Catholic Candle note: The article below is part 2 of an analysis of the duties and role that God has given to men.  The first part of this article is here: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/09/26/the-duties-and-role-that-god-has-given-men/

This entire article is a “companion” article to these two articles:

❖  The one regarding men being more blamable than women or children for the ongoing destruction in civil society and in the human element of the Catholic Church.  That other article is entitled: The Crisis in Society is Caused by Unmanly Men, and can be found here: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/07/22/the-crisis-in-society-is-caused-by-unmanly-men/

❖  The article entitled: The False Principle of “Diversity and Inclusion”: https://catholiccandle.org/2022/01/05/the-false-principle-of-diversity-and-inclusion/

The Duties and Role that God has given Men – Part 2

Synopsis of the first part of this article:

In part 1, we saw that God made a hierarchy in everything.  That is, in all of reality one thing is ordered to another.

Manhood and Fatherhood are inextricably intertwined (like Womanhood and Motherhood).  Even for a man who is not called by God to be a father to children in his own family, he is still called to be a father in other ways, e.g., a priest, who is the spiritual father of a parish. 

God made man to lead and to be responsible for his family and, to one extent or another, also for civil society and for the human element of the Church.

Man’s responsibility to lead and govern comes with the obligation to lead sacrificially and for the good of those for whom God made him responsible.

Part 2

Man must Fulfill the Role for which God Created Him

We saw earlier that God’s order in creation is most perfect and that God made the most perfect possible universe.  Part of the perfection of this order is God creating men to have the authority and the responsibility of unselfishly protecting, guiding, and caring for those whom God put under their charge (their wives, children, and, perhaps, others).

Thus, we see that men are more to blame for the evil of the feminism that we see all around us.  Men are really the evil “fathers” of feminism and are more responsible for the feminist revolution than women are. 

Because man is the head of woman, it is principally man’s failure in his role and duty of manhood that gives rise to feminism.

Man’s failures of his responsibilities are of two types:

1.    He sometimes fails because he is irresponsible and lazy.  This results in him failing to be selfless and diligent in expending himself to rule, to guide, and to promote the welfare of those under his care – and to do his duty even when he does not feel like doing so. 

2.    A man sometimes fails because he is selfish and predatory.  This results in him abusing the authority that God gave him by using it for his own self-interest and advantage, instead of for the interests of those under his care.

We will look at each of these failures in turn.

Man’s Failure to do His Duty because He is Irresponsible or Lazy

A man is not only responsible for governing himself, but also for the proper order in the other members of his family (and of society to the extent part of it is under his care). 

A man commits this type of failure when he does not want to correct or guide someone who needs it and for whom he is responsible.  Although this failure can be a mortal sin, it is not as grave a sin as the second type of failure mentioned above (viz., using his authority to aggrandize himself).

Men are most to blame for disorder in their families and similarly are most to blame for disorder in society.  If we had more true men, then feminism would come to an end, and society would have more true women. 

A man who is not so evil as to promote the feminist revolution, is still to blame if he fails in his duty to diligently do his part to lead women and all of society to reject feminism (as well as other evils).  Part of a man’s duty is to govern and guide his own wife.  By failing to do this, he is derelict in his duties like a king who does not rule his kingdom because he wants to devote all his time to gambling, or the chase (e.g., foxes), or some other pastime. 

Here is how St. John Chrysostom taught this truth (preaching to the men of his congregation):

Govern your wife, and thus will the whole house be in harmony.  Hear what St. Paul says. ‘And if they [wives] would learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home’ [1 Cor. 14:35].[1]

We see here that St. John Chrysostom is reminding men that they must govern their wives so that the home and family are orderly and harmonious. 

Of course, it is not only a man’s wife that he must guide but also anyone else for whom he is responsible – most commonly his children.  We see an example of this duty being breached in the first book of Kings, where God says concerning Heli:

I will judge his house for ever, for iniquity, because he knew that his sons did wickedly, and did not chastise them.

1 Kings, 3:13 (emphasis added).

Besides a man’s responsibility for his wife and children, he might have various responsibilities for leading society (or part of society) in some other way.  He must use his authority and carefully fulfill his responsibility in order for society to be orderly and harmonious.  This is why Pope St. Pius X admonished men that:

In our days more than ever, the greatest strength of evil men is the cowardice and weakness of those who are good.[2]

When men fail to fulfill their duties to their families or to society, – and most men are failing in our times – it causes chaos and strife in society.  So, it is plain that men are most to blame for the problems in society that we see all around us.

The Second Way a Man can Fail in His Duty to Care for those in his Charge is by being Selfish and Predatory.

