Quick Aside: Thank you for your kind thoughts and prayers. Polly is going to short term rehab and we hope to have her back home on hospice in about a week. It has been a really tough road for her.
Women and the Presidency of the United States
The following post is not meant to be a discussion of politics and we would ask that our readers refrain from discussing, endorsing or critiquing any candidates. Hillary Clinton has a good shot at the Presidency and this makes the following theological discussion more relevant than ever.
A few years ago I asked a question which has never been answered from those within the CBMW tribe.
Assume a member in good standing of a complementarian church gets elected President. That church is planning on teaching a course on Christians in Politics. Tell me why she would not be more qualified to teach this course than some wet behind the ears elder.
Some complementarians might say that a woman can do anything except inside the church and in marriage. Only men can be the head of the household and only men can serve as pastors and elders. To this, I have been asking another a couple of other questions.
1. Why spend a gazillion dollars on organizations and conferences if it just boils down to these three items?
2. What exactly are the specific leadership actions men can take in marriage that a woman cannot?
The answer are rather simple.
1. There are many things that complementarians believe a woman can't do but they refuse to answer until push comes to shove. And they are beginning to shove quite specifically.
2. They are unable to define anything a male leader does in marriage except to make a tie breaking vote.
Mary Kassian claims complementarianism has nothing to do with homemaking.
We wrote The Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: If You Can’t Explain It to Me, You’ve Got a Problem. We documented a number of statements made by Kassian and others which demonstrate a lack of cohesiveness thinking on roles, etc. We looked at statements by Wayne Grudem, Al Mohler, Dorothy Patterson and others. Here is our conclusion.
So, I am left with this. I don't understand the practical application of comp theology and I don't think the CBMW crowd does either. If I don't understand it, I can assure CBMW that few people in the church or outside the church get it either. Yet, for some reason, the gospel is at stake.
Owen Strachan says God might not want a woman to be President and that the proper separation of gender roles should last for *all time.* (Think ESS debate.)
The Washington Post published God might not want a woman to be president, some religious conservatives say. Observe the title itself. Notice that the word *some* is used in the descriptor of religious conservatives. There is a hint of disagreement.
Strachan knows he stands for what he calls "a culturally despised position." However, he seems to indicate that his position is the position of *many* evangelicals.
“The Old Testament is very clear that Yahweh desires men to lead,” said Owen Strachan before he stepped down last week as president of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. The purpose of the organization — to insist on separate roles for men and women in modern life — is itself an unpopular view, Strachan acknowledged upfront. “I do stand for a culturally despised position.”
But he believes the Bible has laid out spheres for men and for women that should last for all time. “A good number of evangelicals would probably prefer to see men lead in the political arena, and I would be one of them,” Strachan said. “Many evangelicals would say that men need to be the ones who step up and take responsibility, not simply for the home and the church, but also for the community.”
Strachan's conclusion:
Men should lead in the political arena. He does not qualify this statement. This could be taken to mean that women should not run for any political office: be it county sheriff, dog catcher or president.
John Piper: Sometimes electing a woman could be the lesser of two evils.
Read that again carefully. Did you catch it? Did you know that Owen Strachan is an author at the Desiring God website? I would suspect that this mean Strachan agrees with Piper on his viewpoints.
In Why a Woman Shouldn't Run for Vice President, but Wise People May Still Vote for Her, Piper, in answering a question about a woman running for Vice President, had this to say.
(Discerning implications of biblical teachings for) political life are nuanced and rooted in Scripture. They are also complex and controversial. So they don’t fit blogs well. But I’ll try. The gist is this:
I think that the Bible summons men to bear the burden of primary leadership, provision, and protection in the home (Ephesians 5:21–33) and in the church (1 Timothy 2:8–15). Add to this that these texts (and others, like Genesis 1–3) build their case not on the basis of culture (which changes) but on the basis of God’s design in creation (which does not change).
Therefore, I am not able to say that God only speaks to the role of men and women in home and church. If our roles are rooted in the way God created us as male and female, then these differences shape the way we live everywhere and all the time.
Now read this carefully. It appears he is saying that voting for a woman would be a less sin than voting for a supporter of abortion. It is still a sin but not so bad as voting for a pro abortion candidate.
Not only that, a person with my view may very well vote for a woman to be President if the man running against her holds views and espouses policies that may, as far as we can see, do more harm to more people than we think would be done by electing a woman President and thus exalting a flawed pattern of womanhood. In my view, defending abortion is far worse sin for a man than serving as Vice President is for a woman.
John Piper believes that women should not be police officers carrying his legalistic restrictions on the roles women far beyond just political life.
Piper recently answered the question "Should women be police officers?" We wrote John Piper Backs Himself Into a Corner and Even Reformed Complementarians Are Confused.
(Begin)
Piper believes that men and women not only have role differentiation within the church and home but also in society. Here is how he distinguishes between "jobs for men" and "jobs for women." If a woman is in a job which is personal and directive, then it will cause men to be uncomfortable. Yes, he means all men, even those who are not involved in his sort of church.
There is a continuum from very personal influence, very eye-to-eye, close personal influence, to non-personal influence. And the other continuum is very directive — commands and forcefulness — directive influence to very non-directive influence. And here is my conviction. To the degree that a woman’s influence over a man, guidance of a man, leadership of a man, is personal and a directive, it will generally offend a man’s good, God-given sense of responsibility and leadership, and thus controvert God’s created order.
Here are two examples that he uses to demonstrate his rather unusual guidelines.
1. A woman civil engineer is OK.
A woman who is a civil engineer may design a traffic pattern in a city so that she is deciding which streets are one-way and, therefore, she is influencing, indeed controlling, in one sense, all the male drivers all day long. But this influence is so non-personal that it seems to me the feminine masculine dynamic is utterly negligible in this kind of relationship.
2. A woman as a drill sergeant is not OK
A drill sergeant might epitomize directive influence over the privates in the platoon. And it would be hard for me to see how a woman could be a drill sergeant — hut two, right face, left face, keep your mouth shut, private — over men without violating their sense of manhood and her sense of womanhood.
He then repeats his advice, saying that there will be a breaking point for godly men and women if they do not adhere to these roles.
If a woman’s job involves a good deal of directives toward men, they will need to be non-personal in general, or men and women won’t flourish in the long run in that relationship without compromising profound biblical and psychological issues. And conversely, if a woman’s relationship to a man is very personal, then the way she offers guidance and influence will need to be more non-directive. And my own view is that there are some roles in society that will strain godly manhood and womanhood to the breaking point.
Just in case you are prone like me to think his advice is strange and possibly damaging, he reminds is all that we must be "submissive to Scripture" and he is pretty darn sure that he is one of those who is submissive.
John Piper's dreamed up guidance is impossible to attain in most jobs in the world.
(End)
Al Mohler appears to believe it is preferable for men lead.
The Christian Post published Is it Biblical for Women to Lead in Politics, Military? Albert Mohler Answers. Mohler says he cannot answer the question definitively and equivocates on female leadership in the areas of politics, economics and culture..
"Even in creation, it was very clear that there was a responsibility given to Adam and Eve together, but there was a complementary relationship between them," Mohler pointed out, explaining that God said of Adam that it's not good for man to be alone, so He will make for him a helper or a complement fitting to him.
"I'm not sure we can give a definitive answer in terms of women serving in economic leadership, in cultural leadership or in political leadership… But the answer is not necessarily 'no.' …Women in the Scripture have had very important responsibilities," Mohler said, referring to Lydia in Philippi, who was involved in business, as an example.
There's "no one flat principle" that deals with the question of the role of women in politics for all times, he stressed. "In general, men need to grow up and take responsibility and fill these arenas with as much leadership as possible. But that doesn't mean that there's never a time for women to lead."
This apparent contradiction—how you can be leader of the free world and yet subordinate to some guy —has proved no less confusing to the nation's conservative evangelicals. For them, the justification for a Bachmann presidential run lies in a very careful, some would say tortured, theological interpretation that emerged during Sarah Palin's vice-presidential candidacy in 2008.
Slate sees the problem with female submission and the White House.
Hail to the Housewife was written during Michelle Bachmann's run for the presidency in 2011.
Why should I go and do something like that?" she recalled thinking. "But the Lord says, 'Be submissive wives; you are to be submissive to your husbands.'"
For non-evangelical Christians, this sounds ludicrous: How can a woman who believes in submitting to her husband's will aspire to be president of the United States? Is she going to have to ask Marcus' permission every time she wants to throw a state dinner?
The article quotes Al Mohler who questioned Sarah Palin's domestic priorities. It dawned on me that he would never question a man running for Vice President while being a father to a large family. Is he implying that a father's presence is expendable?
Albert Mohler Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said that while he liked Palin's political views, he worried about the effect of her candidacy on her domestic priorities. "It would be hypocritical of me to suggest that I would be perfectly happy to have Christian young women believe that being Vice President of the United States is more important than being a wife and mother,
Conclusion
I believe that the complementarian camp is heading for a split. Those who believe that women could be President are far different than those who believe such an accomplishment is a sin. Those who believe women will be subordinate to men forever are far different than those who believe that some form of submission is temporary.
One thing is definite. Women are and will be filling roles in all levels of business, politics, government, academics, etc. There is nothing in the Bible that clearly prevents them from doing so.
So where does this leave the minority who believe that it is unbiblical to have a woman as a President, a firefighter, an Air Force pilot, etc.? They will be come increasingly irrelevant as women assume these roles, fully believing that God has ordained it to be so. Many men will agree with them, especially as women continue succeed on all levels of leadership in business, politics and culture.
First?
I should note that Driscoll, another guy who has issues with women and our roles in life, put up a video for his church’s opening. Eagle-eyed me watched it with the sound turned down and noticed that it included footage from their open house on Easter Sunday afternoon. For about one second. In the background you can see three figures. That would be us protesters. I have a screenshot.
And I’m absolutely certain that protesting is off the list of proper, Godly things women are supposed to do.
Eight years or so ago during the campaign, Voddie Bacham made his CNN debut declaring that a woman should NOT be VP. SBTS got in on the action with a news piece interviewing several students (and if I remember correctly one was Courtney Ressig before marriage) and the message was that a woman could be VP with some caveats about spiritual roles.
That was the first time I ever considered a serious split in the comp world might be inevitable. They had been very busy promoting all of these rules and roles for the genders without thinking them through to their practical applications. I mean, do women really have a spiritual self in a non-spiritual self? That seems to be what some of the comps are saying. I think those that are patriarchal are actually more honest. They are wrong but at least they are consistent.
Notice that Owen Strachan immediately cites the Old Testament patriarchal society
as the way to run our society. No mention of the New Covenant we have in Christ, at all,
ever.
Did he make his proclamation wearing a dress and sandals, after all that’s what Jesus wore.
Is Owen giving up running water, electricity, his car and everything else? No modern medicine?
By the way, I grew up in a family listening to the little old ladies talk about what it was like for them to be in graduate school in university and NOT have the right to vote.
The women of my family worked very hard to get the 19th Amendment (women’s vote) passed to the U.S. Constitution.
If Courtney and the rest of them are so opposed to “women’s rights”, by all means please don’t vote. Because “liberal” women, liberal for their times, got you that precious vote. And I got to hear about how hard it was, thank you.
Dee, good news about Miss Polly!
If any of these guys ever need an emergency medical procedure, I hope he gets a female doctor in the ER. And, I hope that female doctor tells him, “Gimme a little while here. I need to go see what kind of procedure my auto-mechanic husband wants me to do to you. I have to submit to him.”
I hope the auto-mechanic husband tell the doctor to just let all the air out of the Complementarian tires.
Velour wrote:
They can also surrender their driver’s licenses, credit cards, remove their names from any property deeds or titles, and GET OFF OF THE INTERNET. Yes, that’s a scream!
@ Nancy2:
Perhaps the hubby might suggest an exploratory with tubing to see if the fuel line is open…
Lydia wrote:
Dualism for the … win?
Oh, and please remind me again, Strachen et. al., why a state of relations between men and women that was introduced in the Fall should be something to which we aspire now, let alone something that we ascribe to all eternity. In the words of our illustrious hosts, “Good night!”
What’s the deal with the OT fandom? I just saw a pastor push male headship as to say that kinsman-redeemers can be a woman’s head. Really, it’s just Gen 2 and 3 and not even 1.
OF possible interest:
http://baylyblog.com/blog/2016/07/seduction-big-tent-compromises
If Clinton wins the election, will these guys leave the USA – maybe go to Iran? I need to know. I can’t decide for whom to vote, but if these guys promise to leave if she wins, that would clinch it for me.
Jamie Carter wrote:
My kinsman-redeemer’s name is Jesus.
L. Lee wrote:
Well, Joseph Bayly so misrepresents what Egalitarian means that I will dismiss whatever else he has to say I. The article.
“Egalitarianism is heresy. Egalitarianism’s core principle is the denial of distinctions, so men and women are the same, Father and Son are the same, Islam and Christianity are the same; and, ultimately, the Creator and creation are the same. To egalitarians, order and hierarchy are like kryptonite because they recognize the distinctions between people—distinctions that are ordained by God. For the egalitarian, “equal but different” is the anti-creed. It is an impossibility. Equal must mean “the same in every respect.” Feminism is one branch of the egalitarian heresy focused on obliterating the distinctions between men and women. Note that religious feminists call themselves simply “egalitarians.” Joseph Bayly
All Piper’s stuff about men feeling less manly like if a woman gives them direct, personal communication or direction – none of that stuff is in the Bible. It’s entirely based on his cultural biases and personal preferences.
Regarding (from the original post, according to Piper):
What if God gifted a woman to be a drill sergeant?
Who is Piper to tell such a woman it’s unbiblical or unseemly for her to be one?
Secondly, you have a secular culture that is pretty much okay with women choosing whatever career they wish. So, what if an atheist lady decides she wants to be a drill sergeant? How is Piper going to stop such a woman?
It’s simply a reality that culture is not going to go the way these complementarian dinosaurs think it should go.
Complementarians need to drag themselves into 2016 and just deal with the fact women are given more opportunities, choices, and rights today than they were 70 years ago.
Nancy2 and Dee are making me laugh!
A woman, like a man, or child like all humans should be all they can be in Christ Jesus our Lord. And He who does not play favorites or separates His children by labels will bring it to pass.
Piper:
He would probably like these comics (satire):
9 Non-Threatening Leadership Strategies for Women
http://thecooperreview.com/non-threatening-leadership-strategies-for-women/
By the way, all this “women should communicate indirectly” stuff Piper goes on and on about is how my mother raised me to think.
I was taught it was unladylike, mean, or not Christian enough for a girl or woman to be communicate directly, be up front. It’s another facet of codependency.
Complementarianism is basically a Christianized version of codependency for women, complete with Bible verses sprinkled on top, and I did a blog post or two about that on my Miss Daisy Blog.
Debi Calvet wrote:
I’m just glad I didn’t pick a veterinarian hubby for the doctor wife ……….
Nancy2 wrote:
Spot on, Nancy2.
@ L. Lee:
I’ve not even read the whole thing but the author created a strawman argument with this:
Egalitarians don’t believe believe there are zero distinctions between men and women.
I don’t know if I’d apply the egalitarian label to myself or not, but I do believe that other than obvious biological differences, men and women are more similar than not.
I don’t know of many Christian egalitarians who would say the Islam and Christianity are the same. I have no idea where he’s getting that from.
@ Bridget:
Men and women can be different biologically, but it does not follow from this that women should be barred from some of the roles men perform. So he’s confused on that point as well.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Because they don’t have a leg to stand on and they know it.
Josh wrote:
Seriously. that is what their position communicates!
But I do think we are seeing an attempt to rebrand CBMW. Burk is somewhat irenic in disagreement where Strachan is a petulant bully boy.
Burk parrots the ideology but is much more likable.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Did this pastor say how many women a kinsman-redeemer could be the head over? Mosaic Law really didn’t give a specific numerical limit to how many wives a man could have.
@ Daisy:
Daisy, my mother taught me similarly. She said that the only way to get a man to consider your idea was to make him think it was his own idea. I remember going camping in my first year of marriage and we forgot to take all sorts of things with us, one of them being the braai (bbq) grid. I spent ages trying to work out how best to put forward what I could see as a solution to cooking our meat on the fire. When I finally did carefully say my piece, hubby says straighout, ‘Oh, that’s a good idea. Great.’ And we did it according to my suggestion. All that mental energy for nothing!
LOL!!
Mom….I just Tweeted Owen and you as well. I said I would love to see Owen tell Margaret Thatcher she could not lead Great Britain because she is a woman.
This is about an Evangelical Free in Las Vegas, and why you should give to a church. This is about tithing, why pastor’s salaries should be open and how a church can establish trust in financial matters.
https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2016/07/30/kevin-scotts-the-stream-in-las-vegas-nevada-are-these-legitimate-reasons-to-give-money-to-a-church/
The Senior Pastor of Cypress Church an Evangelical Free in Orange County, California wrote a piece on the importance of peace and how you could find peace in the church. This is my unique pushback of “peace, peace? what peace?”
https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2016/07/28/mike-mckay-from-cypress-church-on-the-importance-of-peace-my-response-peace-peace-what-peace-there-is-no-peace-in-modern-evangelical-christianity/
Daisy wrote:
I can’t find that verse in Judges where Deborah was judge over Israel …… no wait. How could she be a judge over all of Israel (men included) and still be passive and demure and never instruct Barak in a way that would make him feel threatened as a man….
4:14 “And Deborah said unto Barak, ‘Up; for this is the day in which the Lord hath delivered Sisera …..’ ” me oral judged Israel, Jael drove a tent stake into the enemy general’s head, and ‘the land had peace for forty years’.
Wow. That is straight outta the Bible, but is sounds so anti-Piperish, which would make it anti-biblical …..
Nah, I’m not confused. I just think Piper is.
Nancy2 wrote:
Deborah judged Israel
Auto-correct has a mind of it’s own!
Solomon, the man with wisdom given by the Lord God of Israel Himself, the wisest man in the world, received the Queen of Sheba, evidently as a legitimate co-head of state, rather than sending out soldiers to turn this usurper of proper masculine roles away at the border. She even tested him with riddles to determinbe whether he actually was wise–the insolence! If he was unduly ruffled by her gender and challenge and thereafter lectured her on her fitting place under a man, the Bible is remarkably silent on the point.
It must be that Mr. Piper, Mr. Strachan and Mr. Mohler are far wiser that Solomon, at least in their own eyes.
From the main body of the article above:
“I believe that the complementarian camp is heading for a split.”
Split? I think that extinction is more like it. Slaveholders could see that their way of life was doomed when Vicksburg fell and the Confederacy was cut in two. If a woman is elected to the highest office in the land, CBMW will have their own Vicksburg epiphany so to speak, no matter how passionately they believe in their cause.
From the OP: “So, I am left with this. I don’t understand the practical application of comp theology and I don’t think the CBMW crowd does either. If I don’t understand it, I can assure CBMW that few people in the church or outside the church get it either. Yet, for some reason, the gospel is at stake.”
EX: They describe that the husband has the authority but he is not supposed to impose it on the wife, she is to submit of her own volition. If the issue of the husband having authority is dependent entirely on whether the wife chooses to submit then the wife is the one with the authority over whether or not the husband has authority. Very circular.
My daughter (23 and married) asked today if I knew who Wayne Gruden was. She got as much of an earful as I could give out in the couple of minutes we had to talk. Since she knew he was connected with SBTS, her conclusion was that she just can’t trust much of what is coming out of the SBC seminaries. She instinctively knew from my brief description that ESS was off base. Proud Dad moment. BTW: in 12 years, if she runs for prez she gets my vote.
Bridget wrote:
Oh, good grief. None of that has any bearing in reality. Not only has he invented a straw man, he’s taken his straw man to ridiculous limits. He can’t really believe this. He sounds like a paranoiac.
This statement is ridiculous as well:
The only statement? Apparently that little document called the Bible is just not doing it for him?
I’ll take the Bible. He can have all his man-made statements, manifestos, paranoia and delusions.
So when you filter out all of the subjective definitions and disagreements, what are you left with that they all agree on? Men are better than women? I mean, what is it, at base?
Here’s some general background I think will be of interest, as we consider the cultural realities involved here … I just posted this yesterday on a mid-60-year-old friend’s Facebook page where she noted how she did not expect to see during her lifetime a woman accept the nomination for president from her party.
I agree with Dee’s conclusion in her projection of the current pattern that a split is underway among complementarians:
It appears the whole set of Trinitarian issues that has come to the forefront in recent months is one of the key “fault lines” that will split the group asunder. Either you are or you are not in alignment with historic orthodoxy as identified with the Nicene/Constantinople Councils, and, with apologies to those who think there’s room for both in the gender-role dictation movement, they don’t seem to get it about what divisiveness is.
Another key indicator may be reconstructionist/dominion theology. If you believe the Old Testament state governmental system of Israel is meant to be completed and perfected through the Church, how can you ever have women in charge? This may be another fault line to watch for in the geography of complementarianism.
I suspect you can have some kind of covenant theology and complementarian view of gender roles without dominionism, but you cannot hold to dominionism without also having a hyper-complementarian/patriarchy view of gender roles. This may not prove correct, but I do think it’s a hypothesis worth keeping in mind as we observe the shifting of overlaps in the theological Venn circle diagrams of what has been the Complementarian Industrial Complex. It already is showing itself not so unified as previously thought.
But then, centuries of studies in paradigms and theologies have already shown us that you can have surface behaviors and vocabulary that appear similar, but they come from different underlying beliefs and values. It’s only when you go even deeper into those that you find out it’s not really similar. For instance, the last TWW post on the shift in the meaning of the word “love.”
So, those are some thoughts in the midst of insomnia at 12:30 a.m. here, FWIW.
Josh wrote:
They purposely mistranslate words to support their position. For example, Eve is translated as “helper” when that word actually has a meaning of “military ally” with a connotation of “rescuer”. And then they imply that the curse is binding permanently on women, while not being so on men.
Add all their other mistranslations of “gospel”, “biblical”, and now “love” as Dee wrote earlier this week, and it’s clear that they just make the story be anything they want. It benefits them, who cares if it’s wrong?
It appears that Mr Grudem has a favourite
http://www.christianheadlines.com/blog/theologian-makes-case-for-voting-trump.html
There’s really not much more I can say on this topic. My final word is men & women are equal. In all ways. Equal to lead, in whatever capacity. No woman should be subordinate to her husband. Both parties in marriage compromise,sure, but submission? No.
Ultimately complementarianism is about control. Just like church contracts,just like the promotion of ESS. It is all about keeping the sheep penned up and away from those subversive democratic ideas like voting. Or debating. Or questioning. Or doubting.
I firmly believe the last paragraph in this post will come true.
ishy wrote:
I have always wondered why Eve is blamed for Adam eating the forbidden fruit? Could not Adam have told her NO! Also, I would think Jesus dying on the cross and being resurrected would have wiped the slate clean about what happened in the Garden. I know I am a HERETIC!!
As usual from these guys, relying selectively on the O.T. but no words from Jesus Christ, the One who just happens to be the Lord of all creation. Does his voice (and actions) no longer matter? Have they removed themselves from his authority? Of course, it is much easier to make the Bible say what you want it to say than wrestle with the living King of all creation.
Dan wrote:
ISTM, these guys see Jesus as a man who died for other men. Women are still subject to Mosaic Law.
Lowlandseer wrote:
Yep, I hoped someone would see this : http://townhall.com/columnists/waynegrudem/2016/07/28/why-voting-for-donald-trump-is-a-morally-good-choice-n2199564
Let’s just spell that out…A MORALLY GOOD CHOICE….
@ L. Lee:
How could I possibly be interested in anything written by the Baylys? Their blog only works if you surgically remove your brain before reading.
The fact is, I have known many misogynist and insecure males in my life. The only reason this article makes me sad is that these are males that have been chosen (by hook or by crook) to be “christian” “leaders”. It is sad, and also a little pathetic. I’m not sure they realize that they are the primary force behind the exponential growth of the “dones”.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
I’m trying to figure out how Joseph Bayly managed to get a degree from Vanderbilt. What’s the degree in, and Daddy buy it for him?
mot wrote:
It really makes me wonder if, in their heads, they believe the elect will be only men. I’ve never heard anyone say that, but it would make a lot of sense from the way the selectively abuse Scripture.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
If they do realize this, IMO they simply do not care. They have a religious gig and will milk it for the last dollar. Truly, sad.
ishy wrote:
Sure. With no more “procreational activities” and no more household chores to be done, who needs women in the afterlife?
Funny how all sins are equal, until it’s abortion and women in leadership. Or abortion compared to pedophiles, or abortion compared to pastors who enable pedophiles. Or homosexuality compared to pastors who enable pedophiles.
Then, oh gracious, grievous sin in the eyes of God and much hand-wringing.
Anger, Bitterness™, Division™, etc are all equal with the worst forms of abuse though.
The Unholy Trinity of Sin is Abortion, Homosexuality, and Unsubmissiveness. With, I guess, Unsubmissiveness in eternal essential submission to the other two.
mot wrote:
Using their logic, I’ve always surmised that therefore Adam was a horrible, horrible leader. Subordinates are known to stray and leaders take the heat. But in the comps world, “because woman.”
In their world, where was Adam’s leadership/headship?!
Too bad they want to subjugate the ” other,” in this case women. This is not much different from similar arguments made against African Americans. Theirs is not an argument for slavery in some cases, but it is the same argument for subjugation.
ishy wrote:
Gotta throw at least a few females into the elect mix. Otherwise, who will they control, er lead, in eternity?!
Lydia wrote:
This post has a link to the transcript of that CNN interview.
http://frombitterwaterstosweet.blogspot.com/2012/03/voddie-baucham-is-sexist.html
Melissa wrote:
The leaders of the TGC clearly believe they should be in control of other men, too. Their “subordinates” go crazy trying to jump over one another to be the next right-hand to Mohler. I think a lot of men in the movement are being misled as much as women are. It’s all about power, and who has it. Most men don’t.
Mark wrote:
In the United States, as well as most countries, it is now illegal to subjugate both African Americans and women.
I sincerely believe that the insistence of “gracious submission” of wives to husbands in the BF&M2K is a direct result of our laws that give everyone, all races and both sexes equal freedoms and equal opportunities. Those laws have stripped privileged white males (infected with “Little Man Complex”) of control over other people.
Back in 1995 I debated John Piper in front of a full house at Wheaton College. The topic was on male headship in marriage. I just went back to my manuscript and am pulling out the following excerpt. My last line was a loudly applauded by many, but most certainly not by all. (The first and last paragraphs are mine, the middle one is quoting him.)
Dr. Piper offers a slightly different picture of the true woman—or, in his words, “mature femininity.” The illustration he uses is a man asking for directions–which in itself seems to be an oxymoron.”
“A housewife in her backyard may be asked by a man how to get to the freeway. At that point she is giving a kind of leadership. She has a superior knowledge that the man needs and he submits himself to her guidance. But we all know that there is a way for that housewife to direct the man that neither of them feels their mature femininity or masculinity compromised.”
