If you’ve spent much time in church, perhaps you’ve noticed something’s missing.

Or, more specifically, someone. Many someones.

Men.

This is the case, anyway, if attendance at your church reflects the national trend of church attendance being nearly two-thirds female. When it comes to the adults-under-35 demographic, as well as to participation in church activities and in leadership roles other than as pastors, the discrepancy is even greater.

This gender gap is nothing new — and neither, some St. Joseph pastors say, are the issues both in men and in churches that have caused it.

“The philosophical, historical and cultural shifts that have produced the last couple generations of ‘men without chests,’ as C.S. Lewis says, are multifaceted,” says the Rev. Jeremy Fruechting, associate pastor of CrossPointe Community Church. “ ... The whole church is too reflective of the culture. Our entire country has all sorts of problems suffering from lack of male leadership or total absence of fathers and husbands acting like real men.”

One such shift may be the message men receive that their duty to be providers means only financially, adds the Rev. Pete Smith, involvement minister at Central Christian Church.

“But (provision) includes spiritually and emotionally, as well,” he says, also noting that “the gap is generationally reinforced. Many men that don’t go to church but have memories of going to church as a child did so with a mom or a grandma, reinforcing that ‘church is for women.’”

And those who do decide to give church a try, the Rev. Smith adds, might get the same “church is for women” message from the decor — which, in a lot of cases, is fairly feminine.

“If we want men who have never been to church to be open, we would do well to make lobbies and fellowship areas look more like offices or sports bars than flower shops,” he says.

And this kind of turn-off is just the tip of the iceberg, according to David Murrow, author of “Why Men Hate Going to Church” and director of Church for Men, an organization established to help churches create an environment where men can thrive. On its Web site, he notes that men see church as feminine territory due to everything from the verbal nature of services (and the fact that women tend to be more word-oriented than men) to the kinds of volunteer opportunities available (often traditionally female tasks such as caring for babies, teaching children or preparing food) even to the invitation frequently given at the end of sermons to have “a personal relationship with Jesus.”

“That phrase never appears in the Bible. Yet in the past 50 years, it’s become the No. 1 way the evangelical church describes the Christian walk,” Mr. Murrow writes. “It’s turned the gospel into a puzzle for men, because most guys don’t think in terms of relationships ... The feminine atmosphere in our churches causes women to feel loved and nurtured, but men to feel hesitant and restrained. The only men who can function in this feminine milieu are those who happen to be particularly sensitive, verbal, dutiful or studious.”

Mr. Murrow offers practical suggestions for how churches can become more man-friendly, such as incorporating songs with more masculine lyrics rather than worshipping only with “lovey-dovey words set to a romantic tune,” as well as encouraging male leadership “by taking risks, dreaming big and bringing a measure of adventure back to the Christian life.”

But the most important force for change, both the Rev. Fruechting and the Rev. Smith say, is Jesus — and presenting him as he truly is.

“The picture people have of Jesus, which was given to them by the church, doesn’t match the picture in the Gospels,” the Rev. Smith says. “While Jesus was playful and affectionate to kids, and accepting of women in a time when that wasn’t OK, he was also rugged. He was always on the go, town to town, sleeping outside. He was challenging to those who wanted things easy. And he was confrontational to those who lived by — and expected others to live by — rigid rules without depending on God for the grace that we all need.”

“He came to make a community in which men are men, pouring their lives out for those closest to them, living and loving and growing into the image of Christ,” the Rev. Fruechting adds. “When churches preach that, and pastors make that their aim, men will be transformed into the creatures God intended: strong but gentle, noble but humble, men of grit and backbone yet with tenderness and love.

“That’s a man.”

Lifestyles reporter Erin Wisdom can be reached at ewisdom@npgco.com.