Why Me? Why Now?
Why Me, Why Now?
Why Men Need Initiation
Men carry pain for years, even decades, either because they see no way to change or because the fear of confronting their wounds is greater than the pain. Yet, there is a high cost to numbing pain instead of confronting it. Father Richard Rohr says, “Pain that is not transformed is transmitted.”
As you reflect on your life and engagement with the human world and the environment that surrounds you, do you see yourself transmitting your pain?
Wounds we have not processed and transformed tend to spiral outward, leading to much larger wounds in society, such as racism, toxic patriarchy, and our ecological crisis — which in turn, creates a negative feedback loop, further wounding ourselves and other individuals.
For many men, the wounding of our souls is not truly confronted until midlife – some call it the dreaded “mid-life crisis.” Carrying unresolved grief, internalized shame and guilt, loneliness, personal family traumas, intergenerational issues, and societal pressures all serve to weigh us down in disparaging and debilitating ways. The impact on those we love can be devastating.
The injury to a man’s soul, and the wounds of the world, cry out for healing. Illuman offers a pathway, through wounds to wholeness. Father Richard Rohr, the originator of Men’s Rites of Passage (MROP), says it this way:
Most problems are interpreted psychologically today, but the real solutions are almost always spiritual. The spiritual is a bigger realm than the psychological because the individual psyche is too individualistic. It’s too small. It’s text outside of context.
In these times of rapid change and global transformation, many in our culture are grasping for a spirituality that is both relevant to our new ways of living and powerful in a world geared for materialism.
While many women have learned the value of connection and support of other women through this quest, many men find themselves wrestling with questions of identity, morality, and power—difficulties which, if not resolved in healthy ways, can cause profound damage to individual men, their loved ones, and others around them.
Change is never easy, and we too often resist until events propel us into profound crisis. A powerful spiritual prayer exhorts, “Lord, let this crisis not pass me by until I’ve learned the gift it contains for me.” Sacred Scripture uses the term, “metanoia” to describe a change in one's way of life resulting from penitence or spiritual conversion. A change of mind. A different way of seeing.
2020 has brought change in the extreme. A natural question is, “How do we cope well?” Perhaps some better questions are, “How do we learn from our trauma and make the most of our crisis experiences by reframing them in positive ways?” “What resources are available to help us to transform our pain? We encourage you to consider Men’s Rites of Passage.
Fr. Richard Rohr shows how primal societies have demonstrated that cultural survival is dependent on personal spirituality. Unfortunately, the proven way to lead males on this journey has been lost to the West for a thousand years. Fr. Richard addresses the reality that if men are not led through an inner journey of powerlessness, they will inevitably misunderstand and abuse power.