Men need to be challenged, need to prove themselves worthy. The church used to make that more present."And there we have the attraction of Thor. These and many other men are not going to identify with Catholic "lite". Their lives are hard, and full of risk. They are fathers and soldiers or sailors or aviators. They seek not comfort but fortitude and a priest and Church that can be of help to maintain this duty and purpose in life as fathers and warriors."
It was also interesting to find out that the Canadian military has allowed beards in all branches of service.
Fr. Sweet is also on twitter as @BradBradSweet
31 comments:
In a way it’s an old complaint— Chesterton wrote of critics for whom it was somehow the fault of Christianity both that Edward Confessor did not fight and that Richard Lionheart did. Christianity both emasculates and turns men into red-handed Crusaders.
Christianity doesn’t need to fear Norse paganism. It’s largely incorporated it. Yuletide and Christmastide nearly converge, Thor and St Olav, Odin and Coifi and Merlin and Gandalf. Christianity should ask why, now, people are rejecting the parts the old desert faith brought. It’s the Bible people are ceasing to believe. I think sex may be a part of it, but less the presence of the feminine than the absence of room for gay neighbors; an ironically Christian reason for rejecting Christianity. Men can still join the Knights of Columbus or the Knights is St John, and find a place in the faith. But they can’t make the Bible stop saying the things they don’t believe.
At the same time, there is a whole set of supernatural and non-Christian, non-Jewish beliefs popular among the "progressives", and especially it seems among women of that persuasion: astrology, homeopathy, magical crystals, levitation, a conscious Gaia, etc.
Note that these beliefs all deal with vague "forces" of one kind or another, rather than with forces personified as gods and goddesses.
Anonymous 10:57 was me, David Foster
Is it true that there were times when men and women attended/worshiped in more equal numbers? I vaguely recall a historian challenging that, saying that women have pretty much always been over-represented in church.
In terms of lay attendance, I think women have always been more common. And women in convents probably outnumbered priests and monks, although that's based on my sense from reading and not based on hard archival research.
In terms of space within the church for males, however, I think there was a lot more room in the past, and more men visible as role models, be they physical warriors or purely spiritual warriors and teachers. I know my current place of worship is a little unusual in having four male ministers, one full time female and one part time female (both in pastoral care roles), and all male deacons and mostly male elders. There are robust and thriving women's groups as well, but the visible leadership is male. (Not Catholic, I should add, but more traditional than most congregations in the denomination.)
LittleRed1
Jordan Peterson has weighed in with thoughts on men in church, though I don't think he actually answers the question.
Taylor Marshall interviewed a fellow who wrote a book on the 'male deficit' in the Church.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLOQJe4z2t0
It's interesting, but I agree with those who state that women have always been over-represented in the pews. However, these days are the first in which women are also over-represented in ministries and in the sanctuary.
A resigned feminist church-friend once complained bitterly "Men don't seem to come if you don't let them run things." There may be something to that, for good or ill.
The Puritan church was over-represented by females in membership - and membership was hard to acquire, often requiring a few re-applications more than two years apart to be approved. The mild joke was also that puritan women succeeded in dragging their husbands across the Atlantic. I don't know about attendance in other eras.
I do get the point he's making about the priests not reflecting the lives and values of the men. In a way that shouldn't be a problem, since priests are a separate caste; they aren't meant to be like ordinary men.
On the other hand, I find that every time I listen to a priest speak I have less faith in the Church than before I started listening to him. That's a problem. If I should leave the Church someday, it will be because of the priests. But not, notice, because of the women.
I don't see where he's saying it's "because" of the women, I think he's more saying it's symptomatic or at most contributory to what's wrong, but not the prime issue. Saying that it's not attractive or resonating with men isn't to say the women repel them (although these days, an organization run by women often doesn't act like it *needs* men- most women are quite happy that 90% or more of the altar servers are female now, at least around here). Also, he's not saying the women drove the men off, but rather the church failed to keep these men in the fold, and he's asking why? Seems like a good question to ask. Maybe sermons that challenged men to be good Christian men in a traditional sense might help, but when's the last time you heard one of those?
