"A brief note about terms: If one word must be used to describe our position, we prefer the term complementarian, since it suggests both equality and beneficial differences between men and women."
John Piper and Wayne Grudem (Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, Preface, xiv)
Do you know the history of complementarianism? I thought I did until I began doing some in depth research. When I shared some of this information with Dee, she found it interesting, so we thought it might be helpful to put together a summary explaining the origins of complementarian movement.
This movement's foundational book (published in 1991) — Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism — provides the following background information in the Preface:
A controversy of major proportions has spread throughout the church.
It began over 20 years ago in society at large. Since then an avalanche of feminist literature has argued that there need be no difference between men's and women's roles—indeed, that to support gender-based role differences is unjust discrimination. Within evangelical Christianity, the counterpart to this movement has been the increasing tendency to oppose any unique leadership role for men in the family and in the church. "Manhood" and "womanhood" as such are now often seen as irrelevant factors in determining fitness for leadership." (page xiii)
In his Personal Reflections on the History of CBMW and the State of the Gender Debate, Wayne Grudem (who played a significant role in establishing complementarianism) provided some background information:
Grudem went on to share the following information:
The Danvers Statement
A number of individuals reacted positively to this announcement, and a month later a group of like-minded men and women met in Dallas, including Wayne Grudem, Wayne House, John Piper, Dorothy Patterson, James Borland, Susan Foh, Ken Sarles, and some others. Wayne House chaired the meeting, and they drafted a statement on what they believed about manhood and womanhood.
In his personal reflections, Grudem wrote:
"But we were still meeting secretly in 1987, not posting the meeting anywhere, not letting anyone know what we were doing. We just didn’t want to get involved in controversy and argument while we were still getting organized and deciding what exactly we would stand for."
With the next ETS meeting fast approaching, the group convened on December 2-3, 1987, at the Sheraton Ferncroft Resort in Danvers, Massachusetts under a cloak of secrecy. They put the finishing touches on their statement and called it the Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. During that private meeting, attendees voted to incorporate as the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.
One of the individuals who helped draft the Danvers Statement was Mary Kassian, who explained her involvement in a post called Complementarianism for Dummies. (see two screen shots below)
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The comps must have really loved Mary Kassian's post because it was published by The Gospel Coalition (TGC) and the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW). We have pondered why Mary, who was fairly young in 1987 (around 27 years old), was involved with writing the Danvers Statement. The only thing we can figure is that it must have had something to do with her submission of Bible study materials to Crossway Books. Here is a screen shot from an interview published in the Women of God Magazine, that explains what happened.
Kassian's first book Women, Creation, and the Fall was published by Crossway in 1990. You can access it here. After perusing the book's contents and footnotes, I believe it took Mary a considerable amount of time to finish the manuscript, and this in all likelihood coincided with her involvement in the Danvers Statement.
Another Christian leader who has played a key role in the promotion of complementarianism is Dr. Lane Dennis, president of Crossway Books. According to Wayne Grudem, Dennis attended the Danvers meeting and was in on the meeting in which the Danvers Statement was finalized.
Two years earlier (1985), John Piper suggested to Lane Dennis a book that would include a compilation of essays on manhood and womanhood. They discussed the potential book, and in 1991 Crossway published Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism. I purchased a used copy through Amazon. It is also available on the Desiring God website here. Some of the key contributors to the book are John Piper, Wayne Grudem, Ray Ortlund, Jr., Thomas Schreiner, D.A. Carson, Douglas Moo, John Frame, Vern Poythress, Paige Patterson, Wayne House, Dorothy Patterson, Dee Jepsen, and Elizabeth Elliot. While this list of contributors is not exhaustive, these are the more recognizable names (at least to us).
In his personal reflections, Wayne Grudem went on to share the following:
We also talked during those meetings about the future of the ETS, and how important it was to show up at the ETS business meeting and vote for candidates for the nominating committee who held to our principles. So we began to show up and vote every year, and I think that has had a positive influence on the officers elected year after year to head the ETS.
(When I reflect on the fact that the incorporation of CBMW, the finalizing of the Danvers Statement, and the agreement to produce Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, all came out of that one meeting at the Sheraton Ferncroft Resort, I think it is one of the Lord’s pleasant acts of providence that twelve years later, on November 17, 1999, I had the honor of giving the ETS presidential address in that very same hotel. Those were the only two occasions in the sixty-year history of the ETS that the Sheraton Ferncroft was the primary hotel for the conference.)
The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW)
According to Wayne Grudem, the core group responsible for the Danvers Statement (which carefully defined complementarianism) was 'very secret' and 'by-invitation-only'. A year after the Danvers Statement was finalized, the group was ready to go public. They chose the 1988 Evangelical Theological Society (ETS) meeting at Wheaton College to announce the formation of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW). They handed out brochures and even held a press conference. Interestingly, only Christianity Today showed up. At that ETS meeting, A Texan named Dr. S. Lewis Johnson told Wayne Grudem that he thought some people from his church would be willing to fund a full-page ad in Christianity Today announcing for formation of CBMW. Lewis and/or his church friends put up the $5,000 to pay for a two-page ad. Grudem explained:
We were thrilled when the January 13, 1989, issue of Christianity Today arrived. They had given us the two center pages, and the magazine just fell open to that spot! The ad proclaimed, “We are pleased to announce the formation of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.” It was very text-heavy and included some questions and answers, the list of Council Members and Board of Reference members, and the entire Danvers Statement! No photos at all! But there was a clip-out coupon to mail in (this was pre-e-mail days). That one ad brought over 1000 responses, which, we were told, astounded the people at Christianity Today when they heard about it-that a single ad that was so text-heavy would bring that much response. People would write us saying, “I wept when I saw your ad. I didn’t know that people held this any more.” We began to sense that this was a big issue and that God was surely blessing our work.
Two years later, Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (with its twenty-six essays by twenty-two different authors) was published by Crossway Books, which, according to Grudem, had been an ally of CBMW from day one.
Wayne Grudem then explained how the foundation book for biblical manhood and womanhood became Christianity Today's "Book of the Year".
In 1992 we found out that Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, by a vote of readers, was chosen as Christianity Today “Book of the Year,” meaning the book that had had the most significant influence on the evangelical world in the previous year—once again, a surprising blessing from the Lord! (I heard later that there was some frustration on the part of some staff at Christianity Today as they counted the ballots that poured in by mail, because our book did not represent a viewpoint that most of them favored. I don’t know if there is a causal relationship, but it was that year that they decided to stop taking readers’ votes for “Book of the Year,” and that honor has since been decided by a committee of experts that they have selected.)
However, Grudem's explanation about "Book of the Year" is confusing because as you can see from the cover of Deb's copy, it received this award in 1993. What we found particularly interesting from Grudem's above explanation is that in subsequent years a committee of experts would determine which books to recognize for this prestigious award.
So the ballots voting for this tome poured in by mail? Sounds eerily similar to what took place in Dallas back in 1979 to bring about the Conservative Resurgence of the Southern Baptist Convention. You remember that Paige Patterson and Paul Pressler orchestrated that denominational takeover. Oh yeah, both Paige and Dorothy Patterson were involved with this movement and specifically the "Book of the Year".
We found it interesting that in his Personal Reflections on CBMW, Wayne Grudem brought up a competing organization called Christians for Biblical Equality (CBE), which was established around the same time as CBMW. CBE believes in gender equality when it comes to spiritual gifting.
Grudem explained that in 1994, around six years after both of these organizations were established, the egalitarian group (CBE) initiated a meeting with CBMW to discuss points upon which the two organizations could agree. Three members of CBMW met privately in Chicago with three members of Christians for Biblical Equality (CBE). Those representing CBMW were Wayne Grudem, Dr. Ray Ortlund (CBMW president at that time), and Mary Kassian. According to Wayne Grudem:
We overcame some misunderstandings on both sides, and the Lord gave a measure of blessing to that time.
Grudem went on to explain that one matter upon which both organizations could publicly agree is that abuse within marriage is wrong. At the conclusion of the meeting, they agreed to come up with a joint statement on abuse. Mary Kassian drafted the proposed statement, and it was reviewed by those involved with CBE. According to Grudem, they were just about to issue the statement jointly, however…
On October 10, 1994, we received a letter from them saying that their board had considered it, and they would not join with us in the joint statement opposing abuse. I was shocked and disappointed when the letter came. I wondered then if their highest goal in this issue was to be faithful to Scripture above all and stop the horrors of abuse, or was to promote the egalitarian agenda. We ended up publishing the statement ourselves in CBMW NEWS (later renamed The Journal for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood).
Based on Grudem's historical account, it appears CBMW was taking the high road regarding not only abuse in marriage but the Gospel….
In our upcoming post, we will share the rest of the story about complementarianism and how this movement, which began almost thirty years ago, has now extended its tentacles far and wide throughout Christendom.
First? No…
Woo hoo. A new blog article.
And I’ll add on Dr. Ron Pierce’s videos – 15 hrs worth. He also wrote a book about this subject (he used to be Comp and is no longer after studying the Scriptures).
Good video of Ron Pierce that someone posted on Tim Fall’s blog. He is a professor of theology at Talbot.
Pierce, also an author, used to be in favor of comp doctrine until he closely studied the Scriptures. That changed his mind and he no longer believes in comp doctrine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTzThBTUXq0&list=PLVHY3HvnI6yP4BsGLPs__YtoYALqHvI_8
I, Velour, hereby relinquish my place as a Silver medalist to Ken F. here on The Wartburg Watch. Ken, patiently, reads the articles first before posting a comment. I don’t!
Mary Ka$$ian said the Comp term came about from a group of “scholars”. Is she including herself, a physical therapist, in this bunch? You know her claims about “studying at the doctoral level” [nobody here knows what she meant by that] and some kind of online Ph.d. from a school in South Africa, that she still hasn’t gotten a degree from some 19 years later.
Top ten!!! Right?
@ Lea:
Yay! It’s usually just nite owls. Now to read…but first I would like to say that the name is dumb. The ideas are damaging of course but the name?
So so dumb. Made up fake sounding non word.
‘beneficial differences’
Bwah! Beneficial to whom?
Fourth… the worst finishing position.
Loosely on the topic of complementarianism, and before I go to bed (it being 11pm here in Blighty), I wonder whether there are any other Wartburgers who like all of the following movies:
The Life of Brian (obvious)
Event Horizon (cult – in the movie sense)
Fish Story (obscure)
Just in case anyone’s interested.
Tom Schreiner has also done an about face on the issue and has written a book about it.
I’ve met with a few of the staff and directors of Christians for Biblical Equality a few times when they are in the Philadelphia area.
They have described how they and others used the term “complimentarian” to describe their viewpoint prior to that term being taken and redefined by Ware, Piper, Grudem etc.
It is interesting in light of the history described here, that currently egalitarians find themselves frequently shut out of speaking positions at ETS
Funny – I wonder if CBE declined to write a joint statement condemning spousal abuse because condemning spousal abuse is the very definition of tackling the low-hanging fruit. This is a non-issue (in terms of theological/philosophical positioning; I recognize domestic abuse is very much an issue for those who are affected by it.) That is to say, there are no rational, thinking people out there who are advocating for spousal abuse. Show me the person who says, “You know, smacking your spouse around and calling her names isn’t ALL bad.” Reasonable members of society do not need to read a statement condemning spousal because they ALREADY KNOW it is an act worth of the strongest condemnation. Why doesn’t CBMW go ahead and draft a statement condemning murder and thievery while they’re at it. And maybe next, they can tackle the complex, multi-faceted issue of whether or not water is wet. CBE probably this “statement” as the pandering that it is and refused to align themselves w/ an organization as sexist and crazy as CBMW in order to say something that reasonable people already know and believe.
Of course, flip-side, it could be that CBMW and CBE don’t share the same parameters for what constitutes abuse. Driscoll’s monitoring of his wife’s email and insistence that she dress and style her hair in the way that he wanted has always seemed like psychological abuse to me, but he’s never earned the condemnation of the CBMW folks for that….so maybe CBE didn’t like their versions of what = abuse and what does not. Will be interesting to read part 2!
Also, this seems apt to share here; this was a serious eye-opener for me: http://www.salon.com/2015/02/27/i_was_a_right_wing_sidekick_what_i_discovered_working_for_the_anti_woman_right/
The first time I heard the definitions from that book I just about puked:
“AT THE HEART OF MATURE MASCULINITY IS A SENSE OF BENEVOLENT RESPONSIBILITY TO LEAD, PROVIDE FOR AND PROTECT WOMEN IN WAYS APPROPRIATE TO A MAN’S DIFFERING RELATIONSHIPS.”
“AT THE HEART OF MATURE FEMININITY IS A FREEING DISPOSITION TO AFFIRM, RECEIVE AND NURTURE STRENGTH AND LEADERSHIP FROM WORTHY MEN IN WAYS APPROPRIATE TO A WOMAN’S DIFFERING RELATIONSHIPS.”
These definitions lack vision, power, beauty, respect, wisdom, reality, and truth. But other than that…
The all-caps are from the book. Here’s the link if you want to read it for free: http://document.desiringgod.org/recovering-biblical-manhood-and-womanhood-en.pdf?1446647999
“So the ballots voting for this tome poured in by mail? Sounds eerily similar to what took place in Dallas back in 1979 to bring about the Conservative Resurgence of the Southern Baptist Convention. You remember that Paige Patterson and Paul Pressler orchestrated that denominational takeover. Oh yeah, both Paige and Dorothy Patterson were involved with this movement and specifically the “Book of the Year”.
Yep instead of focusing on Bold Mission Thrust Patterson and Pressler used dirty tactics to steal a denomination they had never really supported.
http://www.landoverbaptist.org/news0500/femsoul.html
“Do Women Have Souls?”
This website is a joke about complementarianism, but CBMW, T4G,TGC, SBC, etc., come sooooo close to making these comic posts reality!
I have truly wondered if these people believe women have souls, since, according to them, God made women for the sole purpose of serving men. We rank right up there with Labrador Retreivers and mules.
Lea wrote:
Those whose Testosterone is Sanctified, of course.
Nancy2 wrote:
Except doing one is NOT bestiality.
Lea wrote:
Some of us are Out West. I’m in CA.
Ken F wrote:
I tried to read “Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood” – free download. I made it to chapter 3 before the dry heaves stopped me. I deleted the “scholarly work”.
I haven’t read the whole post yet, but my dyslexia just now allowed me to read “tilted” instead of titled in “‘ The book was titled “Women, Creation, and the Fall . . .
Ha!
Nancy2 wrote:
Me too Nancy. So many times!!
Would they be happy ‘winsomly’ accepting dumb and/or selfish decision making from people just because they are women? Would they be cool shutting up when they know something useful. Obeying without comment. Considering themselves as people solely in relation to someone else?
There are some deep issues here.
Velour wrote:
Ah. That’s true. I’m central time so a couple hours behind you. I’m generally sleeping when these posts come out!
On the topic, I hate Mary’s thing about different aspects of Jesus. Where is THAT written???
Lea wrote:
Service animals. Pat them on the head and throw them some milkbones every now and then ……. Aw, what a good girl,you are!
Lea wrote:
Does she think Jesus is schizophrenic, maybe bipolar?
Nancy2 wrote:
I am sure that the real book would make excellent target practice, just like all of the other real snakes you’ve taken out.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
I was just thinking I needed a new list of movies to watch this summer. Thanks, Nick.
@ Velour:
In honor of CBMW, I will watch “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”, ……. again!
Nancy2 wrote:
Ha!! I love life of Brian.
We are all individuals.
We are all individuals.
Nancy2 wrote:
Nancy2,
I’m pretty sure that I’m a Belgian Malinois.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r76nFVNgTJg
And I think you’re one too.
I found this list of scriptural behaviors on the web that make absolutely no mention of gender, ethnicity, age, or status. I wonder what foundation (other than one word….head) Piper and other comps have built their entire movement on.
The 59 “One Anothers” of the New Testament*
1. “…Be at peace with each other.” (Mark 9:50)
2. “…Wash one another’s feet.” (John 13:14)
3. “…Love one another…” (John 13:34)
4. “…Love one another…” (John 13:34)
5. “…Love one another…” (John 13:35)
6. “…Love one another…” (John 15:12)
7. “…Love one another” (John 15:17)
8. “Be devoted to one another in brotherly love…” (Romans 12:10)
9. “…Honor one another above yourselves. (Romans 12:10)
10. “Live in harmony with one another…” (Romans 12:16)
11. “…Love one another…” (Romans 13:8)
12. “…Stop passing judgment on one another.” (Romans 14:13)
13. “Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you…” (Romans 15:7)
14. “…Instruct one another.” (Romans 15:14)
15. “Greet one another with a holy kiss…” (Romans 16:16)
16. “…When you come together to eat, wait for each other.” (I Cor. 11:33)
17. “…Have equal concern for each other.” (I Corinthians 12:25)
18. “…Greet one another with a holy kiss.” (I Corinthians 16:20)
19. “Greet one another with a holy kiss.” (II Corinthians 13:12)
20. “…Serve one another in love.” (Galatians 5:13)
21. “If you keep on biting and devouring each other…you will be destroyed by each other.” (Galatians 5:15)
22. “Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.” (Galatians 5:26)
23. “Carry each other’s burdens…” (Galatians 6:2)
24. “…Be patient, bearing with one another in love.” (Ephesians 4:2)
25. “Be kind and compassionate to one another…” (Ephesians 4:32)
26. “…Forgiving each other…” (Ephesians 4:32)
27. “Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.” (Ephesians 5:19)
28. “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” (Ephesians 5:21)
29. “…In humility consider others better than yourselves.” (Philippians 2:3)
30. “Do not lie to each other…” (Colossians 3:9)
31. “Bear with each other…” (Colossians 3:13)
32. “…Forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another.” (Colossians 3:13)
33. “Teach…[one another]” (Colossians 3:16)
34. “…Admonish one another (Colossians 3:16)
35. “…Make your love increase and overflow for each other.” (I Thessalonians 3:12)
36. “…Love each other.” (I Thessalonians 4:9)
37. “…Encourage each other…”(I Thessalonians 4:18)
38. “…Encourage each other…” I Thessalonians 5:11)
39. “…Build each other up…” (I Thessalonians 5:11)
40. “Encourage one another daily…” Hebrews 3:13)
41. “…Spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” (Hebrews 10:24)
42. “…Encourage one another.” (Hebrews 10:25)
43. “…Do not slander one another.” (James 4:11)
44. “Don’t grumble against each other…” (James 5:9)
45. “Confess your sins to each other…” (James 5:16)
46. “…Pray for each other.” (James 5:16)
47. “…Love one another deeply, from the heart.” (I Peter 3:8)
48. “…Live in harmony with one another…” (I Peter 3:8)
49. “…Love each other deeply…” (I Peter 4:8)
50. “Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.” (I Peter 4:9)
51. “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others…” (I Peter 4:10)
52. “…Clothe yourselves with humility toward one another…”(I Peter 5:5)
53. “Greet one another with a kiss of love.” (I Peter 5:14)
54. “…Love one another.” (I John 3:11)
55. “…Love one another.” (I John 3:23)
56. “…Love one another.” (I John 4:7)
57. “…Love one another.” (I John 4:11)
58. “…Love one another.” (I John 4:12)
59. “…Love one another.” (II John 5)
If we agree these behaviors are not gender-specific, we will have to agree that they result in a relationship of mutuality in the body of Christ at large without exception regardless of one’s status, age, gender, ethnicity, or marital status.
Nancy2 wrote:
LOL.
Lea wrote:
Congratulations! According to the Periodic table the 10th metal is Vanadium.
23 Vanadium
http://periodic.lanl.gov/index.shtml
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium
Nancy2 wrote:
Chapter 3 is, IIRC, the one by Ray Ortlund. He’s the one who finds whispers and hints of male authority, but never can point to an actual text where God ordains that authority based on gender. That is exceedingly odd for a conservative scholar because one would expect to find their arguments grounded in textual evidence rather than pure eisegetically-derived ideas strung together with hints and whispers. Once upon a time, eisegesis was not considered standard practice for conservatives.
