In part one of this series I explained how Malachi 2:16 is being reworked from a condemnation of divorce theft to justification for divorce theft. Thus Joel and Kathy Davisson have changed the meaning of “God hates divorce” to God hates men who can’t keep their wives happy (all emphasis in this post is mine):
Men, obey the Word: Quit dealing treacherously with your wives. Why? Because if you don’t, you are going to end up divorced and God hates divorce. We are not going to applaud you as a great man of God anymore if you cannot keep one little wife happy.
Treachery is expansively defined here to mean anything that displeases a wife. A husband’s role in this new definition of Christian marriage is to follow the instruction of his wife on how to be married, since God has provided wives with all of the knowledge when it comes to marriage. Joel and Kathy explain this in their book The Man of Her Dreams The Woman of His!
God has equipped every woman with a marriage manual in her heart, designed to instruct her husband in how to meet her unique needs.
…
It is very simple. When your wife’s marriage manual points out that you have violated her in some way, your job is to hear her heart and accept what it is that your personal marriage manual is saying to you. Your wife may not have a clue as to how to handle the household checkbook. She may not have a clue as how to run a lawnmower. What she does have is that unique marriage manual in her heart for your marriage which is given to her from God. The way that a man becomes the man that God has called him to be is to become the husband his wife needs him to be. The only way to become the husband our wife needs us to be is to read our personal marriage manual. How do read that marriage manual? We listen to her heart.
While Joel and Kathy are probably the most over the top in how they present this new view of Christian marriage, what they are teaching is the mainstream conservative Christian view of marriage. I promised in the first post to include another example of this in part two, and the example I’ll share is from Pastor Sam Powell in his post God Hates Divorce, part two (see part one here).
Pastor Powell is a bit more circumspect, but he is selling the same message as Joel and Kathy. If a wife is unhappy in her marriage, it is evidence that her husband is hateful and treacherous to her. Powell explains that God created Adam and Eve to have a perfect marriage, but because men are sinful they hate their wives and treat them treacherously. Powell claims that instead of hating divorce, God is saying men need to make their wives happy or they deserve to end up divorced:
…sin entered the world and men became treacherous, violating that harmony, hating their wives and oppressing them, rather than loving them. This should not be, especially among God’s people.
And now we get to verse 16 and see that it makes perfect sense. If you hate her that much, set her free! Be open with it. You put on one front but behind closed doors you are something else entirely. Clothe yourself with the violence that defines your life and set your wife free!
So is God condoning divorce? No. That isn’t really the point of the passage. The point is the last part of the verse: “therefore take heed to your spirit, that ye deal not treacherously.”
…He hates lying and deceit. He hates the proud, treacherous heart. He hates the entitlement mentality that says “I am; and there is none like me!” God hates the hatred that a man has for his wife, causing him to rail at her, to oppress her, to take a mistress or another wife. He hates the disharmony that wicked men cause in their home.
If you insist on treating your wife like this, set her free. It will be the only decent thing you’ve ever done.
What would be far better, though, is if you took heed to your spirit and quit treating her this way. If you refuse to do that, don’t think that God doesn’t hear the voice of your wife pouring out her tears on the altar. God hears that, and will not allow those tears to go unanswered.
Why isn’t God hearing your prayers? Why doesn’t he accept your sacrifices? Because of how you treat your wife.
If you hate her that much, set her free.
Pastor Powell then anticipates the objection to his claim that marriage vows are conditional on the wife’s happiness:
But then, you say, how will we keep our wives from leaving us? First, I have to say to you that if force and intimidation are the only tools in your arsenal to keep your marriage, then you need to reevaluate your existence as a human being.
Instead of asking that question, ask instead, “How can I make my wife WANT to stay married to me?”
Paul answers this in Ephesians 5. Love your wives, as Christ loved the church.
This is the same message as the one I quoted at the top of the post from Joel and Kathy. Make your wife happy or God says you will deserve it when she divorces you. This is likewise built on the claim that a wife will be happy if her husband loves her. Powell repeats this claim that a wife who is loved will be happy frequently in his writings on marriage. In Headship is not Hierarchy Powell writes:
…you can see a woman who is loved by her husband. She is alive, fully human, confident, and joyfully doing whatever work God has called her to with spirit and life.
Note that you could easily reword this into the language that Joel and Kathy use; the wife is a responder.
Powell explains this in more detail in his post To the Newly Married. The key to a Christian marriage, he tells us, is for the husband to learn how to make his wife happy:
This is where it gets endlessly wonderful. Women are fascinating creatures; each one created just a little different. They are almost like a puzzle to be solved… If you want a blessed and beneficial marriage, learn how to make your wife exult. What makes her tick? What does she fear? What does she dream of?
…Guys, do away with the jokes about not understanding women. You are commanded to do just that. But to do that you have to put off your own self-absorption, and figure out how to listen. Listen with your ears, with your eyes, even with your finger-tips. She’ll let you know what causes her to exult, but you have to tune in.
…Don’t try to learn about your wife from stereotypes, books (especially of the “women’s place is in the home” variety) or locker room gossip. This is your wife you are learning about and she is the only one who can show you what causes her to exult. You are on a wonderful journey of discovery together.
As Joel and Kathy say, every wife has a marriage manual written in her heart, from God.
Powell closes his advice to newly married couples by explaining that if their marriage ever becomes “stagnant”, this is a sign that the husband isn’t loving his wife enough and isn’t listening to the marriage manual in her heart. He needs to repent and learn to make her happy before she decides to divorce him:
If you have been married for a while and find your love growing stagnant, it is probably because you didn’t heed God’s command. Repent and ask your wife’s forgiveness for failing to understand her. Then start your year now. Turn the TV off. Give up boys’ nights out, and learn how to cause your wife to rejoice. It may not be too late.
See Also:
You just can’t make this stuff up. In commenting on part one, I linked to Joel & Kathy’s homepage. Take note of the t-shirts they are wearing. Her’s need to be changed to read “I’m the boss.” His needs no alterations – it is already the epitome of cuckoldry.
Pingback: Reworking Malachi 2:16 for our feminist era (part 2). | Aus-Alt-Right
This blog and its comments already contains all the content required to create an extremely successful (and lucrative) church that……*gasp*…..teaches the Bible and sticks to gender realism.
Tons of people would flock to it…
Which entrepreneur will seize the opportunity?
I saw their web site. Now I’ll never be able to unsee it. It’s a shame Kathy doesn’t have an HTML manual in her heart.
These insane goobers are actually respected among a significant number of Christians? Things are worse than I thought.
This blog and its comments already contains all the content required to create an extremely successful (and lucrative) church that……*gasp*…..teaches the Bible and sticks to gender realism.
Tons of people would flock to it…
Which entrepreneur will seize the opportunity?
When I semi-retire to Montana, I plan on making this basic idea my missionary work. I will go it alone if I have to. I have a couple of ideas for how to get a red-pill friendly church up and running, and I will also offer red-pill friendly counseling since I am a licensed psychologist. I’m not a particularly good expositor and presenter of scripture though.
So, if you like it cold. Wait about 2 1/2 years.
Good one Anon. Early polling however, shows 10 out of every 10 women refusing to attend until gender realism is abandoned.
Early polling however, shows 10 out of every 10 women refusing to attend until gender realism is abandoned.
Oh no. Not true at all.
Women are very attracted to Islam for specifically this reason. 75% of all Western converts to Islam are women.
I’m no theologian, but am pretty confident all the “spiritual leaders” referenced here by Dalrock are way off base. The message I am getting is worship your wife until she is happy. God Himself can be worshiped later. This concept has been proven dangerously wrong throughout all known history. Extreme Danger.
But, always looking for the comic relief, it is to be found in the Amazon reviews of Joel and Kathy’s book linked in the post. Who knows if they’re real? Sound real though. A sampling.
Women, 5 stars:
– “I am filled with comfort knowing I am not the bad guy in the story.”
– “Very easy read. Easy to understand and implement.”
– “When I asked my husband to read the book, he was reluctant, but I was at my wits end and if he didn’t read, I wasn’t going to speak to him any more.”
– “The Man Of Her Dreams The Woman Of His, books and subsequent ministry, with God’s Help, has SAVED our marriage.”
Men, fewer stars:
– “They basically claim the man is always the abuser and the wife’s sins are his fault. Not kidding.”
– “There have been so many great articles written on the internet about this cult which teaches women to abuse, bully, manipulate and threaten men while ignoring and twisting scripture.”
– “Do you want to be a total “beta” who your wife will never ever respect?
Do you want your wife to lead from behind while criticizing your lack of selflessness and leadership?
Do you want your wife to grow increasingly unhappy with you as you turn into a spineless bag of mush? Buy this book.”
– “What troubled me were my take aways on core assumptions in this book: The husband is always the abuser; until he gives his heart to God and listens to his wifes heart he will stay immature; His wife will always respond to him in time if he listens to her heart and meets her needs; The wife is never at fault; She will naturally repsond to his needs if she is taken care of first.”
Mangina, 5 stars:
– “Having an outrageously happy marriage centers around ephesians 5:25. Husbands loving their wife as Christ loved the church. The authors do a great job a unpacking this verse and teaching men practical tips on how to do this.”
This is my first time posting here, but I’ve been reading here with interest for a while. The comments about starting a Biblical and red-pill church caught my attention.
No need to start a new church. It already exists. As far as I have been able to tell from reading here, my church has everything this blog is looking for as far as gender roles go. The teaching we get over the pulpit is as straight and Biblical as can be, and the membership lives the talk. I’m not b bragging, we certainly have our faults like anyone does, just want to let you know there is hope and not every church has fallen for the poison that is washing over the country today.
If you are interested in hearing the kind of direct preaching we get regularly, here is a link to a recent sermon titled “The Ornament of a Meek and Quiet Spirit”
https://www.dropbox.com/s/manr4yuo7c1myza/mix_50m44s%20%28audio-joiner.com%29.mp3?dl=0
The fact is that a clear and honest following of Biblical teaching on marriage produces a completely different culture from the general climate of this country today. And there are still churches that promote that culture and keep it alive. Unfortunately we are an almost invisible minority. So I don’t know about the people flocking to it, Anon, but maybe if I get the word out here……
[D: Great to hear. Welcome Grey Man.]
@Anon: “75% of all Western converts to Islam are women.”
Circuit overload. Unable to process. Previous data indicates Western women are SIW, beholden to neither man nor God. I’m even more confused than normal.
Circuit overload. Unable to process.
Why? Some women are capable of little thought outside of the short-term pursuit of gina tingles. Since they get gina tingles from violent, authoritative men, this is obvious.
Related : Serial killers get thousands of love letters from women. Especially if the serial killer specifically killed women. Surely this is not news to you.
@Anon
I’m with you man. Should have used one of those smiley faces on it. Can’t get it to work though. Or those cool italics everyone else has figured out.
Once again I’m nearly dumbstruck that supposedly Christian leaders can read the same Bible I do and come away with the idea that all women are sinless. As a Protestant I criticize Catholics for their assertion that one woman was sinless, but these false prophets genuinely believe that ALL women are sinless… in fact – seemingly incapable of sin. Likewise, I criticize Catholics for asserting that a man can be “infallible” but again, these false prophets claim that a wife’s emotions are infallible.
