the church is for girls
The greenman has made some remarks about whether the Church is too feminine. He also goes on to make some disparaging remarks about me too 
Anyone who has met Phil of Signposts , and more recently of GeekyInfo, could not accuse him of being on the girly side. He is not exactly petite or femine for that matter. It doesn’t matter for him because he is a minister in his church. It is about the only post in the modern church that still has a serious masculine feel. The church of today is a feminine domain. The workers and employees are women, the congregation are women. The modern church reeks of estrogen. There is a small niche for quiet introspective men but they are more tolerated than embraced.
David Murrow of Baylor University believes he knows why, he says
the modern church is too chatty, too touchy-feely and full of hokey rituals that don’t affirm a guy’s manhood. In short, the faith founded by one man 2,000 years ago needs a testosterone shot
Head on over and read the whole post
July 25th, 2005 at 3:46 pm
I though he was complimenting you, phil.
July 25th, 2005 at 3:55 pm
I think he has a point. Though I’m not sure I’m ready for the rain-dance either.
I think the use of technology has probably brought some manliness/boy toys back…but that’s probably not a real triumph. Nice certainly has a big place. Bring back some righteous anger maybe?
July 25th, 2005 at 4:28 pm
Problem is that much of what we do in church involves sitting around listening and singing - skills that most men don’t excel in generally. First sign that they can cope with it, they’re shunted off to become a minister. What about ‘doing stuff’? Best church for men I’ve experienced has been ‘on the go’ - with food, drink, action, changing something somewhere, and a bit of conversation with God and each other to make sense of it all.
July 25th, 2005 at 5:34 pm
Personally, I gave up on church for a number of reasons. One was that sitting inside on a Sunday morning sure came a poor second to playing sport. But another was that all my Sunday school teachers were female, or were somewhat effeminate males, and I saw no strong Christian role models who were men. The Jesus of my church was a soft, poncy character who loved everyone and was in my 14-year-old mind, a bit of a nancy-boy. The only males in the church were all either old or a bit poncy themselves, too. Surely not something I wanted to be.
Possibly my view of what it meant to be manly was also skewed from idolising people like athletic coaches, and older boys I knew from playing higher age grades at a young age. But I’m sure that wasn’t all of it.
It wasn’t until I was about 19 or 20 that I met a bunch of guys who were hard on the sporting field, worked hard in their jobs, were competitive men…manly guys, who spoke my language and stood up for themselves and each other….and who loved Jesus as well, that I actually saw something in this religion business that I wanted for myself. I know I’m not the only guy that felt like that as a young man, either.
I’m not going to say that the church has been over-feminised, or de-masculinised, or any such gender language. Because that says that all women are weak, all men are strong and the church needs more men because it needs more strength. Which is crap. What the church needs is more strength, full stop, and quit this “gentle Jesus, meek-and-mild”, “good old God” nonsense.
There is a dynamism, a radicalism, a challenging, exciting, inspiring vibrancy at the heart of what it means to be a follower of this bloke Jesus. That’s the stuff we should be worrying about re-igniting. Drop the gender crap; it’s the passion we want back.
July 26th, 2005 at 8:59 am
I really don’t get this stuff, because I’m constantly surrounded by men in church circles. My actual church would be 50/50, with men and women playing pretty equal roles in terms of preaching up front. The only thing that is noticeably dominated (in terms of numbers) by women is the catering - and we’ll definitely have to do something about that! We still have heated arguments about the use of the male pronoun to describe God, because some women loathe it and some of the men can get equally angsty about it.
Outside my church, I’m involved in a stack of Christian organisations, and every single one of them would be 90% male. I dunno what that says about me. ;P
I don’t deny that the church has more men than women in it, but I think the “problem” is a whole lot more complex than posts like the Green Man’s indicate. And that’s without even getting into all assumptions he makes about what is “masculine” and “feminine”!
July 27th, 2005 at 9:48 am
They weren’t so much assumptions Bec as generalisations and based on contemporary thinking in the nature of what it means to be feminine or masculine. Like any generalisation, numerous examples can be found to disprove the ubiquitousness of the generalisation. Without generalising, however, it is very difficult to present complex issues for critical thought and discussion.
The role of The Green Man website is to canvass contemptorary issues in science, ethics and culture (more often than not in an iconoclastic fashion). I think the fact that 90% of boys raised in the Church feel compelled to leave it during adolescence reflects the fact that
1. At this age boys need to begin to embrace their manhood
2. There are no structures in the Church to facilitate this.
Many will return in later life but surely it is a challenge for the Church that it is failing so completely this demographic in its congregation.
January 1st, 2006 at 10:45 am
hi guys. i have a question want to ask.
I am married. I really love my wife. but i am keep thinking to fuck other girls.
what's wrong with my brain. anyone can help me.? I've read on http://www.shaved-x.info forum - it is normal..