@ Victorious:
Thank you for posting that. I smiled and I was encouraged!
Victorious wrote:
I think the amount of time and effort Grudem has put into “head” is a good indicator of how essential their ***interpretation*** of head in 1 Corinthians 11 is. Another essential is their ***interpretation*** of the 3 pairs of “head of” in verse 3. And that is where they also get their heretical doctrine of ESS.
Thank you for a refreshing reminder of what living the Christian life is really all about.
I am so happy to read that CBE never joined CBMW in an agreed marital abuse statement. The very concept of the authority of men over women is abusive.
Gram3 wrote:
Yep.
A man by the name of H. Wayne House also wrote a chapter in RBMW. I have wondered if he is related to the Alan House who has commented on TWW and other sites.
Velour wrote:
Tee hee. I haven’t had my rabies shots! Have you had yours?
The reason complementarianism gets any traction at all is because there is an element of truth in what they are trying to capture. But CBMW and their ilk have transmogrified that truth into a hideous caricature that completely misses the point. From Genesis we get a picture of God giving the man a dangerous world to explore and tame. It’s a task WAY too huge for him (God gives him plenty of time to come to that conclusion). So he gives him a “helper” to join him in the impossible adventure. That word “helper” doesn’t begin to do justice to what the Hebrew word means. The Hebrew word is ezer which comes from the word azer. In NASB, azer is translated as ally, furthered, granted, help(ed), helper(s), helping, helps, protect, restrains, supporting. Ezer is translated as help, helper(s).
It has the meaning of being a strong military ally or life-saving rescuer. It’s a much more powerful word than how it comes through in translation.
Here’s the amazing part. In numerous passages in the OT God uses ezer to describe himself:
– Deuteronomy 33:26 – “There is none like the God of Jeshurun, Who rides the heavens to your help, And through the skies in His majesty.”
– Deuteronomy 33:29 – “Blessed are you, O Israel; Who is like you, a people saved by the Lord, Who is the shield of your help And the sword of your majesty! So your enemies will cringe before you, And you will tread upon their high places.”
– Psalm 33:20 – “Our soul waits for the Lord; He is our help and our shield.”
– Psalm 70:5 – “But I am afflicted and needy; Hasten to me, O God! You are my help and my deliverer; O Lord, do not delay.”
– Psalm 89:19 – “Once You spoke in vision to Your godly ones, And said, “I have given help to one who is mighty; I have exalted one chosen from the people.”
– Psalm 115:9 – “O Israel, trust in the Lord; He is their help and their shield.”
– Psalm 115:10 – “O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord; He is their help and their shield.”
– Psalm 115:11 – “You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord; He is their help and their shield.”
– Psalm 121:2 – “My help comes from the Lord, Who made heaven and earth.”
That’s probably enough passages to illustrate the point that the word “helper” does not mean some kind of winsome servant with a weird disposition (there are a few more verses that describe God as ezer – there are even more that describe him as azer).
I might be missing something, but this “helper” does not sound anything like how CBMW describes women.
Nancy2 wrote:
Even if I did have my rabies shots, my bite is definitely worse than my bark.
Between the two of us, they don’t stand a prayer!!!
Signed,
Belgian Malinois (aka Velour)
I found this article helpful
http://newlife.id.au/equality-and-gender-issues/head-and-headship-in-genesis-1-3/
Ken F wrote:
I thought you were going to describe the element of truth. Please do.
Patti wrote:
That is a troll-like comment. Are you saying you see no differences at all in any way in how men and women look, think, and approach life? Sad…
@ Ken F:
Patti is no troll. i think you misunderstood where she is coming from. I am also interested in what you think is the element of Truth in comp Doctrine. That there are two sexes? :o)
As Grudem's own work on the meaning of kephale states, he used the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae (TLG) project at the University of California-Irvine to look up the word in its database. There were 12,000 examples; but he felt it was too large of a sample and 'too much work' so he limited the results to just 3,226. He also used teaching assistants and their staff to check the material for him, he didn't actually look them all up himself on the computer. I find his explanation that it would be 'enough' unconvincing. When you want to prove something beyond the shadow of a doubt, you don't do half-measures and let other people do the work for you. You put in the time so that when a person stops you on the street and asks you to explain to them what source number 2,173 was and why kephale had to mean authority in that instance, you don't have to refer them to your teaching assistant to answer them for you. Somebody else had to be the one who input into the computer database what the source was, tell the computer what each word was, what it's meaning was and Grudem would have no idea if that work was double-checked by the various lexicons. Then his assertion that if anybody wants to challenge it, they should do their own work and check up all 12,000 (or more) sources just goes to show that he's shifting the burden of proof. It all sounds to me like it's little more than: "I told the computer to tell me so that I could tell you it's so." Looking at his results, it's odd that in the secular uses, kephale means "authority" in 2% of the instances (a total of 49/3226), yet somehow in Scripture, he identifies it to mean "authority" in 16% of the instances even though the word "kephale" appears far less frequently in Scripture – 75 according to Strongs. 2% of 75 is 1.5; if the use of the word was consistent, kephale cannot mean "authority" unless there was more frequent use of the word to mean "authority" and it wasn't so extremely rare to mean that – and that's just outright assuming the 16% he says it means "authority" really do mean "authority" odds are not all of them do.
Lydia wrote:
Ok, now I see the misunderstanding. I wrote, “there is an element of truth in what they are trying to capture.” I did not write anything about comp doctrine having an element of truth. That’s where the two of you misunderstood me. I believe that the CBMW ilk have taken some of the general difference in how men and women are made (the truth part), and have created a diabolical doctrine to support their twisted view.
I have to say that I am pretty shocked that what I wrote was interpreted in the worst possible way.
Ken F wrote:
Grizzly bears are so fuzzy and adorable.
Hey, there is an element of truth to that! I’ve seen photos and films of mama bears with their babies!
Nancy2 wrote:
I have struggled as well. Sounds like you missed Chapter 5, which discusses Head Coverings, Prophecies, and the Trinity.
The chapter by Tom Schreiner ends with this (page 139):
@ Jamie Carter:
Good post about Grudem.
Deb wrote:
gag…
Lea wrote:
I started this post last week, so I get to go to bed earlier tonight than usual. 🙂
Deb wrote:
Ha ha ha! When I was in my late teens, I played on a mixed gender church basketball team! I wish this guy could have seen us! When we played, there was no “gender distinction”. We were a team.
Gram3 wrote:
I don’t think that there are even whispers. The ancient world was a loud, noisy, patriarchy and the author of Genesis was steeped in patriarchal tradition – it’s natural for any human author to read back into something old an explanation for why things are the way they are – and that’s what happened when the narrative of Genesis 2 is broken by: “And that’s why marriage…” The idea of perfect Christ-like headship in the Garden of Eden before the fall really isn’t stated as such, that’s why the ten reasons (actually eleven) are such an odd bit of logic to read. The problem is that they’re so firmly ingrained in Complementarian circles that nobody really listens when you point out the absurdity of the idea. Like if Adam had perfect headship and Eve had perfect submission, how sin still happened on his watch and how he didn’t recognize the serpent as one he had not named or thought it odd that it could talk or forbid his wife from speaking to it.
@ Nick Bulbeck:
My hubby and I watched London Has Fallen last night. I would imagine it would be really difficult for Brits to watch. It was Air Force One on steroids!
Deb wrote:
The women must be submissive to male leadership–whatever the heck that is. Gibberish talk.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Brilliant.
Deb wrote:
Years ago Bob Mumford (of the Shepherding Movement strangely enough) told this little story. A child was standing up in his high chair and his mother repeatedly told him to sit down. Finally he did, but as he submitted to her command he was thinking, “I may be sitting down on the outside….but I’m standing up on the inside!!!”
Haha! I wonder if there aren’t many women who are “standing up on the inside….”
The agenda of the new reformation is getting more sinister. Complementarity and New Calvinism have merged into one movement. Both are designed to control others into submission to a legal system framed in “grace”. Recovering Biblical manhood and womanhood has tag-teamed with recovering the ‘real’ gospel to create a tremendous challenge to mainline Christianity. To date, it has not been confronted except in the blogosphere. Thank you, TWW, for another excellent article.
Formerly known as Elizabeth – not the shaming Elizabeth wrote:
Wait – what? Please elaborate! Schreiner was a hardcore fundamentalist when I was at SBTS.
Victorious wrote:
I still believe this may be the Achilles heel of the New Calvinism movement … when women ensnared by it rise up en masse and declare “Wait just a darn minute here!” and then begin dragging their sorry husbands/boyfriends out of the mess.
@ Max:
My husband keeps asking this question: "Why are the women putting up it?"
And he is dead serious!
Max wrote:
I’ve often wondered if there isn’t something similar to the Stockholm Syndrome at play with some women who are willingly aligning themselves with those who have taken them hostage for the sake of safety. Kinda like joining the bullies on the playground so you won’t get beat up by them.
Thoughts?
Deb wrote:
It might have to do with the godly teaching of dying to self, emptying of self, putting others before themselves – a lot of women have a hard time taking care of themselves so that they can take care of others because it’s just too selfish.
Formerly known as Elizabeth – not the shaming Elizabeth wrote:
Wait, what? Elaborate, please. Schreiner was a hardcore fundamentalist when I was at SBTS.
Emily wrote:
The only reason CBMW has to have a statement like this is because their position encourages it.
I assisted my daughter with some wedding videography Saturday. It was at a church I was unfamiliar with.
The minister explained that if the husband was the head then the wife is the crown. He further explained that the man was God’s first attempt and the woman was the improved version.
Not sure if this holds up to theological scrutiny, but I do think his explanation is healthier and closer to God’s intentions than CBWM’s.
Patti wrote:
CORRECT
This was written recently by a complementarian who is concerned at how some other complementarians have been distorting the Bible to support their views.
The page discusses the history of the term “complementarian,” I think complementarianism itself, and other things:
Complementarian Issues of Nomenclature and Doctrine
http://www.theologyforwomen.org/2016/07/complementarian-issues-of-nomenclature_8.html
Velour wrote:
It was all Eve’s fault that she was deceived. Adam sinned on purpose, which is why men should always be in charge.
That’s all we need to know! Don’t think too hard about it, ladies.
@ Emily:
Naturally, CBMW spokesheads will say they denounce domestic violence, but the reality is, their gender theology is utilized by preachers and abusive husbands to keep women stuck in abusive marriages.
These women don’t receive practical help from complementarians, but are told to “submit more.”
Concerning domestic violence especially, the majority of complementarians remind me of this comment by Jesus:
Complementarians all talk but don’t do anything to help women. Their doctrine and biblical interpretation harms women in abusive marriage, it doesn’t help them.
Some complementarians, such as Piper or Patterson, coach women to stay in bad marriages and get physically beaten by their abusive husbands.
So no, they don’t truly oppose domestic violence. If they did, they wouldn’t be giving women useless advice about submitting more and trying to convince them that divorce isn’t an option.
Control: The Reason The Gospel Coalition and CBMW Cannot Actually Condemn Spousal Abuse
http://fiddlrts.blogspot.com/2016/01/control-reason-gospel-coalition-and.html
Lea wrote:
What I also don’t understand is the smack-down that the Comps give to Jesus. So according to the Comp argument, Jesus atoned for Adam’s sin but not Eve’s. Therefore Eve is greater than Jesus?
It seems that is their argument.
Daisy wrote:
Some of them don’t even attempt to talk a good game. Very few seem to come through in an actual case of abuse.
I haven’t quite finished the post or read the comments yet, but there’s something I wanted to make sure of…
The OP says Mary Ka$$ian was 27 at the time she took part in the Danvers Statement (1987), and published her book through Crossway in 1990. Am I correct in assuming that her kids were still at home at that time?
I ask because I recently read a
screedblogpost condemning working mothers. An astute reader here pointed it out to us last week. It would be absolutely priceless to show this know-it-all that one of the pioneers of his precious complementarianism “neglected” her kids and was “disobedient to God” (in his view).Jamie Carter wrote:
If you mean the famous 10 reasons for male headship, I agree they are absurd, and I agree that nobody really listens. Because the well has already been poisoned by accusations of feminism and capitulating to culture and blurring gender roles and other such thought-stopping nonsense. Danvers is one big logical fallacy tutorial, but you cannot get anyone to actually defend the statements and the reasoning and the texts which supposedly support it. They are above having to answer for anything.
@ Victorious:
The new reformation is an exercise in mind control instead of heart control. Religious indoctrination is at its worst when it is packaged in patriarchy to control, manipulate, and intimidate the lives of women.
Deb wrote:
They aren’t!
The Southern Baptists, who promoted NeoCalvinism/Comp, are losing a whopping 200,000 living members a year — fed up with this nonsense.
The Southern Baptists have the distinction now of having the highest divorce rate in the nation of ANY denomination (Barna study). Even Atheists manage to have more peaceable marriages than Comp promoting Southern Baptists.
Can you imagine being a CEO of a store and losing 200,000 customers? You know the whole argument in business: it costs 10 times as much to gain one new customer as it costs to keep an existing customer.
@ mot:
“instead of focusing on Bold Mission Thrust Patterson and Pressler used dirty tactics to steal a denomination they had never really supported.”
++++++++++++++++
They actually named something ‘Bold Mission Thrust’?? talk about phallic advertising.
or maybe they actually liked the name, something they felt good identifying with.
either way, the only thing missing is a giant effigy for bowing down to.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Traits which are not modeled by New Calvinist leaders.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
Me, too. Schreiner’s view of “saved by childbearing” is unintentionally hysterical.
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
Great comment! I can answer your question regarding the ages of Mary Kassian's children.
The legal document regarding the December 24, 2002 accident involvlng the Kassian family states the following:
Simple math reveals that Mary's eldest must have been born in 1984, with the middle son coming along in 1986. Perhaps the youngest child was on the way when the Danvers Statement was finalized since he was born some time in 1988.
@ Nancy2:
“This website is a joke about complementarianism, but CBMW, T4G,TGC, SBC, etc., come sooooo close to making these comic posts reality!
I have truly wondered if these people believe women have souls, since, according to them, God made women for the sole purpose of serving men. We rank right up there with Labrador Retreivers and mules.”
+++++++++++++++++++++
well, since according to Bruce Ware, spokesperson for CBMW, it is men who are made in God’s image and women are more like derivatives, it is the obvious conclusion.
Gram3 wrote:
Yes – the very same ones. Reason 11 was tucked away in the footnotes – he decides not to expand upon it or explain it, but it’s the idea that God gave man headship because woman was made “from” or “out of” man. Perhaps he neglected to do so because he ran out of ideas of how to twist scripture to make it sound reasonable outside of just stating it as is.
From the OP (quoting Kassian):
I think that may be the quote I was thinking of that I’ve mentioned on this blog before, but I couldn’t remember who wrote it or where I saw it.
I’m a former complementarian. Kassian’s claims are false there, completely false. She is misrepresenting complementarianism to make it appear less sexist and hence more palatable to contemporary women.
As I said when discussing that quote before, either she (or other complementarian writers) completely negate everything they just said in the rest of the literature they churn out.
Not only was I taught many of those things on her list by complementarian parents growing up, but certainly in the last 15 – 20 or more years, I have seen other complementarians argue those things.
Complementarians lament bitterly in their blog posts (or way back when, in magazine articles I saw) that more and more women are or were choosing to work in offices, not marry, not have kids, etc. and so on, which sure as heck does demonstrate that comps think women should only marry and be mothers.
Complementarians will occasionally write those comments saying they support women in whatever choices women make, but in reality, they do not.
Some of their doctrinal stances prevent women from using their gifts, which runs contrary to what Kassian wrote.
Some women feel called or gifted by God to be preachers, for example, but complementarians forbid women from preaching. So those women have to bury their preaching talent or dream.
Depending on the type of complementarian we are talking about, some are very hard core and do teach that women are to be “bobble-heading yes dolls” to their husbands. Complementarians will do things like write blog posts or articles telling women never to directly state a grievance with their spouse.
The vast majority of complementarian writing and teaching tends to focus on wife-hood and motherhood, so yes, complementarians do strongly imply and teach that women are to only marry and have “dozens of babies.”
Complementarians never have anything to say about or to women who never marry, who remain childless, or who become single again, through widowhood or divorce.
If you look at complementarian sites for women, not only do they dwell constantly on marriage and motherhood, but-
Complementarian sites for women (and complementarian women’s conferences) are filled with girly articles (or speeches or references to) how to bake cakes, how to make “frou frou” stuff using glitter and glue guns, how to be a wonderful party hostess and create a nifty, stylish home environment – they present a one-dimensional, retro view of femininity.
Even Kassian’s own blog (which I linked to on an older thread), has several posts about how to organize a closet, how to shop for clothing. There’s this stereotype on her own blog that all women are into shopping, they like it, and are “clothes horses.”
If you’re a woman who likes sports, maybe you don’t care much about clothing, wearing make-up, or you like to drive sports cars (you don’t fit their pink hued girly ideology), there’s nothing for you on their sites or in their theology.
I find Kassian’s whole quote (in the OP) very dishonest. Complementarians most certainly do present a very narrow view of what it means to be a woman or girl, and then they have the nerve to insist their view on that is the only conservative, biblical and/or godly one. There is no place in their thinking for women or girls who don’t fit their gender box.
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
What really bothers me about his perspective is that he’s likely teaching it to the next generation. If you’re a woman, then you’re only God-honoring purpose is to be a stay-at-home wife and mother. His kids are being raised being told that if they want to be God-honoring individuals, the sons had better support their entire family on solely his paycheck and the daughters had better learn to be efficient home-makers who make do with just one paycheck. A lot of that is cultural more than it is biblical, after all, the proverbs 31 woman used money from her own earnings to buy a field – but that’s not as important as maintaining tradition.
Daisy wrote:
It might be more accurate to say that they never have anything good or nice to say about such women other than that they’re responsible for the ills of society and culture and believe all those mean, nasty feminist lies and perpetuate them by teaching them to the impressionable innocent girls that are the next generation. If only they’d just take God at his word (literally obey the Bible) they would find true lasting happiness and sunshine rainbow gum-drop marriages.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
I’ve mentioned a time or two on older threads that it is, if you stop to think about what complementarians teach about women.
Considering that some complementarians think women are only animals, only derivatives of man, while they argue that the male sex is the full imaging of God in human form.
I don’t see how they reconcile their view that women are essentially just an animal with the Bible’s condemnation of bestiality being sinful.
elastigirl wrote:
Man oh man. What kind of home did Bruce Ware grow up in where he could sass his mother this way? Did he actually ever try telling her that she was a derivative image of God, carried Bruce, gave birth to him, raised him, and voila…Bruce is MADE in the image of God?
@ Daisy:
You made a home run, Daisy, on your post about Ka$$ian and Comp.
Gram3 wrote:
In honor of Ray “Whispering” Ortlund:
Whispering Pines, sung by Johnny Horton
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47O_W-znJIk
@ Jamie Carter:
“Wayne Grudem…kephale…There were 12,000 examples; but he felt it was too large of a sample and ‘too much work’ so he limited the results to just 3,226. He also used teaching assistants and their staff to check the material for him, he didn’t actually look them all up himself on the computer.”
+++++++++++++++
i appreciate the detail of your comment.
it’s very apparent to me that CBMW, TGC, etc. folks all have their ‘Wayne Grudem’ card which they hold up whenever challenged on these kinds of things. They don’t even say much of anything, just hold up the Wayne Grudem card (or so to speak). As if that’s enough to dismiss any challenge.
i like the bumper sticker, “Question Authority”. at the very least, one should vet the authority to which one appeals to. instead of mindlessly hiding behind the name.
