Calvin University's official student newspaper since 1907

Calvin University Chimes

Since 1907
Calvin University's official student newspaper since 1907

Calvin University Chimes

Calvin University's official student newspaper since 1907

Calvin University Chimes

The Bride’s man problem

I plopped down next to a couple of friends at LOFT in the back row of chairs before the sound booth and got my favorite vantage point of the chapel. Out of curiosity and to pass the time, I counted the row of chairs in front of me. Seventeen people. Three men, fourteen women. “Huh, must be a girls’ floor or something,” I thought. The row that I sat in: four men, six women. Better. The row to my right: four men, eleven women. A fluke? A row across from me I estimated two men and ten women.

I wasn’t aware of how significant the gender imbalance in the church was until a few weeks ago when a favorite blog of mine brought it up, citing statistics and history that indicated the imbalance is pervasive throughout Christianity and has been for quite some time. That’s what prompted the demographic inquiry at LOFT, and naturally, it was the main thing on my mind when I attended the “Man Enough” seminar some weeks ago. (An aside, many thanks to Reverend Nate Pyle for a challenging, informative talk, thanks to the Sexuality Series for hosting him, and thank you to all the men and women that showed up. Men appeared to be in the majority!) When the room was opened to questions at the end, I had to ask Pastor Nate, “Do you see this gender divide in your church? If so, what have you done about it?”

The gender imbalance is hardly a new phenomenon. Depending on your source, church pews and rosters have been predominantly filled with women for 400 to 1000 years. And these disputes are more often concerned with the reliability of records than when the split began. Even in early Puritan colonies where the balance of the general population favored men 3 to 2, most church attendees were still women. One recent survey by Pew Research Center stated that 25% more women attended church on a weekly basis than men. Nearly any survey or study on the topic will give the same trend. Think it’s because of old widows? The imbalance exists across all ages. A minority of people, including Rev. Pyle himself, have speculated that the church has always been this way (although I haven’t seen any support of this). And when I say gender imbalance, I don’t just mean 55/45 (like Calvin), I mean 60/40 or even 80/20. Count up a row next time at LOFT or a church you attend and see for yourself. I would wager that even Calvin’s imbalance is symptomatic of the broader trend.

This split that I see at Calvin and every church I’ve been a part of bothers me. If spirituality is inherently feminine, or if religion is more appealing to women, as some propose, then why doesn’t Islam, Judaism, Orthodox Christianity or until more recently, the Catholic Church, have this problem? Why doesn’t the church appeal to or reach out to those who typically have the most power and authority in family and society?

After some pondering, Nate admitted, “Yeah, my church is mostly women.” He didn’t think his church did anything specific to address it, and he said there wasn’t much for the church to do. He said something to the effect of ‘we should go out and interact with men in such a way that inspires them to get involved in a church.’ Sure, but that seems like a cop-out for the church as an organization. I was disappointed.

Maybe I don’t have a right to be disappointed; it’s hard to point to one specific problem or guaranteed solution. Some movements in the church to address this issue have been met with varied success (see: Muscular Christianity), but it seems unlikely that any single tweak can change a cemented trend. I fear that if the trend continues, the church will spiral into irrelevance and powerlessness. While a deeper discussion of the issue would include ideas to change the tide, maybe the one we can all start on now is actually what Nate suggested. Let us persuade men to recognize God’s presence in their lives and that God, in fact, demands men be present and active in the Body and Bride of Christ.

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