When's the last time you heard a priest talk about St. Olav, Coifi, or Gandalf (in a christian sense)? If that were a more common occurrence, maybe things would be different, but generally the sermons I hear are very much in line with a more feminized, progressive culture. I think what you said about "every time I hear a priest talk" is exactly the problem he's referencing.
The Knights of Columbus could be helpful, but mostly it's unseen in the parishes I've been to around here (There are chapters around here, but few relative to how many parishes there are), and I'm not sure it's performing as much more than a service club, which is great (and I speak from admitted ignorance here), but maybe a group to involve men in the church needs more than that. When you refer to the Knights of St. John, I'm not even sure I know what that group is other than a few references I've heard from you. It's surely not a big part of most parishes lives.
I suppose it's worth asking- why is the Priesthood restricted to males in the first place?
why is the Priesthood restricted to males in the first place?
Melchizidek, Levi, and Christ. The priest is "another Christ", and priesthood is a continuation of the priesthood of Melchizidek and the order of Levites.
I realize that the above is sorely lacking in detail and nuance, but that's the brutally short version.
1. why is the Priesthood restricted to males in the first place?
2. Melchizidek, Levi, and Christ. The priest is "another Christ", and priesthood is a continuation of the priesthood of Melchizidek and the order of Levites.
Problem here is that 2. doesn't explain why 1. works. 2. just illustrates that it is an older pattern.
Let me throw this out: God created Adam to satisfy Himself. A priest to himself, if you will. He saw that Adam being alone was not good, so he created Adam a helpmate, Eve. Will the helpmate replace the priest as the priest to God?
-Stc Michael
Ultimately it depends on a basic assumption that the sex divide is fundamental in the eyes of God.
Natural theology: it must be, because so he made it. But it’s not evident in lower orders. So maybe not? Or maybe it’s a sign of ascension that it becomes so? Both arguments are plausible.
"it must be, because so he made it."
True, of course. But he could have made it any way he liked- he could have made it so that we had Women priests, or both, but he did not.
So one supposes that it's a question of function with our natures and tendencies, for lack of anything else to point to. Does a church led by women work better? One led by both women and men? If one believes, then one should figure that he judges that one led by men would serve better (this is not to exclude women or say they don't also play an instrumental and necessary role in the church). If he set us in this model, who are we to change it, or to think that changing it wouldn't have some negative effects?
Of course, if you aren't a believer in the tenets and traditions of the church none of this necessarily holds, but we are.
"Ultimately it depends on a basic assumption that the sex divide is fundamental in the eyes of God."
Considering both the natural model and the way it's treated in the scriptures, hasn't God treated us as two parts of a kind of whole? Eve is of, but separate from, Adam. Mark 10:8 says "and the two shall become one flesh". I'm sure there are other passages that would suggest the same. I think it would be hard to argue in the Christian context that it is fundamental in his eyes.
Or perhaps I shouldn't even say "led by men" but "have clear distinctions for men and women"?
If he set us in this model, who are we to change it, or to think that changing it wouldn't have some negative effects?... Considering both the natural model and the way it's treated in the scriptures, hasn't God treated us as two parts of a kind of whole?... I think it would be hard to argue in the Christian context that it is fundamental in his eyes.
This is the basic issue. I think that contemporary Americans just don't believe any of that anymore. They don't believe we should be submissive to the natural order; they believe it's crippling to be bound to it, in fact. Just as we don't submit to the natural order in going blind as we get older (we have glasses), so to we should use our will and our science to shape nature according to our desires and preferences.
There's a whole Aristotelian argument about why the eyeglass thing perfects nature according to natural design, while many of the other changes that are untied to natural ends are "unnatural" and perverse. I think that's a defensible position, though I rarely hear anyone defending it; but more and more it's just not what Americans believe. America believes in will to power, where power is a means to the ends of desire.