@ Ken F:
“I have to say that I am pretty shocked that what I wrote was interpreted in the worst possible way.”
++++++++++++++++
i always appreciate your comments. let me say that i’m quite sure patti was equally shocked that what she wrote was interpreted in the worst possible way.
i, too, was looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the kernel of truth.
@ Gram3:
P.S. I think if Ortlund sees “whispers” of male authority in the Bible, he’s likely mistaken the patriarchal backdrop of the Bible as being God’s intent for the sexes.
As far as that goes,
On Biblical Manhood: A Q&A with Author Carolyn Custis James:
@ elastigirl:
I’ve always loved that bumper sticker!!
@ Deb:
“…women….should dress so that they retain their femininity.”–Tom Schreiner
++++++++++++++
can i wear pants? jeans? what is my femininity? does it require i wear pastels & puffed sleeves?
…i’ll stop now before i gag.
i guess my femininity is whatever Tom Scheiner thinks it is.
how dare tom scheiner dictate to women what femininity is.
Deb wrote:
What does any of that even mean (the part in bold face), and who or what is the final judge and arbiter? Are my cut of jeans, t-shirts and sneakers feminine enough?
This Schreiner guy’s comments shows that Kassian’s quote in the OP is false. Complementarians most definitely do have certain views on how they think women should act, think, dress, and live.
If they did not, Schreiner would not have felt the need to tell women to dress in such a way to keep their femininity.
@ Nancy2:
Ken F wrote: “The first time I heard the definitions from that book I just about puked”
Nancy2 wrote: “I tried to read “Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood” – free download. I made it to chapter 3 before the dry heaves stopped me. I deleted the “scholarly work”.”
+++++++++++++++++
i say make the content of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood as public as possible. it will indict itself & complementarianism by the sheer repulsiveness of it. Let people actually get exposed to its disqualifying nonsense.
Victorious wrote:
In some complementarian families, that means the women can only wear denim jumper / romper dresses that reach to the floor. A totally dowdy look, IMO, but that’s what some of them promote. Being in dowdy or dorky dress = “feminine” in their view.
(Part of me feels bad for writing that. I don’t mean to pick on women who do genuinely dressing in that manner. To each her own. But for me? No, I couldn’t dress like that. I guess choosing of one’s own accord to dress like that is okay, but if you’re being shamed by Quiverfull or complementarians, no.)
elastigirl wrote:
I see the Wayne Grudem card a lot, particularly when it comes to kephale. I listened to a sermon delivered at a mega church on 1 Corinthians 11 a few months ago and the pastor said: “The word ‘head’ it means ‘authority’ lots of scholarship has been done the ancient use of the word ‘head’ and I think it has really shown that the notion of ‘authority’ is here in this word.” To me, “lots of scholarship” is his way of saying “Wayne Grudem said so.” So sometimes it exists in a far more subtle form.
elastigirl wrote:
I must add this to the Pound Sand Ministries (TM) online store and it should be our “official” bumper sticker.
Our “official” cake: GovPappy’s Sour Cream Pound Cake
Our “official” frozen dessert: Gram3’s Sacred Cow Sundae
Sincerely,
Velour, Vice-President of Online Retail
for Pound Sand Ministries (TM), founded right on this blog
Jamie Carter wrote:
But, it certainly gives him loads of ‘plausible deniability,’ doesn’t it?
I ran across the following on Google books:
Beyond Reasonable Doubt
By T. Scott Womble
From the footnotes:
https://books.google.com/books?id=_2FYbmwnAiYC&pg=PA386&lpg=PA386&dq=%22A+Survey+of+2,336+Examples%22&source=bl&ots=ylhYcjeG_D&sig=U2014-GxkSypWosDheM5SVrHRs4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjDnuKBxv7NAhUGOCYKHeBVAmA4ChDoAQgeMAE#v=onepage&q=%22A%20Survey%20of%202%2C336%20Examples%22&f=false
Here is an interesting blog post regarding Grudem’s analysis of the uses of kephale.
https://thejawboneofanass.wordpress.com/2011/09/26/a-bad-answer-is-worse-than-no-answer-kephale-and-authority-1/
@ Ken F:
I figured you meant biological differences but I can see how it could have been misunderstood to mean “truth in comp doctrine”.
Comp doctrine is actually saying that too many people don’t accept the biological differences that they say demands different roles and even a spiritual caste system due to plumbing.
This puts women in an impossible position when it comes to seeking to be more like their “male” Savior. :o)
Jamie Carter wrote:
Wayne Grudem also promotes the Eternal Subordination of the Son (Jesus Christ) to Father God for which he has come under considerable criticism in recent weeks.
If he gets that wrong, what other doctrines has he erroneously taught?
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
I used to be a gender complementarian, and I do, in a way, understand where they are coming from.
Complementarians really, honestly believe that complementarianism (but here’s the key: complementarianism as it’s taught exactly as they view it and believe it), results in a loving husband who would never, ever abuse his wife.
Complementarians really believe in all the male servant-leadership baloney they promote.
They think it’s beautiful to think in terms of a woman submitting to a superhero, Christ-like, Savior, protector and defender husband who only has his wife’s best interests at heart.
The problem is, their notion at the core of male authority over a woman (or women in general) is itself abusive, sexist, and easily open to being exploited, especially by men who are abusive or controlling.
I had to go through some serious stuff in my personal life (my mom’s death triggered a lot of this for me), and I started reevaluating my beliefs, even deeply held beliefs I had going back to when I was a kid.
I’m afraid most of these complementarians, unless they experience a series of life changing events like I did, won’t be able to stop seeing the Bible through their male-hierarchy assumptions and filters and question if the Bible really says what they think it is saying about men, women, and marriage.
They will remain trapped in this loop that they can’t break out of.
@ Deb:
Flowy flowery dresses?
elastigirl wrote:
I have wanted to highlight some of the chapters in that book. Perhaps in the coming weeks I can do so. There's just so much other stuff to cover!
It was a different time in evangelicalism. It was a time when you could go to a church and trust it. You didn’t deal with questionable authority, and people led in love. This was my introduction to Fresno Evangelical Free Church, known today as The Bridge Fresno. This compares the Evangelical Free of then with what exists today.
https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2016/07/18/a-personal-reflection-on-fresno-evangelical-free-church-known-today-as-the-bridge-fresno/
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
Kind of related to that, I brought this up in an older thread.
I read in a book (portions that were published online) that the actress who played June Cleaver on the TV show “Leave It To Beaver” in real life was a mother to 2 or 3 kids.
Every day that she had to film the ‘Leave It To Beaver’ TV show, (which is so revered by people who think women should only be SAHMs), she had to leave her own kids at home with a baby sitter while she went off to her day job of pretending to be married to Ward Cleaver and mother to Beaver and Wally. LOLOLOLOL.
Emily wrote:
Piper said a wife should take it for a season.
You are so right about the spouse abuse being low hanging fruit. These guys are masters at propaganda and hijacking issues.
@ bonnie knox:
Interesting name for a blog. 😉
@ Jamie Carter:
He and Piper did something similar concerning Junia being a man. It is despicable what they try to pass off as scholarship.
Velour wrote:
One of the funniest things I ever read was this marriage counselor describing how his atheist clients differed from the Christian ones. He’d give all his clients homework assignments between counseling sessions.
He said his married atheist clients would go home and do the assignments.
But the Christians would usually NOT do the assignments he gave them but tell him they had read the Bible together, held hands, and prayed about their marriage.
The counselor didn’t come right out and say it, but my impression is that every time the Christian couples did this sort of thing, he wanted to sigh heavily and go pound his head into a brick wall.
@ Jamie Carter:
“I see the Wayne Grudem card a lot, particularly when it comes to kephale. I listened to a sermon delivered at a mega church on 1 Corinthians 11 a few months ago…”
++++++++++++++++++++
are you sure it wasn’t something like,
“The word ‘head’ it means ‘authority’ waynegrudem lots of scholarship…waynegrudem…. in conclusion,–”
you know, case closed. 😐
BL wrote:
That and he lucks out in that nobody has yet decided to go through and check those sources against the latest research and lexicons and see what the uses of kephale really were. One thing that he does fail to understand is how much English predisposes us to understand ‘head’ as authority, from heads of state, to department heads, to head honcho … it’s almost an automatic association. Going as far back as old English, ‘heafod’ also has a definition meaning authority, head-man, chief-head. British English still retains a more common usage of head meaning authority, headmaster, headmistress, headteacher … American English retains that connotation, just not as closely. Whereas Kephale didn’t attain an association with authority until around the middle ages, if I recall correctly, so at the time it was used in Scripture, ‘authority’ is pretty much the one thing it cannot mean.
Gram3 wrote:
I have not read it. Was it in a book?
Jamie Carter wrote:
Yes, that is true on the rare occasions they address childless, childfree, or single women, it’s usually in a negative fashion.
I’ve yet to see many conservative Christians or complementarians realize there are many Christian women out there who wanted to marry but never found the right guy – they are single by circumstance, not by choice.
But many complementarians I’ve seen, if they discuss singleness at all, tend to assume that women intentionally stayed single.
(Of course, there is nothing wrong with wanting to be single by choice, and some people are. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 7 that remaining single is fine with God.)
Velour wrote:
He’s sort of arguing he’s a photocopy of a photocopy and putting himself down in the process, isn’t he? 🙂
Deb wrote:
I read part of it – kinda gave me an itch to cut a couple of holes in a sheet and go to church dressed as a ghost!
Did you notice the referrences after each chapter? Almost all of the writings in that book are based on works done by other men – from the time periods when women were still thought to be inferior to men and were thought of as property.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
Oh my! I’ve been caught in a “senior moment”. I was reading Tom Schreiner, but my mind was confusing the name with John Stackhouse.
So sorry for the confusion!!! Sometimes it’s hard to keep track of who is on what side!!
My bad.
Lydia wrote:
Mennonite dresses, with bonnets.
Nancy2 wrote:
The dresses are for the men, so that they can be *Biblical* men — just like Jesus, who wore a dress and sandals.
@ Velour:
Thank you. It really annoys me how dishonest complementarians are at marketing their product (complementarian), and how they speak out of both sides of their mouths.
They will sometimes deny in some articles that they don’t expect all or most women to be SAHMs-
But look at the 99% of other articles at their same site, and they are all promoting SAHMism, and lambasting secular feminists for supposedly discouraging women from being SAHMs.
Daisy wrote:
Daisy, Besides failing at Logic, they failed in Biology. And of course *Charm School*.
They have none. Pray tell, how did they ever get a date? Married?
I loved what that young woman Tweeted when the Council on Biblical Manhood Womanhood 2016 conference was being held: “They’ve gathered together in one room all of the men that I would NEVER date.”
@ Daisy:
Welcome, Daisy. Maybe Dee and Deb would let you write an article about it some time.
elastigirl wrote:
It’s from an Evangelical Presbyterian Church – their recommended reading list included John Piper, Timothy Keller, and a book called The Doctrines of Grace, so I guess they keep the sermons accessible and try to hook them in the small groups settings. Once sufficiently tenderized, they grill them in the teachings to keep them on the straight and narrow.
Velour wrote:
Shame she didn’t lock them in.
Velour wrote:
Maybe they just paid a bride price.
Nancy2 wrote:
She wasn’t there. Just commenting. It was probably like Chernobyl.
But hey, maybe next year…we could get a group discount and go. Tee hee hee.
Nancy2 wrote:
Probably so.
Lydia wrote:
They dismissed Ruth Tucker’s personal experiences in this area – they say they care about domestic abuse but do not. Their attitudes and actions don’t match their rhetoric.
Aimee Byrd is one of the very few complementarians who seems to understand how bad other complementarians are about this topic:
http://www.alliancenet.org/mos/housewife-theologian/black-and-white-reviews-black-and-blue-complementarianism#.V4VLotQrLGh
Dave (Eagle) wrote:
Can you give us a link to the page? I’ve tried googling around to find the Google Review page for this church but don’t see one.
Nancy2 wrote:
I know this blog, TWW, did a story about this, but I’ve also been to a few other sites where some Christian egalitarian people hang out, and they discuss this stuff.
Every so often, some of the single women will post summaries of conversations they have had with complementarian men who have flirted with them on dating sites, or, they will post portions of these men’s dating profiles (without posting the men’s name or other identifying information) to these sites so others can read them.
Needless to say, these single men on these dating sites talking about how they expect to be the male head authority in a marriage, and they want a Christian wife who will properly submit to him – is laughed at, puked over, or rejected by all the Christian women on these sites.
A lot of Christian women, singles especially, don’t find those sorts of views attractive and have no interest in marrying guys who expect or want these things.
If no women want to marry them, certainly women who don’t subscribe to husband = head boss / wife = submissive doormat philosophy, I don’t know what those comp men seeking mates are going to do…. But learn being happy being single, I guess.
Daisy wrote:
And Ruth Tucker’s former husband, who also abused her, abused their foster child (in a very bad way). The Comps have NO shame.
Mary Ka$$ian…was just unconscionable to gloss over all of it.
Daisy wrote:
Exactly.
Daisy wrote:
It’s too close to selling yourself into slavery. If those guys are that outspoken on a website, imagine how bad (demanding, domineering) they’ll be when the rubber really meets the road!
I am all for complementarianism! As a woman I am going to win big-time when the last become first in heaven! And it seems that there is no controversy over whether Jesus said this.
Irene wrote:
?
Wasn’t Jesus talking about those who were poor and persecuted, who didn’t have the power and riches of this world?
Irene wrote:
Sorry lady. Some slaves and harem girls who were beaten and abused will probably outrank you. And then there’s all of the children who have starved to death in third world countries, low ranking soldiers who’ve died to save the lives of their superiors ….., yeah, the list goes on.
Just a note that Shauna and her son have some pressing needs. Wartburg Watch previously covered the story and their being horribly abused by their church in TX after Billy was victimized.
In the new school term, Billy will start high school.
I think he and his mom have some technology needs, computer, etc. that they can’t afford.
Perhaps some of our good researchers here could start researching those things and we could maybe contribute – later on – for those things?
Here is the GoFundMe campaign for
https://www.gofundme.com/pxs5dk
Also Jeannette Altes has bills too and a GoFundMe on the Open Discussion Board.
Please keep all of these folks in prayer, as well, if you’d be so kind.
Thank you.
@ Nancy2:
That will preach, Nancy2, about Comps and places in Heaven.
I just don’t see Comp promoters like insurance heiress Nancy Leigh Demoss [she got married], Mary Ka$$ian, Dorothy Patterson (Paige’s wife), and the rest of these very elite women who’ve had pretty cushy lives as being “first”. They wouldn’t even know.
Besides, they’ve made the lives of so many women worse by their horrible teachings. They’ve hobbled daughters to horrible positions, to not fulfill their potential. Women and girls depressed.
Comps have made men arrogant. I don’t know how the boys will turn out. Comps harmed The Gospel witness to unbelievers, who know and do better.
They have preached another Gospel, one of bondage. And they have done much damage. They have nothing to brag about. They can never undo the damage they did.
Velour wrote:
It’s beyond bondage, Velour. Their “Gospel” hackneys more than half of the Christian population when it comes to the Great Commission. I’m afraid that for some people, it may mean eternal damnation, just because women’s hands are tied and our mouths a gagged! Lottie Moon would have been branded a heretic in today’s church culture.
Irene wrote:
Jesus was pointing out that the rich, young person would not give up his worldly goods to follow Christ while many who were poor did, or rather, did not put such a high priority on worldly goods like the rich, young man did. So, your rejoicing in being in a second-class position in church isn’t going to translate to greater goods in heaven.
Daisy wrote:
Well, I’m glad these men are being honest. We need to know whom to avoid!
Patriciamc wrote:
Irene thinks she has an ace up her sleeve.
Jamie Carter wrote:
The EPC is one of those denominations where they leave issues like women in the church up to the local congregation. My parents’ church with it’s female associate minister left the PCUSA and joined the EPC. There was no way they were going PCA.
Ken F wrote:
To some women, talk of the differences between men and women is no big deal. I, though, cringe because I’ve seen in print and in person how talk of those differences frequently leads to women receiving the short end of the stick. So, the differences have been used quite a bit to keep women out of power and in subordinate positions where they can’t fully use their gifts and be the person God intended them to be. These differences have never, to my knowledge, been used to hurt men, so yeah, a man probably wouldn’t think that this could be a sensitive topic.
Victorious wrote:
If anyone wants to find a ‘model’ for a Christian marriage, let it be found within the Body of Christ, then, as it was in the early Church:
“From a letter by Tertullian, an Early Church Father, to his wife, ca. 202 A.D.
” How beautiful, then, the marriage of two Christians, two who are one in hope, one in desire, one in the way of life they follow, one in the religion they practice.
They are as brother and sister, both servants of the same Master. Nothing divides them, either in flesh or in Spirit. They are in very truth, two in one flesh; and where there is but one flesh there is also but one spirit.
They pray together, they worship together, they fast together; instructing one another, encouraging one another, strengthening one another.
Side by side they face difficulties and persecution, share their consolations. They have no secrets from one another, they never shun each others company; they never bring sorrow to each others hearts… Psalms and hymns they sing to one another.
Hearing and seeing this, Christ rejoices. To such as these He gives His peace. Where there are two together, there also He is present, and where He is, there evil is not.”
Living on UCT+1 is a blessing and a curse. The latter, because you go to bed and a large number of comments appear while you sleep, so you have to run to catch up. The former, because there’s naebdy else up and about the noo (well… very few folk anyway) and I can comment away!
Nick’s Tuesday Morning Comment 1 of 2
Ken F referred to an element of truth in complementarianism – the element of truth being, of course, that men and women actually do complement one another. Lesley and I, for instance, have complementary skillsets that dovetail really well; we do all of our best work together. In fact, I’d say we make a really strong team. Which of us gets to do the talking (so to speak) in a given setting depends on whose skills are needed.
The dogma of “complementarianism” has gone the way of all legalistic, fundamentalist dogmas which is: take a very wide and liberating truth out of context
suck the life out of it and stuff its corpse into a small tin
keep using its original name/label as if nothing had happened
Think “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”.
Nick’s Tuesday Morning Comment 2 of 2
Well, that didn’t last long. Apparently @ Christiane is up and about.
Morning, Christiane!
Velour wrote:
I was thinking about that ‘pastor’ who brought in his friend who was a pedophile and child porn maker, and told a mother she had no right to stop access to her child . . .
if he said that to me, I would turn into Mama Grizzly for sure
I really think most women WOULD, if they understood the consequence of letting these dangerous leaders call the shots in the lives of their children
Women within these ‘complementarian’ churches need to be informed and empowered … I think they already have within them the ‘mom’ instinct to protect their young from harm
@ Nick Bulbeck:
MORNING, Nick!
What time is it there?
Nick’s Tuesday Morning Comment 3 of 2
As Patriciamc pointed out, discussions of broad differences between men and women have usually ended up with the women paid less, with less influence, less scope and less authority – in fact, less of everything that anybody wants.
There’s no reason why it has to be this way. From time to time, there are calls over here for more women at board-level in British industry on the specific grounds that industry needs certain skills that women are more likely to have. I think there is a lot of truth in this and that the issue is well worth investigating. It has been said, for instance, that a significant driver of the trading-floor culture that in turn drove the financial crisis is, quite literally, testosterone. (This based on measurements of testosterone levels in traders.) And that having a better balance of genders might have led to a less toxic financial sector.
To my mind, it will take some firm and assertive leadership to reclaim “complementary” from the parasitic clutches of C“B”MW and their ilk, and to resist both of the inevitable claims: on the one hand, that this debate will place women in a subordinate role (because it can only be motivated by sexism), and on the other, that the debate should place women in a subordinate role (because it’s “biblical”).
Christiane wrote:
Approaching 11 o’clock; and all’s well.
P.S. That was a really good quote, BTW.
