Art of Manliness blog on the feminization of Christianity: its' relevance for Mormonism?

[flameburns623]

The Art of Manliness blog has run an extremely interesting series on the feminization of Christianity, generally. Links here:

http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/08/01/christianitys-manhood-problem-an-introduction/

http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/08/08/is-christianity-an-inherently-feminine-religion/

http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/08/22/the-feminization-of-christianity/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheArtOfManliness+(The+Art+of+Manliness)&mc_cid=d540c2b03b&mc_eid=79697a0b51

I would note that I think the LDS Church, with it's current structure and emphasis upon an all-male priesthood, perhaps avoids some of the pitfalls of such feminization. 

For one thing, I think the role of Christ as a Leader and as a Standard-Bearer, rather than as a confidante and even as a Lover, get played up more in Mormonism. The 19th Century struggles of Saints during persecution and on the frontier lead us to talk more of the heroic, "manly" virtues than other Christian churches might. 

Given these considerations, I would question whether extending the Priesthood to women would be healthy for the LDS Church.This, although I do favor greater roles for women in the Church where proper and possible. 

Thoughts?

Edited August 27, 2016 by flameburns623

[juliann]

Luv ya, Flameburn. But oh my gosh. There is a word for people who write anti-woman articles like these. Heaven forbid that any womanly virtues should seep into Christianity, the last male bastion against that, eh?

Quote

Among men who are committed Christians, why do they seem to be more effeminate, on average, than the male population as a whole? As Murrow puts it, what is it about “Christianity, especially Western Christianity, that drives a wedge between the church and men who want to be masculine”?

Does this even deserve comment?

[Jeanne]

Shoot!!  I thought the topic meant I would be seeing pictures of men!  What a bummer...

All I can say is I am from farm country..you wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley with some of the priesthood holders in my former ward,

[PeterPear]

I'll tell you of some feminization.

A PhD with an emphasis in Women's Studies once taught a Gospel Doctrine Sunday School Class on Joseph of Egypt, then gave her personal opinion that the reason Potiphar's wife chased Joseph was because she was being ignored by her husband. 

Ha ha ha!

There was no mention by her of Joseph's integrity and faithfulness in remaining chaste and his subsequent blessings because of it......nor of being sexually-harrassed by his employer - a favorite topic of Women's Studies.

[The Nehor]

The average Christian male when he goes out in public.

This is why he hides in churches.

[The Nehor]

5 hours ago, PeterPear said:

I'll tell you of some feminization.

A PhD with an emphasis in Women's Studies once taught a Gospel Doctrine Sunday School Class on Joseph of Egypt, then gave her personal opinion that the reason Potiphar's wife chased Joseph was because she was being ignored by her husband. 

Ha ha ha!

There was no mention by her of Joseph's integrity and faithfulness in remaining chaste and his subsequent blessings because of it......nor of being sexually-harrassed by his employer - a favorite topic of Women's Studies.

Give her a break. Sunday School is the only time she can use her degree. It is not like it is called for much when she is at work flipping burgers. 

Edited August 28, 2016 by The Nehor

[mapman]

Anyone worried about "feminization" is clearly concerned more about performance than reality. The reality is that you don't have to do anything to be a man, it's a matter of personal identity. The only thing that you are at risk of losing is the fantasy of the "real man," who isn't really anything like how real men are, or at least not how they should be. The beauty of Christianity is that it teaches us that all people, man or woman, need to do the same thing to be a good person: deny these idols and fantasies and try to become like Christ, getting rid of the natural man/woman.

Edited August 28, 2016 by mapman

[BCSpace]

I have to agree that the Church has become over feminized.  Right at the top of the list: one usually sees only one aspect of Christ, the 'weak' one, the only one females can tolerate, presented in Church.  Now before you say "Yes well, Blessed are the meek...." take a good long look and ask yourself why we can't have robust discussion and debate in Church?  It's because women, by and large, can't tolerate it (and a bunch of feminized men as well).  The meekness of Christ presented because of female intolerance is NOT the meekness of the Biblical Christ.

Look also to the 'social programs' of the Church.  Home/Visiting teaching?  Long meetings?  Now wait a minute!  Didn't JS and BY stand at the pulpit for hours on end?  Yes they did.  But guess what?  It was fire and brimstone and that is why a man can tolerate, and even enjoy, such things.

