It’s no secret that worship services do a poor job transmitting faith to children in general—and to boys in particular. How has the church responded? With a flashing midway of specialized programs for the young: Sunday school, vacation Bible school, AWANA, CCD, confirmation classes, RAs and GAs, and youth group. Step right up, kids, and meet the amazing Jesus!
Despite this blizzard of programs aimed at youth, at least seven out of ten boys who are raised in this system leave the church during their teens and twenties. Some alarmists believe we are witnessing a historic rejection of Christianity by the young.
Why is this happening? Certainly, worldly influences share some of the blame. Young men are bombarded with distractions and temptations their grandfathers could not imagine. Many of today’s boys grow up fatherless or with irreligious dads. Then there’s that perception that church is not for men—passed down to boys from role models, from the media, and from their peers.
Just as the adult church system caters to women, the Sunday school system has favored girls for decades. I’d like you to meet Connor, a twelve-year-old boy who has grown up in a traditional Sunday school program. Connor has just informed his mother that he hates Sunday school and never wants to go again. Why does Connor hate Sunday school? Even Connor doesn’t know. After all, twelve year-old boys are not practiced at the art of self-analysis.
Speaking as a former twelve-year-old boy, let me offer a theory: Connor is frustrated because, no matter how hard he tries, he cannot win in a traditional Sunday school class. And boys must have a chance to win—or they become discouraged and quit.
“Win” in Sunday school? You didn’t realize it was a competition, did you?
With guys, everything is a competition. And here’s the kicker: generally, men will only compete at things they’re somewhat good at. If they have no chance of winning, they simply don’t play. One time I tried golf. You’ve heard of Tiger Woods? Well, I spent most of my time in the woods, looking for my ball. I have no knack for the game, so after a few rounds I gave it up. I knew I’d never be any good at it.
That’s how Connor feels. After twelve years of nursery, preschool, and Sunday school, he knows he’ll never really be good at church. To learn why Connor feels this way, let’s rewind about six years.
Connor is a first grader. He’s having trouble sitting still while his Sunday school teacher, Mrs. Lennon, tries to teach the class about Balaam and the talking donkey. Connor is bored and starts making donkey noises. The other kids think Connor is funny. Mrs. Lennon does not. She finally remands the disruptive boy to Mrs. Karl, the Sunday school superintendent. Connor spends the rest of the hour alone, playing with an ancient flannelgraph in the storage closet. (Connor sets Jesus to dive-bombing the disciples as they walk along the Sea of Galilee.)
On to second grade. Connor is supposed to be coloring a picture of Daniel in the lions’ den. But instead, he’s folded his paper into an airplane, which makes a perfect crash landing in Loretta Jenkins’s ponytail. Connor and his friends are amused. Their teacher, Miss Ramirez, is not.
In third grade, Mrs. Carroll passes out well-worn King James Bibles to every student and then assigns each a passage to look up. Connor has the misfortune of drawing
“In…the…third…year…of…the…reign…of…Jeh—Jeh-o—”
“Jehoiakim,” says Mrs. Carroll.
“Jehoyakeem king…of…Ju-dah…came…Neb—Nebu—”
“Nebuchadnezzar.”
“Nebu-kanezzer…king…of…Baby-lawn—”
The other kids titter. Mrs. Carroll shoots them a withering stare. “That’s Babylon. Please continue, Connor.”
In fourth grade, Connor’s teacher, Mrs. Wilson, passes out those same Bibles. She teaches the youngsters a new game: sword drills. Mrs. Wilson barks out a Bible reference, such as, “
Connor usually likes competition, but he’s not very good at this game. It combines two of his weaknesses: reading aloud and fine motor skills. Girls often read better than boys and do so at an earlier age. And throughout their lives, women have greater finger dexterity than men. Connor’s clumsy boy fingers aren’t very good at flipping through fine onionskin pages. One time he thought he found a verse, but he read from John’s gospel instead of John’s first epistle. Disqualified.
In fifth grade, Connor is assigned the role of a wise man in the Sunday school Christmas pageant. He has to wear a fake beard and sing a solo. Connor is chosen because he’s one of the few boys who still attend Sunday school regularly. Connor feels like a fool wearing a towel over his head and dyed cotton balls on his face. Somehow he manages to get through his part, delivering his lines with the enthusiasm of a convict headed for the gallows.
So by sixth grade, Connor is tired of Sunday school. He’s tired of being outshone by the girls. He’s tired of being embarrassed. Sunday school makes him feel dumb. Connor would rather do the things he’s good at, like running around on a soccer field, kicking a ball.
