Review: Why Men Hate Going to Church

David Murrow's book, Why Men Hate Going to Church is an amazing book that actually answers the question of the title. I learned of the book while writing Is God Manly? and picked it up hoping to gain another man's perspective on the intersection of manliness and godliness. I was a bit disappointed, though. Murrow answered the question implied by the title, but not mine. His assumption appears to be that godliness is the automatic result of involvement in church.

The other day Adam contributed to the discussion on Is God Manly and asked, “If the leaders of the church are men, how did feminine values become predominant?” Murrow asks the same question, “How did a faith founded by a Man and his twelve male disciples become so popular with women, but anathema to men?”

Murrow’s assessment is that men hate going to church because it just ain’t manly. He provides extensive documentation to support this assessment. His suggestions for correcting this, however, lack substance. Part 1 of Murrow's book establishes the premise that men avoid church because it is perceived as a woman's thing.

Men have believed this for centuries. In the 1800s, Charles Spurgeon said, “There has got abroad a notion, somehow, that if you become a Christian you must sink your manliness and turn into a milksop.”

So it isn’t a new problem anyway. Later Murrow writes

The pastorate is a men's club. But almost every other area of church life is dominated by women. Whenever large numbers of Christians gather, men are never in the majority. Not at revivals. Not at crusades. Not at conferences. Not at retreats. Not at concerts. With the exception of men's events and pastoral conferences, can you think of any large gathering of Christians that attracts more men than women.

Visit the church during the week, and you'll find most of the people working there are female. Drop in on a committee meeting, and you'll find a majority of the volunteers are women—unless it's that small bastion of male presence, the building committee.

Murrow cites numerous statistics by Barna, Gallup, ABC News, and several other organizations that agree that women are more than 20% more likely to be in church on any given Sunday. He also suggests that we examine our own church congregations to see if this trend applies there.

Murrow does an excellent job painting the picture of churches without manly men. And having established that men don’t frequent church, Murrow describes how men contribute to the health of a church in ways that women, generally speaking, do not.

• Men’s expansionist outlook promotes church health
• Men’s orientation toward risk promotes church health
• Men’s focus on the outside world promotes church health
• Men’s concern with rules promotes church health
• Men’s pragmatism bring innovation to the church
• Men bring strength to the church
• Men bring money to the church
• Godly men attract women
• Men bring their families to church

He supports each of these contributions, but then he waxes melodramatic with a bold heading, “If Christianity Is to Survive, We Need Men” and he fails in his desire to not sound alarmist with the following paragraph.

 Christianity is still growing worldwide, but it is losing ground to two aggressive competitors: secularism and Islam. At the risk of sounding alarmist, I believe the church has at most 250 years before it is totally overrun by this duo—unless we reengage men.

This paragraph represents Murrow’s greatest failing with this book. He forgot what he was talking about. The church is not just a social institution with more noble goals than other social institutions. It is the body of the risen Christ. There are spiritual forces not just social forces at work, but Murrow does not address these. Like I said before, he answers the question implied by the title, “Why do men hate going to church?”

Parts 3 and 4 of the book addresses the many ways that church sucks the enthusiasm, the life from us men. Murrow is right in nearly everything he wrote about the interaction between men and the church.

In part 5, Murrow suggests that we solve the problem by adding the trappings of manliness to the church and make it more man friendly. Though “man” here sounds like a subset of the much maligned class of people called “seekers,” the solution isn’t as pathetic as it sounds, and I won’t try to belittle it further. But what we need goes much deeper than placing swords, shields, Celtic banners and tomahawks in a designated prayer room (though that sounds like a cool piece of decorating). If the church needs to regain the power and courage provided by a host of godly men, it must begin Biblically rather than socially. This requires  that we turn our attention to Biblical masculinity.

Part 6 is challenging. I could claim that is covers externals as part 5 did—except that these “externals” aren’t merely external. The two challenging chapters are titled “Every Man Needs a Spiritual Father” and “Every Man Needs a Band of Brothers.” These are not programs that can be put into a church. As Murrow describes them, they are needs for a spiritually healthy man. The church needs to allow these kinds of relationships to develop. Murrow describes spiritual fathering as a role that only a man can provide. A Band of Brothers is a close-knit team with each member essential to the teams success and some challenging endeavor. Here, as in the beginning of the book, Murrow excels at communicating coherent  observations, and we are challenged to consider our relationships in the church, measuring them against his observations.

The book is invaluable for understanding the state of the church today in respect to men and their involvement, but when he gets to proposing a solution, I found it inadequate. My recommendation is that you read this book. It provides a an objective foundation about the state of the church for us to start from. Many of my presuppositions concerning the issue of manly Godliness have support from the documentation that Murrow has provided. It also suggests answers to many of the questions that have been raised here in regards to this issue.

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