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Why Don’t Men Go To Church?
It’s been a controversy for a few years now, and it seems that at least one huckster is always selling a book on it: it looks like men are checking out of not only school and careers, but church too. I can personally attest that I felt better about Christianity as an apostate.
When my other half decided to go shopping for a church, the men I met at some of the prospective houses of worship made me want to threw up a little. My God, what a bunch of worthless weenies. Seriously, it was like looking at a pet that was mangled in some farm equipment and just won’t mercifully die. You want to love it, but you’re physically repulsed at the same time.
Our present church merely annoys me, so it’s tolerable. I can occasionally get down with the sermons. But they harp on about why I should give them money an awful lot. I go to the traditional service, as I like the old hymns more than the homoerotic love songs for Jesus and, for whatever reason, I like the company of older men better. I generally listen to the choir — which is really good — and then half-listen while I tune out and think about my week. The church does run a mission for men to hang out with school kids and provide a masculine influence in their lives. I may sign up for that when I get out from under traveling for work, and grad school, and all the other responsibilities that come with being the Atlas that keeps the world up.
Can churches survive without men? Can they survive with no masculine vitality at all? Why aren’t men going?
Image Credit: Flickr user Jonathan Mallard.
There is a Pastor up in Wisconsin by the name of Mark Gungor that started asking the same question a few years back. It doesn’t look like they’ve done it for a couple of years but they did a Manly Man Conference for pastors and laymen to look at the issue of why guys don’t go to church much anymore.
I’d have to go back and re-watch the DVD they had of the conference but that pastor brings up some of the stuff you mention. At least in Evangelical churches the atmosphere, the music, even the way things are phrased in sermons tend to be geared towards how women respond to things and men have in general responded accordingly. One of the issues though is that we live in a culture now where having a church that caters more towards men would likely cause an uproar about misogyny, patriarchy, and other such bilge so it’s just not done.
Just seems like it fits here:
I am Orthodox Christian. One thing that always amused me going to a Greek Orthodox church were the number of men (typically Greek) that would stand outside the church, smoking, until Communion was being served. They would then grind out their butts, rush inside, take Communion, and then leave. I always wondered why they even bothered to come.
Seawriter
Actually, I think this is a reason for patriarchy. Mormons are unabashedly patriarchal in our leadership structure, though women lead the women’s and the children’s organizations. Men are the leaders of congregations and in other ways however, and it is a good thing. It forces them to step up to the plate and they do.
This same thing happened at the beginning of the 19th century. At that point many churches stepped away from the old tough-minded and masculine Calvinist view of salvation and adopted universal salvation views, while at the same time women created all kinds of societies to promote things like Bible distribution, temperance and the like. Then and now, I’ve noticed that many men are all too willing to let women run things if they want to, and women, who are detail oriented, like to run things. While appreciating the talents and gifts of women, churches need to ask men to step up and be leaders too.
If you’re ever in Seattle, I’ll take you to my church. The pastor is also a football coach. Need I say more?
How does he “tackle” sin?
It’s a bigger opponent, aim for the lower legs…
Many years ago, while using up whatever personal wealth we had to spend 8 years working with the disabled poor around the world, we came to believe that most churches were operating like academic institutions; replacing study for discipleship, academic credentials for wisdom and organization for energy. And the men deferring to the women for leadership. We stopped going to church for about ten years.
We have noticed, however, that Pentecostal churches have an energetic male membership even though they also have a substantial number of women in leadership and pastoral roles. They also, and especially the church we now go to, have a leadership which is half white and half black… with a few other minorities added. Joyce Meyer would be considered one of the genuinely inspired and inspirational leaders of this movement, which has been around for much more than a century.
This is also a young congregation, with leaders from 30 to 75 and a large youth involvement. Our 4 grand kids, 10 through 18, practically live at the church.
This Sunday Dr. Ben Carson is our guest speaker.
Yes, indeed. *snorfle*
Preaches the Gospel every week, full of truth and grace.
So, what are you doing to change the culture? Man up, and start a Bible Study. Or a weightlifting class for the pencil-necked congregants towards whom you feel so charitable. Is there something manly about complaining? Act!
I’ve never heard a lady preach in my church. We have a rule that only priests can offer a homily. Ladies do lots of other things, but the men at my church are fantastic. Many are Knights of Columbus.
My church is good, too– the ladies’ groups are actually in worse shape than the men’s, because there’s no room for folks under 60 that aren’t already there. The Knight officers are mostly older, yeah, but those that are also deacons are only five or ten years older than me. Probably somewhat related, we have more families with small kids than I’ve seen at any other parish.
