Male gender role strain : a pastoral assessment

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The purpose of this study was firstly to investigate Korean males' gender role strain, its impact on their spirituality and identity, and the relationship between male gender role strain and the issue of power within the Korean context, based on Pleck's male gender role strain paradigm. Firstly, the empirical study (in-depth interview with the fifteen Korean males within the Cape Town region) found that the majority of males (12 out of 15) experienced anger, shame, anxiety, helplessness, guilt and health problems as related to male gender role strains. Secondly, the research also indicated that their dysfunctional strain seemed to lead them to seek a God who guarantees material well-being, prosperity, and success, while their discrepancy strain seemed to generate anintense low self-esteem that is associated with a distant, callous and unfair God. Thirdly, this study indicated that the strains in their roles were closely related to the issue of power (12 out of 15). They identified the source of their strain as getting ahead, competition, winning, anxiety about performance, longing for a sense of superiority, a sense of comparison, and their wish to boast about their competency. The second purpose of this study was to examine whether a theological understanding of God's vulnerability help pastoral care to address the problem of men's power and psychological struggles(male gender role strain) - possibly to reframe the notion of power in order to foster spiritual maturity in males. In order to reframe the concept of power from a theological perspective (through reinterpretation of the notion of God's power), the researcher has selected three interpretations of a theology of the crossand resurrection (Luther, Moltmann and Louw). Three interpretations of a theology of the cross and resurrection can contribute towards this paradigm shift. The first concerns our human existential predicament of helplessness, while the second is about the theological problem of God's identity: God's relationship to the notion of suffering. The third has an implication for pastoral therapy and identity formation.The research finding is that, if the concept of the pantokrator can be reframed by a pathetic interpretation of the cross, this theological reframing has consequences for the human understanding of power. A reinterpretation of God's power could bring about a paradigm shift from the notion of power as strength, control, domination and success, to that of power as vulnerability, service and pathos ofother-empowerment. Such a hermeneutics of power can foster spiritual growth and healing in malesby helping them to shift their concerns to serving others, and empowering fellow human beings from pursuing strength and control.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University