Virilis Vocatium Dei: How Catholicism Develops Masculinity
Date
2023-05
Authors
Leija, Will
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Abstract
Many "men" today are just boys in a mature body. The problem is that many boys grow up with a misconstrued sense of what it means to be a man and as we see today with social justice movements and the rise of gender ideology, it appears that being a man does not matter. Understanding what it means to be a man is important for society and for the individual. So, to see if this can be solved the Catholic Church will be analyzed as being one of the oldest institutions in the world, which has been influencing the world for thousands of years so to see what the Church has been teaching for boys to grow up and see the type of men being raised would be important and to see if this institution has an answer. It is generally believed already that Christianity is a female dominated religion with little to no proper theology of masculinity. Along with that, it is already believed that the Church hates any deviation from the "normal" so gays, lesbians, non-binary, and transgenders (LGBTQ) to name a few but the research shows the contrary. I propose that both have only a partial of the truth. Through the investigation of the Church's thousand years of theology, the use of the bible, independent literature tackling the same topic, and many resources from the official teaching office of the Church, I find that the Church's view is not a minority view. Too much of the literature today speak on behalf of the ideologies that are popular and promoted today. There is a lack of literature from the other side. And if the Catholic Church is proclaiming itself as the source of truth within Christianity and to the world then it must offer ways it is raising up men for the past thousands of years and today. The next step is for the Church to develop a proper theology of masculinity if it wants to influence the next generation of boys. Further research would be needed in comparing generations of boys and men and see if there are correlations in the modern world and to figure out if the Church's view is the answer.
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Keywords
Catholicism, Christianity, masculinity, Jesus Christ
Citation
Leija, W. (2023). Virilis vocatium Dei: How Catholicism develops masculinity. Honors College, Texas State University.