Church vs Men

Church vs Men

IVA wrote (in a forwarded message):

A writer for the Jackson Sun argues, correctly in my view, that men are staying away from evangelical churches in droves because the evangelical church has been so thoroughly feminized that males find little there to appeal to them.

He cites a book by David Murrow, “Why Men Hate Going to Church,” which argues that “manly men” have all but abandoned the church because churches primarily cater to women by over-emphasizing the softer, feminine virtues of Christianity such as gentleness, forgiveness, sensitivity, meekness and sweetness. (I’ve often observed that one of the myths the evangelical church has believed is that God has primarily called Christian men to be “nice” rather than “good.”)

There are masculine qualities that are just as much a part of the Spirit of Christ, such as courage, boldness, strength, standing for the truth against fierce opposition and calling for justice. However, when Christian men exhibit these qualities, rather than being praised for imitating these dimensions of Christ’s character, they are often castigated by a feminized church for being harsh and difficult.

Says the writer, “No wonder so many men have a faulty view of Christianity as ‘too feminine’ for them. If that’s what Christianity was about, I wouldn’t want to go to church either.”

(Jackson Sun – Men have abandoned our churches)

That is almost correct, but not just for Evangelical churches. It is generally true, to slightly varying extents, for all Christian churches.

The discussion omits the feminists’ role in the feminization of the churches.

Here is what Robert H. Bork had to say about where all of that is coming from and what ultimately the consequences will be:

Radical feminism is the most destructive and fanatical movement to come down to us from the Sixties. This is a revolutionary, not a reformist, movement, and it is meeting with considerable success. Totalitarian in spirit, it is deeply antagonistic to traditional Western culture and proposes the complete restructuring of society, morality, and human nature.

— Robert H. Bork
in Slouching Towards Gomorrah, p. 193

But not only that:

The strongest force seeking to destroy traditional religions is feminism. Radical feminists have little use for religion or churches as they are, but they do not leave the churches whose doctrines and liturgies they find objectionable. They work within to change the churches so that the final product will bear little resemblance to Christianity. The feminists call for “reimagining” the Christian religion, which means rejecting all traditional doctrine. One form of reimagining is to reject the gospels because they were written by men and replace them with a history that pleases feminists. Feminists see no problem with that, according to Catholic theologian Joyce Little, because they believe that written history is merely the record of the victors, and that includes the Bible. “Everything is a form of propaganda pushing somebody’s ideology. Nothing is to be trusted at face value. This is what the feminists mean by their ‘hermeneutics of suspicion’. And on this foundation of suspicion the feminists have constructed their ideological alternative to Christian faith.”^[1] The implications of this approach for honest investigation are obvious: anything goes. “The purpose of scholarship has become, not the discovery of truth, but the nurture of feminist consciousness,” wrote theologian William Oddie, then an Anglican, in the process of analyzing the views of a feminist theologian teaching at Notre Dame.^[2] Thus, biblical history is rewritten, without evidence to support the rewriting, so that it better fits the feminist view of what women must have done, what ought to have happened.

— Robert H. Bork
in Slouching Towards Gomorrah, p. 287

And:

…the mainline Protestant churches have conformed their standards to those of the secular culture, on the theory, which has proved mistaken again and again, that to remain “relevant” and keep its members, a church must change with the time. The Roman Catholic Church has made the same mistake, but to a somewhat lesser degree.
The obtrusive fact is that the churches that make the highest demands on their members, that focus on salvation, community, and morality, that stand against the direction of the secular culture, are the churches that have gained in membership. The same phenomenon is observable within denominations. The Catholic Church suffers from a shortage of priests and men seeking to become priests, but there is no shortage of vocations in the orthodox dioceses.no shortage of vocations in the orthodox dioceses.

— Robert H. Bork
in Slouching Towards Gomorrah, pp. 286, 287

And:

Feminist gatherings within traditional denominations celebrate and pray to pagan goddesses. Witchcraft is undergoing an enormous revival in feminist circles as the antagonist of Christian faith. The damage done to traditional religion that is most obvious to the people in the pews is the feminist drive to make the language of the scriptures and the liturgy “inclusive.” As in all of feminism’s endeavors, the charge is that the traditional—in this case the English language and the original language of the Bible—are unjust and offensive because they make women feel left out.
The complaint is both silly and one more instance of feminists’ ability to find offense everywhere and whine about it. But in churches as in universities and the military, the opposition collapses at once when belligerent women claim to be offended.

— Robert H. Bork
in Slouching Towards Gomorrah, pp. 287, 288

That is why, in churches, men stay away in droves. In case you missed one of the most important statements in all of that:

The strongest force seeking to destroy traditional religions is feminism. Radical feminists have little use for religion or churches as they are, but they do not leave the churches whose doctrines and liturgies they find objectionable. They work within to change the churches so that the final product will bear little resemblance to Christianity.

— Robert H. Bork
in Slouching Towards Gomorrah, p. 287

–Walter

#ChurchVsMen

See also:

• Gender Under Re-Construction – Social Justice Warriors at Work
• Interfering with Marriage and Encroaching on National Sovereignty