My favorite painting: “Godspeed” by Edmund Blair Leighton, 1900
This is from the UK Telegraph, and it’s a nice confirmation of sex differences.
Excerpt:
Women who put in long hours in their careers greatly increase their risk of developing life-threatening illnesses, including heart disease and cancer, a new study has shown.
Work weeks that averaged 60 hours per week or more over three decades were found to triple the risk of diabetes, cancer, heart trouble and arthritis, according to new research from The Ohio State University.
The risk begins to climb when women put in more than 40 hours and takes a decidedly bad turn above 50 hours, researchers found.
Crucially the same pattern was not seen in men. In fact, they got healthier the longer they worked.
[…]Men who worked long hours had a higher incidence of arthritis, but none of the other chronic diseases.
Surprisingly, those men who worked moderately long hours, 41 to 50 hours weekly, had lower risk of heart disease, lung disease and depression than those who worked 40 hours or fewer.
[…]The research was published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
Recently, I was very much in love with a woman I’ll call Gertrude and I can remember thinking often about how much I wanted to work so that she wouldn’t have to work. I wanted to go out there every day and make money for us both, so that she wouldn’t have to face the world and all the pressures and difficulties of a job. I wanted her to stay safe at home and make the home comfortable and raise children who would respect their father and know and serve the Lord. There is something inside a man that translates love into “wanting to take away trouble from his woman”, and that was a very strong feeling for me at the time. I did not mind that she worked before we married and before children arrived. I did not mind that she pursued advanced degrees after marriage, did things in the community, or organized Christian events at the university. I just didn’t want her to have to face work. I wanted to protect and provide for her, and rescue her from work.
I think more women are expected to work today because government is so big that more taxes and more debt are needed to fund all the programs. That makes marriage and family harder to do on one man’s salary. This also might be one reason why men are reluctant to marry. Every man knows for certain that a woman who does not work makes a gentler and more faithful wife and mother. A woman who works is inevitably going to have more stress, which makes being a good wife and mother harder. Women who work also cheat on their husbands more than women who don’t work. My friend Dina tells me that about 90% of the women she works with withhold sex from their husbands, and many of those husbands have tuned out of the marriage, as a result of not getting their needs met. Some have gone on to have affairs, and that’s to be expected, especially if the woman chose a man who had recreational premarital sex before she married him.
The bottom line is that through their voting and life decisions, women often create the very problems that they later blame on men. A little wisdom would go a long way.
I guess I will start this post by linking to something a friend of mine named Joel Furches wrote about an atheist engineer.
He writes:
As an Aerospace Engineer for the U.S. Navy, Jason Pratt is not inaccurate when he describes himself as a rocket scientist for the government. He has flown F-14 Tomcats and the F/A-18F Super Hornet. He was a test pilot of the FA-18B and D Hornet, the FA-18F Super Hornet, and the T-45 Goshawk. His pedigree with all things aeronautical is well established. As was his atheism.
Pratt grew up in a single parent home. He and his sister were raised by their mother, who felt it was her duty to introduce them to church in their teenage years. The church Pratt attended was a religious shell: a ritualistic facade with little reference to actual scriptural teachings. He went through the ceremonial steps as a matter of form, and the moment he was confirmed by the church, he confirmed himself an atheist, and left the church in his dust. His family took this with barely a nod, and as soon as she was confirmed, his sister followed his example.
After High School, Pratt entered college to study engineering. Academically, he proved himself quite brilliant, and flaunted that brilliance at every opportunity. He describes himself as very much a “self-righteous atheist” in college.
He found his atheism very freeing, morally, living by the code of “do whatever you want as long as nobody gets hurt.”
Says Pratt:
“I started to meet other students, and some of them were claiming to be Christians. I even had some of them as roommates. Having had some church background, I knew the type. They were hypocrites, deluded by the silly book that they claimed they believed in. And so I frequently took pleasure in ridiculing them. I would mock them. I would look for any reason to bring out things that they would claim they believe and I would just make fun of them, and mock their God and the Bible that supposedly guided them.