Patriciamc wrote:
They are not just talking about physical differences, are they?. Comps insist there are mental and spiritual differences, too, they lump into the physical differences. A pink and blue Christianity.
Nick’s Tuesday Morning Comment 4 of 2
It was around 10 years ago that I first heard the assertion that “A woman wants to be loved, whereas a man wants to be respected”. I think this is half true, in that
1) A man does want to be respected, and
2) There is a subtle but important difference between “love” and “respect” in this context
Consider the following two quotes from the 4th chapter of John’s gospel account:
And:
The latter is from the NIV; the former is a pile of *****.
But here’s the thing. Large segments of the Church just don’t get the whole idea of “respect”. Each of us is “God’s precious child”, and/or we’re reaching out to a lost, hurting and broken world [of crying, frightened babies]. This is huge and entrenched in the UK. A whole generation of Christians are just tired of being infantilised in church, and if you finally offer respect to half of them, it’s like offering food to the starving: they’ll grab it with both hands, without necessarily stopping to think that the other half might also be starving.
Nick’s Tuesday Morning Comment 5 of 2
Finally:
So, women also need to be respected. Moreover, it’s not only women who can fall in love with being infantilised. I’ll never forget the way a (male) Christian friend used a book in which a woman described her love for her still-born baby as a perfect illustration of why God’s unconditional love was all we needed. As though he (and I) were God’s still-born babies.
This is an unhealthy adult/infant thing that has become corrupted into a male/female thing.
elastigirl wrote:
We know because reasons that it actually doesn’t mean source.
Some variant of that is their answer to any tricksy questions…
Daisy wrote:
Yes. Doesn’t he think it odd that a derivative could produce someone fully human? That’s not how things work.
The God rested and then did a better job interpretation makes far more sense 🙂
Daisy wrote:
She is a woman and Ruth is a woman. They will never listen to either of them for that reason.
Deb wrote:
Thanks so much, Deb. It’s good to have this info. I’ve got a reply cooking for Arnan, but it might take a day or so.
And I do mean “cooking”. His reply to my initial comment has me seething, in a way even his article did not. I might need a bit of time to distill my anger into something coherent. And even then I’ll probably have a lot to say.
(For those who are curious, you may check out: https://wordweld.wordpress.com/2016/07/08/mom-make-up-your-mind/ )
Patriciamc wrote:
I can kind of see both sides of this. I have no problem talking about wide ranging differences, i.e. Propensity of women and men to be better at certain things by small margins, so long as people understand that this probably doesn’t apply to any specific person. If you say something like ‘on avg men score 2 points higher in math’ that doesn’t mean that any particular woman is better or worse at math than any particular man. Because individual training, intelligence etc mean more than wide averages or stereotypes.
Unfortunately, I don’t think most of the comp guys are good enough at basic math to understand this. Add statistics to the list of things they really should be doing a better job teaching at seminary…
(Of course most of their favored stereotypes aren’t even true, so this part doesn’t really apply)
If a complementarian man finds himself being taught by, or under the authority of a woman, he should endure it for a season.
If a complementarian man finds himself being taught by, or under the authority of a woman, I think he should endure it for a season.
Lea wrote:
You have it exactly.
I hate to ask, but could somebody with The Power please delete my comment, currently in mod, of 8:15am? I unwittingly hit two keys at once whilst filling in the “Name” field and, therefore, WordPress decided I was a new commentor.
(Obviously, the above is an attempt to avoid directly saying “I spelt my name wrong”.)
@ Nick Bulbeck:
I wasn’t to your comments when I replied but I really appreciated then.
I think respect is a part of love. A woman who is infantilized by her husband is not truly being loved for herself.
Maybe someone has previously posted and another has answered this question, but why all of the SECRET meetings to come up with definitions and form a group? To me, it seems they were trying to ignite a movement of power and not to simply come together and pray. When you start holding sessions, classes, workshops, conferences, write books and Bible studies on a movement, it then becomes a parachurch in my mind.
@ Nick Bulbeck:
You still want me to delete it? It was a great comment!
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
What gets me is that their idea of a man is simply a coward who can’t handle being an adult.
A real man isn’t threatened by a smart, talented, intelligent woman who is his equal in all things. A real man can handle criticism of their points and take correction, and most importantly, admit when he is wrong. A real man doesn’t avoid subjects that have a lot of grey and try to force everything to line up neatly.
And I would add that a real scholar doesn’t try to make mountains out of molehills, and then base an entire worldview on that.
@ Nick Bulbeck:
Lol!
@ waking up:
I'm not sure the secrecy has ever been addressed to any great extent. I'm surprised Wayne Grudem included these details in his personal reflections.
I’m doing a course on Highbrow, and today this quote came in it. I thought it was appropriate here:
Deb wrote:
That’s very kind of you to say so, but it appears twice!
waking up wrote:
maybe the whole business was intended to shore up the change in the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message, this:
” A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband …”;
but then it took on a life of its own . . .
patriarchy has been around for a long time, and has cultic tendencies with many documented abuses of women and children,
so when the SBC changed it’s stripes to intensify a patriarchal system, I suppose it required all hands on deck to further the cause ….
some people took advantage and ran with it for their own glory, yes
@ Nick Bulbeck:
P.S. I have no idea who “Nick Bulbecki” is. He may be related to the fictitious French mathematician Nicolas Bourbaki; or he may be a pseudonym for Nice Keckbulb. You can never tell…
@ ishy:
Great quote!
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
Too right.
BUWAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA [to be read in the tone of an evil laugh]
ishy wrote:
As a matter of fact, I married her.
@ Nick Bulbeck:
Great comments are definitely worth repeating. 🙂
ishy wrote:
Their idea of a man is apparently afraid of a simple adult conversation with a woman about where to go to dinner or when. This is very, very strange. I don’t know why they can’t seem to see that.
Velour wrote:
Worked for St Mary…
@ Christiane:
Not all Southern Baptist churches have embraced the BFM2000.
Irene wrote:
Comp-POE-mentarianism.
Who knew that women need not even ask Jesus for the same privilege as the Sons of Thunder did, and He’d be obliged to give it to them anyway because of their religious self-obliteration as Daughters of Thunder? A fascinating theology of demand and supply in the economy of God this makes … but not exactly a theology of εἰρήνη/peace.
@ Nick Bulbeck:
Smart guy!
Irene wrote:
Now, if I had said this it would be sarcasm, but I take it you may mean it..If so, I’m not sure that’s exactly the attitude we are supposed to take.
I don’t think Christians are supposed to be running around trying to be ‘first’ in heaven or on earth…only in comment sections 🙂
Nancy2 wrote:
The Fix is In.
Deb wrote:
THIS is good to know! Come to think of it, WADE’s Church has not done it and he is on the forefront of fighting against patriarchal abuses, yes.
I stand corrected, and joyfully so!
@ Lea:
You betcha!
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
Doubtful anyone will help him see other views. He is all about how others should arrange their lives according to his twisted understanding of scripture. Did you notice how he teaches the consequences of the fall as prescriptfve. and my goodness, not even the Cross/resurrection can change it for women in his world.
@ Burwell:
Si!
Deb
Great post!! We’ve been talking about this stuff for years. So glad you got it down!
Deb wrote:
This is true; but some of the leaders of the SBC IMO would love to get everyone in the SBC to sign a document that they agree with all of the 2000 BF&M.
@ waking up:
This struck me too. But then, complementarianism is a caste system, where those with special anointing, knowledge, privilege, get to define the rules. In the end (I believe) it is not even about men and women, but about power and money… and how to keep it in the hands of a few. The men and women issue just happens to be the tool they used to build their empire.
I might be marginally cynical this morning. 🙂
One comment not allowed, and five comments deleted that were off topic.
mot wrote:
Hi MOT,
I know better, but I’m high on pain meds from surgery yesterday morning … please take what I write today with that in mind …
I do know that there is diversity in the SBC, and a lot of it is a healthy diversity,
which, in time, may work to heal some of the problems that seem to be on the rise currently. But I think good will come eventually. Too many good people care too much. And they are staying and they are speaking out.
Lydia wrote:
He CANNOT teach it as ‘prescriptive’ and call himself ‘orthodox’, no.
Lea wrote:
Lea wrote:
Servitude under the guise of servanthood in order to get the goods from Jesus? Surely this is Poe’s Law at work … and not God’s law.
ishy wrote:
Just look at the emotional maturity of men of HONOR in REAL Complementarian societies like the Taliban and Daesh.
Nancy2 wrote:
That is so true, Nancy2.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
Nick, it’s worth repeating! : )
Christiane wrote:
I wish I shared your optimism, but I am confident that the SBC big boys are not flexible about the 2000 BF&M.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Power corrupts. It is not good for men to have too much power over women.
Patriciamc wrote:
True. What sort of creeps me out is I might have found that openness a good thing in my younger years – I was raised to think in traditional gender role terms, so back then, I may have found their dating profiles appealing.
Now that I’m older and my mind has changed and I see the problems with complementarianism, I don’t want to marry some guy who wants to be in authority over me and have me be the subordinate doormat.
Christiane wrote:
Ironically, “orthodoxy” is decided by a select few for others. I have no respect for the word or how it is trotted out to shore up positions from comp to Calvin to you name it. For example, how can “orthodoxy” describe determined and choice?
Well, this may seem like a stretch and it is purely my own thinking, but shouldn’t the “complementarianism” (you know what? my computer is not recognizing that as a real word. Talk about ironic!) view make it really difficult for pastors to constantly move up the ladder?
I’ll explain. In this view of the man being the head of the home (i.e. in charge of all things), when a pastor dumps his 300 member one site church “family” for the thousands member mega/multi-site church “family” complete with Mcmansionesque parsonage, isn’t he sort of leaving his church “family”? It’s always amazing how no one can question the move from one church to another since preachers will usually invoke God’s “will.” How is that God’s will for them, as they interpret it, is always for a larger church with a bigger office and much larger salary? Ever heard of one resigning for a small church in the poorest of neighborhoods? Me neither. I’ve literally heard one pastor tell his church “family” he was leaving how much he loved them and hated leaving and did not want to leave and within 24 hours, had a video up to his new church “family” (much bigger pay, much larger attendance, huge modern facilities) on how much he loved them and couldn’t wait to be with them.
Todays preachers seem very flaky with their church “families.” I read somewhere the average time for them to pastor a church is 3-5 years. The pull to move up the ladder is huge I feel in large part because of the attention the big dawgs garner in the SBC. They get cross conferenced, book signings, lots of special speaking engagements, retweeted and reshaped on social media, news interviews, and top leadership positions in denominational groups and sub-groups. I think it tears up the “family.”
On another note, if they would change their ideas from “complEmentarianism” to “COMPLIMENTARIANISM” I think we would all win on that one. Yes, think about it. We could all meet in the open and discuss a movement where we issue compliments to one another.
Deb wrote:
It suprised me that he has openly admitted that their work permanently placing women in second class status was cooked up in secrecy, under the cloak of darkness over a period of several years. Makes it sound like the evil it is, rather KKKish.
Lydia wrote:
I define ‘orthodoxy’ by the early Councils of the Church. But I have seen how the word ‘orthodox’ has been thrown around and applied in ‘other’ directions, none of them in sync with the early Creeds and Councils, and this is something I cannot respect, no.
Nancy2 wrote:
I’d like to think she was joking, not being serious.
mot wrote:
I’m Catholic. I have to be optimistic. 🙂
Ken F wrote:
FW Rez wrote:
I have heard this explanation before as well – the problem is that a crown is an object that is primarily associated with being worn on the head. A head is has no such automatic connotations to the crown. Women are too often defined by their relationship to men, rather than their relationship to God. (And equal creation and an equal image bearer – distinct and complete in and of themselves.)
I have also heard the celebratory language of woman as God’s ‘improved version’ – but this also belies the Ezer-Kenegdo language of Genesis – as a ‘Strength – Equal-To.’
Also, there is very little practical difference between being limited in your capacity due to either being ‘lesser than’ or to being ‘greater than.’ Both statuses deny women the agency to obey the calling of the Holy Spirit.
@ Velour:
Egalitarian Marg M. (I’m not sure how to spell her last name, I don’t feel like looking it up at the moment), who has a fantastic blog defending egalitarianism, was upset with one of Deb and Dee’s recent posts about Kassian. (I saw some of her Tweets to Dee on Twitter about it.)
She felt their post about Kassian was too harsh (I think it was the second post about Kassian). I was really surprised by that. Marg did say it may be a cultural thing she isn’t understanding (she is Aussie, I believe).
If you spend any time reading American complementarian literature and blogs and reading how complementarianism has impacted women who had to divorce abusive complementarian husbands…
You see how insensitive or indifferent complementarians are to domestic violence and other issues women face, and you come to see how complementarian itself feeds sexism and violence against women.
I think Kassian is part of that whole thing. I believed her book review of Tucker’s book was more about protecting the complementarian position than in speaking out against domestic violence.
Kassian is helping to uphold the system (complementarianism) that keeps women in bondage. So I’m having a difficult time seeing Deb and Dee’s last post about Kassian to be way out of line.
I did send Marg this link (by a complementarian, one of the few who seems to grasp the problems in complementarianism), and told her this might help her understand:
Black and White Reviews, Black and Blue Complementarianism
http://www.alliancenet.org/mos/housewife-theologian/black-and-white-reviews-black-and-blue-complementarianism#.V444r9QrLGi
Christiane wrote:
Christiane, the SBC looks a little different for those of us who see it from the inside.
When we hear preachers preach on Eph. 5. …. when we hear men repeatly say that women should not be allowed to teach men …… when women are not allowed to speak in business meetings ….. when women have to go to their little segregated “women’s classes” if we expect to be allowed to comment or ask questions in SS class discussions ….. when some men rant about how wrong it is for a woman to teach adolescent boys or be the church treasurer (just because a man won’t step up and assume his God ordained responsibility) ….. when church deacons repeatedly make jokes about women drivers …….. when SS teachers in the adult married classes go on “Jezebel” rants in class …..
There’s more. And yes, it’s happening now, on a regular basis.
waking up wrote:
We need to have some secret meetings first , then draw up an official document, which we will present at a big conference. During the secret meetings, we’ll all compliment each other with official titles, just so we can present a unifed force.
See this site for some good titles (a little inappropriate language): http://www.imediaconnection.com/articles/ported-articles/red-dot-articles/2012/aug/the-most-meaningless-and-hilarious-job-titles-on-linkedin/
Daisy wrote:
Bottom line. …. you grew up, and outgrew that nonsense. Scary that so many women buy into that nonsense and choose to be forever children.
Nancy2 wrote:
The saddest thing is that I wanted to agree with Christiane a little bit, but I’ve seen nearly all of these situations.
Patriciamc wrote:
All very true. The differences cited are normally given as rationales as to why women cannot, or should not, do X, Y, or Z – to bar women from certain positions or tasks that men want all for themselves.
Other than obvious biological differences – men grow five o’clock shadow, women have fallopian tubes and so on – I’m having a hard time seeing how men and women are all that different.
I sometimes see Christian complementarians write posts telling men how to be “biblical men,” or explaining how men are different from women. Most often, though, their lists of ‘manly man’ or ‘biblical manhood’ traits can also apply to women.
For example, such a complementarian post might say the Bible calls men to be tough, assertive, and brave.
First of all, some of these traits might be more cultural and read back into the Bible than they are purely “biblical.”
Secondly, such traits can equally apply to women – women can also be tough, assertive, brave – but are often penalized by American culture for being so.
Next, complementarians tend to define ‘biblical woman’ in cultural terms (but they think this stuff is in the Bible), so they expect all women to be nurturing, love babies, wear pink, and enjoy using hot glue guns to make frou frou artsy craftsy projects.
Problem is, not all women are interested in that stuff or are any good at it.
I’m not too into making craftsy stuff with paste and construction paper. I am more maternal towards baby dogs and cats than baby humans. I don’t like the color pink. Any compassion and nurturing I may have is buried under layers of crankiness.
I do not fit the complementarian notion of femininity / biblical womanhood. And it’s just the way I am, I’m not being this way on purpose.
There was a study that came out this year or last showing that there is no such thing as a male brain or female brain.
Male and female brain? Research says they’re unisex It’s unisex
http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/health/sc-male-female-brain-health-1201-20151201-story.html
Nancy2 wrote:
OK, but only for a season.
Daisy wrote:
I thought she came off as exceptionally mean spirited and snippy in that review. Even without all the comp background, I would have thought poorly of her after that.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
😯 That is really weird. 😯
@ Lea:
You’re probably right about that. You might think that having a daughter might open some of the male complementarian eyes to problems with comp, but apparently not. I guess they want their daughters to be limited and treated like chattel.
Nancy2 wrote:
Hi NANCY TWO,
these men demean themselves … but it cannot last as long as some in the Church are willing to confront them and to be there to support victims of abuse
I have to be confident that good will come, because of the good people who remain, and don’t give up. It doesn’t take many, when good folks step up and speak out for right to be done. Don’t be discouraged.
” All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well’
(Julian of Norwich)
Christiane wrote:
The Southern Baptist “ship” is being steered onto the rocks by the patriarchial/Comp espousing NeoCalvinists. 200,000 living members are leaving the SBC every year because they are so fed up with these teachings. The Southern Baptists now have the distinction of having the highest divorce rate of ANY denomination in the nation (Barna study) at a time when the nation’s divorce rate has been going down. Even Atheists can do a better job of keeping their marriages together (Barna study) than Southern Baptists.
The NeoCalvinist “captians” of this “ship” should be courtmartialed.
ishy wrote:
All this nonsense is happening right now and the leaders would rather people just leave and they are–200,000 a year. The money in the SBC will eventually dry up.
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
I’m just now taking a glance at that guy’s blog post. I don’t have time right now to take it all apart.
About this quote of his on the page:
Other than a percentage of far, far left wing, extremist secular feminists, I don’t know of anyone who is teaching what he says culture is teaching.
Most women today are single and have to hold a job to pay rent and other bills. Some of these women want to marry, but are unable to find a mate.
Most feminists (even left wing secular ones) are about choice. They aren’t all saying that the only way a woman should live or find happiness is to ditch marriage and motherhood, but that women should be given a choice on whether they want to be mothers, be married, or hold jobs.
The guy who wrote that post (based on what little I’ve read of it so far) is like a lot of other Christians I come across – they are blind to the realities that women face and live out.
Life doesn’t always turn out like we hope and plan. I was raised by traditional Christian parents with the expectation I would one day marry, have a kid, and be Susie Homemaker (which is what your Blog Guy is advocating all women do).
Guess what? My life didn’t turn out that way.
I had wanted to marry, couldn’t find the right guy, so I’m still single. (Now, I don’t have a desire to be married to a guy who fancies himself my ‘authority,’ no. But I’m pretty much okay with the idea of marriage.)
But guys like the Blog Guy you linked us to would likely assume since I’ve never married over the age of 35, I must be a….
Man-hating, liberal, career- obsessed, abortion- supporting, bra- burning, feminist. In reality, I had wanted to marry, didn’t worship career, am conservative, pro- life, don’t hate men, and I don’t burn my bras.
Guys like him cast aspersions and make assumptions about ALL women. He does not give women like me the freedom to live my life the way it is without judging it or condemning it.
Does that Blog Guy realize that the Bible says in 1 Corinthians it is better to stay single (and therefore remain childless)? The Bible does not command women to marry and have children and be SAHMs.
The New Testament allows them to choose their own path in life, whether that is marrying, or staying single, or being a SAHM, or having a career (or being a mother AND holding a career).
Blog Guy is the one wanting to box women in, not the left wing secular feminists he’s appalled by.
Daisy wrote:
It could be a cultural thing, you’re right. I know Marg via Twitter.
Maybe Marg hasn’t gotten the full brunt of this Comp nonsense where she’s living.
