I don’t know how accurate the report is but in my observations, I have seen more women in churches than men, almost always and everywhere.
I don’t know how accurate the report is but in my observations, I have seen more women in churches than men, almost always and everywhere.
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Yes. In mainline churches in NZ, women outnumber men 2:1.
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We don’t visit many churches but where we do,I think your observation is correct. I wonder why that is…
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I think that would make a good science paper.
Happy Sunday Sally
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You are so right! I was thinking too about the Church we visited when volunteering in Mapoch near Pretoria. There the church was full to bursting with both men and women. Happy Sunday to you too. We have sunshine! 🙂
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We have a bit of sunshine and a lot of rain.
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That was a fairly flimsy article from the economist. The comments were most varied with some very silly ones.
Wasn’t this discussed on another blog post recentlyish looking at the reasons why more women attend church?
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I guess the economist collected anecdotes and called it research. Some of their articles are so bad; catchy title and no content.
Didn’t see that post
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There is a very simple explanation for the disparity between the genders in NZ, and I presume in many Western countries. Demographics. The average age of church members in most of the mainline churches is the late sixties to late seventies. In this age bracket women outnumber men by a considerable number.
However census statistics over more than a hundred years have shown that women are more religious than men.
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When I used to attend church, there were always more women than men. And this was for the entire spectrum of the demographic.
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Here there’s a direct relationship between the average age of the congregation and the prevalence of females.
One thing that worries me is that the only churches with demographics close to the national population is in the new evangelical/fundamentalist churches – American style fundamentalism. The mainstream churches will probably disappear within a decade or two as they are not getting new members. Unlike the new churches they mostly support gender and LGBT equality and are active in social
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I hope the evangelicals do not become so many as to be a problem for the rest of the society
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Unfortunately they are the only churches that are growing. I’m not sure what the answer is. We have a high immigration rate, and a high proportion of them are of the evangelical fundamental Christian kind. More than ninety percent of immigrants from places such as the Philippines and the Pacific Islands are very conservative and evangelical
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Oops. Hit post too soon. The older churches are active in social matters such as housing, dispute resolution, environmental issues etc, whereas the new ones only seem to be interested in pushing their hatred of LGBT, and the subservient role of women.
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Sounds like a great place to meet chicks –!
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Ha…you’d have to get married before you’d get any action, Arch.
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Don’t discourage the brother, V
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It always was
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As an American, I must say, that yes, more women attend church than men. But, as any TruChristian American can tell you, in the eyes of god and Jesus, only men count. If you doubt this, read the bible. So, it really doesn’t matter what woman do. Men are all that matter to god.
This TruChristian message has been brought to you by the TruChristian Misogynist Society of America. Help keep them in power this fall by voting early and voting Republican. $Amen$
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I will help campaign for the GOP.
You have a point. It’s men who are the majority.
When Jesus fed the 5K, it was men who were counted.
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Of course it’s men. The Abrahamic religions are male run, male led, male dominated, and disgustingly misogynistic. The question we should ask, since this is true, is if more women than men are attending churches that condone the ideas and behaviors of these religions, why is it? The bible is a disgustingly misogynistic piece of tripe. The churches that adhere to it promote this tripe. I find it sad that anyone, male or female, follow this crap.
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I think it is difficult to understand why women would still follow these very male centred religions
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Very difficult, though I’d be fascinated to learn why.
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Me too. I think such projects need funding
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Victoria could lead the project. This is her kinda subject. 🙂
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Yes. I hope she can shed more light on it.
Maybe Templeton foundation could fund her research
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Primarily because women have been indoctrinated for thousands of years to do as they are told. By men. Who are Always In Charge. Women must conform and fit in with societal expectations. Male-dominated/dominating religions reinforce the stereotypes.
There are other Maslow-type reasons but that’s a short answer to your comment.
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Men start religions, most of the time anyway, and women just follow.
Maybe women should refuse to follow
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According to Bart Ehrman, women were certainly predominant in the early Christian church.
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So it hasn’t changed much it seems
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Absolutely. In our street we have a Mary cult organised by a bunch of local women. They share a statue among themselves, and meet for songs and chanting every few weeks.
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Can I join in? Sounds like fun. Oh, btw, on an off subject comment, our friend, Bobby/Leroy has now created another ID for himself. It’s a female one complete with a pic and everything. She/he goes by the name Charlotte (or something like that) 1234Brown. He/she popped up on Nan’s blog and inadvertently posted the exact same long, meandering comment under both names, one immediately after the other. I’m more certain than ever, that if this multiple personality person isn’t SoM, he/she is most definitely CS as well as his/her other names. Whack job extraordinaire.
