Latter-day Saints can foster better relationships within the church if they eliminate stereotypes about those whose marital status differs from their own and focus more on what they can do for each other.

A single LDS attorney and her married sister, a clinical social worker, told members of the Association of Mormon Counselors and Psychotherapists on Thursday that tension between adult Latter-day Saints often centers on marital status because of the faith's emphasis on marriage and family.

Mary Ann Rackley grew up in Utah and now works as an attorney, and when she returns to visit her mother's ward in Salt Lake City, "I'm still treated like a very young person," because she is not married, she said. "I'm very sensitive to that. I try hard to be a mature individual."

Assumptions that a single adult is immature topped Rackley's list of the "common misperceptions" that single adults perceive their married friends believe about them, she said. Other myths include assumptions that LDS singles:

• Have an abundance of free time. "Generally we're very involved, have an active social life and a lot of responsibility," Rackley said.

• Are "too picky" when it comes to dating and marriage. Rackley said one woman told her and a group of other highly educated singles that they "needed to pretend we didn't know so many things in order to get a date."

• Are unhappy being single. Whether spoken or not, some convey the impression that, "I just want you to get married so you can be happy like me," she said. "I look at them and their spouses sometimes and think I'd rather be single. I think we need to learn to be happy and accepting at whatever stage of life we're in."

• Lack faith or are not "worthy" in some way. "Being single doesn't mean I haven't prayed and I don't have faith," she said. "Perhaps this is their trial in life, to learn what they need to learn to return to Heavenly Father. That's something I focus on a lot as a single person."

Rackley's sister, Chris Falconer, said the "lack of faith and/or worthiness" perceptions are often applied to part-member families like her own, particularly "when they choose to marry people who are not LDS." She married her non-LDS husband more than a decade ago, learning through prayer that he was right for her in spite of cultural expectations about marrying a church member inside one of the faith's temples.

"That's very personal, yet I've often received comments about that ... If (her husband's conversion) was based on prayer and faith, it would have happened long ago," she said.

Rackley has written a book on the subject "to try to help people understand that just because they are single, they're not necessarily unhappy," and that it's illogical to categorize all single Latter-day Saints as having common interests or concerns based simply on their marital status.