Passed thru Fire – April 2012 – Gauteng

Another Passed thru Fire event has come and gone with 12 Boys and their Dads set on fire during this incredible time away.
Once again we were privileged to hold the event on a cattle farm just outside Groblersdal – with the rugged bushveld providing an ideal setting for this time full of challenge and meaning. We saw boys inspired towards godly manhood, Dads initiate and embrace moments of intimacy and connection with their Sons and new life breathed into Father-Son relationships. We trust that these will impact families and communities into the future.

Standing out as highlights during this time away were;

• The courage of young men to stand up for themselves and to stand together against adversity – not too much whingeing was heard;
• The energy with which the boys faced the challenges put before;
• The renewed energy displayed by Dads thoroughly enjoying the time together with their Sons them – charging through the bush together and nailing each other in paintball; and
• The awakening of some men being challenged not just in terms of their fathering but also about the impact of their whole lives;
• Boys willingly embracing the challenge to aim at godly manhood in a world that has disposed of it.

Passed thu Fire is a Rite of Passage Experience where we challenge boys aged 13 to 15 on the attributes of godly manhood and facilitate the strengthening of Father – Son relationships by valuing and encouraging the affirmation that all boys need and that is best given by their Dad.

There is no question that children who grow up in fatherless homes have a much greater risk of major challenges in life than those who grow up with a father at home. These statistics are alarming and should give any father pause.

Incarceration Rates. “Young men who grow up in homes without fathers are twice as likely to end up in jail as those who come from traditional two-parent families…those boys whose fathers were absent from the household had double the odds of being incarcerated — even when other factors such as race, income, parent education and urban residence were held constant.” (Cynthia Harper of the University of Pennsylvania and Sara S. McLanahan of Princeton University cited in “Father Absence and Youth Incarceration.” Journal of Research on Adolescence 14 (September 2004): 369-397.)

Suicide.

63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Bureau of the Census)

Behavioral Disorders.

85% of all children that exhibit behavioral disorders come from fatherless homes (United States Center for Disease Control)

High School Dropouts.

71% of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes (National Principals Association Report on the State of High Schools.)

Educational Attainment.

Kids living in single-parent homes or in step-families report lower educational expectations on the part of their parents, less parental monitoring of school work, and less overall social supervision than children from intact families. (N.M. Astore and S. McLanahan, American Sociological Review, No. 56 (1991)

Juvenile Detention Rates.

70% of juveniles in state-operated institutions come from fatherless homes (U.S. Dept. of Justice, Special Report, Sept 1988)

Confused Identities.

Boys who grow up in father-absent homes are more likely that those in father-present homes to have trouble establishing appropriate sex roles and gender identity.(P.L. Adams, J.R. Milner, and N.A. Schrepf, Fatherless Children, New York, Wiley Press, 1984).

Aggression.

In a longitudinal study of 1,197 fourth-grade students, researchers observed “greater levels of aggression in boys from mother-only households than from boys in mother-father households.” (N. Vaden-Kierman, N. Ialongo, J. Pearson, and S. Kellam, “Household Family Structure and Children’s Aggressive Behavior: A Longitudinal Study of Urban Elementary School Children,” Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 23, no. 5 (1995).

Achievement.

Children from low-income, two-parent families outperform students from high-income, single-parent homes. Almost twice as many high achievers come from two-parent homes as one-parent homes. (One-Parent Families and Their Children, Charles F. Kettering Foundation, 1990).

Delinquency.

Only 13 percent of juvenile delinquents come from families in which the biological mother and father are married to each other. By contract, 33 percent have parents who are either divorced or separated and 44 percent have parents who were never married. (Wisconsin Dept. of Health and Social Services, April 1994).

Criminal Activity.

The likelihood that a young male will engage in criminal activity doubles if he is raised without a father and triples if he lives in a neighborhood with a high concentration of single-parent families. Source: A. Anne Hill, June O’Neill, Underclass Behaviors in the United States, CUNY, Baruch College. 1993

Article By Wayne Parker

This year in September, 5 boys and their Dads attended HCA’s first Passed Thru Fire event. It got messy… really messy, but alas, a very good mess.