Men's Ministry in Russia

  My years in Russia have taught me that some of my pre-conceived notions about mission and ministry are misguided...or, at least, that they are not completely applicable to this context. One of those examples is "men's ministry." In the past I had a notion that this was a way for men to assert their authority in the church and in their families. This looked a lot like encouraging patriarchy, certainly not something in which I would want the church to be engaged. 

  Here, however, in addition to there being a different set of issues around gender and roles than in the West, there is is the problem of an almost total absence of men in many congregations. "Men's ministry," as I see it being developed here in the Omsk region of Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Urals, Siberia and Far East, is not about re-asserting men's power, but is instead an attempt to help men see that there is a place for them in the church and to give them the opportunity to be surprised both by their potential usefulness and by the support which they didn't even acknowledge that they needed. 

  For that reason I've been hoping to find a way through the "Equipping for Service" program to support an idea I heard at the last synod assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in European Russia. There my successor as pastor of St. Nikolai Lutheran in Novgorod, Igor Zhuravlev, mentioned the lack of men's ministry (despite a thriving women's ministry) at the last ELCER synod. I suggested to him and then to the folks in ELCUSFE that he and I travel to Omsk, where they've been doing such work for a few years. He agreed, and our hope was to go a see a model that we might use to replicate (with certain modifications) in European Russia. 

  We arrived on Friday morning and left Omsk for the  “Admiral Makarov” camp in the early evening. One of the most impressive things about the seminar was the way different types of activities were planned and balanced. We started with bowling and a meal Friday, while on Saturday we had activities that were more about listening (morning prayer, Bible study) or about talking (stereotypes about men, a survey of questions about our live's most significant moments), were more focus was on the physical (winter soccer and capture the flag) or the mental (chess with living figures). 

  Sunday morning was used for morning worship, another activity reflecting on mens' roles, and final reflections before leaving back for Omsk around noon.  By the end of the weekend the seminar's 13 participants had had the opportunity to reflect, be encouraged, experience renewal, and come away with a new sense of brotherhood. 

  If the original goal of this seminar was to help Igor and myself gain confidence and motivation to run a seminar in ELCER, that goal was met. While it would be wrong to underestimate the importance of the unique character of the gathered group (Omsk has a good team of leaders that know one another well) we came away from the seminar with the realization that, because this is a need that is not currently being met, it actually might not be as challenging as we thought to hold a similar activity. Igor and I felt inspired to make further plans, and we hope to test out our ideas at the first men's seminar for the Northwest Russian deanery in May. Dean Vinogradov also saw the potential to build on what has already been accomplished, and he and I are making plans for a church-wide (including participants from other parts of the former Soviet Union) coordinators' seminar in September.