wfn.org | Men Don't Seek Pastoral Care

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"UNITED METHODIST DAILY NEWS" by SUSAN PEEK on Aug. 11, 1991 at 13:58 Eastern,
about FULL TEXT RELEASES FROM UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE (3488 notes).

Note 3485 by UMNS on March 13, 1997 at 16:39 Eastern (4827 characters).

Produced by United Methodist News Service, official news agency of
the United Methodist Church, with offices in Nashville, Tenn., New
York, and Washington.

CONTACT:  Ralph E. Baker                      131(10-21-71B){3485}
          Nashville, Tenn.  (615) 742-5470          March 13, 1997

New book discusses why men
tend not to seek pastoral care

by J. Richard Peck*

     Why don't men seek pastoral care? That's one of the questions
considered by a series of scholars writing in The Care of Men
(Abingdon, 1997).
     We long have recognized that men, on average, die sooner than
women, and there has been considerable research documenting that
some of the stressors that contribute to mortality are related to
male gender roles and behaviors, say co-editors Christie Neuger,
professor at the United Theological Seminary in New Brighton,
Minn., and James Poling, professor at Garrett-Evangelical
Theological Seminary in Evanston, Ill. Nevertheless, men are less
likely to seek pastoral care and counseling.
     "It's really hard for a man in my church, especially an older
one," said one pastor, "to acknowledge the fact that he can be
wounded or his fears about that."
     One reason men prefer to "go-it-alone" is that they fear it
is not "masculine" to seek help, especially if it is associated
with emotions and with religion.
     Without seeking an appointment for counseling, Neuger finds
that men sometimes will seek help through casual drop-ins on the
pastor.
     The man may make a casual or light-hearted reference to a
possible concern. "If the pastor responds invitationally and
nonjudgementally, the careseeker will often continue by
elaborating on the concern."
     Neuger also finds pastors will encounter pastoral care needs
of men in crisis situations such as death or illnesses. And wives
occasionally will ask pastors to engage in conversations with
their husbands because of a problem she perceived he was facing.
     Finally, pastors, who have men's groups, find those
individuals are more likely to come to them in a time of need.
     While the problems of men in former generations focus on
relationships, Neuger found that most of men's problems today
focus on work. She said pastors report that men are the "clearest
about the economic and employment insecurities, but they are also
in uniform agreement that the issues of identity and meaning and
commitment were causing enormous stress."
     The second concern that pastors say men are raising has to do
with their roles as fathers. Surprisingly, the pastors said men do
not talk about their wives. One pastor attributed this to the fact
that families are so focused on kids.  "It makes me nervous for
when kids leave home," he said. "What happens to the marriage?" 
The pastors agreed the issue of spousal relationships is a concern
by its absence in their pastoral-care experiences.
     Several pastors talked about the fact that men did not bring
in for discussion typical midlife crisis issues. "Maybe there
isn't the luxury anymore to have midlife crises," said one pastor.
     About one-third of the pastors reported that shifting male
roles and identities is an issue for men in their churches. One
pastor said, "Men are asking, 'Who am I if it isn't my work that
gives me value?"
     Despite an emphasis on diversity, nine contributors to the
254-page volume agree that gender roles are more the result of
cultural values than of biological definitions. They conclude that
pastoral care must have a strong "countercultural message when
helping men (and women) to create new and healthier self-
definitions."
     The authors agree that helping men to change also means
helping to change the culture. "If men learn to challenge dominant
norms of masculinity and the associated higher value of things
designated masculine (stoicism, aggression, isolation,
rationality, control, maleness, whiteness, heterosexuality and so
on) then those [cultural] norms and values will change."
     The group most resistant to change, according to one
researcher, is the working class/lower class men. It is in these
men, says Ronald Levant, co-editor of A New Psychology of Men,
that the "most resistant masculinity norm is the fear of all
things that are 'feminine.'"
     Several of the authors point out that the church was
unfortunately colluded with the very structures named to be at the
heart of the destructiveness in men's lives. "On the other hand,"
they conclude, "the abiding messages of resistance to evil,
commitment to justice, the power of grace and the persistence of
God's lure toward the fullness of life are the very resources
needed to do this work."
                              #  #  #

     * Peck is editor of Newscope, published by the United
Methodist Publishing House.

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