HOW IS IT POSSIBLE FOR AN ADULT TO BELIEVE THIS NONSENSE – EVEN FOR A MOMENT?
If this is what my fellow Protestants are falling for, I may owe an apology to the nuns who taught my kindergarten classes all those years ago.
Some of you may recall that when I asked “Pastor” Powell if he could think of any description for what wifely rebellion might look like, he had no answer, so he made a series of absurd ad hominem attacks, called the question “creepy,” and banned me. He and those like him simply reject the Biblical assertion that women are fallen creatures every bit as much as men are.
The corollary of being incapable of sin (if a woman does anything wrong it’s some man’s fault), essentially strips women of their will, their need for salvation, and arguably their humanity. But unlike feminists who merely infantilize women, these people actually worship them. We scoff at the ancient Greeks for seeking guidance from the Oracle at Delphi about great matters, but apparently some “Christian leaders” have determined that every woman has an infallible oracle between her thighs. Not only are they not excommunicated – they have legions of followers.
How could this happen?
Lyn87,
HOW IS IT POSSIBLE FOR AN ADULT TO BELIEVE THIS NONSENSE – EVEN FOR A MOMENT?
Perhaps the definition of ‘adult’ itself is wrong. Assuming that women are ‘adults’ just because they are over 18 was probably the biggest mistake the West ever made.
so he made a series of absurd ad hominem attacks, called the question “creepy,” and banned me.
Pastorbator Powell probably spent the next day telling the church fatties that they are ‘beautiful, beautiful, beautiful’ (three times).
Being a cartoonish mangina is not enough. He has to exhibit proof of a complete lack of genuine faith.
Lost Patrol,
This link shows how use HTML codes to modify your text. I’m not sure if this WordPress platform accepts them all, but you can easily learn to italicize and make text bold.
I am recently widowed…30 years of blue pill bliss.
After my wife’s passing, I stumbled on to the red pill, via Heartiste, through a link in a comment posted at Zero Hedge.
I have since discovered Dalrock, Jim’s Blog, Rational Male, Alpha Game Plan, and a host of others.
I am now the happiest and saddest I have ever been.
I am finally alive at 60 years of age, perfecting my manly skills and building a solid relationship with a woman I would never, in my former life, have dreamed of being with.
Thank you, Dalrock, for the truth you post.
@Lyn87
”HOW IS IT POSSIBLE FOR AN ADULT TO BELIEVE THIS NONSENSE – EVEN FOR A MOMENT?”
They are under judgment.
https://empathological.wordpress.com/2013/09/13/into-the-maw-of-the-matriarchy/
@Lyn87
Also:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/05/12/christianity-faces-sharp-decline-as-americans-are-becoming-even-less-affiliated-with-religion/
As those people’s descendants fall away.
The modern American church is hopeless. Hopeless.
Like I’ve said in the past (and Rollo graciously quoted in a recent post) the only reason to go to a church is to meet young, cute girls. It is the only reason I go.
If I ever got married, there is no way my family would attend a church unless it was a small and I could vouch for the pastor and leadership. Exposing your wife to this stuff in the typical six flags over Jesus church is the fastest way to get divorced or be miserably married.
You have got to be kidding me! Heck, won’t matter much longer. Christ will indeed return, or the “modern-american-dream-happiness-doctrine-church” will implode. Over 50% of the US population is single now, and really doesn’t want to belong to a place that puts female happiness over His salvation, grace, and true hope for the world! May He only be praised.
The attacks are going to get more vicious men. The sermons and re-configuring of “what Jesus really meant……” and the driving of the real men of God who faithfully serve underground to the proverbial “catacombs” is already happening.
Despite this….the books, the podcasts, the attacks, the ‘bold n’ biblical’ pastors are speaking louder than ever to the applause and laughter of female approval from the pews at the expense of men. They still cannot ponder why any Godly, upright man would even consider marriage today.
I have stated for a bit now that MGTOW is a slow growing movement within many churches now. There are several pages dedicated to Christian MGTOW. There were none a few years back. It’s time to hold on men. Gonna be a wilder ride….and Internet censorship is coming asunder faster than I even imagined!
Get right with God. Read the word. Watch sermons by likes of Leonard Ravenhill, and repent of your sins. Come to His grace! Come for renewal! Come Lord Jesus! Come!!!
The modern American church is hopeless. Hopeles
Depends how you look at it.
If you treat it as a Sunday Morning Nightclub (i.e. a continuation of the nightlife revelry that was underway just hours earlier as Saturday Night merged into Sunday Morning), then a single man can pump and dump the church sluts.
It is not ungodly to fight evil through the agree and amplify method.
Pingback: Reworking Malachi 2:16 for our feminist era (part 2). | Reaction Times
So when the church apostatizes it is Jesus’ fault, because he is a bad husband? It follows that since women are “responders” who always respond correctly when given the correct inputs that every woman who goes to hell is the result of Christ not be the sort of Lord that inspires her infallible heart to follow Him.
Still seems like they are peddling blasphemy. As I’ve said before, feminism is really about calling God an abuser and making women the new god.
And all this time I was concerned with what the Bible was saying to me as the Holy Spirit made its meaning known. But I ignored the memo that my wife is the replacement for the Holy Spirit and her heart is the replacement canon. Should I obey God or (wo)man? Hmmm- hell on earth or hell for eternity – which should I choose?
There’s another way to look at this.
All the young bachelors can now rejoice as they’ve been given a plausible out for rejecting the “man up and marry these born-again virgins who can no longer ride the carousel” pleas.
“No, I don’t want to take the risk that I’ll fail to understand and follow her ‘marriage manual’ and end up in divorce (which God hates).”
it is interesting that Mr. Powell would say this:
“…sin entered the world and men became treacherous, violating that harmony, hating their wives and oppressing them, rather than loving them.”
because it contradicts this:
1 Timothy 2:14
And it was not Adam who was deceived by Satan. The woman was deceived, and sin was the result.
again in Ecclesiastes:
while I was still searching
but not finding—
I found one upright man among a thousand,
but not one upright woman among them all.
“The modern American church is hopeless. Hopeless.”
I am afraid this is true:
The Church’s institutionalized fornication: Cohabitation by church members
http://surburg.blogspot.in/2016/01/marks-thoughts-churchs.html
According to the author, it is very commonplace
Lost Patrol: “Should have used one of those smiley faces on it. Can’t get it to work though. Or those cool italics everyone else has figured out.”
You make cool italics by enclosing the text to be italicized in HTML “tags” — “<i>” [the opening tag] and “</i>” [the closing tag]
Once again I’m nearly dumbstruck that supposedly Christian leaders can read the same Bible I do and come away with the idea that all women are sinless.
One (compound) word: threatpoint.
The culture demands that women be idolized and indulged. Today’s “church” is nothing but the culture with a “cartoon Jesus” sticker slapped over it, patronized by people very much OF the world who, for some unfathomable reason, want their ears tickled so as to convince themselves that they can be of the world and a follower of Jesus (given that no one, including the typical pastor, reads Scripture in depth anymore, this is easy to pull off).
Any man who takes what Scripture says about marriage seriously is in deep trouble with his worldly churchian wife – pastors NOT exempted. If he insists on following the Biblical patriarchal model and insists that his wife behave in a manner prescribed by Scripture, then he’s abuser (so too, by extension, are God, Jesus, and all the apostles, but of course no one dares say this). If he’s a pastor, then his wife, while perhaps not going so far as to divorce him, will rebel against him by questioning his authority, quarreling with him, and ignoring or doing the opposite of what he directs her to do – all in front of the congregation, of courrse. It has the effect of undermining him, effectively revoking his pastoral authority. This is why pastors not only supplicate to their own wives, but demand that other men in their congregations do so to their own wives as well. They know that if they even so much as look at their wives the wrong way, all hell will break loose, a rebellion within the church by women under Mrs Pastor’s leadership breaks out, the end result being the loss of his church
Los Angeles is expanding public awareness of domestic violence: http://mynewsla.com/crime/2016/10/05/you-may-now-hit-the-bride-not-okay-garcetti-new-domestic-violence-campaign-launched/
Mayor Eric Garcetti and his wife, Amy Wakeland, launched a domestic violence awareness campaign Wednesday that subverts romantic tropes to bring home the chilling effects of abuse and controlling behavior hidden in some relationships.
So “controlling behavior” now constitutes “domestic violence”?
The purpose of the campaign is to “educate people — victims, perpetrators and every single person in this city — about what domestic violence is and what it looks like, and that’s how we’re going to break the cycle of fear,” Garcetti said.
The city has expanded its domestic violence response teams at police stations, mostly through private donations, to give extra support to those suffering from domestic violence.
Interestingly, Los Angeles’s website on domestic violence acknowledges that men too are victims: http://nodvla.org/
@Anon & Scott:
What the Church lost, a rather long time ago, was any Wisdom. From there, it’s all been downhill. It’s not been a lack of energy, work, enthusiasm or desire. It is the loss of the very Voice of the Lord telling you when to adjust what you are doing. This result from the loss of Wisdom is the loss of proper assumptions. Upon false assumptions are built theologies and institutions that are only loosely attached to the Lord, their foundations in the rocky sand.
I also firmly believe that the assumption too many Christians have that one to “solve the problem!” is to just jump in and let the Lord sort out the details. It took me a number of years to really sort out why I found that approach incredibly off-putting, and I finally realized its due to another form of “woe is me!” thinking. Yes, sometimes, the Lord uproots a Christian in a hurry, but most of the time that isn’t true. So to put all of the work upon the Lord, when one is utterly capable of doing pre-planning and groundwork is a form of “faithful laziness”. Which is really off-putting.
By all of that, I mean to say that structure & basic theology are the important details no one wants to work out early. The Western Church doesn’t work. The Romans always end up with terrible corruption & an inability to remove people. The Orthodox still have a couple of hundred years to dig out of the mess that happened because of the Communists. And the Protestants have been little more than small fiefdoms acting as social clubs for Women for 300 years. (There’s a lot to be learned from the Anabaptists & Amish, even if replicating them isn’t a great idea.)
Main things, off the top of my head, that are necessary for things to work, but that don’t come up are: 1) Under 80 people per “church”. Churches get split as they get larger. (See the Korean House Church movement.) 2) Leaders actually understand “the mystery”, not just believe it. Yeah, it’s great you believe in the Lord. We’ve all meet people that believe in Aliens having visited the Earth. Belief means very little without Wisdom. For the Christian, it’s simply “fire insurance for the Soul”, which is why so many Preachers come across like insurance salesmen. (Which might actually be an insult to insurance salesmen, frankly.)
God help us all! Look at this young woman who says she has been celibate for three years, but rode the carousel before, and then reminds others she is following God’s plan with almost no remorse for her actions. What kind of Christian man would marry this used car?
http://www.relevantmagazine.com/life/i-gave-sex-three-years-ago-heres-what-happened
”The Western Church doesn’t work. The Romans always end up with terrible corruption & an inability to remove people. ” i thought there were a lot of good people in the West like Anselm and Aquinas.
Jay and Kathy say:
To be clear, the Davissons are making two very specific claims: 1) a woman’s heart is pure and 2) a husband can read her heart like a book.
Hmmm. I’ll just leave this right here:
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? – Jeremiah 17:9 King James Version (KJV)
Ouch… that’s gotta’ hurt.