I'm sure you can think of more et. al.....

Now before you women start brawling (Proverbs 25:24), there is an erroneous perception in the Church that women are somehow more spiritual than men.  Obviously not true but men themselves lend credence to that abominable notion because we ourselves are not doing our duty.  If we were, the women of the Church would not be dictating the 'social programs' of the Church.  Because we men are not doing our duty, the leaders of the Church know it is the women where the strength of the Church lies hence the Church is tailored for them.

Now the Church is ready to be led by men again, but we have to get off our duffs and lead our families in FHE and family prayer etc. and also go out into the world and combat SJW's and the like to regain our honor.  The women will be excited because despite all their intolerance of things we men prefer, women above all, prefer a real man who does his duty. And you don't even have to be a Peter Priesthood to do it (women really don't like those just as men really don't like Molly Mormons).

Though I was a bit tongue in cheek here, I'm also dead serious.

 

 

Edited August 28, 2016 by BCSpace
grammar

[BCSpace]

7 hours ago, PeterPear said:

I'll tell you of some feminization.

A PhD with an emphasis in Women's Studies once taught a Gospel Doctrine Sunday School Class on Joseph of Egypt, then gave her personal opinion that the reason Potiphar's wife chased Joseph was because she was being ignored by her husband. 

Ha ha ha!

There was no mention by her of Joseph's integrity and faithfulness in remaining chaste and his subsequent blessings because of it......nor of being sexually-harrassed by his employer - a favorite topic of Women's Studies.

Didn't you know that it's impossible for a woman to sexually harass a man?  She's just acting out against his privilege.

 

[mapman]

Wow. Some of these comments are disgusting.

Edited August 28, 2016 by mapman

[Calm]

32 minutes ago, BCSpace said:

I have to agree that the Church has become over feminized.  Right at the top of the list: one usually sees only one aspect of Christ, the 'weak' one, the only one females can tolerate, presented in Church.

 

Aren't you cute.

[BlueDreams]

1 hour ago, BCSpace said:

I have to agree that the Church has become over feminized.  Right at the top of the list: one usually sees only one aspect of Christ, the 'weak' one, the only one females can tolerate, presented in Church.  Now before you say "Yes well, Blessed are the meek...."

Actually my reaction was more like WTH...followed closely with another expletive two letters to the left of the H on a keyboard. I would say this was tongue and cheek, but I was pretty serious as my mouth dropped in incredulity. 

 

With Lady-dainty expletives (because I can't tolerate the hard stuff...and because I don't know if this flies with the moderators (they're probably women)),

BD

[BlueDreams]

On 8/26/2016 at 11:37 PM, flameburns623 said:

thoughts?

I'm not sure if I have too many. The basic premise that these authors are promoting is a little weird to me to begin with. And I say this as a person who has a thing for more rugged men (well, a man at times) and grew up with a household of 6 younger brothers and another with 2 more...so I have 8 bros. All but one played sports. I think I've mentioned that I have a picture of two of my brothers shooting each other with air soft guns. And still.....this is weird. It's glorifying the ultra-male image. And by doing so it's also making huge generalizations about what has constituted masculinity through varying cultures. 

Having focus on masculine traits, just as a heavy emphasis on traditionally feminine traits in an individual has it's problems. What i've seen in my peoples is a lot of emotional constipation. They have emotions, they just struggle to express them...minus one bro. Showing them can be a weakness and weaknesses are intolerable.

To me Christ indicates what a man should be -- balanced. And really the person we all should be. I would have a problem if our church focused to much on the characteristics of Christ these articles are hounding on. I also have a problem with hyper-focusing on love without boundaries, tenderness with no capacity for strictness at times, calling a spade a spade moments as well as reaching with compassion, etc. In this Jesus, to me, both extremes in gender roles should be questioned. Both extremes need to give way to who Christ desires them to be.

With luv,

BD 

    

[flameburns623]

11 hours ago, juliann said:

Luv ya, Flameburn. But oh my gosh. There is a word for people who write anti-woman articles like these. Heaven forbid that any womanly virtues should seep into Christianity, the last male bastion against that, eh?

Does this even deserve comment?

