Last week, I told my wife that it would be appropriate, dare I say “loving” of her to get me an iPad for Father’s Day. Her response? She laughed. It wasn’t a mean laugh, it was more of a giggle that seemed to say, “An iPad? That is adorable. Should I buy it with one of our offshore Cayman Islands bank accounts Lord Featherton?”
Needless to say, I did not receive an iPad for Father’s Day, but I did have a great weekend … until a reader named John Harris exposed a church-flavored Father’s Day scandal to me.
I didn’t notice it at first, I give him all creative credit, but upon hearing about it I knew I had to share it with you.
The controversy? The scandal? It’s simple.
On Mother’s Day, the sermon most pastors preach is like this:
“Moms are amazing. They are like human unicorns, special, beautiful, smelling of lavender and night jasmine, deserving of our gratitude and our complete affection and pedicures. Mothers, please stand up so that we can shower you with applause and have the ushers give you roses commemorating this moment when we, the body of Christ, were able to bask in your combined loveliness.”
On Father’s Day however, the sermon most pastors preach is like this:
“Dads, what are you doing? Seriously, get your act together! It’s time to be leaders of your households. It’s time to put away jobs that consume you. It’s time to put down your Blackberrys and serve your family with your heart and your soul. Cowboy up already! Your role is critical to the family and it’s time for you to get motivated and active in your family, your community and your world.”
One feels like a Lifetime movie, the other an episode of “Scared Straight,” where high school students are forced to listen to convicts yell at them about their lives.
Dads, am I wrong? Do you need to cry on my shoulder at the “Wild at Heart,” live like William Wallace style sermon you received two days ago? Moms, am I wrong? Like my own mother who told me that there’s no such holiday as “Kid’s day” because everyday is kid’s day, is one sermon not going nearly far enough in our appreciation of you? (And it’s not moms, you are in fact amazing.)
Moms?
Dads?
Kids?
What say you?
Have any of you been to a church that gives Oldest Mom and Youngest Mom awards? These have sort of gone out of style for a couple of reasons. One reason is that the preacher or some other sap has to get up and start yelling out ages for women to admit to. "Every mom over the age of 50 please stand." Then they start weeding them out, having the younger ones sit. Once I saw a tie in one of these fiascoes. The preacher got flustered and gave the ONE gift to a woman in the choir because she was closer. "Of course..the choir members get everything." It was a mess.
The 'youngest mother' used to be perfectly innocent but not it could be someone as young as 13. AWKWARD!
I'd prefer no acknowledgment of Hallmark holidays in church. Well, come to think of it, I'm not all that happy with what goes on at Christmas either.
The underpinning being that women are weak, and easily agreeable to the church thus valuable as a part of the flock. Men are not, and must be chastised for not being “yes men” The best Christian man says yes.
It just goes to show you that feminism has creeped into the church as well: women are goddesses, men are idiots. No wonder we feel the need to whip men into shape if the entire world assumes and expects them all to act like fools. Maybe if we all stopped worshiping women simply for being born with two x chromosomes and respected men as the heads of their households, we wouldn’t NEED to tell them to cowboy up — they’d already be doing it. And maybe if we gave women the constructive criticism everyone needs instead of encouraging them to be prideful in themselves, they would be better supporters/encouragers/helpers to their husbands instead of emasculating them.
At least us moms are hearing it somewhere. Today is Mother’s Day. My kids are bickering, my house is a mess (so is the car), and I’m trying to plan what I’m going to make for dinner. My husband is in the bedroom, taking a nap. I’m sorry, but I have more respect for the father of my children to let his “special day” be like this. So yeah, I don’t mind being told I’m amazing and getting handed a nice rose. At least I’m getting flowers from someone.
Maybe this is just an American Thing. Here in Australia I have never heard anything like that.
Excellent point, Jon! I’m really not comfortable with the trend of pastors beating up on men from the pulpit. Some men say it’s great and they need it, but it just seems odd to me.