_______________________
But it’s even worse than that: they’re very coy about what “listen to her heart” and “accept what [it] says” means, but it seems indistinguishable from “Figure out what she wants and then do it.” Note that they absolve wives of the responsibility of even telling their husbands what they want – they demand that each husband “read” his wife’s “heart.” Note how cleverly that preemptively disarms the argument of a discarded man who says, “I did exactly what she said she wanted!” Nonono… that’s not good enough. It’s “”Listen to her HEART,” you dolt, not “Listen to her WORDS.””
But even if they were right about that, this is what God says about His people coming under judgement:
As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths. – Isaiah 3:12 King James Version (KJV)
Lyn87, Ilion,
Thanks guys
It has been said that I could screw up an anvil, but if this works you will have made me seem slightly smarter.
I notice that she was scrubbing clean the comments that she didn’t like. Very democratic.
Well Dalrock and Co………..
This day, the scriptures have been fulfilled in your ears
http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article106192992.html
@Grey Man –
Within the first two minutes of listening to that sermon you linked to, I had a good feeling about that church. Two reasons:
1) The pastor said “This evening”. So this church doesn’t just have a Sunday morning service; it also has Bible teaching happening in the evening. Probably Sunday evening, though Wednesday evening also seems popular. Now, some churches have a regular service on Sunday evenings, to accommodate people who might have to work on Sunday mornings, and there’s nothing at all wrong with that. But if a church has a Sunday evening service in addition to a Sunday morning service, in my experience that usually means they have good solid Bible teaching. Not always, but usually.
2) A young child was making happy noises close enough to the microphone to be heard in the background. That means that at least one family with young children not just attends the Sunday evening service, but also brings their kids along — which means that both Mom and Dad are committed enough to good Biblical teaching to want to go.
But there’s one thing you forgot to mention. Which church is it, and where? I’m living outside the U.S. so the information won’t be of much immediate use to me, but every 3-4 years I’m back in the U.S. for several months, and if I’m anywhere near your church I’d love to visit one Sunday. If for some reason you don’t want to mention the church’s name publicly, you can email me at (my first name) dot (my last name), courtesy of Gmail.
“If you refuse to do that, don’t think that God doesn’t hear the voice of your wife pouring out her tears on the altar. God hears that, and will not allow those tears to go unanswered.”
Uhhhh, correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Pastor Powell a Protestant? So what “altar” is he referring to? Does he now think he’s a Catholic or Orthodox priest, offering up to God the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass?
Because an “altar” implies the offering of a sacrifice by a priest – that’s the whole point of an altar. Animal sacrifice under the Old Law, the Blessed Sacrament under the New.
Is this clown really that confused that he doesn’t even know what religion he is?
Jeff,
While I’d like to give Mister Powell (I won’t refer to such a man as “Pastor”) the benefit of the doubt and call him “confused” about a great many things (because the alternative to being confused about all the heresy he spouts is that he is “deliberately evil”), he did not misuse the term that time. Lots of Protestants use the term “altar” to mean the area at the front of the church where people may go to pray. That space typically has places to kneel, and the invitation to go there to pray is generally referred to as an “Altar Call.”
@Jeff Strand:
Yes.
Adam Man, one of the many noteworthy comments from that “Christian” carousel rider’s article:
It wasn’t until several years later that I realized how much my drunken hookups and sex with guys I dated had both hurt my heart and persuaded me to stay in unhealthy relationships. I had given a part of myself to men who didn’t truly love me and I hadn’t respected myself enough to realize I deserved better because my body is God’s temple (1 Corinthians 6:19).
1. The men she dated hurt her heart. She’s a victim.
2. Her hookups were drunken, so she can’t be blamed. She wasn’t whoring. It was the alcohol doing the whoring. So she was doubly victimized — by the men, and by the alcohol.
3. She was in a series of unhealthy relationships. Not immoral, but unhealthy. She refuses to admit she was behaving immorally. No repentance. Even there, she claims the men persuaded her to remain in these unhealthy relationships. Not her fault. (Bad, bad men, taking advantage of this strong, independent Christian woman.)
4. She deserves better. She won’t admit that she was as immoral as these men. It’s not that she wishes she deserves better, or will strive to change her ways to deserve better. No, she already deserved better, even while drinking and whoring. She’s a temple just by being born (whereas the men, apparently, were not).
Really, why aren’t the men temples? Temples who deserved better than her. Temples that she defiled.
What a sad situation for those little children.
Incidentally: Naghmeh quit boasting about her divorce on twitter after a few of us told her to have some shame (her last outburst there was over 6 months ago). My hat’s off to the other bros who did this with me – everyone was polite and civil but free with the realtalk. I hoped at that time we’d have some small chance of encouraging her to think about what she was doing.
We shall hope that Saeed gets the max amount of time with his little boy and girl, and that she eventually makes amends for her actions.
Boxer
Something I came across. A chemistry kit for kids — with a girl on the cover: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01C6FJ994
It’s even called the We Heart Chemistry Kit.
I guess they’re trying to encourage girls to go into chemistry. Or at least, trying to encourage feminist moms to buy this for their girls.
The chemistry “experiments” seem geared toward girls, with an emphasis on pretty colors:
Project Mc2 We Heart Chemistry Kit gives you supplies and instructions to conduct fizzy, foamy, color changing chemistry experiments. Conduct 10 awesome experiments! Make ordinary powders fizz and foam, concoct a color changing mixture, a rolling wave, a color changing eruption, a glow in the dark test tube and even mix your own to see what you can create!
I’m noticing something else devious:
On the one hand, the Davisson’s are are vastly oversimplifying women in order to hold men accountable for the wife’s sin.
We are not going to applaud you as a great man of God anymore if you cannot keep one little wife happy.
So, if the wife is unhappy, then the husband is clearly at fault for not fixing such an EASY problem as keeping ONE LITTLE WIFE HAPPY.
On the other hand, Powell over-complicates women in order to hold men accountable for the wife’s sin.
Women are fascinating creatures; each one created just a little different. They are almost like a puzzle to be solved…
So, if the wife is unhappy, then it's the husband's fault for not fully appreciating her complexity and treating her like a stereotype (in Powell’s words).
This is a brilliant method of keeping men in a constant state of confusion and submission.
For the record, I would err more toward women being simple. Maintaining frame covers a multitude of sins. However, the Davissons suggest that women are simple in their sin. In reality, the sin of women is deep, if not deeper than the sin of men. It takes true discernment to understand and manage a wife’s sin. This is where blogs like Dalrock have been so valuable, and where people like the Davissons and the Powells have only served to deceive and distort.
One more thing: Powell says, …you can see a woman who is loved by her husband. She is alive, fully human, confident, and joyfully doing whatever work God has called her to with spirit and life.
This is utter bullshit. 75% of the couples I know the husband is affectionate, sacrificial, kind, (in other words, beta), and their wives are petty, nagging, outspoken, and self-centered. Beta men promote rebellious women. THAT’S the Christian marriage book the church needs.
What the heck does “fully human” mean? When I had a conversation with my aunt about headship she kept going back to “women are people too”, “women are humans”. She has had some psychology training, maybe that has something to do with it. Has anyone here ever heard someone indicate that women aren’t human? What is the implication then that causes people to constantly remind us that women ARE human? Weird.
“The Western Church doesn’t work. The Romans always end up with terrible corruption & an inability to remove people”
The Church has never worked going all the way back to Moses. The surest proof for God’s existence is we’re still around. The next-surest proof is that Original Sin is still our #1 problem.
It’s maddening. We’ve made amazing strides in every area of human knowledge with the single, specific exception of morality… and nobody recognizes that as a clue that we’re a flawed species? Least of all Pastor “Eve didn’t rebel and Adam did right to obey her”.
…
Jeff Strand@ 9:52 am:
“Is this clown really that confused that he doesn’t even know what religion he is?”
Yes. Like you and Lyn, I’ve noticed that the very criticisms we Protestants level against Catholicism are now applicable to our own leaders. Closed, ‘professional’ priesthood. Church teachings superceding clearly-worded Scripture. Willingness to ally with secular tyrants in return for worldly gain.
It seems Papism is no longer an exclusively Catholic phenomenon. In turn, that means the battle lines of Christendom are about to be redrawn.
…
“Project Mc2 We Heart Chemistry Kit … mix your own to see what you can create!”
As a kid I actually did that with my chemistry set. The, um, the stains never came out. What genius gave a young boy cobalt to play with?
@N. Vandenberg
Read that blog post. It is very true, especially in my region.
This all goes back to the ridiculous, absurd expectations we have in our society that the church takes and tries to make Christian Kosher. We want the young to live traditionally, but tell the men they have to wait until they’re 30 to get married so their future wife can earn a sufficient number of feminist merit badges before settling down. And then we wonder why it’s a disaster and people shack up during the interim.
Yeah, its probably cool for little girls. My daughter, in high school, was very active in the robotics club and engineering, but once she got out of high school that interest seems to have left her, as now all she wants to do is work her night shift job, hang out with her boyfriend and go to the movies. I think she was interested in that stuff during school because GUYS were interested in it and it made her a bit of an oddity to be a girl in those classes. I mean, she was good at what she was doing, but apparently she didn’t have interest enough in the subjects to continue studying them after high school.
@N. Vandenberg
This segment from http://surburg.blogspot.in/2016/01/marks-thoughts-churchs.html is absolute gold
“From the perspective of faith and God’s will for life, it may seem strange that such couples want a wedding in church. But in our culture a wedding is “the big show.” It is “the big party.” When it is assumed that a couple lives together before marriage, a wedding is not the start of something completely new. The wedding night holds no mystery for the couple. The wedding does not signal the beginning of life lived together. Instead the church is the stage and the pastor is a prop that is needed for “the wedding of their dreams.” The couple wants the experience of the wedding, and the church and pastor are necessary elements of this, like the dress, the flowers and the meal.”
@Lyn87,
“Once again I’m nearly dumbstruck that supposedly Christian leaders can read the same Bible I do and come away with the idea that all women are sinless. As a Protestant I criticize Catholics for their assertion that one woman was sinless, but these false prophets genuinely believe that ALL women are sinless… in fact – seemingly incapable of sin. Likewise, I criticize Catholics for asserting that a man can be “infallible” but again, these false prophets claim that a wife’s emotions are infallible.”
Catholics asserting men are infallible, I’ll have to check on.
But claiming the Virgin Mary as sinless is probably keeping the rest of the congregation in check. Who would dare raise a women to the level of Christ’s mother? It would be idolatry. Women are sinners like the rest of us.
This and the fact that priests don’t marry is probably keeping the message from being watered down too much from feminist meddling.
My two cents.
The chemistry “experiments” seem geared toward girls, with an emphasis on pretty colors:
I used to say chemistry was the science of pretty colors. That’s why I got my degree in spectroscopy.
But gee-whiz experiments do nothing to get new people interested in science.
@ rdchemist says:
October 7, 2016 at 11:57 am
“Catholics asserting men are infallible, I’ll have to check on.”
The Pope is a man, isn’t he?
RPL,
I noticed the same thing when I was reading the “I stopped being a whore three years ago” article: she paints herself primarily as a victim, with the slightest of nods toward personal responsibility.