In the Charles Dickens novel, Nicholas Nickleby, there is a memorable example of a man using his authority for his own selfish advantage.  This novel depicts an English country schoolmaster, Squeers, who uses his authority over his students for his own advantage, instead of selflessly seeking to benefit his students, as he should have.  Below, Schoolmaster Squeers explains to his new assistant schoolmaster, Nicholas Nickleby, how he “teaches” his students:

‘This is the first class in English spelling and philosophy, Nickleby,’ said Squeers, beckoning Nicholas to stand beside him.  ‘We’ll get up a Latin one, and hand that over to you.  Now, then, where’s the first boy?’

‘Please, sir, he’s cleaning the back-parlor window,’ said the temporary head of the philosophical class.

‘So he is, to be sure,’ rejoined Squeers.  ‘We go upon the practical mode of teaching, Nickleby; the regular education system. C-l-e-a-n, clean, verb active, to make bright, to scour.  W-i-n, win, d-e-r, der, winder, a casement.  When the boy knows this out of book, he goes and does it. It’s just the same principle as the use of the globes. Where’s the second boy?’

‘Please, sir, he’s weeding the garden,’ replied a small voice.

‘To be sure,’ said Squeers, by no means disconcerted.  ‘So he is.  B-o-t, bot, t-i-n, tin, bottin, n-e-y, ney, bottinney, noun substantive, a knowledge of plants.  When he has learned that bottinney means a knowledge of plants, he goes and knows ‘em. Thats our system, Nickleby: what do you think of it?’

‘It’s very useful one, at any rate,’ answered Nicholas.

‘I believe you,’ rejoined Squeers, not remarking the emphasis of his usher. ‘Third boy, what’s horse?’

A beast, sir,’ replied the boy.

‘So it is,’ said Squeers.

‘Ain’t it, Nickleby?’

‘I believe there is no doubt of that, sir,’ answered Nicholas.

‘Of course there isn’t,’ said Squeers.  ‘A horse is a quadruped, and quadruped’s Latin for beast, as everybody that’s gone through the grammar knows, or else where’s the use of having grammars at all?’

‘Where, indeed!’ said Nicholas abstractedly.

‘As you’re perfect in that,’ resumed Squeers, turning to the boy, ‘go and look after MY horse, and rub him down well, or I’ll rub you down.  The rest of the class go and draw water up, till somebody tells you to leave off, for it’s washing-day tomorrow, and they want the coppers filled.’[3]

This example, of course, is an appalling caricature of a man abusing his authority.  Squeers is in charge but his authority is for the good of his students, in order to teach them and to develop their minds.  Instead, he seeks only his own advantage and not their good.

This is like the importance of a judge using his authority for the sake of justice.  He might not render judgment in the way desired by those whose case is before him.  But he must not render judgment in a self-interested way (e.g., according to who pays him the largest bribes, or by inflicting harm on someone because of hatred rather than justice).

Similarly, God made a man to be in charge of his family (and, sometimes, in charge of others too).  But He gave this authority for the good of those he governs – not to be used selfishly.

So, the authority a man has over his family requires their obedience to his decisions.  This is why St. Paul commanded women:

Let women be subject to their husbands, as to the Lord.

Ephesians, 5:22

But a man must use his God-given authority for the good of those under his care.  St. Paul tells men how they must use their authority, namely sacrificially, for the good of their wives, not for their own selfish advantage:

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church, and delivered Himself up for it.

Ephesians, 5:25 (emphasis added).

When a man uses his authority for his own selfish advantage, using the levers of his power and authority to aggrandize himself, this is an abuse. 

Although a man must govern for the good of those under his care, that does not necessarily mean exercising his authority according to their preferences.  So, e.g., if a school boy told his teacher that learning to read was too hard and begged to be allowed to play during reading class, the teacher would be required to exercise his authority to have the boy learn to read.

The Proper Order: Manly Men and Womanly Women

Right-thinking people of both sexes want men to be manly men and not act like women.[4]  Thus, the most perfect man – viz., Our Lord – is the manliest of men.  St. Gregory Nazianzen, Doctor of the Church, stated the truth of Our Lord’s Manhood:

There is in Him [i.e., Christ] nothing womanly, nothing unmanly.[5]

Men must be clear-thinking, strong of will, virtuous, and strong of body, to the best of their efforts.  When a man’s body fails him due to disease or age, he must continue in virtue, in the clarity of thought, in the strength of will (and body) to the best of his ability.  The manliest thing a man can do is control himself and this is his first responsibility at any age.