Likewise, I don't think Americans in general -- ordinary middle class Americans -- still believe that there should ever be fundamental sex divisions in labor. I think most Americans have come to view that as per se immoral, and if you're telling me that God is on the side of the per se immoral, what does that say about him?
Ultimately the Church could probably do itself some good by drawing bright lines again, and defending them emphatically through confrontational engagement. Maybe insofar as women (as AVI often points out) are statistically more likely to score high on agreeableness, a larger percentage of female leadership makes it less likely that the Church will be the sundering sword it was supposed to be. But the priests aren't doing it either; and in going along with the flow of the culture, they're seeing their flocks drift further and further away. Eventually they drift out of sight, and out of memory.
This is really an advantage of the Evangelical approach, when I think about it. They're all about the message that you should submit to the book, and let the book change you. The fact that the book says things you don't believe is a starting point, not the reason to walk away.
All the mainstream churches, Catholic or Protestant, have watched their flocks thin because they don't do that anymore.
True, of course. But he could have made it any way he liked- he could have made it so that we had Women priests, or both, but he did not.
Or we've misinterpreted what God did and why vis-a-vis Adam, and Eve, and we've constructed rationalizations--wholly logically consistent internally--to support our interpretation.
This is a problem I have generally with human institutions purporting to represent God or God's Word. We think we know so much, but too often we know it so wrong.
Eric Hines
Wrote Grim: Likewise, I don't think Americans in general -- ordinary middle class Americans -- still believe that there should ever be fundamental sex divisions in labor. I think most Americans have come to view that as per se immoral, and if you're telling me that God is on the side of the per se immoral, what does that say about him?
This is the proclaimed view, but not the practice even among women. If we look at the physical nasty jobs, we do not see a clamor for equality. Instead we see a push for equality of the "nice" jobs. This suggests there is an error somewhere in there.
Wrote Grim: Ultimately the Church could probably do itself some good by drawing bright lines again, and defending them emphatically through confrontational engagement.
As the Creation is, then His laws exist. As His laws exist, his priesthood should proclaim the truth as they know it.
Wrote E. Hines: This is a problem I have generally with human institutions purporting to represent God or God's Word. We think we know so much, but too often we know it so wrong.
I agree with this too. An interesting paradox. God give us wisdom.
-Stc Michael
Amen.
I know about all that stuff. It is just that data is restricted to certain classification levels. Yours is not at an entry level due to no data. If there is no data then yes it is vague and subjective.
The word priest has gotten yoo many state religion mean8ngs thrown in that adulterates the original divine purpose. Priests were merely middle managers. Their job was to organize power centers and faith as a power network as every body else forgot.
This forgetting was so serious that all written and perceived knowledge was corrupted in time.
The modern idea of a priest is maybe 10%
It is because that was the only way to track the genetic changes, by male patriarchy, in those days. The group people now call yahweh, was both what people thought but also ... not.
I have no idea where the others are.
More data on divine feminine vs divine masculine. Is out on youtube
In order to house a spirit or child of god, the human avatar and vehicle was modified from existing matter. There are different realms where source did not divide into 2 opposing energies.
Saul saw it as clothing.
There are many churches. Why the assumption that your church s tenets are the true ones?
The priests of a god have little relation to human positions of authority, aka elders deacons etc.
I see no difference for a male priest or a female priest when neither were authorized by divine power
A book is not the words of a god.
It is only at best a mere representation and worship of an image is an idol.
I think similar thoughts
Ooops, late night typing leads to errors uncaught- " I think it would be hard to argue in the Christian context that it is fundamental in his eyes." should have read " I think it would be hard to argue in the Christian context that it is *not* fundamental in his eyes."
I think you all understood me anyway.
But, yes, the march of society (and the church) away from that which we believe to be the truth of things is the core of the problem.
One more bit of scripture that reinforces the idea that we are different parts of a greater whole: Matthew 19:4-6
"4 And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, 5 And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? 6 Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder."
Post a Comment