When I read, It wasn’t until several years later that I realized how much my drunken hookups and sex with guys I dated had both hurt my heart and persuaded me to stay in unhealthy relationships. I had given a part of myself to men who didn’t truly love me and I hadn’t respected myself enough to realize I deserved better because my body is God’s temple (1 Corinthians 6:19)…”
… my first thoughts were that she focuses on her pain rather than the pain she caused, and she acts as though the men she fornicated with somehow defrauded her by not loving her – she neglects to mention that she did not love them either (not that it would have even mattered – love or not: she was not married to any of them). She also claims that she deserved better (but just didn’t realize it), but upon what does she base that assertion? Why should a whore “deserve better” than to be treated like a whore – that’s what she chose to be.
I suppose Jay and Kathy Davisson, the Osteens, Mark Driscoll, and “Pastor” Powell would say that it was the duty of those men to “read her heart” and realize that the drunk chick in the short skirt dancing on the table was really a “good girl” who was just looking for “twu-wuv” in the only way she knew how, and they – who had NOT grown up in the church – victimized her by giving her what she indicated she wanted. If only those rotten scallywags had been more Godly this could have all been avoided. /sarc
(See?… I knew there was some way to make it the fault of the men.)
One could easily make the case that her transgression was worse than that of the men, since she says she didn’t stop screwing around until her circumstances prevented it because she was on a missions trip(!) By the time you’re deep enough into the Christian scene to take six months out of your life to go on a missions trip, you MUST know that habitual drunkenness and fornication are wrong, yet there she was.. getting hammered and spreading her legs for “unworthy” men. /sigh.
Matthew 11: 20-24 seems to apply here.
What she could have said was, ” Rather that treating those men like human beings made in the image of God, I used their bodies to satisfy my own lust. Those men deserved better than what I gave them: I – who knew better – gave them my body rather than the Gospel.”
“The Pope is a man, isn’t he?”
Touche.
The rest of us, on the other hand, have to be redeemed through Christ. This was where my head was at when I wrote it.
rdchemist:
I was at the gym and didn’t see your response. Oscar handled it: I was referring to the fact that popes are male.
Again, as a Protestant I have been critical of the Catholic positions on Marian sinlessness and Papal infallibility, but both of those positively pale in comparison to what large numbers of my fellow Protestants are now swallowing from the likes of the Davissons:
Catholics posit that one woman (Mary) was sinless, on the grounds that only a sinless women could give birth to a son without the taint of Original Sin, and they also posit that one-man-at-a-time (the pope) may sometimes speak infallibly on the grounds of Apostolic Succession. While I can’t agree with either of those positions, it’s clear to see that they are very limited in scope and at least have an articulable rationale.
But that’s NOTHING compared to what’s being preached here. These mega-church charlatans (Davissons, Osteens, etc) and their small-time wanna-be imitators (guys like Powell), and their itching-ear followers posit that women in general are functionally sin-free (their sins are “really” the sins of men, donchaknow?), and that their emotions are an ongoing infallible indicator of God’s will.
Great post; I particularly liked your catch of this from Joel & Kathy’s book:
This reminds me of a quote I remember seeing awhile ago from James Dobson where he said that he believed that wives in general worked much harder in relationships and displayed a far greater commitment to their marriages than husbands did. And how had he reached this conclusion? Well, he’d observed that the majority of the attendees at his paid speaking engagements were women, and he’d also noticed that the most frequent customers for his books of marriage advice were women as well.
Let’s all hear it for American Evangelicalism, where the true measure of your faith can be determined by rating your willingness to buy the products that the pastor just happens to be selling today.
Apart from the heresy that pours out of every pore of this strange doctrine, this man is doing a lot of disservice to those hapless men who sit under his teachings, thinking they are being taught the Word.
It reminds me of Jesus’ words to the Pharisees, when he accused them of “crushing people with unbearable religious demands, and never lift a finger to ease the burden” (Mat 23.4).
Any man who aims to make a woman happy at all times is in for a lot of frustration. Women are too fickle to make it a lifelong goal to make them happy. Even God does not aim to make anyone happy at all times.
Of those who will go to the hottest parts of hell, these preachers will definitely be among them.
Lyn87,
Thanks for the reply.
Catholicism is probably imperfect.
But somehow the top-down organizational structure of the Catholic Church and the doctrine of Immaculate Conception is keeping modern feminism and the false prophets li k e the Powells and Driscos at bay for the most part. I simply don’t see the male bashing that is being described on this blog.
I’ll also note that the Russian Orthodox church my wife goes to doesn’t have the male bashing either. Here priests can marry, there is no papal infallibility, but the Virgin Mary is still venerated and it’s a 2000 year tradition that also seems to keep feminism out. Women even cover their heads in the church.
Just my testimony.
@ Lyn87 says:
October 7, 2016 at 12:45 pm
“Oscar handled it: I was referring to the fact that popes are male.”
To be fair, I’m not convinced that the current Pope is Catholic. Are we sure he’s male?
Pope Francis seems a little too liberal for my taste, but he’s holding firm on gay marriage and abortion so I think he’s genuine.
“If a wife is unhappy in her marriage, it is evidence that her husband is hateful and treacherous to her. Powell explains that God created Adam and Eve to have a perfect marriage, but because men are sinful they hate their wives and treat them treacherously. Powell claims that instead of hating divorce, God is saying men need to make their wives happy or they deserve to end up divorced”
“This is likewise built on the claim that a wife will be happy if her husband loves her.”
I think the whole thing is really just women married to unattractive men, and women refusing to honor their marriage vows.
It should be “if a wife is unhappy in her marriage, it is evidence that her husband is unattractive to her.” It’s really “because men are unattractive, their wives hate them and treat them like shit.” It’s really “men need to become more attractive, and their failure to do so is a big part of divorce.”
“A wife will be happy if she is attracted to her husband.”
And men need to become more attractive physically, but they also need to lead, refuse to tolerate disrespect, and take what belongs to them.
Part of this though is that wives need to honor their marriage vows, marry men they are attracted to, marry men they respect and are willing to follow, and refuse to marry men they aren’t attracted to. And if they aren’t attracted, then they need to at least act like it. They need to show respect to their husbands not because the husband has earned it but because she put him in that position of respect by marrying him. They need to have frequent sex with their husbands, even if they don’t always feel like it. Don’t wait until you feel like it; do it until you do feel like it.
This is really a problem of sexual attraction.
rdchemist,
I know you’re not taking it this way, but for the good of the order I’ll reiterate that I’m not Catholic-bashing here.
My point is that Mary Tudor became known to history as “Bloody Mary” because of the hundreds of Protestants who chose martyrdom rather than accept Marian sinlessness or Papal Infallibility, yet now mega-Protestant churches are insisting on the general sinlessness of ALL women and the habitual infallibility of their emotions.
I find it so hard to read the posts and thoughtful comments here. I’ve seen these behaviors at every church I’ve attended. Finding an actual biblically principled church is a tough proposition these days.
I’ve considered Russian Orthodox myself. I find the mechanics of worship tend to minimize SJW infiltration and the growth of heresy. I’d consider Catholicism, but they are being well and truly converged at the moment.
All joking aside, this new commandment (found in the Relevant Testament) – “make your wife happy” – is a natural evolution of the more subtle twisting of Ephesians 5:25 – “make your wife FEEL loved”.
My kids don’t FEEL loved when I discipline them, but discipline IS an act of love, and failure to discipline is an act of hatred.
Proverbs 3:12 For whom the Lord loves He reproves,
Even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights.
Proverbs 13:24 He who withholds his [a]rod hates his son,
But he who loves him [b]disciplines him diligently.
In fact, when God demonstrates His love for us by disciplining us, we don’t FEEL loved by Him.
Hebrews 12:7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we had [b]earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of [c]spirits, and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. 11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.
See that? “All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful.”
We don’t FEEL loved when God disciplines us, yet discipline is an act of love. God loves us. God does not make us FEEL loved. If God Himself does not make us FEEL loved, how can we be expected to make our wives FELL loved?
We can’t.
That’s why God NEVER commanded husbands to make their wives FEEL loved. God commanded husbands to love their wives, irrespective of whether or not the wives FEEL loved.
Per Desteen-
I am confident that Dalrock will permit me to share this, as I have no reputation as a prostletizer. It’s just my story of becoming Orthodox. (It has links to a total of 5 parts).
http://journeytoorthodoxy.com/2016/04/from-the-church-of-christ-to-the-orthodox-church-part-1/
@thedeti:
We also have to remember, since Women work by their instincts almost wholly, that they’ve been given a gun to hold to their husband’s head the entire time. It’s hard to have respect & attraction to a Man you’ve taken prisoner. There’s *always* the Cycle Down effect for the unrepentant Woman, but the modern environment is designed to rapidly accelerate it.
We’re back to the fried ice dilemma The modern, Christian husband is supposed to navigate a minefield. And they want to blindfold him, just to make it sell better… to the Women involved.
Great point Oscar,
I was flailing about for a way to articulate something like that, but you nailed it.
The problem (well… one of the many problems) with what The Davissons, Osteens, Driscolls, and FOTF-types are espousing is that they really are demanding two mutually-contradictory things: to give your wife what she wants in the short term while also giving her what she needs on the long-term… and failure to meet both of those mutually-exclusive goals is proof-positive that a man isn’t “Godly” enough to lead his family, and that his wife has God’s permission to use Threatpoint (or worse) on him.
A man who constantly caters to his wife’s emotions and whims will lose her respect, which is “proof” that he’s a mamby-pamby wussy who lacks the strength to lead. A man who occasionally tells his wife, “No” is a misogynistic brute with control issues, which is ALSO “proof” that he’s not fit to lead.
Damned-if-you-do-and-damned-if-you-don’t, because a husband who leads will be accused of being “emotionally abusive” by the same people who will be first in line to condemn him for not “Manning Up” if he does not lead.
Looking Glass:
This entire bit about reinterpreting Scripture is to give women a pass for mistreating, cuckolding, and divorcing unattractive husbands, in my view. It’s to give women a pass for not observing and fulfilling their own marital vows. This way, women can do all manner of injustice and violence to their husbands, and Scripture not only doesn’t forbid it, not only permits it, but MANDATES it. She is REQUIRED to divorce a man who “deals treacherously with” her (in other words, doesn’t make her feel loved, doesn’t do what she wants, doesn’t give her what she wants).
It’s also the source of this old BS viewpoint that women know what’s best for marriages, because, well, they’re women, and they just plain “do relationships better” than men do. Women are more nurturing and caring; men are just big dumb oafs who don’t know what’s best for them.
Lyn87,
For the record I know that you weren’t Catholic bashing, and I know I might have opened a can of worms.
I know that in a recent thread you talked about the difficulties you had with your current pastor, and it seems like you may have to find another church. Your new church could be in a different faith. It won’t magically bring your wife into submission but having a priest/pastor/whatever not undermine your role in the marriage will help tremendously.
