Men! A call to arms.

What makes the difference between: A, a gentle, loving, strong character-ed, Godly woman who can raise saints, be a wife to her husband, and provoke/help along healing in people's lives, calling all she knows to Christ: and B, a loose, provacative, selfish woman who lives for her own pleasure, hates men, and is always out for her own gains?

Perhaps a little bit has to do with her temperament and her personality. Even more has to do with her education. Still more has to do with her peers, her society, her environment. However, none of these is the pivotal point on which her person will turn. A girl from a conservative Christian neighborhood may run away from home and live a loose life, while another who has grown up in Harlem may carry herself like a lady and remain faithful to her man her entire life. Is faith the difference? yeah, but her faith is based on something very much more pivotal, more concrete, more close to home than the pulpit or the chatechism. What is the real difference?

Her father.

Girls need a mother around, yes, and should not live without a mother figure. After all, somethings are just easier when another woman is there to help you along. However, she draws her ideas of what it is to be a real woman from her father. His approval is what really matters. That is why a little girl will put on her mother's lipstick, tie her hair in 25 different ribbons, put on a polka-dot shirt and a flowery skirt, tie 10 scarves around her waist, put on all the necklaces and bracelets she can find, wear her mother's high heels, and run to her father, who is very busy at some task or other. She begins to twirl, saying "Daddy, look! Look Daddy! Daddy daddy daddy! Look! Look Daddy! Daddy Look!" Hopefully, he looks, because then she smiles her biggest smile and says "Am I pretty, Daddy." He thinks "gosh, how did she get so much lipstick on that much surface area?" but he doesn't say that. He bends down to her level, smiles and says "you are so beautiful. You look just like your mother," and she smiles even bigger, runs into his arms, and he holds her close, despite the fact that her rumpled hair is scratching his face and her lipstick is coming off on his shirt. She knows in that moment that she is beautiful, that Daddy thinks she is pretty, that she is worth something.

I once heard from a friend about how her young sister was sitting up in a tree with her older sister, about 14 feet upin the air. Their father walked over to tell them it was time for dinner. She looked up from her book to see her little sister's smile as she lept out of the tree. The girl screamed, and a look of horror flashed over her face and the face of her father, as his heart stopped beating and he lunged forward. He caught the girl just before she would have hit the ground. The older girl watched as her sister continued to laugh and to hug her father, and the father said nothing but held his daughter tight.

The little girl was not afraid. She had never been dropped. It never dawned on her to think that maybe daddy would not catch her. Of course he would catch her.

So many girls have been dropped.

If daddy says "yeah, you look great honey" and continues at his task without a backward glance, the little girl may not show it, but she has been dropped, smack on her heart.

A child's veiw of God the Father is drawn from his view of/relationship with his dad. If Dad is always busy, can't stop for a game of battleships, cannot take time out to say "my goodness, Jenny, you look beautiful in that dress," if he doesn't kiss Mother when he walks in the door, a child may grow up thinking that Dad doesn't care about them. "What should I do, Dad?" she will ask, "Oh, I don't care. Do whatever you want. Doesn't make a difference to me." Think about it.

Girls become the sort of women their father likes. They are always searching for approval from their fathers. All those loose women out there, who are falling out of their clothes, or the ones who are power hungry, CEOs of a large corporation and cannot think of anything but money...yeah, you guessed it. All those nuns and model wives and mothers........yep, that was probably Daddy too. Either that or there was another man who stepped in and picked up the gauntlet, the dropped girl, and took her father's place, rescuing her from the shambles she was in.

Don't believe it? One year, the top model for Playboy magazine was asked why she does what she does. Her answer: because my father loves this magazine and was always looking foreward to when it came, and I want him to love me too, and to make him happy.

One of my friends is right now in a legal battle for her child, born out of wedlock, with the father of her child who is an emotionally abusive, crude, and selfish man. When asked about her father, her response was "Oh, he was there, and I love him." Does he love you, "uh..........I don't know. I guess he does."

Several co-workers of mine have children and are unmarried...nor are they still "with" the father. What is your dad like: "Oh he's just there. He comes home from work, sits down with a beer in front of the TV, and that's my dad." Does he love you? "What kind of question is that?" or "I'm sure he does. He's just a man, and you know men, they can't express it love very well. And it doesn't mean as much to them."

It seems like a little thing, but it is true. Ask any woman who is perverted or has been degraded about her father. I can gaurantee you that in 95% of cases she will say "I never knew him" or "I met him a couple of times" or "I hate him" or "oh, he's my dad" or she may just try to brush it off. Girls love their fathers, even if they abuse them physically, emotionally, or sexually. How can you love someone who is so horrid to you? Well, that is the mystery/weakness of love...and of women. They give everything or nothing at all. God is like that too: he continues to love a person despite the fact that they are covered in putrid, slimy gook, and may never really turn back and love him.

I know a girl who was perhaps a victim of the love of her father. Her father set rules on everything: she could not wear jeans, or any shirts that had lettering accross the chest. She had to wear skirts when she became a teenager all the time. She must say the Rosary with the family every day at a certain time (despite accademic or work related conflicts). She must go to daily mass at the church he designated, at the designated time. No make-up, no peircings (not even one earlobe) no nail polish. These sorts of things are not in themselves right or wrong, but the way in which it was done, the manner in which it was enforced was abusive, to the point where she was not allowed to do anything and was chastized every day. She was very much in danger of going wild, and did to some extent....when her older brother stepped in to be her "father."

The father is the pivotal point on which a girl's character, ideals, and virtue turn. He is her foundation for what she knows of God, of her Father in heaven. He is where she learns how she should be loved, how much she is worth, and where she will base her standard of men in her life. Women don't naturally jump from one affair to another, or throw themselves into the arms of a worthless man, a man who sees them as a hunk of steak or a video game. If she didn't get love from her father, she will search for it in the places she thinks her father may have found it.

All men are called to be fathers, whether or not they are married. A priest who loves his spiritual children may be that man who rescues a girl or boy from destruction by his approval, acceptance, and encouragment. A single man in the world is still called to be Christ to everyone he meets, to the old Lady in the next appartment, to the girl at the checkout with 25 peircings on her cranium. Never judge a woman, tell her she is ugly or worthless, because she will remember it for the rest of her life.

Love your daughters and your sons. Love thier mother. Express your love to them in a way that is meaningful to them, not just to you. It may not mean much to your daughter that you drop her off at school every day, or that you give her permission to go to a sleep over. She may want to hear that you love her, or be hugged and kissed. It may not mean much to your wife when you buy her flowers, but it does when you take out the trash, or fold the clothes with her. Every person is unique in the way that they need love. Encourage your children. Set limits in appropriate places (don't force your kids to wear certain colors of clothes for example), like what movies they can watch. Love God, and be the Father to your children, spiritual or biological. It really will make all the difference in the world to their salvation and their character.