The preachers and pastors wonder why is it so hard to get the men to come out to church and why religious gatherings tend so often to be merely female gatherings. They have yet to recognize what appeals to men. They have yet to accept that in order for a religion to appeal generally to real men it must require the exertion of a professional athletic event, produce the intensity of sexual union, yield the ecstatic unity and comradery of a music concert, and promise the fame and public acknowledgment of the mass media.
Why does common, boring religion fail? Just ask yourself how hard it is to go to church and sit in the pews. It is not hard. Make religion hard on men. Make a religion that requires them to sacrifice all things and pushes them to edge of sanity and real men will flock to your standard. They will die for religion when previously they thought it was all a waste. This is why we have failed to understand the Muslims who do understand what I am saying. We are afraid to understand this. Consequently, we and our Christian nation have no true religion.
And where is the religion that produces the intensity of sexual union? It can only be a religion that makes sexual union or its equivalent part of the religion. But, honestly, does sex have an equal? We ought to wonder. But the religion that produces sexual intensity cannot be the modern Christianity that cannot explain sex, that relegates it as a mere human, fallen, and earthly thing. Sexual intimacy can be divine. Indeed, true religion will make it cosmically valuable bringing us closer to origins of our human race and even the gods. Consequently, true religion will embrace the need to treat sexual union with the reverence and exaltation it merits. These real-universe spiritualists will sanctify and celebrate the union. They will have no trouble appealing to the fundamental nature of real men the world over.
What do we find at a great music concert? When we stand before the artist on stage we find ourselves one in movement and spirit. The crowd pulses and swells to a single rhythm. A single person can be for a moment lifted up as a surfer on the waves of humanity supported by the strength of thousands. Why? No one knows why or even says why. But it is obvious that they have found something, some spirit of unity that they could not find at home, at work, or, above all, at church, the very place it should have been. Of course, the churches will never be able to duplicate this phenomenon until they actually try. They have called all this the “devil,†the have put for darkness the very liberating light. True, “devils†may be twisting the essence of the music concert, but the cosmic value and unifying potency is still there for the churches and it is still untapped. If you achieved this ecstasy in your religious gatherings you would be surprised what you could invite men to accomplish.
And who loves to do the good that will never be known? Christians think this is at the heart of Christianity, but honestly they only do good in private because they believe they still have the audience of the universe. They do good with the conviction that God, himself, and the hosts of heaven are watching. What could be more arrogant, more fame-seeking, more beggarly for acknowledgement? And yet I am not being entirely critical. What I am criticizing is this fake and fraudulent Christian notion that some how the “true†Christians have overcome the need to be acknowledged for their good deeds. “But your Father in heaven seeth in private.†Not only do they crave an audience they have made the Master of the universe their audience. It is pure hypocrisy for them to say they do not practice a religion that promises fame and public acknowledgment for that is precisely why there will be a final judgment where the good and faithful are publicly exalted in the eyes of the hosts of heaven and earth making them infinitely famous through the Media of the Most High. What am I suggesting? True religion will be honest about this need and craving for individual recognition. It will make the righteous famous in the here and now. It will make a heaven on earth. It will preach a doctrine that allows God to exalt men on earth while still alive and even in the prime of life and youth. It will allow God and his followers to publish the greatness of religiousity to the ends of the earth. Far from keeping good deeds private, when we see a good-doer we true religionists will lift him (or her) up on our shoulders, tell his story on the news and movies, and put his face on billboards.
This is what James was really saying, that true religion begs for overcoming all odds and this is what we find faces the lowest stratus of society: the widows and the fatherless. We could be creating spiritual heroes of men and women who overcome the dragons and demons that face those disadvantaged people in the world. We could create a society that publishes good deeds to high heavens. We could exalt one another. We could make reality shows of such heroes. We could.
Was there ever such a religion? Has it ever existed? Perhaps, it has in ancient America. At least it is true that there we find the ancient ancestor of the game that would be what is called “Soccer†today. The sacred ball game was used to determine the fate of humans and the mind of the gods. We find a religion that required the utmost sacrifice we have to offer: human. Do we find music? Do we find concert? Do we find sexual intimacy as religion? Do we find ancient mass media in the stone etchings covering the temples? If our anthropologists and archeologists do not eventually find all these among the Maya and Aztec I will be astonished and publicly call myself a fool. So, yes, I believe that at least once the human race tried to achieve this true religion. That does not mean they succeeded. There are a thousand “devils†that could have tripped them up and ensnared their hopes. But if our Christians will just read their own texts, they will see that along side all the apocalyptic prophecies of destruction and desolation there is a parallel set promising the some kind of restoration of the righteous to result in gatherings and rebuilding cities. There is, in truth, a set of prophecies dedicated to humanity’s victory on earth, not merely in heaven. So, at least there is a Biblical basis for the hope of true religion as an earthly one in our own archives, though I do not know that Jesus would endorse all that I have said.
Of course, all that I have said applies to women. But I was speaking to my brothers and I believe that women are still attracted to real men. Fill a church with real men and women, who are already attracted to religious society, will show up to your events. It is men who need more to be brought out of their dark caverns of soul. They have yet to find a religion which encourages and invites them to be themselves, their complete, whole, unedited selves.