To take a parallel example, just as right-thinking persons of both sexes want men to be manly, so in the same way, all right-thinking citizens want policemen to have and to exercise their authority in a manly way.  Similarly, they want policemen to be strong of body and forceful (so they can do their duty to enforce the law). 

Of course, if that policeman unjustly takes a woman’s purse (for example), this is wrong whether that policeman took her purse by abusing his authority (e.g., by ordering her to give him her purse) or by abusing his strength to take her purse because he is stronger than she is. 

The problem is not that policemen are strong and have authority.  They must have strength and authority to do their job well!  The problem would be if they abuse that strength or authority.  Such abuse does not change the fact that policemen should have manly authority and strength.  But if they abuse these things, then they are bad, are unworthy of their position, and are deserving of punishment.

When policemen abuse their authority or strength, this shows they are poor-excuses for policemen, just like a man is a poor-excuse for a man (i.e., unmanly) if he is a bully. 

The Poisonous Lies That Leftists Call “Toxic Masculinity”

As we saw above, God made men to be manly.  This is obviously true since God made creation perfect and He made men to be men, not women.  But how does this fit with the leftists’ continual condemnation of so-called “toxic masculinity”?

Here is one modern dictionary which parrots the leftist position and defines “toxic masculinity” as follows:

A cultural concept of manliness that glorifies stoicism, strength, virility, and dominance, and that is socially maladaptive or harmful to mental health[6]

Similarly, the leftists say things like this:

Traditional masculinity – marked by stoicism, competitiveness, dominance, and aggression – is, on the whole, harmful.[7]

The leftists add things like this:

Achievement, eschewal of the appearance of weakness, and adventure, risk, and violence, … these standards are damaging to mental and physical health.[8]

But God made men to be like men because that is exactly how He wants them to be, viz., manly.  The leftists say that men should stop being men and should start being like women.  For example, leftists say things like this:

To the extent that any vision of “nontoxic” masculinity is proposed, it ends up sounding more like stereotypical femininity than anything else: Guys should learn to be more sensitive, quiet and socially apt ….[9]

But God intended that men have exactly the traits of a man.  God intends a man to be strong, clear-thinking, organized, sacrificial, goal-oriented, virtuous, and dedicated to using his manhood for the work God gave to him.  A man must use his manhood to serve God and to guide and to care for those that God put under his charge.

It is certainly not manly – but rather is selfish and disgusting – for man to use his manhood to “walk all over everyone else” for his own selfish interests and to grab from them whatever he desires.  God made a man stronger to protect those who are weaker, not to abuse his strength to take advantage of them. 

This is just like the example we gave above of the policeman.  He should be a man of authority and strength but should use these for the good of those over whom he has authority.

In fact, a man who uses his greater strength of mind and body as well as his authority, for his own self-interest – to selfishly grab pleasures and wealth without regard to truth, justice, purity, and to God’s law, is a poor excuse for a man, since he does not follow his reason, which directs him to live according to virtue and not according to sin. 

A man should live according to reason.  But to live for himself alone is greatly unreasonable.  Such a man’s life of sin is most disordered and shows that such a man is really a slave to his passions and is dominated by vice. 

So, the leftists fail to make the necessary (and obvious) distinction.  The traits of manhood are good, important, and are made by God (just as are the traits of womanhood).  But a man can use those traits well, as God intends, or he can abuse them to commit sin and to abuse those under his care.  This is like the fact that a hammer is good but can be abused, e.g., if it were used as a weapon in a robbery.

So, it is not virility, strength, or dominance themselves that are “toxic”, only the way that those traits are sometimes abused.  If men are not virile and strong in character, they are not fully men, after all.

Virtuous and manly men are society’s essential protectors, guides, and managers.  Human society needs traits like these for its very preservation.  By contrast, a bad and vicious man:

➢  uses his God-given protective abilities as an armed robber, a serial killer, etc.; 

➢  uses his God-given guiding ability to guide people toward his own selfish interests; and

 

➢  uses his God-given managing ability to direct persons or society to his selfish and demonic advantage.

So, what we need to do is promote true Catholicism, holiness, and virtue so that masculinity (which is a work of God) is used for the good.[10]  And plainly, man being the way God intends him to be, viz., a virtuous and manly man, is necessary for his happiness and his success in life.  This is the opposite of the leftist lie that man being this way would be “damaging to mental and physical health”.[11]

Even most men who consider themselves “Traditional Catholic” are weak because they are products of the society in which they live.  Most men nowadays are soft and habituated to a life of ease, pleasure, and comfort.