I’m currently finding my way back to the Lord also so I’m not trying to speak with any authority but just sharing my experiences can help with under s tanding. I did so on my blog around father’s day.
http://rational-utopia.blogspot.com/2016/07/happy-father-bashing-day.html
Good luck with everything.
rdchemist,
Thanks, but you misunderstood me: my wife is not in rebellion at all. She and I see eye-to-eye on these matters, and have for the nearly-three-decades we’ve been married (the “87” in my username is the year we were married). After we left the church that I mentioned earlier we attended a Baptist church for a couple of years, and liked it a lot. Then the pastor moved away and his replacement was a much younger guy. I didn’t have much of a problem with him – he’s a good preacher, and I can’t recall ever hearing him say anything I disagreed with, but EVERY SINGLE SERMON contained some variation of “The Romans Road.”
While I can see the rationale behind that (since Baptists generally believe “Once saved, always saved,”) it was just too shallow for us. After you’ve been a Christian for forty-plus years, you don’t need to hear the salvation message every Sunday. The milk-to-meat ratio just wasn’t there, and we found (or more accurately, were led to) a church that has e-x-t-r-e-m-e-l-y detailed preaching on the Word. The fact that the pastor has a couple of blind spots is to be expected: I’m sure I have some as well.
@Oscar
Great point, and the entire comment is outstanding.
Reading your comment caused me to look up an old post from 2012, Reframing Christian Marriage. I mention it because it opened with:
I wrote that post months before I really read anything from the Davissons, and over four years before I read anything by Pastor Powell. But the patterns are painfully common, as we both have seen. I’m going to add that post to the “See Also” list at the bottom of this one.
The first I heard about Joel & Kathy was here: https://empathological.wordpress.com/2012/05/27/your-wife-had-and-affiar-its-your-fault/
The picture says a lot to me. They have their backs to each other. Joel has his arms crossed with a big shit eating grin. Kathy is showing lots of skin. They look to me like a couple that has lots of sex, but not with each other.
If that’s the sacrifice a Christian man has to make, count me out.
Lyn87,
Thanks for the clarification. Maybe I confused you with another person.
Scott,
Nice story about your conversion. Thanks for sharing.
I couldn’t finish reading the quotes in the post. I didn’t get past all the “becoming” (no mention of “being” in Christ), and husbands hating their wives. They’re sick puppies.
They’re full-on enablers of feminist claptrap (craptrap). Truly sickening and vomit-worthy. MGTOW all the way.
As usual, I am busy collecting top quality material for my arsenal from this thread. Given the wide experience base here, can anyone provide some insight about Dr. Robert Lewis and his “Authentic Manhood” series?
http://www.mensfraternity.com/
My church uses this program religiously (get it?) to train up men in the way that they should go, and all men are encouraged to attend the evening sessions. I admit to gaffing if off without any honest hearing. I perhaps unfairly lumped it in with other similar sounding programs I’ve been around in the past, which I summarize (with my usual hyperbole) as: if you are a man it is all your responsibility, it is all your fault, if you were more woman-like things would be going better for you and you would be pleasing God better. That’s why the Malachi posts made me think of it.
But maybe this program is decent. Does anyone here know?
“But maybe this program is decent. Does anyone here know?”
I haven’t looked yet but here’s a simple test: do any of the laymen in the program take turns leading the classes? Leadership is something men unquestionably need to train in so it would be very curious if a specifically train-the-men class didn’t involve some delegation of authority.
“Pope Francis seems a little too liberal for my taste, but he’s holding firm on gay marriage and abortion so I think he’s genuine.”
Francis cannot be the pope, by decree of Pope Paul IV back in the 1500’s. Paul IV was concerned a secret Protestant might become pope, so he officially declared that if any pope publicly deviated from Catholic doctrine and promoted heresy before his election to the papacy, then his election was null and void (unless he had PUBLICLY confessed and repented of the heresy). And such a person’s election to the throne of St. Peter was to be taken to be null by all Catholics, including the laity, by the very fact itself. No formal judgment or pronouncement required.
The year before he became pope, then-Cardinal Bergoglio co-wrote a book with his rabbi buddy. Wherein, Bergoglio declares that the Old Covenent is still in force, it was NOT superseded by the New Covenent, and that today’s Jews have no need to convert to Christianity and are basically guaranteed to go to Heaven AS JEWS because they are the “chosen people”. The inescapable conclusion being that it is God’s POSITIVE will (as opposed to His permissive will) that Jews remain Jews, and that they resist accepting Christ as the Messiah and resist baptism. He has continued to teach this since his election as “pope”.
All those who think this isn’t heresy, raise your hands. (And this is just ONE example)
So according to official Catholic doctrine promulgated by a sitting pope (Paul IV), Bergoglio is not the pope and has never been the pope. We live in interesting times, no?
Scott: “I am confident that Dalrock will permit me to share this, as I have no reputation as a prostletizer. It’s just my story of becoming Orthodox. (It has links to a total of 5 parts)”
I wonder if you’re familiar with Brother Nathaniel Kapner, or as I affectionately call him, BroNat. He was born a Jew and is now an Orthodox monk. He’s a hero of mine – a man of singular devotion, courage, and energy. Check him out on YouTube or check out his site, realjewnews.
@Lyn87
”Catholics posit that one woman (Mary) was sinless, on the grounds that only a sinless women could give birth to a son without the taint of Original Sin, and they also posit that one-man-at-a-time (the pope) may sometimes speak infallibly on the grounds of Apostolic Succession. While I can’t agree with either of those positions, it’s clear to see that they are very limited in scope and at least have an articulable rationale.
But that’s NOTHING compared to what’s being preached here. These mega-church charlatans (Davissons, Osteens, etc) and their small-time wanna-be imitators (guys like Powell), and their itching-ear followers posit that women in general are functionally sin-free (their sins are “really” the sins of men, donchaknow?), and that their emotions are an ongoing infallible indicator of God’s will.”
The road to destruction is broad but the road to salvation is narrow. This shows how narrow true faithfulness to God really is.
@Per Desteen
”I’ve considered Russian Orthodox myself. I find the mechanics of worship tend to minimize SJW infiltration and the growth of heresy. ”
True of myself also. I did consider converting to Orthodoxy. But they still contained a lot of the theological problems in contradiction to scripture that Catholicism had. So I am sticking with the Reformed Faith for now.
LP,
I’ve never heard of it either, so I did a Google search for mensfraternity.com and came up with numerous videos that all feature a guy named Dr. Robert Lewis. The short ones are too vague to allow me to form an opinion, but this one is about 50 minutes long and is called, “What Men Need to Know About Women.” That should give you an idea of what the program is about.
I only skimmed through it, but I get the impression that if you’re looking for red pills you’re not going to find them. On the other hand you’re not going to find “ManUp and marry those sluts,” either. What I gathered from the snippets I watched didn’t show man-bashing, but neither did I see any indication that he talked about the temptations that women face that men need to know about, like hypergamy, “$H1+ tests,” and the feminist zeitgeist in the culture and, sadly, most churches.
@Lost patrol
But maybe this program is decent. Does anyone here know?
I do not have firsthand experience, but after a quick perusal, my impression is that it is more condescension towards males with about 80% filler from modern pop psych. Flags always go up for me when the adjective “authentic” is a central identifier. Who defines what is authentic? Why is Robert Lewis more qualified to define authentic manhood more than anyone else, why not historical Christians who did not live in the lap of luxury and did not kowtow to feminist sensibilities. I am reminded when the term “authentic christian” became vogue for the “seeker sensitive churches” as a way to disparage the tried and true faithful who worshiped with a liturgy that was not as cool as their night-club mega-churches. It was a way to show dishonor and engage in a little self aggrandizement while claiming to take the high road….right of the cliff.
Topics like leading family worship, rigorously studying the word, suffering for Christ and building a civic society are seemingly absent. The program looks lean on bible and fat on stereotypes. While in the first series there are sessions called the Biblical definition of manhood, how does one make such a claim? There is no “Biblical definition of manhood”, it appears to me as eisegesis packaged as male sensitivity programming. Equally disturbing is the two sessions called “A Man and His Woman” is immediately followed with “25 Ways to Be a Servant-Leader” which is evangelical code for how to submit to your wife and call it leadership. It looks at first glance as Promise Keepers repackaged for the sensitive new age guy who likes his sports when he isn’t busy serving his wife and making her happy.
The session topics for Winning at Work and Home are as follows, they make my red pill spider senses tingle more than just a little:
A Man and His Mirrors
What Men Need to Know About Women
Engaging Your Woman Successfully
Staying Close to the Woman You Love
Improving Your Sex Life
How a Man Makes the Money Work at Home
THe (sic) Good Life and Where to Find It
What Every Dad Needs to Know
Dad’s Game Plan for Raising Sons and Daughters
Maximum Parenting
A Man and His Work
Two Visions of Work
Coming Alive at Work
Making a Name for Yourself at Work
Taking God to Work
Launching a Lifelong Winning Streak
I could be jaundiced and prejudiced by experience, your mileage may vary!
Lyn87 says, “They’re very coy about…” Yes, they’re very deceitful, so they always choose their words very carefully.
First, I have to say to you that if force and intimidation are the only tools in your arsenal to keep your marriage, then you need to reevaluate your existence as a human being.
This is addressed to a husband, but it sounds very much like the “breaking plates” incident committed by unhappy wives.
Also important in why so many “Conservative” Christians are cucked:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B018ZHHA52
Evidence of entryism into the church 14 years ago:
https://www.newswithviews.com/religion/religion9.htm
Recommend every read how the Presbyterian church was turned apostate via infiltration:
http://www.garynorth.com/freebooks/docs/a_pdfs/gncf.pdf
Dear Jeff Strand:
With respect, I don’t think a serious student of Christianity is going to learn anything substantive from Brother Nathaniel. I know his material moderately well. There are a couple of personal anecdotes about coming to Jesus, embedded in hours and hours of a rather angry web of snark, antisemitism and conspiracy theory.
I get it. He’s angry at being duped by his religious community. I went through a phase like that where I hated Mormons, too. A well-adjusted person gets over that. (My phase lasted less than 6 months, when I was a teenager)
If I ever had the chance to talk to Brother Nathaniel, I’d let him know that spending one’s life bashing the Jews, and trying to be as disrespectful as possible to the Jews, means that the Jews are still in charge of his life. He’s not really a Christian, as much as a weird sort of Jewish inversionist, who always tries to be as offensive as possible to Jews. It would be more effective for him to simply forget about his religious community, and wander off to find true happiness in Christianity.
But, far be it for me to tell him or anyone what to do. I’m just one guy with an opinion.
Boxer
Boxer,
I couldn’t disagree with you more. BroNat is a national treasure. And he’s got the guts of a Clint Eastwood combined with Charles Bronson…and maybe add Rambo for good measure!
I urge everyone else to ignore the character assassination on Brother Nathaniel Kapner, and go to his site or watch him on YouTube with an open mind. See for yourself his courage and devotion. We need 1,000 more like him!
I’ll also note that the Russian Orthodox church my wife goes to doesn’t have the male bashing either. Here priests can marry, there is no papal infallibility, but the Virgin Mary is still venerated and it’s a 2000 year tradition that also seems to keep feminism out. Women even cover their heads in the church.
One technicality: priests cannot marry in the Orthodox Church. However, married men can be ordained as deacons and then priests. If their wife passes away, they may not remarry, but they are then eligible to be elevated to the episcopate (there are usually a number of such bishops in any given Orthodox jurisdiction).
