Why are so many Catholic men absent from the Church?
The common reply is that men just aren’t as religious as women. Then why is there no record of a lack of difference in piety between men and women in the early centuries of the Church? And why are there more men than women in synagogues and mosques today?

The absence of men from Catholic [and Protestant] Churches is a crisis that few seem willing even to publicly acknowledge. Perhaps the crisis of absent male Catholics [AMC] is so large and seemingly hopeless that it is ignored. For the good of the Faith and the family we need to ask and answer two hard questions:

Why have men left the Church? How can they be brought back?
It is too simplistic to attribute the absence of men from the Catholic Church to a single underlying cause. Like any massive cultural or ecclesiastical phenomenon, there are several streams contributing to the main current. Nevertheless, two Irish researchers (F. John Herriott & Joseph Foyle) seem to have uncovered one significant cause for AMC by directly interviewing Catholic men who have quit practicing their faith.

The major reasons AMC give for not turning up at Mass are listed in the article on page 3. In a nutshell, AMC say that they have nothing to fear from God for violating his commandments, such as the obligation of Sunday Mass attendance and the Church’s teaching about sexuality. These men are deceived by a false security that they are going to heaven regardless of how they live.

Single-Fisted Preaching
Herriott and Foyle trace the root cause of AMC to what they call single-fisted preaching. For the past thirty years (with many notable exceptions) Catholics have heard preaching that emphasizes the love, mercy, and forgiveness of God while excluding the fear of God, the justice of God, and the demanding holiness of God. Single-fisted preaching talks about Heaven, but only occasionally whispers about Hell and Purgatory.

John Cardinal Newman warned about the dangers from a one-sided presentation of the Faith in his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. He said, "… one aspect of Revelation must not be allowed to exclude or to obscure another; and Christianity is dogmatical, devotional, practical all at once; it is indulgent and strict; it is love and it is fear."

The Double-Fisted Gospel: The Cure of AMC
Herriott and Foyle say that the secular world is well aware of the need for motivating men using the "Gain and Pain" factors. Do men respect and respond to a coach who just uses the "gain" approach? Do men achieve their potential in the military with superior officers who just use the reward approach? Of course not, yet the Church has followed this path for the past thirty years. The "gain only" approach will not work with men in sports, the military, the workplace, and especially in the Church. The single-fisted gospel has created a hemorrhage of men from the Church.

John Crosby, the Chairman of the Department of Philosophy at Franciscan University of Steubenville said, "Are we not preparing for a violent rejection of the Faith by men who feel deeply and yearn for something real, when we, who would represent Christ’s Church, embody only ‘languid and unmeaning benevolence’? … If a man asks for bread, we give him only a stone by trying to love him without severity, in portraying God as unfit to be feared… Serious men cannot believe in a God reminiscent of a benevolent old grandfather."

Men Require a "Kick in the Pants"
I’ll never forget a community breakfast I attended in a southwest Florida community several years ago. The current Chief of Police was there in uniform to present a gold chief of police badge to a former chief. Before presenting the badge, the current chief told a story to highlight the practical wisdom of the former chief.

It seems that a couple of teenage boys were caught drinking beer and drag-racing on the runway of this small town’s airport. Today the judicial system may want to send such boys off to a psychologist for self-esteem therapy. This former chief knew these boys and didn’t want them to get an arrest record, but he wanted them to straighten up. So he turned them around and gave them a swift kick in the rear and told them in no uncertain words to hightail it home. Which the boys promptly did! At the conclusion of his story as the current chief presented the gold badge to the former chief, he said with obvious emotion in his voice, "I was one of those boys."

Most men occasionally need a kick in the pants. In church life a "kick in the pants" comes in the form of preaching the need for repentance, the neglected first fist of the double-fisted gospel. Men need to hear that certain specific sins are wrong (birth control, adultery, pornography, homosexual acts, sterilization, profaning God’s name, willfully skipping Mass, drunkenness, worshipping mammon, a persistent unforgiving heart towards a spouse, family member or any other person).

Men need to be warned that refusing to turn in repentance from such sins can send them to hell. They need to be shown that following such a sinful course will ruin their lives and their family life. Men need to be told forthrightly to stop sinning - immediately - and turn their lives around. They need very direct exhortations like Jeremiah gave when he said, "Turn now every one of you from his evil way, and amend your doings" (Jer. 35:15). Finally, they need to be encouraged to receive the Sacrament of Penance, as soon as humanly possible.

Someone might object to the above prescription saying, "Men will leave the Church if we talk to them like that!" More than half have already left and tens of thousands more will leave this year! The single-fisted gospel is the main reason these men give for leaving. Yes, some men will leave if they hear the double-fisted gospel again, but many others will come back.

