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News

Should Christian men consider single mothers for marriage?

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Why Christians object to warning men about high-risk relationships?
Why do Christians object to warning men about high-risk relationships?

A while back, I explained my three concerns about attending church. One of them was that male pastors and church leaders have adopted the priorities of radical feminism, and have turned against men who want a traditional marriage in which the man leads and the wife supports. Well, I found something that really illustrates what I mean by that, so that everyone will understand it.

Above, you can see a tweet by Michael Foster, a pastor who hosts a podcast called “It’s Good to be a Man”. His web site states that his goal is: “Extending God’s house & father-rule by helping men to establish their own houses in strength, workmanship & wisdom.”

He explains in subsequent tweets that he is just urging men to ask questions to find out how the woman became a single mother.

Reactions to the tweet

Here are some reactions to the tweet:

The negative reactions are all anti-intellectual and childish, especially trying to refute statistics with “you hurt my feelings” or telling a single personal story as a counterexample.

Here’s a disclaimer. In this post, I am talking about single mothers by choice, and single mothers who initiated divorce. Widows are excluded.

The risks posed by single mother

Now, let’s improve Foster’s warning, by looking at some evidence – is a marriage to a single mother really more likely to result in a bad outcome?

First of all, women initiate 70% of divorces. If you meet a woman who divorced her husband, she either had a defect in her ability to evaluate and choose a man, or she had a defect in her ability to maintain a commitment to the man she chose. Either way, a woman who divorced her previous husband has red flags. There are two possibilities. She either chose a good man or she chose a bad man. If she chose a bad man, then it shows that she didn’t choose a man with good moral character and spiritual leadership. That means that those things were low priorities for her when deciding who to get naked with. Alternatively, she married a good man, and failed to maintain the commitment. Then she has different problems: problems with male leadership, problems with responsibilities, problems with commitment, problems with contentment, etc. You need to ask questions to get to the bottom of what happened, and more importantly, what she has studied and done to change her worldview. Don’t take her words for it, look at her actions.

Second, the number of premarital sex partners a woman has makes her a higher risk of divorce. The more sex partners, the more risk. The problem with women who engage in sex with men who don’t commit to them is that they necessarily don’t see a man’s willingness and ability to commit as valuable when choosing a man. Women who have premarital sex with men who don’t commit see OTHER THINGS as more valuable. They are rewarding the man for his height, his muscles, his tattoos, his piercings, his entertainment of her, etc. A good man should be very wary when a woman who gave her best youth, beauty and sexual interest to men like that now want to “settle” for a boring, unattractive provider who they see as having lower value than the men they gave sex to without requiring a commitment. What they really wanted was bad boys, and they threw sex at those bad boys without asking for commitment. With the man they perceive as low-level, they are insisting on commitment first, because they don’t want this low-level man as badly as they wanted the bad boy. They are settling for less than they feel they deserve. This is where sex-withholding, feelings of unhappiness, and frivolous divorces come from. And by the way, hollering Jesus doesn’t fix that risk any more than hollering Jesus fixes student loans accumulated for a useless non-STEM degree. Jesus-hollering isn’t evidence that a woman has persuaded herself to change her view of which men are the most attractive. A woman’s lack of respect for men who prepare for commitment and who keep their commitments is dangerous for marital stability. The hysterical reactions to a man’s judging a woman for her past mistakes don’t cancel the damage and risks caused by those mistakes. They simply tell the man that this woman is unrepentant, and therefore unteachable, and likely unsuitable for goal-oriented marriage. She is not qualified for the job of wife: self-sacrificial love for her husband, respect for her husband, and supporting her husband in what he is trying to achieve for God.

Here’s what the Bible says about sex outside of heterosexual marriage and about frivolous divorce. Read the critical replies to Foster’s tweet. The critical responses show the default position of church-attending Christian women and pastors to the Bible in this culture. First, the critics don’t accept the Bible as an authority over women’s choices in any area of life. Second, the critics don’t believe that women should bear any responsibility for their past actions. Nobody believes that women choosing bad men is the woman’s fault in this society. So you should assume that single mothers don’t take responsibility for their own failures. And that means that she will have taken no steps to repent of her mistake, and change her character so that she doesn’t make the same mistake again. It’s up to you to look at what she has been reading, listening to, watching, etc. and to check her actions in order to find out what she really thinks about what the Bible says. You can’t marry a woman who responds to any mention of the moral law and moral obligations with denial of responsibility and insults. If she hasn’t become an active crusader against women who choose bad men, and women who choose premarital sex, and women who choose divorce, then you can’t really believe that there’s been any real repentance. The risks to you are too high to take a chance on someone who is not certain. I’ve only ever met one single mother (Kerri) who blamed her own divorce on her own bad decisions.