I’m not sure how a woman demonstrates mature femininity in such circumstances. Should she merely suggest that if he would like drive down the road two miles to the stop sign that would be fine, and that she would encourage him then to turn left and look for the big green sign pointing to the freeway? Or should she simply tell him where to go?
Josh wrote:
Their ‘evaluation’ that this is God’s ‘prescription’ which He ordains for humans is NOT orthodox. The orthodox opinion is that the domination thing is a result of The Fall, not a condition that God intended.
as far as ‘biblical’, well:
the comps don’t want female battle commanders or a female Commander In Chief? Bring on Deborah.
the comps don’t want women in battle? bring on Jael
the comps want their women running to their husbands for every little decision? bring on Mary who said ‘Yes’ to God without consulting her espoused future husband
the comps want to shut their women up from speaking the Good News to the men of the Church? bring on Mary Magdalene, the Apostle to the Apostles, the woman sent to announce the Resurrection of Our Lord
I could go on and on and on
But I think everytime these ‘men’ try to shore up their ‘masculinity’ by putting women to shame, the women (and the men who really care about them) need to ‘bring it’ to these creeps
My husband’s health is failing. My recent surgery was to repair a hernia so that I could physically try to get strong enough again to assist him when the time comes. I think of Piper and his problem with strength in women, and I am wondering HAS HE FORGOTTEN THE MARRIAGE VOW: ‘in sickness and in health’? ‘either to other’?
I know my ‘place’: in two more weeks it will be in the pool and in gym getting stronger for what may come all too soon. When my husband needs me, my strength will be there, God willing. And YES, I know God wants me strong at this time in our life together.
mot wrote:
Dones are obviously not the elect so them “leaving” doesn’t matter.
NC Now wrote:
Sincere question. How do these folk know they are the elect?
I am going for turn to another tradition within Judeo Christianity — believe it or not Haredi Judiasm. What of Rashi’s daughters? I am sure many Patriarchs within this tradition or modern day Patriarchs such as Piper will change the spin on this story like they do Deborah. Also I think we should take the complementarian term away. It is a euphemism for Patriarchy. The leopard has attempted to disguise its spots with paint, but it is still a leopard. I hope exponents of complementarianism will start calling their sets of beliefs a modern polemic for Patriarchy. Shame on them!
Ruth Tucker wrote:
Such idiocy demonstrated by piper.
mot wrote:
Melissa wrote:
Also by their logic, poor old Adam was deceived by Adam. How do they know this? Could he not make his decision in spite of Eve’s offer. I have always been struck by the very weak man-Adam-that is portrayed by these headship guys.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
Well depending on where she tells him to go …..
Nancy2 wrote:
He didn’t; but he did say: “A woman going to a church should think of it as full of her fathers and brothers and desire to honor God and them by covering her glory while in worship.”
@ Ruth Tucker:
Brava, RUTH TUCKER !
NC Now wrote:
Maybe she is dressed like on of those paragons of femininity, a Fox girl, and she could tell him with sweet Southern Beauty Queen demure: ” Pastor Piper, you can go where the sun ____ shine.” It wouldn’t surprise me if this happens one of these days.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
I think Piper is in constant fear, every moment of every day, of having his “masculinity” compromised.
Jamie Carter wrote:
I totally agree with you. Wish I had said it.
Velour wrote:
That’s why they prop each other up on complementarity; otherwise, they would corporately fall to the floor if they repented of their position on this error. They can’t afford to proclaim at this point “After a more careful study of the whole of Scripture, rather than texts taken out of context, we admit that we have been wrong about eternally subordinating the Son and women.” That would sink the New Calvinist ship for sure!
Piper
This reflects a total ignorance of how people in the “real” world do their jobs. Totally. A civil engineer doing such design work will have people working under them. Men and women. (Unless this is a really strange place.) They will be told to look up laws, rules, product specifications, etc… and present them to “her” for review and inclusion in the work being done. And most likely this “women civil engineer” will let out bids, be in charge of accepting them, and supervise the work of employees or contractors implementing these traffic flows which will almost certainly means she will be telling men what do to and exactly how it should be done.
The only way to deal with Piper’s views of how men and women should interact is to form separate societies of men and women outside of the home. Similar to what places like Saudi Arabia and it’s neighbors do.
And riffing back on his comments in the past about women with muscles not being in a proper Christian women’s role… I guess the only way women can be a proper Christian is to live in modern times in the first world. Because until the last 100 to 200 years 99.999999% of women had to do hard physical labor just to fulfill their homemaker roles. Milking cows. Hauling firewood into the kitchen stove. Dealing with cast iron pots and pans. Spinning thread. Whatever. These ladies certainly had muscles.
Piper lives in a fantasy world. Similar to my mother in law. But hers is based on dementia. What’s his excuse?
L. Lee wrote:
Thank you. I just tweeted this. He says that egalitarianism is a heresy. That CBMW allows semi egalitarians in their camp (They do???!!!-News to me.) Therefore, CBMW is flirting with heresy.
These guys are eating their own.
Nancy2 wrote:
That’s it. Their ‘masculinity’ DEPENDS not on their own manly strength, but exists in inverse proportion to how weak they can make their women, or ATTEMPT to have their women pretend to be weak.
Wow. at one end of their spectrum you have a mentally unstable quiver mother of five homeschooling in a rehabilitated bus for a ‘home’, and her handsome youthful happy foolish husband;
and on the other end of the spectrum, you can have a wife shouting: ‘I am woman, hear me roar’ and my goodness her husband is cursed to shrink to Piper size and commences to shake.
The comp world demands the ‘sacrifice’ of a woman’s humanity to shore up a phony masculine image of ‘strength’. It’s so transparent that this cannot work without tragic consequences all around.
brad/futuristguy wrote:
That sounds right to me. Definitely theonomy must include gender roles. I think they have lost the battle for civil theonomy and have shifted to making the Christian life very church-centric, much like the 9Marks crowd except that the glue for 9Marks is the Church Covenaant while the glue for the Federal Visionists is sacramentalism. It is interesting to me to observe the parallels between the mostly credo Calvinistas and the Federal Vision movement which is adamantly pedo and which grew out of Reconstructionism. I think Grudem was one of the crossover points and Christian homeschooling was another. It is very odd that conservative evangelicals do not blink an eye at Peter Leithart and his cronies like Doug Wilson. It is almost like patriarchy is the most important doctrine to these men.
Bridget wrote:
I agree. Each of us have different talents and abilities. You would never want me on the stage to sing with the Met. Women have babies. Men make better professional basketball players due to a difference in muscle development.
The whole idea is to use the God given talents given to each of us. Bailey wants women to deny their talents to fit into his paradigm.
I haven’t read the comment section, so my question may be a repeat. During the campaign circus, I have often wondered about these complementarians; those who love to lord it over their wives, or anyone in their paths for that matter for they are the all knowing source of wisdom, knowledge, and what they believe is good.
What would these unbiblical types and shadows amongst us do, if in fact, a woman was elected President of the United States?” Would they be able to ‘sit under’ and apply the same Biblical verses of obeying the government and living peaceful lives, or would they lash out in non-Biblical ways to gain dominance? Would the complementarians respect the office of the President of the United States equally, with a woman as leader?
And I often wonder, if we were living back in Jesus’ day and witnessed how He treated women, would the complementarians, especially those who call themselves pastors/teachers/leaders/believers and followers of Christ; whine and complain, rebuke, correct, criticize, and perhaps secretly work to have Jesus crucified, because of the love and respect He had for women as co-heirs of His Kingdom?
Maybe I just don’t get it, but me thinks that these complementarians need to go out and get a real job, like the Apostle Paul, work hard while they are here in this life, and please leave the rest of us alone. Their wagging tongues are like a shallow gong in the life of this Christ believing woman.
brian wrote:
I agree with you.
Daisy wrote:
This is one of the best assessment I have ever heard on not talking with a man directly. I may use it in a post and I will give you credit when I do. Awesome!!
Poor persecuted Preacher Piper ponderously pontificates Paul posits patriarchy persistently perpetually!
@ Dave (Eagle):
Owen doesn’t have the guts to speak to a woman who is brilliant. He hides behind the skirts of the men at sBTS making dumb statements. And just like CJ Mahaney, they protect him.
Mark wrote:
Hey, this is good!
@ Nancy2:
It is just the opposite with Mohler, Russ Moore and that gang. That is what makes all this so interesting and confusing for some people. They want an establishment candidate where they have more leverage. They are doing the opposite this election since their candidate did not win the primary.
NC Now wrote:
When I was a child, my family went to the Allegre Feed Mill to get corn ground or cracked, and to buy supplies and feed for our farm animals. The feed mill was owned and operated by an older couple – Mr. And Mrs. Cox. Mr. Cox lost a leg below the knee in WWII. So, Mr. Cox took care of the office work, while Mrs. Cox did the manual labor, slinging 50 lb. bags of chow and grain, loading and unloading trucks. I though the world of Mr. And Mrs. Cox, but these Comp. men would have been terrified of Mrs. Cox. I do believe she would have bagged Piper up and put him on an outbound truck.
Such a position leaves them making wilder choices…like endorsing a remorseless cheater for president. My thoughts on Wayne Grudem’s endorsement here: http://www.divorceminister.com/wayne-grudem-endorses-a-remorseless-cheater-for-president/
Karen wrote:
Good question. They have a real problem with the gender thing and government. Jesus said to obey the laws of the government and to render unto Caesar…etc. He never said: if I agree with them, if they only have men in charge, etc.
Interestingly, Jesus never spoke to the gender makeup of business, government, etc. That was not an issue with Him. He had far important things to discuss with us. He told us to care for the sick, the poor, the forgotten-once again,not mentioning gender. He said “Let the little children come to me.” Not let the little boys come and hear about sacred testosterone.
I don’t know about Strachan, etc but i have a hard enough time living my life out as a compassionate person responding to the needs around me and caring for the sick and abused. These guys have too much time on their hands. Maybe they are dumping all of the calls for love and compassion onto the women o take care of it for them while they sire around and make up new rules for gender differentiation.
Beakerj wrote:
Morals don’t matter any more to the electorate as a whole, ISTM. There is no longer a consensus on what constitutes morality, if there ever was. I did not read that article because the title told me all I need to know. Personally, I don’t think a theologian can make an argument from morality for either person. And I think to vote for a female candidate primarily because she is female is foolish just as it is foolish to vote against a female candidate because she is female. We need to get way beyond that mode of thinking, regardless of gender or race or any other condition which is irrelevant to the task.
@ Lowlandseer:
He has split from the Russ Moore, Al Mohler wing.
Update
Polly is going to short term rehab today- a few days- in order to be able to transfer safely from bed to chair. Then we will take her back home on hospice. Her blood work indicates a failing liver amongst other things and it is apparent she is in the end stage of her battle.
We do not want her to spend too much time in a facility, away from her family and her pug dog. I look forward to bringing her home. This time we will have a hospital bed, aides, etc.
Nancy2 wrote:
perhaps Piper needs to spend some time in the REAL world . . . it might help him (if it’s not too late) to see how marriage ‘works’ when people help each other as needed, when needed in real time. Piper DOES live in fantasy land, up in a study, ringing for tea.
Yeah, a little time spent among real people who love each other and help other without being ‘told to’ or shamed. He could use this therapy, poor man.
Melissa wrote:
In their theology, the de facto Original Sin was the Woman usurping the Man’s authority. The alternate view in their System is that Adam was passive and did not intervene is some way. Either view flows out of their theology, not from the actual text where the Original Sin was disobeying God by eating the fruit. Which used to be obvious even to the casual reader of the text.
@ Divorce Minister:
Here’s the deal that none of them talk about. We are always endorsing sinners for President, mayor or dog catcher. I am with Jesus. The kingdom we seek is not of this world. I will do my best to vote for the people I think will do the best job but that doesn’t mean than I think they are ethical, Christian, kind or truthful.
This is why I shy away from discussing politics on this blog. I believe that decent people can come out on all sides of the voting spectrum. This includes the members of my family. Instead, I want to focus on the church and the injustice that I see there.
Take a look at the Neo Calvinist crowd. Denny Burk is a “Never Trump” person. Wayne Grudem is voting for Trump. Thabiti Anyabwile is voting for Hillary. These guys are in the same tribe yet they cannot agree.
Perhaps if Hillary becomes president, the New Calvinists will be so humiliated that they will just go away.
NC Now wrote:
It’s just the logical outflow of the five points of New-Calvinism:
“Total Denial” of truth, reality, evidence, justice, alternative explanations/interpretations, etc.
“Unconditional Accolades” for New-Calvinist leaders and supporters.
“Limited Justice” for those who have been abused or otherwise mistreated.
“Irresistible Inconsistency” in describing doctrine, applying standards, writing biographies, demonstrating financial integrity,etc.
“Perseverance of the Aint’s” – Poorly credentialed “Leaders” and “Teachers” must be propped up at all costs.
This a great, fundamental point that GRam3 made….. This criwd is messing with one of the fundamental concepts of the Bible….. The Calvanists are teally showing their arogance
Gram3 wrote:
Darn phone… “Really” not “teally” and “crowd” not “criwd”…. My fingers are not that fat!
@ Jeffrey Chalmers:
Lowlandseer wrote:
Now what are the New Calvinist boys supposed to do come election time?! I love it when these guys take sides against each other! Russell Moore and Dr. Al won’t invite Grudem over for a watch party on election night!
@ Mara:
Gram3 wrote:
I could not agree more. There is nothing “equal rights” about voting for someone specifically because of gender or ethnicity. It negates the whole concept and is a horrible strategy to guilt people into voting for someone based upon those sort of characteristics. It really means we have not advanced as far as we think we have.
And what defines “moral” to the electorate is all over the map. Our country decided a long time ago to dismiss certain types of immorality when it comes to high office.
dee wrote:
Looks like it. The CBMW crew is getting pressured by the “thin Complementarian” confessional conservatives on ESS and strict roles and by conservative mutualists on exegesis and interpretation and by the patriarchs like the Baylys on having an insufficient degree of patriarchy. It is enough to keep Denny on his skateboard and out of the office.
Max wrote:
Or fail at a coup attempt and spend the rest of their lives studying theology in the library of a federal penitentiary – with a few female guards?
Oh, this reminds me. I remember listening to a NPR report ages ago about South Korea as they had elected a woman to be president and drew the ire of North Korea – this article covers some of the rhetoric: https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2016/02/24/north-koreas-invective-escalates-as-it-calls-south-koreas-president-an-old-insane-b–.html
What Comps might not realize is that women already are presidents in other countries – women from history like Margaret Thatcher, and even today’s Angela Merkel show us that women can do the job just as well as men can no matter what circumstances they face.
Mara, I must have goofed with your name in there. I did read your link and was glad someone else remembered Voddie’s bizarre appearance on CNN. I thought the comps were splintering at that time and had the election turned out different, I think we would have seen the splintering more clearly after.
mot wrote:
A question I have been asking for 10 years since they are “unable” to really know such things.
Nancy2 wrote:
Or even worse for Piper, she would have totally ignored him except perhaps to directly order him to get out of her way.
dee wrote:
They are so threatened by a strong woman and thank God for strong women!! This says so much about their insecurity.
Lowlandseer wrote:
Yep, and it was picked up rather quickly by the RationalWiki group on Facebook. I commented that Wayne’s probably a bit distracted these days. He’s been having to fend off challenges to his theology from people who say his conception of the Trinity is a semi-Arian heresy.
I don’t know why people just don’t flatly say that Grudem and the rest of the bunch, with their ESS and ranking of 83 things women can’t/can do, are simply anti-woman. Yeah, I know that’s a shocking thing to say, but if the shoe fits…
Lydia wrote:
Obviously, they have the correct knowledge of the Bible and it’s teachings, live out the bible’s commandments, read all the approved commentaries from the approved teachers, are official members of official churches, submit to the official leaders of the official churches, and tithe above and beyond. How could they not be among the elect after those credentials?
Lydia wrote:
ISTM that Mohler is triangulating on this issue. I wonder if a similar phenomenon is occurring in the mainline churches except the dividing line issue might be who is the real, authentic and compassionate person of the little people?
In other words, human sociology plays the same tune but in different keys.
dee wrote:
Your kids are seeing an example of Christ’s love in action. Best wishes and prayers for Polly and all of you.
Jamie Carter wrote:
But they still can not be truly sure of their salvation.
mot wrote:
I’ll try to answer this from my own experience as a(former) member of an authoritarian NeoCalvinist church. The church was also 9Marxist and John MacArthur-ite [senior pastor had his degree from MacAthur’s The Master’s Seminary in Southern California and his *Ph.D.* from an online diploma mill in Missouri for $299].
When new members are introduced at the Sunday church service the pastors/elders say that God chose them before the beginning of time and knew they would be saved and were among “The Elect”.
During Easter, at Good Friday services when the pastors/elders have a Christian give their testimony, the pastors/elders weave in this phrase that the person was chosen by God before the beginning of time to be saved and is among “The Elect”, going to Heaven.
They use it over and over again in every situation imaginable. Nouthetic Counseling sessions/Biblical counseling sessions with the pastors/elders are laden with this.
At my ex-church the pastors/elders managed to blow major problems -alcoholism by one woman church member, Dyslexia/memory problems by another – by treating them with *Scripture* verses and trying to get “unity” without getting medical care by physicians for the real problems. When the problem isn’t solved, the pastors/elders then say that they tried and blame the church member and say that the church member isn’t one of us and must be destined for Hell. Scripture verses are read in somber tones to the church member.
(At my ex-church, the pastors/elders frequently crossed over the line into the Unauthorized Practice of Medicine, a crime here in CA that can be prosecuted as a misdemeanor or a felony.)
At Sunday church services, the pastors/elders tell new attenders that they can’t attend church services if they don’t sign the Membership Covenant and that they “must not be called by God” to be at this church. (Which as Nick who posts here from Scotland has said is a good thing.)
I’ve never seen ruder people than my ex-pastors/elders. They’d proudly say from the pulpit “how do we know you are one of ours if you didn’t sign?” They are rude and immature. Just uncivil. My cheeks would burn scarlet at how proud and immature and rude they were. I’d sit in my pew and think, “They found the church address, figured out the time of the church service, got dressed, got here, and this is the ‘best’ welcome you can give them? Don’t come back.” No class and no manners. No Christian love.
At excommunications/shunnings of wonderful Christians the pastors/elders would openly lie about these dear saints and tell church members to never speak to them again, they aren’t one of us. No immorality, no affairs. Just an iota of discernment, critical thinking skills, and push-back.
Max wrote:
If it were only that easy.
“Why a Woman Shouldn’t Run for Vice President, but Wise People May Still Vote for Her”, has Piper lost it completely (spiritually speaking)? Firstly, last time I checked, there was no “it’s better to sort of sin, then to completely sin” in the Bible. Sin is sin, it separates you from God, and compromises your spiritual state. So, if a woman president is a sinful choice, then a Christian should not vote for her, lest they risk their eternal salvation. Even if the other male candidate is an equally sinful choice, Piper should stress that both options are spiritually unsound in the eyes of God, instead of making a woman candidate the less sinful and therefore, better option.
In addition, the whole idea of a woman leader being sinful is ridiculous. I suppose next he’ll be telling us that Deborah and Huldah were heathens (though it is interesting to note that God never struck them down for their “unwomanly” behaviour.) In the Old Testament, if God was clearly unhappy with the ways of his people, everyone knew about it, and the guilty were severely punished. Please note, that in both their cases, nothing happened.
End rant.
Gram3 wrote:
In the SBC, Russ Moore as the new “ethics and liberty” spokesman for the entire convention has worked hard to convey the message that your salvation is in question if you vote for Trump since the primary.
I keep telling people that the old fault lines have been blurring for a while now. Things are not as clear cut as people think.
Jamie Carter wrote:
And most importantly, they “obey” and “submit” to the NeoCalvinist pastors/elders and don’t have a shred of critical thinking skills. Being a Berean at these churches is a fast track to excommunication and shunning.
Beakerj wrote:
Well, there is another word whose meaning is being hijacked- “moral” – moral according to whose moral compass?
TGC, CBMW and their ilk are the theological wing of the right wing nut jobs (RWNJs) that have turned the Republican Party into the party of hate and oppression. Whatever ‘gospel’ they are proclaiming, it’s definitely not the one proclaimed by Jesus Christ, for theirs is a ‘gospel’ of oppression of women and hatred of those who don’t believe what they do. Saying they are ‘Christian’ does not make it so. Who in their right mind could imagine Jesus uttering the despicable things said by these so-called Christian leaders. It cannot be said loudly enough that THEY ARE NOT CHRISTIANS.
Gram3 wrote:
Amen to that. I call it mercy living.
@ dee:
Thanks for updating us about Polly. Keeping her and your family in prayer.
You are an awesome woman and daughter-in-law. God bless you, sweetie.
@ JeffT:
Those are the old days that have become a cliche. The political lines have been blurred for a long time. SBCVoices ran quite a few articles in support of our current president years back in the form of support it would bring racial reconciliation.
SBTS had students interviewed on the news about why it would be ok to have a female VP. Now that same faction is questioning your salvation if you vote for the Republican candidate.
It’s not as clear cut as you think.
Jamie Carter wrote:
How do they know they aren’t being fooled? Have you read the sections on reprobation in Calvin’s Institutes? According to Calvin, you can feel saved, act saved but really be reprobate and not know it until you die. Calvin refers to it as grace while you are alive but still, you are not chosen.
They often leave out that part or perhaps have not read that part of his ST. Or perhaps did not understand it. Scary stuff. That is why I usually ask how they can really know since they are not involved in responding at all in the process.
Max wrote:
Moore and others want her as prez now. We have surpassed doctrine and are in establishment territory now. Much more leverage. Never ever forget these men are selfish, first and foremost. They are all about power and fame where they can be players. They have much more leverage if she wins. Moore is questioning the salvation of those who might vite for her opponent.
It is a new day. A confusing one for a lot of people.
Lydia wrote:
Perhaps the Apostle Paul was a reprobate?
I got to thinking some more after I got off the internet last night about someone’s link above to that Bayly blog post yesterday, where Bayly was saying how egalitarians supposedly deny that there are differences, or distinctions, between men and women.
I’m wondering if the reason why these Bayly type of complementarians or patriarchalists are so insistent that men are so distinct from women is that they feel they need this belief to justify barring women from holding certain roles and therefore competing with men for jobs.
For instance, if you insist that all men were created by God to be strong, assertive, risk takers, brave, logical, good at math, etc,
And if you insist that women differ from men because God created all women to be passive, weak, irrational, flighty, dainty, lovey-dovey, nurturing-
That can lead you to feel that only men should fulfill jobs or roles that may be more suitable to having all those supposedly masculine-only traits (e.g., assertive, brave, risk- taking, etc).
One problem is, of course, men and women don’t fit those boxes. You’re going to find exceptions.
You’re going to have women who are naturally good at math, or who are strong, and men who are passive, weak, timid at taking risks.
I think this type of complementarian clings to the “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” view because they believe it justifies prohibiting women from certain tasks or careers.
I suspect it’s not based on any sincere desire to honor God, or go by what the Bible may really say about men or women. It’s just about finding excuses to keep all power and control and plum jobs in the hands of men.
I do suspect one other thing is that most of these guys who support barring women one way or another is a deeply ingrained sexism (whether it’s benevolent sexism or overt sexism), an idea that men are just superior to women.
Anyway, I think maybe this group (the “men and women are distinct” types) use that “distinct” argument to discriminate against women, the way the ESS crowd uses Trinitarian views to limit women.
I think the ESS guys realize that the “genders are so very distinct from each other” arguments don’t work now the way they did decades ago, which is why they don’t seem to lean on them as much.
And good luck to these “distinct” guys winning any points with some of today’s left wing, secular society, who believe gender is fluid and there is more than binary gender, and so on.
JeffT wrote:
One of the oldest political tricks (predating our Democratic/Republican binary) is to find an enemy, declare that enemy an existential threat, and gather followers after yourself or your tribe. It is not localized to the Republican party which is diverse in viewpoints just as the Democratic party is diverse in viewpoints. The tactic is employed by *every* political party, though it may look different on the surface. Naturally, neither party wants their “own people” to see how they are doing this. The tactic relies on people in the tribe only seeing the other tribe doing it.
Lydia wrote:
Really? Seriously?? He said that?
Estelle wrote:
What’s really said, and is a common experience for women (especially working women in the work place), is that when a woman makes a suggestion at a staff meeting filled with men and women, everyone will ignore her idea.
Two seconds later when a MAN repeats that women’s same idea, suddenly all the MEN at the table say, “That idea is fantastic! Randy, you are a GENIUS!! Why didn’t someone think of that idea before????”
Meanwhile, the WOMAN who first uttered the idea is sitting there in shock that a man is getting credit for the same idea she just stated a moment before.
Daisy wrote:
That was supposed to say “what’s really SAD”
Dave (Eagle) wrote:
Britain has a new woman PM now, Theresa May
Theresa May becomes new British Prime Minister
, July 14, 2016
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/13/europe/theresa-may-david-cameron-british-prime-minister/
@ Gram3:
True, but I don’t think the hate and oppression has been this bad in a political party since the pre-Civil War Democratic Party
Nancy2 wrote:
I’m waiting for Piper to next instruct women to communicate indirectly with men by using smoke signals or pantomime.
Men and women will have to play games of charades to exchange ideas.
-Instead of just using the brains and mouths God gave them.
Karen wrote:
Possibly they would ramp up all the nonsense about how ‘persecuted’ Christians supposedly are in this country today and fill their followers with even more paranoia and desperation that “if we don’t do something” the world will soon end.
I think you are spot on.
Muff Potter wrote:
I think it may be both 🙂
We’re all seeing a split, between the ESS guys and the non-ESS guys. Now you have the comps who think it’s acceptable for women to be POTUS and those who do not.
Then, after all is said and done, I agree, they will go the way of the dodo bird. Actually, they already have become irrelevant.
The only people who take their gender role malarkly seriously now are Christians who were brought up viewing the Bible through that filter; they are preaching to the choir, not winning new believers.
I was once one of them, but even I eventually saw past it and no longer agree with them.
I don’t see them persuading Non-Christian women to jump aboard Christianity, not to a version of Christianity that includes a view that says God basically views women as less capable than men and not equal to men in role.
I want to go ahead and say this now. Whoever wins this coming election, I did not vote for that person.
I do plan to vote, not sit home, but either it is predestined that I will not have voted for the winner or else I am perfectly willing to lie about it.
Just so you know.
dee wrote:
This could be a really good thing for their followers, if it forces them to see that things are not all black & white. Hopefully they can then apply that discovery to other areas.
Lydia wrote:
I think that for many of them, they have to believe that they’re the elect, who have it all right – ‘know’ is a sciency term that means you lack faith. But if you believe, then you’re good. They can’t exist in a world where they could get everything right, know everything right, submit correctly and still not be saved.
Daisy wrote:
Or maybe telepathy? Or maybe women should just leave it up to God to tell him, if it’s important?
