Category Archives: Parenting

This Week in Sexuality

Posted on January 21, 2012 | Leave a comment

20120121-173425.jpgThis Saturday marks the starts of my “This Week in Sexuality” weekly feature. Every Saturday I will spotlight the “sexuality” stories I came across in the previous seven days.

Real Marriage
 
The biggest sexuality story hands down has been the release of Mark Driscoll’s Real Marriage. The book has barely been out two weeks and it already has just shy of an hundred reviews on Amazon. Egalatarians hate the book because Driscoll is a complementarian and believes in “traditional” marriage. No shocker there. However, the book is even getting mixed reviews from people that are in basic theological alignment with the Seattle pastor. A lot of the controversey stems from the fact that the book has a seemingly inordinate amount of its content dedicated sexual intercourse and various sex acts. I have yet to read the book but I do recall Driscoll’s teaching on the Song of Solomon being fairly messed up. I do eventually plan to pick up since it will be a significant influence on Christians.
 
Here are some of the better reviews I came across:
  • Deny Burk has lengthy review here.
  • Tim Challies has a short review here.
  • Doug Wilson did a mutli-parter: pt. 1, 2, 3, 4, & 5.
Sidenote: The best book I’ve read on marriage so far is Doug Wilson’s Reforming Marriage. I’d recommend Ed Wheat’s Intended for Pleasure if you are looking for something that focuses on the sex act.
 
Babies are Good
 
Mark Oppenheimer’s latest article in the New York Times on Evangelicals shifting their views regarding contraception is worth checking. Here is a short quote:
“Since then, however, there has been a shift in evangelical thinking about contraception, and therefore about big families. You can see it in the Duggar family, the enthusiastic Santorum supporters who star on the reality television show “19 Kids & Counting.” You can read about it in books like “Quiverfull,” Kathryn Joyce’s 2009 account of Christians who forgo contraception to add children to the Lord’s army. And you can hear it in the teachings of theologians like Russell D. Moore, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary dean who warns evangelicals to be skeptical of the ‘contraceptive culture.’”

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Posted in Abortion, Parenting

Home-schooling Homes and Homosexuality

Posted on October 26, 2011 | 14 Comments

Homosexuals come from all sorts of households. Single parents homes, Christian homes, middle class homes, biracial homes and just any other category of home you can come up with. Homosexuality is a sin (Scripture says this clearly and repeatedly) and sin knows no boundaries. That being said, Dr. Joseph Nicolosi’s research has shown that there are a triad of factors that tend to be present in the homes that homosexuals come raised in. The present of these environmental factors and shaping influences will put a child at higher risk of developing and acting upon homosexual urges. Several years ago I noticed this triad in one of the places a Christian would least expect. I started noticing an abnormal amount of especially effeminate young men from home-schooling families. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the causes behind this trend.  However, over time I began to notice that three variables tended to be present in all these home-schooling households.

 

First, the father was often absent due to working long hours to provide for his family. It should be noted that the father appeared to be godly in all examples I observed. He just was gone a lot and was exhausted when he was home.

Second, the mother tended to be overbearing in her management of her home. Her home was well kept. Her lesson plans well-executed. She was queen of every aspect of her home.

Third, not all the sons in these homes came across as effeminate. Some of the boys were very masculine. They were covered in bruises and cuts from building a tree house or playing soccer. However, I noticed the sons that did demonstrate these prehomosexual tendencies were usually homebodies. They tended to be very timid, artistic*, and clung to mother while his brothers explored the world outside.

So, in summary, a distant father, overbearing/protective mother, and timid child were a concoction that tended to produce effeminacy and potential homosexuality. This was disturbing to me because all three are common in home-schooling households. In this sense, home-schooling can be a very dangerous environment for young men to mature in.

What is a parent to do? Should we reject homeschooling? Should we force our artistic boys to build tree houses? Not necessarily. There is another way to come at this and it starts with the parents.

Consider this passage from Joseph Nicolosi’s A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality:

“For variety of reasons, some mothers also have a tendency to prolong their son’s dependence. A mother’s intimacy with her son is primal, complete, exclusive, and this powerful bond can easily deepen into what psychiatrist Robert Stoller calls a ‘blissful symbiosis.” But the mother may be inclined to hold on to her son in what becomes an unhealthy mutual dependency, especially if she does not have a satisfying, intimate relationship with the boy’s father. In such cases she can put too much energy into the boy, using him to fulfill her needs for love and companionship in a way that is not good for him.
Continue reading →

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Posted in Biblical Sexuality, Fatherhood, Femininity, Homosexuality, Masculinity, Parenting

Four Free Resources on Biblical Parenthood

Posted on August 31, 2011 | Leave a comment

Times are tough and money is tight.  Don’t let that stop you from picking up some great resources on biblical parenting. Here are four free resources that I’ve found especially helpful.

1) Future Men by Doug Wilson (free on Google Books) – This book is insanely helpful to parents of boys. It is an extremely practical and crisp read. I learned a lot about being a man just by reading it.

Preview Snippet…

“So strength in discipline by itself is not sufficient. A father must also be wise in how he uses his strength. Many strong, aggressive fathers are very foolish in how they use that strength with their boys. Strong men are frequently competitive men, and competitive are often competitive with their sons. And this is why many “strong” fathers have weak sons–the son was never allowed to attempt anything. Or, when he attempted something, it was never good enough, and the “disciplinary” response was always disproportionate and unjust. Discipline of this sort comes from fathers who are control freaks, having to do everything themselves.”

2) The Duties of Parents by J.C. Ryle (free on a website)- Are you looking for a short read that gets you the basics of biblical of parenting? Look no further. Ryle’s little work is packed with more insight than an entire library of parenting books. I find myself returning to it a couple times a year.

Preview snippet…

“The mother cannot tell what her tender little infant may grow up to be—tall or short, weak or strong, wise or foolish—he may be any of these things or not—it is all uncertain. But one thing the mother can say with certainty: he will have a corrupt and sinful heart. It is natural for us to do wrong. “Folly,” says Solomon, “is bound up in the heart of a child” [Proverbs 22:15]. “A child left to himself disgraces his mother” [Proverbs 29:15]. Our hearts are like the earth on which we walk; leave it alone, and it is sure to bear weeds.” Continue reading →

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Posted in Books for Fathers, Fatherhood, Parenting