“I generally enjoyed playing the intellectual superior, and I enjoyed challenging what they believed.”
Not much surprise to Pratt, most of the Christians he met had no ability to defend their faith against his ridicule.
[…]One day, however, Pratt met a fellow engineering student named John Thatcher. Thatcher had a perfect GPA, which was somewhat intimidating to someone like Pratt, who took such pride in his own intellect. Thatcher was a very likable guy. He was also a Christian. This made things difficult for Pratt.
At the same time, Pratt discovered that his Academic Adviser – a leading authority in the field of Thermodynamics – was a Christian. This discovery was made when Pratt went to his adviser’s office one day in order to request some help from the brilliant man. As Pratt approached his office, he was shocked to find a scientific article, arguing Thermodynamics from a Christian perspective, hanging from his office door. Pratt was so infuriated, he stormed away and never spoke to his adviser again.
Confused and upset that these two very intelligent men would believe in superstitious nonsense, Pratt made it his goal to truly examine the claims of Christianity for the first time.
This reminded me of a quote from atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel.
He says this:
“In speaking of the fear of religion, I don’t mean to refer to the entirely reasonable hostility toward certain established religions and religious institutions, in virtue of their objectionable moral doctrines, social policies, and political influence. Nor am I referring to the association of many religious beliefs with superstition and the acceptance of evident empirical falsehoods. I am talking about something much deeper–namely, the fear of religion itself. I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself: I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers.
I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn’t just that I don’t believe in God and, naturally, hope that I’m right in my belief. It’s that I hope there is no God! I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that.”
(”The Last Word” by Thomas Nagel, Oxford University Press: 1997)
I think in general, it’s a good thing when Christians strive to be different from the culture around them. Obviously, that means having different moral values and different goals than what’s popular and acceptable for non-Christians. It means not openly engaging in activities that are forbidden to Christians, like not getting drunk, not having premarital/extra-marital sex, etc. And I think it also means being as smart as you can possibly be about about areas that touch on your Christian worldview. Why? Because like the story above says, being informed and having the answers is attractive to people who are searching.
I say stuff to my co-workers
I’m going to give an example of a conversation I had recently with a co-worker, which he started.
Many of my co-workers know my politics and my religious views. I keep books on apologetics and economics, etc. on my desk from all the good academic publishers. So they know that I am informed and I do have reasons for believing what I say. My co-workers sometimes come to me and ask me questions about moral issues, science news, foreign policy and other things like that.
Just recently, one of our senior engineers asked me how can it be that people who are for limited government can be opposed to abortion, because wouldn’t stopping abortion require government to intrude into people’s lives.
Well, we had a wonderful conversation about how to restrict abortion without growing the government, and I was ready for this because I love to read current events about pro-life legislation in various states, as well as the writings of people like Francis J. Beckwith and Robert P. George. It went on for 15 minutes or so. And because we are seated in an Agile pod, everyone got to hear, too. If you are reading about these issues at a high level, you have confidence in what you say, which is why you should always be reading AND talking about what you read with other people who are studying, too. It’s in the talking with others (and watching debates) that you learn what you can and can’t say, and what you should and shouldn’t say when you have limited time to respond.
Frankly, I think a lot of people abandon Christianity in college and in the workplace precisely because they do not want to be thought stupid by their peers. And they also engage in a lot of “normal” behaviors, like drinking, partying, getting drunk, premarital sex just because they want to fit in with their secular peers. The solution to having confidence in the face of peer pressure is to know that you’re right about what you believe, and right about what actions you are taking. You need to situate your principles within a larger plan that is aimed at some goal, and be able to demonstrate to others that the steps you are taking to get there are likely to get the job done.
It doesn’t help God for you to be wild and stupid
Last point. In my life, I have sometimes tried to lead other Christians to study harder things and to get better jobs. Most of the time, this works. I can get young Christians to not study English or Drama or Art History, and instead get them to study Engineering or Computer Science or Nursing. And if they already are studying hard things, then I encourage them, I buy them books, I play games with them and ask them how things are going. Once they have the degrees, I encourage them to get jobs, to work in the summers, to open investment accounts, and pay off their loans.