@ dee:
God bless you, Dee. I can only hope I am so well cared for at that stage of life.
mot wrote:
Because they know. 🙂
The only ones who come down as true believers in the “elect selected before birth” are those who are convinced they are part of the elect. So arguments against this position are obviously from those going to hell so they can never win the argument so …. rinse lather repeat.
dee wrote:
You truly are counter-cultural dee and all heaven smiles. This is the way it was done before a vapid and morally bankrupt culture decided it was best to warehouse our elderly and infirm to die alone and in misery.
FW Rez wrote:
Yes, thank you! This is a point I’ve hammered on a time or two in the past but didn’t put it as well as you did.
Where the Bible talks about wifely submission, it sounds voluntary, left up to the woman in question.
Submission is not something a man can demand of a woman.
(Yet notice how often it’s men who are barking at Christian men that they MUST insist, or trying to debate with us on this blog and convince us that the Bible teaches one-way, wifely submission). Anyway.
So, I’ve asked on older threads, what do complementarians do when or if a woman refuses to submit to her husband?
Comps cannot do “boo” about a woman’s refusal to submit, unless they want to advocate it’s a husband’s right to abuse his wife to force her to comply.
Unfortunately, I have seen too many posts online, though, about abusive Christian husbands who will verbally or physically beat up on their wives if the wife is not submitting to them (these are the men who demand complete compliance from their wives).
But you’re right, too, that the whole complementarian thing ultimately makes the wife the “authority” of the husband in a round-about way.
Consider their other view, the flip side of the coin, where complementarians attempt to justify wifely submission by saying the husband is to be like Christ unto the wife
(this is where they talk about “servant leadership” and so on, and they argue the wife should actually find it enjoyable to submit to a guy who acts all nice, Jesus like, and lovey towards her).
Under that comp position, the husband is to bow to the wife’s desires and whims and so on, at least most of the time
(e.g., according to soft comp A. Byrd, the husband is to “give in” to what the wife wants, unless it’s a “big deal,” such as where, or if, to move to a new city).
So even under that specification (the “husband is a loving servant leader”), the wife really holds all the authority, in a manner of speaking, at least some of the time.
GuyBehindtheCurtain wrote:
Spot on.
My ex-NeoCalvinist pastor would say from the pulpit that when Jesus returns that my pastor would be on a horse doing battle for Jesus. My ex-pastor’s disconnect was astounding.
I’d think, “A guy like you – who screams, yells, bullies, threatens, lies about, excommunicates and orders to be shunned dear Christians – thinks Jesus would entrust you with ANYTHING? Jesus wouldn’t trust you with the manure in the horses’ stable, let alone with a horse.”
FW Rez wrote:
One other thing just occurred to me about what you said.
I did a lot of reading about boundaries and such subjects.
I was reading one book by Christian doctors Cloud and Townsend about boundaries. They have this comment in their book where they say something like every adult already has power.
The authors were saying you don’t have to demand respect and power from other adults, or to insist on getting respect/ power from other adults is to miss the point, because you ALREADY HAVE IT.
So, I find it interesting and troubling that complementarians feel the need to keep coaching men to insist to women around them that women “owe” men respect, deference, power, or authority.
If you are well-adjusted and already secure, you should not NEED another person (or entire group of people) bowing down to you and deferring to you.
Under the complementarian scheme, you’re also looking to others to validate you, rather than getting your sense of respect and value from Jesus Christ.
Complementarians also pull this on women, but in a slightly different way: they are, at the end of the day, teaching (married) women to derive a sense of purpose and identity from a husband, when women (married or no) should be taught they get their purpose, identity, and value from Jesus Christ.
FW Rez wrote:
I just provided a link in the last thread about complementarianism where Wayne Grudem has recently written an op/ed in defense of a certain orange-complected candidate.
The thing that got my goat was how Grudem was saying in his op/ed that “Mr. Orange Candidate” is not sexist.
I think Mr. Orange is in fact sexist (and I am right wing myself, so this is not meant to be ‘right wing bashing’).
Grudem is so steeped in sexism himself, he is blinded to it when it is in others.
Daisy wrote:
The Neo-cal/complimentarian movement is just one of the myriad upon myriad of powers and principalities that vie for power and control. Just like all other ideologies that vie for power and control, it too will eventually meet its demise. Until then, it will – like all other powers and principalities – fight for survival.
The following description of principalities offers an amazingly apt profile of the Neo-Cal “principality.” (As well as the countless others we encounter daily.)
The immense scope of the powers is suggested by William Stringfellow in An Ethic for Christians and Other Aliens in a Strange Land, in which he offers the following descriptions of the principalities: • legion in species, number, variety, and name; • creatures that are fallen (meaning that they thrive in chaos, confusion, and competition); • an inverse dominion (one that works backwards – not to foster life, but to dehumanize); • not benign, but aggressive; • causing all to be victims (with or without their knowledge); • capturing leaders as acolytes enthralled by their own enslavement; • engaged in rivalry with each other since their very survival is always at stake; • and creating a new morality of survival.
Marva J. Dawn. Powers, Weakness, and the Tabernacling of God (Kindle Locations 70-74). Kindle Edition.
was thinking about my Pop, of blessed memory, and why although he came from a traditional French-Canadian family, there was NO sign of ‘comp’ hubris . . . he was a very dignified, hard-working man who had the utmost respect for our mother and fostered that his daughters should have university educations, as well as his son. . .
then I remembered:
a role model for my Pop still stands in the courtyard of the school (St. Joan of Arc School, Aldenville MA) where the nuns first taught him English:
a beautiful statue of Jeanne d’Arc, armed and in full battle armor, the French peasant girl who inspired her countrymen (and women) to drive the English out of France.
yeah . . . teenager, uneducated, from a small village, impoverished simple faithful family . . .
she was only nineteen when they burned her at the stake. All France honors her courage and service still. Her memory is a source of national pride and she also remains a great heroine among the Quebecois of Canada.
Daisy wrote:
Comps now have the highest divorce rate in the nation (Barna study), record amounts of domestic violence, incest, and sexual abuse (non-relatives). The teachings – that women and girls are garbage [and other people too] – has gotten them treated like garbage. No great surprise there. That’s the “fruit” of Comp/NeoCalvinist teachings – destruction.
siteseer wrote:
The only thing I’ve ever seen complementarians reach a consensus on is that
1. women should not hold positions of leadership in churches
2. husbands get the tie-breaking vote in disagreements.
However! Even in points 1, and 2 they disagree.
I believe it was soft complementarian A. Byrd on her blog (or one of her fellow comp writers there) who said that comp should NOT be thought of in terms of “husbands get a tie breaking vote” only.
As to point 1, I’ve seen some comps who are OK with women being elders or deacons, while other comps are not OK with that. I think they all agree that women should not be preachers.
Other than the “no women preachers” thing, I’m hard pressed to think of any other point they are in total agreement over.
I remember when a comp guy used to post here quite a bit, he’d get frustrated at me criticizing one point or another in comp teaching and start telling me “But I”m a comp, and I’m not like that.”
I was like, “Well that’s great, but there are in fact comps who DO believe in what I’m arguing against. That you don’t agree with them and don’t feel they speak for you is actually a sign of weakness for your position.”
@ Gram3:
John Quincy Adams dwelt at length on this dynamic long ago.
okrapod wrote:
LOL
Daisy wrote:
I’ve been thinking a lot about Comp’s and the complete lack of healthy boundaries they espouse. It’s no surprise to me that all of their big heros who taught this have been felled by sex crimes accusations and lawsuits for damages.
People who don’t want other people to have healthy boundaries have an agenda, in my opinion, and it’s usually not a good one (immoral, unethical, and even criminal).
@ Christiane:
That’s a sweet memory about your father.
Nancy2 wrote:
Nice way of putting it.
The Gospel is “good news” for the male gender, but not for the female gender, apparently.
From the post:
“Just in case you are prone like me to think his advice is strange and possibly damaging…”
In context: As a teacher, I have seen a Muslim father of a middle school boy student tell his son in front of the student’s science teacher during conferences: “You do not have to listen to her, you do not have to do anything she says, she is a woman.”
I have also seen a supposedly “Christian” student, grade 1, from Lebanon but being raised in the USA, being told by his father that he, too, did not have to listen to any of the female teachers/administrators in the school building. The boy’s mother was a teacher at this public school! As a result, the boy was the #1 problem child in the school, and a total embarrassment to his mother (again, who was a teacher in the building). No one could manage this child at school, and certainly not even his own mother.
Daisy wrote:
At my ex-church the NeoCalvinist pastors/elders didn’t even need Jesus because they were so special that they were among God’s chosen Elect before the beginning of time.
Jesus is redundant.
JYJames wrote:
That’s terrible.
okrapod wrote:
I will vote, but I might throw up afterward before I even find out who won.
Gram3 wrote:
Bingo.
JeffT wrote:
Oh, it was very, very bad during Jim Crow. If you look into that history (which I lived through) you will find that the biggest supporters were Southern Democrats. It was Lyndon Johnson who changed that, ironically, and he did not change attitudes overnight. I think that parliamentary systems make this a little more visible where our system can mask the continuous change of alignments of political interest groups.
Political parties are not static repositories of Absolute Truth, Justice, and the American Way regardless of how any of us conceives of those.
JeffT wrote:
Join the Libertarians with me cos I seem them both as hateful and oppressive. It is amazing what can be seen when you don’t have a tribe.
ishy wrote:
I resemble that remark, ishy! My grandfather was the Democratic party chairman in our county for years – during that time, our family punched a straight-ticket. Without offering any commentary on this year’s election, I can say with a seasoned knowledge that they don’t make Democrats like they use to.
dee wrote:
LOVE!
mot wrote:
I’ve seen a curious trend over the last few years on professional Christian, or well- funded Christian blogs and sites (like TGC, or Relevant magazine, etc).
Instead of the authors on those sites asking themselves, “What are we doing to turn off so many people to church and to Jesus, and how can we rectify this?,”
They instead churn out several posts a month shaming and scolding people for quitting church or quitting Christianity, or for voicing complaints about churches.
Sometimes, their assumptions are wrong.
I keep seeing such editorials where they argue and gripe that Christians today are “church shoppers” or “church consumers.”
-(Irony: they gripe in their articles that other Christians should not be griping, because a Christian griping is un-becoming.)-
This is where they shame you for having needs and preferences. (‘How dare you actually look for a church where you may get your needs met and where you feel you will fit in.’)
So, they assume you, the church shopper / church consumer, are dumping church only because the church has blue- colored carpeting, but you prefer tan- colored carpeting.
Even in the articles that are closer to home and sort of get it right, the ones who realize that maybe the reason so many are quitting church, is, for example, the sexist way churches treat women.
Instead of saying, “You may be right. We should take another look at what we are teaching about women, what we believe about women,”
They instead shout down the reader by saying the Bible clearly teaches no woman should be preachers, leaders, or equals in marriage, and you must simply accept those beliefs, and if you don’t, you’re a Bible- rejecting liberal.
Then these writers of such pages might get into this thing about how you are there to serve the church, you should care more about saving lost souls, than if women can teach Sunday school.
If you care about stuff like how women within church are treated, you are, they say or imply, not in line with what Jesus is concerned about.
It is just a bunch of guilt tripping stuff that isn’t willing to realistically or fairly acknowledge whatever your gripe is with churches.
okrapod wrote:
I am undecided between Pat Paulsen and Alfred E. Neuman on the theory that they cannot do as much damage to our republic.
@ Lydia:
It’s well past time for Southern Baptists to ask Brother Russell to cool it on several fronts, but that ain’t going to happen as long as Mohler stands with him.
Gram3 wrote:
However, Emily Litella is also under consideration.
mirele wrote:
If he knows what’s good for him, it would be best for Mr. Grudem to go silent for a while. He’s stirred up enough stuff on the theological front to go meddling in politics.
okrapod wrote:
Kept implying it over and over ad nauseum is more like it in tweets and public statements. Linking such a vote to the Gospel and salvation.
Moore worked for congressman Gene Taylor. Moore has never been a Republican ideologue. Ever.
Gram3 wrote:
I’m voting Bill ‘n’ Opus.
@ okrapod:
Lol! We debated every issue Under the Sun in my house growing up. But it was considered vulgar to ask anyone how they voted. My parents were adamant about that sort of personal privacy. Now I get it.
ishy wrote:
This is something Custis-James has brought up in her book and interviews about Christian patriarchy – that only a small percentage of men benefit from male hierarchy.
In patriarchy or complementarianism, only a small number of men make it to the top of the Pyramid Of Power. Under them is a boat load of other men, and at the very bottom are women.
I wonder if most of the men who support complementarianism realize this, or if they do but secretly hope one day to be at the top of the pile themselves.
Muff Potter wrote:
Probably because he paid attention to history as well as current events.
@ Gram3:
Do you remember Lyndon LaRoche? (Did I remember the name right,?) He would buy airtime on one of the four channels to give a speech sitting at a desk. It was so unusual to do it that people watched it. I can’t remember his positions, though.
JYJames wrote:
If there were witnesses, I would think that the administration would intervene here: if a child will not respond to direction, the teacher cannot possibly be ‘an officer of the school system’ or act ‘in loco parentis’ in matters of safety and well-being for the child.
Sometimes, a public school setting is not appropriate for those who are a danger to themselves or others, and in the middle of a fire-drill or a lock-down, if you get a mouthy kid who refuses direction, the consequences have to be considered. Perhaps an ‘alternative school’ placement for such a child? Or, sending the child home and having tutors come to work with him at home.
A parent ought to know they can send their child to a safe school. But teachers and administrators have limits of what they can handle in the way of children who are not cooperative, and especially are disrespectful thanks to a parent’s permission to flaunt authority. Very sad story, this.
JeffT wrote:
Like this?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_of_Charles_Sumner
Daisy wrote:
Blame-shifting is a very old and widely-practiced tradition. Though I am not a psy* I think it is a very primitive defense of self.
Muff Potter wrote:
Someone gave me a JQA potbelly. I love it and him. :o)
Daisy wrote:
But the ones who are drawn to it believe that they will be at the top someday if they cater to the right people who are the people currently at the top. Probably because they know at some level that they cannot rise to the top of anything else and they cannot be content anywhere else but at the top.
It reminds me of the core issues in Cluster B disorders. Again, I am not a psy*.
Lydia wrote:
I do remember him, and I do not remember his positions other than the “weird” alarm went off. But my weird alarm is hyper-sensitive.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
(Quoting John Piper):
One thing I wanted to point out about Piper’s example.
Why does the woman in Piper’s scenario have to be a “housewife” (i.e., married woman who is a SAHM type of person)?
Maybe the lost male motorist approaches a never-married woman who is doing yard work in her yard.
Or, maybe the woman he approaches for directions is in a marriage where the woman works 9 to 5 but the husband is a stay- at- home- husband.
Perhaps the male driver encounters a widow or a divorced woman.
Maybe the lost male driver comes across Mirele, (who like me, has never married), who is out picketing Mark Driscoll’s church to ask her for direction (hee hee).
Why is it that “woman” or “being feminine” is always equated to “married mother” with these complementarian guys such as Piper?
There are such creatures as single women, or childless or child free women in the world.
BTW, a hyper masculine manly man type of complementarian, such as Driscoll? I think he would rather gouge his eyes out first before asking ANY woman or any martial status for directions if he were lost.
Driscoll would (just guessing here) probably say that Piper is a wimply girly man for even considering asking a woman for directions.
Driscoll probably goes so far to choose a man’s voice on his G.P.S. driving system (whatever those things are called), rather than go with a lady’s voice.
@ Lydia:
There’s plenty of legitimate and deal-breaking criticisms of Trump whether you’re a social conservative Christian or a secular free market advocate, but their Emannuel Goldstein treatment of Trump is just weird:
https://twitter.com/ThabitiAnyabwil/status/753363931809263616
It might just be TGC’s standard operating procedure of being a big contest of who can most extremely support the ideas they announce their approval of, or, along with their overtures to Black Lives Matter, is an intentional appeal to the Clinton administration to not attack tax-exempt status of evangelical churches by way of the gay marriage decision. I caught an article by Joe Carter that indicates some of fear of this:
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/do-churches-contribute-to-solving-social-problems
And now that I’ve posted about Trump, race issues, and gay marriage, I’ll run and hide. 😉
@ Gram3:
It changed when certain groups could vote. Not on ideological grounds but along pragmatic lines. The older I get the more embarrassed I become at my ignorance concerning the power dynamic of the ruling oligarchies. Those entrenched in DC are more alike than different no matter the party affiliation.
Of course NeoCalvinist *leaders* don’t want women to vote or hold political offices, because when women can exercise these rights in our nation, they’ll wonder why they can’t do the same in the church.
Why should women give their hard-earned money to churches that want to treat them like second-class citizens?
@ Christiane:
The religious view of women posed a problem here. The point is the trajectory – boots on the ground – of religious rules for men and women. One would think that the Comps or whomever is setting up gender-specific rules would look at how this is all played out in the Muslim community and take heed. The same with the Christians all camping out in one specific political affiliation or another. Go to a one-party State and see how this plays out – go to China if there is to be no difference of opinion or social diversity.
@ Velour:
Yes, but that is exactly actually how these defined gender roles play out.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
Someone needs to tell Piper that normal people simply don’t wonder if their femininity or masculinity has been compromised. We just get on with our lives!
Christiane wrote:
Secular society is even tilting towards this.
The main character in the latest Star Wars set of films is Rey, who is on her way to becoming a Jedi. She fought the male villain, Kylo Ren in the first installement.
The new Ghostbusters movie came out about two weeks ago, which recast all the lead roles to women, so you have women fighting ghosts now.
The upcoming Star Wars movie, Rogue One, from what I’ve seen in the trailers so far, features a woman hero who fights the bad guys in shoot ’em up scenes.
Way back when, you had Sigourney Weaver playing alien fighter Ripley in the Aliens movies, Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy saved Han Solo in Episodes 4 and 6 (from Jabba the Hutt in 6).
On TV, there has been Buffy the vampire slayer (female vampire hunter), Michonne (katana wielding zombie slayer on “The Walking Dead”), and Xena, who was dubbed the “Warrior Princess” who got into sword fights with people, including men.
Complementarian Christian men are really determined to view women, and insist upon them being, perpetual damsels in distress and never the stars of their own shows or lives, but only as supporting roles to men.
ishy wrote:
A man tweeted last week that he’d prefer jumping in a vat of lemon juice with knives than having to vote in the upcoming election.
Mark wrote:
Some of them have already admitted to this:
Russel Moore: “I hate the term complementarian’…”
http://baylyblog.com/blog/2008/05/russel-moore-i-hate-term-complementarian
I’ve seen some declare they are “confessional” rather than complementarians.
dee wrote:
Yes, yes they are, and part of me finds it gratifying and entertaining.
Which is why I feel this animated GIF of Michael Jackson as a movie audience member eating pop corn is so apropos:
https://m.popkey.co/98d4e9/1GJN7.gif
(Michael Jackson eating pop corn animated gif)
Jamie Carter wrote:
Then they need to stop confessing the beauty of complementarity!
This response by John Mark Reynolds to Wayne Grudem and his endorsement of Trump speaks volumes about the man and his theology:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/eidos/2016/07/a-good-man-justifies-a-wicked-deed-grudem-on-trump/Lowlandseer wrote:
Max wrote:
They sure picked an immature political hothead to represent the entire SBC on “ethics and liberty” to America. He is Mr.Optics. The man cannot resist a mic.
I now have a new rule. Any church or church leader who suggests or even hints at how I should vote (even if by shaming the other side) is an immediate “get up and walk out the door” for me. I don’t care which side they are on. I am an adult and don’t need such “instruction”. We should all be offended at such a thing. Hopefully!
Christiane wrote:
Perfect example of that is this page by a complementarian guy:
An Open Letter To Rey
(Rey is a woman who is a main character in the new Star Wars films)
https://warhornmedia.com/2016/03/07/an-open-letter-to-rey-from-star-wars/
1. If these Comp. leaders see the sociological problem being: “that men are not stepping up—that is why so many women are filling all of these ‘manly’ positions,” then, alas, they will soon be outnumbered and out-brained by the fact that so many men (in America??) have just dropped the ball and have allowed those wimmin folk to get the upper hand in taking over professions and politics. It is just a matter of time.
2. Daisy makes the point: “but I do believe that other than obvious biological differences, men and women are more similar than not.” Yes, there are differences and yet maybe there are greater similarities! After all, both are human beings.
There are many studies that have demonstrated the similarities and differences of gender. These are wonderful studies which can highlight the similarities as well as the technical differences and why. These guys would do well to get up to speed with the research on ‘gender issues’ in order not to sound like uninformed dolts.
3. BTW, Daisy, I read the articles on your blog and they were informative and excellent. From your personal perspective of being in that camp through your family of origin belief system, your insights, especially those regarding the co-dependency of females, has got lots to inform others. Well done!!
BTW I was not able to leave a comment on your site. Is there some easy way to do that or not?
4. Muff said: “Split? I think that extinction is more like it.” Would to God that this be so! And yes, like the dinosaurs of old!
@ Lydia:
At our church the pastor has twice now, on two separate political issues, stated that he is not going to publicly take sides not permit the teaching function of this parish to be allowed to take sides. He had religious reasons for this. I like that, but from the fact that he had to say it in the first place I assume that had he not done so there might have been some side-taking going on.
Like you I don’t want somebody trying to tell me how to vote, but if they want to knock themselves out in trying what can I say. It is a useless pursuit, but I suppose they will realize that in time.
dee wrote:
Thank you. I go into great detail about the similarities between Christian gender complementarianism and codependency on my Miss Daisy blog,
https://missdaisyflower.wordpress.com/
And part of that does entail teaching girls that it’s wrong, ungodly, or unlady to be assertive, have boundaries, and speak directly (especially to men).
My Mom was deeply steeped in this stuff.
It took me the last few years (after she died) to start looking into these beliefs, and I was astounded to see how similar Christian gender complementarianism, as taught to Christian women, is to codependency.
In my mother’s case, I believe she was extremely codependent not only due to how she was raised to understand the Bible, but she was an adult child of an alcoholic.
My mother’s codependency did stem in part from coping skills she learned as a child to avoid her father’s wrath when he was inebriated –
But my mother definitely also got the message from her Christian mother (my grandmother) and from various Christian sources (books, church sermons etc) that women were to be subservient to men, all due to God’s design or wish.
RHE did a blog post touching on some of this same stuf a couple of months ago, under a March 2016 post entitled,
“The Absurd Legalism of Gender Roles, Exhibit D: ‘Biblical’ Manipulation”
It is obvious their comp rules, roles and formulas don’t work in society. They have been haggling with this for the last 10 years and are not on the same page but have played the mental gymnastics cognitive dissonance game with their approach to the problem.
Its not just the men. I have seen many educated professional women play this game. Emerson Eggerich really helped that cause with his “love and respect” doctrine separating the professional educated woman leading men at work who goes into a telephone booth to change into the the submissive wife and church member. More dualism.
They are now down to presenting the dualism as the normal. These are Women who must operate in spiritual and non spiritual roles in order to be Christian. She can be president of a bank leading many men but not teaching men at church. And the bank president must come home and be properly submissive to her husband. They have chosen a tough path with much cognitive dissonance because nowadays women are outpacing males in college entrance and professions. They are always having to rewrite their rules. They are doing just that with this election.
https://adaughterofthereformation.wordpress.com/2016/07/21/we-need-a-new-name
http://www.alliancenet.org/mos/1517/i-am-not-a-complementarian#.V5zrZIa3N0s
On Confessionals
dee wrote:
Cannibalism can occur in animal populations if they are kept under unnaturally cramped conditions. As New Calvinst leaders vie for position and power over a limited number of thrones in the reformed movement, they are starting to crowd each other – some are turning vicious! Scripture says “If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other” (Galatians 5:15). The new reformation will implode because arrogant leaders will not surrender their thrones without a fuss and such immature behavior will eventually drive off their followers.
@ okrapod:
good for him! Yes, sad he had to even say it.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Yeah, what is up with that? I found that rather confusing using old creeds that were written in a time women had NO rights at all. Are they simply not thinking this through?
Nancy2 wrote:
This comment just made my day lol
JYJames wrote:
Exactly! Bravo. Great comment!!!
JYJames wrote:
To some degree, they might like that women in mosques are physically separated from men, men are front and center, women are in the back or in some other room where they cannot see/hear or be seen/heard. Some might look at a group of devout Muslim women and see that they are (1) dressed modestly (2) in complete submission/obedience and say that’s what has to happen in Christianity for God to be as pleased with us as he is with them.
dee wrote:
I think I am in a similar boat with you Dee, RE:politics. The thing that bothers me about Grudem’s endorsement is how he is endorsement Trump AS A MORAL CHOICE! It is not simply a political statement in that sense but a statement regarding morality as he frames it.
Okrapod, I may end up up doing the same thing as my husband and voting downticket only. I considered voting libertarian, but Gary Johnson has some strange ideas about freedom of religion.
If Dr. Who were a real person I’d vote for him, in spite of his birth on Gallifrey. 😀
Jamie, I think that’s also true of Orthodox synagogues.
Our family had attended 2 John Piper following churches for quite some time and when our daughter of 16 we encouraged her to get a job out of the home. We were really looked down on. And guess what the pastor talked to me not my husband about it.She was hired by the first place she applied, a restaurant that we frequented. We attended a church that had several young men in it that were constantly asking for prayer that they might get a job and this kind of request was continual for months and in 1 young mans life for years. The pastor had laid all these rules, no working on Sunday no place that serves alcohol and you will need to take time off when your needed at home or at the church. We asked our daughter to ask for Sunday mornings to be free for church and to openly share the Gospel when she could. I was approached by our pastor and was told we were making a terrible mistake by allowing our daughter to work outside the home. I explained to him(( with all the respect that his office deserved )that our main goal is to evangelize and as soon as he told one of the many young men in the church who were jobless to take her place I would gladly bring her home as it appeared to me all these young leaders were not leading at all and they at 20-25 were still bound to apron strings of mommy and a pastor that wanted free labor. This whole patriarchal teaching is really crippling everyone so women who are fixers by DESIGN WILL step in to fix what you men refuse to fix because your too busy pontificating your hog wash!
Lydia wrote:
I’m not really sure – in the Christianity I grew up in “creeds” were almost useless. As useless as ‘tradition’ and ‘church fathers’ and anything historical. I grew up with no knowledge of them except as something vaguely ‘Catholic’ – a catch-all term meant to suggest ‘barely’ or ‘the wrong kind’ of Christian that we didn’t need – like Lent.
It reminds me of the tendency of people to re-brand a product just so they can sell it to another audience or to the same audience under another name as if it were something else entirely. Perhaps Complementarianism has become so thoroughly discredited in it’s own circles that some are trying to form a new group that borrows it’s teaching just changes the formula slightly. They’re still keen on complementarity, just not the ERAS/ESS trinity thing.
