who you calling a wimp?

a friend made me aware of the following commentary written by the president of sbts, al mohler. now, since al signed the diploma from my master's program, i think that makes it ok for me to interact with his many social commentaries. and i suppose i ought to admit that for the most part, i generally agree with him, though i almost always wonder about his inability to see exactly what he is really saying.

a nation of wimps?

"Are we raising a nation of wimps? That's the surprising question raised by a recent article in Psychology Today. Writer Hara Estroff Marano argues that America's parents are coddling our kids into wimps--leaving them unable to cope with challenge, difficulty, or disappointment.
She points to the playground, where kids are surrounded by rubber, lest they scrape their knees--and parents who won't let their children play along with other kids, but supervise every moment and call it "play."
These parents demand that their kids get special attention, want every child on the team to receive the same award, and then send their kids off to college with the cell phone as a virtual high-tech umbilical cord.
Observers warn that American parents are turning their kids into permanent adolescents who never make it to adulthood. Parental "hyper-concern" has replaced the parent's goal of raising mature adults. This is a warning we all need to hear."

now, since i am fairly certain that mohler experienced some of his life as a "wimp," i suppose that he has some credibility when it comes to speaking of such things. of course, i can make that same argument for myself. so, my comments on al's comments. as usual, i think he says much that should serve to alarm responsible christians of societal tendencies. again, as usual, though, i think he fails to see where many responsible christians are implicated in this tendency. i have known many "responsible" christian parents who send their children to private christian institutions, especially during the elementary, middle, and high school years. all too often, the unstated motivation for doing this was not so that the young persons in question might get a better education. no, it was for their protection. protection from the trials of life. protection from skinned knees. maybe, a parent might argue, the attendance at such schools is part of raising a child in the nurture and admonition of the lord. i suppose it can be. but given the spiritual climate of so many private christian institutions, i doubt this usually happens. especially if many of these concerned christian parents are shirking their responsibilities and expecting the school to provide the bulk of the nurture and admonition. no, seems very similar to the padded playgrounds to me. and, as any one over the age of 25 or so knows, those things suck. in the end, i think al is correct. but, lamentably, responsible christians are part of the problem, raising a nation of spiritual wimps.

on a side note, a longer version of this commentary can be found at mohler's blog, which i must say is a fun place to keep up on all sorts of things that matter to all sorts of varying degrees. sometimes the subjects even matter as much as al contends.