Is There A Shortage of Men In the Church?

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Many priests don’t know how to handle bossy or persuasive women. It is a blunt statement but true. As a result, these types of priests have a viewpoint that since women can’t be priests, the Church needs to make it up to them by letting them run everything else. As a result, the altar is overflowing with women at Mass, from serving, to reading, to being EMHC, running the R.E. program, singing very dainty and feminine songs, etc. What young man in the parish is going to aspire to a vocation to the priesthood by witnessing what amounts to a liturgical girl scout meeting every week? I teach R.E. at my parish, and out of about 60 catechists only 5 of us are men. So the young men see theology as a woman’s endeavor. Admittedly, the men need to step up. But the priest does not try to actively engage with them to do so. This seems to run rampant at many parishes. A feminine parish perishes.
 
^This!

Our world is sorely lacking in good male role models nowadays. It’s no wonder men feel uninspired or unmotivated to step into the breach.

I encourage Catholic men to read “The Manual For Men” written by Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted. It is a great book that is about how to be a virtuous Catholic man in the eyes of God.
 
Men are intimidated? It sounds like you have a bunch of wimps at your church. Women ruling the roost? I’ve never heard service being equated to ruling anything. The priest not hanging around after church? All this makes me feel fortunate to belong to a parish without this mentality.
 
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bobperk said:
As a result, the altar is overflowing with women at Mass, from serving, to reading, to being EMHC, running the R.E. program, singing very dainty and feminine songs, etc. What young man in the parish is going to aspire to a vocation to the priesthood b
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I would disagree, the liturgical ministries accept male volunteers as well.
 
a shortage of tall men and an oversupply of short men
 
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From reading some posts in this thread it’s more like a shortage of men with backbones and an oversupply of spineless men
 
Scott84 said:
Now I did a little research and to my shock I discovered my parish isn’t the only one that has a majority of women over men.
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Yes, there are more women attending Mass than men.
  1. This is (partially) explained by logistics. Men still work more than women on average and they’re more likely to be the one out if they have to work on the weekend for some reason.
  2. This is also (partially) explained by intermarriage with other faiths or with no faith. A man is more likely to get his wife to attend his church than the other way around. Whatever pseudo-scientific propaganda might be fashionable about the sexes being identical, men are and always will be generally socially dominate and this is hardwired into human psychology.
  3. This point is very important: Men are less emotional thinkers. What this means is that if a man has some sort of major issue with his faith, he is much more likely to simply leave the faith. Whatever happens at Judgment will happen.
A woman can be slightly more complicated. She is more likely to stay because she has certain warm memories and attachments to the faith of her childhood, even though she has dissented from one or more critical teachings. She’s pro-choice and pro-SSM, doesn’t believe in the Real Presence, doesn’t raise her children in the faith at home with much fidelity, doesn’t make prayer a habit except when she needs or wants something and then selfishly uses God like a genie in a bottle, married an atheist because he has a fat salary and seemed like a nice guy, etc. But to get a feeling of comfort and stability, she still regularly participates in parish and sacramental life and pretends that everything is okay when in fact everything is not okay. She might even eventually convince herself that everything is okay so that it is no longer an act, and this belief will continue right up until Judgment.

It might also be the case that some of the happy clappy practices that made their way into churches in the 1970s made lots of men flee in terror, but that would only happen if they were already weak in their faith.
I 100% disagree with the idea that ‘bridal theology’ keeps men away. If that keeps a man away from the Church, then he is already weak in the faith and he desperately needs to grow up and put the “machismo” attitude in the trashcan. The relationship of God with creation being like a groom and bride is something that predates the New Testament.
 
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That’s an ancient vid. I remember replaying it over and over when I was in high school.
 
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Hey, if your parishes are so short of men, go out and recruit some. Just don’t assume every parish is having the problem, because every parish isn’t.
 
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