Why do people go to church? What about a congregation attracts new members? What is it that draws women and men differently into diverse types of congregations? Getting to Church assesses the deeply personal and gendered narratives around how women and men move toward identifying with three very different Christian congregations one Orthodox, one conservative, and one mainline. Drawing on extensive research and ranging across layers of congregational
history, leadership, architecture, new member process, programs, and service ministries, Sally Gallagher explores trajectories of joining, as well as membership loss and change over a seven-year period. By following both those who join a community and those who explore but choose not to, Gallagher avoids the
methodological limitations of other studies and assesses the degree to which the spaces, people, programs, and doctrines within distinctive traditions draw women and men toward affiliation and involvement. Getting to Church demonstrates that women are attracted to specific doctrines and ideas, opportunities for individual reflection, experience and expanded personal agency; while men find in these congregations a sense of community within which they experience greater connection with
other men, appreciate beauty, and yield to something greater than themselves. Drawing on extensive field work, personal interviews, and focus groups, Getting to Church challenges extant theories of gender and religious involvement.
Drawing on extensive field work, personal interviews and focus groups in mainline, evangelical, and eastern Orthodox churches, Sally Gallagher examines what it is that draws women and men differently into different types of congregations.
Sally Gallagher's thoughtful and well-researched analysis gives us new insight into how gender shapes the ways that people experience and enact religious commitment, and how they choose to join or to leave religious communities. This nuanced account takes into account a wide range of contemporary American religious communities and helps us to move beyond tired stereotypes about women'sand men'sreligiosity.