Respectfully: I'm thinking you did not read the links, certainly not with any degrer of care. 

The point of the articles is that Christianity has largely been a bastion of femininity for over the past thousand years, with women outnumbering men at rates approaching three to one in some cases.

And this despite the fact that nearly all Christian bodies have, until the mid-20th Century, excluded women from many pastoral & leadership roles. 

The very first article discusses how other world religions manage to maintain rough parity in participation between the genders. IOW, Hinduism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, etcetera, have far less of a gender gap than does Christianity; while men slightly outnumber women in Islam.

These days, denominations with widespread female clergy and hierarchs (the chief example given was the Church of England), are coming to have congregations comprised of upwards of 90% women.

Yet, for the first 1200 or so years (so nearly we can tell), Christianity ALSO had roughly equal appeal for both women and for men.

The blog author took some pains to define what he meant by the expression "feminization": and that he was not suggesting there is anything wrong with feminine values or virtues. Only that in an institution where such virtues or values predominate to the exclusion of masculine counterpart values and virtues, men will lose interest. And will stay away in large numbers. 

In reading the articles (particularly the concluding article), it occurred to me that Mormonism manages to straddle that gender gap better than most Christian bodies. .

While the Relief Society has been an often ground-breaking vehicle for encouraging strong women, the Priesthood has been a place where faithful men could still be men. WITHOUT dishonoring women or womanhood in the process. 

This evening's Stake Priesthood meeting brought home that fact, again, as it told the story of three young men whose efforts enabled many Saints to cross a half-frozen river--at sacrificial cost to those three young men, who apparently perished as a consequence.

Art of Manliness has not carried a reputation of being an "anti-woman" blog. It has seldom addressed specifically religious issues before, to my recollection.

Juliann: it is tangential to this discussion, but you might find this AoM podcast ( by a woman psychologist) more to your liking:

 http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/08/26/podcast-229-how-men-and-women-socialize-differently/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheArtOfManliness+(The+Art+of+Manliness)&mc_cid=7e5f3eaa18&mc_eid=79697a0b51

Edited August 28, 2016 by flameburns623
Some typos, some clarifying insertions

[Bernard Gui]

Maybe this is why Church men's sports often get out of hand.... It's the only place Mormon men get to let it all hang out and let go of all those repressed emotion and aggression. Usually ends up with the Stake President cancelling the season and the brethren joining city leagues. In pioneer days there was plenty of excitement and danger to keep the brethren feeling manly. See my quote below.... It says it all. Handles or blades?

 

Edited August 28, 2016 by Bernard Gui

[PeterPear]

To continue...the same Gospel Doctrine teacher with the PhD in English with an emphasis in Women's studies, earlier taught the lesson on Abraham - before the her lesson on Joseph.

On explaining Abrham's multiple wives, she gave her opinion they were "whores" - her exact word.

yeah.

Everyone in the class sat there. I piped up and asked her if she considered BY's wives to be whores. I forget her answer. It's not important. It was amusing. This was in a Singles Ward. Lol. Maybe that had something to do with it. Ha ha ha.

I've never before or after heard the like.

 

What does this have to do with the topic?  Stop spreading gossip.

[The Nehor]

4 hours ago, BCSpace said:

I have to agree that the Church has become over feminized.  Right at the top of the list: one usually sees only one aspect of Christ, the 'weak' one, the only one females can tolerate, presented in Church.  Now before you say "Yes well, Blessed are the meek...." take a good long look and ask yourself why we can't have robust discussion and debate in Church?  It's because women, by and large, can't tolerate it (and a bunch of feminized men as well).  The meekness of Christ presented because of female intolerance is NOT the meekness of the Biblical Christ.

Women can only tolerate weak aspects of Christ? Wow! That is quite condescending and blatantly untrue. And then those weak men losers who cannot handle tough Christ. Yeah.

4 hours ago, BCSpace said:

Look also to the 'social programs' of the Church.  Home/Visiting teaching?  Long meetings?  Now wait a minute!  Didn't JS and BY stand at the pulpit for hours on end?  Yes they did.  But guess what?  It was fire and brimstone and that is why a man can tolerate, and even enjoy, such things.

I'm sure you can think of more et. al.....

So the apostles who only rarely give fire and brimstone talks are actually wimps?

