What God Wants From Men: How to Build True Masculinity | Met. Jonah & Adam Lane Smith

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Sep 24, 2026

Metropolitan Jonah, an Orthodox Christian hierarch and former primate of the Orthodox Church in America, joins Adam Lane Smith for a searching conversation on mature manhood. They explore fatherhood, servant leadership, male friendship, emotional discipline, asceticism, faith, and the spiritual meaning of responsibility. A thoughtful look at how men grow into strength without pride, shame, or emotional collapse.

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INSIGHT

Healthy Patriarchy Is Servant Leadership

Healthy patriarchy means decisive, rational, loving leadership aimed at each person’s ultimate potential.
Its defining structure is servant leadership, not authority used for self-serving control.

INSIGHT

Selfishness Separates Leadership From Abuse

Abuse begins when leadership becomes selfish, prideful, and ego-driven rather than protective.
Patriarchal responsibility means loving the people entrusted to you, modeling God’s unconditional fatherhood.

ANECDOTE

The Russian Word For A Lifelong Male Friend

Russian culture distinguishes an acquaintance, buddy, and druk, meaning “the other me.”
Such lifelong friendship lets men disclose inner pain without forcing spouses to carry every burden.

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We have talked about masculinity and manhood on this show before. Today is the mature version of that conversation, going back to the oldest teachings we have.

In this episode, attachment specialist Adam Lane Smith sits down with His Eminence Metropolitan Jonah, retired primate of the Orthodox Church in America, rector of St. Herman's Church and Abbot of St. Demetrios Monastery, for a conversation about what forms a man.

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In this episode you will learn:

1- Why so many young men have no working model of a man, and what that costs them
2 - What it looks like for a father to nurture, and why the word gets mocked online
3 - Why a father's role with a son and with a daughter cannot be filled by anyone else
4- The distinction between servant leadership and authority that serves itself
5 - Why male friendship has thinned out, and the Russian word for the friend who is your other self
6- Why a marriage cannot carry every burden both people bring home
7 - The third way between swallowing every feeling and collapsing into all of them
8 - What asceticism actually asks of you, and why self-control is a threshold of maturity
9 - The nous, the two aspects of the mind, and what the Western tradition left behind
10 - Why responsibility without shame is the mature form of all of this

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Metropolitan Jonah was born James Paffhausen in Chicago to a German American Episcopalian family, and was raised in Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Diego. While studying at the University of California, he discovered the Russian Orthodox Church and was received into the faith in 1978 at age 19. After completing his BA in Anthropology at UC Santa Cruz, he attended St. Vladimir's Seminary, earning both a Master of Divinity and a Master of Theology in Dogmatics. He later worked in real estate finance and for the OCA Diocese of the West, and resumed doctoral studies in theology at Berkeley before traveling to Russia in 1993, where he became a novice at Valaam Monastery. Upon returning to the United States, he was ordained a hierodeacon and then a hieromonk in 1994, serving St. Mary Magdalene Mission in Merced, California, and helping to establish several new missions.