Daisy wrote:
I read that ludicrous article. Too bad this young Comp pup wasn’t on the farm with the conservative Christian woman, who tweeted from her tractor as she farmed thousands of acres, that Comp was meaningless in her life. Too bad the young Comp pup wasn’t with a conservative Christian woman rancher at her cattle ranch where she tweeted same: Comp is meaningless in her life.
Comp is meaningless, and insulting, for most people.
By the way, our daughter did go through some bumps in life by working outside the home( the boys at church were not encouraged to step in and “protect her”) but isn’t that the proving ground for our faith? She is now the mother of 3 beautiful children and is a very active evangelist with her husband, no not the evangelist of an institution but a soul winner that we are all called to be. They work hand in hand together with the children spreading the Gospel where ever they go either by giving tracts or by giving the “Good Person Test” and taking time to build those relationships we all crave. Me for one, I am glad she had her chance to be proofed .
@ Muff Potter:
I know you meant well by your statement. I do honor Dee and Her family’s decision to care for Polly in their home. Different people make different decisions for different reasons.
I have asked my children to put me in a care facility rather than care for me in their home. I was extensively involved in the end care for my mother, and two former husbands. Each time was about a two year commitment. I am glad I did it–it was very difficult. There was no one else who could step up to the plate. My choice for my final time is my gift of love to my family. Having worked as a nurse’s aide over the years, I do not consider a care facility a warehouse at all. Many employees are very caring individuals. Recovery from two knee replacements and a broken arm required stays in a rehab care facility. I adjusted well and enjoyed my stays. It does not have to be a bleak situation. Our Lord gives grace, love and laughter in those places too. So much depends on attitude.
I am sorry if this is way off topic, I just had to speak up. I am thankful that Polly can be with all those she loves. I do not consider my choice to be an unloved and pathetic one. I am 74 now–I made this decision about 30 years ago and I have never had regrets in telling my children to accept this gift from me.
Nancy2 wrote:
I have no idea. Seriously. I am not insulting the man when I say that he is dumber than a box of rocks. It is simply a fact. It shouldn’t be held against him, but he also shouldn’t be pretending to teach people.
Mark wrote:
LOL. I am impressed.
Daisy wrote:
He rightfully got blasted by most people on Facebook. The poor thing didn’t realize that he had slapped an “undatable” sign on his forehead.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
Demonstrating the reductio absurdum in Piper’s case is too easy to be fun. But it does put the lunacy of his words into tidy context.
NJ and Okrapod, as to voting the only conclusion I could come to for myself was to vote for the person who says he will put a prolife justice in place. As much as I hate the very poor choices we have on every level I don’t want to give up my vote so that is how I have reached my decision, as sad as it is.
@ Ruth Tucker:
Ruth, if you’re bashful about plugging your book Black and White Bible, Black and Blue Wife on this blog, allow me. It’s terrific, and readers of TWW should buy it.
https://www.amazon.com/Black-White-Bible-Blue-Wife/dp/0310524989/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
dee wrote:
Bravo, dee. Well said.
Law Prof wrote:
He may have lectured her on her fitting place under a man because she left pregnant with a son, Menelik, who became the first Solomonic Emperor of Ethiopia!!
JeffT wrote:
I agree completely. Of course, I don’t believe that to be an insult; rather, I see it as a bare fact. If words mean anything, than the ESS crowd and its hangers-on are not Christian.
Donna, I’m not sure we can depend on Trump to nominate a prolife justice to the SC. He’s so mercurial it’s hard to know what he’ll do.
In this election, I suspect Christians will be all over the map with what they decide to do. Which probably means Madame President and the First Gentleman.
@ NJ:
The libertarian party here consists of old hippies with grey ponytails who stand outside the DMV collecting signatures for petitions to legalize marijuana. :o)
I still agree with the principles of smaller government and the ability of adults to self govern. I am worn out with big brother micromanaging me.
Addressing Nancy2,
Thank-you for that memory of Mr.& Mrs. Cox. I would have loved to have known them and witnessed the kind of relationship they had to make life work for them. Truly inspiring. Perhaps ‘the man’s man preacher’ would have been aghast seeing such a sight and pounded the pulpit while preaching against doing the LORD’S work together, side by side. Then resigned to his Lazy Boy saying, “Oh what a great preacher man am I.”
Addressing Velour at 2:40 PM,
Completely agree with you. Our LORD uses which ever gender He pleases to get the job done!
I have heard this statement come out of several conservative men’s mouths recently, for a man/woman ticket has stirred up strong debate within evangelicalism; “If women wouldn’t have been allowed to vote in the first place, our country wouldn’t be in the state is in now. The majority of women always vote liberal.” This comes from patriarchal church systems where the men lord it over the women and is a few beliefs short of Sharia, not Christianity. And to my knowledge, in understanding the ministry of our Savior, Jesus was NOT a patriot, nor did he ever vote or align Himself with a political party of His day. Rome must not have been that important to Him for He lived under their rule, still doing the Work of His Father.
Politics never, ever saved one human soul. Should not those who claim to be ministers of Christ, which is all who believe in Jesus (the priesthood of believers, the Body of Christ) be sharing the life saving Gospel and the love of Jesus Christ with other human beings? Governments don’t go to heaven or hell, individuals do and perhaps this is truly what Piper and the others need to be concerning themselves with.
May I ask, what are these men who deem themselves so important in the religious system, really afraid of?
And please know Dee, you and your family are in my prayers. You are an amazing testimony of what it looks like to share Christ’s love.
Jamie Carter wrote:
I think you are on to something. Interesting that the word “confessional” was chosen. It skirts Patriarchy but implies it, though, considering the confessions and creeds are from an era before the rights of individuals. I am not sure they have thought this through.
Lowlandseer wrote:
Grudem’s article is taking fire on Twitter today, and it’s getting a lot of pushback.
I would personally love to confront Grudem and ask him why he holds women, minorities, the disabled, immigrants and all the other people I’ve forgotten in such contempt.
@ Jamie Carter:
We already have a variation of this. It is called Chrislam. :o)
Do those who run together in the comp crowd make vasts amounts of money selling their books, cd’s, dvd’s and other wares and tares to supplement their income? Is their false belief system really money oriented, so they must keeping banging their drums to earn an easy living, with no sweat of the brow?
And I am speaking of both genders here, who live off of the money from the blind sheep.
Daisy wrote:
Oh WHOAH!
i just read that ‘open letter’ . . . now I have never beaten the *)$@ out of anyone in my life, but if that ‘man’ ever came around me with that drivel, it would be like my girl students in the drug rehab used to say, “hold me back”
What a sick slimy pretentious ******* . Now THAT is what I would never want any Christian girl to be around, ever. That is one sick pitiful creature, I hesitate to call a ‘man’.
@ Lydia:
A shining example
Gram3 wrote:
It comes pretty darn close that’s for sure. Thanks to southern Democrats in the Senate, Congress could never enact an anti-lynching bill.
Karen wrote:
Hi Karen,
You are so right. These Comp-promoting churches (my former church was NeoCalvinist)
are practicing a form of Sharia Law. It is oppressive and it is NOT of God.
My YELP review of my ex-church: https://www.yelp.com/biz/grace-bible-fellowship-of-silicon-valley-sunnyvale
My ex-pastors/elders’ “advice” to “obey and submit” constitutes criminal acts in my state (California) that they can be arrested and end up in jail/prison for. Ditto for mothers who follow their advice and it all goes wrong, including not protecting her children because the pastors/elders ‘said so’ and she was ‘to obey’ her husband, not the laws of the state of CA. It’s a chilling message that they teach, that is not grounded in reality or law.
Ted wrote:
Go, Ted!
How interesting. You quote Strachan (as being quoted by a news source) saying, “The Old Testament is very clear that Yahweh desires men to lead,” said Owen Strachan before he stepped down last week as president of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. The purpose of the organization — to insist on separate roles for men and women in modern life — is itself an unpopular view, Strachan acknowledged upfront. “I do stand for a culturally despised position.”
But Owen, Owen, the OT kind of got superseded. Christ came to fulfill the law, and he gave a new commandment. Did you miss the memo?
Matthew 5:17 Think not that I came to destroy the law or the prophets: I came not to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law, till all things be accomplished. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say unto you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Didn’t Christ say on the cross, “It is finished”? I thought that meant it was accomplished, but maybe I’m reading it wrong?
@ Karen:
You know, it used to be big money for a lot of people with conferences, books, speaking gigs, etc.
I think this time around with the rebranding going on, at least in the SBC, it is the ONLY doctrinal position left for which to promote a faux UNITY. But even there the ONLY thing they agree on is “no women pastors”. Its in the BFM200 now, you know. And that is the go-to confession/creed for the SBC these days. Every single SBC debate or discussion is couched in BFM language and whether it is allowed or not allowed according to the BFM. You would think Paul wrote it instead of Mohler.
The CBMW preconference was a bit of a disaster for them on social media. The whole “sanctified testosterone” meme went viral and people were having a blast poking fun at the absurdity. It got as ridiculous as saying it was testosterone that took Jesus to the cross.
These guys have lost it in their bubbles, have no clue and it shows. I think they are trying to save the brand with the appointment of Burk. He parrots the current party line but is more irenic.
@ Lydia:
You know what cracked me up the most about the CMBW preconference to T$G? That the over ripe boys of the conference were furious that people hijacked THEIR hashtag to make fun of them. They really are that authoritarian and think they control the hashtag world. They don’t get it at all. They cannot accept they don’t control the message anymore.
JYJames wrote:
My son’s girlfriend (soon fiance, formally) is from Latvia, a Baltic state which in her childhood was a part of the Soviet Union. She has shared that, as a little chld, she and all her friends had ‘the same doll’ . . . no one had a nicer doll than the next girl . . . all the SAME . . . she explained that they were taught to feel that ‘no one is any better than anyone else’.
Now, this beautiful angel is one of the humblest dearest people, but she says her Latvian people were so glad to be free of Soviet rule. They LOVE Americans there. But this dear Latvian angel has memories of something I cannot imagine going through. We don’t experience that kind of thing here, and I love our diversity in this country as a strength. We are forged together as a nation in times of trouble, and in the mix of peoples, we have come out stronger and tougher, and I will hope this: more compassionate because of our blended strength.
(And thank you, Mr. Khan, for your speech at the DNConvention: thank you for your dignity and your sacrifice. Your son WAS the best of who we are. May his memory endure in our land.)
refugee wrote:
Let’s see. The FIRST mediator between God and humans was the serpent! :o)
@ Christiane:
promoting your tribe again?
Lydia wrote:
It may be that their possible paths to thinking it through are bounded by their confessions which they take to be a faithful summary of Biblical teaching. The confessions were, as you say, written when patriarchy was an unquestioned assumption. The confessions are based on a plain reading interpretive principle of the clobber verses, so there are a couple of good first steps that a Confessional Non-ESS Complementarian could take.
One is to recognize the inconsistent application of the plain reading method and begin to question why certain verses must be interpreted that way. Another is to carefully think through the ways that patriarchy may have colored the way that the Westminster guys read the clobber verses. Yet another way is to start from a clean slate entirely and work through the clobber verses without automatically assuming that any deviation from the traditional view is also a departure from Biblical authority.
I think that a very good first question is how does Paul’s supposed rationale for banning female authoritative teaching make any sense unless he is making a bare appeal to primogeniture and/or saying that sinning due to deception is somehow more disqualifying than sinning with knowledge. Neither of those two things are grounded anywhere in the actual text. That logical leap is a very big one, IMO, and was the first thing that jumped out at me when I started to analyze the entire argument Paul is making in 1 Timothy.
I don’t think we will see an open revolt in the PCA any time soon. However, the cat is now out of the bag and I think there will be a gradual re-thinking of the whole big issue because of the ESS heresy *and* because the abuse aspect has been handled so incoherently by the Usual Suspects.
Lydia wrote:
What the boyz don’t realize is that we use their hashtag throughout the year, not just during their conference.
For instance, if you check #CBMW17 (twitter hashtage for next year’s conference), you will see that I have already been planting articles and tweets over there. Tee hee hee.
Karen wrote:
Women are already making gains in leadership role in ‘secular’ spheres. The complementarians need to get over it already.
I don’t think that the rest of America or the world is going to go backwards because they have their insecure complementarian underwear in a twist that women now have more options and ROLES open to them.
Europe already has women leaders.
In the USA, we have women judges, women police officers, women military personnel, and a woman SCOTUS.
Meet the Army’s first female infantry officer [Kristen Griest] (April 2016)
http://www.armytimes.com/story/military/careers/army/officer/2016/04/27/meet-armys-first-female-infantry-officer/83591066/
Other headlines:
-Air Force Gen. Lori Robinson becomes first woman ever to lead U.S. combatant command
(Washington Post, May 2016)
-Navy Promotes Its First Female 4-Star Admiral [Michelle Howard] (NPR, July 2014)
-First Female Navy SEALs Could Get Assignments in 2017 (military -dot- com site, March 2016)
FW Rez wrote:
You raised her right! Be proud, Papa.
@ dee:
I’m very sorry about her condition, but it’s good to know she will be able to spend more time around family and her pug, and in more comfortable (less clinical) surroundings.
nancyjane wrote:
I understand what you are saying, and if anyone says that you are doing the wrong thing, then I think you should put on your Pound Sand tee and tell them thanks for their opinion but, really, their opinion is too generous a gift and you need to return it.
Your children are blessed as were the ones you gave yourself to care for.
Ergh, that stuff from Calvin the Lesser (Calvin & Hobbes is the best Calvin) is just awful. How is anyone supposed to have any confidence at all? I’m still having a really hard time with all this stuff – I’ve been off with depression & trying to reconnect with God but it is infinitely hard & I feel like binning everything most of the time. Please keep praying.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
Having done a tour-of-duty of an authoritarian, NeoCalvinist, comp-teaching, 9Marxist church, Jesus doesn’t seem to be in their theology. After all, they don’t need Him because they were among God’s Elect before the beginning of time. And don’t even get me started on the absence of the Holy Spirit.
refugee wrote:
His crowd tends to view it this way:
Perfect Male Headship existed in the Garden of Eden
Sin happened, distorted the roles, made men into harsh masters
Jesus’ sacrifice reversed the distortion, restored Perfect Male Headship
therefore, Genesis 1-3 describes God’s ideal, the perfect trans-cultural, trans-temporal state of Perfect male Headship as His intention for the roles of men and women, forever.
@ Beakerj:
Praying for you from across The Pond.
Love and hugs,
Velour in California
Christiane wrote:
Thanks for sharing that story. She sounds like a lovely person.
The Communists murdered many of my Russian relatives.
nancyjane wrote:
Thank you nancyjane and I fully respect your beliefs and the options you’ve chosen.
Beakerj wrote:
Will do. Many of us have been there or are there or at least someplace like where you are. FWIW, I smile every time I think about what you did with Grudem’s ST. And didn’t you invent Wheelie Bin Ministries? Anyway, your comments have made me think about some things in a different way, and what you do is so valuable, though it surely must cost you a lot emotionally. Apologies if I have confused you with someone else.
Lydia wrote:
Goodness! you must mean my reference to these gold star parents:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG0K_9RDeFE
I don’t have to promote these parents or their message, Lydia. Gold Star parents have a voice in our country that is a given right, earned by their child’s death. As to whether someone wants to agree with them, well their son’s death also went to ensure that is possible. Some things go beyond ‘tribe’. Agree? Disagree with me? No problem. That we can have differences of opinion and can express them openly is beyond ‘tribe’ . . . so, I thank Mr. Khan for his sacrifice, yes
Y’all seen the latest RNS article: http://religionnews.com/2016/07/30/wayne-grudem-donald-trump-politics/
Daisy wrote:
I have Comps who follow me on Twitter. Whenever a woman makes advances – military, science, sports, law, etc. – I tweet it out.
US Supreme Court women justices: 1st was Sandra Day O’Connor (now retired) appointed by President Reagan. Also, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor.
Lydia wrote:
He’s still alive and in his 90s. He was convicted of mail fraud and other charges in the late 1980s. While he was in prison, one of his cellies was someone familiar to evangelicals in America: Jim Bakker.
I first heard of him in 1982ish, when his followers sent out packets of material to Democratic delegates to the state convention. One of my friends was a delegate and he shared the contents of the packet with us one night. It was all conspiracy mongering stuff, including a very sensational “Queen Elizabeth pushes drugs!” (I have to wonder if that wasn’t the first time I ran into absolute, full-blown conspiracy theorizing.) Obviously, LaRouche was not regular Democratic party, even though Wikipedia says he ran for President seven times on the Dem ticket.
Lydia wrote:
I actually know someone who is a descendant of Charles Sumner’s brother. We talked about it on Facebook last week. I also saw Sumner’s grave when I visited Mount Auburn Cemetery in Massachusetts last month. (Yes, I know it sounds morbid, but that’s a lovely place to walk around. It’s a quasi-arboretum with a lot of different trees–labeled–on the property.)
It should be noted that political parties can and do switch identities over time. It’s also interesting to note the political parties which have come and gone over the decades. Who has heard of Whigs or Know-Nothings recently, outside of a history class? I facilitate a call at work and have to come up with trivia. One question I had was, “Which political party held the first nominating convention?” It was a party we don’t have now, the Anti-Masonic Party and the convention was in Baltimore in 1832. And yes, I stumped them.
@ Christiane:
My sister sent me the link to Mr. Khan’s speech. It was quite moving. I am sorry that he and his dear wife are in the sad category of being Gold Star Parents due to their son being killed in the American military.
I have many dear Muslim friends, including a college roommate, who are well-educated, kind, loving, decent people. They and their families have lived under brutal regimes in their homelands, including arrests, tortures, etc. for the slightest democratic freedom.
One mother was arrested in the outdoor market by the religious police who accused her of being an unmarried woman who was dating a man. The man was her son. Her husband and father had to come to the police station because the religious police were furious that she was shopping with…her son.
Velour wrote:
I’m so sorry. My godmother never want to talk much about what had happened to her family in the Ukraine.
Christiane wrote:
My grandparents were the same way. I asked my Russian grandfather once at his farm in California, “Tell me about Russia. Tell me about the war.” He was a gentle man, and I really blew it. He had tears out of his blue eyes down his rugged, tan cheeks, and he said softly over and over again, “I don’t remember, I don’t remember, I don’t remember.”
I never asked again. My heart broke that I made my grandpa cry.
@ Beakerj:
Praying for you, Beakerj….
@ Velour:
so very sad
Christiane wrote:
Yes. Wars are very sad indeed.
Jeffrey Chalmers wrote:
I’ve never really understood their (the complementarian) point on that.
I’ve always understood the original sin to be that Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit period, and that was what God took issue with.
Not that it had to do with who ate it first, or that the gender of either was relevant.
Both the man and the woman disobeyed God; that was the point.
It was not that the woman supposedly disobeyed the man – if that were the case, it would make it appear as though the most grievous thing about the apple eating incident was that a human man was offended.
It was God who was sinned against, not the man.
Jamie Carter wrote:
I just noted in a post above that as of 2016, the UK has a new woman PM (Theresa May).
About your link about Korea, “North Korea’s rhetoric gets uglier with sexist insults at South’s president”, a snippet from that:
Other than perhaps Doug Wilson (and maybe Mark Driscoll), I’m not aware of other complementarians who would be that blunt with sexist put-downs of women, but what troubles me about even much of “soft, nice” complementarianism is that it’s built on the same sexist attitudes and assumptions.
I get the impression that most complementarians are blind to their own prejudices in these matters.
They’d probably not stoop to calling a woman a “senile old b—-” and so on, but the root of the attitude is the same.
Daisy wrote:
I was totally gobsmacked when I read this guy’s piece at the link you shared.
These guys really do feel threatened by warrior women on more than one plane don’t they?
@ Velour:
something about people’s silence tells us that it must have been much much worse than we could imagine or understand
my own niece wrote about the carnage she was witnessing as a nurse in Afghanistan, stating simply
‘there are no words’
mirele wrote:
I am right there with you.
Complementarianism is sexism under another label.
But complementarians try to disguise that and pretty it up by repeatedly saying, “But gosh golly ladies, we sure do think you are equal in worth!!”
I won’t be voting for Hillary, but not because she is female. Rather, I disagree with her strongly on too many points.
And I can’t imagine anyone would vote for her SOLELY because she is female.
Hopefully the voters will consider the policies and the vote for the candidate best representing them, not for a male or a female.
Daisy wrote:
It is always-ladies you are equal BUT! I am male but I am sick of this nonsense!
Christiane wrote:
Yes. Unspeakable.
Velour wrote:
In terms of human cost alone, the Russian people bore the heaviest brunt of the load in the defeat of Germany. And don’t let anybody try and tell you different.
Velour wrote:
That doesn’t leave much of the Trinity! You couldn’t be any further off-track than diminishing the Trinity in your belief and practice. I continue to be amazed that folks are attracted to a “Christian” movement which doesn’t talk much about Christ. And dumbfounded that there is not a shout ringing through the halls of Christendom to put a stop to it before they take any more of our youth!
Sam wrote:
All of what you said is very true, but your quote from the OP of the article heading by Piper got me to thinking:
“Why a Woman Shouldn’t Run for Vice President, but Wise People May Still Vote for Her” (by Piper)
This relates to what I was saying in another post earlier, but complementarians need to get over how they wish culture to be and accept it as it is.
Piper can sit around all day with his fingers crossed hoping that no woman ever again applies to be a police officer or run for office of POTUS, but society is not going to change back just because he’s upset that more and more women have more opportunities.
I can’t see Hillary Clinton or Sarah Palin, and these other ladies going to themselves,
“Shucks, my running for office really disturbs Piper and other complementarians, so from this day forward, I’m dropping any and all political aspirations.”
Piper, like all complementarians, need to accept and live with reality, instead of complaining about it in their books, blogs, and sermons.
About Deborah and Huldah: complementarians will insist those ladies and other ones like them in the Bible are aberrations and not to be examples for women today.
That reasoning appears to be contrary to this, from Romans:
“For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.” (Romans 15:4)
siteseer wrote:
Maybe “moral” is starting to replace their use of “Gospel” or “biblical” as adjectives slapped before every idea or noun?
Rather than, “Candidate X is the Gospel choice,” or “Candidate X is the Biblical choice,” it’s now, “Candidate X is the Moral choice.” 🙂
We’ve had 2 women Presidents…. Mrs Woodrow Wilson after he had the stroke and they kept it hidden and Valerie Jarrett.
Lydia wrote:
It makes me wonder at all what the point is in their theology.
You can live any old way you want to (even be really horrible and hurt people constantly) and still get to Heaven in the afterlife, if you are one of the Elect.
I don’t see where the incentive is in their theology to do good and be good.
Gram3 wrote:
Yes, if virtue does not help drive or parent movements of equality, then it is not true equality. A woman is not virtuous simply or generally because she is a woman, and this is what subtly bothers me about some discussions and assumptions around women’s rights and roles. And this assumption/belief manifests itself out in different ways and forms irrespective the specific place of the view on spectrum of belief on these topics, from extremely liberal to extremely conservative. The conclusions and outworkings in these cases may look completely different depending on the group but the same root assumption is there if you follow it all the way back.
A woman’s virtue is dependent on whether or not she is actually virtuous, not her biological sex parts. A woman can be patient and long suffering, generous, kind, peacemaking heart, etc. and so on. A woman can also be the type of person to be manipulative or smarmy (one of my favorite words! p.s), get by on charisma, surfacey abilities/talents being confused or conflated with high character, can be arrogant, can oppress, etc. just as men can. A woman, like a low in character or vicious man, could abuse power and position, and not care for the least of these, the marginalized, or can appear to care for them but use them for some other means or as accessories for their own agenda. The discernment and discussion on women equality has to keep this in the front of it’s mind.
Equality for women has to be underlying dependent on her ability to thrive and be rewarded as a virtuous person, and access to attain benefits, rewards, and opportunities based out of that virtue. Consequently, then, equality for women must also call on them being held accountable to the social and personal consequences of vices and poor and hurtful behavior. If this isn’t being explored and implemented in movements, equality is a mirage and is not really happening.
I think that it might be correct to say that all discussions and movements of equality, from race, gender, etc. all ultimately boils down to discussion of the imago dei (all humans are made equal in the image of God and are thereby to be treated with respect and certain fundamental rights) alongside virtues and what they are exactly. How is this group of people able to live virtuously? To be way too simplistic, I think this is historically where things gets off-centered, and where ESS as this point specifically goes wrong (as it seems to me that it makes and qualifies women as sub-human, amongst many other problems.)
Society and churches must always be recovering fundamentally, what is virtue? what are the virtues? How are we actually defining them, what do we mean by the words we are using exactly? What constitutes the ability and disability to live virtuously? How are our systems in the world and society and in churches set up that confuses or contradicts this?
No complicated and multi-layered discussions there! (lol). Thank God for wise people in day to day life, and the people who devote their careers/life to studying these things such as social psychologists, psychologists, anthropologists, theologians, philosophers, political scientists, ethicists, historians, linguists, etc. and so on.
Velour wrote:
The ESS boys are starting to feel some heat over this heresy, as evidenced by a recent tweet from Owen Strachan “We must not divide & distrust one another re: the Trinity controversy. There is room for both sides. We should love one another.”
Room for both sides?!! When did orthodoxy develop two sides about the Trinity? ESS is about as unorthodox as you can get, for a group claiming to be called into the world for such a time as this to restore orthodoxy! Mainline Christianity didn’t lose the truth about the Trinity; the new reformers are desperately off-track on this.
@ Lowlandseer:
What I find strange about all this is the fact that Mr Grudem offers the following advice on how to vote for the right candidate.
“”In the previous chapter I examined five incorrect views about Christian involvement in civil government. In this chapter I propose what I think is a better solution: “significant Christian influence” on civil government. The “significant influence” view says that Christians should seek to influence civil government according to God’s moral standards and God’s purposes for government as revealed in the Bible (when rightly understood). But while Christians exercise this influence, they must simultaneously insist on protecting freedom of religion for all citizens. In addition, “significant influence” does not mean angry, belligerent, intolerant, judgmental, red-faced, and hate-filled influence, but rather winsome, kind, thoughtful, loving, persuasive influence that is suitable to each circumstance and that always protects the other person’s right to disagree, but that is also uncompromising about the truthfulness and moral goodness of the teachings of God’s Word.” from “Politics – According to the Bible: A Comprehensive Resource for Understanding Modern Political Issues in Light of Scripture” by Wayne A. Grudem
http://amzn.to/2ai1HUM
Note the word ‘ winsome’. Does that apply to the candidate he endorses??
My own view is that the words “In addition, “significant influence” does not mean angry, belligerent, intolerant, judgmental, red-faced, and hate-filled influence, ” might be more appropriate for his choice.
Max wrote:
These guys sure did not allow for 2 sides of anything during the TAKEOVER of the SBC. They must be panicking over the disintegration of the SBC.
Max wrote:
There is no Trinity in NeoCalvinism. John Calvin has replaced God.