I think feminism is kept more at bay in many Orthodox churches because of the difficulty of trying to force change in the context of the typical Orthodox church. It isn’t a church based on an external authority model, like Rome is, but rather one that is based on an internal authority model which is much messier (there are often internal disagreements) but which at the same time makes it impossible to have the kind of changes that the Roman church did after Vatican II, for example — Orthodoxy lacks any central authority with the power to make such sweeping changes. So the authority model that is often viewed by Catholics in particular as dysfunctional in Orthodoxy nevertheless serves to make change difficult, which has the impact of making it easier to prevent any deep spread of feminist ideas or practices in the Orthodox church. Something as simple as female altar servers, which were made possible in the Catholic Church in the wake of Vatican II, are impossible in the Orthodox Church.
Having said that, there are feminists in the Orthodox Church. Some Orthodox jurisdictions are more “modernist” than others. They cannot do the same kind of things you see in Protestant churches or even some Catholic parishes, so they don’t look modernist to the typical Western Christian, but once you have been Orthodox for a while you can see the differences pretty easily. Again, they are hemmed in, in terms of what they can do because of the way authority works in the Orthodox Church, but they do still exist and would *like* to see things change in their direction — they just don’t have an easy means to do so, because there is no power center they can colonize and then force through changes easily.
Dear Jeff Strand:
Criticism isn’t the same thing as character assassination, and I haven’t told a single untruth about the good man.
Be that as it may, it’s entirely possible that I missed out on all the many videos that he posted, where he doesn’t talk about Judaism, but instead talks about Orthodox Christianity, disseminating the good news of Jesus and serious intellectual exegesis of the texts thereof.
If you’d be good enough to post one of these, I’ll be glad to apologize and retract.
Best,
Boxer
@ Dalrock says:
October 7, 2016 at 3:04 pm
“The command to husbands to love their wives has been transformed into a command that he make his wife feel loved.”
I hadn’t read that post of yours. That was before I stumbled upon your blog. I particularly like this line.
“This subtle transformation turns a straightforward biblical command into a Sisyphean task.”
Ain’t that the truth!
Gents,
Do any of you have a link to a pastor or some other Christian leader saying that Ephesians 5:25 means that husbands should make their wives feel loved? I know I’ve heard that before, but I can’t find a written statement or a video right now.
Don’t try to learn about your wife from stereotypes, books (especially of the “women’s place is in the home” variety)
So men are not to learn about marriage or women from the Bible then.
Titus 2:3-5
3 The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things;
4 That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children,
5 To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.
When will they come right out and say the truth that they have rejected Scripture?
Does love even exist?
http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=1027252
A Man Says “A Single Phrase Helped Save My Marriage.” (Take a guess…)
http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=1027472
SnapperTrx: What the heck does “fully human” mean? When I had a conversation with my aunt about headship she kept going back to “women are people too”, “women are humans”. … Has anyone here ever heard someone indicate that women aren’t human? What is the implication then that causes people to constantly remind us that women ARE human?
I think it’s a talking point that goes back to the 19th century suffragettes, when women couldn’t vote or own property.
The suffragettes argued that the U.S. Constitution recognized the inalienable rights of Natural Persons (extended to former slaves by the recently passed 14th Amendment). Because women were people too, the Constitution also recognized those rights as pertaining to women.
I think those are the origins of that phrase. I’ve heard that phrase used by female characters in movies set in the 19th century. Even films set in the early 19th century, when many Brits and Americans were still inspired by the French Revolution of a generation ago.
Jeff Strand: The year before he became pope, then-Cardinal Bergoglio co-wrote a book with his rabbi buddy. Wherein, Bergoglio declares that the Old Covenent is still in force, it was NOT superseded by the New Covenent, and that today’s Jews have no need to convert to Christianity and are basically guaranteed to go to Heaven AS JEWS because they are the “chosen people”.
As I understand it, the Old Covenant is still in force — but that’s irrelevant, because no Jew was ever saved through the Old Covenant, or ever will be. This is because to be saved through the Old Covenant, one must obey it to perfection. To be blameless before God. To never even have had a sinful thought. No lust in one’s heart. No anger at one’s brother.
Because no man or woman has ever been sinless, all men and women can only be saved through the new Covenant.
He needs to read the Book of Hebrews.
Reading over the passages by the Davissons and Powell, it strikes me as completely immature and amateurish.
I would say that the authors of this lack any emotional sophistication, as if they froze emotionally in high school and never developed further.
“God has equipped every woman with a marriage manual in her heart, designed to instruct her husband in how to meet her unique needs”.
“When your wife’s marriage manual points out that you have violated her in some way, your job is to hear her heart and accept what it is that your personal marriage manual is saying to you.”
I was a teenage poet in high school, and I came up with better lines than this then. It’s bad, as well as untrue. I mean, what about all of the failed relationships? It would seem that God designed a wife with 3, 6 or more “unique marriage manuals” based on her N count.
On the contrary, we are called upon in Scripture to have a mature understanding of human nature and the world around us:
“Brethren, be not children in understanding: howbeit in malice be ye children, but in understanding be men.” (1 Cor 14:20).
Reading of this material tells me why the generation of 18-35 year olds no longer attend church. They have a better understanding of human relationships than the guy preaching to them that what he is saying is authoritative.
Off Topic.
@Robin Munn
Very perceptive of you. You’re right, this was a Sunday evening service. And we do have regular Sunday evening and Wednesday evening services.
And there are lots of families with young children in the congregation. Out of an average Sunday morning attendance of a little over 100, around 40-50 are children under 16. And yes, families do bring their children to all the church services.
Submission, Biblical headship, modesty, and the head covering are both taught and practiced uniformly. It is a very different culture if you are used to the typical American culture.
I would rather not post my particular congregation publicly, but we are part of a group that is a fairly conservative Anabaptist denomination. We have a number of churches across the country and outreaches in several other countries. I’ll email you my congregation, and if you are ever in the area I would love to have you visit.
Whoops, got my markup wrong. Just went back and read Lyn’s instructive comment, didn’t see it the first time. Dalrock, if you could delete my first comment I’d be most appreciative. Sorry about that.
HOW IS IT POSSIBLE FOR AN ADULT TO BELIEVE THIS NONSENSE – EVEN FOR A MOMENT?
The corollary of being incapable of sin (if a woman does anything wrong it’s some man’s fault), essentially strips women of their will, their need for salvation, and arguably their humanity. But unlike feminists who merely infantilize women, these people actually worship them. We scoff at the ancient Greeks for seeking guidance from the Oracle at Delphi about great matters, but apparently some “Christian leaders” have determined that every woman has an infallible oracle between her thighs. Not only are they not excommunicated – they have legions of followers.
How could this happen?
◄ 2 Peter 2:1 ►
New International Version
But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them–bringing swift destruction on themselves.
It’s all right there.
False prophets and false teachers. Among God’s people.
Secretly working. Introducing destructive heresy.
Denying the sovereignty of God and the blood He shed to pay for their SINS. Including women, or God was lying when He said “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” Romans 3:23.
And its end is destruction. Evidenced by all the marriages that get destroyed by listening to their heresy.
Spike,
You’re onto something… the way they write about women is reminiscent of the kind of sappy poetry a high school nerd writes about the cheerleader he has a crush on who doesn’t even know he’s alive – not at all like the sober wisdom of men who have a few miles on the odometer.
They idealize women… and that’s a dangerous thing considering the unaccountable power we give them. As an example of what eventually happens when you idealize people who possess power, let’s look at the way that lots of people idealize cops. We pretend the job is especially dangerous (it’s not), and that abuses of power are exceedingly rare (they’re not), that they’ll always come promptly when you call (they might), and that you’ll get a fair shake when you encounter them (you might, depending on your sex and – to a much lesser extent – your skin color). Over time that idealization has led to absurdities that allow cops to get away with things that would be serious felonies if anyone else did them – up to and including murder. What’s more: they know they can get away with them, which encourages the escalation of their entitlement mentality that we see today. Eventually many of those absurdities became codified into law, and we no longer even pretend that cops are not members of an elite class for whom the usual rules don’t apply. (Gee: I wonder what other group enjoys such privilege…) As a military officer (now retired), cops tend to assume I’m “in on it” and will casually tell me “funny” stories of abuse-of-authority that would make anyone concerned with civil rights recoil in horror (if the average cop-apologist knew what they will admit to in private when they think the audience is sympathetic… there would be a lot fewer cop-apologists).
And what has been the backlash of all that idealization of people with power? A general loss of credibility, which has resulted in riots in some places, and a very small number (for now) of attacks on cops… and now cops in jurisdictions all over the country are being forced to wear body-cams – against their wishes – because nobody trusts them any more. [NOTE 1]
I used that as an example we can all understand, but the way these “Christian leaders” look at women is also based on idealization. Historically, the temperance movement was the first real success by feminists once women got the right to vote without the responsibility to back up their decisions with their lives – like men have always had to do. The temperance movement was based on the idea that men were prone to drunkenness and needed to be reigned in by suffering women (who are virtuous by nature). [NOTE 2]
That’s not really much different than what is being peddled here – husbands are prone to misbehavior by our very nature, and we need to heed the voices and “hearts” of our wives because women are simply better and wiser than we are by default. Once you give in to that level of idealization, it becomes easy for Churchians to turn “women are the weaker vessel” into a positive duty of men to throw themselves sacrificially into the service of women (as opposed to leading the family unit in the service of God)… the wise-and-virtuous women set the policies and the strong-but-ignorant men just shut up and do what they’re told.
It’s sappy, it’s immature, it’s counter to Scripture, it’s contrary to common sense, and it won’t end well.
One final example of idealization then I’ll quit rambling: Edith Cavell.
Edith Cavell was, by all accounts, a very good woman. She was a British nurse (and a devout Anglican) in German-occupied Belgium during WW1 who saved the lives of soldiers without regard to their nationality in the midst of a war of then-unparalleled brutality.
She was also a British spy who helped hundreds of Allied soldiers escape Belgium so they could re-join the fight.
The Germans found out about her activities and arrested her. She was found guilty (she was, in fact, guilty of the crimes for which she was arrested), and sentenced to die by firing squad. Millions of men were dying in muddy trenches and the response was to send even more, but there was a huge international backlash against Edith Cavell’s pending execution. The German’s shot her anyway – which was well within the rules of international conflict as all sides understood them at the time – at which point the propaganda machine was cranked up to “11” and she was falsely presented as a murder victim, and idealized.
This is what she looked like in real life, but a popular propaganda poster used this artist’s rendition instead. They deliberately made her look like an angel, with her head-piece designed to look like a halo. Clever.
Don’t get me wrong: Edith Cavell was a good woman (maybe even a great woman – they don’t make many like that), but she was one woman, and the propaganda surrounding her lawful execution was used to recruit thousands of men to die horrible deaths… men whose names none of us have ever heard and never will.
Idealization is little different than propaganda – and propaganda is designed to make you react strongly to something that may or not be true… to react on emotion rather than reason. It’s best to be wary.
_________________
NOTE 1 – But while history is filled with examples of police states and their enforcers, we’re treading fallow ground when it comes to giving immense and unaccountable power to women. I expect an eventual backlash that will make BLM look like small potatoes, although I think it will take the form of social and legal restrictions on women rather than broken windows and burning cars, since 99% of men would sooner stick their hands into a running wood-chipper than be physically aggressive towards a woman – especially one of their own “tribe.”
