relationships-meaningful-satisfying-or-fulfilling/

Also Available, Signs of Hope and Health in Mainline Churches.

This 2025 book features findings from a recent research project with this surprising conclusion: It’s time to replace lament over problems facing twenty-first-century mainline churches with aspirations of hope and possibilities for health. Core beliefs about hope and guidelines for making hope happen are introduced. Eighteen models of healthy congregations over four decades are highlighted–some research-based, others denomination-based or book-based. Markers of flourishing congregations are derived from these models. A new 4 C’s relational approach to congregational health is offered centered in community, communication, character, and collaboration. Twenty-four practical ways these four signs of health are exemplified are drawn from the latest social and relationship science research. The research project tests the validity and usefulness of the core beliefs about hope, the markers of flourishing congregations, and the new relational approach to congregational health. You’ll also find guidelines for creating more hope-filled and healthy futures for mainline churches.

Available from Amazon at this link: https://a.co/d/8TPVam5 and from Wipf & Stock at this link: https://wipfandstock.com/9798385236237/signs-of-hope-and-health-in-mainline-churches/

Also Available. . .Better Ways to Better Relationships in the Church at this link: https://tomkirkpatrick.org/2021

My 2021 Wipf & Stock publication, Better Ways to Better Relationships in the Church, is a companion to this 2016 Rowman & Littlefield Alban publication, Communication in the Church: A Handbook for Healthier Relationships.

Most congregations are eager to help people create healthier ways of relating to one another. So here are some practical, sensible guidelines to help people become more effective in how they build relationships, lead meetings, experience trust, practice forgiveness, use power, and bridge cultures. Each chapter includes real-life scenarios, sensible guidelines, practical applications, and suggestions for further study. You may adapt this handbook’s content and resources to a variety of religious communities, learning audiences, work contexts, educational programs, and training events. Drawing on the latest research and geared particularly for clergy, laypersons, continuing educational planners, professors, students, and scholars, business and community leaders, nonprofit organizations, consultants, and professional speakers will also find it useful.

Available as a Rowman & Littlefield Alban Publication from Amazon at this link: https://a.co/d/hXSOyGe and from Bloomsbury at this link: https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/communication-in-the-church-9781566997898/