I have been pondering this information from the latest issue of Christianity Today.
27% Rate of major depression in women who have attended religious services since childhood.
36% Rate in women who had changed attendance patterns (nearly all had stopped attending services).
31% Incidence of major depression in men who have always attended religious services.
24% Incidence in men who had stopped attending.
(Source: Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology)
Whenever we talk about men and women, we are making broad statements and generalizations, but then, generalizations are generally true.
We have all heard a lot those generalizations like…
Women are more inclined to highly value security and relationships. (Did I just explain the values behind the findings above?)
Men tend to highly value adventure, conquest, and freedom (I did it again!)
In my circles, it has been the men who are who are blatantly unhappy with their experience in the institutional church, while their wives are not so unsettled and unhappy in their church relationship.
Not surprisingly, when many of these families make the jump to a new expression of church, like a house church, it is the women who are concerned about the children having a place or program for learning and nurture.
The men are ready to experiment; the women tend to be unsure.
I wonder how much of what is happening in Emergent, missional, house church circles is driven by men who have gotten PO’d with their experience in their IC, whose wives are in tow and trying to be supportive of their husbands, but would have never made the move if it was up to them.
I hope that I didn’t offend any women or men who don’t fit the pattern, as I can personally think of some of each gender who defy these generalizations.
I don’t know what this means, nor do I know how to address it. It may just be the outgrowth of who we are.
My concern is for the women who are swept up into a huge change because their husbands feel so strongly. How can a husband and wife be true to who they are and follow God’s leading their life together? Now that is a very big question, one with many applications.
I don’t know, Glenn. In my experience the exact opposite is true among church leavers I know. I know you made a disclaimer about generalizations, but I don’t see those generalizations at all. I just think the men have louder voices, to tell the truth. I don’t mean to contradict you, because I know you have thought a lot about this kind of stuff…this is just my own experience.
As far as those stats: while I can definitely vouch from personal experience that there is a high rate of depression among women in the church, I don’t know that men are primarily the “leavers”. In my circle of friends, most of the women were either the instigators of church-leaving or at least in complete and total agreement with their husbands about leaving and it was a mutual decision. I might even say that women are more likely to want to leave because they invest more emotionally in church and the relationships within the church than men do, so they are more likely to be hurt enough to leave when something goes wrong.
Then again, in my own life, I left church 6 months before my husband, so I’m biased.
By: Erin on July 8, 2008
at 2:06 pm
glenn, i’m afraid i agree with erin. i’m the dissatisfied one in our house. my husband doesn’t like church, but then he never expected to… he can blow off most of the garbage while it eats at me because i know it should be different. he is never really there emotionally to begin with.to him it’s just stuff we do and then we leave and he is rarely affected by the good or the bad. i envy him.
By: cindy on July 8, 2008
at 2:31 pm
Erin and Cindy ~ Somehow, I thought this would happen, i.e., hearing from people who destroy my hypothesis. There probably are no “genderalities” on this issue and our experiences are all varied.
By: Glenn on July 9, 2008
at 9:19 pm
glenn- clearly there are a lot of men who are the primary dissenters in their families. so it probably just goes both ways.
By: cindy on July 10, 2008
at 7:58 am
Cindy ~ I think you are right. You are proof that a person can be nice, but dissenting.
By: Glenn on July 10, 2008
at 6:07 pm
And I think you are right about that difference between men and women, generally speaking. I’m just not sure it applies to church.
By: Erin on July 11, 2008
at 1:16 am
I also left four months before my husband did, rofl. Conversely, I know men who would leave if only their wives were willing to give up the social aspects of church.
I think it is harder for a woman to leave because women are more social by nature, and we experience the persecution of leaving far more than men do. No more lunch dates, play dates, etc.. and we have to run into the people who are now shunning us more often. Also, women can just be plain nastier about it. I was very depressed after leaving. I felt freedom, but the level of judgment and shunning were harder for me to bear than for my husband, who was very little exposed to it. The enhanced isolation of women out of the system would make it far more difficult.
I know that didn’t answer your question tho….
By: Tyler Dawn on July 11, 2008
at 1:23 pm
Erin ~ Good point!
Tyler ~ Welcome! Another good point. Thanks!
By: Glenn on July 13, 2008
at 1:58 pm
I see that this post is a few days cold, but I’ll comment anyway.
I know of three marriages where the husband has wanted to change their church experience. In one case, the husband waited 12 years before they left their church because the wife was unwilling to leave. In each of the other two couples, the husband is very much more interested in emergent/missional church, and the wife is very much at home with the IC, and is drawn to it because it is familiar and safe. Security issues come into play.
In another couple, the wife will not attend a church with a male pastor. She’s a pretty strong feminist. Her husband appended her last name to his when they married.
And another couple, both want to find an authentic Christian community.
In my own marriage, my wife is a bit frustrated because I am uncomfortable with many churches where she might be willing to find a church family. So I feel a bit guilty for being a malcontent, but at the same time I hunger for certain realities which I believe are important to God.
By: Gary Means on July 27, 2008
at 10:48 pm
Gary ~ This sounds very familiar. Thanks for joining in on the discussion.
By: Glenn on July 28, 2008
at 8:38 pm
Gary – I didn’t forget about you as an example of this…it just seems in the blog and real life circles I run in that it more often is the woman…but I realize that it depends who you know and where you sit. I’m not sure why God puts us (married couples) in different spiritual places…I can only hope there is something for each of us to learn where we are.
By: Erin on July 29, 2008
at 11:47 pm