Why Should the Church Care About Reaching Men?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I was interviewed the other day by a newspaper reporter on the topic of men and the Church.\u00a0 She mentioned the statistics about how men are leaving the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Why Should the Church Care About Reaching Men?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I was interviewed the other day by a newspaper reporter on the topic of men and the Church.\u00a0 She mentioned the statistics about how men are leaving the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Tim Wright Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-11-07T14:35:11+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/827\/2016\/07\/Asleep3-300x171.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"300\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"171\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Tim Wright\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Tim Wright\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/\",\"name\":\"Why Should the Church Care About Reaching Men?\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-11-07T14:35:11+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-11-07T14:35:11+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/#\/schema\/person\/d376e49ac40fe61bef02b93f41269340\"},\"description\":\"I was interviewed the other day by a newspaper reporter on the topic of men and the Church.\u00a0 She mentioned the statistics about how men are leaving the\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Why Should the Church Care About Reaching Men?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/\",\"name\":\"The Tim Wright Blog\",\"description\":\"Musings on God\u2019s bold, reckless grace\u2026and life in the middle\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/#\/schema\/person\/d376e49ac40fe61bef02b93f41269340\",\"name\":\"Tim Wright\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/12d5559111c8a68f11425c607bcfe664?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/12d5559111c8a68f11425c607bcfe664?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Tim Wright\"},\"description\":\"I've been a pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America since 1984, currently serving as the founding pastor of Community of Grace in Peoria, AZ. 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{"id":154,"date":"2013-11-07T07:35:11","date_gmt":"2013-11-07T14:35:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/searchingfortomsawyer\/?p=154"},"modified":"2013-11-07T07:35:11","modified_gmt":"2013-11-07T14:35:11","slug":"why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/timwright\/2013\/11\/why-should-the-church-care-about-reaching-men\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Should the Church Care About Reaching Men?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a>My initial response (which I didn\u2019t verbalize) was: If the statistics were reversed and women were dropping out of church, we wouldn\u2019t ask, \u201cWhy does it matter?\u201d\u00a0 The first question or two would probably be: \u201cWhy is that happening and what do you think the Church needs to do about it?\u201d\u00a0 It would be seen as a major crisis for the Church.<\/p>\n

My first verbal reply was that it had to do with the message of the Gospel and the Christian belief that God\u2019s grace is for everyone, male and female.\u00a0 We believe that Jesus comes to call all of us to follow him; that life is found in him.\u00a0 So we want men and women to hear that message and follow Jesus through the local congregation.<\/p>\n

My follow up answer had to do with men and culture.\u00a0 Men without a vision for good, noble manhood tend to end up either violent or passive.\u00a0 I talked about the fact that over 90% of those in prison are men; how almost every day we read a story about another man doing harm to others.\u00a0 Or we see passive men: giving up on fatherhood, their wives, living lives focused on Fantasy leagues and 24-hour-a-day sports and video games (at the risk of over-stereotyping.)\u00a0 With fewer and fewer young men attending and graduating from college, with no strong skills for liveable wages, these passive and\/or violent men will be a huge burden on society.<\/p>\n

The Church can offer men a vision for good manhood.\u00a0 Jesus not only models that manhood but calls men into it, forges it in them, and empowers them to live it out.<\/p>\n

In other words, the Church should care about reaching men because society needs good men\u2014men who are good husbands, dads, employers, employees, citizens, and churchmen.\u00a0 When the Church gets it right (and that\u2019s another issue) the Church can offer a compelling vision for that kind of manhood that, over time, can help build a better society.<\/p>\n

Why should the Church care about reaching men?\u00a0 Because the world needs good men.\u00a0 Because Jesus can forge men into good men.\u00a0 And because Jesus died and rose again to empower men to be good men.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"