That’s where more and more Connors can be found on Sunday morning. Sports leagues are taking over the time slot traditionally occupied by church. This is fine with boys. They know how to win on the athletic field. But in Sunday school, it’s very hard for boys to win. The rules favor children who can sit quietly, read aloud, memorize verses, and look up passages in books. A star pupil is also compliant, empathetic, and sensitive. A long attention span and the ability to receive verbal input from a female teacher also help.
How many ten-year-old boys do you know who fit this description?
Oddly enough, there is a boy like this in Connor’s Sunday school class. Brian is a quiet, obedient kid. He’s a bit of a nerd. Brian is very studious and loves to read. He grew up in a devout home, so he knows his Bible. Brian is not particularly athletic; he’s more the artistic type. He’s kindhearted and empathetic. Brian is very close to his mom.
Fast-forward thirteen years. Brian graduates from seminary and becomes a pastor.
Boys, like men, are visual creatures. They believe what they see. Unfortunately, the Jesus they see in church and Sunday school is warping their impression of God.
Traditional holy pictures portrayed Jesus as thin, pale, and soft, with long, flowing tresses caressing an androgynous face. This Jesus bears little resemblance to the rugged Judean carpenter who possessed the strength to drive out the money changers with a whip. Catholic boys meet Jesus at his weakest moment: half-dead, stripped, head down, and nailed to a cross. (Meanwhile the female icon, the Blessed Virgin, always looks healthy, calm, and serene. Hm.)
But the old holy pictures did get one thing right: they showed Jesus as a man of action—working in the company of men. Sure, they wore robes and had long, flowing hair, but at least they had beards.
In the 1980s, a Sunday school curriculum publisher decided to do some market research. He discovered that most of his product was purchased by married, middle-aged women. So he asked these ladies what they disliked about traditional curriculum. They spoke with one voice: “The pictures!” They thought Christ seemed frightening and unkind. Instead, they preferred to see pictures of a friendly Jesus doing fun things—preferably smiling, with children on his lap.
The publisher immediately called in his artists and ordered them to give Jesus a makeover. Out went the somber Nazarene in the company of men—replaced by a happy Jesus loving children.
The new Jesus was an instant hit. Women rushed to purchase this updated curriculum. Soon every Sunday school publisher had remade Jesus into a smiling Jewish camp counselor.
But there was a problem with the new Jesus. He took wimpishness to a new level—particularly when you compared him to the tough guys boys idolize. The male action heroes of popular entertainment are hypermasculine, scowling, and filthy, with sweat shining off their bulging muscles. Meanwhile, the new Jesus looked as if he’d just come from a spa treatment.
Once again, modern marketing created a Jesus who does not exist. The true Christ of Scripture is more akin to a gritty superhero. As a homeless man, he was no stranger to sweat and grime. As a tradesman, he must have been well muscled. Like a video game hero, Jesus was a fighter who left a trail of mayhem in his wake. He vanquished demons, destroyed stuff, and made people so mad they tried to kill him. Camp counselors don’t get nailed to crosses.
Not only was the new Jesus sissy, but most of the new illustrations placed him in the presence of children. And what’s wrong with that? Nothing—as long as you also show Jesus among men. But over the past twenty years, Jesus-and-the-children imagery has come to dominate Sunday school curriculum. In the lower grades, it’s practically the only picture of Christ children see.
All these pictures of the Messiah chillin’ with children have created an unbreakable subconscious link between Christ and childhood in the minds of boys. As young men mature and think of Jesus, their mind’s eye recalls those images of him with little ones.
The time bomb is planted.
When a boy reaches puberty, desperate to become a man, the bomb explodes. A voice in his head says, Christ is for children. I’m no longer a child. Therefore, I must rid myself of Christ. We have an epidemic of young men leaving the faith not because they disbelieve, but because they perceive Christ to be a pansy and church to be a symbol of childhood.
Clever marketing has done its damage—by catering to the women who buy curriculum, publishers have unwittingly sabotaged the faith of young men.
Girls are largely unaffected because they never reject their childhoods the way boys do. It’s not uncommon for a seventeen-year-old girl to display stuffed animals, dolls, and baby pictures in her room. Seventeen-year-old boys never do this. Every young man comes to the day when he puts away childish things. And thanks to the way we portray Jesus in Sunday school, Christ has become a childish thing.
