The Erosion of Thresholds for Young Men to Adulthood

A generation of young men remaining at home into their late 20s and 30s isn’t explained by housing costs or student debt alone. Earlier generations faced wars, depressions, and thinner safety nets — and still formed households, took wives, and carried weight. The deeper problem is that the thresholds which once moved a boy into a man the community could recognize have withered. Traditional rites of passage created a clear before and after: separation, ordeal, and incorporation. They imposed demands that built endurance under the eyes of men who had already crossed those same thresholds. Without them, responsibility stays optional. Military service remains one of the last functioning versions of this threshold. Most civilian markers — a degree, a job, a car, an apartment — are consumer checkpoints. They can be purchased, postponed, or redefined. They rarely require an ordeal that changes the person. When a culture no longer knows what a man is for, the remaining rites become optional and the checkpoints become endless. Adulthood, in its older sense, was never a comfort one reached. It was a weight one was made to carry, after being changed enough to carry it. Read the full piece here:
https://orthodoxreflections.com/the-erosion-of-thresholds-for-young-men-to-adulthood/