The culture opposes male leadership

Foster’s warning is intended to help men to make better decisions, so that their relationships will produce results for God. But his critics aren’t interested in what men are trying to achieve for God. They are only concerned that women get what they want, regardles of their past actions. In their opinion, men exists solely to serve the needs of women. Women don’t have to be good enough for marriage, men just have to give them what they want regardless of the woman’s suitability for wife and mother roles. The role of men in any relationship is not to lead and achieve goals for God. Their role is to let women rule over them, disposing of their earnings as they see fit, for the benefit of the woman.

When women are young and pretty, they are entitled to hot bad boys to entertain them. When they are older, have tons of sexual experience, and children from different fathers, they are entitled to a husband to financially support them. But a husband with no power to lead the home, since their past choices of man showed they have no interest in following a man who has good character. And the churches, pastors, courts, schools, hospitals, etc. are all there to enforce this view of men as clowns / slaves.

This is what women are told about the role of men in every area of society. This society, including the Christian parents, Christian pastors, Christian culture, etc. do not produce women who prefer early marriage to men who are good at moral leadership and spiritual leadership. Therefore, men who are chaste, sober, have good educations, good private sector jobs, good savings, etc. need to be extremely careful. Look at the responses to Foster’s tweet, and think: do these people care about providing you with a good wife? Or is their concern all about how to insult you and shame you, until you are submissive to her needs?

Your marriage is your enterprise for serving God

My advice to men right now is to read over every single critical tweet in that thread that Foster started. Imagine that you are trying to get these women to do something in a marriage that is part of your plan to make the marriage serve God. You’re trying to get her to watch a William Lane Craig debate. You’re trying to get her to stop spending money on 50 Shades of Grey and Harry Potter. You’re trying to get her to stop smoking and drinking. You’re trying to get her to talk about the sermon instead of essential oils. You’re trying to get her to read a Thomas Sowell book. You’re trying to get her to not put the kids in day care or public schools.

You need to assume that her response to male leadership like this will be the exact same as the responses that Foster is getting to his tweet. And then after you have assumed it, then you need to keep your hands off that woman. Keep your distance, and ask her questions to find out what her real views are, and whether she is interested in growing into the kind of person who is safe for you to marry. Don’t forget that chastity and sobriety are important during the evaluation process, so that you aren’t influenced away from your leadership role. Don’t listen to her words, look at her actions.

News

Pro-life student Nathan Apodaca wins case against California State University

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House Republican leader tweets about Nathan's case
House Republican leader tweets about Nathan’s case

I have some good news! Last week, a pro-life student who attends California State University San Marcos was able to sue for discrimination, and he won. The case has implications for the entire CSU system, and every university in America. What’s more, the plaintiff in the case is a friend of the Wintery Knight blog! Let’s take a look at the details of the case and the judge’s decision.

Nathan told me that this story from The College Fix had the most details, and here it is:

Six months after a federal judge ruled that California State University officials could be held personally liable for funding policies that disfavor pro-life students, the largest four-year university system in the country has agreed to revise policies across its 23 campuses.

CSU’s board of trustees and the student government at CSU-San Marcos entered into a settlement agreement with the campus chapter of Students for Life and its former president Nathan Apodaca.

[…]The lawsuit challenged CSUSM funding policies that overwhelmingly favored two pro-choice campus organizations: the Gender Equity Center and LGBTQA Pride Center. They receive nearly $300,000 from Associated Students, Inc. each year with no strings attached.

Alliance Defending Freedom are the masters of defending religious liberty, and as they usually do, they made a video of their client explaining the facts of the case:

And here are the details of the decisions:

CSU is paying $240,000 in legal fees to the students’ lawyers at the Alliance Defending Freedom and $3,000 in damages to the club. The student government is giving Apodaca a $300 refund of his mandatory student fees, which he paid into a funding system that favored pro-choice viewpoints and disfavored his own pro-life views.