4 hours ago, BCSpace said:

Now before you women start brawling (Proverbs 25:24), there is an erroneous perception in the Church that women are somehow more spiritual than men.  Obviously not true but men themselves lend credence to that abominable notion because we ourselves are not doing our duty.  If we were, the women of the Church would not be dictating the 'social programs' of the Church.  Because we men are not doing our duty, the leaders of the Church know it is the women where the strength of the Church lies hence the Church is tailored for them.

And lets condemn the other gender too while we are at it. If only we had men but not the sissy effeminate secretly-transvestite panty-wearing weak men that cannot be bothered to go home teaching and preach hellfire and brimstone in the family rooms of their assigned families.

4 hours ago, BCSpace said:

Now the Church is ready to be led by men again, but we have to get off our duffs and lead our families in FHE and family prayer etc. and also go out into the world and combat SJW's and the like to regain our honor.  The women will be excited because despite all their intolerance of things we men prefer, women above all, prefer a real man who does his duty. And you don't even have to be a Peter Priesthood to do it (women really don't like those just as men really don't like Molly Mormons).

Yeah, the one thing women over are men who go off the handle in glorious internet battles with Social Justice Warriors to retain their honor. It is as impressive as morons whining about how the guy at the bar "disrespected" them.

4 hours ago, BCSpace said:

Though I was a bit tongue in cheek here, I'm also dead serious.

Please don't beat your chest so hard or you might bruise it.

[The Nehor]

4 hours ago, mapman said:

Anyone worried about "feminization" is clearly concerned more about performance than reality. The reality is that you don't have to do anything to be a man, it's a matter of personal identity. The only thing that you are at risk of losing is the fantasy of the "real man," who isn't really anything like how real men are, or at least not how they should be. The beauty of Christianity is that it teaches us that all people, man or woman, need to do the same thing to be a good person: deny these idols and fantasies and try to become like Christ, getting rid of the natural man/woman.

Male identity is a bit of a problem in westernized cultures. It is more about expectations then reality. The standard masculine drive to win women, feed a family through labor, and defend your household has fallen away a little bit and many young men are confused as to what they are supposed to be doing to "be a man". There is no feeling of having arrived for many.

[The Nehor]

1 hour ago, Bernard Gui said:

Maybe this is why Church men's sports often get out of hand.... It's the only place Mormon men get to let it all hang out and let go of all those repressed emotion and aggression. Usually ends up with the Stake President cancelling the season and the brethren joining city leagues. In pioneer days there was plenty of excitement and danger to keep the brethren feeling manly. See my quote below.... It says it all. Handles or blades?

I went and sparred yesterday to work out my aggression. I heartily recommend the practice. If you are not finding activities to vent aggression you are doing it wrong. Fix it.

[Gray]

17 hours ago, juliann said:

Luv ya, Flameburn. But oh my gosh. There is a word for people who write anti-woman articles like these. Heaven forbid that any womanly virtues should seep into Christianity, the last male bastion against that, eh?

Does this even deserve comment?

I wonder how the author is defining the word masculine? Old Andrew Dice Clay bits?

[flameburns623]

1 hour ago, Gray said:

I wonder how the author is defining the word masculine? Old Andrew Dice Clay bits?

See the second installment as cited in my OP

The Masculinity of Christianity

The inherent femininity and weakness of Christianity posited by Nietzsche and others has not gone unchallenged. Defenders of the masculinity of Christianity don’t deny that many of the tenets of the Christian gospel are “soft” in nature, but argue that they are joined by an equal, if not greater number, of “hard” virtues and strenuous requirements that align with the code of manhood in many respects. In fact, there are those, likeCatholic scholar Leon J. Podles who argue that the way of Christ isprimarily masculine in nature — that “Women can participate in this spiritual masculinity, but men could be expected to have a greater natural understanding of the pattern.”

Podles and others say that while the loving, merciful, nurturing, gentle side of Jesus represents one part of his character, he has another, often ignored side — a lion in contrast to the better-known lamb — marked by traits like justice, boldness, power, and self-mastery. This is Jesus the carpenter, the desert camper, the whip-cracker.

The man who said to “judge not” roundly condemned his critics.

The compassionate healer who championed children, cleansed the temple in a righteous rage.