NOTE 2 – Look how well THAT turned out… the unintended consequences of Prohibition are still plaguing us today – nearly a century later.
@ Dalrock says:
October 7, 2016 at 3:04 pm
“The command to husbands to love their wives has been transformed into a command that he make his wife feel loved.”
And before they can transform [lie about] that thought they have to transform “as Christ loved the church”; they have to lie about WHO Christ is. To fill the pews and keep the power, pastors have had to transform the love of Christ to only mean Christ as Savior but not as Lord. They preach very little cost, very little anger of God, etc. When they do preach it, they never hold anyone’s feet to the fire.
If we don’t see Jesus as Lord [despite many saying “Lord, Lord”] how is a wife to see her husband as lord? A husband loving his wife is confronting her just as Jesus confronted the church. Why? To present her unblemished to the Lord.
But if we went back to the Word then Pastors and women would have to give up their Illicit Authority, which they religiously hold onto.
I used to think that the Prosperity Gospel was the most despicable heresy produced by Evangelicalism.
So it turns out I was wrong. I shudder when I wonder what they will come up with next.
@Frank K:
Considering either of them are actually new (just rehashes of heresies stretching back to the 2nd & 3rd centuries), we could probably go down the list of crazy stuff from the early days and predict what’s coming back. Hard-core Gnosticism is almost there.
“As I understand it, the Old Covenant is still in force — but that’s irrelevant, because no Jew was ever saved through the Old Covenant, or ever will be.”
It’s still in force for Jews AFAIK but non-Jews were never required to obey it. And you’re right, they still need Christ for salvation from their inevitable failures.
Which makes me a little suspicious of that BroNat guy mentioned above, if he’s Christian but hostile to his Jewish ancestry. But I haven’t checked him out.
…
Grey Man @ 7:41 am:
“I would rather not post my particular congregation publicly, but we are part of a group that is a fairly conservative Anabaptist denomination”
No need to say more. Your people give up the Great Commission and being the salt of the Earth for peace with the devil. Seriously, all Christianity across the world is suffering persecution for our faith and you haven’t stopped to wonder why your little group is exempt? Here’s a tip, it isn’t because you’re any kind of threat to the schemes of wicked men.
Brother Nathanael is more a showman than an evangelist. He wanders around in a (handmade, by the looks of it) priest outfit and tries to convince people that Jews are secretly running the whole world, to the detriment of everyone else.
He is very funny and entertaining, and when I first stumbled upon his videos, I was convinced it was a sort of Borat-type comedy schtick. At this point I think he’s serious.
I support anyone making a sincere conversion to whatever they want, but if Brother Nathanael has done this, I’d be surprised. It seems more like he’s using Christianity as a prop to lash out at his community. It’d be more convincing if he simply forgot about the Jews, and threw himself into making serious videos about Jesus. The best revenge against them, in his case, would be forgetting them and moving on to be happy with something else.
Best,
Boxer
I’ve seen a couple of Brother Nathaneal’s videos. He talked about his childhood, and his father’s hostility to Christmas carols. All his Christian friends went caroling in the 1950s, and Brother Nathaneal wanted to go, but when his father heard, he angrily denounced Christmas. Brother Nathaneal couldn’t understand why, until he got older and learned about Jewish hatred of Christianity.
He’s seemed to have made it his life’s mission to teach Christians about Jewish hatred of Christianity. It’s also one of E. Michael Jones’s main themes.
I think Brother Nataneal was (maybe still is) a legitimate Christian Orthodox priest, but he got into trouble with the Orthodox Church because of his videos. I don’t know the details.
In the Orthodox Church in Jerusalem in the Old City I think either the head priest of one of the higher levels priests is Jewish. It was more than a decade ago that I met him and talked for a while while i visited the place. I do not think that’s the same person. [There are probably a lot of Orthodox churches there but i am referring to the one right near Har Zion ]
@Gunner Q
Interesting response. Do you care to elaborate?
FYI, I’m enough of an outsider to the church I currently attend, and objective enough, that I won’t be offended by anything you might say.
Do you have anything to back up those claims? I agree with you that some groups like the Amish are not following the Great Commission, but that is far from being true of all Anabaptist churches.
On persecution I don’t follow you at all. If you care to explain further, what makes you think we are exempt from persecution?
Dalrock
“The command to husbands to love their wives has been transformed into a command that he make his wife feel loved.”
In other words, it’s the husband’s job to make sure she is always, perpetually … haaaaaaapy.
The Church of the Vagina?
The words that come to mind reading these sorts of articles are: “Gynocentric rather than Theocentric”.
These men reverse the ceated order. God made man for Himself. Then God made woman for man. Christ is my Head. I exist to please, serve, and worship him. The Bible teaches that woman was made to help man in that role. Thus, in some very real sense, the woman exists for the man. The man does not exist for the woman. Man exists for Christ alone, and Christ will permit no idolatry.
When men listen to and heed the word of their wives, instead of listening to and heeding the voice of God, the repeat the original sin of Adam’s idolatry.
Genesis 3 tells us what that was. Adam heeded Eve, rather than God, and the world fell into ruin.
There is a “manual for my marriage”, and it is not written in my wfe’s heart. Rather, it was breathed out by the Holy Spirit, and written down on the pages of the Bible.
No more golden calves of gynocentrism. Let all honor, glory, power, and dominion be to Christ alone!
These men speak half truths. It is true that we should not be self centered, but we should not be wife centered either. We should be centered on our Head. The head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is her husband. In submitting (in everything, and regarding him as lord like Sarah did) to her husband, the woman honors Christ the greater Head as well.
@Lynn87-
Geez, it’s simple. Why don’t you Just Get It? Simply lead her where she wants to go. Problem solved!
/sarc
Geez, it’s simple. Why don’t you Just Get It? Simply lead her where she wants to go. Problem solved!
That is the distillation of the wisdom of the ages right there, gentlemen.
Gunner Q, Lyn87, Jonadab-t-R,
Thanks for your initial impressions of “Authentic Manhood”. I note a general lack of enthusiasm similar to my own.
Gunner – I do not know who leads the sessions but intend to find out.
Lyn – On the other hand you’re not going to find “ManUp and marry those sluts,” either. Sadly, I have been reduced to viewing a statement like that as hopeful, given the usual alternatives.
Jonadab – I had not noticed the 25 ways to be a Servant-leader; a seemingly innocuous or even noble term, that as you noted has proven to have ominous undertones the way some pastors are now employing it.
I could of course just dive in and find out, but previous brushes with other man-making seminars have left me snake bit.
@Looking Glass:
You make a very good point there. I’m not an expert on ancient, so perhaps I should read St. Iranaeus’s “Against Heresies”.
LP,
I’ll admit to not attending any “How To Be A Christian Man” seminars of any type from the time they started to gain popularity in 1990 with “Promise Keepers” and continuing to today with various spin-offs and other approaches. To the extent that I’ve encountered them at all, they tend to be like the snippets I ran across in the link I posted: puddle-deep exhortations and simplistic explanations. I guess for guys who don’t know anything, those sorts of things might be useful places to start. The only thing I’ve ever encountered that I thought had any utility was the “Five Love Languages,” but even then I learned everything I needed to know in about five minutes of a friend of mine telling me about it, and it seemed to me to be similar to the MBTI, except for couples (you can communicate better if you know how the other person processes information).
But what a lot of guys don’t know – and what the seminar leaders never seem to talk about – are the sorts of things we talk about around here: like, “How can a Christian man avoid being Gilligan trapped on Slut Island when even the Mary Anns in the churches have double-digit n-counts?” as well as stuff like, “Forget what people in church say – if the going gets tough, you’ll be fortunate if any of them have your back.”
It’s possible that something like that is out there, but in my very limited experience this is one of those cases where the “children of darkness” are a lot more savvy that most of the people sitting in churches… including the ones telling men “how to be men.”
“Geez, it’s simple. Why don’t you Just Get It? Simply lead her where she wants to go, and make damned sure you read her mind correctly, because she’s sure as hell not going to tell you! Problem solved!
/sarc”
FIFY
Why wives? (“[…] let her know that women are not to be submissive to men […]”)
http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=1027531
How to ‘get over’ no sex in your marriage
http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=1027577
@Lyn87:
We also now know that that Gilligan gets the vapors. What a weird couple of days.
Marcus,
Those weren’t nearly as bad as discussions on CAF usually are. The first question was stupid, but it was submitted by a teenage girl relaying the question her 11-year-old sister asked in the middle of a wedding. Having taught 11-year-olds as a classroom teacher, I can testify that they do, indeed, ask some pretty stupid questions… because they’re 11 years old, and 11-year-olds don’t fully understand such things. The comments were mostly very good (which may just mean that the “usual suspects” haven’t gotten into the thread yet).
The second one wasn’t too bad, either: the wife didn’t just lash out at her husband like most of them do when they have a problem, and most people’s first reaction to his lack of libido was, “Have him see a doctor to look for a medical problem.” Only one guy went straight to, “It’s not you, it’s his porn,” but even that was apparently based on her past admissions that he had been into it in the past. The only other thing I saw that I found troublesome was the reference to a counselor: they had been going to a female counselor. That’s bad in at least two ways: IF psychological counseling is required (and that’s a big “IF”), it should have been “him” not “them” going to it, and the counselor should be a “him” not a “her.” A woman giving marriage counseling to a couple? Not just “No,” but “Hell No!“
@Lyn87
I have seen many marriage counselors, they each to the best of knowledge possessed a penis, but make no mistake they were all women. They exegeted, talked, acted and avoided reason just like a woman, they even get weepy eyed at the drop of a hat. In fact they all were variations on the theme of this blog-post, man=bad, woman=holy spirit, patriarchy = abuse, correcting your wife = abuse, leading means submitting, a wife’s submitting means control, divorce is good if it makes a woman happy, if a woman isn’t happy it is because man=bad…. Oh and they were all ostensibly christian men with graduate or post graduate degrees.
If a man is having problems with his wife he is better off avoiding all
marriagedivorce counselors – he already has a wife in rebellion who is burning down the home, why throw gas on the flames and have a professional validate her mutiny.“A woman giving marriage counseling to a couple? Not just ‘No,’ but ‘Hell No!'”
This really should be a universal motto, although not expressed quite so politely.
And +1000 to Jonadab’s amplifying comments on this. There is no such creature as a “male” marriage counselor.
Those weren’t nearly as bad as discussions on CAF usually are. The first question was stupid, but it was submitted by a teenage girl relaying the question her 11-year-old sister asked in the middle of a wedding. Having taught 11-year-olds as a classroom teacher, I can testify that they do, indeed, ask some pretty stupid questions… because they’re 11 years old, and 11-year-olds don’t fully understand such things.
In all honesty, though, I don’t see a significant difference between the question/issue posed by the teen and her pre-teen sister and the nonsense spouted by the “adult” regulars in that place. The “adults” [sic] might be a bit more polished in their presentation, but they still exhibit the same lack of awareness, maturity, knowledge of Scripture, ability to reason, or to accept accountability for their actions.
@Jonadab and Lyn
I’ve known a few male Christian marriage counselors. Some of them recognize the feminism issue. However, they face the same problem pastors face, which is that 95% of the time the wife is the one who initiates and drives the couple to counseling. Therefore, speaking the truth is bad for business. Unfortunately most counselors, like most pastors, buckle under that pressure.