[…]Lorenz ordered CSUSM to revise the $500 application process to require “specific and detailed standards guiding decision making” on funding requests. They can no longer judge “the content of the speech” seeking funding by asking questions about its “purpose” and the “student benefit” of clubs’ events.

[…]The student government will adopt viewpoint-neutral standards for the allocation of mandatory student fees to any registered student organization “that involves viewpoint expression.” They must comply with the Supreme Court’s 2000 ruling in a similar case, known as Southworth.

The process must “not discriminate against any funding request based on the viewpoint to be expressed by the RSO or proposed event.” Funding applications that are “denied or reduced” must be accompanied by “the reasons” for the decision and a “right of prompt appeal” to an official or administrator.

All 23 campuses are getting a policy makeover as well. The agreement directs Chancellor White’s office to issue a “policy directive” across the system that imposes viewpoint-neutral criteria and procedures on student association funding requests for “student speech events.” It lays out five specific policies getting revisions.

This is the part that made me say “WOW!”:

In a major setback for the feminist and LGBTQ centers, the agreement bars them from funding via mandatory student fees, retroactive to July 1. The student government’s Board of Directors and Campus Activity Board will also not use those fees “unless and until” the student government adopts viewpoint-neutral criteria.

[…]In a statement on the settlement, the [ADF] emphasized that the two CSUSM centers received “57 times more than” the 100-plus recognized student organizations combined.

[…]Lorenz had rejected the defendants’ arguments that White and Haynes had a “reasonable belief” that forcing pro-life students to fund pro-choice speech, while denying them funding for their own speech, “was lawful.” The judge said “the development and state of the law” on compelled speech made clear to both officials that the funding mechanisms they oversaw were unconstitutional.

Things were really bad before Nathan and the ADF got the win.

I know that after he finishes his undergraduate degree, Nathan has plans to apply to law school in the future, so this may not be the last you hear about him. If you want to hear more from him before he argues for the reversal of Roe v Wade at the Supreme Court in 2035, then you can check out his articles at Human Defense Initiative.

My job right now with Nathan is to collaborate with him about what books to read, and annoy him about not doing a degree in computer science. (This is my job with all the young adults I advise) We exchange book suggestions in order to develop our worldviews. He also bullies me to watch movies in the theater like 1917 and to care about Star Wars, which I most certainly do not. I feel that if Nathan had one piece of advice to give my readers, he would say that you need to read books and watch movies about great people, which is what you can see on his Amazon wishlist. One of his favorite recent books was a book about Churchill, which he also bullied me into buying. It’s enormous, I will never finish it. He also likes to make fun of the way youth pastors offer young Christians pizza and movies instead of apologetics and bioethics training.

I think it’s important for old Christians to have a hand in what is going on in the minds of our Christian college students, and in their battles on campus. If you are looking for a good person to partner with, look up your local university’s pro-life club or Ratio Christi club. (I’m told by Carla that Nathan not only started a pro-life campus group, but also was part of a Ratio Christi campus group). At the local university, you’ll find lots of action going on that you can get involved with or financially support. Every older Christian should be in contact with a younger Christian who is making a difference. People think that older Christians need to care about the nonsense that young people are interested, like Tide pods and their weird music (I don’t know what their names are). That’s false. My job is to tell the young people about what I have learned about being a Christian. Not every young Christian will care about making a difference for the Kingdom of God, which is why you should focus on the ones who do.

News

Where does Pete Buttigieg stand on infanticide and religious liberty?

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Democrat presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg
Democrat presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg and his partner

I saw a short video from the Iowa caucuses recently, in which a female Democrat voted for Pete Buttigieg, then was shocked to learn that Pete is a gay man in a “marriage” relationship with another man. This woman knew enough about the Bible to accurately state that God’s design for marriage is for one man and one woman. So she had concerns about what she had just done.

Here’s the video:

This is why we should urge voters to not pick their political candidates based on looks. Maybe put down the romance novels and the unicorn mug, and turn off the “your best life now” sermon long enough to do a policy assessment on the candidates, before you vote?