@ Lydia:
I am wondering. Suppose ‘The Pantsuit’ (H.C., as some call her) wins POTUS and any number of failures or mistakes happen while she is in office, how will complementarians spin that?
Despite the fact that male leaders / POTUSes make mistakes too, I have a sneaking suspicion that complementarians will associate any ‘Ms. Pantsuit’ errors as POTUS to her gender.
I don’t see complementarians necessarily chalking up the failure of male leaders to the male’s gender.
(Exception to that, possibly: as Gram3 noted, complementarians will blame Adam, the first man, for not carrying out his supposed male headship role over Eve.)
Aside from that, I don’t see complementarians harping on a man’s male sex if and when a man makes a mistake or sins.
If a Christian woman teacher teaches wrong doctrine, all the sudden with complementarians, why, it’s because of her gender – women are easily deceived, etc.
If a Christian man teaches false doctrine, why, it’s not because men are more easily deceived.
Men are just pretty much allowed to make mistakes in the complementarian system of thought.
This brings to mind an article I read a few weeks ago about the Ghostbusters movie reboot, where the male roles were replaced with women.
I think this was the article:
Box Office: ‘Ghostbusters’ Should Be Allowed To Bomb
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2016/07/11/box-office-ghostbusters-should-be-allowed-to-bomb/#2646287160c5
I think you can replace “Ghostbusters” with the phrase “women politicans” and it would be applicable to complementarianism.
Snippets form the page:
—–
by Scott Mendelson
… We shouldn’t still be having this conversation, but we are.
Every time a big female-driven hit comes out, it’s written off as a fluke, and every time the next one comes down the pike it is held up as a glorified litmus test.
We still shouldn’t be looking at every big-budget female-driven offering as a litmus test.
…The fear is that Ghostbusters may bomb just as hard as any number of male-driven blockbusters in any past summer (Land of the Lost comes to mind) and be used as proof positive that the problem was with the gender of its leads.
If we are honest and fair to those involved with the film, and with the idea that our population is 51% female, the stakes for financial success should be no higher than the countless mediocre or terrible male-driven franchise films (Pan, I, Frankenstein, Jack the Giant Slayer, etc.) that bomb every year at a theater near you.
————–
Seriously, I feel that this guy’s article about the “Ghostbusters” reboot may be very pertinent to complementarian views that oppose women being in political office, depending on how complementarians will treat any HC-mistakes in office (if she wins POTUS).
Daisy wrote:
This is NOT the faith handed down from the Apostles, no.
Emily Honeycutt wrote:
Virtue has gone out of style, if it ever was in style. ISTM that Jesus the Messiah embodies all the virtues, and to emulate his life is to live virtuously. Which has nothing whatsoever to do with being in authority or being superior or any of those things. It doesn’t even mean having perfect doctrine which is much easier to do than having love for one another and acting on that love.
Emily Honeycutt wrote:
I think that comps attack the humanity of women in their patristic demands for ‘submission’;
and then they attack the divinity of Christ in their ESS doctrine;
the strange thing is that first they went after the human dignity of women, and when that didn’t gain the acceptance they sought;
they THEN went after the full divine worth of Our Lord within the unity of the Holy Trinity
honestly, that is desperation
but I still get it WHY some of the people they respect didn’t speak up sooner about the ESS debacle . . . for some reason, there was a delay of many years . . . there must have been a reason . . . but WHAT?
@ Christiane:
should be ‘what I still DON’T GET’
@ Lydia
I have found a website (ICHTHYS) that looks like it may be informative but I want to know if you know this man and/or know anything about him. I would be surprised if he is not known in some churches in Louisville.
Robert Dean Luginbill
Professor of Classics
Department of Classic and Modern Languages
University of Louisville
He has an impressive CV, and good evals from the students and the website looks like it may be a find.
Yes, Gram, true. Jesus Christ is virtue embodied.
Often, virtue as virtue has gone out of style. There’s (almost) no quest and recovery for the transcendent at this point. I think that groups and systems all have their own “virtues” they operate with, but it can be all upside down, which is what I think God is trying to reorient all through Scripture and ultimately in the embodiement of Christ.
Instead, we’re disordering virtues and reality, and calling good (virtue) bad, and calling bad good (virtue). The virtues of group can actually be vices, if we really look at the fruit and what it’s doing. In these instances typical and traditional language of virtue is used, like what can be seen in recent ISIS recruiting videos. It can be virtue wrongly or not at all defined, but trying to operate in the same function as virtue. We can diagnose what is considered “virtue” for a specific group or context based on what is being rewarded, facilitated as that groups “good”, and enabled. If the fruit is bad, virtue is either being wrongly defined and assumed, or overtly opposed. Some viciousness is upfront about itself and not trying to pretend it’s virtue or for the good of others, etc. of course.
This has helped me with working through theologies and watching what’s going on in discussions and fruit of women in the church and in society. In this way, theologies can use biblical or virtue language and actually be wrong, and I don’t get sidetracked into thought stopping or just taking things at face value, though I am still in process with many things.
@ Velour:
“A human being survives by his ability to forget. Memory is always ready to blot out the bad and retain only the good.” (Varlan Shalamov, Kolyma Tales)..
No one in the West truly understands the suffering and sacrifice of the Russian people. “Life and Fate” by Vasily Grossman comes close as does Shalimov’s work.
@ Velour:
“If Courtney and the rest of them are so opposed to “women’s rights”, by all means please don’t vote. Because “liberal” women, liberal for their times, got you that precious vote. And I got to hear about how hard it was, thank you.”
++++++++++++++++++
i watched the movie “Suffragette” this week. It was very humbling, and made me appreciate how excruciatingly hard-won the women’s vote was. it must never be taken for granted.
okrapod wrote:
I have since skimmed over 10 or more pages about this topic.
I haven’t yet seen Moore come right out and say that (maybe he did, I just cannot find it), but he did say in a June 2016 article that he doesn’t think Trump is “saved.”
You can read that here:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jun/6/russell-moore-trump-lost-person-must-repent-sin/
In other articles, Moore said that both candidates are yucky, and Christians should not vote for either one.
I don’t know if that is still his opinion, or if that has changed since those pages were published.
From Christian Post, March 2016:
siteseer wrote:
That, or shadow puppets.
Use your hands to cast shadows in the shapes of animals and stuff on to the walls.
I’m surprised men like Piper favor women “beating around the bush” about things when talking to men.
Every time I see male Christian marriage gurus try to get a laugh on Christian TV shows, it’s when they joke that women talk too much and take a slow, tortuous route to tell a man a story.
Women generally (so the stereotypes goes) like to fill their stories with lots of irrelevant details (which can take 3 hours to tell a two minute story), and many men prefer to get to the bottom line.
Daisy wrote:
Several mistakes in that. I hope people were able to parse it anyway.
It should have read like this:
——————–
Yet notice how often it’s men who are barking at Christian WOMEN that they MUST SUBMIT, or trying to debate with us on this blog and convince us that the Bible teaches one-way, wifely submission….
Lydia wrote:
Spot on.
@ JYJames:
Those parents are not doing their sons any favors.
Those boys need to learn at a young age that when they are living in nations that pretty much do permit women into positions of leadership and power, they will need to learn to accept that and be respectful towards women.
If that boy wants to have a job when he gets older, he may end up getting a woman boss.
He may get pulled over by a woman cop one day. He may have to face a woman judge some day.
His dear old dad is ultimately handicapping his kid and creating a life of future, unnecessary problems for him by teaching him that sexism is okay.
Could you imagine if my parents had taught me from the time I was a little girl that MEN’S opinions mean nothing, and I therefore spent the rest of my life thumbing my nose at any and all male authority?
I would’ve been in trouble all the time.
The boys in your story are in store for the same type of thing, and already are.
And unfortunately, that boy won’t figure out his father was horribly wrong until much later in life, and realize how much it cost him (assuming the kid wakes up from such indoctrination eventually).
Then there is the old Calvinists such as John Knox of Scotland who is 1558 published “The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstruous Regiment of Women” attacking the female Catholic rulers of England (Mary) and Scotland (also Mary though since a child the actual ruler was her mother Mary of Guise). His argument was that as women it was unbiblical and unnatural for them to rule.
He had a problem when Mary of England died and was followed by her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth. She apparently didn’t appreciate his views, but, he needed her help so wrote a letter which explained that she like Deborah might be a rare god-chosen special case.
http://biblehub.com/library/knox/the_first_blast_of_the_trumpet/20_july_1559_john_knoxs.htm
Lowlandseer wrote:
Thanks for those quotes.
elastigirl wrote:
I need to see that movie. Thanks for the reminder.
Velour wrote:
I’ve seen this point raised in books before, but in the context of secular employment.
I’ve seen men quoted as saying (to paraphrase), “I work with women on the job all day, some are my bosses, but stepping into [complementarian] churches is like stepping back into a time warp.”
Women wonder about that too, ones I’ve seen quoted in that book or on blogs around the web – they get power and decision making abilities in their secular employment, but they walk into a church and get told to shut up, sit down, let the men lead.
@ ishy:
“The leaders of the TGC clearly believe they should be in control of other men, too. Their “subordinates” go crazy trying to jump over one another to be the next right-hand to Mohler. I think a lot of men in the movement are being misled as much as women are. It’s all about power, and who has it. Most men don’t.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++
hence, the gleem of gender roles. They may be lured to and then denied power, but at least they can have it in the marriage, in the family, and in the church social structure.
CBMW, TGC & co generate a product (entitlement to power), have very few suppliers of it (positions of influence or in proximity to it), so the perceived value of gender roles goes way up.
(all at the expense of women and girls, of course. how sh|tty of them)
Jamie Carter wrote:
Yep. I’ve seen several of their blogs posts saying they no longer want to be called “complementarian” because the nutso’s in the rest of the comp group is making ALL comps look like loons.
These are generally the complementarians who are against women preachers and women having equal say in marriages, but are otherwise a-okay with women being police officers, or holding the office of POTUS.
Daisy wrote:
Imagine what would happen in our churches if we really let the Holy Spirit work through the gifts of men AND women and stopped hobbling them to this inane Comp doctrine?
Barb Orlowski wrote:
Thank you.
I am amazed that anyone makes it through my blog posts at my “Miss Daisy” blog, because I know they are rather lengthy.
People might want to sip coffee or something else with caffeine before reading my posts over there (to stay awake). 🙂
Having been brought up in complementarianism and then changing my mind on it years later does maybe give me an insight into how and why complementarians think the way they do.
You said,
Comments on my Miss Daily blog are stuck in queue until I approve them (so I can avoid any spam or trolls).
After I manually approve your first two posts (two or three), all others should be published automatically.
I approved one or two of your comments on there about a week ago. You are certainly welcome to make any additional posts there if you like, and I can approve them to appear, if they get stuck in moderation.
I don’t know how often I plan on blogging there.
elastigirl wrote:
They are doing that, and they are also selling a false identity to both the women and the men. The false identities are Biblical Man and Biblical Woman. Any man *or* woman who is a believer indwelt by the Holy Spirit has their real identity In Christ. We are called to be conformed to *his* image, not the image manufactured and marketed by mere mortal humans. They are selling a cult of religious practice that is not based in love for Jesus who has provided every good thing for us which love should motivate us far more to do good to one another than a gender role handbook based on lousy methods of interpretation and down-the-rabbit-hole reasoning. And all of this is wrapped in spiritual blackmail: Agree with us or displease God. Obey us or disobey God. Do not attempt to adjust your set.
Lydia wrote:
Oooh, I have a book that spends a chapter on this very thing!
I guess you could say it’s a secular book. It’s not marketed to Christians as being Christian. I have no idea if the author was a Christian or not (she passed away years after writing the book).
The author (who I think was a psychiatrist, or some other mental health professional) spends this chapter on how secular society conditions women to be how you were describing complementarians brainwash women to behave.
She mentioned one case study of this single woman, who was in her 50s, who despite being in a very powerful position at a company, and a leader in the community on women’s issues (e.g., standing up for women being treated fairly, against domestic abuse, etc), she felt that in order to get a boyfriend or husband…
That away from the office, she had to shift her personality and become the demure, passive, fragile “June Cleaver.”
What happened is that she ended up dating this man who was terribly abusive of her.
The doctor used this woman (and the doctor said this is very common, for women to think it’s acceptable for them to be tough and capable at work but not in dating), to educate women it’s okay to be capable and assertive both in your personal/ dating life, and just in public/ on the job.
The author says women can end up attracting abusers by splitting their identities like this – thinking they can be tough at work, but that attracting men to date means that they define ‘feminine’ in their personal lives to being a weak push-over for a man.
Lydia wrote:
Source:
I am not a complementarian by Todd Pruit
http://www.alliancenet.org/mos/1517/i-am-not-a-complementarian#.V51GDNQrLGg
Jamie Carter wrote:
The details escape me, but about a year ago on Julie Anne’s “Spiritual Sounding Board” blog, she or one of her guest bloggers did a post where a quote was given by a complementarian Christian man he heard by male Muslims about how this type of Muslim believed women should be treated.
(The Muslim guy’s views were oppressive of women, especially married women.)
The complementarian Christian guy thought it a pity more Christians were not more like that Muslim group.
The complementarian Christian guy thought Christians should be taking pointers from Muslims on how to do marriage and how to treat women.
Only in complementarian Christianity do you find Christians thinking Christians should emulate Muslims rather than Jesus Christ.
Gender complementarian Christians also sometime mirror Mormon teachings about women and marriage.
Some complementarian Christians don’t want to mirror Jesus and Jesus’ teachings, but Mormons and Muslims.
Donna wrote:
If that pastor was telling the young men to stipulate that on job applications or in job interviews, no, they’re not likely to get hired.
If you really want to get hired, you will need to work your personal schedule around the employer’s.
@ Daisy:
I have never read the book you are talking about, but I would like to mention that there is another side to the question of having one way of doing on the job and another in one’s private life. I don’t doubt but that some women really want to be assertive if not actually aggressive all the time, and I do think that to pretend to be something one is not is deceitful and should not be done. If that is who they are then that is how they need to be.
One other way also exists, where somebody ends up in a job where they have to be in control and tell other people what to do and basically kick a and take names when necessary and they find that distasteful and tiring and unnatural to themselves. So they do it on the job, because you got to eat and pay the light bill, but off the job they want no part of that. What they are doing is whatever is necessary on the job but when they go home they put down that burden and seem almost to be ‘a different person.’ I am of course describing someone I know, who does the job and does it well and hates it because that is not who she is in her heart. But that is how the world is any more-perhaps always was.
I think I hear in some of the way people talk about women that the only acceptable way to be is aggressive pretty much in every aspect of life. Not everybody can pull that off without doing a lot of damage to themselves.
@ Velour:
I have no intention of dumbing myself down or being a passive doormat to make insecure men like the guy who wrote that article to feel better about himself.
He needs to be getting his sense of worth from Jesus Christ, or something else.
I find it ridiculous that so many men who buy into this sexist nonsense really expect half the U.S. population to shrink themselves down so their fragile male egos will feel better.
To the guy who wrote that page:
Your fragile, wounded male ego is not my responsibility to bolster and repair (and especially not by me changing myself for the worse), sorry dude. (Or, sorry not sorry.)
Patriciamc wrote:
I’ve been on egalitarian sites where the single women post the dating profiles of complementarian men they bump into online (without revealing the men’s names) to critique or laugh at the stuff the men say.
Stuff like, “I am looking for a biblical, submissive woman to submit to my husbandly authority male headship in a meek and loving way.”
You’re either not going to attract any women with a dating profile filled with that stuff, or only emotionally damaged women who were conditioned by mom and dad to depend too much on a husband.
You would be marrying a little girl in a grown woman’s body. You will likely find being married to such a woman may be more stressful and exhausting than a blessing.
Gram3 wrote:
Very poignant observations, as usual, Gram. One thing that the Reformers didn’t quite realize was that their democratic approach to Scripture would necessarily result in multiple interpretations, since the understanding of any text is relative to the three horizons (see Moises DeSilva). The fundamentalists who pretend there is a “plain reading” really haven’t got any excuse these days, since the internet has made language theory widely available to most anyone.
Karen wrote:
This is what I see in the Bible, as well. It seems that others tried to hook him into political debates but he refused.” Render unto Caesar that which is Caeser’s and unto God that which is God’s” is the most political statement I can find that the Lord ever made. And it wasn’t because Rome was a great place where no change was necessary!
@ Velour:
Yes, that is (unfortunately) my experience as well. One of the code words is “Yahweh”. If you hear one of these cultists talking about God using the name “Yahweh” it is a pretty good bet that they are a Holy Spirit-free, Jesus-lite, authoritarian Neo-Cal church.
Gram3 wrote:
“The Calvinistic doctrines of election, reprobation, and the atonement are so repulsive to human reason that they can never obtain the assent of the mind, but through the medium of the passions; and the master passion of orthodoxy is fear.”
— John Quincy Adams —
mot wrote:
I think they actually planned for that to happen. When all the non-Calvinists leave, die or raptured, they will have several seminaries, home & foreign mission agencies, a publishing house, and 45,000+ churches all to themselves! And all of it previously paid for by non-Calvinists. A brilliant strategy!
JYJames wrote:
The way I see it, a boy needs to be able to love and respect his mother (as well as father) in order to develop normally emotionally. This kind of devaluing of the mother is very damaging to children, it is a form of abuse, a form of cruelty to the child, cutting him off from the very things he needs. It makes me wonder if this is what a lot of the rage in these individuals traces back to.
Max wrote:
The FUNDAMENTALIST first stole the SBC from the Moderates and now the Calvinists steal it from the non-calvinists. Awesome strategy as you correctly point out. It is all about power and money!
Daisy wrote:
Brava, sister!
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
I’ve also found other code phrases that should make a person turn on their heels and leave
a church. “Elder-led.” “Obey and submit to your elders.” “Your elders will give an account to God for your souls [so obey and submit].” “You are bringing an accusation against an elder without cause [for any question/pushback].” Forced meetings for lunch or coffee
and no liberty to get out of them. “The Bible is sufficient counsel for all things [more mind control/authoritarianism by untrained men running their mouthes.”
mot wrote:
The closet Calvinists called themselves “Conservatives” at the time. It should be clear to all Southern Baptists at this point that the “Conservative Resurgence” was really a “Calvinist Resurgence”. I don’t think the non-Calvinist conservatives who were leaders in that movement expected the pendulum to swing back 500 years and retrieve John Calvin on the way back. Southern Baptists have always been fussing about something, as a lost world watches and says “I told you so. There’s nothing to it.”
okrapod wrote:
I don’t think a woman being a grown up in a relationship, instead of behaving like a little girl that Comps insist upon, should be equated with aggression.
And Daisy is correct. That when women are trained to be doormats, they attract bad men.
mot wrote:
and with each ‘takeover’, the faith of Christ is diminished openly:
the CR followed with the 2000 BF&M that removed Christ as the lens through with Scripture is to be interpreted
the Calvinists (neo-Cals) have tried to bring in ESS which attacks ‘Who Christ is’ and the doctrine of the Holy Trinity
St. Peter once asked Our Lord ‘to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life’
Someone here at TWW asked me “How does one become saved in the Catholic Church?” well, the ONLY answer I could give to that was ‘Christ and Him Crucified’
There is no other place we can go for the words of eternal life but to Christ. If the neo-Cals want to try Piper or Grudem, or Calvin or Ware or whomever, they can try . . . but in the end,
I hope they find their way back to Scripture to the answer St. Peter gave Our Lord,
because Our Lord then told Peter that the Father had revealed this to him directly, not any man
I hope the neo-Cals find their way back. So then maybe they will stop hurting people. Sooner or later, they must seek the Lord again. I hope it’s sooner. May it be sooner.
Since when is the unbelieving world subject to the dictates of scripture? Why do we expect the world to act like the church? When I vote it is as a citizen first, then as a believer who tries to be discerning. Seems to me these pastor boys are whistling in the dark and expecting the secular world to listen to them….would any of them speak well of Margaret Thatcher? Golda Meier? What about Condoleeza Rice, who would not even have any conflict in office as she is not a mother? ????
Max wrote:
I have always thought what the lost world wants to see is us Believers living a live patterned after Jesus Christ.
mot wrote:
Amen! That was the eternal plan for those who put their faith in Christ. Believers were saved for a purpose: “chosen” to be holy and blameless before Him (Eph 1:4) … “predestined” to be conformed to the image of his Son (Romans 8:29) … “elected” to walk in a manner worthy of His calling (Eph 4:1). And it doesn’t have anything to do with Calvinism!!
abigail wrote:
In the United States at least, since relatively recently. Whether it was the Scopes trial, Engel v. Vitale (school prayer), or Lawrence v. Texas, Christians losing the privilege of dictating the behavior of non-Christians has been an ongoing, modern phenomenon.
Speaking as a Christian who is happy that the United States is governed as a secular nation, this is encouraging to me, although I recognize that many Christians are grieving the “persecution” that is no longer being allowed to tell other people that they must live according to Christianity-specific morals by force of law.
http://sbcvoices.com/women-and-sbc-ministry-clarifying-the-2000-bfm/
Nancy2, looks like you got called out for making a comment on a 6 year old post about the glorious BFM2000 that restricts women in the SBC.
:o)
@ Josh:
A lot of believers might want to read some Leonard Verduin. Especially his, “Anatomy of a Hybrid”. And study history of the state church under both the magisterial Protestantism and Catholicism and what like was like for the peasants who were limited in life choices to get ahead.
@ Josh:
I like your comment, JOSH.
I sometimes think that the Church, by becoming heavily involved in politics, has weakened its moral imperative to point our countrymen to a much higher law.
Lydia wrote:
Thanks for posting Nancy2’s excellent comment over there. Spot on, sister.
Lydia wrote:
Which is one of the salient reasons why our founders took steps to ensure that religion would never become wed with the machinery of the state. They were much closer to those horrors than we are.
Agree Daisy. Perhaps what these men need is a dog for a pet instead of a capable wife.
Lydia wrote:
I keep waiting for: “Women must remain silent in the churches ……. and disconnected from the Internet, especially from Pravda.”
The Rhetorical Maneuvers of Wayne Grudem: A Guest Post from Matthew Boedy
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/warrenthrockmorton/2016/07/30/the-rhetorical-maneuvers-of-wayne-grudem-a-guest-post-from-matthew-boedy/
“insist on separate roles for men and women in modern life”
Sounds like a plan. Let’s play those seperate roles to the hilt.
These staunch comp men can cook their man food on their man stoves; wash their man clothes in their man machines; sleep their man behinds in their man beds; have their manly fellowship meals prepared by men, attended by men, and cleaned up after by men who rinse the manly soap bullies off of their manly dirty dishes. ….
Let them all play their little separate roles, in one-man plays.
The women can all do their seperate roles on seperate stoves, with seperate machines, in seperate beds ……
Muff Potter wrote:
Whether they are selling vacuum cleaners or running for head of state, it is best to be highly suspicious of a sales pitch that emphasizes religious affiliations.
Lydia wrote:
Better late than never, because the Comp NeoCal boyz damage is showing up in churches and families across the nation.
Nancy2 wrote:
We can call is The Tarzan Gospel (TM), for the truly ‘Biblical man’.
^it
Lydia wrote:
Piper would probably say that she shouldn’t be a bank president in the first place because this hurts her “femininity” and the masculinity of all those men who report to her.
Lydia wrote:
This is the only comment I’m finding from Nancy2….
cb scott,
I discovered SBCVoices 2 or 3 years ago. I didn’t know this article existed until I noticed a link to it on a more recent article.
Was the other comment removed?
Nancy2 wrote:
How dare you question the boys at SBC Voices. I noticed on of the attack boys–Scott showed up to question your comment. I guess because your name was Nancy he had to make a smart aleck comment. I did notice he made no comment about your comment.
Power to you for challenging them, but they do not like anyone, especially women to challenge their world
Gus wrote:
Someone who is so easily swayed by the actions of others can’t be very “manly” to begin with. Every time I see comments by these guys about stuff affecting their masculinity, I can’t help but think of them as wimpy little cowards. A real man can handle being led by either a man or a woman, because who he is doesn’t depend on the actions of someone else.
Victorious wrote:
Here is her other comment:”I used to work in VBS. I used to teach a SS class. As a former 7-12 math teacher, I work better with adolescents. The SS class I taught had 13 and 14 year old boys and I almost always taught 5th grade level, or higher, in VBS. One of the deacons constantly ranted about a woman teaching those boys. When I gave up teaching to be a teacher’s aid, the male teacher made it clear that I was there simply to clean the room.
My husband and I used to take a church bus to pick up children on Wed. nights – he drove, I monitored. With my educational training and experience, I could keep the “wild” teenaged boys in check on the bus.
When my husband and I went to church in my car, I used to drive. Certain people ranted and joked about “women drivers” until I now refuse to drive to church under any circumstances. Neither will I work in VBS or SS classes.
Women are not allowed to speak at church business meetings, either.
At this point, the only thing stopping me from withdrawing my membership altogether is my respect for my husband and consideration for his reputation.
As a woman, my gifts can clearly be of more use to God outside of the church walls.”
What she wrote above is the absurdity that exists when Bible verses are twisted.
@ mot:
Thank you!
Victorious wrote:
Is that not unbelievable what men are doing to women in their churches? God can not be pleased.
Victorious wrote:
Wow! That was quick! They deleted it? Her comment was very tame.
Nancy2 wrote:
I can remember in the early days of blogging they were not real sure what to do with women online who spoke up since it was not technically church. But they figured it out.
Gus wrote:
We are to forget about Piper and his damage. The spokesman for the SBC on “ethics and Liberty” to the world made his way to fame and fortune from SBTS promoting Patriarchy. Not kidding. Russ Moore was known as the gender role guy who claimed comp doctrine was for wimps and we need more Patriarchy.
He was Dean of SBTS and had no problem working at an institution that named a college after a pro chattel slaver Founder named Boyce as late as 1994. I have also been told that he acceppted a painting of pro chattel slaverr, Broaddus, as a gift from the trustees when he left. The irony of all that is his big claim to fame “now” that gets him all sorts of big media time is….are you ready…..Racism!
So from Patriarchy to Racism. Of course we all know the NYT, WaPo and Face the Nation are not going to bring Russ Moore on to discuss why this country needs more patriarchy.
But you and I are to forget about all of that.
Lydia wrote:
The ERLC has always made me very uncomfortable. They’ve done a few good things, like working against modern slavery and sex trafficking, but mostly they just issue statements like they speak for all Southern Baptists. And neither leader of the ERLC has appealed to me at all. If they worked toward solving problems like sex trafficking and stayed out of politics, I’d be less bothered by them.
@ ishy:
The concept of the organization is political in nature. How could it not be? But the most important thing to remember is the concept of the organization is very UNbaptist. One person representing the thoughts and beliefs of ALL baptists to the media and political leaders? Unthinkable!
But the SBC did just that. But now it is a weapon, too. You see, if you disagree with the the hypocrite Moore publicly in the Neo Cal circles and say he does not speak for you, you are automatically labeled a racist. Thus are their tactics. They know what they are doing.
