Masculinity is Institutional.
Like femininity, it is multi-leveled: biological (chemical, morphological, neurological, etc.), emotional, cognitive, social, spiritual and institutional. Femininity is less institutional: more organic, fluid, emotive, natural, synthetic, concrete, direct, intuitive, and instinctive. Of course integral femininity also requires education of the intellect, strengthening of the will, habits of virtue, the sanctification of prayer, and the orderly life of institutions. Femininity, with even modest safety, order and love, flourishes organically. It fluidly directs itself, with even modest organization and discipline, to care of and communion with the persons close by: particularly the young, infirm, suffering, and elderly. Already by age two the girl is mothering her dolls: this is not socialized behavior, it is organic.
In every dimension (oxytocin, intellect, body) the male is more distant, abstract, isolated, outlooking. If the female vocation is primarily direct attention to the person; the male vocation is outward to create a world which protects, shelters and enlivens the mother/child/infirm/elderly/hurting. Of course man and woman partner in a common vocation, to multiply and govern the world, but there is a fundamental difference in calling, identity, destiny and mission. In family and society, the two are fully equal partners, but there is divine/natural gender distinction. For example, even in the now common event of the wife outperforming in career, (think Justice Amy Barrett), the woman retains a powerful focus on the persons close to her, the man share this but less intensely with more orientation to the broader world and abstract cultural realities.
While more sensitive and prone to anxiety/hysteria, the woman is also more resilient and hardy in her core femininity. She is like a hardy plant, a hosta or day lilly, that thrives with little attention, water, nourishment or sunshine. Masculinity is more delicate, fragile and complex: it is like a very fussy plant that requires prolonged attention, fertilizing, sunshine, trimming and water. Mature, wholesome, fruitful masculinity requires a prolonged, elaborate itinerary of formation through multiple institutions. These need not be formal. They include direction, correction, accountability, encouragement, fraternity, obedience, recognition for achievement, and certification.
Nature of Masculine Institutions
The male vocation is to provide and protect the family and community. It is to create a safe, sheltering, dignified, life-enhancing world. This requires order and structure, good institutions...authoritative, stable, reliable, fluid, resilient, adaptable. The core male institutions are naturally, ontologically inherent to the structure of the natural family: son, brother, husband, father. These are absolutely closed to women. We can add to these primal, pure male institutions: Catholic hierarchy and priesthood, kingship classically understood, the "father figure," and the warrior.
Other institutions are strongly male, but not absolutely as they require some balance with the feminine dimension to be healthy. Most areas of contemporary society properly include both: education, entertainment, politics, health care, and so forth.
The Catholic Church is herself ontologically feminine in reception of the spousal love of Christ, the Bridegroom. The corporate Church and each of us individually is receptive of Word and Sacrament, the Holy Spirit, forgiveness of sin and eternal life. So, Mary epitomizes in herself the Church and discipleship. However, within that filial-bridal-maternal-mystical identity, the "Petrine" dimension is the masculine or institutional: authority, governance, tradition, proclamation of the Word, and presiding over liturgical life. And so, the Church is the masculine/institutional within and subordinate to the more primal feminine/mystical.
Characteristics of Masculine Institutions
1. Fraternity within combat and competition. The male psyche instinctively goes to war and finds brotherhood within battle. The feminine psyche inclines more to cooperation, less to combat.
2. Sacred order, hierarchy, authority, obedience. Masculinity carries a powerful sense of a transcendent, moral order which permeates all of life. And so, etymologically, hierarchy ("sacred" "rule") means a holy order; it entails obedience to the transcendent, not the oppression of the weak by the powerful. Likewise, authority (as distinct from power) is an anointing from above for a mission of service and stewardship. Filial obedience is given, not to the strong or the conqueror, but to the holy, the good, the true as represented by an authentic representative of the cosmic order.
3 Prominence of abstract, ordering principles, laws, regulations, protocols; justice including retribution, not revenge, but sober reward/punishment for good/bad. Mercy and compassion are operative, but do not absolutely abolish justice, truth, retribution and wrath against evil.
4. Tradition as a connection and rooting in history as well as a hopeful anticipation for the future through the fidelity and stability of institutions and manly behavior.
5. Blood sacrifice, heroism and martyrdom, courage, fortitude and perseverance in combat.
6. Humility: the fragility of the inflated male ego is overcome by movement into virtue and service of the good, the true and the beautiful as instituted in family, community, organization and nation.
7. Chastity: toxic proclivities to lust, domination, covetousness, indulgence and fantasy are mortified by fidelity to institutions, spouse/family, vows, Church, the innocent/incompetent, and social group.
8. Sobriety as gentle strength, freedom from disordered emotions, clarity of thought, prudence in judgement, emotional patience and steadiness...source of comfort and security for those anxious and threatened.
Classically Masculine and Feminine Institutions
More masculine, by nature or form, institutions: Catholic priesthood, military, law enforcement, elite chess, engineering/architecture (88%), computer/math (74%), stem (71%), professional athletics, construction, truck driving, manufacturing, organized crime, and comedians (2-1 ratio, 6-1 in standup, and 10-1 open mic.)
More feminine institutions: education (73%), health care and nursing (76%), psychological therapy and counseling (75%), service. Women now outperform men in higher education: they are 53% of college educated workers.
We are now 60 years into the relentless insistence on gender homogeneity. But the hard, factual reality of gender difference persists in the professions above.
Cultural Revolution: Assault on Masculinity and Institutions
The relentless disparagement of "patriarchy" from the cultural left is in some part justifiable renunciation of toxic male domination, misogyny, lust, and control. But it has actually thrown out the baby with the bath water. It has deconstructed masculinity itself: its very identity, destiny and mission; and the dense web of institutions that both express and nurture it.
The prosperity and comfort of postwar American has fostered a cult of indulgence, narcissism, comfort, unchastity, and effeminacy. Femininity...filial, sororal, spousal, maternal...has been corrupted by emulation of toxic masculinity in sexual license, careerism, and abortion. But virility has been fundamentally vacated of its interior form as paternal, spousal, fraternal, and filial...as humble, chaste, courageous, sober, prudent and just. If the woman/mother is reconfigured as glamor or career girl; the man/father is perverted into wimp or thug.
A New Era?
Femininity and masculinity are forms intrinsic to nature, to reality, to the human person. They cannot be extinguished or repressed by progressivism: they are inexorable, inevitable, in a degree invincible.
There is a clear, if statistically modest, revival among Gen Z men: movement to religion, conservatism, and classical virility. This is a promising blessing. Let us welcome, encourage, and pray for it. The biggest benefactors will be women...and their children!
No comments:
Post a Comment