So, it’s Father’s Day, and we’re in the midst of a series exploring the relationship between family, Church family and discipleship. We are likely already painfully aware of the chasm that exists between much of our culture’s thinking and practise around family life and a Christian’s. It’s a hard judgement to make, but one of the places where that chasm might be at its widest, and perhaps at its most antagonistic, is in relation to boys.

Seriously - it’s almost impossible to find any meaningful point of contact between the Church’s vision for raising boys to men, and our society’s. The fact that we be may largely unaware (at least consciously) of those tensions, speaks powerfully of the extent we have been evangelised by our culture! There are a number of really helpful books on this - but here is a particular recommendation for Father’s Day.

It isn’t an explicitly Christian book. It’s brilliantly well researched (though largely from an American context, you can recognise much that is reflected in British culture and societal values), it’s unbelievably readable, and if you are a parent of boys, will likely move you to tears… both of relief and of sorrow, and out of a sense that there might be a constructive way through!!

You can find out more here: https://boycrisis.org/