@ mot:
Hey, Good for you copying the comment!. Frankly, I thought it so benign they would not bother deleting. I should know better. She was even questioned for commenting years later.
It’s real simple guys, just close the comments so you don’t have to be so suspicious of people commenting later. Sheesh!
@ mot:
This is mean and so true. Woman drivers? What are we? Saudi Arabia? So sorry for your experience. I know it is all true having been around more than a few Baptist business meetings. If a woman spoke up, a faction would always chide her for being a feminist. And they would always blame some other woman for being the ring leader of all this talk. They had women Sunday School teachers in mixed classes. They moved away from this to only male teachers. I am pretty sure this repeated in other baptist churches during the CR. There is a general ethos that women should be silenced. Too bad.
Lydia wrote:
Oh, I know. I’ve always been against it as an organization. I think it’s always gone against what most Southern Baptists stand for.
Richard Land was not a paragon of virtue, either. I don’t think he’s a Calvinista, but he definitely has patriarchist tendencies. I’ve gone to school with some of his kids, and I honestly felt sorry for them.
Daisy wrote:
Hi DAISY,
thank you for posting the link to this awesome take-down of Grudem on Patheos
refugee wrote:
On Biblical Manhood: A Q&A with Author Carolyn Custis James
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/takeandread/2015/06/on-biblical-manhood-a-qa-with-author-carolyn-custis-james/
Muff Potter wrote:
They even feel threatened by FICTIONAL warrior women (Rey in Star Wars, the lady Ghostbusters in the new Ghostbusters movie, the female lead in the last Mad Max movie…)
Victorious wrote:
My original comment is still there. It’s just further up, in the 1st half of the comments.
The guy who wrote the article is a hard-core Calvinist, big Piper fanboy. He makes it clear in the article that he doesn’t believe the BFM2k goes anywhere near far enough in limiting women. He thinks it should be added to.
mot wrote:
There is a Christian blog out there somewhere where it’s either called “No equal but…,” or that was the sub-heading on the blog pages. I would link you to that if I could find it.
Shirely Taylor wrote a book about this called “Women – Equal No Buts.” Maybe she has a blog with the same name, and that’s what I’m thinking of?
In the meantime, I did find this in my bookmarks:
The Logical Fallacy of “Equal But Subordinate”
https://bltnotjustasandwich.com/2014/03/21/the-logical-fallacy-of-equal-but-subordinate/
Hey, Mot, I think you as a man are equal in worth to a woman, but I don’t think you’re equal enough to deserve an extra helping of ice cream.
So, observe as I give you ONE scoop of ice cream and Gram3, Lydia, Deb, Dee, and other lady members here THREE scoops each of ice cream.
But (*patting you on the head in a condescending mannter*) I really do gosh golly want to reassure you that I think you are equal in worth to women. 🙂
In the abstract, you’re totally equal, but as this pans out in reality and practical terms, NOT so equal. I hope that’s OK. 🙂
Max wrote:
But then they have to maintain all of that. I know of one church that has converted to Calvinistaism that has trouble doing just that. When they narrowed their membership pool by requiring members to sign a covenant to do things their way, a significant portion of their giving units chose the highway. The new, young Calvinista members do not have the discretionary income to support a huge facility that was built on a larger giving base.
Math is unforgiving and un-winsome.
@ Daisy:
This might be the site I’m thinking of – if it is, it has undergone a site re-design because the look of the pages seem to be different from what I remember:
bWe Baptist Women for Equality
http://www.bwebaptist.com/equal-no_buts
There is a web page, linked to on the left, called “Equal No Buts”
Could it be possible that those who worship this false view of the patriarchal system, still desire that we ‘go back’ to the culture of Jesus’ time? Would these types enjoy the treatment women received back in Jesus’ day? And how many of these women who speak, write, and believe this lie in today’s Christian culture, would appreciate living the lives of those women back in the day of Christ, or perhaps actually survive it. Those were difficult times, we probably cannot even begin to imagine the hard work and fortitude it took just to survive.
Then when Jesus came along, He treated women so differently compared to the patriarchal culture of His day…and the wicked men hated Him. He went against the norms of those cultures and His Disciples and Apostles also followed Jesus lead. In fact, all of them called out BOTH evil and wicked men and women who hated the Gospel preached and lived; they didn’t spare any gender clauses.
Patriarchy and their minions would hate Jesus if He walked the earth during this time of history. And that woman at the well interacting with Jesus, whom she recognized….how dare she go back and tell ‘the men’ exactly Who she met…..shouldn’t she have kept her mouth shut?
Praise the LORD, she did not!
Daisy wrote:
Another interesting link, thank you DAISY.
Karen wrote:
How many of these men would sell their daughters to the highest bidder, and then instruct them to respect and submit to the men who bought them?
Max wrote:
Strachan said that did he?
The same guy who said this:
Look at how Strachan and his like-minded buddies don’t think there is any room for egalitarians, mutualists, or whatever other labels that can be given to dissenters of complementarianism.
@ Daisy:
The source for my Strachan and Grudem quotes from my last post comes from this page (I forgot to link to it in that post):
The Conservative, Christian Case for Working Women
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/07/the-conservative-christian-case-for-working-women/490025/
abigail wrote:
She has three strikes against her: power over lots of men, unmarried, and not a mother. Aimee Byrd has a guest post up about “Complementarians” and singleness which points out some important things.
The roots of the evil of hyper comp and of ESS go back to the same sin that caused Satan to fall: pride.
All the fighting over who can do what, when, where, and how is a struggle for power. Nothing upsets the applecart more than when the “powerless” walk away and just do.not.play!
I’m seeing a doc re an old injury who happens to be a woman. Not seeing her BECAUSE she is a woman, but because she is tops in her field in our state. I’ll go to church later where the pastor happens to be male, not because he is male but because God has called him as servant to this church. And servant he is, not servant leader, just servant. With only one musician left, not a good one (me), and with a bum wing putting me out of commission, he is teaching himself guitar and piano and doing a most excellent job each week with both the music and the preaching. His gender has nothing to do with this, as he is not in authority OVER us but servant TO us.
His wife was a career gal but is choosing sahm BECAUSE she feels God calls her to put the kids first for a season of life, not because she HAS to do so.
Take the “who is top dog” out of the equation and life works so much better.
@ Daisy:
The ice cream’s ontological essence is equal. (Wink)
Lydia wrote:
That almost makes me want to give them a pageview. I imagine Nancy2 stepped on a very irritable and exposed nerve over there.
@ Gram3:
When the Calvinistas manage to plow through the legacies of my former church, I do wonder how the 30 something seminary brigade and fellow travelers are going to maintain it all. NAMB?
Daisy wrote:
The character that wasn’t mentioned that I thought was an extremely powerful female role was the character ‘Ree Dolly’ in ‘Winter’s Bone’. The actress is a young Jennifer Lawrence in her first major role. The character’s strength is a moral strength, built out of love and compassion for her dependent siblings ‘who cannot feed themselves yet’, and her mentally disabled mother. I was surprised they missed that character in the litany of women’s roles who ‘threaten’ manly men;
but in a way, maybe they WERE AFRAID OR ASHAMED to mention Ree Dolly, because the role is so strongly evident of how it is that in this life, adverse circumstances call forth from human persons an extraordinarily powerful strength that is possible when rooted deeply in the love of family.
If women have to feign ‘keeping sweet’ in the face of these wimps to shore up their fragile ‘manhood’,
then there had better not be any REAL crises in their lives.
okrapod wrote:
That wasn’t what the doctor was describing in her book.
The women in the book wanted to be equally assertive in their private lives but had been conditioned by parents, culture, or churches to think that to attract a man, a woman must be soft, lack boundaries, be a doormat, and passive.
Being a doormat was considered to be feminine. That is how my mother raised me, too.
mot wrote:
Their world has little correspondence with the real world where real people live and deal with real problems.
Gram3 wrote:
The post was from 2010. Things change. For someone with the time and inclination it would be interesting to go through posts and see the progression of thinking and particular focus on specific issues as it ebbs and flows depending on what the big cheeses want the focus to be. I can remember some but not details. To me, Pravda was a perfect venue to check what rank and file Neo Cal Baptist ministers were thinking.
In 2010, no one in their bubble world was questioning ESS as undergirding comp. now some from the fringes are even looking at the BFM for hints of covering ESS. Yes, I would say they are touchy. You are supposed to be focused on unity
okrapod wrote:
Being assertive and having healthy boundaries is not the same thing as being aggressive, a nag, a shrew, or a pushy, loud- mouthed harpy.
My sister is aggressive.
My sister does not respect people’s boundaries. She refuses to accept your “no,” if you say “No I don’t want to thus- and- so.”
My sister bulldozes over people and their feelings and considerations and does not care.
(I am not exactly sure why my sister turned out that way. I could speculate all day long, but my post would be 45 feet long.)
My sister is HIGHLY aggressive and bullies me and bullies other people a lot of the time.
That is not what that book I was describing was promoting at all.
The book was not promoting women being nasty to people.
Most women in our nation have the opposite problem: they are taught (by culture, parents, churches) that being properly feminine means being a doormat and never getting your own needs met.
I’ve noticed that some of the women commentators on this blog sometime push back to what I say these types of subjects.
If I say women should be assertive and practice boundaries, or it’s okay for women to have careers, please do not mistake this to mean I am arguing the absolute opposite.
I am NOT saying women should be bullies and big meanies.
I am not saying that motherhood is, and being housewifes are, crocks, terrible, and stupid ideas or lifestyles for women.
Gram3 wrote:
Natural consequences is a good teacher for children but apparently not for pastors. The former church is facing a budget deficit of 20%-25% of budget. One of their solutions recently was to invite a pastor from a mega-church in the conference to come preach … on tithing. There is nothing like a good harangue on giving to increase attendance and morale.
@ Linda:
Ditto.
@ Velour:
I find it hypocritical that the complementarians paint all men as being strong, leader, headship material…
If that were so, the men should not be asking women “to please make us fragile men feel better by dumbing yourselves down.”
If you are already a strong, capable, male head, you should not require any sort of ego-massaging from a woman.
That thinking is a contradiction of their own principles, regrading male headship and women supposedly being weaklings who NEED strong men leaders.
@ mirele:
I love American political history. I think it is especially fascinating in comparison to European political history. I am a big believer in our republic and it’s “ideals” for which we had to overcome a a lot of evil and wrong thinking—- if we can manage to keep it.
Daisy wrote:
A few lines from the movie Tootsie:
“Some men find that attractive.”
“I know, I know. I just don’t like the men that find it attractive.”
Parents that would groom their daughters to be doormats are destining them for marriage to men with little confidence or worth..
Daisy wrote:
Yeah, bless their hearts. An emotionally damaged man will just attract an emotionally damaged woman, and together they’ll spread the misery. Not only will they further damage themselves and each other, they’ll also turn others off to Christ.
I think someone may have already mentioned Judges but couldn’t find the right verse. In Judges 4:4 (NRSV) “At that time Deborah, a prophetess, wife of Lappidoth, was judging Israel.” She even summoned a man to her and told him what God commanded.
It seems that people want to use the Old Testament to prove how women shouldn’t be in leadership except the parts of the Old Testament that talk about women being in leadership.
Lydia wrote:
There is the other problem that the seminary establishment may be facing: declining enrollment as the tide goes out on rabid YRR. NAMB can fund a limited number of “church plants” but NAMB cannot fund job creation for an unlimited number of graduates from the seminaries. Are Millennials drawn to YRR? Or was that a GenX and GenY thing?
Velour wrote:
I also have to point out being a doormat woman means you can and will attract abusive, exploitative, or mean WOMEN.
I know that over the course of my doormat life, I not only attracted mean or selfish MEN, but I also had quite a few women friends, women bosses, and women co-workers walk all over me, because I lacked boundaries and assertiveness.
I cringe every time I am at a secular, left wing feminist site where they argue that women being mean to other women at the job is a myth. Oh no, it’s not.
I have had rude, bad male co-workers, but some of the worst workplace abuse / bullying I ever got came from a WOMAN boss and a few women co-workers.
Also, if one reads books on workplace bullying (and I read millions of them years ago), the stats and studies show that the number one group of workplace abuse is woman on woman. Not man on woman, not woman on man, but woman on woman.
If you’re a doormat woman who is afraid to be assertive, you will also attract women users, women bullies, etc, not just male ones – which left wing secular feminists are loathe to admit in their blogs and articles, but it does happen. It sure as heck happened to me often enough.
Precisely, Nancy2. How many patriarchal families are doing this to their daughters, while espousing the faith of the saints under Jesus, our New Covenant?
I recently read a pseudo Christian blog where the male author has some deeply disturbing emotional issues regarding ‘women wear pants in church and swinging their hips to the contemporary music.” Why is he watching the women’s hips swinging when he can control where his eyes and thoughts go….Look up, man and watch the words on the screen or dig them into your hymnal and focus on WORSHIPING THE LORD…..you, man can control these things so don’t blame it on the wo-man!
Guess blaming Eve has not stopped; nothing new under the sun.
Josh wrote:
I was watching a preacher on a Christian TV show whose views are like mine.
He was saying he does not want the United States run as a Christian theocracy as some Christians say they want.
He said the problem is, WHICH version of Christianity do you want in charge?
I was like, yes, that is my problem. Some of the movements and groups I see who bill themselves Christian are terrible enough as-is, like these sexist gender complementarians and authority-obsessed Neo Calvinist preachers and churches. I would not want to live under any of those guys.
If they were in charge, they would likely create a Christian form of Sharia, where they would ban women from attending college, driving cars, have careers, etc., and they would argue all that is “totally biblical” and “it’s God’s design!”
No thank you.
Bill M wrote:
Their interpretation of those natural consequences of their ideology is that any problems are the result of insufficient deference/cooperation/support/submission by the membership just like problems in a marital relationship are the result of insufficient deference to the husband. It is a very flat and static way of thinking, so there is no surprise that they cannot see the logical consequences of their ideology.
Cluster B theology: blame other people first, last, and always.
And if Hillary does get to be elected President of the United States, what, pray tell, will be the main topic of many an abusive pulpits within this country. Will these authoritarians be focusing on Jesus and His ways/Teachings, or will they corrupt the fellowship with their own agendas?
Look out folks….may have an uprising of Jezebel sermons from destructive pastor men if a woman is ever elected into office.
@ Muff Potter:
Daisy wrote: “Perfect example of that is this page by a complementarian guy:
An Open Letter To Rey (Rey is a woman who is a main character in the new Star Wars films)”
Muff wrote: “I was totally gobsmacked when I read this guy’s piece at the link you shared.
These guys really do feel threatened by warrior women on more than one plane don’t they?”
and (some) male responses to female heroines in general
+++++++++++++++++++++
so, what is it, exactly? is it the so-called ‘male ego’? deep vulnerablities & insecurities? society’s default position of male preeminence? inherited memory of multi-generational patriarchy going back into the mists of time?
my view is that as all humankind (hopefully) endeavors to rise above human nature (cultivating patience, generosity, kindness, self-control, self-sacrifice for others & one’s convictions, etc.), for a man it includes championing gender equality.
(to put a finer point on it, for majority people be they male or female to champion minority equality)
i mean, what isn’t totally obnoxious (& anti-community, anti-human race, anti-good) about a mindset that let’s ideas of “I’m #1! and those like me” go unchallenged?
(that’s not to say there aren’t things
You are spot on, Daisy. In total agreement with you!
Nancy2 wrote:
I posted this before, but I feel it’s worth a re-post:
Complementarian Theme Song (for marriage):
Put Another Log On the Fire:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWpYQjuJ0u0
Lydia wrote:
I have seen some complementarians direct women bloggers to state clearly up front that they are women on their blogs, so that men won’t accidentally learn something from a woman.
LOLOLOLOLOLOL. Pathetic.
@ Karen:
The SBC big cheeses want her to win. The focus is now on establishment. Many are missing this one because they are stuck in the old cliches.. People forget that the focus is always “power” and always has been. The outcome of this election is all about having political leverage with what they know as the establishment.
I am certain of one thing:
people who are threatened by the strength of others have a low self-esteem to begin with
the need to surround oneself with ‘yes’ men, only the like-minded, and those who can be ‘controlled’ and ‘dictated to’ is also a red light indicating a deeply-flawed soul
but when these troubled, insecure people try to build a new theology around their own needs,
that is where EVERYONE who cares about the Church needs to step in and stop them . . .
you can call it ‘reformation’ or ‘intervention’ or being a watch-dog, but stepping up and saying ‘enough’ is what is called for
what I CAN see is, if any of those ‘comp’ marriages include women who realize how the ‘new’ thinking has damaged her husband’s integrity and the wholesomeness of their union as husband and wife before God,
then these women ALSO need to speak up and say ‘enough’ ‘this is wrong’;
and they need to do it in time to prevent a break-up and especially in time to salvage the upbringing of their children who need a home where women are not subjected to humiliation in front of their own children as ‘Christian’, which it is NOT, nor ever could be.
Some of the work needs to be done ‘in house’ in those comp. marriages, and it looks like the heavy-lifting may have to fall to the women,
if nothing more, for the sake of their children.
Mark wrote:
Saudi Arabia and Driverless Cars
http://www.inquisitr.com/3333660/google-saudi-arabia-and-the-politics-of-driverless-cars-as-google-works-on-driverless-cars-what-does-tech-giants-upcoming-idea-mean-in-a-country-where-women-cannot-drive/
Nancy2 wrote:
Hmm. He should convert to some militant version of Islam.
@ Lydia:
“The focus is now on establishment…. The outcome of this election is all about having political leverage with what they know as the establishment.”
+++++++++++++
Lydia —
i’m sad to say i’m on the uninformed side of things (distracted by caring for ill elderly parents, among other lesser reasons). in a nutshell, how would Hilary as POTUS impact the establishment & political leverage?
(i’m too interested to understand not to ask a potentially dumb & ignorant question)
Karen wrote:
My guess would be that their sermons would not so much address the fact that Hillary is female but would certainly address some of the issues which she supports and they do not. They would definitely be ‘see, I told you so’ sermons.
Of course, those same issues will continue to be addressed no matter who is president, and the ‘see, I told you so’ aspect will still be there because Trump was not their man in the primaries either.
I think that no matter who is president there will not be any amazing miracles in how our national and international issues are somehow resolved. If that turns out to be the case, then the way would be open for sermons along the line of promoting an evangelistic call for national revival, that being a broad enough concept to include almost any specific idea as to how we need to change the nation in order to facilitate that.
In other words, same old same old from some pulpits.
Daisy wrote:
That’s also why I reject the Chicago Statement and the Inerrancy of Scripture that they came up with. The men behind it head an absolutely vile group that wants to have their group and its men be in charge of all government agencies, abolish the US government, their supports slavery, supports the enslavement of non-Christians, hates Jews, and denies the Holocaust ever happened.
The Chicago Statement was to make their group sound plausible.
Karen wrote:
I agree.
Complementarians and Christian patriarchalists of today have more in common with the Pharisees that Jesus rebuked for how they treated women than with Jesus.
Complementarians and Christian patriarchalists remain oblivious to that, in part of how they choose to continue interpreting a handful of verses by Paul (which does not mean I hate Paul or the Pauline epistles).
^sigh. auto(in)correct. “they support slavery, support the enslavement of non-Christians…”
Karen wrote:
my understanding is that Hillary has been the subject of abuse from fundamentalist evangelical pulpits for twenty years now, and that wouldn’t change if she were Commander In Chief, it would increase
The communion of certain pastors who quote in blogs from Rush Limbaugh is a ‘brotherhood’ that will only grow stronger if Hillary is President. But in truth, out in those pews, I think there may be some small stirring of pride in the hearts of many a woman who has allowed herself to be silenced and cowed and abused of her human dignity and full personhood. And that small stirring will not be destroyed. It represents a sea-change for the Church. I hope it comes. Yes.
Christiane wrote:
One of my faves and who didn’t get mention is Clarice Starling (from the pen of Thomas Harris). She has been portrayed in film by Jodie Foster and Julianne Moore.
Nancy2 wrote:
Ever read any Voddie Baucham or seen him give one of his courtship and marriage talks?
Daisy wrote:
DAISY,
I don’t think it would be ‘un-Christian’ to at least for a season, remove yourself from the toxic relationship by distancing yourself from this abuse. Here’s why: first of all, it will provide a BOUNDARY not to take phone calls or be open to interaction in person with the toxic sister. It’s a boundary that says to her: ‘I’ve had enough’, but it also gives her this gift: she is not going to be allowed to continue abusing you during this season. You would show strength, and in a way, compassion in not allowing her your attention or providing her with the opportunity to abuse you. You are sending a message, this: “no more of this, I am better that this, WE are better than this.”
Nancy2 wrote:
I hate to say it, but the sexism is so deeply ingrained among some Christians, and their blind devotion to their pet doctrines or being loyal to the Bible is so great, they might consider doing just that.
Look at the Duggar family. They are willing to sacrifice the safety of their daughters or a girl babysitter to protect their son, Josh.
See also:
“Bible believing” pastors and the enabling of domestic Abuse
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/johnshore/2015/04/bible-believing-pastors-and-the-enabling-of-domestic-violence/
There is something twisted when a man’s supposed devotion to God or the Bible, or his understanding of both, leads him to be conflicted on the question, “should I coach my daughter to stay in an abusive marriage?”
This is where I think 99% of atheists (or agnostics) have an edge over Christians: most of them would not hesitate to tell a daughter, “Leave that abuser NOW, and I will help you.”
Atheists in that same situation (daughter in abusive marriage) would not have to quibble on semantics, research the meanings of Koine Greek words, or what did Paul mean in the letter to Timothy, or in Ephesians?, etc.
That tells you there is something horribly wrong in some forms of Christianity.
@ Christiane:
“then these women ALSO need to speak up and say ‘enough’ ‘this is wrong’;
and they need to do it in time to prevent a break-up and especially in time to salvage the upbringing of their children who need a home where women are not subjected to humiliation in front of their own children”
+++++++++++++++++++++
it would behoove such women whose husbands are benevolent autocrats to remember that some of their ideological peers have tyrants for husbands. say “ENOUGH!” for their sakes.
@ Muff Potter:
YES! great example
Gram3 wrote:
She’s the queen of the sciences as someone (Gauss) once observed. She demands 100% internal consistency and will tolerate no bull poo-poo.
@ Christiane:
I remember my complaints about all the focus on politics during the 1990s. Once my complaints got the reaction: “you aren’t in Gods Own Party. Do you feel persecuted?” I was making comment that all this focus on politics is taking away from doing the Great Commission. And now they want to silence women. The person who made the Gods Own Party comment was a women.
Lydia wrote:
Try pulling that on me when you give Mot five scoops of chocolate chip and I get only one. 🙂
Christiane wrote:
If that character is fulfilling what is considered traditional feminine duties – caring for the sick – no, they aren’t going to be threatened by that.
Comps and sexist men are threatened and offended when women take on roles (police, fighter pilot, etc) traditionally associated with men or masculinity.
The original Ghostbusters from the 1980s were men. The new ones are women. Ergo, sexist men online were outraged.
Ditto when the hero of the last Mad Max was not Max, but a woman who fought and liberated other women.
Daisy wrote:
That reminds me, Wartburgers, that today is Sunday. Go make yourself the official frozen dessert of Pound Sand Ministries (TM) which is a Sacred Cow Sundae (Gram3’s TM).
Muff Potter wrote:
Yes. Tossed it in the trash.
Bill M wrote:
That seems to be the common S.O.P. for many preachers these day, especially the celebrity boys and/or mega church ones.
That, or Robert Morris’ favored approach: scare them into giving more. I’ve seen him on TV telling his audience that if they do not give more, God will allow their marriages to end, demons to attack them, etc.
Daisy wrote:
This is an awfully vague and subjective warning.
Maybe it would be more up-front to say it can lead to ‘understanding the word of God differently than I do’ and there’s nothing wrong with that.
@ Daisy:
Please re-read my comment, because I said that there may well be people like that, but there is this other kins also-which I went ahead and discussed.
I enjoy what you write, but misrepresenting someone else’s comment is not something I enjoy.
Bill M wrote:
I was reading yet another book by another doctor who spends several pages on that.
She tells the women who were programmed to think they have to be passive doormats to attract men that the kind of men you end up attracting when you act that way are not the sort of men you’d be happy with.
(A lot of such men are abusers or selfish and are seeking a woman who is easy to control.)
@ okrapod:
Error: kind, not kins
Gram3 wrote:
Yours truly would probably count as a millennial (at 29, I’d be on the upper end of the scale), and I’m drawn to the YRR movement like a toddler is drawn to a jumbo bowl of Brussel sprouts drowning in vinegar (yes, I’m still bitter). Most of the millennials I know aren’t well versed in the intricacies of Christian culture to even know what the current movements are, and the only one who would know is quite not a fan of Calvinism, so I’d say he’s not on board (though he’d be traditional and complementarian in other respects).
Lydia wrote:
This “power” of which you speak, I can’t imagine anything more beneficial to the leading lights of the SBC et. al. than an “enemy” in the White House. It seems to me that a pro-choice, pro-marriage equality president would give conservative evangelical leaders a great deal of leverage in the form of fear mongering over the people in the pews. On the other hand, an anti-Muslim, anti-all sorts of things president who claims that if he’s elected we’ll all be saying “Merry Christmas” again (uh, wat?) would compete with their authority, and let’s face it, that candidate is way more charismatic a leader than many of the evangelical brights. Methinks they don’t like the idea of competition…
Daisy wrote:
When you see the film, there comes a part where Ree is looking for her father who disappeared and she is asked ‘aren’t their any menfolk that will do this for you?’
you have to see the film to comprehend the kind of strength this character shows, and I do think the strong portrayal of Ree by Lawrence may be one of the reasons why Lawrence was chosen to portray Katniss. The role of Ree Dolly is a testament to how strong love can be in the face of ‘You were warned. WHY DIDN’T YOU LISTEN?’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bE_X2pDRXyY
powerful film . . . one of few I bought for my library
Daisy wrote:
The Duggar parents were also willing to blame anyone else but themselves for Josh.
They blamed their town’s woman police chief. They blamed the Arkansas State Social Services and had Josh sue them when he became of age. Where did he get the money to do that? Where did he find an attorney?
He’s a criminal brat because Mommy and Daddy have enabled him every step of the way.
okrapod wrote:
Ummm, Okrapod…that’s something you do to many who post here…misrepresent them and what they wrote, criticizing them for things they never said and for somehow not covering all of the angles on a subject.
Muff Potter wrote:
Oh yeah! A few years ago, an idiot at the Bible college recommended one of VB’s books to my husband. VB views anything female, including his own daughters, as nothing more than a Godly(TM) man’s property!
Josh wrote:
Love it!
Christiane wrote:
Then those people–male or female–who think that electing Hillary is a statement about empowering women and our voices has not bothered to think about the many women’s voices which Hillary and Bill tried to silence back in the 1990’s. Sadly, neither candidate has a stellar record on protecting the voices and dignity of ordinary women. It is about power and money, as Lydia has said. That is what politics is always about.
