The Real Reason Women Are Leaving The Christian Church

It's Not The Devil

Another church.

Another sex abuse story. Not uncommon in American Christianity these days.

The setting was idyllic.

A cute little barn church, with a christian school to boot. Male elders doubling as middle school teachers.

“Covenant Love”, originally named “Love Inn”.

Years later, the once powerless young girls, now full-grown women with voices and families, bring to the surface the sexual abuse long hidden from view.

For a brief time, I was a teacher there. 23 and submissive.

The kind of girl Evangelical Christianity prefers.

I embraced patriarchy under the guise that God called men to be in charge. “Man is the head of the woman,” a line oft repeated throughout my time in the church.

I was too early in healing my broken childhood to see that I had exchanged one form of misogyny for another.

The whitewashed, Christian version.

The middle-aged male teacher made me uncomfortable, with flirty jokes and unnecessary comments about my clothing and body. I felt the unwanted gaze, objectified in a thousand small ways, like only an entitled man can do.

But objectification was not yet a word familiar to me.

No church leader ever told me, “His lack of self-control has nothing to do with your clothing choices.”

Why would they? The men were in charge and they were the ones doing it.

Cognitive dissonance in the church is strong. Girls are raised to feel responsible for the minds of men, trained to ignore their intuition and suppress their anger at any injustice against them. “Women’s bodies”, we were told, “are evil temptations for men.”

After years of internalized misogyny from within the church and out, I was conditioned to believe this was acceptable.

But I wasn’t vulnerable in the way those young girls were.

A male voice always carries more credibility in a system poisoned by patriarchy, his word weighing more than hers.

It’s not difficult to see why when an entire doctrine is based off the belief that women were deceived from the start.

“You’re inherently equal”, lip service given to the ladies. But functionally, men carry all the power.

To the women who were harmed by this system. I’m so sorry.

I’m sorry my indoctrinated eyes couldn’t see what was happening right under my nose.

I’m sorry that a place that should’ve protected you, perpetrated harm in such a quiet, insidious fashion.

I see you.

I validate your painful experiences.

I believe you, I believe you, I believe you.

I didn’t know that I was swimming in a toxic system, designed to defer to men at the cost of your safety.

The constant focus on women’s modesty should have been a clue.

“Keep the women covered, keep the men safe.”

Safe from what?

Their own deviant nature, I now know.

And if you think your little Christian community is safe, I have news for you.

Studies suggest that a significant percentage of Christian men, 50-70%, regularly engage in pornography use.

And wherever porn culture exists, misogyny and entitled sexual attitudes are alive and well.

Men who view porn develop pornographic styles of relating with women, devaluing her person hood for his selfish pleasure.

What men infiltrate their minds with on the screen eventually translates to real life.

And when up to 88% of porn (according to a content analysis study by D.A. Wright and others) involves some form of aggression or violence, it’s not difficult to understand why men assume women’s bodies are theirs to devour at will.

Porn doesn’t need consent. And men become dangerously comfortable using women’s bodies like food.

Food is designed for consumption. Women’s bodies are not.

There’s a deep, deceptive sexual basement thriving in the church. Ask any of the women who’ve left how they know.

What many Christians fail to see is how the patriarchal ideology enables men to bathe in these destructive entitlements.

The church responds by increasing its feminine hold, controlling her body over holding him accountable for not controlling his mind.

Stop wearing leggings.

Don’t move your hips on stage.

And for God's sake, do not show a belly button.

Photo by Artem Labunsky on Unsplash

But no amount of rules for her body will stave off a culture of men steeped in subtle misogyny.

“Men need sexual release every 72 hours”, lies that flow like a toxic river through religious circles, enabling abuse.

Women are leaving church like never before.

Patriarchy doesn’t like dissidence from empowered women, so it doubles down on attempts to silence her.

Recently, a Christian pastor, Joel Webbon, proposed that women who make false accusations about sexual abuse be executed.

“Me-Too would end real fast”, the pastor said.

The church isn’t responding well.

Patriarchy is dying hard and the seats will continue to empty as long as this toxic system remains at the wheel.

Women were once the backbone of Christianity, as Jesus’ message drew in the marginalized and upended social hierarchies.

Not anymore.

Women are leaving the church faster than ever.

And it’s not the devil making them do it.

Sheila Wray Gregoire, leading expert in healthy, evidenced based biblical marriage advice and author of the “Great Sex Rescue”, highlights this research from Pew Research Analysis of General Survey data in her article, We Can't Be Angry That Women Are Leaving The Evangelical Church:

In the 1980’s, 38% of women and 25% of men attended church weekly. a 13-point gender gap.

By 2012, the numbers showed a different story. The gender gap shrunk by more than half, not from more men attending, but more WOMEN LEAVING.

Women are refusing, in ever increasing numbers, to participate in a system that calls them equal while subjugating them to second class citizenship.

They no longer want to sacrifice their voice, making their dreams small and secondary to his.

Actions always begin with ideas and these philosophical views have consequences for women.

Katharine Bushnell, a 19th century physician and missionary, explored how cultural and religious interpretations led to the subjugation and marginalization of women.

“Bushnell found that the global abuse of women was inseparable from a devaluation of females promoted by religious and philosophical teachings, justifying and codifying male dominance and female subservience.”

“The abuse of women”, she argued, “will not be overcome as long as the ‘subordination of woman to man was taught within the body of Christians’, Bushnell wrote.

“Ideas Have Consequences”, Priscilla Papers Volume 26, Issue 1, 2012

Gender justice begins with the idea that male and female are equal.

The “separate but equal” attempts have long been proven to be a front for segregation and domination. The south used this term as a constitutional cover, theoretically treating black people as equals but essentially creating a caste system to subjugate and disempower.

“Equal” never needs adverbs or qualifiers.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg said it well,

“Women belong in all places decisions are being made. It shouldn’t be an exception.”

Economists and NGO’s have long recognized that investing in the education and leadership of females brings major growth to communities.

Non-government organizations call it “The Girl Effect”.

“Feminism is destroying the culture”, I hear evangelicals say. “If women would return to their place at home, society would be healthy.”

But society won’t be healthy. Not as long as male entitlement exists and women continue to be blamed, gaslit, and abused by it.

For the men, the good ones who can use their power to incite real change, the ones for whom the church will inevitably rise and shout, “Not all men!”,

I offer you this challenge:

• Step back and assess your ingrained attitudes and agendas.

• How have you contributed to the misogynistic treatment of women?

• Do you participate, to any degree, in porn culture?

• Stop using half-hearted confessions as replacements for true repentance.

• Don’t stay quietly culpable, ambivalent, or deflective.

• Let the truth of her story help you face your own healing journey.

Stand With Her And Say “No more”.

It’s time to pull up a chair and offer her an equal seat at the table of decision making.

Her voice may be softer, her stature smaller, but her vision and leadership ability shouldn’t be a threat to your own.

How many more women will be harmed before the church will stop paying for his entitlements with her voice and vulnerability?

Church,

Women are rightfully angry.

I, for one, will not be silenced to placate your system.

I wasn’t made to play second fiddle.

And neither were my sisters.