A Man’s Duty to Learn to Be Manly and to Teach His Sons to be Manly Men

If any man were to find himself unprepared for his role in life, he must diligently prepare himself by effort, training, and practice – better late than never!  This is analogous to the duty of a woman if she is not prepared for the role for which God created her.  She must diligently learn and prepare herself when she comes to understand her duty.

A crucial part of the man’s selfless duty towards his family is his obligation to raise his sons to be able to perform well this role for which God created them.  In the years before a boy or young man has entered into the vocation to which God will call him, he is being raised in a family in which he is “apprenticed” in the “school” of manliness, especially being trained by his father.

Men’s Duty to be Paternal and Gentlemanly

So, we see that God’s Plan answers all of society’s problems.  That is, the Catholic life (with every person fulfilling his God-given responsibilities) is the answer to all of society’s ills and so we should live this Catholic life fully!

In this, we see the “recipe” for happiness: fulfilling our duties of state according to God’s Plan – viz., men living and acting their traditional and natural role as men, in the way God made them.  And in a complementary way, women acting in their traditional and natural role as women, living the womanly life that God made them to live.

As our world gets more and more irrational and absurd (as well as more pagan and immoral), we see the answer to this crisis all around us is that our future is our past (viz., Catholic Tradition), as Pope St. Pius X used to remind us:

The true friends of the people are neither revolutionaries, nor innovators: they are traditionalists.[12]

But the devil apes this genuine Catholic solution causing the strife of his own counterfeit “solutions”.  For example:

➢  Instead of a man’s duty to selflessly care and govern his family, the devil promotes feminism and the “women’s equality” movement, in which women battle for their supposed “rights” and they declare they don’t need to be under the care of their husbands; and 

➢  Instead of an employer acting as a father to his employees, acting for their good, the devil promotes the false “solution” of employees battling for their supposed rights as directed by Marxist ideology. 

Because of Original Sin, men (and women) don’t always live up to their vocations and responsibilities.  But men should show respect for women and, more than that, they should honor women, cherish them, and be chivalrous.  God gave women into the care of their men.  This is the true, natural, and Catholic way of life.  

Men should show this chivalry in many ways, large and small, e.g., changing a flat tire for a woman motorist at the side of the road, opening a door for a woman (although she is capable of opening a door herself), giving her his seat on a crowded train, offering to help her carry her heavy packages, even when she is capable of lifting them herself, etc.

Men should be courteous to women, charitable, respectful, polite, attentive, considerate, patient, thoughtful, obliging, listening well, not failing to listen because they are formulating a new comment while a woman is talking.

God made men to compete with men.  God made women to be man’s helpmate, not his competitor.  That is one reason why the Catholic Church overcame paganism to instill into a man to be a gentleman and to be gallant toward women. 

Women and girls have their own role and dignity in God’s Plan.  God did not put them on earth merely for men’s selfishness (any more than men are on earth only for women’s selfishness).  Rather, God made women to collaborate with men in the work God intends them to accomplish, in the roles for which God created them in the family.[13]

Men should treat all women as images of Our Lady.

The weightiest lesson of all comes from the law to love our neighbors as ourselves, which St. Paul applies to women (wives) in particular:

Thus, ought husbands also to love their wives as their own bodies. Who loveth his wife, loveth himself, for no one ever hated one’s own flesh (Eph. 5:28-29).

The Catholic Church has ever been the leaven which fosters the dignity of women.  This is what the Catholic Church has to say in the context of the family:

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it.

Ephesians 5:25. 

This means that, as Christ gave His Life for His Church, a husband should give/devote his life to his wife and to her true good.

Our Lord teaches us the generosity we should have for each other, and husbands for their wives: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”  St. John’s Gospel, 15:31.  Husbands should remember that their wives should be their best friends.

A man who loves much does not “count the cost” and he gladly sacrifices everything for his friend (especially his wife and children):

If a man should give all the substance of his house for love, he shall despise it as nothing.

Canticle of Canticles, 8:7.

We should take to heart also, as regards the women in our midst (and men, too), what our Holy Redeemer taught us:

As ye would that others should treat you, so do ye likewise to them.  …  So be compassionate as your Father also hath compassion.  Judge ye not, and ye shall not be judged.  Condemn ye not, and ye shall not be condemned.  Forgive ye, and ye shall be forgiven.  Give ye, and it shall be given unto you.  They shall give into your bosom good measure, pressed down and shaken together and overflowing.  For it shall be meted unto you again with the same measure wherewith ye have meted.

St. Luke’s Gospel, 12:31, 36-38.

 
Conclusion

God made man to be manly, to selflessly use his greater strength of mind and body for the good of those that God has placed under his care. 

Let men be manly and gentlemanly!