I lived through the insufferable Comp teachings at my ex-NeoCalvinist/9Marxist/John MacArthur-ite church. I watched it degrade grown women, daughters, destroy marriages, families, friendships. It has driven people from the faith. It has driven children from the faith. It is – rightly – condemned by unbelievers who see it for what it is and its abuses and would never sign up for it.
I couldn’t even comment on Tim Fall’s blog recently, because some guy over there was calmly defending it and Bruce Ware. And I was so angry. So angry at all of the lives I witnessed damaged by it.
I had to stop commenting, stop reading, and go have a good cry.
So many young couples at my ex-church (including Stanford University students) who may have had a fighting chance at a good marriage, won’t under the burden and lies of Comp.
Very informative, Deb. I’m looking forward to part two.
In answer to Grudem and Piper’s book, Susanna Krizo wrote “Recovering from Unbiblical Manhood and Womanhood: a response to evangelical patriarchy” which I reviewed in the post Don’t Lose Your Head Over Doctrine.
P.S. I linked your post at the BCE Facebook page.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
LOL. 🙂
Daisy wrote:
I’d like to see that man work a day in my shoes when I taught in the inner-city. I’d give him two hours. What a creep!
Lea wrote:
And that is definitely one of the outcomes of complementarianism: women are taught to act like children, and men to view them as such.
I read a letter to Dear Abby or Ann Landers years ago. I don’t know if the letter writer was Christian or not, but he said his marriage was driving him nuts.
I think he may have been in his 30s, his wife too. He said he would get phone calls from his wife all day while he was at his office job. She seemed unable to take care of even the most simple problems on her own, or to make choices.
I don’t remember his exact words, but the guy basically said it was exhausting being married to an adult who was like a child.
He felt like her parent. He resented the 100 phone calls per day of her asking him how to solve some problem or another.
Other than controlling abusers, I can’t think of why any man would want to marry a woman who is basically a helpless toddler. It would be draining.
My ex? I was like his mother figure. He felt like my son. I was regularly having to help him fix problems in his life (some financial). I came to resent it. I felt more like his Mom than a romantic partner, and the dip stick never helped me with my problems. I had to carry his and mine. It’s no way to live.
Christiane wrote:
You’re absolutely right that most mothers would turn into a Mama Grizzly to protect their children. However, women in the Comp system are cowed many times. It is cultic and controlling.
The reality is what what the pastors/elders at my former church said that mothers were required to do – not protect their children – is a crime in my state (CA) that can be prosecuted as a misdemeanor or a felony. In this type of case, the risk to the child is so great that the district attorney would most likely prosecute it as a felony (Child Endangerment, Neglect, Abuse, etc.). A mother who “obeys” these pastors/elders and their criminal advice is NOT off the legal hook and she can land in jail or state prison for it.
Additionally, the pastors/elders can be arrested and prosecuted for telling mothers to violate the law and face the same criminal penalties. The pastors/elders can end up in jail or state prison.
And these crimes in CA are “strikes”, if they are charged as felonies. That means after the 1st strike if a person is prosecuted for another felony by law they get double the sentence. And if they are prosecuted for a third felony, it’s an automatic 25 years to life.
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
Wow. I couldn’t even read that guys drivel!
I did catch: “The worst fate a woman can suffer, says the world, is to be relegated to the home-to be kept home slaving while their husbands enjoy the glamorous, fulfilling, paid jobs that are the highlight of being a human being. ”
What world is he living in? I think many women would LOVE to stay home with their kids, but financially it isn’t in the cards. He’s a jerk, judging people without knowing what goes on.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
It sounds like an Italian name. Reminds me of….
Arthur Fonzarelli
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQc9L2RbQkw
Velour wrote:
It is easy for them to be calm. It does not affect them in the slightest.
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
My response to you is stuck, but I like what you said. His response is mean. Judgmental. Uninformed. I can’t even make it through what he said and he will never hear you.
Christiane wrote:
Again, a few select men deciding for others what is orthodox. Why not Jesus Christ? Isn’t seeking His truth what it is all about for each person?
Lea wrote:
The Absurd Legalism of Gender Roles, Exhibit D: ‘Biblical’ Manipulation
http://rachelheldevans.com/blog/absurd-legalism-gender-roles-submission-piper
Christiane wrote:
Or unloading trucks on the night shift at Walmart, or cutting and housing tobacco, or fixing barbed wire fences alone down in the creek bottoms at dusk with a fox barking not so far away ……
I’ve down a lot of “manly” work, oftentimes not so much by choice, but by necessity.
Health problems prevent me from doing a lot of things I use to do, but I still do what I can. I really irks some of the men at church to know that I am still such a tomboy. Those men avoid me. They will shake hands with my husband and talk to him, then walk past me as if I am not there.
A few years ago, my husband was a business trip to Alabama when his truck broke down. He called me, and I drove from Kentucky to central Alabama in the middle of the night to get him. It was a Sat. night, so I missed church the next day. When some people at church found out about it, the said I should have called another man to go get my husband! I snorted.
Nancy2 wrote:
That is appalling, Nancy2. These guys need to be sent to *Charm School* en masse.
Nancy2 wrote:
These people are nuts.
ishy wrote:
Titles like “Commander of Great Feathers” from The Airplane Game?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airplane_game
(Not mentioned in the Wiki summary, but when the Game was faltering, those near the top of the list started awarding themselves grandiose titles.)
Lea wrote:
Oh! You should start calling them everytime something ‘manly’ needs to be done. Morning noon and night.
Daisy wrote:
In an Age of Extremes like today, you never can tell.
Only rule-of-thumb is the more over-the-top the claim is, the more likely you’ve got a Dead Serious True Believer.
Lea wrote:
See also (this can apply to complementarianism also):
How Quiverfull Speech Can Crash Airplanes
https://taylorjoyrecovers.wordpress.com/2014/04/02/quiverfullspeechcrashesairplanes/
There was also a news article called “Korean culture may offer clues in Asiana crash” (via CNBC) which points out problems with the sort of indirect communication styles complementarians ask women to follow when talking to men.
A snippet or two from the CNBC page:
The end result is that if the lower ranking pilot sees a problem with the plane, he won’t tell the higher ranking problem (or can only offer vague hints to the lead pilot something may be wrong), because to be really direct and blunt is considered disrespectful in that culture.
Which some sources say can lead to plane crashes.
And John Piper wants all American wives to behave like that- be indirect with men.
Lydia wrote:
Used to be at CBMW. Kostenberger has the same view, and I think their articles were the basis for their book about women in the church.
@ Formerly known as Elizabeth – not the shaming Elizabeth:
Totally understand. Schreiner did change from Amil to non-Dispensational PreMill some years ago, but I cannot remember the rationale for his change.
Lydia wrote:
Well, in the early Church, people were working out ‘Who Christ was’ and the formal doctrine of the Holy Trinity;
as well as fighting all the early heresies that attacked so much of what the Apostles had preserved and handed down.
I do believe much of the current trouble in the SBC is that Our Lord was kicked to the curb as the ‘lens’ through which Scripture is to be intepreted.
But when the neo-Cals began the work of ESS, trying to attack the concept of ‘Who Christ was’ and His place within and of the Holy Trinity, then they committed a great work of heresy that departed from the classic orthodox teachings of the early Church.
Christocentric, red-letter Christianity, and a constant recognition of Jesus Christ as ‘Kyrios’, Lord of the Cosmos are ALL ways to keep on course and you can see the effects quickly of what happens when people forget that Our Lord spoke and acted in the very Person of God. I think the Councils and Creeds did help avoid an initial chaos, and they also clarified the ‘canon’ …. not all the work of the early Church went for nothing, Lydia. That is my thinking.
Irene wrote:
Irony by Irene?
Daisy wrote:
It’s perhaps not as weird as I made it sound. I don’t think, for instance, he actually thought we’re all Mummy God’s stillborn babies. By temperament, he’s much more gooey-hearted and less cold-headed than I am, but he’s decent and honest with it and I can certainly vouch for the fact that he’s no fruitcake. It’s probably more a case of, he wasn’t really thinking clearly.
So: he has a job, and a reasonably prominent one at that. He works for a living, accomplishes things, and derives a great deal of benefit from that – if you will, God feeds and blesses him through this job/career. But he doesn’t associate “secular work” with the Presence_Of_God – that comes in a time of worship or similar, emotionally-arousing religious encounter. So he simply doesn’t realise how much of his innate need for God is actually fulfilled in the workplace. As per Jesus’ statement I quoted above, which begins, My food is to do…[stuff] .
All of this is terribly clear in my head! I hope I’ve explained myself…
Now; he reads this book. And it’s a very heartstring-tugging book; as such, it presses the emotional buttons that he’s come to regard as “spiritual”.
“On October 10, 1994, we received a letter from them saying that their board had considered it, and they would not join with us in the joint statement opposing abuse. I was shocked and disappointed when the letter came. I wondered then if their highest goal in this issue was to be faithful to Scripture above all and stop the horrors of abuse, or was to promote the egalitarian agenda. We ended up publishing the statement ourselves in CBMW NEWS (later renamed The Journal for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood).”
Unbelievable. How stupid do they think their readers are? This, (and other aspects of their history as discussed today) are filled with shameless martyrdom: “Oh, we tried to do the Lord’s work, but the evil heathen staff at CT tried to shut us down,” and, “Can’t you see how we tried to stop the abuse of poor, weaker vessels but those nasty wasty egalitarians refused to help us because they don’t care about women like we care about women.”
Yikes. And don’t get me started on Kassian and that whole trial business (and she still has the nerve to play the “I as a complementarian woman are superior to egalitarian women because I am making my Heavenly Father proud with my submissive and respectful behavior.)
Lea wrote:
So very true.
Lea wrote:
You know, nuts is often used as a slang word for something else …. Which makes your response very gender appropriate, given the church dynamics.
Christiane wrote:
I Think NT Wright was spot on when he said each generation needs to seek the historical Jesus. Perhaps such a thing would have prevented the Euro blond Gentile Jesus from becoming the norm for over a Millenia.
Reading the church fathers is interesting but usually leads to people debating their understanding and their interpretations. Some of it was very political. I believe the holy spirit gives us the ability to understand Jesus Christ in depth if we seek His truth.
1st John actually touches on this.
Nancy2 wrote:
I fear if I responded in detail to this comment I would go a wee bit more tacky than this blog allows…
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
I went back and read his comments. I think he was taking out some of his frustration with me on you. I think that for so many of them, they consider themselves to be living in God’s ideal and perfect will that anybody who disagrees with them about their interpretation is in rebellion.
It reminds me of another post that didn’t leave room for comments where it’s OP was talking about how it irked him that women would dare to hyphenate their last names, it was going against God’s teaching about being one flesh and having one name. I thought: “How culturally unaware you are, don’t you know that in quite a few cultures last names don’t change even upon marriage?” The worst thing is the havoc that complementarianism wreaks in countries that aren’t tempered by the same rights that holds complementarians back. It takes what’s already there and enshrines it as gospel truth; it does not change anything for the better.
Gram3 wrote:
Or Dead Serious True Believer.
Or Properly Domesticated Animal.
Gram3 wrote:
That was my take but you never know
Jamie Carter wrote:
Even the guys wife apparently told him he sounded mean towards women who couldn’t afford to stay home, although she told him in a submissive enough way I guess. But seriously. Catch a clue.
Lea wrote:
Not calm. COLD.
The Calm Rational Coldness of the Intellectual Psychopath.
Gram3 wrote:
Is he the same guy that said he rejected the eternal subordination of women when his father died and his mother remarried?
Daisy wrote:
Something similar came up in a Left Behind snark thread on Slacktivist years ago, regarding the supporting character Chloe (who after she Says the Magic Altar Call Words loses all personality except for “What is Thy will, My Lord Husband? How might I better Submit?”).
My response was we were heading into hard times where you need a partner who’s got your back, and in such a situation Widdle Chwisitian Wifey is a liability who can get you both killed.
How about Closet Pedo? Because though she’s “basically a helpless toddler”, she’s an above-age-of-consent helpless toddler With Benefits (nudge nudge wink wink known what I mean know what I mean…)
@ Lydia:
Sadly, many church fathers had very bad things to say about women which leads me to question their overall understanding on more.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Yes, exactly. If you can calmly read a story of violence against a woman like Ruth Tucker and COLDLY say that people should not read the book, because they might get the wrong idea about theology, you are treading very close to that, aren’t you?
You should be ANGRY as Christians when you find someone is being mistreated! You should especially be angry if someone is using your words and theology to do so. The reaction of these men tells us everything we need to know about them. Their theology is a cold and unfeeling. It is not of Jesus, who wept and told us to love one another.
Jamie Carter wrote:
God is SOOOOOO lucky to have them…
What would He ever do without them?
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
That sounds pretty entertaining, only I didn’t read any of the books so maybe I would miss the jokes.
Lydia wrote:
I think if people want to read the Fathers, they should be aware that there are some spurious documents out there and if they don’t know which ones, they can get into difficulty. I agree about ‘political’ and its harm to the Body of Christ. Some of the earlier writings of the Doctors of the Church are not accepted now, but the Doctors are recognized solely on the basis of certain specific contributions to the Church. It’s complicated.
@ Sam:
It is a good thing CBE stayed away! Look at how CBMW has positioned what is abuse or not, divorce being verboten and the “derivative” status of women. Yikes!
Lydia wrote:
Somebody clearly smelled a setup. CBMW needed CBE. CBE didn’t need them!
Christiane wrote:
It does not need to be. It is good to gain understanding of that particular time. But they are not Jesus. Neither is Paul. :o)
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Our Great Pyrenees is a rescue dog – “big time”. (Our vet says he is definitely a purebred GP). He was abandoned down in the creek bottoms in the winter time (early 2008) about 2 miles from our house when he was about 6 months old. We took him in when he finally made it up to our hayfield. He had been beaten – he was afraid of drop cords, flyswatters, BBQ tools, etc. He was especially afraid of children.
He’s back at the end of our hallway enjoying the air conditioner today, and he ain afraid o’ nuthin! He will head-butt my youngest niece to get her to pet him more, more, more!
He won “big time”, and he is much loved, but he’s still a dawg!
(Tee hee. He is also very big, and much feared by strangers. Out here, that’s a good thang!)
So, a question keeps nagging at me.
If women are supposed to recede into the shadows in utter self-abasement, then what do these Comp guys make of Mary’s statement, “Henceforth all generations will call me blessed”? In fact, what do they make of the entire Magnificat? It’s one bold, stirring statement after another!
Also, what do they make of Mary’s instruction to the servants at the Wedding at Cana: “Do whatever He tells you”? Is this not an example of a woman teaching and instructing MEN? And it’s in the Bible, yet. How do they explain it away?
Lea wrote:
Like what happened a week and a half ago, when I was visiting my writing partner (the burned-out preacher) on the East Coast. It was late at night in his church office, and I was showing him several blogs on the Web (including this one).
Well, I showed him the Christian “beatingware” alert from Homeschoolers Anonymous ( https://homeschoolersanonymous.org/2016/05/20/that-christian-man-selling-child-training-whips-is-back/ ) and the temperature in the room dropped twenty degrees like the church spook was doing its thing. When he got to the part about how this was sold at homeschool convention dealer’s rooms (he homeschools; the public schools in his area are some of the WORST in his state), he exploded.
“If I ran across anything like THAT at a Homeschooler’s Convention, you would have seen me in the news. Because I would have taken that and USED IT ON THEM until the cops dragged me off.”
You see, my writing partner has an unofficial second ministry Internet- and Phone-Counseling Furry Fans — many of whom came out of seriously-abusive homes and obsessed on FURRY as a survival mechanism. He’s had to patch up the damage.
Loosely related – but something of interest – NPR interviewed Joshua Harris on his book about a week ago. It seems to not have gotten a lot of attention.
http://www.npr.org/2016/07/10/485432485/former-evangelical-pastor-rethinks-his-approach-to-courtship#
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
They go more into Mariolatry than a Baysider?
Until a RL mortal woman is rancid dung compared to the Supernatural Ideal?
Irene wrote:
Not according to complementarianism’s corollary: ESS.
Jamie Carter wrote:
I don’t have time to listen to it right now. If you listened to the interview, would you please so kind as to nutshell what he said.
Thank you.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
Mary is important insofar as she is the mother that nurtured Jesus as a child. Jesus humors her on several occasions because he’s that kind of a guy; but the Magnificat and other Mary-centric events in Scripture are usually downplayed. It’s not that dissimilar from what john the Baptist said, “I must decrease so that he can increase.” Mary is decreased in order to increase Jesus’s status and importance.
Lydia wrote:
This is a fairly good reference for the early writings
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/
I have seen some of St. Paul’s writings interpreted in a way that definitely clashes with the teachings and example of Our Lord,
and I think this is NOT what St. Paul would have wanted.
I would never say that St. Paul’s words had the same weight in Scripture as the words of Our Lord. And the teachings of St. Paul can never be seen in any light other than the light of Christ’s example while He was here among us.
Lydia wrote:
Oh, I’m under no illusions about changing Arnan’s mind. But in his response to me, he said straight up that my mother ought to be ashamed of herself for daring to work and raise a family at the same time. Believing the world’s lies and shaking her fist at God, as he put it.
I refuse to simply let that stand. I will say something not just for her sake, but for the sake of anyone who might read his drivel. My plan is to tell him exactly who is being deceitful, and whose behaviour I find shameful. It’s gonna be a doozy.
And if it somehow disappears into the aether, I’ll be sure to share it here.
@ Velour:
He says that he regrets that people used I Kissed Dating Goodbye as a rule book – he meant it to be speculative and obviously people took it too literally. He’s sorry that people were hurt as a result, but he hasn’t gone back through it to say “I was wrong about this …”
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Just so. I’d like to be Marketing Supreme Ninja. Or the Nap Room Technician.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
In my limited experience, SBC churches say very, very little about Mary.
Although they have much to say about Eve and Sarah, Mary and Martha are usually only mentioned in relation to Lazarus. Not much said about Ruth and Esther, either. Deborah, Jael, Miriam, and Zipporah are definitely off limits!
@ FW Rez:
Also, my daughter’s ex-boyfriend from SGM was taught that women are put on pedestals in comp theology. My daughter told him she didn’t want to be on a pedestal. I think that idea also contributes to abuse as boys can resent the girls for being on the pedestals. So sorry Irene, they’ve already got all angles covered to keep you in your place for eternity.
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
These guys seem to believe that it is better to let children do without or starve to death, than for a mother to work. “Hey woman! Just keep rinsing the soap bubbles. God will provide, if he wills it!”
I was a SAHM until our daughter was 2yo. I got tired of having 17 cents left in the bank account at the end of the month and worrying about what we were going to do the next time our daughter got an ear infection, etc. so, I went to work. Good thing, too, because my 1st husband died in an auto accident when our daughter was 6 yo. How would we have paid for his funeral and survived if I hadn’t had a job?
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
Yes, please. What if my mom had no education or skills as my dad got very sick and died during my tweens. Of course my parents never subscribed to that thinking anyway.
Of course his wife might be changing his Depends one day, too. :o)
@ Victorious:
I love this list. This is exactly my point in the distortion “gender roles” bring to scripture. All of these are disregarded in order to push gender roles.
Nancy2 wrote:
How awful!
That does remind me of something in general. All of their systems seem to be designed around ‘best case scenario’. No divorce, Wife home with the kids/single income family, having lots of kids…these things all make things harder if anything happens. And they kind of have no answer for what to do in life when things get difficult!
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
I have no idea how you do not know this, but Baptists rarely mention that Jesus had a mother except when they can’t avoid it at Christmas, and they think that the Catholic Marian Dogmas are or are close to idolatry. They think that Jesus said that people ought not to think all that highly of Mary based on what he said to the woman who tried to say that blessed are the womb that bore you and breasts that you sucked. Usually they do not think that his response meant that Jesus was saying that Mary was among those who do the will of the Father and therefore would be called blessed, but rather that he disavowed veneration of Mary.