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Is that Roy? She’s commented a few times on my blog. Ask Nan to check the IP address. Roy’s is 99.117.84.82 (Texas)
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Need i say it, Bobby’s is 99.117.84.82, too
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He admitted to being Bobby though. He got caught being the female character. He thought he was being slick.
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so why would a person do something so silly?
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Mental illness.
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It’s him. Same EXACT long comment showed up under both names. One immediately after the other. Bobby and Roy are banned on Nan’s site, so he created this new female character to sneak around it. He messed up and posted under both, but several of us caught him/her. What stinks is that I now am coming to believe that this person is actually ALL the whack jobs who post on these blogs. I was hoping there were more than one. however, this one is truly a piece of work.
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Investigate it. You have the IP address (and that gives the town in Texas). See how many Roy’s there are. After his behaviour he deserves to be doxed.
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I just did. It’s him. All 3 of “them”.
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I’ll try and find the thread where he was posting as this woman.
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Yeah. Check the IP address of that. She’s never posted on my blog, so I can’t check the address. Dude has a pic of a woman as the avatar and everything. Amazing.
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maybe they share the same computer. You have to look at it from the brighter side
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Indeed. But, sadly, it is the same person. 🙂
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And it can’t be Colourstorm, his IP is 72.77.71.171
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It can if he’s using more than one computer and/or server. I do not put that past him at this point.
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CS is in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Roy is Texas, Fortworth, if i remember.
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Well, then there are 2 at least. Gotta check out SoM’s next. I actually can’t verify the IP address of Ms 1234Brown. She/he has never posted on my site. However, there’s no way it isn’t Roy. The exact same comment, and a long one, appearing under both names, one after the other, is not a coincidence.
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It’s not SALLYBR0WN, is it?
And SOM’s IP is 99.42.99.72 (Pflugerville), Texas
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No. Different Brown. I’ll try to find the link for you.
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Can’t find it. It’s possible Nan deleted the comments. 3 of us noticed Bobby’s mistake and pointed out to her it was the same person.
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So SOM and Roy/Bobby/Ms 1234Brown are all from Texas. Interesting.
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Different towns, though. When I first encountered Roy he was VIDASDECRISTO with an avatar of a kid praying.
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That’s 4 we know of for Mr. Roy. Nan did delete his/her comments. So there’s these 4 names plus SOM and CS. 4 out of 6 are the same nut job.
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Cindy1234Brown is the name Bobby/Roy used on Nan’s blog, complete with a woman’s photo for the avatar and everything.
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Strange fellow. The kind of person you see on the news with the neighbours saying, “We had no idea… he was so quiet.”
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As they’re removing 36 bodies from his basement.
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Maybe it says something about Texas
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Absolutely. Let’s sink the whole state into the Gulf of Mexico and be done with it.
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I think that old bird and ladysighs resides in that state. We get them out first
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Absolutely.
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I doubt it be Sallybrown. I would vouch for her honesty even when we disagree every once in a while
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Yeah, I saw the name, Brown, and remembered it, but its different.
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Wasn’t her. She’s an atheist. Bobby/Cindy would not even joke that he/she was one.
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I have an idea now. I should have a female personna
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Maketta
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Pittsburgh? Ugh that’s only a 30 mile buffer zone from where I live. Too close I say. 🙂
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You need a firebreak, just to be safe.
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You haven’t tried to join them dressed as a woman?
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I would, but their singing leaves a lot to be desired.
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You can go after they sing.
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That’s the thing, they don’t stop singing, and chanting, then more singing… and they carry around this statue of Mary. It’s kinda’ weird.
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That’s really weird. Don’t go there my friend.
You would die, literally, from boredom
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a lot of women are taught that they need to be led. they look for the nearest authority figure, and that is usually a church.
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maybe churches should go and be replaced with libraries and social halls.
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I don’t think it’s that difficult to understand why women raised in a deeply paternalistic society might be more attracted to the Head Guy than guys might be. Many of the nuns I know have far more than just a ‘thing’ for the Jesus fellow; they’re actually married to this absentee landlord but never have to pick up after him.
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I’ve wondered about the Jesus fantasies these women must have.
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oy, can you just imagine the fan fic from that?
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Dammmmmn! Do you have any idea how well those books would sell?
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heh. Jesus/Fabio on the covers, the works 🙂
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You mean like this:
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John, Christians read this blog
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I hope they like Swedish Jesus
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Maybe they will stop visiting 😦
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wonder no more.
