The Possible Meanings of a Masculine Religious Revival

For some time now, going back to the immediate aftermath of the pandemic, if not earlier, I’ve been hearing anecdotes about young men showing up at churches in unexpected numbers. Unexpected because a gender gap in religion, where women are more likely to identify with and practice Christianity, has been a consistent feature of the American religious landscape going back generations.

But maybe not any longer, or at least not for America’s younger generations. My newsroom colleague Ruth Graham has a report this week that cites data from the American Enterprise Institute showing that more Gen Z women than Gen Z men describe themselves as religiously unaffiliated — a reversal of the pattern for every older age group. And she gives life to that data point with vignettes from the religious culture of Waco, Texas, where both church and campus life (at the Baptist-founded Baylor University) offer examples of greater male investment paired with female disaffection.

Continues...