The gentle sage who spoke of lilies and sparrows, rebuked his friend as Satan incarnate, and declared he had not “come to bring peace but a sword.”

The teacher who admonished his followers to “love thy neighbor as thyself” called Gentiles dogs, and at first reserved the teaching of his message for his own people. And while those “others” were eventually able to fully adopt his message, the Christian gospel hardly disavowed its “us vs. them” ethos; Jesus had no problem drawing lines between the sheep and the goats — those who were part of his tribe, and those who had no place in it. All would be welcome, as long as they lived a strenuous code of ethics.

Sharp of tongue, deft in debate, and unafraid of conflict, challenging the status quo, or causing offense, Jesus was anything but safe and predictable. Far from hiding in private solitude, and playing it small, Jesus was a public figure, a revolutionary who rigorously confronted the establishment, and who preached such a confrontational and audacious message that he was ultimately killed for it . . .

[halconero]

I think exploring the blog without listening the relevant podcast leaves a bit of nuance and context out of the picture. I'm a fan, and I say this as someone who isn't into the whole hyper-masculine, red pill, alt-right scene that the title of the blog could easily be associated with.

In the podcast there's little concern about Christianity feminizing males. Rather, it focuses on whether or not it provides the spaces, rituals, meetings, and interactions that along males to explore and discover their gender. Really, it advocates activities tailored to young men which allow them to discover answers to the questions "what does it mean to be a man?", or more specifically "what does it mean to ME to be a man?"

The guest speaker relates an experience when travelling through Syria (prior to the war) as part of an aid group and being asked about his family. When he shared his son's name he was given the name "Abu John" meaning "father of John." When they realized that he had never properly celebrated his fatherhood they through a giant party for him, dancing, singing, eating, and drinking all night as men to celebrate this. It hit him then that there were few ample rituals, rites of passage, or moments which could celebrate and honour a boy's passage into puberty, fatherhood, adulthood, etc.

I think it's important for all genders that they provide moments of passage, intimate times where men get explore manhood. I think the same should be done for women. I don't think the standard lesson in YM or YW is sufficient, and a lot more should fall on the shoulders of parents. I don't remember specific YM's lessons growing up, but I do remember my dad sitting down with me to explain what the Aaronic priesthood meant in my life, or being taken camping for the weekend with him where we ate junk food, he talked to me about sex and dating, and we went fishing. I remember getting together with my male teenage friends and sitting outside with our young men's leader, an old NHL hockey player as he reminisced about old fights, building things with his own hands, how he met his wife, and what he had learned about raising a family growing up.

These are the moments the Art of Manliness podcast explores. It's most certainly not anti-feminist, and advocates the same for women. It's not even about reinforcing gender roles. What it argues is that in most Euroamerican religions their is a decreasing role for the celebration and opportunity of gender self-discovery. I would say we have ample opportunities in the Church, with advancements in the Priesthood, young-adult endowments, the example of Eve (not just in terms of Motherhood, but her valiant use of agency), etc. I think we could be doing more to utilize these stages as significant developmental moments.

[Gray]

30 minutes ago, flameburns623 said:

See the second installment as cited in my OP

 

 

Sounds pretty much like Andrew Dice Clay. I suppose that's one way to define masculinity, but it's probably dysfunctional.

Edited August 28, 2016 by Gray

[SteveO]

I think a lot of society's ills could be cured with more compassion, understanding, and meekness...I don't think we need more pickup trucks, beards, beer, guns, or bad country music. To me, that tough guy culture that gave us Donald Trump is everything wrong with the country today....I used to be an infantryman in the army and worked on oil rigs for 2 1/2 years...I've seen it all, and trust me, we don't want that stuff in the church.

[halconero]

1 minute ago, SteveO said:

I think a lot of society's ills could be cured with more compassion, understanding, and meekness...I don't think we need more pickup trucks, beards, beer, guns, or bad country music. To me, that tough guy culture that gave us Donald Trump is everything wrong with the country today....I used to be an infantryman in the army and worked on oil rigs for 2 1/2 years...I've seen it all, and trust me, we don't want that stuff in the church.

Trust me, that's not what the person in the podcast is advocating. They're arguing for the development of a virtuous, compassionate, confident, humble, and spiritually driven individual.