That said, it is beyond belief? Of course not, that is the power of good satire. It does not focus on the absurd that will never happen but the absurd that just might happen, especially given the direction of our culture today. We live in a time when the assault on manhood has done an effective job of raising boys who are not men and shaming men who grew up from boyhood into manhood. The antics of politicians and media figures in sexual abuse, rape, lewd conversation, preoccupation with games, and a life around a screen is not manhood's problem but boys who never grew to men and remain big children. St. Paul says clearly that when he was a child, he spoke and acted like a child, but now he has grown up. This grown up life is characterized not by satisfying desire or living out your identity through your desires but self-control. It is not the living out of the flesh but life in the Spirit. It is not living as a victim but as one made new in Christ to reign in desire and strive to live the holy life of faith in which love's duty to God is lived out in love's duty to family, neighbor, co-worker, and even stranger.
We do not have a man problem in this world. We have a child problem. Boys behaving badly, most especially by failing to grown up into men. Tony Esolen has written a very good piece on this. Read it.
We do not need more feminine men. We need more men. Period. The names in the news and the bad behavior of those who should know better is not due to an unrestrained masculinity but a life stunted in childhood, without responsibility, a sense of duty, and the power to control desire. It is not that boys have failed us or we have worse boys than we ever had. The mechanisms of culture and community, yes, and church, have failed to train up and raise up these boys to men. They have a terrible dearth of good role models, a limited number of mentors, and a host of other issues that have made maturing the exception rather than the rule. We do not raise our boys to become men, husbands, fathers, community leaders, and examples of faith and virtue. We raise them to remain boys and then looked shock when they act like boys. For that matter, we do not raise our girls to become wives, mothers, community leaders, and examples of faith and virtue, either. We raise all our children to believe that happiness is what you want it to be when you want it and that this is the highest and most holy goal of life -- one which God also wants for you. Hogwash.
We don't people who will self-identify as male but real men and real women. This has never been the exclusive content of our culture and community but it has always been the foundation and backbone of society. If things are falling apart, it is not because we have too many manly men but too many big boys who are not real men. The same is true of the Church. We welcome any and all, sinners with all kinds of sins to be released from the prison of their sins and death sin has caused. Not all will be married, nor will they look or act or sound the same. Not all will be families, but all should find family within the household of God where desire is not what defines us and self-control is not an optional extra but the very essence of holy living. This message is not anti anyone or any group but for the new life and the righteousness of that new life in which the lens through which we look is not our desires but Christ, maturing of faith, and holiness of life. God help us raise up such men (and women!).
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Recently a Circuit court judge ruled that the use of "men" as a synecdoche for male, female and otherwise-gendered people was sexist and a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. She then ruled that the Declaration of Independence was discriminatory and unconstitutional in its claim that "all men are created equal" and "Governments are instituted among Men." The judge ordered the National Archives to surrender its copy of the signed Declaration of Independence within 30 days. All public and private schools and other educational institutions subject to Title IX will be required to have faculty, staff, and students sign a notarized agreement binding them not to synecdochally use the words, "man" or "men," in violation of the judge's ruling.
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