IMO that many Baptists are more versed in why they do not venerate Mary than they actually know about the woman herself.
@ Christiane:
I gently challenged a youth worker to drop all the study materials that they inundate the youth with and focus discussion on Jesus’ words in the Gospels for several years and see what happens.
Of course it doesn’t work that way. Quote everyone but Jesus. At least give him equal time. :o)
Domestic violence is clearly where complementarians are most vulnerable. It is a huge issue (and crisis) in marriages today and they have no response that doesn’t impinge upon their doctrine of male headship.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
Yes. None at all.
Huge problem, that.
@ Ken F:
I didn’t mean to be snarky when I asked for details. Many possible thoughts about what you (Ken H) might consider an element of truth went through my head. But the simple differences between men and women was not among them. All I was trying to convey was that an initial statement had hooked me to read the comment but then it did not explain the statement, therefore I was still interested in your view.
I am sympathetic to soft comps because I consider that I was one for a while because I was only 99.9 percent confident in my egalitarian interpretation from the Bible as I thought an element of truth might be that sometimes kephale can sort of mean being responsible for something. Something just always felt off about my .1 percent that I gave my husband for some sort of final say like I owned just 49 percent of the marital stock. But the day my daughter called me to find out where the Bible tells men to lead women because her comp boyfriend couldn’t find it, I became 100 percent sure that the Bible is fully egalitarian.
As far as differences between men and women, the only biblical references I can find are that women can have babies and menstruate and men cannot. So seriously, what element of Biblical truth does complementarian doctrine start out with? Nature itself shows that the physical differences are necessary to reproduce.
On the lack of a common statement on abuse, I think it gets into the definition of spouse abuse. As an egal, I think that male supremacy ideas facilitate abuse. So I think the hangup was in the definition of what constitutes abuse.
Daisy wrote:
If it was the second post, then that’s the one I wrote.
The only thing I would change about that post is I would make my words even HARSHER!
elastigirl wrote:
Yes, a lot of roads lead back to this one man, Wayne Grudem. In writing his philosophy into a (so-called) systematic theology, he has legitimized all manner of error. If you are going to a church and you hear Grudem being referred to as an authority, beware.
okrapod wrote:
LOL!! Good point!
Oh, I do know that Baptists downplay Mary. But how can they get away from the fact that the Magnificat is in the Bible? Or that Mary instructed *men* (gasp!!) at Cana?
For that matter, how do they explain away Deborah, one the judges of Israel?
Jamie Carter wrote:
Ok, thanks for nutshelling the interview for me.
Also, thank you for your other insightful posts. I have learned so much. I appreciate the time you take on them, research. Ditto for Gram3’s, Lydia’s, Max’s, Daisy’s, Ken F’s, and many others. You people have taught me so much and deprogrammed me from so much drivel.
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
So does he think that every family won the Powerball lotto? Bills paid for, food on the table?
The reality is that throughout time, including now, the majority of women have worked (farms, etc.).
Deb wrote:
Go Deb!
I just referred a young woman over to this blog, whose best friend is in a Comp church and a horrible marriage, with all of that mind-control stuff. I said that you ladies write the most awesome articles and the posters here have so much experience and insight as well.
She was relieved and is going to check it out.
Ruth Tucker wrote:
My (now deceased) grandmother who was university educated married another man from university, whom all of her friends and her friends’ parents hated and begged her not to marry him.
My grandfather was a batterer and an incredibly abusive person to many in our family. He had an upstanding job. Because of the times and society, my grandmother did not leave. She could not.
So she walked on egg shells.
And not only did she pay the price but so did generations of our family, the children.
While visiting my grandmother’s home as a young woman, to pay her a visit, my grandfather savagely beat me with a cast iron fry pan over the head. I hadn’t “confessed” to spilling salt on the stove top, which my grandmother had spilt while making soup. My grandmother was legally blind. I had cheerfully responded that I would wipe it up. But he wanted “a confession”. And as I proceeded to wipe up the salt with a sponge, he rained down blows on my head.
He could have killed me.
These people are nuts who promote Comp and its abuses.
I’ve seen story after story on Twitter of adult children (Christians) who said if their moms hadn’t gotten out of abusive marriages, the whole family would have been killed.
Thank goodness for all of the shelters run by unbelievers who know what they’re doing.
A quotation used in the OP: “People would write us saying, ‘I wept when I saw your ad. I didn’t know that people held this any more.'”
People are still weeping.
Velour wrote:
And comp men would say she was not submitting enough!!! They have no idea what they are talking about. They are just trying to save their pet theories because they keep them in charge.
Men supposedly need respect? I have NONE for them!
@ Velour:
Things are about to ratchet up from my end. I have absolutely had it with this controlling group!
Look for quite a few more posts exposing them to unsuspecting Christians. I'm just getting started…
Velour wrote:
“Question Kephale” !
Lydia wrote:
http://www.myculottes.com/
http://1611skirts.com/
😉
siteseer wrote:
Excellent bumper sticker!
Victorious wrote:
It is amazing that with so much guidance on how we should relate to each other that CBWM thought it necessary to build an organization around a few narrowly interpreted passages. Perhaps they saw a market for selling books and hosting conferences?
Deb wrote:
You go, Deb!
I’m sick of them too. I’ve written my own mini-version of my ex-church on YELP review, a blog, and I just did a Google review beneath their church address. (I gave them this website as well to get further information about these un-Biblical practices.)
Lea wrote:
Preach it!
Ruth Tucker wrote:
I was just reading about the legacy of domestic violence – how it’s like a bad family heirloom that gets passed down from one generation to the next in a cycle. Complementarianism perpetuates abusive tendencies and becomes a destructive ‘normal’. The best way to break the cycle is to break it’s hold – interrupt the norm and teach non-violent methods of problem solving which Complementarianism isn’t exactly designed to do because they run counter to Complementarianism’s basic premise.
http://www.crisiscenter.org/pdfs/generational_effects_of_violence_doc.pdf
http://www.urbanchildinstitute.org/articles/features/domestic-violence-an-unwanted-family-legacy
Jean wrote:
I took his intent to simply be dismissive of authoritarianism. As I looked at the church website, I saw that his wife preached the Sunday sermon the week before.
FW Rez wrote:
Always remember – Lane Dennis, president of Crossway Books, was in it from the very beginning.
Lea wrote:
Don’t need to.
They Hold the Whip and like it that way.
Deb wrote:
In the words of the Prophet Pink Floyd: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0kcet4aPpQ
siteseer wrote:
That’s “WAYNE GRUDEM GO WAYNE GRUDEM!” to all you Lowborn.
Lydia wrote:
*Really* bad things.
Marriage and conjugal sex wasn’t much admired either.
Dave (Eagle) wrote:
“The Bridge” is also an official alternate name for Scientology.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
If you don’t already watch the AMC cable program The Walking Dead you should. AMC sometimes runs marathons of it, going back to season 1.
The people who make it end up having to be tough as nails. One character on the show, Carol, started out being passive and a doormat.
Her husband abused her. As the show progresses, her abusive husband gets kills, and she becomes arguably one of THE toughest people on the show. She even rescues the main male character on an occasion or two.
The character Rick Grimes: his first wife, the standard housewife, get killed. He later pairs up with Michonne, who is tough and carries a katana.
Rick’s son, Carl, learns to handle a gun well and face the realities of the zombie apocalypse, so he can defend himself.
The kids who were sheltered in safe zones by their parents (not allowed out to face zombies or learn how to use fire arms) end up mentally weak and get knocked off by zombies.
If there is one scenario where a man certainly would not want a soft and fuzzy passive doormat wife, it would be the zombie apocalypse of that show.
Even in regular every day life, wouldn’t you rather be paired up with Wonder Woman, as opposed to Polly Purebred, or some other perpetual woman in need of rescue?
@ Lea:
Yes, I am being sarcastic! But I also have a point–that Jesus doesn’t teach us to focus on who is first or in any superior position by this world’s standards (rich or more powerful).
Daisy wrote:
A denim jumper is the skirt version of bib overalls, and bib overalls reduce your apparent IQ by 30-50 points.
I suspect denim jumpers (with loooooong… waaaaavy… haaaaair…) was originally a turn-on paraphilia for a certain ManaGAWD.
Deb wrote:
Go Deb!
I’ve never been a comp. Never heard of it until it started it’s creeping eruption into our rural churches a few years ago – been kick over the traces ever since.
Daisy wrote:
In the words of a certain marshmallow unicorn,
“A CRIME AGAINST FABULOSITY!”
Lea wrote:
What some of them really need is a swift kick in the hind quarters.
Irene wrote:
Oh good. I honestly can’t tell anymore!!
Irene wrote:
Whew! Good. We were worried about you!
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
Speaking of believing lies…
My liedar is pinging.
Quoting Arnan:
He makes the following claims:
His Sunday School class has 3-4 women in it.
Almost ALL of the wives in the church with children work.
The children of ALL these working women are NOT in daycare, they are being cared for by family members.
Does his church have a congregation of ~50 people, consisting of ~10 families? With ~6 wives/mothers working in the medical field who just so happen to all have grandmothers/family members providing childcare?
This is beginning to sound a lot like a “made for blog” story.
He goes on to tell us –
His Sunday School teacher evidently makes statementS like the following to those 2-3 couples often enough for him to take note of it.
Quoting Arnan:
Yeah, I’m not seeing this “Some women neglect their children”…but not YOU women – as a statement that’s going to be showing up in a Sunday School class on a regular basis.
I’m thinking that Mr. Arnan had a hobby-horse he was wanting to ride, so he fabricated one.
Velour wrote:
Not Powerball Lotto. Juiced Best-seller Book Deals and TITHES TITHES TITHES.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Oh my gosh, did you know there is a UniPegasus?? I am quite pleased about that (although apparently that’s not her official name and she is princess of something maybe – the things I learn hanging out with a 6 year old).
Irene wrote:
I need glasses.
I thought this said “who is on first” and had visions of Abbot and Costello flash before my eyes.
I was reading along through the article, and when I got to the part about meeting in secret, it jumped out like a bright red waving flag. Amazing that they even divulge their meetings were secret and use that word; they are proud of it.
Secrecy is not transparency, it is not openness. As Christians we are told to be “without guile.” Meetings are kept secret for the purpose of hiding things. I would expect things were discussed that would not sound right or good to the average person, i.e., how the idea would be presented vs what the real end goal was,, strategies for grasping the narrative that would not look good in the light of day.
This brings to my mind the passage in 2 Cor 11- “False apostles, deceitful workers…”
Deceit is how this group operates.
I believe it was a big mistake for CBE to meet with them privately. These are not sincere and faithful brothers in Christ. They are users of political strategies and propaganda, pushers of an agenda.
I expect CBE recognized their mistake when they received the so called “joint statement” they were expected to sign and they realized that in their naivety, they had handed over the narrative to CBMW. This reminds me of Kassian’s attempt to get Ruth Rucker to meet with her.
Moving on to Mary Kassian, it’s interesting she denies right from the beginning the obvious implications of the teaching. One should always pay attention to what is said in the negative and ask, why is this person bringing these things up? People don’t generally bring things up unless those things are on their mind. Why are those things on their mind? Could it be because they are very aware that those things are involved?
Another comment of Mary’s that brings me pause is when she says, “I came up with these materials myself.” Why would a writer feel the need to state this? The actual affect of such a statement is to make us question whether she came up with the materials herself. Can you imagine J K Rowling in an interview feeling the need to say “I wrote these books all by myself” ? Obvious red flag.
Reading of the “frustration” of some of the staff of Christianity Today and their subsequent dropping of the “book of the year” voting immediately led me to wonder if they felt the system was being gamed.
The early statements of CBMW are deceptive. They present complementarianism as though they are simply talking about the differences between men and women while stressing that they are equal. As I said in a previous post, if you do not have the same freedoms as others, you are NOT equal. But I imagine they sucked in many unwary persons.
A lot of women at the time were concerned that being a woman had become identified with the pro-abortion stance which they did not support. Many were concerned about the rise of single parent homes and the higher rate of crime that seemed to be coming from fatherless children. Many felt that mothering was not getting the recognition that it deserved- the nurturing of the next generation is of the utmost importance in any society, but in the early days of feminism, managing a home and raising children were kind of seen as non-productive, menial work. I think we’ve come past that view.
CBMW honed their narrative to draw these women in. They kept the part about being subjugated, exploited, limited, and controlled in the background.
I think this passage from 1 Cor speaks to the followers of this crowd very well:
“For if one comes and preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully… For you, being so wise, tolerate the foolish gladly. For you tolerate it if anyone enslaves you, anyone devours you, anyone takes advantage of you, anyone exalts himself, anyone hits you in the face.” (1 Cor 11:4, 20)
Deb wrote:
That reminds me that I’m looking forward to the Babylon Bee’s review of the book detailing Mark Driscoll’s return to ministry: “Rev-A-New”.
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Lol!BL wrote:
I figured if they get that sooooo very wrong….the opposite of Christ, in fact, why put them on a pedestal as some ‘go to guy’s for understanding Jesus Christ?
@ Christiane:
20 Vile Quotes Against Women By Religious Leaders From St. Augustine to Pat Robertson
http://www.alternet.org/belief/20-vile-quotes-against-women-religious-leaders-st-augustine-pat-robertson
A couple of quotes from that page:
· Woman is a temple built over a sewer.–Tertullian, “the father of Latin Christianity” (c160-225)
· Woman was merely man’s helpmate, a function which pertains to her alone. She is not the image of God but as far as man is concerned, he is by himself the image of God. –Saint Augustine, Bishop of Hippo Regius (354-430)
Nancy2 wrote:
We were about ready to send in the Navy Seals to capture Irene from hostile enemy forces and get her deprogrammed.
It is interesting that the C”B”MW began as a response to the scary monster of feminism and its “counterpart” in the church. I say interesting, because it is redolent of a crisis facing the early church.
The Roman empire was full of licentiousness, sin, and pagan syncretism – people wanting a religious excuse to get drunk and get intimate with animals, etc etc. The counterpart to this in the early church were the “Gentile Christians” – a sub-group who had begun to have first-century charismatic experiences despite being uncircumcised.
Fortunately for the future of the Church, a group of devout and faithful believers came together to form the Council for Biblical Ethnic Identity. These men travelled to Antioch – the nerve-centre of this new heresy – and testified to the Gentile “Christians” that, whatever some Holy Spirit or other may have thought to the contrary, they could not be saved unless they were circumcised according to the Law of Moses. These same faithful servants of Scripture testified the same thing at the divisive “Council at Jerusalem”, though sadly they were over-ruled by some self-appointed Apostles, at least one of whom claimed to have special personal dispensation from Jesus.
Oh – wait…
Never mind.
BL wrote:
I wonder what Lord Arnan’s salary is? The area I live in is in an economic depression. There is no way a family of 7 could survive on one income – unless it’s a farming family growing and hunting their own food!
@ Catholic Gate-Crasher:
God is okay with a woman issuing commands to a man:
——————-
But God said to him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your slave woman. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned. (Genesis 21:12)
mot wrote:
Or a rapist’s dream.
Lea wrote:
http://frombitterwaterstosweet.blogspot.com/2013/07/unconditional-respect.html
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
I commented on your link higher up the page. He’s reading a lot of his culture and personal biases into the Bible.
As I said above, life does not work out the way we want or hope, nor does everyone get to live out his ideal of SAHM because they cannot financially afford to, or, like me, they never met “Mr Right” and remain single. I left you a post higher up the page about all this.
Patti wrote:
Either extreme view – women are garbage, or to be put on pedestals are problematic. If I remember his book correctly, I think Bancroft discusses the “woman on pedestal” view being a factor in some abusive relationships.
My ex fiance’ went through a phase the first few years we started dating where I was on a pedestal, and I hated it. I was not being treated like a real human being with real needs, flaws, and problems, but like this pristine Barbie doll to be admired from behind glass.
So, The Woman On Pedestal Perspective doesn’t work on that level, either.
I was wanting a boyfriend to be supportive of me, cheer me on during rough times, but he was not capable of doing that, because as a perfect doll, I don’t have problems (that is, in his pedestal view of me), and later he neglected to help me out or cheer me on, because he was self- absorbed. (He wanted me to cheer HIM on.)
Nancy2 wrote:
I haven’t heard that. I imagine he holds to ESS since he believes that 1 Corinthians 11 is about “authority over.”
Nancy2 wrote:
“It’s Astounding…
Time is… fleeting…
Madness… takes its toll…”
The early Eighties was the peak of the Rocky Horror Craze, and it extended into SF fandom. SF litcon Masquerades of the period were not complete without at least two or three in-costume performances of “Time Warp” and/or “Sweet Transvestite”. And I saw a lot of them.
Even had s co-worker at the time who was a major-league Rocky. He was also into fire-eating tricks and once became a legend for “blowing the volcano” at a midnight screening on Sunset or Ventura Blvd:
“There’s a light…
Over at the Frankenstein place –”
WHOOSH! Five-meter flare of butane whites out the screen!
Rockies were “Impressed”.
Theater management, not so much.
Daisy wrote:
That was just because there was no MAN to tell him, so god had to send a woman!
Jamie Carter wrote:
Yes, and the second ugly outgrowth of comp teaching that doesn’t get as much press as spouse abuse is the issue of child abuse. The teachings of the Pearls, Baucham, and others fit into the authoritarian mindset right along with the subjugation of wives. The abuse of children, particularly very young children, (even infants, as these deranged leaders advise) produces another generation of damaged individuals who can only see life as a battle for domination.
Daisy wrote:
These two views usually seem to go together. The image of ideal womanhood (represented by the Virgin Mary in a lot of cultures) is way up on a pedestal. The real women in real life are garbage.
@ Catholic Gate-Crasher:
I imagine the Magnificat can be placed in the prophesying category rather than “authoritative teaching.” Scare quotes because they think that is its own special category. Grudem says prophecy is not infallible, so it is OK for women. Or something. He did an online debate with Ian Hamilton about whether New Covenant prophecy is fallible or infallible.
As for the wedding at Cana, I imagine that comes under the same exemption plus it was not in “gathered worship.” Scare quotes for the same reason. I actually have never heard any of them address that particular incident.
Nancy2 wrote:
In which case, mom was busy from can to can’t providing for the basic needs of her family.
Which would entail cooking everything from scratch, if not outright chasing it down and wringing its neck.
Planting, hoeing, picking, preserving the family food garden.
Sewing, knitting, and quilting to provide clothing and bedding for her family.
Washing, hanging out and ironing clothing.
And much, much more.
All while nursing baby and/or being pregnant with the next baby.
While mom was performing the daily chores the infant children were penned up in some fashion (my own mother used an old tractor tire to hold her infant in place while working acres of garden), or relegated to the care of an older sibling, and the oldest siblings (if not care-taking) were working side-by-side with mom.
I’m having a very hard time locating this ideal time & location when pop was away working and mom was dedicating her day to childcare.
I just can’t locate this ideal time & location of mothering in history or culture – childcare was provided by extended family like grammaw & grandpaw, or by a servant, or by a nanny, or by the older siblings, or by the other wives/concubines, or by the village, or by the great outdoors.
As children, by the time we were 3 or 4 – our days were spent outside, either in a fenced-in area or toodling along behind an older brother/sister.
So, I wish these guys would specify just exactly when and how this epitome of family life existed.
Deb wrote:
Interesting from the article by Frank Schaeffer linked above http://www.salon.com/2015/02/27/i_was_a_right_wing_sidekick_what_i_discovered_working_for_the_anti_woman_right/ :
All about the $$
Patti wrote:
Their argument is essentially circular in a loopy sort of way. They interpret Genesis by 1 Corinthians 11 and Ephesians 5. They interpret 1 Timothy 2 by what they read into Genesis because of their interpretation of 1 Corinthians 11.
