Gentlemen, Christ and the Church Need Us

“I’ve been bad about missing church lately, so maybe now is not a good time.”

Discerning whether or not to join the Church is no small feat. In fact, it’s quite intimidating. My friend, we’ll call him Joe, didn’t come from a Catholic background. He’d never prayed the rosary, couldn’t recite the Nicene Creed from memory (even I have to cheat sometimes), and what’s this about being a saint?

Despite all the “rules” and strange traditions that non-Catholics may be unaccustomed to, there was this little tug on his heart at a very difficult time of his life. But then he missed Mass a few times. And the momentum stopped.

You see, Joe is facing a great struggle. No, it’s not fighting a war on foreign soil. No, it’s not persecution for being a Christian. It’s not even the day-to-day struggle for food and clean water.

Joe is the modern man.

Have you felt like you've lost momentum in your spiritual life?

Unlike Joe, I was accustomed to the kneeling, sitting, standing regimen. I can still remember that polished feel of the little black beads on my first rosary. I’ll never forget the moment I laid eyes on Gamera, “Guardian of the Universe” in my comic book and knew St. Michael the Archangel, protector of the Church, would be my role model and confirmation saint.

But like Joe and so many prodigal sons today, I once lost momentum too.

Gentlemen, spiritual life is warfare. And we’re losing the battle.

According to Pew Research Center, women outnumber men in the Catholic Church by 54% to 46%. Dig a little deeper into spiritual life, and you’ll find that the gap is even wider. 67% of Catholic women say they pray every day while only 49% of Catholic men say the same. And this is nothing new. Overall church attendance among Catholics has declined from 75% in 1955 to an  abysmal 39% in 2017.

Want to see where society is today? We don’t need to look very far: broken homes, the opioid epidemic, 50+ million abortions, the sex scandals of powerful men, mass shootings, the incel phenomenon…the list goes on. I’m not suggesting that men are the answer to all of society’s ills. But what good has their absence brought?

Jesus wants you just as you are. And here some ways to take the first steps back to Him:

First things first: just show up.

This may sound a little cliché, but showing up is half the battle. When we’ve fallen away or become lukewarm, we come to Jesus as we are. He doesn’t want us to worry about who we will be in the future or who we were in the past. He wants us as we are. Here are four ways to help:

Pray: Giving God our attention in prayer every day, even 15 minutes, opens a personal connection. Ask Jesus to open your heart and be your center.

Confession: An invitation to God’s grace. We fall and keep going. Once a month, once a week, or as often as needed. Feel weird? Don’t worry, priests have heard it all.

Mass: It’s not about the homily, it’s about receiving the greatest gift Jesus left us—Himself. When we receive Him in the Mass, we find our role in His Church.

Read the Bible: Even 5-10 minutes each day is our key to God’s guidance. Try reading one chapter, section, or passage. Don’t know where to start? Start here.

When in doubt, look to other role models (the foremost being Jesus Himself).

“I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do.” John 13:15

Fr. Mike Schmitz, YouTube personality and chaplain at the University of Minnesota Duluth, has already laid the groundwork for what he calls “The Marks of a True Christian Man.” Each mark prepares us for the next. We must ask ourselves each day: how can we be reflective of these five marks?

Responsibility: The opposite of laziness. A man who embodies this mark fulfills his commitments. He is never bored. He’s always challenging himself. He orders his life.

Competence: Another way to think of it is preparation. This kind of man wastes nothing. Every moment, no matter how small, is an opportunity to exercise his moral muscle.

Integrity: Being united in principle and action. What a man of integrity believes to be right, he does. And a man of integrity is bound by his word.

Love: Selfless action for the sake of another’s good. A man who acts out of love gives without expecting something in return. This is a man who serves others.

Defiance: Bringing the faith to the world, not just church and home. A man of defiance brings his faith with him wherever he goes, whether that is in public, school, or work.

Gentlemen, being the man Christ wants us to be may seem daunting. But we’re called to take up the spiritual sword. He has shed His blood for us, given us the Church, grace through the sacraments, and a whole litany of saints as role models. We may be quite imperfect, and that’s ok. Jesus came for the sinner.