It does nothing for women as a whole just to say we have elected a woman as president and aren’t we great for doing that finally because gender pride. Fact is, if Hillary is elected the secular feminists will *never* talk about her failures and the patriarchists will *only* talk about her failures. Lost will be any discussion on the merits of a position on the actual issues. To make this about gender or race is to make this about social virtue signalling.
Velour wrote:
He is a very troubled dark soul who grew up from a baby in the system that fostered what he became.
All the more reason why today’s comp. wives need to shelter their own sons from the sights children don’t need to see of an abuse that may range from a casual insulting gesture (soap bubble theology) to some of the vicious beatings given by men who say things like ‘why did you make me hit you?’
If people stop to think of the impact of their game-playing on their children, there would be less Joshes produced. The most unselfish thing comp. husbands can ever do is to put their chldren before their own need to be ‘important’ by putting their wives through a very prolonged humiliation.
Muff Potter wrote:
No wiggle room. Nothing but the facts!
When I worked at a private Christian school, I told my students that I believe Math is Gid’s favorite school subject – the book of Numbers proves it. ; D
@ Nancy2:
Typo: God’s favorite subject!
@ Velour:
I’m in. 🙂
Karen wrote:
This comes up often.
Here is another example, which was ripped apart on another site about a week ago:
Why Do So Many Women Show off Cleavage in Church?,
written by John “I can’t stop staring at women’s chests and feel compelled to write an entire essay about female chests, but somehow try to blame women for this issue” UpChurch
http://www.crosswalk.com/blogs/christian-trends/why-do-so-many-women-show-off-cleavage-in-church.html
@ Nancy2:
On Stuff Fundies Like, the blog of blessed memory, some of the commenters used “Gid” as a reference to the fundamentalist conception of God because an angry fundy had come by to troll one time, and bless his poor little heart, the poor guy couldn’t type his way out of a paper bag if his life depended on it.
(Gid was the fundy version of God, and Satin was Gid’s enemy whom all of us ex-fundies were often accused of serving.)
@ Karen:
I was wondering something similar in a post last night, this one:
http://thewartburgwatch.com/2016/07/29/a-woman-should-not-be-president-john-piper-owen-strachan-al-mohler/comment-page-1/#comment-272519
@ Velour:
I do not mean to misrepresent anybody, but I do pick up on an idea and then add to that idea in a different direction sometimes, and I do hear people object because I did not limit my ideas to their specific words. I do sometimes say things like ‘but also’ and then hear people say ‘I did not say that’ but in fact ‘but also’ means that the other person did not say that. I was under the impression that this is how conversation works. I have even tried saying ‘I know you did not say this, but…’ and still have people reply that in fact they had not said that. This aggravates the life out of me because I want to ask did the person even read and process what I said. I have even posted comments intentionally not directed to anybody only to have one or more person accuse me of misrepresenting them, when in fact it had nothing to do with them And, I note that this happens to other people and not just me. Yes, well, there may be no getting around that as I have no idea of how to clear up the issue.
But, I think you are correct that this stuff happens. And there are issues about which I feel strongly and that strong feeling is not identical to the feeling of some other people. I think I need to take a break for a while, especially until we all get off of politics, because I am bound to get into trouble otherwise. Thanks for mentioning this, because you have brought up an issue that needed brought up.
Lydia wrote:
Why do you believe that is so? Why do you think the head phoobas in the SBC want Ms. Pantsuit to win? (I’m asking because I’m curious to hear your take.)
I have a new update on the open discussion thread. Thank you.
http://thewartburgwatch.com/open-discussion-page/comment-page-11/#comment-272677
elastigirl wrote:
One can only hope. I’m firmly convinced that the human conscience has been the prime vehicle for progressive and meaningful change in the course of human events. It is also my fervent hope that their Jiminy Crickets within haven’t been sprayed with enough DDT (dogma) to fully kill them.
okrapod wrote:
Thanks for your quick reply. I know you don’t mean any harm. And I know you are a thoughtful, well-educated, concerned Christian. I know you like details and
thoughtful research to back up points.
If I may suggest, be very explicit and intentional about your ideas as opposed to another poster’s ideas, including stating it as a separate post if appropriate.
@ Velour:
Hmm. I don’t know if I’m against the concept of biblical inerrancy per se, though no, I don’t support Reconstructionists or Christians who want a Christian theocracy.
Some of them want the USA to be governed under Old Testament rules, like sinner would be stoned to death.
I am open to hearing out challenges to biblical inerrancy (being open to it does not mean I’m ready to dump the view entirely).
I’ve been reading some essays on the Jesus Creed blog giving alternative views of biblical inerrancy.
McKnight, who owns that blog, has been doing a series on the topic this past week. Here is one post (one of a few):
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2016/07/27/inerrancy-michael-bird/
Gram3 wrote:
yes, I HAVE seen the links on that topic. And I have considered the sources, also.
I am for people treating one another respectfully, so there is never any excuse for attempts at ‘silencing’ anyone. The GOP candidate for President has called out the ‘silent’ performance of MRS. Khan who stood beside her husband on the DNC stage and spoke directly to Trump ‘you have sacrificed nothing and no one’.
Trump replied that maybe the mother was silent because she was TOLD to keep silent. I imagine his supporters will repeat that accusation. And I imagine that Hillary’s supporters will confront him on attacking a Gold Star mother who is still so in grief that she told her husband she could not speak and hold it together when her dead son’s picture was being displayed before her.
This is the way we are now. We believe that which we want to believe all too often, instead of employing critical thinking skills.
But I DO think we ARE ‘better than this’. We have to find a more wholesome way of evaluating ‘information’ than the way we have of okaying what is ‘tribal’ as ‘correct’.
Churches Silencing Women who are Abused by A. Hurst at Jesus Creed blog
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2016/07/30/churches-silencing-women-who-are-abused/
Snippet:
@ Daisy:
Daisy wrote: “Regarding (from the original post, according to Piper):
1. A woman civil engineer is OK.
2. A woman as a drill sergeant is not OK
What if God gifted a woman to be a drill sergeant?”
++++++++++++++++
Let’s de-spiritualize things. What if a woman simply desires to be a drill sergeant?
i observe men having the freedom to pursue whatever avenue or career or self-enrichment they desire, regardless of ‘gifting’. No limitations whatsoever.
Daisy wrote:
You and I love God and His Word. But we can do so on our own, without the Chicago Statement and some band of bizarre Old Testament promoting, Patriarchy supporting,
slavery supporting men who were behind it.
Daisy wrote:
LOL …
mixed messages to women: like the Duggars’ guru who ordered modest dresses (as in, the long shapeless denim skirts) and the contrasting very long curling hair with tendrils that might have been a style favored by Brigitte Bardot in her day. Go figure.
If women have surpressed their personhood because of the their feminine roles, why NOT bring out ‘the girls’ in front of them what wants a caricature of a real woman instead of the real thing. ‘The girls’ are to these women at least some statement of who they ARE. ‘The girls’ are silent. ‘The girls’ teach no men doctrine. What’s not to like?
Christiane wrote:
The whole Comp teaching is based on: 1) women and girls are garbage and therefore are treated like garbage (I say this bluntly because I am out of a NeoCalvinist, Comp teaching church); and 2) the complete lack of basic, healthy boundaries between people (husbands and wives, men and women, adults and children).
Treating anyone as second-class, with a superiority complex and demands for “obedience” and “submission” sets the stage for abuse. The on the lack of boundaries.
Lydia wrote:
Ya know. That makes no sense at all to me. Hillary Clinton is a Methodist. Methodists give women more freedom than an SBCer would ever allow. They have expressed utter disdain for and kicked out Baptist churches who have the guts to give women the same freedom that the Methodists do.
Are the “SBC big cheeses” greedy enough to put their power and control over women on the backburner, just to gain political power and control? And I wonder, if they gain political power, what will they do with that power?
@ Daisy:
I totally agree Daisy. At times, it becomes difficult to choke out the words Christian and patriarchy simultaneously for I believe they are in total opposition to one another. Funny how patriarchal types and shadows love the applause, the first in and of everything, to be seen, heard, and praised, yet, they themselves would never give those same cheers to their wives, let alone other women of Biblical faith.
Josh wrote:
Christians have been subtly derailed from preaching and living the message of Christ to trying to control the secular culture through legislation. This puts their energy into affairs of this world instead of the kingdom of God.
I doubt that anyone ever comes to saving faith in Christ through secular laws. We could theoretically change every law in this country to a ‘righteous’ law yet impact no one’s eternal destiny. Is that the point of the Christian life?
Christians have also been misled to think that separating church and state somehow impacts their faith. It does not. Our faith does not depend on the state displaying manger scenes at Christmas. We should be thankful that the laws that guarantee freedom for others also guarantee our own freedom to live and believe according to our own conscience. We should guard this freedom for others to live according to their own conscience, knowing our own freedom is tied up along with theirs.
There is nothing new under the sun- theocracy has been done and it has not been good or righteous in any of its forms. Power corrupts and when the church gets power, it gets corrupted.
Christiane wrote:
Excellent. Me too.
I think I may have crossed the line with some political references in some recent comments. Please feel free to discard those comments with my blessing, and my apologies.
Can’t blame this one on pain meds, I’m not taking them anymore. I was just furious about the attack on Mrs. Khan, but I don’t need to bring that here, no.
Christiane wrote:
No worries. I too thought it was classless and tacky to attack such dear people whose son was killed to save his fellow US soliders.
I don’t care whom the vile words come from.
Daisy wrote:
I find this so bewildering, given the rabid focus they have on the purity of young women (all women) in their culture, you’d think they’d try harder…
Regarding the idea of a split … I’ve been thinking: If Wayne Grudem et al were precluded from grounding their version of complementarian gender roles in the Trinity, then do they even have a sufficient *biblical* case to support it? I mean, if it is all that important of a doctrine as is so often suggested, then where is the full evidence, and not a few mere proof-texts or gymnastically-arrived-at supposed theological proofs?
This has been one of the key problems all along with various views on complementarian gender roles — the squishiness of sources and descriptions for what exactly men must do to be “men” and women must do to be “women,” and how the two roles relate in marriage, in family, in church, and in society.
Maybe the recent controversies and all the deep theological assumptions that have surfaced in the past few months, will force all forms of complementarians to articulate their biblical and theological sources, and a defense of how and why they have chosen (and perhaps left out other contenders that conflict with their views), and as precise of descriptions for God’s supposed requirements on gender roles as their theology allows them to state without equivocation.
And maybe that will all be part of dissociations within the broader complementarian movement, as it fragments as part of the even larger fragmentation and realignments that now seem inevitable in evangelicalism.
Christiane wrote:
Thank you for the concern. Yes, I put such measures in place about 2 or 3 years ago.
She was being nasty and abusive on Facebook for awhile, over a year ago, too.
She picks fights with me, I don’t pick fights with her, even on the internet – to the degree I blocked her on my social media, like Facebook, for about a year.
We haven’t spoken on the phone in awhile.
I stood up to her the first time ever (over the phone) about 2 or 2 and a half years ago. She blew up at me over the phone at that time, then sent me some hate-filled e-mails not too long after (some were 20 or more paragraphs long).
I stood up to her via e-mail at that point in short replies telling her that her e-Mails, like her phone calls, were hateful, rude, and I wasn’t taking it any more – but I eventually ignored any forthcoming e-Mails from her.
If I had not done so, I would probably still be getting 10- page- long invective- and insult- laden e-Mails from her to this day. She never stops with a fight.
She will keep coming after you until you throw her e-mails unopened in the trash can and stop replying, or until you slam the phone down on her, if it’s a phone rant.
I also stopped sharing personal, private details about me or my life with her, because she only exploits that information to use to insult me with at a later time.
I had to learn how to deal with her (and other troubled people) by reading books and blogs by psychologists and psychiatrists –
Because the Christian family and churches I was raised in taught me that being a good Christian girl meant being this passive, wimpy doormat who allows people to be rude and abusive to her.
How or why my sister did not soak in that same message of ‘femininity means be passive’ and turn out wimpy too, I do not know (she’s most often a bully, at least to choice people in her life, such as me).
I’ve had to keep her at arm’s length in my life. I cannot tolerate anymore of her incredibly vile put downs or profanity laced tirades. (I’ve never been that way with her.)
Gram3 wrote:
I totally agree with you Gram. When churches invite the American flag, the patriotic warrior, and the Democrat verses Republican theme within the Body of Christ, I dare say the system has been given over to reprobate minds, seeking dominance and power within all facets of our culture including religion, government, business, and all forms of social functions.
@ Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist:
“The fact is, I have known many misogynist and insecure males in my life. The only reason this article makes me sad is that these are males that have been chosen (by hook or by crook) to be “christian” “leaders”. It is sad, and also a little pathetic. I’m not sure they realize that they are the primary force behind the exponential growth of the “dones”.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++
how has this happened? is it that such leaders (who crave power & money as well, for some) are skilled at selling? at subtle manipulation?
is it that christians are impressionable (taught to be trusting, to trust in the invisible, to have childlike faith)?
and put these 2 people groups together and you get misogynists at the helm?
elastigirl wrote:
Good point. Not all wives are married to caring guys.
Muff Potter wrote:
Grumpy Cat says that Math also makes people cry. Which is why she loves it. 🙂
Gram3 wrote:
THIS is one of the most insightful ideas I read all week:
the concept of the ‘leadership’ triangulating:
covering all the bases,
so if one of them goes down, the whole magilla won’t collapse entirely and they can continue with their agenda to incorporate more and more Calvinism into the SBC (excuse me, ‘neo-Calvinism’)
I think what is happening is that some people went too far into fantasy land with ESS,
and when this was realized as a THREAT to the credibility of the whole power structure, well . . . you get apparent ‘divisions’ of opinion, then a scrambling to smooth over these divisions with ‘let’s all get along, there’s room for ESS as well as non-ESS’ (as though the Trinity was up for being treated that way???)
Yes. Triangulation. Very astute comment.
It’s not division they are attempting, it’s covering their you-know-what’s in the face of the majority opinion of those they respect.
Very human nature. Very political. Not so much a sign of moral integrity, though. No.
Good on Gram 3 for this insight.
@ Mark:
“Theirs is not an argument for slavery in some cases, but it is the same argument for subjugation.”
++++++++++++++
from reading ‘Recovering Bib Mnhod & Wmnhd’, they vehemently disagree & have a calculated response to this. (i can’t remember what it is, though.)
Daisy wrote:
The Comp men are nothing special to write home about, despite their many claims.
They don’t have superior behavior, problem-solving skills, etc. To the contrary,
they have created destruction just about everywhere and never step up to the plate
and own it.
okrapod wrote:
I did read your whole comment.
I did not misrepresent your comments. I’m not a dishonest person.
Anyone could click on your name in my response to see your post to view it in all its contextual glory.
The qualifiers you put in your initial post aside regardless
(e.g., that SOME women hate being tough on the job, and want to be passive at home -AND- at work, so people should not be telling women to be aggressive nasties all the time):
I was concerned you were misunderstanding the book I was describing, or equating being assertive with being an aggressive bull dog.
Karen wrote:
Blowing long trumpets before them, that they may be seen by men…
— some Rabbi from Nazareth
Christiane wrote:
I figure we got a look-see into the ManaGAWD’s personal sexual fantasies.
Daisy wrote:
Oh DAISY,
sometimes people in that much trouble will strike out at the ones they know love them best …. I have seen this happen in my own life and it is heart-breaking
it’s almost as though they TRUST the person they are attacking NOT to attack back in kind;
which is in itself, a huge sign of being in over their head with their behavior and even on some conscious level acknowledging that their own treatment of others is so vile that it will bring the ceiling down on them IF they aim it at the ones they don’t trust not to hurt them.
I know this cycle. I have seen it in my own life. I know it’s difficult. There are no easy answers. Sometimes separation is necessary ‘for a season, or so’. Yes.
Daisy wrote:
In the words of the prophets the Holy Modal Rounders:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0qDW9shiD8
@ Christiane:
I don’t doubt she is a strong character, but where today’s sexist boy-men feel threatened are by women characters who can and do physically beat up men, who are experts at hand- to- hand combat, and who get into gun fights (and win) with men.
@ Christiane:
Too late. You got it in as always.
Daisy wrote:
Let the Sorcerer summon and bind the spirits to do his bidding and send them against the Sorcerer’s enemies…
Daisy wrote:
http://i1.wp.com/www.nakedpastor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/the-theologians.jpg
Lydia wrote:
They took it out of moderation?
Oh darn. 🙂 More trouble.
My husband, when I told him what I had done, said this:
well, you ARE probably coming down off of those pain meds in ‘withdrawal’ symptoms, you’ve been crabby all day.’
I hate to say it, but he might be right. Apologies none the less. But about that attack on Mrs. Khan . . . okay, I’ll stop.
My Crab-in is over.
Velour wrote:
Which begs the question: What is a REAL(TM) Christian?
“How do you know if they’re non-Christians? If we’re able to enslave them!”
Christiane wrote:
Some people LIKE being abusive. It’s a high for them. It’s not a mistake it’s a choice.
The whole Proverb about rescuing an angry man [person] and you’ll just have to do it again.
Daisy wrote:
And he’d be able to bang FOUR wives instead of only one, plus more concubines than Solomon…
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Anybody that challenges them isn’t a REAL (TM) Christian. Any denomination not like theirs is destined for the hot place and not a REAL (TM) Christian.
Karen wrote:
A Righteous Mass Movement doesn’t need a God, but HAS to have a Devil.
Daisy wrote:
Because when you get up in the stratosphere it is not about ideology it more about maintaining the establishment and making legacy. Don’t get me wrong, ideologues are used to rally the sides against one another and people fall for it. Most of us have at one time or the other. That is why defending a tribe, whether it is Religious or Political, keeps people blind to the much bigger picture.
This is true in religious organizations and in DC that run on power. In fact, they all utter the party line to keep the followers happy while working to maintain the established oligharcichy where they have some power and opportunities.
When you look at certain high levels on opposite sides, they are more alike than different. Rarely are they real ideologues even if they say the right words in front of a mic.
They won’t shill for her but if they can convince enough people their salvation is at stake or they have no moral conscious, they will stay home and the same is accomplished by at least keeping an establishment they can leverage. It is a sick power game and I am glad to be out of it all.
Mark wrote:
Here’s a quote I find relevant to what you’ve said. It comes from Gary Ross, director of the first *Hunger Games* movie. He says, “The Hunger Games gets people invested in a contest. People are rooting for their favorites, rooting for their survival. And suddenly, unwittingly, the people being oppressed are actually engaged in this form of entertainment. That’s one of the things Suzanne [Collins] did that was so brilliant. She understood the ultimate extension of something like this. The way you get to control people is to make them participate, not just subjugate them. If there’s one survivor, one victor, we get them participating in our system.” (Emphasis added. Source: The Hunger Games: The Official Illustrated Movie Companion by Kate Egan, page 154.)
Forcing “the other” into silence, and then enforcing the silence by playing the God card, gets both men and women participating in a system that diminishes both of them.
brad/futuristguy wrote:
I was asking something similar in a post on this page last night.
I think the Bayly type of complementarians obsess over the supposed deep “distinctions” of the genders to make their case for why they bar women from being preachers or whatever role, while your ESS types of complementarians try to base their rationale of why limit women in Trinitarian teachings.
As S. Holmes said on his blog post, complementarians over the centuries (and now the last few decades) have had to shift their arguments around so much, that one wonders how much the basis for their activity is based on loyalty to the Bible vs. harboring an agenda (ie, oppressing women).
-I forget exactly how he put it, but it was something like that.
He, I believe, also mentioned in that same page I read that complementarian-type views from centuries past merely relied on old- fashioned sexism, where a lot of men (and maybe some women back then) just assumed women were dumber, less trustworthy, less capable than men.
And that assumption carried the day for complementarian biblical interpretations for centuries, until maybe around the 20th century.
Then, by that time, complementarian types had to dream up new justifications for limiting women, because many modern people no longer buy the same ideas about women.
Velour wrote:
They didn’t pull this one out of thin air (or another place that I’m going to let you infer because I shouldn’t mention it in polite company).
https://valerietarico.com/2013/07/01/mysogynistquoteschurchfathers/
In this context, I won’t use the label as a political identifier, but these atrocious sayings are why I take an arguably “progressive” position on these matters, because I see precious little from the past that is worth “conserving” in terms of how women and minorities were treated.
Gram3 wrote:
Eternal Hell (AKA God’s Never-ending Cosmic Auschwitz) is one strong motivator.
@ Ruth Tucker:
Dr. Piper offers a slightly different picture of the true woman—or, in his words, “mature femininity.” The illustration he uses is a man asking for directions–which in itself seems to be an oxymoron.”
“A housewife in her backyard may be asked by a man how to get to the freeway. At that point she is giving a kind of leadership. She has a superior knowledge that the man needs and he submits himself to her guidance. But we all know that there is a way for that housewife to direct the man that neither of them feels their mature femininity or masculinity compromised.”
++++++++++++++++++
First off, i want to know how the man got in her backyard.
Secondly, preposterousness of the whole scenario aside, I’d say this mysterious mature femininity looks a he11 of a lot different in a New York City borough compared to Nashville.
Daisy wrote:
I had the same rule about healthy boundaries with unhealthy people at my ex-church that I avoided because they had never gotten professional help to deal with their problems. (Other singles, marrieds, and families said they too avoided these problem people.)
My pastors/elders constantly had me in to meetings to demand my “unity” with abusive people. I was constantly told that there was something wrong with me for not being friends with an alcoholic who lashed out at others all of the time, a verbal abuser who constantly ridiculed others (told people who’d been laid off not to come to the potluck church meal any more or to church until they had a job, even though they contributed), and another
woman with NO boundaries and respect for other peoples’ privacy [she demanded my personal business and threw a temper tantrum when I told her I didn’t discuss; picked fights with people who were divorced and told them they had to refer to their ‘ex-spouse’ as their ‘current spouse’ because this woman believes that divorce ‘doesn’t really exist’. OK, she’s just flat out loony tunes. We have courts, laws, legislatures. And yes, it really does exist even if she enjoys living in la la land. Really bizarre person, however, to tell people point blank that they have to play along with her version of reality.]
The pastors/elders are highly verbally abusive, think nothing of screaming, yelling, lying, and abusing people. The pastors/elders have also lied about their own credentials and backgrounds and have ZERO credibility. They most recently lied about law enforcement agencies and that made it up to the district attorney’s office, the San Jose Mercury News (our major newspaper in Silicon Valley), and the women’s groups that deal with abuse
(that are well-organized with child abuse prevention experts, attorneys etc on staff).
People that don’t respect boundaries don’t have your best interests at heart.
Run.
Daisy wrote:
Was this article back when Sarah Palin was McCain’s running mate vs the Obamanation of Desolation?
@ Stan:
The entire establishment is scared to death. They have had it very cushy for years passing mandates for us for which they are exempt…. for life. One person is not going to change that but it is the camel’s nose under the tent.
Christiane wrote:
As is often discussed here, repentance is superior to an apology.
@ Jamie Carter:
““A woman going to a church should think of it as full of her fathers and brothers and desire to honor God and them by covering her glory while in worship”
+++++++++++++++++++++++
covering my what??
Max wrote:
What do predators eat after they’ve eaten all the prey?
“By morning there’ll be only one shrew on the island, and he’ll be dead of starvation.”
— last line of dialog in Fifties B-movie The Killer Shrews
mirele wrote:
CTHULHU IN 2016!
Why vote for the lesser evil?
@ Christiane:
I replied to your post in the Open Thread here:
http://thewartburgwatch.com/open-discussion-page/comment-page-11/#comment-272736
brad/futuristguy wrote:
Bingo.
@ Christiane:
“Their ‘masculinity’ DEPENDS not on their own manly strength, but exists in inverse proportion to how weak they can make their women, or ATTEMPT to have their women pretend to be weak.”
+++++++++++++++
oh my goodness that’s absolutely it. MANLY! = she has to shrink. Manliness is contingent on a woman reducing herself.
“Me. Man. You. Woman. You shrink. Now me manly.”
That’s not manliness! it’s neediness.
(i’m not going to accomodate that!)
@ Josh:
I’m not surprised by the hateful attitudes toward women that so many church founders have espoused. That link was a sad read.
I wonder if there were any church founders who wrote respectfully of women, had a high view of them.
Off topic, but I have a book about community property laws in Spain and Early Texas
called HERS, His, & Theirs by Jean A. Stuntz, an attorney and historian. Spain had a high view of women and that showed up in the 1700’s in what is now Texas. It later became the basis of our community property laws. And that was a very different view of women than
the colonies.
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Basically, yeah. That cartoon hits the nail on the head.
If Christians had to decide on if or how to save a drowning person:
Instead of just, say, throwing a life preserver to the drowning person in the lake…
Let’s go check every mention of water, swimming, and drowning in the Bible first;
then look up all the cross references to that stuff in a concordance;
and debate on how many ways the koine Greek for the words “sea,” “swim,” and “lake,” can be interpreted before we even consider making a move.
And ponder if Jesus Good Samaritan story was really applicable to helping drowning people in the year 2016 or was that parable only meant for the Jewish audience 2,000 years ago???
Meanwhile, the drowning guy in the lake is going *gurgle -help me please- gurgle gurgle -can’t tread water much longer- -help- gurgle*
elastigirl wrote:
LOL!!!
Who knew???
Velour wrote:
LOL. You summarized neatly in one sentence what it took me a long page to say (in the Open Thread). I do not have a gift for being concise.
@ dee:
“The whole idea is to use the God given talents given to each of us.”
+++++++++++
i’d say life, liberty, & the pursuit of happiness factors in, as well.
Lydia wrote:
Thank you for your response. I read the rest of it and think I understand a little better now.
About the part of yours I did quote here. I started noticing a few years ago that the far, far left has a lot in common with the far, far right. They tend to be flip sides of the same coin.
I’ve noticed with this current campaign season, neither side is happy with the candidate they ended up with, whether on the (D) side or the (R).
You have the “Feel the Burn” crowd who did not want Ms. Pantsuit, and the (R)s who kept saying “#Never Mr. Orange” all over social media. Both sides seem pretty unhappy.
And so many conservative Christians seem torn on this. Some of them are against Mr. Orange, some against Ms. Pantsuit.
Daisy wrote:
I used to be long-winded at these explanations. Then I listened to people who cut to the chase.
Now I can do same.
elastigirl wrote:
It’s almost like these guys take a verse from Scripture, then corrupt it totally, this:
“English Standard Version
He must increase, but I must decrease.” John 3:30
If John the Baptist knew his words would be aimed at women some day, he would come back HEADLESS from the grave and haunt these jerks.
St. John the Baptist spoke in holy reverence to Our Lord, Whom he recognized as the ‘Lamb of God’.
The comp. men? They are no gods. No one needs to ‘decrease’ so that they will be given a greater place at the table. No way.
