Thanks to Bill Reichart, pastor of the Provocative Church at Big Creek, for responding to my article, “The Loss of Soul.”    You can find Bill on  www.provocativechurch.com.   

Bill ’s blog includes the first talk in  a series entitled “False Self” which I thought you might want to check out for yourself, you men in particular. 

As you know, I’m running a series called “Quest For The Soul,” which explores the same theme.  I enjoyed the first talk in the series at Bill’s church, however,  because (a) it was given by a man who’s obviously experienced his own spiritual awakening (you could tell this because he’d dropped his masks!)  and (b) it was a talk given by a man for men,  and consequently had that unique  male  perspective and focus. It also got me thinking about the issue of masculine identity  in today’s world.

I support any attempt to encourage men to break free from the emotional straight-jacket that society has imposed upon them by demanding they conform to  patriarchal ideas of male identity.  Expected and encouraged to be aggressive, dominant and emotionally stoic, has produced generation upon generation of emotionally unavailable  and under-developed men who have been groomed out of expressing and experiencing a full emotional life. 

What it means to be a man in the twenty-first century  is  examined and explored in two of my recommended links : “Menweb Articles” and  “Achilles Heel,”    websites I recommend specifically because they contain articles which offer alternative versions of masculinity,  new ways to “be” male. 

So, you men in particular,  check both Bill’s course on the False Self, out, and my recommended links, “Menweb Articles” and “Achilles Heel.” You women as well, of course. After all, we are all either daughters , sisters, mothers or wives and/or partners,  of men.