The magic Male Authority verse(s) do not exist in the actual text. If you make a simple request for them to lay out a non-circular and non-fallacious argument for male authority, they will ignore you, dismiss you, or call you rebellious. The one thing they will not do–because they cannot do it–is show their work in a logically and exegetically coherent argument for male authority or a gender hierarchy.
@ siteseer:
a favorite image of Mary:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_ukJoR7KkHD4/TGREMwGTkfI/AAAAAAAAEw0/2_X0rm5IgW0/s1600/mary+comforts+eve.jpg
Patti wrote:
Yeah, kinda sounds impressive until you realize that “putting women on a pedestal” actually translates to:
“Right *here* is your place. Now, don’t be *moving* from this place, because this IS your place.
And you just stay there all nice and quiet until when & if I need you for something, then I’ll take you down off that shelf for a while.
And just as soon as I can, I’ll put you right back up there on your shelf… I mean pedestal.”
Gram3 wrote:
It seems like most of their argument rests on ‘head’ – which is why they can NOT let you believe that meant source. The rest is some nonsense interpretation of genesis and a few comments about conducting an orderly church.
BL wrote:
*shudder*
BL wrote:
1950s American Suburbia, at a time of prosperity unequalled before or since.
(Even before it was Mythologized through a filter of Ozzie, Harriet, and Donna Reed.)
siteseer wrote:
It appears that there was a meeting of the minds between Grudem, Piper, and Knight at Bethel Seminary back in the 80’s. Knight is the one who came up with Trinitarian hierarchy and roles which supposedly show God’s intent for male and female. I think they saw the traditional arguments being refuted exegetically and they panicked. People do not make good and rational decisions when they are panicky.
siteseer wrote:
Friend of mine (with a lot of offbeat interests) told me once that a lot of Goddess cults in history were as Male Supremacist as the Taliban. It was a sort of Cosmic “Perfect Porn Star” dynamic — since the Goddess represented a Perfect Ideal Archetype of the Feminine, imperfect RL mortal women were rancid piles of skubalon in comparison (and were treated accordingly).
And with the extreme focus on St Mary in Medieval Europe (Hyperdulia taken too far to where it approached Latria), she ended up on the receiving end of much the same baggage.
Lea wrote:
The exclamation points gave it away for me. A little suggestion for next time: try to work in some adjectives and use some version of “thrill” at least once. Also recommended are “beautiful” or “glorious.” 🙂
Also, in the interest of true confession, if I wanted to post something ironic, I might use a screen name that could be mispronounced Eye-ren-ee.
siteseer wrote:
When the rules of Power Struggle are in play, there are only two possible states:
1) My Boot stamping on Your Face.
2) Your Boot stamping on Mine.
And the only way to get out of (2) is to make sure of (1).
Hold the Whip or Feel the Whip, nothing in-between.
Wondering exactly how many on the current “Council” of CMBW do/don’t adhere to the Nicene Council (and related confirmations), as demonstrated through the recent critical dialogues about Trinitarianism, ESS, etc.
@ Gram3:
Where can I find info on this?
@ siteseer:
Looks like another topic that must be thoroughly explored.
Lea wrote:
I have really tried to figure out the logic, and I have done that in an effort to understand how they could get hierarchy out of the text. I have asked more than several of them to explain their reasoning. The approach one offered is that 1 Timothy 2 interprets Genesis 1-2. The Fall narrative of the curses provides their evidence for gender roles. Ergo, hierarchy. This was from a person holding a doctorate. I was stunned that this would be proffered to support something as weighty as female subordination being God’s design. The Ph.D. who thought this was a reasonable way to do theology and logic was stunned that I could not see the “beauty” of the way this doctrine is revealed.
Another approach is via kephale in 1 Corinthians 11. I think this is the path taken by Grudem and those who explicitly put forth ESS. I think you are absolutely correct that Grudem’s interpretation of kephale as “authority over” is non-negotiable and absolutely essential to his system. Any other interpretation, no matter how well it is attested, must be excluded a priori lest someone see the other possibilities which fit much better with the entirety of the text.
Deb wrote:
I have squirreled some of the excellent posts here, including Gram3’s, at the top of the page here under the Interesting tab, the Books/Movies tab. I had no place else to store them for future use.
Maybe we could have an additional tab at the top too in that section: “Interesting Posts/Quotes”…or something like that.
Deb, start looking at July 10, 2016, in that section for Gram3’s posts that I archived.
Gram3 wrote:
I kept running into references of a rebuttal to Grudem by Richard S. Cervin.
I finally located a copy of Cervin’s article:
http://theriveroflife.com/wp-content/plugins/Cervin-kephale-1989-pp-1-10.pdf
http://theriveroflife.com/wp-content/plugins/Cervin-kephale-1989-pp-11-29.pdf
That opens with the following:
“In his article “Does kephalê(‘head’) Mean ‘Source7
or ‘Authority Over’ in Greek Literature? A Survey of 2,336 Examples,”1
Wayne Grudem claims to have analyzed 2,336 occurrences of the
word in Greek literature in order to determine whether κεφαλή can
mean “source” or “authority over.”
His findings are directly relevant for our understanding of Paul’s use of this word in the New Testament. Grudem concludes that (1) κεφαλή never means “source,” and (2) “authority over” is a “common and readily understood” meaning of the word, and that the latter meaning “best suits the
New Testament” (p. 80).
Is Grudem correct in his assessment of the meaning of κεφαλή?
My answer is “no.”
Grudem’s article includes some questionable assumptions.
I will expose Grudem’s assumptions, and I will further demonstrate that many of the 49 passages which Grudem cites as evidence for “authority over” do not mean what Grudem claims they mean, and that Grudem has misrepresented the evidence.”
Ouch!
Daisy wrote:
Doublethink, Comrade, Doublethink.
Or they use the same mental rationale I encountered from the more sicko fringes of Furry Fandom, where the furry ladies (think Judy or Gazelle from Zootopia) were just human enough so it wasn’t bestiality but not human enough for it to really be rape.
brad/futuristguy wrote:
I am beginning to suspect that nothing good comes from these groups when they meet at hotel conference rooms, and draft statements about *pressing issues*. So far they’ve come up with the Council on Biblical Manhood Womanhood/Danver’s Statement with all of its abuses and not found in Scripture.
Then there’s that Chicago group that invented the *inerrancy of Scripture*, which they mean *literal*. Scripture is much more complex than that.
They are always inventing something disastrous to solve the complexities of life. Couldn’t they just meet and pray?
Deb wrote:
I put that together from Grudem’s personal recollections in the OP where he recounted Knight teaching there. Piper was at Bethel, IIRC, so I was putting 2 and 2 together and thinking that was at least one possibility for how this team formed.
Ware and Grudem were both at TEDS, and Grudem was at Westminster Philly at about the same time as Susan Foh. Then there was the Coalition on Revival with a *lot* of familiar names. John Walvoord and Wayne House were at DTS along with S. Lewis Johnson. I must admit, if anyone could convince me of hierarchical Comp, it would be Dr. Johnson’s lovely accent and gentlemanly way.
Even back in the 70’s, I do not remember a gender hierarchy being taught but rather the traditional view that wives should have a willingness to submit themselves to their husbands because their husbands were laying down their lives. I really do not recall Roles but rather attitudes of mutual love and respect though those words were not used. I think that is why a lot of older folks are surprised by this new and more aggressive “complementarianism.”
BL wrote:
Yep. My grandparents babysat me. At ages 3 and 4, I played with Tonka trucks at the end of the garden rows. My Barbie dolls hiked up the sawdust “mountains” beside the dark-fired tobacco barns. At ages 4 and 5, I was standing on an upside down 5 gal bucket, putting the bridles and collars on my granddaddy’s mules. I climbed trees and played with the dogs while my grandparents cut and loaded firewood. My grandmother cut and spiked tobacco in a dress — When she got too old and feeble to do that, she cooked lunch for the rest of us.
At age 6, my butt was firmly planted on the seat of a tobacco setter …
I was a girl? So what!
Gram3 wrote:
To them this is a beautiful doctrine. Quite fetching and winsome. Quite alluring and tempting. They are won, not by logic, reason or anything resembling exegesis. They are won over by this tantalizing bit of ‘theology’ because it appeals to their baser nature. It is a way to whitewash their sin of wanting to rule over what belongs to God. They want to be the lords of their manors. Such a thought is exhilarating. And any doctrine that can trick them into thinking that they are humble and pleasing God while they rule over others, that doctrine is simply gorgeous.
waking up wrote:
This is exactly what the Fabulous Five of Shepherding Discipleship did back in the 70s.
Held secret meetings to make alliances and plans to control the charismatic movement – via their hierarchical leadership, of course.
Quoting from minutes from one of the meetings:
“Speaking about the Council
We will not make a public announcement about our commitment together. We can be open about the commitment between Don, Ern, John, Derek, and Charles now.
Steve and Ralph have to get the approval of their community coordinators and inform the Catholic Charismatic Renewal Service Committee. We will discuss at our next meeting how to communicate about the full council.”
And this caution from the minutes:
“We must be very careful how we introduce what we’re into.”
And:
“General Council should “go public” in some ways since news is leaking out that there is a “general council.”
Or when it seems that you keep running into the same theme over and over…
“Charles Simpson, Ralph Martin, Derek Prince, Larry Christenson and Don Pfotenhauer are all due in Australia in January-February 1978, ministering in three different situations.
They should all emphasize the same themes: “sow the same seed in three different plots.”
And then there were magazines, and newsletters, and books, and conferences, and teaching tapes, and study guides…
Oh, and tithes and offerings that needed somewhere to go.
I have no doubt that the CBMW used similar machinations.
Gram3 wrote:
Tied in with the Joel prophecy Peter was quoting at Pentecost and 1 Corin 11. As you know, prophecy cannot ever ever be confused with teaching or preaching. So not authoritative. Sigh.
BL wrote:
Talking points. When you hear weird phrases or words over and over again (*cough*winsome*cough*), you know the word has gone out.
Mara wrote:
My Comp promoting pastors at my ex-NeoCalvnist/9Marks/John MacArthur-ite church in Sunnyvale, CA (Silicon Valley), renting from the Seventh Day Adventists, stealthily snuck Comp in on many of us who didn’t know it.
The pastors/elders told me that mothers were required to “obey” and “submit” to their husbands in all things, including letting a sex offender touch the children. According to the pastors/elders that “fathers had the ‘final say’ over their families.”
In that meeting, I hit the pastors/elders back with the fact that my state (California) requires that mothers protect their children from danger, it’s a crime for her not to,
she’s not off the legal hook because her husband ‘said so’ and ‘made the final decision’, and the pastors/elders ‘said so’. Any mother who endangers her children can be arrested, prosecuted for misdemeanor or felony child abuse [I think the issues are so serious that the pastors/elders *demand* that mothers subject their children to] the district attorney would prosecute it as a felony. Child endangerment, neglect, etc.
California Penal Code 273a PC punishes acts of child endangerment . . . a California domestic violence
crime. Simply put, the crime of California child endangerment occurs when someone:
Causes or permits a child to suffer unjustifiable physical pain or mental suffering,
Willfully causes or permits a child in their care to be injured, or
Willfully causes or permits a child to be placed in a dangerous situation.1
Unlike the California crime of child abuse, a child endangerment conviction does not require that any child suffer an actual injury.2 Therefore, it is easy (and unfortunately quite common) for innocent people to face prosecution under California child endangerment laws.
Penalties
If the circumstances of the child endangerment charges involve a risk of great bodily harm or death for the child…then the offense of child endangerment is a
wobbler. This means it may be charged as either a misdemeanor or a
felony.3
Misdemeanor child endangerment penalties include up to one (1) year in county jail. For felony child endangerment, penalties include two (2), four (4), or six (6) years in California state prison.4
But if there was no risk of great bodily harm or death to the child, then child endangerment in California will be a misdemeanor.5
….
1. Legal Definition of Child Endangerment
in California
The legal definition of child endangerment revolves around certain facts called “elements of the crime.” For you to be guilty of child endangerment, all of these facts must be true:
You did ONE of the following:
a. willfully inflicted unjustifiable physical pain or mental suffering on a child,
b. willfully caused or permitted a child to suffer unjustifiable physical pain or mental suffering,
c. caused or permitted a child in your care or custody to be injured, or
d. caused or permitted a child in your custody to be placed in a dangerous situation;
You were criminally negligent (if the allegation is that you did (b), (c), or (d) above); AND
You did not act while reasonably disciplining the child.6
In addition, if you are charged with wobbler child endangerment under Penal Code 273a(a) PC . . . instead of misdemeanor child endangerment under Penal Code 273a(b) PC . . . then the prosecutor must also prove that:
You acted under circumstances that were likely to produce great bodily harm or death.7
….
Criminal negligence
Under California law, “criminal negligence” refers to behavior that is so aggravated, gross, or reckless that it goes against all common sense.
If a “reasonable” person in a similar situation would not have engaged in the same behavior, you could be found criminally negligent for your act.11
Put another way, if
you acted in a reckless way that was a gross departure from the way an ordinarily careful person would act in the same situation,
your actions amounted to disregard for human life or indifference to the consequences, AND
a reasonable person would have known that acting that way would probably result in harm to someone else,
you are considered to have been criminally negligent.12
….
2.3. Child endangerment and California’s “three strikes” law
A felony child endangerment conviction will result in a “strike” on your record under California’s Three Strikes Law . . . IF the offense actually resulted in great bodily injury (as opposed to just creating a risk of it).32 :
This means that if you are subsequently charged with any felony, you will be considered a “second striker.” As such, your sentence will be twice the term otherwise required by law.33
And if you accumulate three (3) so-called “strike offenses,” you will be considered a “third striker” and will serve a mandatory minimum sentence of 25 years to life in California state prison.34
This is from a CA law firm’s website, Shouse Law.
deb wrote:
I’ve been talking to a few people, and they want a mini history of the SBC Calvinista takeover, along with some of their distinctives.
It might be good to make this a permanent section, sort of a quick resources? Something that people can send to others as a way to get up-to date-quickly. I definitely think you should include this history of complementarianism series, too, along with maybe a post or two from your archive about Mars Hill and the Mahaney debacle.
My Comp promoting pastors at my ex-church can also be arrested for criminal conspiracy and other charges, for their part in causing children to be abused, not having moms protect them, not having people call law enforcement. It’s just outrageous.
siteseer wrote:
Love it!
Editorial correction on my post to Mara about child abuse in CA.
I was typing so fast, I forgot to add the quote marks.
I was citing Shouse Law in Southern California.
Quotes should be, “2.3. Child endangerment and California’s “three strikes” law..And if you accumulate three (3) so-called “strike offenses,” you will be considered a “third striker” and will serve a mandatory minimum sentence of 25 years to life in California state prison.34″
Gram3 wrote:
And I think that the older view is similar to the one held by Aimee Byrd, for example. Non-hierarchical complementarianism based on a plain reading of Ephesians 5 and 1 Timothy 2. I wonder how many of the founders of CBMW held the traditional view and were alarmed by the mainline denominations ordaining women. ISTM that it is possible that a lot of things got conflated back at the beginning of CBMW, and two of those things are “liberal who rejects the authority of the Bible” and “female ordination.”
One more note on my post to Mara, Shouse Law in Southern California have a good website explaining criminal laws in my state. They are, however, defense attorneys (some are former prosecutors) and of course write their website with future clients in mind.
Thanks.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
My husband and GovPappy both like Monty Python stuff. I’ve seen the Event Horizon, but hated it. I’ve hot heard of Fish Story.
Patriciamc wrote:
I took patriciamc’s quote as being humorous/ironic, not that she was dissing the genuinely “last.”
Deb wrote:
Sadly, I know *exactly* why complementarian women are putting up with it. The Cognitive Dissonance is strong here, and I was one of them, until just 4 years ago:
http://iprefercaptain.com/2016/03/remember-the-complementarian-woman/
siteseer wrote:
Ah, the Mary Pride books impacted homeschooling mothers as deeply as Harris’ book on giving up dating.
That is to say – negatively.
And she did exactly what Harris has done when the fruit of their book had a couple of decades to fully appear & become vocal – which was the equivalent of shock and amazement that people had taken their writing so very seriously and used it as a guide or a rule book.
I’m not accepting that cop-out from authors/teachers anymore.
What? You were clueless that if you asserted something was Scriptural and trotted out the verses that people would actually *believe* what you were teaching and ACT upon it?
THAT is the attitude of these goobers out there making $$$$ by producing books and teachings that insist that THIS is the right way, and anyone doing otherwise is DISOBEYING GOD.
People are teachings things as absolutes that they themselves aren’t even living.
XianJaneway wrote:
Speaking of GovPappy and his First Lady, I have put his family’s Sour Cream Pound Cake recipe at the top of the page here under the Interesting tab, the Cooking tab, if you’d ever like to make it.
Pappy tweeted it to me and I made it for neighbors (three children in the family). It was a big hit!
Deb wrote:
Because there is some truth mixed in it.
And it is presented as an either-or choice, all cut and dried.
Either you are submitting to your husband, or you are rebelling against God.
Either you desire to live God’s way, or you desire to live your way.
Either you are putting to death your flesh, or you are putting to death your spirit.
And it is the very people who have a sensitive heart, a strong conscience, and a desire for God that will fall so very far into the rabbit hole.
Lydia wrote:
Can I have a t-shirt? In Greek?
@ BL:
There was some truth mixed in with what the serpent told Eve as well.
deb wrote:
I agree! 😉
Satan even quoted Scripture to Jesus…
It’s the little leaven in the bread that *eventually* works itself all the way through.
Just like the yeast in bread dough – it often takes time and heat for the evidence of the yeast to make its appearance.
@ BL:
Have you seen ALL the ESV Bibles that Crossway publishes? You can get virtually any size, color, or special features you want.
If you ever catch me buying an ESV Bible, you will know that there is something terribly wrong with my mental state. I own practically every other translation and can do without the Bible of choice for the Neo-Cals.
@ Gram3:
Yes, and for me God is just more logical than that. If God meant for men to lead women God would have stated it plainly. How the complementarians can make up an entire doctrine on how men are to lead and women are to follow is adding to the scriptures. Comps argue that the Trinity is not spelled out. Yes it is. Who can’t count to three when God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit is listed all together in one place. But my being allowed by God as a Christian while submitting to my bread and butter (husband) in a culture that demanded it, was mercy. God would have told the men to lead and rule their women and next he would have told women to obey that rule. But God did not.
Deb wrote:
Deb, I haven’t set foot in a ‘christian’ book store or ordered one online for about 15 years.
So, I haven’t seen them – or anything else that the churchianity business complex is out to sell. 🙂
I have discovered that NOT buying the latest number 1 churchianity book over the years has saved me quite a bit of money as well as my spiritual sanity!
ishy wrote:
For a *love offering*, yes.
If you’d like your t-shirt “blessed”, that will be an *extra* love offering.
Signed,
Velour, Vice-President of
Online Retail and Marketing
Pound Sand Ministries (TM)
Deb wrote:
Could the special “features” include a Today’s New International Version?
@ ishy:
Great idea!
Lydia wrote:
I have thought this too. And even Mirele pointed this out about the Nicene Creed and other events. Women did what? Served food. Washed dishes.
Patti wrote:
We all know what Paul had to say about servants and masters, too. But, in every documented time, when one race, clan, tribe, or family held another in slavery how’d it turn out for ’em?
Who is this Mary Kassian? Why is she famous?!!
Until reading this blog, I’d never heard her name before. And so I looked Kassian up online. Let me state my disbelief: On her Amazon profile, I see a woman who looks more Harley Davidson than housewife. She has a short horrifically processed haircut, heavy makeup, and is wearing a leather jacket. In her YouTube videos, her clothing is ummm…loud(?) and accessorized with piles of costume jewelry. She seems like an absolute pro when it comes to public speaking–very comfortable leading others–and could mirror any professor of Feminist Studies. How is this the face of Complementarian doctrine???