True headship would negate the need for couples counseling all together as most problems can be solved via the husband exerting his will and the wife submitting, and when the husband needs guidance going to an older mentor, or in some cases the mentor can intervene directly with the husband privately in order to not undermine his authority.
Most couples counseling these days consists of the counselor taking on the privileges of headship in the relationship while outsourcing the responsibility to the husband. It’s a great ego boost for the counselor, makes the wife happy (hence they keep coming back), makes the husband miserable, and hastens the destruction of the marriage. I’m reminded of a great former blog by Dalrock where a pastoral counselor did this blatantly.
And people wonder why the evidence shows that marriage counseling does not work. It was never about effectiveness. It’s about keeping the customer happy (wife) by facilitating the rebellious regime.
@RPChrisitan
What you describe is now called abuse according to the newest books of the canon, the book of Duluth and the book of Oprah. What inevitably happens when such a posture is tried, is that the counselor joins the wife to further diminish the husband’s headship (temporarily assuming the husband’s headship for himself and placing the husband in a subordinate position to his wife) and justify the wife’s feelings as the work of the Holy Spirit to put the “abusive” husband back on his leash and in a proper heeling position to be a good doggie for his wife.
“In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man
Women do have a marriage manual written on their hearts. But it wasn’t written by God. It was written by the serpent.
The serpent inscribed it onto Eve’s heart, and it’s been passed down to her daughters ever since.
@Jonadab
Exactly. Deluth is a way to codify the approach and keep any counselors who may want to defy the feminine imperative at heel. It’s very effective propoganda. It targets a population that is already more emotionally sensitive (counselors), and terrorizes them into implementing their political goals.
To be a Godly marriage counselor in this day and age would take enormous discernment and emotional fortitude to resist the propoganda pressures. It would also take strong resilience to endure years of non-biblical training (and tuition costs) to get the credential. Then, you would have to be willing to do it as a hobby because the moment the wife gets a wiff of biblical truth you can forget about follow-up appointments and referrals.
Biblical marriage counselors don’t exist.
My point about female marriage counselors is that it immediate runs afoul of two things:
1) You don’t counsel a superior about his dealings with a subordinate in the presence of that subordinate. (That is especially true if the husband bears any of the fault.) It undermines his authority, which he will be required to exercise (and she to submit to) long after the session. Making the counselor the “referee” puts the husband into a subordinate relationship to a woman in the context of the relationship (which itself is unacceptable) – and compounds that error by doing it with the wife present.
(If a First Sergeant does not feel that he can obey the directives of his commander, but neither can be reassigned, the last thing that would happen would be for the First Sergeant to pick an NCO from a different unit to sit down with both of them and adjudicate. No commander would agree to that – nor should he.)
2) Couples counseling treats the husband and wife as peers – they are not: she is his help-meet.
If a husband needs a talk things over, he should do so in private with a well-seasoned pastor or elder who’s demonstrated the attributes found in 1 Timothy 3 [emphasis added]:
This is a true saying, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach; Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity; (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?) Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. – 1 Timothy 3: 1-7 KJV
A wife has the right to ask her husband to talk things over with an elder (I’m using the term generically), but she certainly does not have the right to use Threatpoint to make him do so except under the most extreme circumstances (and by extreme I mean actually extreme – not the trivia that passes for “extreme” in the minds of your typical Churchian or “licensed counselor”).
Women are beyond criticism.
@Lyn87
What you say is true – if only we lived a world where it worked that way!
Finding an elder or pastor that believes 1 Tim 3:4-5 means that the husband has the authority to rule his wife and not submit to her as a “servant-leader” is like finding a needle in a haystack. Almost without exception if an elder has a submissive wife he believes it is because he so awesome a husband and leader. His assumption is that if you were as awesome (and humble) as he is then your wife would be submissive too, the idea that his wife is submissive or that your wife is rebellious is an act of her volition is not even on his radar. After all according to the book Oprah “Women are responders” and incapable of volitional sin or obedience in marriage, it must the the response to the quality of leadership. No volition = no guilt = no need for repentance. The idea that different women need different manifestations and methods of leadership is to them anathema. There is in my experience more concern that a husband is not abusing his wife (by ruling her) and he is worshiping her then there is that a wife submit to her husband and seek repentance for any contumacy, in fact a wife’s non-submission is often venerated as the work of the Holy Spirit.
Newsflash: 1 Timothy 2:14 Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.
In our congregation, the way this is looks is like this:
Me, going to our priest alone: “Father, I instructed my wife to do X as part of a larger plan to [save money/get our of debt/teach our kids a lesson/etc] and it didn’t work the way I had planned.”
Priest: [proceeds to give me advice about what went wrong with my plan but does not question the fact that I made a unilateral decision about something in my home].
This is the only way it can really work.
Most couples counseling these days consists of the counselor taking on the privileges of headship in the relationship while outsourcing the responsibility to the husband. It’s a great ego boost for the counselor, makes the wife happy (hence they keep coming back), makes the husband miserable, and hastens the destruction of the marriage.
That is gold. Very well put.
@Dave
All credit to Dalrock and the commenters on this site for helping me see it more clearly.
@Lyn87
You make excellent points. The more I think about, the more I realize that couples counseling in and of itself is non-biblical, regardless of the counselor’s approach. The only way I could see it working is if the counselor simply reprimanded the wife and/or reiterated the importance of submitting to her husband. As you said, you cannot counsel a superior about his dealings with the subordinate in the presence of that subordinate.
I need to find a church like Scott’s. As a guy who converted as a teenager and has no tradition to fall back on, I’m completely at a loss as to where to find a good church.
@ RPchristian, I am very new to Orthodoxy and a woman to boot, but our priest is this way. He clearly understands and preaches/counsels Pauline doctrine on marriage and the family. Just today, in fact, in a lecture.
Funny how these pussy cucked so-called pastors have forgotten that isn’t it?
Have these guys had every drop of testosterone drained out of them? Unreal! Stop going to these pagan temples people.
@mrteebs
“Take note of the t-shirts they are wearing. Her’s need to be changed to read “I’m the boss.”
Take note of the other picture. I’d hope that if I were putting a picture of my family as the header for my “Christian” site, I would be aware enough to notice my teenaged daughters bra is clearly visible through her shirt.
It is fortold
2 Timothy 3:6-7
6 For among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, 7 always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.
@lyn87
Your narrative is true. Unfortunately, it’s unavailable. I am a former blue pill caught in divorce hell. We have attended several counselers, marriage conferences (Fof), and countless attempts at “turning to the church”
So far, I have been pushed away from the church. If I try to discuss anything or learn anything, I am simply told I “need to be more like Jesus” and until I do, nothing will change.
My wife is divorcing me and forcing me to communicate through her lawyer. When I suggest that we aren’t supposed to sue each other and instead take our issues to the church body, she says “no. That’s not what they are there for” The church seems to agree. Meanwhile, they still embrace her AND have her in leadership positions over the children’s program.
While the bible will tell us to deal with our family issues BEFORE church, they seem to think the answer to all problems (men and women) is to just get busier within the church. Because serving Jesus and serving the church are synonymous to these wicked foolish people.
HoseB,
You are correct to point out the things you did: suing another believer violates the spirit of Romans 12:18 and is expressly forbidden in 1 Corinthians 6:1-8. Your wife is clearly in open rebellion in that way and others, and as this blog has noted for years, most churches are fine with that as long as the one sinning is a woman. Your church is following the typical Churchian script of encouraging your wife’s rebellion while placing the blame on you for not being sufficiently “Christ-like” (by which they mean the very UN-Christ-like attitude of submitting to her while accepting all the responsibility for yourself). Any church that would put a woman into a leadership position is already going down the wrong path, and to support her even though her own house is not in order simply compounds their error. (You might want to point this out as well, since she’s in leadership while she’s divorcing you: both 1Timothy 3 and Titus 1 require that at the very least, those in church leadership positions must be removed from leadership unless their own houses are in order. Clearly a marriage undergoing a divorce is not “in order” by any definition. She has used the legal system to usurp the leadership role and the church has accepted it – let her meet the responsibilities that go with leadership.)
Realistically, though, Churchians rarely care about following the hard sayings of the Bible under the false assumption that they can have all the “good” stuff without submitting to the hard stuff. Luke 6: 46 describes such people well, “And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?”
It may call itself a “church,” but Christ does not seem to be Lord there.
My advice? Prayerfully consider the words of Jesus in Matthew 10:14-15, “And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet. Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.”
HoseB
So far, I have been pushed away from the church. If I try to discuss anything or learn anything, I am simply told I “need to be more like Jesus” and until I do, nothing will change.
My wife is divorcing me and forcing me to communicate through her lawyer. When I suggest that we aren’t supposed to sue each other and instead take our issues to the church body, she says “no. That’s not what they are there for” The church seems to agree. Meanwhile, they still embrace her AND have her in leadership positions over the children’s program.
While the bible will tell us to deal with our family issues BEFORE church, they seem to think the answer to all problems (men and women) is to just get busier within the church. Because serving Jesus and serving the church are synonymous to these wicked foolish people.
I’m not protestant (anymore) but I have been there, done that. (Not that this only happens in protestant churches, but I can picture it better because of my experience).
Every time I read a version of this story, with slight variations but basically the same narrative, I cringe. What you will be told (if you haven’t already) is that you are trying to “control” your wife using “technicalities” found in scripture. And what is sad about that is these “technicalities” are there to force the couples to stay in the fight and make the marriage work, when all else seems to have failed and there is no feeling of love between you.
Those technicalities are a feature, not a bug of Christian marriage.
The outcome here is predictable, but no less distressing to read. Praying for you, brother.
Talked for awhile with my pastor this evening. Every Tuesday he has “office hours” at the local Irish pub, and anyone is invited to stop by for beer and theological discussion.
I explained this interpretation of Malachi 2:13-16 to him, and his reply was as follows:
Back in the day, only men were allowed to divorce. This passage speaks of what we know in the modern world as successful men divorcing their first wives taking a “trophy wife”, and leaving the first wife destitute. This thwarts the purpose for which God created marriage, which was Godly offspring.
But in this age, when women have an equal right to divorce, we can just as well reverse all the pronouns, and apply it as written to women:
13 And this second thing you do. You cover the Lord’s altar with tears, with weeping and groaning because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. 14 But you say, “Why does he not?” Because the Lord was witness between you and the husband of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though he is your companion and your husband by covenant. 15 Did he [God] not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you be faithless to the husband of your youth. 16 “For the woman who does not love her husband but divorces him, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers her garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”
And, given the asymmetry in Ephesians 5:22-33 between husbands commanded to love their wives, and wives commanded to submit to their husbands, we could modify Verse 16 to say:
16 “For the woman who does not submit to her husband but divorces him, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers her garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”
I am so glad I am Eastern Orthodox.
@HoseB
Hi HoseB
I would like to encourage you to be strong, and courageous. Remember that God vindicates the righteous. If you don’t feel that way, call out to God for help. Do not be scared or fearful. Just remember, it is not your fault at all if your wife divorces you. Just focus on God, and see your wife as she is: an evil jezebel who is full of lies. The more you cling to this fact, the more you will be able to persevere.
Grace and peace
lady jojo