You know the speeches. Even if you don't attend church, you've heard the specials on TV during Father's Day weekend. They aren't the gooey, lovey-dovey programs you see for moms. They're in-your-face "why aren't you more of a man" TV shows, designed to make men feel bad on the one day we would expect to be treated like the kings of our castles that we are. As I heard the same old talking points, this year something was different.
No, they still gave the same scolding that is due every year around this time to all of the dads in attendance; that much did not change. What changed is that now, this year, I am among the fathers in the audience being chastised. This year, I got to hear how horrible a job I've done at being a father, and what's more - a man. Another Mother's Day passed and my wife got flowers. I got a talking-to.
But the differences between years past and this year don't end at that. As I sat and listened and took in what was being thrown my way, this year, as a new father, I understood that they're right. For so long manhood (and fatherhood along with it) have been on a downward spiral, out of control, to the detriment of our whole society. And I finally realized why they yell at us on Father's Day. We, fathers, are in need of an awakening. They, the speakers, are trying to snap us out of the self-induced coma we've been living in.
Fatherhood has always been an important topic to me. Even before I got married I knew I wanted to be a daddy someday. From childhood I just knew I would one day grown up and be a dad myself. The child of a divorced family, my father left when I was 6 years-old, I looked to men around me for guidance on what it means to be a man and how a man should act. Fortunately for me, unlike so many others, my dad was never far away and I could always call him and he would come pick me up. I never lacked a father, I just didn't have one in my home.
That being the case, I was more inclined to watch what men were doing and how they were doing it in order to learn from them. I learned about opening doors for ladies and received further guidance on how to treat women from my mother. But camping and widdling, that I learned from the adult men in my life. As years passed and I got older, I was always interested in what I was supposed to do as a grown man. How was I supposed to go about maintaining a job and a family? What role was I supposed to have in my household?
These are all lessons that sons, and even daughters, learn from their fathers. It's not that men have to sit down with their kids and "teach" them all these things, but that is nice. Men - fathers - need to BE a father for their children to see. They need to demonstrate love for the mother of their children so that they can have an understanding of a healthy relationship. Fathers need to treat their daughters in a way that when they are older they will know what qualities to look for in a man. Dads need to exemplify to their sons how a man is to act and to treat others. It's not in the lessons that are taught, it's in the time that is spent.
But where are all the fathers? Divorce is on the incline, more and more children are born to single mothers (or aborted because it's too hard to raise a child alone) and will never know their dads. The National Fatherhood Initiative [1], a non-profit organization whose mission is to improve the well being of children by increasing the proportion of children growing up with involved, responsible, and committed fathers, believes that father absence produces negative outcomes for their children, widespread fatherlessness is the most socially consequential problem of our time, and that societies which fail to reinforce a cultural ideal of responsible fatherhood get increasing amounts of father absence. So...where are the fathers?
It doesn't take much research on the internet to pull up the statistics on father absence. The sad reality is that many fathers are simply choosing not to be involved in their children's lives. It is not that more men are incarcerated. It's not even that more fathers are serving overseas in Iraq, as many of those deployed return home and immediately resume being involved dads. No, the reason many children are left without a father to guide them into adulthood is that so many men are just caught up in their own lives and are too busy to be a parent.
This does not just speak to "fatherless" children though. Sadly, many children have fathers at home who simply don't give them the time of day. And while it may have taken me a while and it may not have seemed like it, these are the fathers to whom I am speaking. I now understand, as a father of an infant, just how hard it can be to give your time, to give up your personal plans, and to just be a dad. Sometimes we are required to drop what we're doing and do something we don't want to do. In decades past, that was an expected part of being a father. Now it seems that men are not so inclined to give up any aspect of their own lives in order to raise up another little life. That is where the change needs to be made.
Like in so many other areas, this can only be solved by changing hearts and minds. It took time for our society to get to this point, and it's going to take time to drive it back in the direction of men taking responsibility for the lives they've helped to create.
Men - fathers - we are in need of an awakening. We have go to become involved in the lives of our children, for their sake, and for the sake of society as a whole. Our children need us and we have got to be there for them. Sometimes we will have to give up comforts in order to give them what they need. Sometimes we will lose sleep. Every now and then we will have to cancel plans. But in the end, it will be so worth it. They will grow up to be productive citizens because their fathers were part of their lives.
And we, dads, we will sleep soundly with the deep satisfaction that we raised up children who have firm foundations, who in turn will raise up children of their own.
It only takes sperm to be a father. It takes a man to be a dad.