Jesus is all the time with them
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That’s what they all say. My nun friends tell me they are married to Jesus or the church. What a waste
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A 3.5% difference between women and men, while noteworthy, suggests causative factors other than gender. From: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/women-more-religious-than-men_us_5702a514e4b0a06d58064516
“It’s not entirely clear why these gender disparities exist, but researchers have considered a range of sources, including varying biology, psychology, genetics, family environment, social status, workforce participation and a lack of ‘existential security’ felt by many women because they generally are more afflicted than men by poverty, illness, old age and violence, Pew said.
The answer likely involves multiple factors, but there is still disagreement about which issues matter more, Pew reported.
Interestingly, women who work tended to report being less religious than women who don’t earn a salary, even when the researchers accounted for other factors, such as education level, age and marital status, Pew said.
This analysis about the beliefs of employed women suggests that women are not universally more religious than men, but that their devoutness could be the result of nurture (for instance, social and cultural factors) rather than nature (for example, biological or evolutionary forces).”
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I think it has a lot to do with socio-cultural and economic factors than with the nature of women.
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I think there could be a number of reasons. Being a very patriarchal religion is could be that church is one place where they feel like they have more status (through volunteering with the church), or just the fact that they get to socialize. I know that the social aspect is huge for women. In a lot of religions not just Christianity, that temple/church/mass is where the big gossip sessions occur. A somewhat superficial way to feel more important, but I think in a patriarchal society that might have some appeal It’s also possible that they simply go to get away from their husbands for while. I know for my mom church was a sanctuary for a few hours where she could talk to people, because my dad’s alcoholism and he would often just be binge drinking on weekends leaving my mom with little to do.
In the U.S. a majority of women are for the democratic party as well…not that there is necessarily a lot of overlap, but I do think that there may be some of the more compassionate aspects of the religion. Just like many seek religion as a way out of their oppression, perhaps women do too, to seek some refuge from the patriarchy.
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Rebecca Goldstein has an important point to make in this area. She talks about the concept of “mattering”. People have an intrinsic need to have their lives matter. For men in a strongly patriarchal society, finding a way to “matter” is pretty easy, but for women it’s a lot harder. Organized religion is one of the few ways that women in that situation can fill this need. They may have no job, little education, and nothing but childbearing and hard work and drudgery at home, but church gives them opportunities to be important (at least among the church ladies) as well as offering the promise of “your life matters to god”. It’s not the “gossip sessions”, it’s teaching Sunday School and VBS, singing in the choir, organizing social events, sending casseroles to the sick, etc etc. Even if your life sucks, your spouse is lazy and abusive, and nobody knows or cares who you are, for some women church allows them to be somebody. It’s hard to compete with that.
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I agree, and I was simply offering up multiple possibilities, the first one I mentioned was status, which is what you’ve said here. I agree that it seems to make the most sense.
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There are women, I hear, in this city who almost every other evening have a church thing to attend. Maybe you have a point. Some husbands are impossible and one needs a break from them
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This has been one of the continuing topics tackled at the Women in Secularism conferences. The question “Are women more religious than men?” has a clear answer: Yes.
But that leads to two more questions: (1) Why? and (2) Can anything be done about it?
Exploring the “why” question is complicated. From a U.S standpoint (which may or may not be applicable elsewhere) a lot of the answer seems to wrapped up in community. Women, particularly women raising children, and especially low-income women, are often dependent on the social support network offered by churches. That’s where their friends are, that’s where their child care is organized, that’s where support comes from if they are ill, it’s just a big part of their lives. Leaving religion means losing that support network, and for many people maintaining that network is more important than whether their dogmas are true. I’m much more of a loner than most women, and don’t easily integrate into groups like that, and that may be part of why I had an easier time leaving religion.
Part of allowing women to reconsider religion, then, is making sure that the support they need is available to them outside the church structure. Stronger social services and groups like Sunday Assembly I think are an important part of this. But I think a lot more study is also needed on this subject.
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You raise very many valid points.
And I also think a lot more study is needed on the subject.
One would think in Muslim majority countries, men are just as devout as the women.
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That’s a study I’d like to see. Though getting accurate results would be difficult, because how many men in Muslim countries that aren’t believers would be willing to tell anybody?
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I honestly believe that if it weren’t for women, the number of men attending church would drop 50% 🙂
A LOT of guys would much rather go fishing on Sunday. Even though they may be religious.
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I think you have a point.
There are many things one could do on a Sunday
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