The point is this – what you study and what you do for work and how good you are at your job plays a massive role in whether you will get into conversations with non-Christians at all. I can guarantee you that Jason Pratt would not listen to someone who was in their 30s, in debt, living at home with their parents, with only entry-level work on their resume at age 33.
It is not good service to God to bungle your education and career because you were more interested in feeling good, having fun and seeking thrills. You will lose opportunities to make a difference in the lives of others that way. Although skydiving, ziplining, surfing and flying off to Europe to help poor people might be fun when you are a teen, it makes you look foolish to non-Christians when you are still doing that into your 30s.
Managing your money – paying off debts and investing early and often – is part of that signal of maturity that you send to others. And don’t underestimate the importance of marriage and children – something I don’t have. If I had a successful marriage, and lots of well-behaved children, that would help a lot as well. Especially if people could come over to a warm and happy home. It sends a message. However, if you’re going to stay single, then keep your self-control and be content with it. That sends a message, too.
Life is short. Don’t do what feels good. Do what works.
Should women postpone marriage and raising children for other things?
Super-mom Lindsay sent me this article about by a former feminist who was once opposed to children, then had 4 of them in 5 years.
Introduction:
Up until my mid-20’s I was firm in my belief that I never wanted to have kids. A combination of events made me reconsider the issue, and by the time we got married I was open to the idea of having some pre-set, small number of kids and had begun thinking about the precise timetables on which I would have them.
[…]It would have been inconceivable to me to imagine that constantly having my plans derailed by pregnancies and not even having any idea when I’d be done changing diapers would be an improvement over my fully controlled, well-ordered life, but it has been.
[…]Lately I’ve been imagining what I would say to 2003 Jen if I could go back in time and give her a crystal ball to show her what her future would be like. I’ve been trying to imagine how I would talk her down from the balcony ledge after the crystal ball got to the “four kids in five years — and doing NFP!” part, how I could possibly convince her that this life is not only not a recipe for misery, but the true fulfillment of everything she thought she wanted.
I would love to tell you that I’d simply be able to explain that each child is such a joy and a blessing, but that would not have resonated with Old Jen; I might have agreed, but ultimately I would have said that those joys and blessing are just too much hard work. “I just don’t see how that kind of life could be anything but miserable for someone like me,” I would have said.
So how do you convince a woman that “hard work”, i.e. – self-denial, self-control, self-discipline, self-sacrifice – while caring for children could actually lead to a fulfilling life? And most importantly, that it should not be postponed in pursuit of something that appears more fun, more thrilling or more important (according to a feminist measure of fun, thrills and importance).
She makes 5 points in her post.
Here’s one:
3. “It’s not what you do, it’s whom you serve.”
A product of secular society, I’d fallen into the common notion that the way to find true happiness is to focus on yourself more and other people less. It makes perfect sense, after all: doing pleasurable things for me is fun, sacrifice and hard work are not fun; ergo, the secret to happiness must be to live for myself as much as possible. Right?
How shocked I was to discover that I was wrong — dead wrong. Part of fully understanding the concept of vocation was understanding that a vocation is not to be thought of as “what you do” as much as it is “whom you serve.” It was nothing short of revolutionary to hear the concept that God has called every one of us to serve others, that living for yourself is not a valid option; that the key to deep fulfillment, to finding your very purpose in life, is as simple as finding out the specific way in which you’re called to serve. Do that, and you will find peace.
It sounded not only too simple to be true, but too difficult. As a spoiled only child the idea of living to serve sounded terrible. But once I actually took a leap of faith and tried it, I had no doubt that this was truth.
Next,I want to talk about one of the young Christians I mentor, and then about the woman I supported for President in the 2012 election.
I spent Friday night playing with one of the young women I mentor. This is the one who did the BS in computer science, and is now doing the MS in computer science. After playing a few rounds of “Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes”, she mentioned the salary from her internship this summer. She asked me “what am I going to do with so much money? I think I had better stop thinking so much about myself and find some people out there to help”. And I was so pleased. Because this woman, more than any of the other young people I mentor, is my replacement.