The real tragedy is not just that we’re losing boys—we are losing the most competitive, aggressive boys. High-testosterone boys destined to be leaders and innovators are checking out of church at a young age. Worldly temptations play a role, to be sure. But many disengage simply because of the way we raise them in the faith. They cannot compete in Sunday school, so they drop out. We teach them Christ is for children, so they drop out.
Thank heaven for high school youth group. That’s been the salvation of generations of young men. I became a Christian at the age of fifteen, thanks to a youth group.
When I was an adolescent, youth group was fun. It was based on the three Gs: games, goofiness, and God. We sang simple songs. We played nutty games. The teaching time was brief but meaningful to teens. I loved it. And it attracted a lot of guys. Church services were sometimes boring, but youth group was always a kick.
In the 1970s and ’80s, youth group music was simple and lighthearted. All you needed was a guitar and three or four songs. The first two songs were usually goofy (“Give me wax on my board, keep me surfin’ for the Lord”). The second two were more serious (“I wish we’d all been ready”). The singing was usually done in about ten minutes. Then it was time for “the talk.” Youth leaders of the 1970s understood guys. My youth leader used to tell us, “Christianity, properly practiced, will result in your death.”
Praise and worship arrived in youth group during the early 1990s. The goofy songs disappeared. Singing time expanded to thirty minutes or more. Songs flowed from one to another. Sometimes the guitarist would pause, waiting for someone to start singing a cappella, “as they felt led.” The whole feeling changed from a fun group activity to an intimate personal time with God. Youth leader “talks” came to focus on sexual purity and relationships.
In the 2000s, the praise band came to youth groups. Today, even small churches are putting together youth rock bands. Big churches are remodeling their youth spaces to offer professional quality stages, lighting, and sound equipment.
The youth meeting is quickly evolving into a music-centric experience. Youth stand in a darkened room and sing love songs to Jesus, led by a praise band of their peers. Singing can occupy up to half of the meeting. This has been great for the musicians—they get lots of stage time. But for the nonmusical, lengthy singing can be a drag.
Girls thrive in this emotional hothouse, but most boys melt and evaporate. Before you know it, you’ve got nineteen girls and five guys at youth group. And there’s not a jock among the guys.
By their senior year, girls are 14 percent more likely to have participated in a youth group. And they are 21 percent more likely to have stayed involved in youth group all four years of high school. Congratulations. The stage is set for the female-dominated church of the future.
Youth group was once a thing apart. But it’s quickly evolving into another church service—built upon a familiar format: singing and a sermon. I call it church lite. Youth ministry has become a development league for future pastors and music ministers. Never mind that church lite is a disaster for most boys—and up to 80 percent of kids who are raised in youth group abandon the church by age twenty-nine. We do church lite because preachers-and-worship-leaders-in-training need stage time before they’re called up to the big leagues.
Why is a church lite youth group so injurious to boys? It’s a very sedentary experience. It’s a lot of singing, sitting, and listening. It’s designed to stimulate the mind and emotions, leaving the body out of the equation.
What’s wrong with this? Boys are kinetic creatures. Young men need to move. During their teens, boys’ bodies are awash in testosterone. It makes them aggressive, risk taking, and fidgety. Healthy kinetic activity is one of the keys to unlocking a young man’s heart.
Paul Hill, David Anderson, and Roland Martinson are authors of an extensive study of the spiritual lives of young men. They found that young men’s “quest for identity and spirituality is kinesthetic—experienced through their bodies as much as their minds. With only a few exceptions, this was true regardless of race, class or context for the young men in our study.”
One need only to watch Muslims at prayer to understand the power that body movement exerts in the spiritual lives of men. Yet 90 percent of Christian worship involves standing still or sitting still, either singing songs or listening to a teacher. So unless a young man is studious, sensitive, or musical, he’ll probably find a church lite youth group boring—regardless of what’s being taught—because his body is not moving enough.
The whole youth group package is boy-repellent. Young men feel oddly out of place but don’t know why. Standing in a darkened room for twenty-five minutes, singing love songs to a man, feels pointless at best. Endless “talks” about relationships and purity do nothing to fire their imaginations. Some secretly wonder, I’m supposed to like this, but I’m just not into it. Is there something wrong with me?
Nonetheless, there are signs of hope. Some youth ministry programs are working. Children’s Sunday school is changing—for the better. We will discuss these successful efforts in chapter 21.
Excerpted with permission from Why Men Hate Going to Church by David Murrow. © 2011 Thomas Nelson Publishers.
