What Happened To PK
Whatever happened to the Promise Keepers? 
Excerpted from John P. Bartkowski’s forthcoming book, The Promise Keepers: Servants, Soldiers, and Godly Men (Rutgers University Press, 2003)
Remember the Promise Keepers? PK, as it was popularly called, emerged from the obscurity of a small 1991 gathering of around four thousand men at its first conference in Colorado to fill stadiums throughout the nation for several years during the 1990s. By 1997, PK supporters estimated at 800,000 strong filled the National Mall in Washington, D.C. for “Stand in the Gap: A Sacred Assembly of Men.” That PK event was voted the second most–newsworthy story of 1997. Now, just a few years past that triumphant march, this very same organization is struggling to reinvent itself. When these facts are considered, 1997 seems like eons ago.
Making Sense of It All: Explaining the Rise and Fall of PK
The rapid growth and decline of the Promise Keepers tells us a great deal about this men’s movement and American religion. As a revivalistic movement that is sometimes quite critical of the religious establishment, PK was able to repackage spirituality, casting it as something other than “organized religion.” This evangelical repackaging of faith made religious conviction palatable for a large number of American men. But eschewing “organized religion” comes at a cost. Social movements have traditionally found it difficult to parlay their appeal into an enduring influence unless they become institutionalized. In the world of feminism, the women’s movement became consolidated and endures as the National Organization of Women. In the world of faith, religious movements often try to channel their charisma into organizations that are familiar to us all—congregations and denominations. United Methodism, begun by evangelist John Wesley, is one case in point. Thus, PK’s anti-establishment approach to faith was its greatest strength and its most glaring weakness. PK was catapulted into the limelight and attracted men by the thousands through because it gave a free-flowing character to spirituality. In this way, it successfully dressed up religion in garb, such as sport, that is very familiar to American men. But this quality also meant that its fame would not last very long, as is commonly the case with revivalistic movements designed to attract a limited constituency (in this case, men).
