Masculinity is one of those topics that I end up wondering about.  I mean, the above video is the second in a series on masculinity in the Church.  It has complaints about the feminist turn many Churches have taken and how this discourages male participation.

I don’t like the feminist turn many of our parishes have but one woman commenting is just another female voice and not very influential.  I also dislike the poor quality of the music, liturgical abuses and lack of male participation.  I do what I can to urge better music, following the rubrics and urging male influence.  Trouble is, women cannot make men participate.  We haven’t got that power or there would be a lot more Deacons and more men in the pews!

I guess what bugs me is this: I had to go to the documents and educate myself on what the Church actually teaches because the Bishops and Priests had fallen down on the job.  Why is it so hard for MEN to do the same?

If men hadn’t abdicated their roles, would women have moved into those positions?  As a kid, most of what happened at Church was run by women.  That was 40 years ago.  Is it worse today?  Only to the degree that actual orthodox teaching is harder to come by than it was back then.

Why is it the fault of women that men abandoned masculinity?  Why is it the fault of women that men do not participate at Church?

I don’t think it is the fault of women.  I think it is the fault of the men because nobody kicked them out– they left.  Nobody told them to ignore Church teaching and choose to be ignorant of it– they chose to skip studying.  Nobody forced them to do anything.  They chose to do nothing.

Why did they not get involved?  They blame the women.  Well, I think they found it easier to quit than to become mature men and BE MEN within the Church.  I think it was more fun to admire the rogues in the movies than to admire St. Joseph or St. Augustine, or St. Thomas Aquinas, Or St. Benedict, or St. Josemaria Escriva.

I think it was more fun to duck the effort of learning orthodox Catholic teachings so they could have a happy ignorant malformed conscience that let them be OK with trying to talk girls into bed with them.

I think it was more fun to go to the football games than to go to Mass.

I think it was more fun to leave all the hard work of keeping a parish running to the women.

So guys, stop whining about feminist theology– go learn the REAL theology of the Church and get in there are fight for it!

Stop whining about how feminine Church has become and go BE MEN there.  Stop whining about women complaining and be men enough to stand firm and kindly refuse to budge from orthodoxy.

Will some women be upset when men step up? Yup, they have been without male involvement for so long it will feel strange and uncomfortable to many of them.  Listen to them and think about what is valid in what they say and then do the right thing.  It is manly to listen, consider and make decisions.  Some of those decisions may not be popular.  Some will be totally wrong.  It doesn’t matter as much as the fact of being involved.

But stop bitching like a bunch of women and DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.