Anyway, let’s learn a bit about Pete Buttigieg, since he seems to be a favorite of Bible-believing Christian women, apparently.

Here’s a story from Life News.

Yesterday on “The View,” Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg said that infanticide was not a thing. He claimed that nobody really seriously believes babies are killed and infanticides across United States.

But figures from the Centers for Disease Control show hundreds of babies are born alive and left to die after they survive failed abortion attempts.

The issue is serious enough that Congress has previously passed legislation requiring babies to receive medical care if they survive an abortion and Congress is currently considering legislation to hold doctors accountable for failing to provide that appropriate medical care.

During questioning, Meghan McCain asked Buttigieg about comments from Virginia Governor Ralph Northam defending infanticide and whether he would support any limits on abortions up to birth — even opposing partial-birth abortions.

“My point is that it shouldn’t be up to a government official to draw the line, it should be up to the woman who is confronted with the choice,” Buttigieg said defending abortions up to birth and infanticide.

I’m sure that the Christian Democrat lady would be surprised that Mayor Pete also supports infanticide. He looks so clean cut and handsome, and women can tell everything about a man’s character just by looking at him, am I right?

Next article is from Daily Wire:

Buttigieg has unabashedly embraced House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) Equality Act legislation that would strike a massive blow to our nation’s religious institutions. Specifically, the Equality Act would create a federally protected status for gender identity, defined as the “gender-related identity, appearance, mannerisms or other gender-related characteristics of an individual, regardless of the individual’s designated sex at birth.”

Any faith-based establishment — including churches, schools, and hospitals — with theological beliefs in conflict with this definition would likely face expensive legal battles, lawsuits, and public scrutiny. Case in point: A Catholic hospital was sued last year by the ACLU because it would not perform a risky sex-change surgery on a 16-year-old girl.

Unfortunately, the Equality Act would coerce health care and mental health professionals into providing dangerous gender-transition treatments for young children and adolescents, counter to their medical advice — and for many, against their religious beliefs.

Just as alarming, Buttigieg has imposed litmus tests based on what he deems theologically acceptable. We witnessed this first-hand when the former South Bend, Indiana mayor attacked Second Lady Karen Pence for teaching at a private school that adheres to her Judeo-Christian belief about marriage. In response, Buttigieg ridiculed the Pences and likened their religious views to that of “Pharisees.”

As a private institution, like thousands of such private schools that have long existed in our country, the school where Mrs. Pence teaches has the right to govern its school according to its own religious beliefs. Islamic schools, Buddhist schools, and Jewish schools are also free to do so under the United States Constitution.

As an individual running for our nation’s highest office, Pete Buttigieg is signaling how a Buttigieg administration would handle religious liberty. And his signals should frighten many.

I posted this story with the video, because I’ve been polling Christian women to find out how they keep themselves informed about politics. Although they all are anxious to vote, there doesn’t seem to be much work being done to read anything about the candidates, their achievements, their policies, etc. And it’s not just reading about the candidates, it’s reading about economics, foreign policy, etc. in general. It’s almost like they have a tremendous confidence in their intuition, such that they can tell everything about a person just by looking at that person’s appearance.

This reminds me of a girl I used to work with who was married to a libertarian. She came up to me one day with a set of photographs and asked me to guess which ones were serial killers. I thought it was stupid to do that, because “there’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face” as Shakespeare says. Well, she told me proudly how she had gotten them all right, because of her amazing skill at knowing all about people from their appearance. I remember talking to her about her libertarian husband, and whether she knew what libertarians believed about social issues like marriage and abortion, etc. She had no concern at all about it. Later on, she left the company, and wrote to me about her divorce.

It’s so strange to me that we are living in a world where character matters less than appearance. We all feel entitled to vote based on almost no real knowledge, just on our gut feelings. So you have Bible-believing people voting for candidates who disagree with the Bible from start to finish, who are in lifestyles that repudiate the words of Jesus about what marriage is, and who support legislation that would effectively end the practice of Christianity that is authentic to what the Bible teaches.

And then people tell me that I need to get married, and lower my standards because I’m “asking for too much”. Wow. I don’t think that women putting in a little work to find out what the candidates for PRESIDENT believe and have achieved is asking for too much.