I just stumbled upon this aforementioned series of videos recorded and distributed in 2018. Unfortunately, Dr. Maxwell has went apostate and renounced his faith as of 2021. However, I cannot help but comprehend what it says when he refers to evangelical culture as too apt to produce effeminate and girly beta males.
“As for My people, children are their oppressors, And women rule over them. O My people! Those who lead you cause you to err, And destroy the way of your paths.”
—Isaiah 3:12
It’s the agreeable, compromising, compliant, capitulating beta male that conveys spirituality in effeminate terms. In fact, spirituality in the popular imagination has come to be perceived as an almost feminine quality. For instance, I have quoted the Bible beforehand in the manner of a devotional, and a less spiritually inclined, more irreligious man speaks of it as me “being sensitive” but the reality is, he’s chosen to see public avowals of faith as a tender, “sensitive” trait, (and maybe that’s a polite way of saying girly because he’s seeing spirituality in feminine terms.) But this is illustrative partially of why evangelicalism has been a failure and its popular perception is that evangelical piety is a display of sensitive feminine traits like being emotional, sensitive, and passive. It’s illustrative of why men drop out of fellowship in evangelical churches. It’s furthered along by the fact that increasingly women (i.e., mothers, grandmothers) are functioning as the spiritual pillars of their households and extended families. Christian masculinity doesn’t find an ideal expression in the evangelical subculture. Not only is this the case, but evangelicalism has also lost its earlier traits of militancy and tribalism that made it attractive to men. Contrast men like J.C. Ryle and Ian Paisley with contemporary evangelicals like John Piper and Andy Stanley, for instance.
Evangelical churches tend to conjure images of soprano-singing males in praise bands playing contemporary Christian music one associates with the KLove radio station. Maxwell was not influential in my earlier summations that evangelical subculture is ‘too effeminate‘ and ‘girly‘ — in the sense of producing a subculture of men that are passive, weak, too prone to a spirit of compromise, and wishy-washy talk in order to be agreeable, and palatable. I just heard Maxwell talk on these issues recently and I had formed a comparable critique of evangelicalism years ahead of hearing Maxwell’s critique.
I have said things, such as affirming that we need “a muscular robust faith,” thinking in terms of soldierly analogies of masculine spirituality whereby we’re prepared for battle. This is an ideal where Christian men can live out their existence as men. We need to comprehend leadership, sacrifice, and the necessity of struggle and see our Christian culture/occidental civilization as an extension of the church and seek its preservation. We men need causes to fight for. Christian men yearn to fight cultural wars and spiritual battles as men with masculine traits of perseverance and steadfast faithfulness, not with timidity, passivity, and an air of compromise. The Christian man prays most humbly in his cloister where the genuineness of his humility and contrition may be manifest not in showy displays of contrived prayer before his fellow man, but in heartful yearning for God’s aid, and professed dependency upon God. There are more than a few reasons why Christian men are NOT putting their most sincere, heartful prayers professing their unequivocal dependence upon God’s providence before others. They’re NOT necessarily ashamed of their faith in such instances, but they’re not seeking to wave it on their shirt sleeves nor virtue-signal it either. Part of being a Christian man entails being discrete and circumspect in certain things such as manifest piety, and aggressive in other things like decrying wrong and standing up for justice.
Jordan Peterson states: “You are like a rabbit. . . A rabbit is not virtuous, it’s harmless, it can do nothing, except maybe get eaten. But If you’re a monster and you show restraint and not act monstrously, then you’re virtuous.” As Peterson surmises, “It’s better to be restrained monster than a well-behaved coward.” It’s in recognizing his own power and strength that a man learns responsibility, and fathoms the strategic imperative of due regard for His Creator God, and using his power for just and right.
And to the point, Christian men have abdicated evangelicalism in mass. Why? Many Christian men profess to be on a search for a more primitive, traditional Christianity. They call themselves traditionalists!—or trads! They extol patriarchy! They’re tribal! Why? Evangelicalism with its de facto effeminate subculture has failed Christian men for the simple reason it’s not allowing Christian men to be ‘Christian men.’ Its lost its allure, and Christian men don’t think you can salvage the church, the culture, the nation, and Western Civilization with a modus operandi that’s perceptively passive, effeminate and girly. Hence there’s a good reason why men have hit CTRL+ALT+DELETE on the contemporary evangelical subculture.
“Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.”
—Ephesians 6:16
“You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier.”
—2 Timothy 2:3-4
Well said Ryan. Men might consider identification with a militant religious order to help meet their needs, such as the “Order of Centurions”