Josh wrote:
I would be careful not to buy too much into the progressive side where you can become blind to their biases. I see it all the time on liberal news sites or left wing feminist blogs.
Progressives have the tendency to say or believe really horrible things about women (generally women who are right wing) who don’t agree with all or most left wing values (i.e., abortion, or what have you).
I am right wing but very receptive to hearing criticisms of my side on whatever subject (especially sexism), and I do see some sexism by other right wingers, but I’ve also seen some very troubling commentary or attitudes from the left towards conservative women.
Both sides have their shortcomings on a lot of issues, sexism being one.
okrapod wrote:
Hmm, I do that, too. I hope I haven’t offended anyone, if I have, there is no offense intended.
@ dee:
“These guys have too much time on their hands. Maybe they are dumping all of the calls for love and compassion onto the women o take care of it for them while they sire around and make up new rules for gender differentiation.”
+++++++++++++++
from their table at Starbucks, of course.
(christian church leaders, i see you. i see you all lounging around at Starbucks.)
Victorious wrote:
Elastigirl,
Next year when the Council on Biblical Manhood Womanhood has their conference, we here at Pound Sand Ministries (TM) will be offering a competing conference.
I am nominating Nancy2 to be in charge of our *camp*. She will be explaining “Cover my what?!” [Note: Inspiration has struck. I think that would make a great t-shirt/key chain/bumper sticker.]
Campers will be issued the subversive *Down with Patriarchy is my Cardo* t-shirt and a choice of yoga pants or leggings! We will be tweeting photos of our subversive campers to the Twitter
hashtag #CBMW17 .
We will have other subversive t-shirts, bumper stickers, key chains and wares.
We will have target practice using the patriarch’s books as target practice.
Signed,
Velour, Vice President of Online Retail
and Marketing
for Pound Sand Ministries (TM)
Velour wrote:
I’m sorry for everything you endured there. Some of it I remember you sharing before.
I don’t recall seeing the part about the pot luck supper thing, though. That is awful.
If you’re unemployed and could use some help with food, I would think a church would be one of the first places a person could go for that.
Boundaries are a great thing. I wish I had been taught about them when younger.
But the message I got was having boundaries is selfish, unloving, and Jesus wants people (especially girls and women) to be great big “Welcome mats” for other people to wipe their feet on.
And a lot of churches today keep on perpetuating these teachings to women and girls.
@ Christiane:
“If John the Baptist knew his words would be aimed at women some day, he would come back HEADLESS from the grave and haunt these jerks.”
+++++++++++++
the Ghost of Christian Past. i suppose he wouldn’t work for the door knocker, but yeah, in the middle of the night,… what a nice apparition he would make. if that’s what it takes to get the point across, go john.
Driscoll report:
There were 36 or 37 cars at 8:35 (service started at 9), 71 cars at 9:10 or so, 72 cars at 10:25 (after first service ended) and finally wrapped up with 66 cars at 11 am (service started at 10:45). Of this megachurches are not made.
Several cars were from out of state.
I had a couple of bicyclists stop and talk to me. The woman had her phone out and I think she was looking up Driscoll and my website. Another woman pulled up from 86th Street, she wanted to see my sign, because she’s seen me out here before.
Next Sunday is the grand opening! (And yes, if you think it sounds businesslike, you’d be correct!)
I also noted that Driscoll’s outfit has met for 18 weeks (including the first open house on March 27, Easter Sunday). I have been out there 16 of those 18 weeks. I can’t hardly believe it. And yet nobody from the church leadership has come out and said hello to me. Even the Scottsdale PD officer came and said hello to me.
Daisy wrote:
Thanks, Daisy.
That older retired woman loved humiliating people. She told guys who were engineers, executives, had been laid off — to never come back again. She was vicious. She took pride in humiliating grown men (and women). She told people who had been laid off that they “would probably become homeless” and laughed in their faces!
They did “contribute” but she just wanted to drive home her evil point, lacking in love.
One of those people who reads the Bible but doesn’t practice it.
She told Christian women who were from cultures that didn’t know how to bake not to come to the Ladies’ Christmas Tea and Cookie Exchange. I been telling the women to come, don’t worry about the cookies, for weeks. Buy some. Take mine. I’ll teach you how to bake (they’d asked me to teach them how to make cookies). Miss-Rain-On-Anybodys-Parade insisted that these women not come to the event and that she wanted good cookies,
she knocked herself out baking, and she didn’t want crummy cookies.
What do you suppose was more important to Jesus? Including our sisters in Christ or your crummy plate of cookies to take home?
She told me after I’d been laid off to only eat 1 thing at the potluck lunch, even though I always contributed and cooked vast amounts for the meal. She told me not to come anymore.
She ridiculed me for helping a young mother neighbor with cancer and kids. The Church Lady unleashed a tirade on me that I’d done my laundry on Sunday and hadn’t “obeyed the Sabbath” (we don’t even believe that). What should I have done? Told the mom on chemo with cancer, “Tough luck, lady. I have to get my laundry done because of the Pharisees at Grace Bible Fellowship of Silicon Valley.”
I have never met more hateful people than at that church. They wake up in the morning and buff and shine their petty hatreds. Their self-centeredness. Their lies. They don’t know Jesus. They are proud.
mirele wrote:
Thanks for the update. In this information age it is hard to imagine even the few attending would be uninformed about Driscoll’s history. I wonder if some aren’t attempting to be the initial investors in the next pyramid scheme.
@ Velour:
I probably would’ve told that woman to get bent.
@ mirele:
Wonderful report, Mirele. So proud of you!
mirele wrote:
Certainly! Driscoll is a religious phenomenon … the newest vacation destination in Phoenix!
elastigirl wrote:
the thing is that when you get some young Christian girl whose husband says to her ‘so I can be more manly, you must live in submission to me’,
and she faintly remembers the words of St. John the Baptist: ‘He must increase, but I must decrease”
but out of its proper context,
she might think ‘what my husband is teaching me sounds ‘biblical’ and then buy into the proposition
the problem with a lot of cult stuff is that pronouncements are called ‘biblical’ that RESEMBLE verses in Scripture but totally mis-applied and taken out of context
It’s a terrible game. I am respectful of the Mormons, but I can see something in how their Book of Mormon is in some parts so very similar to the Bible, only slightly ‘changed’ with a new twist
how the new Mormons must have seen that and thought ‘that sounds SO biblical, it must be true’
Daisy wrote:
The pastors/elders were friends with her so they constantly demanded my unity with her and demanded that I put up with her verbal abuse, saying it wasn’t a big deal. Of course not, two of the pastors/elders have worked for her, gotten paid money by her, and so they have that conflict of interest. They’ve known her for years. They also have the same verbally abusive characteristics as she does. They might have to grow up if they saw anything wrong with it. They all feel entitled to do it. Shameful, disgraceful, un-Christian.
The pastors/elders demanded “unity” and against my better judgment she got to come to my birthday party at a restaurant with other church ladies. No, we couldn’t even make it through that night either – my birthday – without her ruining it. She turned to a woman next to me and ridiculed another guest’s (lovely wife and mom) modest white blouse
and skin coloring, going on a catty tirade about how terrible the mom looked, how washed out, and all wrong. I almost burst into tears and got up and walked out. In my entire life I’ve never had ANYONE disrespect me that way by wrecking my birthday! Just low-class trash behavior — at all times — that woman.
The chairman of the elder board required that I have a whopping 6 months of meetings with him about that woman to get brace yourself – “unity” – with that woman. She finally showed up and gave her trash apology “I didn’t do it and she [me] acts like God.” Wow, just wow.
Wreck somebody’s birthday with trash behavior and then add on a non-apology, i.e. more of the same.
Her friend, who should have shut her down, NEVER apologized to me. I wish I had gone to the drive-thru by myself. I would have had a better birthday and it would have saved me six months of my life from wasted elders’ meetings about “unity” with a jerk.
Velour wrote:
Even the strictest Orthodox Jews allow for helping in cases where there is sickness and a great need for doing a work of mercy.
@ Sam:
“…there was no “it’s better to sort of sin, then to completely sin” in the Bible. ”
++++++++++
lately i’ve been wondering what my previous pastor would say if I asked him if gender roles are a sin issue. He talked about the subject now & then, mentioned John Piper and what great guy he is, & they had a marriage small group going through a study (which I perused) with contributors such as Voddie Baucham, Wayne Grudem, etc.
Gender roles, headship, submission were soft-pedaled. so, if I were to ask him, i have a feeling there would be a bit of stammering, foot-staring, clearing of throat, before he came out with “no, no, it’s not a sin issue.”
To which i would respond, “then what’s this all about, then? why even bring it up? why base your relationship teaching on gender roles and not other any other approach (like mutuality)?”
what he either has not faced or is unwilling to admit is that the only logical conclusion is that gender roles ARE a sin issue. they can’t be a sort of sin thing, going part way but not going the whole way.
Christiane wrote:
Yes they do.
What was ironic about The Church Lady at my ex-church was that she was a nurse who used to work on some Sundays. But she honestly enjoyed abusing people. Humiliating them.
She should have been in professional therapy years ago to resolve her anger and hostility about her past. She’s too arrogant and self-centered, though. And when she chooses a church where her friends/pastors enable her bad behavior — well she’s home free.
There’s something to be said for what the Bible says: that an enemy multiplies kisses [enables], but the wounds of a friend can be trusted [and are actually a form of love to no enable].
@ Daisy:
“What’s really said, and is a common experience for women (especially working women in the work place), is that when a woman makes a suggestion at a staff meeting filled with men and women, everyone will ignore her idea.
Two seconds later when a MAN repeats that women’s same idea, suddenly all the MEN at the table say, “That idea is fantastic! Randy, you are a GENIUS!! Why didn’t someone think of that idea before????””
++++++++++++++++
ha — happens all the time in our home.
i’ll have an idea, an explanation, a solution. my husband appears not to hear. i wait (not)patiently. Then finally, “Or, why don’t we do this…” and proceeds to say what i just said, with a few words changed out for synonyms.
it would funnier if it weren’t so dang frustrating. but i give him great kudos for always being genuinely kind and mutualist to the core.
Beakerj wrote:
Actually, no. Every single example of purity culture that we have studies results in the same thing: abuse of women.
Velour wrote:
I haven’t seen Okrapod do this. She often makes a partial quote and adds her own thoughts, but everyone who comments here does this.
@ okrapod:
FWIW I understand your commenting practice. I have never thought you intended to misrepresent anyone. Conversation in this format can be difficult. For me, it can be even more difficult in person due to my thinking process that is accompanied by facial expressions 😉
@ Bridget:
I guess you missed it.
elastigirl wrote:
You dodged a bullet.
Do you read over at the Junia Project?
http://juniaproject.com/
@ okrapod:
FWIW I understand your commenting practice. I have never thought you intended to misrepresent anyone. Conversation in this format can be difficult. For me, it can be even more difficult in person due to my thinking process that is accompanied by facial expressions 😉Velour wrote:
Did you read this part?
okrapod wrote:
elastigirl wrote:
The sad part is, many of the comp men seem oh! so! proud! to be so blatantly cavemanish . . .
@ siteseer:
“This could be a really good thing for their followers, if it forces them to see that things are not all black & white. Hopefully they can then apply that discovery to other areas.”
(neo-cal crow cannot agree on issues, presidential nominees)
++++++++++++++++++++++
i agree. as convoluted as this presidential election is, i see it as a catalyst for some good things. (no doubt some bad things, too)
if hilary wins, i think it will force a more honest appraisal amongst gender role-ians. as nauseating and horrifying as the g.r.’s are, honesty & transparency (even by degrees) is much better than all the trickery, deception, & self-deception.
@ Daisy:
Like I said, I don’t use progressive as a political identifier, and I have plenty of bones to pick with an ideology that says that people who don’t agree with us must be silenced (which is a problem both on the regressive left and the far right). But I see much that is not worth conserving in the historical majority views of Christendom on women, the Jewish people (which thankfully we all progressed rapidly on that one after the Holocaust), and those who are not straight and/or cisgender, and I support the – for lack of a better term – progress that society as a whole has made in these areas, often while catching flak from powerful elements within the church. If there’s a better term for people who hold my views, I’d love to know what it is, because “progressive” does come with a good bit of baggage – as we see here – even though I disclaimed the more popular definition before explaining what I meant by it.
@ Velour:
“Campers will be issued the subversive *Down with Patriarchy is my Cardo* t-shirt and a choice of yoga pants”
+++++++++++++
alright, what message on the butt in chunky, 300 point Arial black-font lettering?
(ha, you should what’s traipsing into my mind!)
Christiane – I totally understand about posting while coming off pain meds or while on paid meds. I promise I won’t make major posts or opine about things after my upcoming surgery. I can’t even do my needlework very well during this time. My mind takes off on its own tangent Plus reading seems to be hard to me during post-op. By this I mean getting things to stick in my head.
FWIW, based on the current ESScreed situations — and on CS Lewis’ The Last Battle [“The dwarves are for the dwarves!”] — I’ve come to the tentative conclusion that there is no such thing as “dialogue” with an ideologue. That is all.
@ bc:
Lol! Very true.
elastigirl wrote:
I don’t see many of them waking up any time soon from Comp doctrine (including if a woman is elected US President in Nov), unless of course it’s forced by cold, hard realities and the dawning realization of common sense. In my opinion they’ll just spin it a new way. That they’re “more Biblical”, “more right”, “more moral”, “more godly”, “this is the sign of the End Times”, they are
“under persecution etc”.
I think there may be pockets of people who come to their senses, men and women alike. It just doesn’t work and they’ll find their own way of doing marriage and life. And like Daisy has pointed out with nearly 50% of the U.S. population as being singles, the Comps are going to start losing that group.
I think more kids raised in Comp homes will jettison it and the church because they’ve witnessed Comp’s failings in their own families.
Women who are loyal soldiers for Christ, fed up with Comp and leaving – as we’re seeing in the Comp promoting Southern Baptists. SBC is losing 200,000 living members a year. People will only put up with so much and then they won’t, especially if they were moderate to begin with.
brad/futuristguy wrote:
Amen, brother Brad.
Josh wrote:
Realists?
Josh wrote:
I nominate: decent human being.
Daisy wrote:
I will say about this what I thought all through the “glass ceiling” years that was a big mistake.
If one makes gender THE reason for being selected or hired, then one is asking people to see their successes and failures as gender generated. Same for ethnicities.
Harley wrote:
Oh, I’m sure you would behave. The truth is that as bad as I have been, they are kind to me, but honest. I want to Dee and Deb’s goals and restrict my comments to the issues the Deebs are focusing on.
Please don’t let my poor example stop you from being here commenting. We have a gold star mother in our family, my cousin’s wife, whose son Jack died in Vietnam. I guess I just reacted to what happened to Mrs. K because I felt bad for her.
My cousin’s wife was heart-broken and never really got over losing who only son, but when her daughter married and gave birth to a little boy, and named him after her brother Jack,
my cousin’s wife said the baby reminded her of Jack as a baby.
I think God’s mercies to us are beyond imagining, but I know that his mother took comfort in that grandchild, I see the hand of God in that comforting.
@ okrapod:
No, I have never come across him.
Velour wrote:
I will explain “Cover my what?!” at target practice, as used in military operations.
@ Daisy:
They are getting quicker at deleting tweets.
@ Erp:
Lol! I forgot about that. Doug Phillips, RC Sproul were always calling current independent women a monstrous regiment.
Bridget wrote:
Yes, they do. The Tarzan Gospel (TM).
At my ex-NeoCalvinist church the senior pastor told grown professional women to ‘obey’ and ‘submit’. He was such a bully about this, that when a dear Christian middle-aged woman had the temerity to leave for a saner church he went to her home and screamed at her and told her to obey and to submit to her husband! Who does he think he is?
If he’d shown up at my house and pulled that stunt, I would have called the cops and would have had him arrested for that. She was extremely afraid, but many church members at our church did not believer her because of the spin that the pastors/elders put on it. They had had “worked with her” for so long to “no avail”. In other words, tried to make her in to a Stepford Wife. Her poor husband to have an unsubmissive wife.
The senior pastor/elders told hundreds of church members to harass her, get her to “repent”. In my opinion, they should all be sitting in jail for that.
@ Velour:
Josh wrote: “If there’s a better term for people who hold my views, I’d love to know what it is”
Velour wrote: “I nominate: decent human being.”
++++++++++++++++++++
DHB
Decent Human Being
Decent: polite, moral, and honest;
showing kindness : caring about the feelings or problems of other people
Human Being: a human
———————-
(seems we should define terms up front, knowing how opportunists twist word meanings.)
i’ll identify as a DHB.
Nancy2 wrote:
I knew you would have the PERFECT answer, Nancy2.
Do you think I should have the “Cover my what?!” t-shirts made up in camo style?
elastigirl wrote:
Yeah. I’m in the DHB group. Josh is one of our charter members.
@ Daisy:
Makes me think of, was it, Mort Zukerman and Gloria Steinem in her middle years. She was considered a sellout by her more strident followers.
@ Bridget:
“The sad part is, many of the comp men seem oh! so! proud! to be so blatantly cavemanish…”
++++++++++++++++++++++
well, if they were cognitively clean & sober, we could perhaps hope for more.
Velour wrote:
Yes, with “Cover my what?!” inside of big red crosshairs!
Bridget wrote:
My husband can be kinda “cavemanish”. But, hey! Me can make fire, too!
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Precisely Headless Unicorn Guy,
So would that mean there would be a “male-volent” Exodus of Biblical proportions should a woman (wearing a pantsuit no less) be elected President of the United States? If so, I’ll set up a lemonade stand on the border, wearing my pantsuit of course.
Nancy2 wrote:
I love it!
Woo hoo!
Where is our camp? Are we heading to Kentucky? Will we have biscuits? Grits? Chicken?
Future camper and sharp-shooter,
Velour
elastigirl wrote:
The next time you have an idea, etc, write it down before you tell your hubby. After he states “his” brilliant idea, let him read what you wrote.
Velour wrote:
I would love a “Cover my what?” t-shirt in camo. Absolutely brilliant minds here!
Karen wrote:
Do you think the wording should be in some kind of glitter – “Cover my what”?
Sincerely,
Velour, Vice President of
Online Retail and Marketing,
and now consumer surveys
at Pound Sand Ministries (TM)
Christiane wrote:
Back in the 70’s they had little choice but to invent something like ESS. The weaknesses of the exegetical case for gender roles was being exposed by conservatives using conservative methods. Egalitarians were using the Trinity (wrongly IMO) to support egalitarianism. That was bound to generate an error in the opposite direction.
Social opinion had shifted to ontological equality between male and female, so how could they deal with that change and still maintain strict gender roles? Invent functional Roles for the Trinity and, voila!, they can maintain the appearance of the fiction of functional inequality or submission while affirming women are “equal in dignity, value, and worth.” That was Knight’s contribution.
So, now, the weakness of the exegetical case is demonstrated by conservatives, the ESS fictional heresy has been destroyed except among the True Believers, so the Complementarians have to fall back on Confessionalism. That is not a criticism of the Confessionalists but rather a description of where the issue really lies with respect to conservative Complementarians who are not ESS Pod People.
Of course, the problem for Confessionalists is that the Confessions are presumed to faithfully represent the Biblical witness. If that is shown not to be the case, then I think there will be some changes made to the WCF, among other conservative confessions. It is only a matter of time, and cultural capitulation will have nothing to do with it. Assumptions will be surfaced and tested. In the openness of the internet. It will be messy, and I think that ESS will die when its main proponents die. And the ones who are left will say, “ESS? What’s that?”
Gram3 wrote:
Could you please explain “Confessionalism” as I don’t know what it is.
@ Josh:
Oh, the opposing side in Congress wants her to win, too. Their cushy way of operating on both sides is being threatened by the stupid peasants. This is the single biggest populist shake up in my lifetime. Look at the Bernie delegates who walked out.
I am enjoying it, munching popcorn because the establishment that has been mandating laws for me that they do not have to follow…. for life…. are being shaken up and are not sure what to do.
Rule Number 1: never believe your tribal leaders are really about ideology.
@ Karen:
“Cover my what?” t-shirt in camo
++++++++++
i want a royalty!
elastigirl wrote:
I will personally deliver your t-shirt to you and subtract the sales tax. Deal?
Harley wrote:
I’m on meds, too, but my (minor) surgery is Tuesday, so hopefully this week will end it. I try to keep things short here, but there’s another place on the internet where I really want to rail on people, and I’ve had to make myself stay away completely.
They sternly warned me not to drink alcohol, but they should have added to avoid controversial internet forums! 😉
Karen wrote:
With the current pastor of our church, that won’t happen in the pulpit (FYI: pastor has “retired; church has been “looking” for a new pastor for a year now. So, that might change!). But, I will guarantee you that there will be several men in our church, including deacons who will have something sexist to say if Clinton wins. I left the SS class I was attending because the teacher went on a “Jezebel rant”!
Velour wrote:
Should the lettering be in glitter?
@ ishy:
I will be praying for you on Tuesday.
ishy wrote:
Hope your surgery goes well!
Velour wrote:
Be happy to give an answer after I pick myself up and my computer up off of the floor…..have a tummy ache from laughing so hard! What a joy you are Velour!
Karen wrote:
Aww, you are sweet Karen.
I think I should add broomsticks to our online store at Pound Sand Ministries (TM),
since so many of us have been accused of being witches, including our fearless
leader Nancy2.
brad/futuristguy wrote:
I don’t think so, but first you have to get past the spiritual blackmail and accusations of abandoning Biblical authority. Those are powerful frames for the issue. I think that Todd Pruitt is being honest about grounding his complementarian views in the WCF. The WCF has changed, but it is not going to be an easy thing to accomplish, and maybe it will take a lot of NAPARC pewpeons becoming “Dones” or switching to female-friendly Reformed denominations.
Nancy2 wrote:
Velour wrote:
Thank you all!
Max wrote:
I don’t know. He’s going to have to transform his act. Young, cool, edgy is tough to pull off when the hipster is middle-aged. It starts to look pathetic.
ishy wrote:
I hope the surgery goes well for you and also for Harley. Watch out for those pain meds.
Woah!
ishy wrote:
Hugs!
Gram3 wrote:
Sorry, not keeping up and so am not familiar with acronyms WCF and NAPARC … what do they stand for? Thanks.
ishy wrote:
Praying for you that it all goes well!
elastigirl wrote:
They paint themselves into corners because they do not have a coherent theology of gender that is supportable from the texts and defensible using common sense. So, they hedge on whether failing to submit (how is that defined?) or failing to lead (how is that defined?) is sinful. The problem is that the build on the assumption (and sometimes the frank teaching) that the Original Sin which brought devastation upon us was a woman usurping and a man failing to lead.
Another related corner is whether a man may compel his wife to submit. They say that submission is voluntary, but how can it be voluntary if the alternative is to disobey God and dishonor his “beautiful and glorious design?” Which is it? Does God ordain a gender hierarchy or doesn’t he? If it is a Gospel imperative, then it seems by any view of the nature of Scripture that he would have just come right out and said it in Genesis 1-2. But God did not do that, and Moses did not record an 11th Commandment, either.
Lydia wrote:
Exactly. It is a double-edged sword. And also it defeats the purpose of advocating for equality in the first place. People succeed and fail for very good reasons sometimes, and being a particular gender or ethnicity is not an exemption from the realities of life and the way things work.
Gram3 wrote:
Yes, the 46-year Driscoll just ain’t the cool potty-mouth dude that he used to be. He will have to come up with a new gimmick to draw a crowd this time around – the 20s-30s won’t be so inclined to hang out with him now. Perhaps he will put on a more mature and calm persona focused on the upper age range of the Generation Xer yuppies in Phoenix. He’s quite the actor so I’m sure it will all work out fine for him. I look for a TV ministry to emerge. It’s weird, but folks still want to hear what he has to say – which ain’t much if you have ears to hear.
@ ishy:
Hope the surgery goes well. I will be praying for you.
Velour wrote:
As an inconsisten non-Confessionalist, I’m probably not the best one to explain it. Confessions are consensus documents that capture the understanding of those who construct the confession. So, the WCF captured the thinking of the guys at the Westminster Assembly during the 17th century. People who are confessionalists go back to their foundational document–their confession–to locate the Biblically faithful view on an issue. That’s why you will hear Confessionalists refer to their catechism or their confession or some other foundational document like a Book of Church Order. Those documents set limits, and much of the discussion in Confessional circles is where those limits lie and whether the Confession and related governing documents prohibit or allow a certain belief or practice. In practice, the pewpeons are not required to subscribe to the Confession, at least in the Presbyterian churches I’m familiar with. Those who are ordained must do that and are subject to discipline if they do not.
Here’s the link to Todd Pruitt’s post proposing to call himself a Confessionalist which you should probably read because I have no doubt misstated his position:
http://www.alliancenet.org/mos/1517/
brad/futuristguy wrote:
Ha!
@ Gram3:
Thanks for explaining that, Gram3. You have taught me so much over here and helped deprogram me from so much nonsense that was taught to me.
Velour wrote:
Ex member need to start bringing lawsuits against your former pastor for harassment.
@ brad/futuristguy:
NAPARC is an association of conservative Presbyterian and Reformed denominations.
http://www.naparc.org/
WCF is the Westminster Confession of Faith which is one of the confessions which Presbyterian and Reformed denominations follow.
Max wrote:
Prosperity theology is evergreen.
@ Velour:
Happy to help. I’ve learned a lot, too.
Bridget wrote:
As for me, I’m working on getting them arrested and prosecuted!
They are doing business in my state (California) that has some of the strictest laws in any area. Their holier-than-thou obey-and-submit-to-us-in-all-things can land them in handcuffs, with Miranda Rights read to them, prosecution, and jail or state prison.
Gram3 wrote:
Whew, a Calvinist positing prosperity doctrine would be something to behold! Yeah, that will draw a crowd! It would certainly be a major reinventing of himself, but Driscoll might very well go that route … and there’s money to tap in the Phoenix area. We’ve seen him go from emergent to resurgent and submergent for awhile … divergent might work this time around.
Gram3 wrote:
Lol!
Lydia wrote:
Isn’t that the Doug ESQUIRE who was keeboarping his handmaid like a Southern Planter gettin’ hisself a little Brown Sugar?
Nancy2 wrote:
And ride horses, drive tractors, hang tobacco, shoot snakes, and on and on. He married equal. :o)
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
That’s because in Purity Culture, women are not people. They are nothing more than WOMBS and genitalia which must be kept Pure exclusively for the Male who has exclusive rights of ownership.
WOMBS which can breed living (male) weapons for Culture War Without End.
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Islam. And Chrislam.
Lydia wrote:
And Nancy2 can take dominion over a stray bat that flew in their bedroom and attached itself to the bedroom curtains! (And her Green Beret husband…was having none of it
and left the bat up to his brave, fearless wife.)
@ Max:
I always viewed Driscoll as more of an smarmy oopportunist than ideologue. He was emergent before YRR. Now prosperity? Still determinist because God makes pastors rich. :o)
@ Gram3:
Thanks for the acro-explanations!