John was a genius. He had the highest IQ of anyone ever tested in our school. His teachers were so impressed they allowed him to skip a grade. Though small in stature, John’s brain scored a knockout against anyone he came in contact with.
John was the type who could spend fifteen minutes reading a television repair manual and immediately know how to completely take apart and reassemble all the parts. His future had scientist, doctor, nuclear physicist written all over it. Today he lives on skid row.
Growing up, John never received any wisdom or guidance. His father attended church, but spent every available moment working. John’s mother never attended church. She spent all her time talking on the phone or watching television. She fought constantly with John’s father. Their home was filled with screaming and tension.
Lacking guidance at home, John followed the path of countless other young men, he turned to the street. From there, it was a short spiral to drugs, gangs, and a wasted life.
John’s life is not a rarity. I see men and women just like him all around me.
I grew up in a Catholic home. Not once, in my entire childhood, did either of my parents have a conversation with me about Catholic doctrine, the Bible, or the difference between right and wrong. We never prayed together except at meal time. I was taught nothing about money, finances, politics, or how to be a man. I suspect my experience is typical of millions of other American males.
Young men have an intense need to understand their place in the world. When they can’t get it at home, they turn to the older males around them. Some are lucky to find a mentor in a teacher or an athletic coach. Most are not. Most follow the same path as John.
The proliferation of gangs in the black community is no mystery. As welfare destroyed the black family and removed the father from the home, young men turned to the older males around them. That these “role models” are less than stellar is irrelevant. The need for guidance and approval from an older male transcends common sense.
Young women also need guidance from their fathers. Without it, they often turn to immodest dress and promiscuity. Their need for approval from an older male is so strong that if they do not receive it from dad at home, they will seek it from a stranger on the street.
Lack of wisdom from a mother is equally damaging to both young men and young women. One of the reasons most men are so clueless when it comes to women is because they never had guidance or approval from an older female at home. As adults, they lack the nurturing qualities a female provides. Many remain in a state of perpetual adolescence their entire lives.
When young women are not provided with wisdom and guidance from their mothers, they turn to the older females around them. This leads many of them to embrace radical feminism and New Age religion. They fear and disdain men, because they were never exposed to positive female role models in the home.
When neither parent is available to provide wisdom for the child, culture becomes a powerful conditioning force. Without positive role models at home, young people seek guidance in music, television, movies, books, and magazines. And if you don’t think popular culture exists to promote an endless Leftist agenda of godless immorality, think again. That is precisely its purpose. The worst offenders of all are the movies, television networks, and shows aimed directly at children and young people. You know who I’m talking about.
Don’t fall for the lie that children are smarter today than in generations past. They’re not smarter, they’re more jaded. They have no role models or examples to look up to. They’re taught that morality is relative, and that feelings trump intellect. They’re taught revisionist history that discredits the country and its religious foundation. They’re taught dependence and cowering to the mob over responsibility and self-reliance.
Are there young people in your life? They need your wisdom and guidance. A word of advice here, a pat on the back there; both contribute enormously to a child’s development. Even more important is the example you set by the living of your own life. Children observe everything.
Being a mentor to the young is not easy, especially for parents. It requires tremendous self-sacrifice and an almost complete withdrawal from the values of secular society. Yet that is another lesson we must teach our young: doing the right thing often means doing the hard thing.
Which brings us back to John. There’s no telling how far John could have gone with a positive mentor in his life. But none of the adults he knew took any interest in him at all. Like millions of others, John’s potential was never developed. Like millions of others, his life became a tragedy.
I know about John personally. He’s my older brother.