The Feminization of the American Male

Recently, the CBMW blog hosted an article by Randy Stinson entitled “The Feminization of the American Male From Top to Toe.” In this article, Stinson criticizes Tony Glenville’s recent book, 2006 Top to Toe: A Comprehensive Guide to the Grooming of the Modern Male, with these words: “I was reminded once again how determined our culture is to make men more like women.” Stinson ends his article with these thoughts:

“Men reading Glenville's book will only be encouraged in their sinful tendency to look out for themselves. If men are focused on such trivial things as dry skin and pampering themselves with long baths, it will be all the more difficult to expect them to lead, provide, and protect. There may be a day when Lowe's and Home Depot have entire aisles dedicated to moisturizers and skin creams for that weathered carpenter. There may be rows of scented bubble bath for that overworked mason. But if the church continues to follow the culture, we will have plenty of 'Top to Toe' men, able to shop with the best of them at Bath and Body Works, but unwilling and unable to fulfill the Gospel demands that require toughness, self sacrifice, and self-neglect. We do not need prettier boys. We do not need softer men. What we need is a church culture that will call boys and men to lives of self sacrifice as exampled by the picture of Christ in Ephesians 5 who loved the church and gave himself for her to his own neglect and sacrifice. What we need are pastors who will boldly preach about and press for an ethos in their churches that expects this type of behavior from their men. What we need is a church culture that will require boys and men to do hard things, to cultivate toughness, resilience, and courage, top to toe” (Retrieved on 7/30/08 from http://www.cbmw.org/Blog/Posts/The-Feminization-of-the-American-Male-From-Top-to-Toe).

What distresses me the most about what Stinson writes is his strong inference that if one is focused on moisturizers, skin creams, and bubble bath, then one is feminine. In other words, one is a woman. The inference is that women can be (and are) focused on their outward appearance while men should be focused on self-sacrifice, self-neglect, and fulfilling the Gospel. That women are to do the “easy things” while men are to do the “hard things.” That women are to shrink with fear while men are to face life courageously.

I’m not sure that this underlying message is what Stinson intended to communicate, but it is inherent in what he wrote. What makes me sad is that his message of self-denial is one that is needed by the entire Christian Church (not just the men) and that both men and women are called by Christ to deny themselves, take up their crosses, and courageously follow our Commander-in-Chief, the Lord Jesus Himself. How much better might his message be if he were more focused on the spiritual aspects of being a Christian and less on whether or not men’s behavior might somehow give them girlish cooties.

In a recent blog, Mike Seaver (a complementarian pastor) posits ten questions for egalitarians (for a complete reading of this blog, please reference http://rolecalling.blogspot.com/2008/07/semi-pragmatic-less-theological-open.html). Although I responded to the ten questions, for me the questions themselves (the construct) was more revealing and more thought-provoking than their individual contents. In other words, the worldview from which the questions arose brought a question to my mind that---at least to me---seems to be more piercing that the content of each question.

In the questions, Pastor Seaver seems to be approaching life from the viewpoint of being male. In other words, for him the beginning of all things is his maleness. Another blog from the CBMW website offered this comment: "If you meet Christ, you will meet the greatest of all men" (retrieved from http://www.cbmw.org/Blog/Posts/Biblical-Manhood-and-the-Role-of-Mentoring on 7/25/08). Laid side by side (Pastor Seavers' blog and this comment by Dr. Peter Schemm, Jr.), I suddenly realized that the worldview of egals and comps might be completely different and that this difference in worldviews might be part of why we are so far apart doctrinally.

Take Dr. Schemm's statement: "If you meet Christ, you will meet the greatest of all men." How do you define the last word, "men"? I would define it as "human being." But for Dr. Schemm (and I believe for Pastor Seaver), the definition would be "male." I thought that this difference might reveal something very important. So I went to talk to my husband (who is obviously male) and asked him, "Do you see yourself as a Christian first or as a man first? In other words, which is more foundationally "you," being a man or being a Christian?"

And I think that becomes the issue. You see, I don't see myself first as a woman and then as a Christian. Rather, I see myself as a Christian who happens to be a woman, the woman part being much more incidental and unimportant. I see the woman part as being more of my fleshly nature which needs to pass away and my Christian part as being that which needs to become more Christ-like everyday. However, I think that comps see themselves as foundationally gendered; that their gender is something which is so inherently them that they must reclaim it; that when they are saved to a new life, they are saved as a male-Christian or a female-Christian and not simply as a Christian. And so, Jesus coming as a male becomes very important.

I thought about that. To be honest, it doesn't matter to me that Jesus came as a male. He could have come as a female and I wouldn't have reacted any differently to Him. There is a sense of genderlessness (for me) in God, God Who embodies all of both genders and who created both genders in His image. And so, when I read Dr. Schemm's statement---"If you meet Christ, you will meet the greatest of all men"---I read "If you meet Christ, you will meet the greatest of all people." Jesus is my role model. I am charged, as a believer, to imitate Him in every way. If, as a role model, He is decidedly male, then, as a believer, I am called to "imitate" maleness. Or I am left without a role model to imitate.

I choose to imitate Him!

I first sung The Messiah when I was a teen. Since then, I’ve sung, directed, and studied this glorious music more than a dozen times. Of all the music written by a person, some of this is the most wonderful.

Last night I stumbled across a Christian radio station and heard the familiar sounds of the organ introduction to the “Hallelujah Chorus.” I love that song! I was excited to hear it again . . . until I heard the voices. It took me a few moments to realize because the melodies were the same. You see, the “Hallelujah Chorus” is actually a four-part counterpoint, four ranges of voices singing similar phrases, but at different times. They all begin together and then the sopranos head off with a glorious phrase while the tenors, altos, and basses join in at different times and at different pitches.

Only the sopranos . . . and the altos . . . were missing. It was an arrangement for an all male chorus.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I like all-men singing groups: quartets, choruses and the like. But there was something tremendously missing in the singing of the “Hallelujah Chorus” without the women’s voices. The glorious soaring into the rafters, the gentle middle voices. It wasn’t the same to have men sing the parts (in their own range, of course). There was a tremendous dramatic and melodic element missing, even though the notes sung were the same.

It made me think about the current trend to silence women in the Church. Just as the women’s voices were “silenced” in the singing of this version of the “Hallelujah Chorus,” women’s voices (participation and leadership) are being silenced in many areas of Church life today. One almost gets the impression that women really aren’t welcomed at all except at ornamental wallflowers (and the doers of the less than glamourous church tasks).

It’s the “Hallelujah Chorus” with only male voices. I wonder if those churches realize what they’re missing?