J. Warner Wallace likes to talk about training your replacement, and I have several replacements, but none better than her. I remember when she was younger, she was a bit more selfish than now. She still organized events, like bringing Frank Turek, Tim McGrew, etc. to speak on her campus. But she never showed much interest in one-on-one care for others. It was my hope that just like me, she would react to computer science salary with a sense of obligation to others, and so she has. And that’s how I think women ought to be. They should be educated, they should be successful – but they should be open to the needs of others.
Michele Bachmann
The woman I admire the most in the world is former GOP Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, who was my first choice for President in 2012. I had been following her for many years before that, when she was just a state senator. I liked her because of her interest in apologetics, as well as her focus on her family.
Marcus and Michele Bachmann and family
The radically leftist New York Times did a profile of her.
It says:
Nearly two decades ago, a stay-at-home mother and onetime federal tax lawyer named Michele Bachmann felt a spiritual calling to open her clapboard home here to troubled teenage girls.
“We had our five biological children that God gave to us, and then he called us to take foster children into our home,” Mrs. Bachmann told a Christian audience in 2006. “We thought we were going to take unwed mothers in,” she continued, adding, “We took 23 foster children into our home, and raised them, and launched them off into the world.”
Today Mrs. Bachmann is Representative Bachmann, a Minnesota Republican, first elected to the House in 2006, and now a candidate for her party’s nomination for president. In Washington, she has grabbed the spotlight as a staunch fiscal conservative and brash Tea Party leader. But a look at her life here shows that it was her role as a mother, both to her biological children and to her adolescent foster daughters, that spurred her to seek public office.
[…]Mrs. Bachmann’s political awakening began with her deep disenchantment with the public school system.
[…]By the late 1990s, with her own children enrolled in private Christian schools, Mrs. Bachman was upset by the education her foster children were getting in public school. Teachers gave them “little special attention,” and many were “placed in lower-level classes, as if they were not expected to succeed,” she told a House subcommittee in 2007.
One brought home “an 11th-grade math assignment that involved coloring a poster,” she testified. Another “spent an entire week watching movies.” A third “remarked to me once that she was in ‘stupid people math.’ ”
So Mrs. Bachmann immersed herself in the minutiae of Minnesota’s graduation requirements. She worked with a conservative researcher and began giving talks in church basements.
[…]The Rev. Marcus Birkholz, the pastor at Salem Lutheran Church, which Mrs. Bachmann attended for years, calls her “a lady with energy and a heart” whose uncompromising “support for the unborn” extends beyond fighting abortion. “She sees the whole picture,” Pastor Birkholz said. “It’s not just bringing a child into the world; that child has to be nurtured and educated.”
[…]Mrs. Bachmann, whose biological children now range in age from 17 to 29, worked until her fourth child was born. (Her youngest, Sophia, is headed to college this fall, while the eldest, Lucas, is a medical resident at the University of Connecticut, pursuing a specialty in psychiatry.) Friends remember her planning neighborhood picnics and organizing bicycle parades.
“I had all these balls in the air that I was juggling,” she said in an interview with Minnesota Monthly last year. In choosing to leave work, she said, “I finally realized my dream, which was to be mom of a big, happy family.”
What does it mean? It means that women ought not be horrified by husband needs or children needs. They should not be opposed to responsibilities, expectations and obligations in relationships. Sometimes, the path to greatness means taking a few years off from work to homeschool your kids. After all, isn’t it better for God to have FIVE Christian kids who will surpass you in influence? Michele didn’t get involved in politics by thinking of herself. She got involved in politics by thinking of her children, and her 23 foster children.
Here’s my advice to young women: 1) Study something hard that pays. 2) Work a few years and get debt free. 3) Marry a good provider in your mid-to-late 20s. 4) Have as many children as your husband can support. 5) Be actively involved in the education of your kids (with apologetics, too). 6) Open your home to kids who don’t have a mom or a dad. 7) Teach your kids the importance of caring for others. 8) Run for President (as a Republican).
WINTERY KNIGHT 