Comments on: The Church’s Missing Men

By: Ben West

Ben West — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 21:01:13 +0000

I’m a 47 year-old nevermarried man who gave up his childhood Baptist membership and faith 17 years ago.

As a single man, I found over the years that even though most churches have something for singles, they still prefer married couples or at least married women. I was in 3 different Baptist churches and one Methodist church during my childhood and they overwhelmingly distrust single males. They just don’t say it “in so many words”.

I finally came to the realization that I never really missed going to church anymore. I agree they do some good things and I’m not just another “church basher” but I don’t feel the loss at all.

I also feel that church isn’t for everbody and not everybody belongs in church. Most ministers I knew would rather have those members who contribute and forget those who don’t for whatever reason. They don’t say it but that’s what it is.

Ben West

By: Cerulean Sanctum » Another Look at the Church’s Missing Men

Cerulean Sanctum » Another Look at the Church’s Missing Men — Fri, 19 May 2006 06:21:22 +0000

[...] Last June, I blogged about the George Barna report that showed that the American Church's face was largely female, with many men skipping church altogether. Since that time, another male-centric book has appeared on the market, David Morrow's Why Men Hate Going to Church. This tome joins the mania created by John Eldredge's Wild at Heart in seeking to find out why men feel bored in the pews on Sunday. Morrow even has a website http://www.churchformen.com that delves deeper into the mystery of the church's missing men. [...]

By: Cerulean Sanctum » The Problem of Porn

Cerulean Sanctum » The Problem of Porn — Fri, 19 May 2006 06:18:50 +0000

[...] But single wage-earner families are not exempt. Evangelicals place much pressure on families to conform to a "Focus on the Family" ideal nuclear family with mom at home schooling the kids and dad serving as the perfect Christian man (I've blogged about the requirements for being such an idyllic man here, here, and here.) And the ramped-up education issue for kids is shockingly high on the list of essentials for such families. Barna recently reported that for born-again Christians, it was more important that the kids get that hyped-up education than that they know Jesus. So the pressures in those other three areas highlighted above remain (and could be worse) for families that conform to the new Christian ideal. [...]

By: Cerulean Sanctum » The Christian & the Business World #13: Radical Christian Workers Unite!

Tue, 16 May 2006 15:34:54 +0000

[...] The Church's Missing Men [...]

By: Cerulean Sanctum » Work (and Everyday Life) Redeemed

Cerulean Sanctum » Work (and Everyday Life) Redeemed — Wed, 10 May 2006 00:27:41 +0000

[...] Hospitality, Maturity, Relevance, Humility, Christianity in North America, Counterculture, Men , trackback span.indent {padding-left: 0em;}var verse1 = ‘Error retrieving Bible passage. Please check againtomorrow.’;In my exploration of why men are missing from the Church (see "The Church's Missing Men"), I touched on the issue of work, showing how the intersection of work life and everything not work is simply not occurring in a reasonable way with many men. Church and parachurch organizations heap increasing loads of requirements on men already burdened with record levels of work time as they strive to avoid the next downsizing. [...]