FATHER'S ROLE IS DWINDLING: CHURCHES URGED TO RE-ESTABLISH FATHERHOOD

Churches don't want to talk about the problems with fatherhood in this nation because the discussion always causes distress in the congregation, says the Rev. Clay McLean.

"People are attracted to it because of their pain and afraid of it for the same reason. But if we don't address this issue we won't be able to save our communities," McLean says.

The minister from Boone, N.C., spoke Friday night at the opening session of a conference aimed at engaging the problems of fathering in America and in Cape Girardeau. About 40 people attended the conference titled "Turning the Hearts of the Fathers to the Children" at Livingway Foursquare Church, 1224 Bloomfield Road.

McLean employed scripture to back up his assertion that all families spring from the father. Husband is a German word meaning "house binder," he said, "the one who protects the home."

The absence of fathers in family life, either physically or emotionally, is at the heart of many family problems, he said. Children who aren't fathered can turn to alcohol, drugs, illicit sex and homosexuality, he says.

He said 96 percent of the men in prison either don't know who their father is or hate him.

The failure of fathers to touch their sons and daughters leaves them sexually broken, McLean said. Sons can turn to homosexuality, he said, and daughters can turn to other men who will touch them.

Weakness of character

A weakness of character is one of the psychological characteristics of fatherlessness, McLean said. "For the most part, the absence of the father, the indifference of the father, leaves children unable to press through life."

His own father was an alcoholic. "I spent the first five years of my life in emotional terror," he said.

In addition, this brokenness in the masculine has put a tremendous burden on women, McLean said.

The church could be doing much more to address these issues, he said. Instead, most Americans are learning how to relate to each other through television shows, he said, calling the people who make TV shows "the most morally bankrupt people on the face of the earth."

We are becoming stupid," he said. "The penalty for disregarding God's revelation of reality is stupidity."

Paul has the answer

Paul, not TV, has the answer, McLean said: being rooted and grounded in love, "the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge."

Paul prayed for the pagan early church in this way, McLean said. "We are facing the same situations."

"The only source of hope for our country is here," he said, indicating the assemblage gathered in the church: "husbands, fathers and marriages."

McLean will speak again at 10 a.m. at the church in a session titled "Issues in the Contemporary Fathering Crisis." Also participating will be members of a panel: Bishop Dr. William Bird of Greater Dimension Church, the Rev. Jack Smart of Teen Challenge, the Rev. David Butler of Shepherd's Cove Children Home in Gordonville, Mo., and Kurt Pfansteil, a layman with Livingway Foursquare Church.

The Rev. Mike Woelk, who organized the conference, said he plans to establish a group in which people can talk about fathering issues.