Not like this is on par with the old joke about “everyone complains about the weather, but nobody does something about it;” don’t like it, spend less time whining about other folks doing something and do it yourself.
When I coached rugby, I taught, “Tackle low, hit hard, and drive your opponent into the ground. You’re aiming at a point past your opponent, so don’t just grab her and hold on. Bring her down.” (In rugby you can’t hit below the knees.)
Easy question to answer: I’ve never been very good at sitting still.
I didn’t know that about rugby. All good advice for either sport though :) I was a bit shorter and lighter than most players were when I played (lot football with friends) so I usually had to get them off balance instead of driving them down until close to the end of high school. A well executed tackle is a beautiful thing to watch.
You know, people mock traditional liturgical services as being “stand up, kneel, stand up, bow, stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down, kneel, stand up, sit down, etc …” but it does have the benefit that the longest one is sitting still is during the homily/sermon. It’s much easier to stay engaged in the service when there is a physical component.
And a beautiful thing to execute. Extremely satisfying.
I’m of evangelical background but this is really true. My father was a pastor and said more than once that the “ears will take only as much as the butt can stand.”
Sadly, I may have to start playing again to find out. :)
It’s been nearly 20yrs since I played…..
I’d also add that I think another thing that liturgical services do well that I find missing in non-liturgical services is the congregational involvement during the service. My experience in non-liturgical services is that as a congregant, one is supposed to sing during the hymns, put money in the plate, and otherwise be a passive receptacle. A liturgical service is full of congregational responses, where everyone is expected to participate. (Confession, Creed, and Lord’s Prayer for the biggest, but also small ones throughout the service, e.g. “This is the Word of the Lord”/”Thanks be to God.”)
In Catholic thinking, one does not “attend” Mass, like a lecture or concert. One assists.
I go to a Bible church, where the pastor typically does expository preaching — preaching through a book of the Bible. As for music, we do half traditional/ half modern, accompanied by piano and organ. There’s no liturgy.
We have men.
Call it the soft bigotry of low expectations. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems that most churches just don’t have many concrete obligations anymore. This is especially important for men who are goal oriented and need accomplishments to feel valued.
-E
I should put on here that the church that I attended in Charleston doesn’t seem to have this exact problem. There are plenty of regular guys there that regularly invest time and participation at the church. The denomination I grew up in though does seem to have this problem, at least the lack of men in general ( not so much them not being manly). Habbit’s of how services are conducted, songs that are used, and the types of “outreach” that are done are hard to break, and they do not seem to be working with the current generation of men.
Men not going to church is also a cultural thing. In Latin America and Europe, it was pretty common for the men to stay home. The men supported the church, but going to mass was something different.
Here is what I’ve seen from churches that have an active male part of their congregation:
* There are service opportunities geared towards men’s strengths. If nursery and children’s Sunday school are the only ways to personally serve, you lose your men. If the church is taking care of home repairs for single mothers or is a mobile church that requires moving lots of heavy stuff to set up for the weekend, then it gives the men something worthwhile to do.
* A masculine pastor. He doesn’t need to go deer hunting every fall, but he does need to display confidence and leadership. Different personalities demonstrate those qualities in different ways, but they still have to exist.
Yes. Men don’t need the doctrine and vocation of headship to make themselves superior to women. They need it because they otherwise wouldn’t play a useful role in the Church.
Guru, I appreciate your post, your candor and your concern. I don’t have anything great to offer. Just that some churches are more masculine than others. And my general observation is that most evangelical men are milquetoasts. (This is most often seen in how they go into the sanctuary—following behind their wives, just so they won’t get in trouble for picking the wrong seat. Observe this phenomenon this Sunday. It’s startling.)
I hope you find a church home where you can grow in Christ.
I, too, find it all too easy to tune out anything other than a really good choir at church. Typically, the only way I can keep myself engaged throughout a service is by being in a decent choir – that way I have to pay attention to what’s going on to do my musical duty – although even then, I tend to space out during sermons.
If you’re worried about homoeroticism in love songs to Jesus, though, I’d also advise against thinking too hard about what many traditional hymns and anthems are saying. Traditional favorites like Wesley’s “Jesu, Lover of my Soul” and Palestrina’s “Sicut Cervus” quite quickly become creepy if you bother to think about what the words are saying in that way.
More generally, the whole edifice of Christianity (including such masculine mystics as St John of the Cross) devolves into a squickfest if you don’t decouple Eros from sex.