Catholic men do not want to be coddled in a soft, childlike fashion when it comes to dealing with the need to straighten up and live a holy life. At Catholic men’s conferences men come up to me after a challenging call for repentance and say, "Thank you for treating me like a man tonight."

The Year of God the Father is a perfect time to resurrect the double-fisted gospel. This entire year is to be a pilgrimage of reconciliation back to God the Father, similar to the return of the prodigal son back to his father. Why return if there are no serious consequences from sin? Why return if there is seldom any mention of certain acts being sinful? The double-fisted gospel gives men the necessary motivation to return to the Father.

If we are to really know God as Father, we must not only love him, but we must also fear him. Fear God? Isn’t that irrelevant Old Testament stuff? There is no stuffing in the Bible! The Old Testament teaches that the fear of God is the very foundation of knowing God. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction (Proverbs 1:7).

The New Testament also highlights the need to fear God as a vital part of the Christian life. 1 Peter 1:17 says, And if you invoke as Father him who judges each one impartially according to his deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile.

Doesn’t St. John teach that the fear of God is pass?? There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and he who fears is not perfected in love (1 John 4:18). St. John is teaching here about what is called servile fear, that is the cringing fear of a slave who is ever uncertain of pleasing a harsh master. This is not the type of fear for a Christian.

The fear of God needed by all Christians is called filial fear, the fear of a son expressed in profound reverential awe for the majestic holiness of God. The filial fear of God is one of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit that sustains the moral life of Christians (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1830 and 1831).

Jesus, the model for all Christians, lived his earthly life with a filial fear of God the Father. In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard for his godly fear (Hebrews 5:7, also see Isaiah 11:2-3).

The early Church was characterized by a healthy balance created by the double-fisted gospel. So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was built up; and walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit it was multiplied (Acts 9:31). It is vain to attempt to have the comfort of the Holy Spirit without the fear of God.

The Fear of God Needed by Today’s Catholic Families
Not only do Catholic men today need a wholesale infusion of the fear of God, but entire Catholic families need it. God expects parents to teach their children about the fear of the Lord (Proverbs 1:7-9). Parents who follow this command will greatly improve their chances of being spared the heartache of seeing their children abandon the Faith.

The fear of the Lord is God’s prescription for keeping children in the New Covenant from falling away. I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me for ever, for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them; and I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me (Jeremiah 32:39). In our day when 75% of Catholic teens in America quit practicing their faith before they leave their teen years, dads need to embrace and teach the fear of the Lord.

Every man needs to ask himself, "Have I come to the point in my spiritual life where I really fear God?" "Do I have a reverential awe for the profound holiness and majesty of God?" "Do I revere His commandments?"

The first step for a man coming to love God is a dynamic turn-around from a self-focused and self-directed mode of life. This is called repentance and it requires entering a path of life that has a narrow gate. Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few. Not every one who says to me, "Lord, Lord,"

shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven (Matthew 7:13-14, 21).

Beware of false prophets who say that God’s blessings and heaven can be obtained by following the broad way that is big enough for egos untempered by the fear of God. A man falls into a profound spiritual delusion when he thinks he is growing spiritually and in his knowledge of God apart from holiness of life.

Men need the double-fisted gospel in order to know God the Father. This is why God sent John the Baptist, a double-fisted preacher if there ever was one, with the message of repentance. The men and women who really came to know Jesus were the ones who repented at the preaching of John. The fear of the Lord isn’t the pinnacle of the spiritual life, but it is the necessary first step in coming to know God.

Counterfeit spiritual renewals are characterized by shallow emotional experiences that have little staying power and are impotent in passing on the faith to future generations.

The beginning of genuine spiritual renewal begins with repentance and the fear of God. Those Christians who have the keenest sense of the fear of God will also experience the greatest measure of His blessings this side of heaven. The Spirit of Sonship is given in overwhelming abundance to those who fear the Father.

God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of sonship. When we cry, "Abba! Father!" it is the Spirit Himself bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God (Romans 5:5, 8:14-16).

The double-fisted gospel is a key not only for bringing men back to the Church, but also for bringing men back to a vital relationship with God the Father. Men who make this spiritual pilgrimage during the Year of God the Father will not only be good Catholic Christians, but will also be good fathers for their children and grandfathers for their children’s children.

Steve Wood is the president of the Family Life Center International, founder of St. Joseph’s Covenant Keepers, and is the author of Christian Fatherhood. He and his wife, Karen have been married 20 years and are the parents of eight children.