Raising boys, that is the topic of this post. I have three and let me say right out of the blocks that I am no expert. I have learned that each of my sons is not like the other: one loves guitar, another basketball and the third politics. So…I am learning…my approach to each one needs to be customized. With that I need help. Maybe you can relate.

An article entitled “How to Fix Boys” caught my attention. It is an interview with Leonard Sax, family physician and research pathologist in Maryland. Here are some quotes that caught my attention:

The six-year-old boy and the six-year-old girl differ from each other much more than an adult man and adult woman do. We all wind up in the same place: there’s very little difference in terms of adult men’s and women’s maturity, ability to sit still, how they learn. But there are huge differences in the ability of the average six-year-old girl and boy to sit still and be quiet.

Policies which ban children from playing with pretend swords or toy guns are not grounded in any research findings demonstrating that those policies accomplish anything good.

If you have such a son, who is very much engaged by competition and mastery, these games [video games] may pose a particular risk. They can be addictive, and I use that term speaking as a medical doctor: literally addictive.

The most startling change between teenage culture today and 30 years ago is the way more and more teenage boys have moved away from the courtship of girls. Online pornography has displaced the pursuit of real girls for a significant number of boys.

Dad has an important role to play, but boys have to see a lot of different men to have a healthy sense of what it means to be a man. They need a community of men, and we don’t provide that.

Look again at the last point. The church needs to be a place where boys find healthy role models. I would love to hear what your church is doing in this regard.