Now in my late 70s and the veteran of 56 annual performance reviews by a beautiful and highly intelligent Catholic female, I feel licensed to offer a few thoughts on the nature of an acceptably “Christian man,” married variety.
In no special order, he must be: a fruitful provider; a good dad; fun, within traditional moral parameters; and an endearing but stubbornly long-term construction project. This last trait is deceptively vital. It keeps even the most gifted, crafty, and impatient Christian wife engaged for the duration. The reason why should be obvious. The perfect husband is always just a few (dozen) well-meaning tweaks away from perfection – if he would only listen.
So much for humor. In the real world, the Christian man needs, above all, to be faithful: faithful to his wife and children, faithful to his Church, and faithful to Jesus Christ. No exceptions. No excuses. No escape clauses. Fidelity matters. This is the Big One.
There’s more to becoming a man, of course. Check out the relevant comments here of a great Catholic pastor; Philadelphia’s emeritus archbishop, Charles Chaput. Note the 22 rules for a Christian man’s conduct that he borrows from Erasmus. Note, too, his reflection on the history and essence of Christian knighthood. His whole talk is worth branding on the masculine heart – but especially its closing thought: “Maleness, brothers, is a matter of biology. It just happens. Manhood must be learned and earned and taught.”
How does a young man do any of that? Let’s start with a few simple facts: Mothers shape the early lives of their sons. Wives anchor their husbands in reality and purpose. But in the end, men are made better men by the example and friendship of other, better men.
Over the space of my lifetime, American culture has recognized the dignity of women more fully than ever before and created fresh avenues for their leadership in dramatic new ways. As a man with an extraordinary wife, daughter, and granddaughters, I can welcome that enthusiastically – absent the anarchic sex and homage to unborn child-killing “rights.”
But in the process, the same culture has too often neglected and even deliberately debased the formation of young men. And that has ugly consequences. “Toxic masculinity” isn’t fixed by effeminizing young males. The result of that mistake is a bumper crop of drones, Peter Pans, predators, porn addicts, and Lost Boys; in other words, a shortage of good, unselfish men of virtue, trained to provide and protect. Which is the pressing problem we now face.
So how do we deal with it?
Exactly 900 years ago, a new religious order of fighting men took root in the Holy Land, the “Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon.” They’re better known to history as the Knights Templar. The animating core of the Templars, as the archbishop stressed in his remarks above, was a uniquely demanding form of love; one urgently needed by the times: “to build a new order of new Christian men, skilled at arms, living as brothers, committed to prayer, austerity, and chastity, and devoting themselves radically to serving the Church and her people, especially the weak.”
He described the continuing value of the Templars’ spirit for today’s different (but not so very different) modern world with these words:
[Living] the Gospel involves a very real kind of spiritual warfare; a struggle against the evil in ourselves and in the world around us. Our first weapons should always be generosity, patience, mercy, forgiveness, an eagerness to listen to and understand others, a strong personal witness of faith, and speaking the truth unambiguously with love. For the Christian, violence is always a last and unwelcome resort. It’s to be used only in self-defense or in defending others. But at the same time, justice and courage are also key Christian virtues. And I think they have a special meaning in the life of the Christian man.
As it happens, the ideal of Christian knighthood has never really disappeared. It persists today in a variety of good Christian apostolates focused on rebuilding a healthy Gospel manliness. And among the most promising (appropriately enough) is one created specifically for high school-aged young men: The Templars.
The apostolate describes itself and its mission in this way:
“Templars – Knights of the Holy Temple” is a program from Unfinished, a Catholic 501(c)3 non-profit led by many of the founding contributors of Exodus 90. Templars is committed to forming young men in the faith, wisdom, and traditions of the Catholic Church. The program is a response to the present challenges facing men, and it aims to free them through the wisdom and teachings of the Church. Today, men – particularly young men – are influenced by loneliness, pornography, consumerism, and often fatherlessness. They are the most vulnerable to the lies that pervert the Catholic understanding of manhood. Templars engages male teenagers at a transformative time in their development, between the ages of 14 and 18, when they are at their most vulnerable and when their values are being formed. The relationships and activities they invest in as brothers of the Templar Order forge a foundation for a life through Christ.
The Templars places a special emphasis on service to the parish. Its executive director, Mark Pica, is a committed and articulate young man. And its materials are excellent, notably Templars: A Pocket Guide to Christian Masculinity and Templars: Rule of the Order, both available here. The Templars has the strong support of Bishop James Wall of Gallup, NM, and various pastors across the country.
“Maleness, brothers,” to repeat what a great pastor once said, “is a matter of biology. It just happens. Manhood must be learned and earned and taught.” The Templars isn’t the only path to recovering a healthy Christian masculinity. But it’s an impressive response to a growing need. It warrants our prayers, encouragement, and much wider attention from Catholics who care about the future of our Church.
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