Brotherhood Before Boyhood: Why Men Form Men with Jason Craig
from the Heroic Brotherhood Summit, 2020
Many conversations about forming young men begin with what boys lack. What they need to learn. What they need to be taught. “But one of the things that we’ve discovered,” he says, “is that the secret ingredient of forming the next generation of men is the brotherhood of the current generation.”
Initiation Is Not Optional.
“What we propose is that it is essential for all men to be initiated into manhood.”
Craig frames this as something deeply human. The desire to be shown how to live, to be guided, to hear the words: “You’ve done a good job,” or even more deeply, “You’re my beloved son.”
He pushes further. Boys and men are not interchangeable categories. “We have separate words for those,” he says. “They’re separate things. They’re different things.” Boys must become men, and that transformation requires men.
“A rite of passage is not just some profound experience.” Jumping off a cliff, traveling somewhere intense — those are experiences. They are not initiation. How does a person move from outside a group to inside it? How does someone become someone new?
“A rite of passage,” Craig says, “is a radical change in the whole understanding of your life.”
The Three Stages of Becoming a man.
Craig identifies three stages.
First: the old life must die. “You can’t enter that new state of life if that old one doesn’t die.”
Second: the threshold. A moment where something is given. A line is crossed.
Third: incorporation. “On the other side of that initiation,” Craig says, “there is a body to welcome you in.”
He describes this as being brought into a living group, a family, an order, a brotherhood. Without that final stage, the process collapses. “It would be like going through boot camp… and then just being sent back out into the world.”
1: Boys Becoming Men.
“The first stage is that his boyhood has to be left behind. He has to stop being a boy.” This includes separation from the world of total maternal care.
“He’s been a boy his entire life. He’s never been a man.” A mother can give everything, but not masculinity. “She doesn’t have that to give.”
Craig describes early life as protected. “In our mother’s womb… we’ve got everything we need.” That protection continues after birth. It is good, and necessary. “Until it’s not anymore.”
When strength grows, staying in that environment causes a problem. “Boys are going to be diminished in their potential as men.”
2: Trial and Formation.
The second stage introduces hardship. “Sacrifice. Danger. Pain.” He explains why many cultures require endurance or difficulty.
“It acquaints them with their ability to sacrifice.” A coach demanding “110%” is not speaking mathematically. “He knows that there’s something in the boy that he doesn’t know is inside of him.”
3: The Missing Stage.
Craig says the third stage is where modern life fails most. “On the other side of their initiation is a brotherhood of men to welcome the boy.” Without it, initiation never completes. “We men don’t belong to one another… and it’s crippling to us.”
“When we’re baptized we become God’s children.” And if we are sons, then brothers. “We are actually brothers. We’re not symbolically brothers.”
“If we’re going to be fatherly men… there has to be a son.” Identity flows both directions. “You can’t be a father if there’s no son.”
He challenges men directly. “There’s a guy over there, he’s 15.” Go tell him. that he is needed, wanted, and he matters. “We raise our sons for 18 years and then tell them to go find out who you are.” Instead, he says, identity must be given. “They are beloved sons of the Father… called to virtue.”
“If there’s a problem with boys today… you’re the first problem.” The work begins with us men. In some groups, men spend months or years rebuilding their own brotherhood. “Your brotherhood is not a nice option. It is necessary.”