A True Solution to Cultural Apathy

So this is depressing, but so is this. And sort of startling to me, from my own peculiar vantage point of being over run by children on one hand, and having a husband for whom physical strength is one of his primary characteristics.

These two unrelated studies, if you didn’t click the links, which you should do, show a steeply declining birth rate on one hand, and a decreasing of physical strength in young men on the other. In the second study, young millennial men are measuring up to be no more strong than the average 30 year old woman. And both these trends are very bad, because physical weakness in a man undermines the properties of his own personhood, or so says the author of the piece. And a declining birthrate for women undermines the whole proposition of humanity, and makes everything sadder and more difficult.

And the solution, it seems, is more policies that will help families, and families taking the trouble to beef up their sons. More child tax credits, better maternity leave, and for heaven’s sake, hit the weight room.

But I actually think these two problems–which of course are fundamentally related one to another–are so deep, and so embedded in the current modern psyche, that they are past the point of any governmental fix. The whole cultural ship would have to come to a slow halt and laboriously reverse course, and that takes an act of God.

Acts of God, I have found, are usually very slow. There is exhausting painstaking work on the part of the church, laborious and menial work, and then suddenly the church wakes up and discovers that God has done something longed and hoped for but not fully imagined.

Indulge me as I use Good Shepherd, my own church, as a comforting example of true cultural change. And you have to bear with me because cultures are made up of individual people, and every time you think you know something about a person or a group, it’s useful to keep your realistic eyes open, but then be ready to see when things are really changing.

For the past many years I would occasionally make remarks to myself, in a quiet whispering way, about the languid apathy that seems more and more to comprise modern masculinity. Lots of young men hit the age of “adulthood” and just don’t have any idea what to do with themselves. They’d like to get married and have a family, they’d like to be ambitious and strong, but not very much about their education–especially in college–gives them room to take the lead, or even to understand that it’s ok to make mistakes. These young men will meet nice girls, and some of them will take the big leap and decide to be married. And that is very good and wonderful. But in the course of ordering their lives with their new gorgeous brides, the settling back onto the heals, rather than pivoting forward onto the balls of the feet, takes over again, and the young lady, who didn’t really want to be in charge, takes over, because that’s what she’s been trained to do. You see it out in the world, and you see it sitting in the pew. And me, I’ve been anxious.

When we first came to Good Shepherd the congregation was weighted a bit more heavily on the feminine side. There were men, lovely strong men who endlessly spent themselves on the upkeep and care of the building, but there was a pervasive feminine feel about the place. Power dwelt steadfastly in the sacristy, and the church kitchen. But one day a man walked in off the street and asked for a men’s bible study. There wasn’t one, so Matt got one together–just a few men, meeting together on Fridays to read the bible and eat breakfast. No women allowed, and at six thirty in the morning, no self respecting woman would desire to be there. Week after week. Month after month. Year after year. The men read the bible and pray.

And on Sunday morning, a man stands in the pulpit to preach–that’s Matt, for the most part. And by a man I don’t mean Pajama Boy. The man standing in the pulpit doesn’t languidly and apathetically give a chat about this thoughts and feelings about the bible. The physical strength of his character is matched by his intellectual and spiritual tenacity. He does hard work to understand the text, to land somewhere, to say whatever needs to be said.

If you’re looking for a fluffy, froufrou, ladies throwing their weight around church, Good Shepherd will probably be a disappointment to you. The biggest change over the last decade has been the deep, strengthening responsibility of men in the church–not just for the upkeep of the building, but for the spiritual well being of the congregation as a whole. Women exercise all kinds of ministry and do incredible work, but they aren’t the only ones. Men comprise more than fifty percent of the ministry work in the church, and ninety-nine percent of the decision making body–the vestry. Every year a bunch of women are asked to join, but it’s hard to get any of them to, because they are already doing lots more interesting stuff, and most importantly, because They Don’t Have To.

But the best part, for me, is the sudden tiny baby boom we’re having. For the first time ever, the nursery is not populated with all my babies. Nor is it sitting dark and empty. It’s got babies in it–other people’s babies.

You know what makes women not want to take the risk of raising an infant all the way to adulthood? Being surrounded by selfish, cocoa drinking pajama boys. But you know what you have to have to have real men show up? This is going to shock you, so man up. You have to read the bible. You have to systematically read the bible. Better yet, have groups of cis-gender heterosexual men reading the bible. Because if groups of men read the bible systematically, together, and pray for each other, you avoid pajama on one hand, and–who is a really bad and abusive man? Trying to think…Osama Bin Ladin? I guess I’ll go with him. You avoid abuse, woe, and authoritarianism on the other.

But it takes years. It takes persistence. It takes men and women hearing the gospel from the pulpit every. single. week. And it takes God having mercy on sinners, and grace for the weak–strengthening hands and arms and hearts to bear the weight of responsibility and truth into the world.