Take a moment to think about the best and worst incidents in your life. Was it perhaps getting, or not getting, an important promotion? Or perhaps you won, or failed to win, a coveted award. In fact, the overwhelming odds are that you will identify the best and the worst incidents in the history of your relationships.

This was the conclusion of a large study reported by the University at Buffalo earlier this year. By a large margin the subjects reported that the beginning or ending of close relationships: making or losing a good friend, falling in and out of love, the death of someone in the family – ­ these kinds of making or breaking of close social relationships ­ mattered more than the dramatic events of success or failure.

I suspect that we all know in our hearts that this is true. However much we may have entered into the consumer society or competitive endeavours of various kinds, and however much these may seem to dominate our waking lives, it is the success of our long-term relationships which really matters. But it is a pity that sometimes we only realise that when we lose them.

I recall reading (but cannot trace the reference) the thoughts of a woman on her deathbed, when she considered how she had lived her life. It was a Martha and Mary story. She decided that she had focused far too much on the useful, and doubtless necessary, activities ­ busy, busy, busy. And too little time on simply showing her love to her family. If an evidently holy woman could think that, what does it say to me about myself?

Perhaps an additional motivation can be found in a meta-analysis of 148 studies covering over 300,000 individuals, who were followed up for an average of seven years (Public Library of Science, August 31 2010). A meta-analysis combines the results of several similar studies in order to obtain the largest and broadest sample. It showed that people with adequate social relationships had a 50 per cent improved rate of mortality over those who did not. This percentage corresponds roughly to factors like smoking and obesity.

Adjustment for several factors such as age, sex, initial health and cause of death confirms that this is a general finding and not restricted to certain classes of people. This throws an interesting and important focus on social life as a factor in longevity. Being a pater of a large familias, I am fortunate in my social relationships. But necessarily this is not true for many people ­ whether we are thinking of young men and women who find it hard to make friends, right through to the elderly who are allowed to slip off our radar too often.

Undoubtedly we have an advantage in belonging to a religion which has an endemic social content, which can naturally spread out from the ritual unity of the Eucharist. But how many of those familiar faces in the pew do we actually know as individuals? To whom does our ‘sign of peace’ have a real, rather than a nominal, meaning?

A study in the American Sociological Review suggests that the higher levels of happiness found in active churchgoers results from its social opportunities rather than any religious merit.

It is clear that the influence of the parish priest, both in the way he conducts the liturgy and the ways in which he provides opportunities for social occasions and a sharing of parish tasks is important. But priests are thin on the ground and, in any event, is this not where we in the laity can be taking initiatives? The local schools have many opportunities to be effective here. And so do we ­  on a personal basis. I am not pretending that this is always easy. Characteristically, lonely people suffer from a tension between wanting relationships and a fear of rejection. In people over 50 this tension is a measurable factor in raised blood pressure. (University of Chicago. March 2010)

There are of course many secular opportunities such as adult education classes (becoming increasingly expensive, I fear) and many other groups open to members who want to join in charitable work or who share a common interest.

 The last are important because  the psychologists tell us that loneliness is not a function of the spread of our circle of friends but whether we have close relationships which include substantial sharing of conversation. Two or three close friends are more important than a multitude of ‘acquaintances’.

For those who are retired from full-time work I will put in a plug for the University of the Third Age (U3A). This is a widespread organisation, with a local presence, which provides and encourages cooperative learning groups. And many other events. No academic qualifications are required, and the groups cover a broad range of activities from the arts, foreign languages, current affairs etc. And if there isn’t a local group to suit you, then U3A will help you to start one. Ask at your library or ‘Google’ U3A.

‘I have been a member of a philosophy group for several years now; and our boast is that we only lose members through death. The exchange of wisdom between people with a lifetime of experience is impressive. I do not see it as a missionary activity but we often discuss moral and religious matters as part of our brief. No one has any doubts about what I believe and why. And I, in turn, have a good understanding of other members’ beliefs and values. We disagree less often than you might imagine ­ and always with respect.