Men are not the problem today. Sin is.

It sounds promising. Men at the University of Regina in Canada are being encouraged to take a stand against violence. So far, so good. Men of virtue do not support needless violence, right?

But then things take a strange turn according to Heatstreet: “Meet up with [University of Regina Students’ Union] members and make a confession,” the program’s website reads. “We have all reinforced hypermasculinity one way or another regardless of our gender! … Come and share your sins so we can begin to discuss how to identify and change our ways!”

Here the true emphasis of the “Man Up Against Violence” campaign locks in. The program is not really about violence after all. It’s actually an act of violence against manhood. It’s an effort to reshape manhood, make it less aggressive, assertive, and pronounced. This program, like so many products of postmodern collegiate departments, is about cutting the heart out of manhood. Manhood in traditional terms is not seen as a positive force today, or even a neutral one.

Manhood is increasingly the original sin of the Western university.

Men do need training. They need standards. They need to learn to channel their innate aggression. The Christian church has identified and attempted this for millennia. Think about the very concept of the elder of the local church. The elder, as captured in 1 Timothy 2 and 3, is a man of great discipline, compassion, self-control, and Spirit-inspired virtue. Christianity offers men the image of the true man, Jesus Christ, and a gospel message that allows every man to know and live like Jesus.

In the biblical mind, men are not better or worse than women. Men are fallen in Adam and like women in great need of salvation and sanctification. Men do show throughout Scripture a troubling capacity for evil; many of the Bible’s worst crimes are led and committed by men. There is a volatility to men that we cannot miss. Men often think of themselves as tough and emotionally impenetrable, but in truth many men struggle to bridle their temper. (Men commit about 75% of all violent crimes, for example.)

Insult a woman, and you likely ruin her day. Insult a man, and he may try to kill you, or himself.

The church has a vocabulary and system for training men to be virtuous. Our secular culture has basically lost such infrastructure. Outside of the military and athletics, many men receive no guidance whatsoever in being a man. They do not know what their manliness is for; they do not know what it means to be a man as opposed to a boy; they do not know how to treat women with dignity and love; they could not tell you why they’re on the earth. At many secular colleges and universities, men grow only more confused. Simply by virtue of being men, they are labeled as the problem, and they are encouraged to “confess” the sins of their innate “hypermasculinity.”

All of this is lamentable. But more than this, such a culture is despicable.

The solution to what ails men is not to gender-neutralize them. It is not to publicly shame them, as the University of Regina is doing. The way to help men is to invest in them. Respect them. Teach them what manhood is. Train them in how to lead, provide, protect, and help others. Define manhood, and define womanhood. (They are not the same thing—here’s one little book that can help in this task.) Urge them to use their strength and aggression not against women, but for them. Ultimately, show them that nothing in this world will satisfy them but living in union with the true man, Jesus Christ.

This age is hostile to men in many ways. Some will sneer at this, but look at the statistics, and the snarking will stop. Unless you want young men to flame out, and suffer, and hurt others, then you will take seriously their plight. You will look into fatherlessness and see that it especially affects boys who need a dad, making them despondent and prone to make good on their sinful instincts. You will examine the economy and see that the millions of men who have lost jobs—or cannot find one—represent an unstable element in American society.

Men are not the problem today. Sin is. Sin in men, though, is a potent reality. This truth means we should not dismiss men, write them off, or torch them publicly. We should help them, reach out to them, discipline them, rebuke them, encourage them, and lift them up. We should call them to die to their flesh and live to Christ. The church is one of the last pockets of culture that cares about men. We cannot give up on men.

As Christians, we offer something better than a confession booth for hypermasculinity. We offer a launchpad for a doxological life. We do not coddle men; in love, we challenge them. Where the modern university now increasingly targets men for ill, we target them for good. As believers, we cannot abandon them. We must help them.