I wish I could propose a better female figure, but unfortunately, where I’m from, women aren’t allowed to go to seminary. Is Kassian aware that the very doctrine she espouses is, in some parts of the nation, the very reason she wouldn’t have her job?
I’m sorry, maybe I sound awful, but I do not understand how a woman who looks and speaks like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJKyrxihs2E
…has, is some corner of the universe, managed to become a voice for my gender. She seems like the very thing she preaches against. Until I see evidence otherwise, I’m pretty sure the only woman benefiting from Complementarianism is Kassian.
Velour wrote:
TAKE MY MONEY!
BL wrote:
Christian bookstores freak me out.
There was one in particular in Wake Forest/Raleigh that looked like a flowered bedspread threw up in it. Apparently Christians are supposed to have shabby unchic houses covered in ugly ceramic knick-knacks.
Gram3 wrote:
Fortunately for you, you have an alternative to fall back on, but by the time I was old enough to be taught about such things, I was taught a version of complementarianism, but it was just called a plain common sense biblical instruction on marriage. Now when I read blogs of others about my age, I tend to see a lot of women introduce themselves as mommies, wives, help-meets first and foremost. I think it’s going to be really hard for those who are suited to living out these teachings to question something so biblical and heavenly. Since I was doing my level best to live out my role but was still single, I ended up doing my own homework and realizing that what I was taught wasn’t necessarily so.
XianJaneway wrote:
I think it’s on Netflix (it was recently added).
ishy wrote:
My FIRST customer.
Lea wrote:
That is very well put. That is one of their major problems. Their views of women and marriage only work in a very narrow set of situations.
This blog post also addresses that:
Biblical Womanhood, or Cultural Womanhood?
http://www.cbeinternational.org/resources/article/mutuality/being-woman-after-gods-own-heart?page=show
Patti wrote:
Patti,
Thanks for your thoughts. At 5:19 this morning Nick Bulbeck posted a good summary of what I meant. Here are some of differences I see:
– Reproductive – these difference are obvious.
– Physical – sexual dimorphism causes most men to be physically larger and stronger than most women, which is why men and women compete separately in most sports.
– Physiological – men and women respond to some illnesses and treatments in different ways. One of the most notable perhaps is the difference in how heart attacks manifest.
– Social – men and women have some general differences in how they approach life, solve problems, relate socially, etc. One evidence of this is the way products are packaged and marketed. The retailers don’t to this for ideology, they do it because it makes a difference in their bottom line. Take razors. The blades for removing hair are identical, but the packaging and marketing is dramatically different for men and women. Why would retailers waste all this effort if it makes no difference? Another evidence is the demographics in prisons – far more men commit violent crimes than women.
When I say that there are some general differences between men and women I am absolutely NOT saying that it somehow makes one gender better than the other. It does not justify hierarchy. It does not justify the CBMW aproach in any way. I also agree that there is no such thing as the actual average man or average woman. What I am trying to say is that the general differences between men and women are a blessing to both genders and make mankind stronger rather than weaker.
I think some reactions here are like people who have gotten sick eating a bad batch of Chinese food and therefore have a lifelong aversion to it. Complementarians have done terrible damage in the name of gender difference, which has made some people averse to any thoughts of differences. But that does not mean that gender differences are bad.
I work mostly with engineers. One of my colleagues is a woman engineer nearing retirement. She is one of the best engineers and workers I have known. I asked her this morning if men and women approach life differently and she shot out, “Absolutely, they complement each other.” She clarified to explain how the combination of male and female input to problem solving creates better solutions. She is very vocal and energetic, certainly not a winsome waif, so her feedback has weight with me.
I understand that my experience may not match your. But I won’t apologize for appreciating the differences.
What did you think of the Hebrew word for helper? It did my wife a LOT of good a few years ago when she learned how powerful that word is. That analysis seemed to have gotten lost in the misunderstanding of what I was trying to communicate.
@ Christiane:
beautiful.
Lydia wrote:
I do not think they are taught anything about the women of the Bible or how women provided the financial glue that kept the SBC alive in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.
@ BL:
No doubt!
@ Ken F:
Your wife might enjoy reading Carolyn Custis James who has done a yeoman’s work on Ezer phrase in Genesis and turns other presuppositions on their head in a scholarly fashion.
Snippet from her site:
That presupposition gets turned on its head in the ancient book of Ruth. The pivotal moment isn’t when Boaz sets foot in the story, but when Ruth digs in her heels on the road from Moab to Bethlehem and embraces Naomi and her God.
From that point on, Ruth’s initiatives and Boaz’s responses drive the action.
I never will forget the moment someone pointed that out to me.
For me, it wasn’t a moment of victory for women over men. It was a devastating awakening that as God’s image bearer I have responsibility for what is happening in his world. It didn’t inspire me to gloat. Far from it. I wept to think of the time and opportunities I had wasted believing passivity in women—in me—was okay.
I grieved (still do grieve) because I knew that wasn’t the message women were/are hearing in the church.”
https://carolyncustisjames.com
Velour wrote:
I’ve come to the same conclusion. Those who feel they need to take control and direct other people rarely seem to be doing so for altruistic motives. There’s always an agenda.
That would entail trusting God and believing his promises. Evidently, God can’t get by without them managing things for him.
One thing that I usually don’t see from evangelicals – and obviously haven’t ever seen from a “complementarian” – is a discussion of 1st century culture and how the prevailing paradigm might have been a necessary medium for divine truth but might not have actually been true or beneficial. I think any honest study of the antenicene fathers will reveal that the prevailing thoughts on “gender” and “roles” (quotes because they not only didn’t know what these things were; they were thinking in a predominantly aristotelian paradigm) were shoe-horned into the existing practices and paradigms of men and women and what the world was like. Duh. Nobody can think outside of their own context – it wouldn’t make sense. But complementarians jettison any pretense of treating the text with respect and flatten it out into some kind of trans-human-experience meta-truth. It really is embarrassing, but what is one to do?
ishy wrote:
It would be invaluable!
Deb wrote:
I hear you. I didn’t think your post was bad.
I may be wrong about which post it was, but I’m fairly sure it was the second one (“Mary Kassian – Is She Really a ‘True’ Woman?”), because it wasn’t too long after that one was published that Marg sent the Tweets to Dee.
I really do like Marg’s posts on her blog about egalitarianism. She seems to be a pleasant person all around. I guess she just felt one of the Kassian posts was too out there or not friendly enough or something.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
I don’t know about Mary, but concerning Deborah, complementarians use the “She Was An Exception” shtick. See, God couldn’t find any men willing for the part, so he had to make due with a woman (that what the comps say)
You can read a response to that argument here, if you like:
Deborah and the “no available men” argument
http://newlife.id.au/equality-and-gender-issues/deborah-and-the-no-available-men-argument/
Deb wrote:
The ESV Study Bible is the bad boy of the bunch … loaded with Calvinist commentary.
Velour wrote:
Speaking of tshirt ministry, have you all seen this one?
https://www.booster.com/pray-for-perry?ref=twitter_social_mobile-campaign-page-share&utm_campaign=mobile-campaign-page-share&utm_content=pray-for-perry&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&type=1&side=back
sigh…
Daisy wrote:
I admit that I viewed it as a bit harsh at first, myself. Once I read all of the linked information, I felt it was a necessary post. Also, would we soft pedal it if the same extent of fraud was committed by a man? And by fraud I don’t just mean her lawsuit, I mean her credentials/writings/teachings/the image she’s selling and the influence she has wielded over a *lot* of women.
@ BL:
Now that was a creepy deja vu to read. I am thinking of all the non disclosure agreements, lock boxes and stealth chutch takeovers in the Neo Cal SBC. Secrecy and the subsequent authoritarianism has become the normal. Just like Jesus.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
Thank you for your feedback. It’s similar with my wife and I. She grew up in a patriarchy where the men had to be appeased. I grew up in a matriarchy where the women had to be appeased. In my case, being male meant guilty until proven innocent, but no evidence was ever allowed, so it basically meant always being guilty. I had to work through a lot of shame from that upbringing. My wife and I are opposing both family systems, which makes us less than popular among our extended families. Complementarianism might appear to damage women more than men, but in the long run I suspect it is pretty egalitarian in the way it damages both men and women.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
I once brought up that very subject to a pastor who was talking about Ephesians. His answer: “Jamie, please stop referring to Aristotle. What he thought or said is quite irrelevant. He was not led by the Holy Spirit. He was not called by God to bring truth to His people. He was not redeemed. He was a fallen, human philosopher who was right on some things, thereby showing that general revelation exists. However, the epistles were not written to confirm or deny Aristotle. Paul may have known of Aristotle but the philosopher was not in the equation when Paul was penning much of the New Testament, neither were any of the other writers. Paul’s views were shaped by the Old Testament and the new revelation given to him by Christ. Paul was moved along by the holy spirit and not influenced by culture, Greek, Roman or otherwise. In fact, much of what he writes is to confirm that Greek, Roman and otherwise is to be condemned (Romans 1). Your use of Aristotle is just another lofty way to say, “has God indeed said?””
Patriciamc wrote:
Can you imagine the backlash I would get if I were to write that about a women on this site? There is a different standard for men when it comes to people believing that we can actually be sensitive to how women feel.
Deb–Are there any sources from CBE that give details about that meeting (in 1994) between them and the CBMW? Perhaps someone who was present would remember what the issues actually amounted that caused CBE to pull out.
@ Serving Kids In Japan:
I read the post by Arnan and the comments made by Jamie Carter and him. With a few days in between that exchange and the comment you made, there is absolutely NO excuse for his insolent, arrogant and vicious reply to you. His post and all his comments reek of self-righteousness. Sometimes devastating personal tragedy can split open such a hard heart, but it is no guarantee. Nonetheless I am willing to hope for such a severe mercy from God to come into his life. Mostly I will pray for your wisdom in replying to such a braying insensitive animal.
Jamie Carter wrote:
On the other hand, modern church movements are moved along by the culture and not influenced by the Holy Spirit! It is only in recent years that the church has put more emphasis on being culturally-relevant, rather than Spirit-led. We are seeing the results of this strategy as ministries fall.
Ken F wrote:
Well….men have had an easier time of it all through history. Of course you can be sensitive to how women feel, and thank you for that, but there’s sympathy and there’s empathy.
This is an interesting page on the general differences between men and women in the area of temperament http://www.slayerment.com/mbti-gender for anyone who finds the MBTI interesting. I think these temperament differences are the basis of some gender stereotypes.
I think that society has a bad habit of deciding what is true for “most” (though “most” may be 51%, leaving a sizeable “less” category) should be true for “all.” Just because there are trends does not make an unbreakable rule. And we still do not know for sure where nature ends and nurture begins.
I do know, though, that when you are one of the more rare types for your gender, you do go through life feeling a bit different.
Patriciamc wrote:
In what way? Dying in battle? Have you visited veterans?
Ken F wrote:
Ok, I don’t think this is going to be a productive discussion. You have to know that’s historically wars have been pretty hard on the local women as well. Wars are terrible all around.
And there are more women veterans every day.
Lea wrote:
It won’t be if you insist that men cannot be as sympathetic and empathic as women. But I guess you bolster my point that there are some gender differences.
There’s a discussion on reddit about this right now in Christianity. The egalitarian arguments are pretty weak.
siteseer wrote:
I knew I had to be in a huge minority as a female INTP, and I was right. There’s very few INTPs to begin with, so nobody understands me! LOL
@ Nancy2:
” Those men avoid me. They will shake hands with my husband and talk to him, then walk past me as if I am not there.”
+++++++++++++++
some years ago when we were shopping around for a church, this was consistently how it was. i was utterly invisible.
mr. pastor (& others) would approach my husband like flies to meat. it didn’t matter if i was there or not. no one greeted me, shook my hand, made eye contact with me, said a word to me.
on one occasion i extended my hand in friendly greeting (so as to be included). the pastor seemed unsure what to do, but ended up limply shaking my hand with a bemused look on his face. i remember the limp part, because of how it felt in my rather firm handshake.
i found it all amazing. anywhere else i go i am acknowledged, engaged, embraced as a viable human being worthy of meeting and talking to. not church, though.
Ken F wrote:
Well, men do start all the wars.
Okay, sarcasm off.
I believe Patricia was thinking about the socio/political side of HIStory.
@ nancyjane:
I haven't checked, but if I had to guess I would say no. When I have a chance, I'll try to find out.
Ken F wrote:
Of course, I said no such thing.
@ Nancy2:
For a site that is very egalitarian, I get a sense of logical dissonance when I am judged differently just for being a man after I suggest that there are some differences between men and women. I feel like I am assumed guilty until I can prove my innocence. But I might be over-reacting because of my history.
elastigirl wrote:
This is a great summary of most of my years in church. I would much rather talk theology than plan a potluck or work in the nursery, I just do not fit in.
Ken F wrote:
I found this to be a profound statement. I also think about the children who are negatively influenced.
When my younger daughter was in 10th grade at a Christian school (from which she later graduated), the boys ganged up on the girls and said that the Fall was totally Eve's fault. The next day one of the male students brought each gal in class a carnation and attached a kind note of apology which was from all of the guys..
Some of the students in my daughter's class attended complementarian churches…
Ken F wrote:
No two of us are exactly alike, or share the exact same history. So, we have different reactions to the same thing. It’s also very easy to be misunderstood when we can only see one another through typewritten words.
Ken F wrote:
Well, you can’t very well go fishing without any bait on the hook, right? There has to be some truth or they wouldn’t get very far. Add to that the fact that they are deceptive about the system they really represent.
@ Lea:
Lea, I am married to Ken F. I am also a German first generation immigrant. Half my family on both sides was decimated by the Russian soldiers invading the places my grandparents and their families lived in. Most of them perished. I remember my father’s mother having the most horrific flashbacks from being raped over and over by russian soldiers. Anyone who has lived through that time period in Berlin or Eastern Germany would know what “Davai, davai!” means. I am also a rape survivor. My rapist(it was in a hospital and no he was not russian…) got so enraged that I can very well describe the sensations, sounds and smells of feeling what it is like to have the fibers of my own soul and my own body start to separate. Not a pretty memory. Please believe me when I say that Ken has actually experienced what it is like to be married to or related to people who have endured the “unspeakable” and by the grace of God, for some mysterious purpose survived it. If there is one human being I know who has an almost supernatural ability to show empathy to true victims of utterly horrific crimes, it would be my husband. The complementarian crowd would have bullied him relentlessly because “no real man can tolerate being married to such a “messed up” (read “curse word -up”) rape victim like your wife”….. I had not planned on posting, but I have been married to this man for 25 years and I just simply could not tolerate reading all these posts without setting the historical record right. Unless your own parents survived one and a half years of relentless bombing by the Allies and multiple rape expeditions by “the Russian”, I don’t think you are as familiar with the effects this does to a family as unfortunately all of us kids and grand kids, along with our spouses are…. But that is probably another topic.
I hope this helps in terms of assessing my husband’s “street creds”. Maybe one day I will start posting some stuff, but I happen to be more “complementarian” in my faith than he is, but the last thing I want to do is to accidentally “dishonor” him because he is a great man and my best friend and has been there for me when I have had to endure such terrible flashbacks regarding my violent rape that I have routinely passed out. It was truly that awful. The YRR crowd would have tried to get him to divorce me, and in fact some folks have tried to force him to do exactly that, but he is very stubborn on my behalf. I wish you would have the courage to give him “the benefit of the doubt”. Not all men are evil because God gave them that particular gender, my husband being one of the kind empathetic ones. I don’t mean to offend anyone but today I could no longer keep my mouth shut. If you’re going to attack somebody, please aim for a true perp, instead of attacking a human being who actually has proven throughout the years to care about the downtrodden and true victims. Of course you could not have known that, but I do hope that you will take my post into consideration before you reach conclusions. Signed “Anne, Ken’s wife”.
elastigirl wrote:
Wait until the men at churches like that find out you have no qualms about blowing the heads off of pit vipers. Even their facial expressions will change when you are nearby. They will not look you in the eye, evah!
We do have two great guys at the church, though. They will shake my hand and pat me on the shoulder ….. and they don’t do it like I’m some rare piece of fragile porcelain.
siteseer wrote:
Bait on the hook? Deceptive?
Ahhh, so their bait is nothing more than a cheap package of rubber worms!
XianJaneway wrote:
Great post. I can relate.
The comp system seems to manufacture unnecessary difficulties, discouragements and trials. Life will have enough of those things without it!
@ Nancy2:
Yes- straight from the *can of worms* hidden out of view.
Siteseer, I hear you on unusual personality types. Ishy, I too am a female INTP. Given the description of it, you’d think we would all end up being scientists or something.
NJ wrote:
Awesome! I think of myself as a random idea generator. It works. Just don’t ask me to pick one option!
I don’t have an interest in math at all, but I put it to use as a fiction writer. I’m actually writing a Christian fantasy right now where I am funneling all my anger about this Calvinista stuff.
Deb wrote:
That’s a real man.
Ken F wrote:
I actually grew up similarly myself. Though my dad was very patriarchal in his outlook (from his Catholic upbringing; he himself was an atheist), he was outnumbered and ignored for the most part. Both systems are poison to interpersonal relations. The beauty of egalitarianism is that we are unique individuals, not representatives of our sexes. That, to me, is a huge weight off the shoulders.
mot wrote:
I think women are still the *financial glue* in the SBC and should pull the plug.
Velour wrote:
I think given the treatment since the TAKEOVER it should be apparent to women that they only exist to be used by the SBC leaders. I’m not a betting man but I bet the majority of the faithful givers in the SBC are women. I truly wish they would pull the plug and swiftly kill this beast!
Velour wrote:
I think given the treatment since the TAKEOVER it should be apparent to women that they only exist to be used by the SBC leaders. I’m not a betting man but I bet the majority of the faithful givers in the SBC are women. I truly wish they would pull the plug and swiftly hasten the end of the SBC as it currently exists!
Velour wrote:
I wish the women would pull this plug. IMO women in the SBC are the most faithful givers.
@ Ken F’s wife:
Greetings Anne. Sometimes I have to remind myself that there are two types of complementarianism. I’m all for the type that lets you choose your role and find your happiness where you may as it’s a matter between you and your spouse alone.
But the other kind of complementarianism is a one-size-fits-all “plan” for every single woman – existing only in the roles of marriage and motherhood. Constantly being taught about the importance of purity and modesty – this is the YRR type complementarianism that we’re speaking out against.
The problem is that they both go by the same name: complementarianism. I hope you choose to stick around, read up on the experiences of women who have been marginalized, hurt, spiritually abused, ignored, by the second kind of complementarianism.
Ken F’s wife wrote:
Hi Anne and KenF,
Anne, thank you for posting and sharing your painful, honest story of being a sex crimes victim. I’m so sorry. I am glad for your healing and I’m so sorry for the sorrows that you’ve suffered. I will pray for good days for you.
I am sorry too for all of the East German women who were violent crime victims at the hands of Russians.
I am part Russian and the communists exterminated nearly all of my family in Russia.
Anne, I agree with you and your husband Ken F. that there are wonderful, kind, empathetic good men. We here about all of the other good husbands here – Dee’s husband, Deb’s husband [wondering why women in churches put up with Comp nonsense], Gram3’s husband Gramps3.
We’ve got Nick posting from across The Pond (in Scotland) who is a good man. Max too.
Muff Potter as well. GovPappy. Jeff. DivorceMinister. Countless good men! They all “get it” (whatever it is).
We’ve got bachelors like H.U.G. and Roebuck who understand too. We’ve got AmosLove, another good man.
Any other good man’s name that I have omitted in this list, you’re included!
So I agree with you and KenF, there are lots of good men and we wouldn’t tolerate women being spoken of as harshly as men.
Blessings to you both,
Velour
from California
mot wrote:
Indeed. But even they’re getting fed up.
Velour wrote:
Maybe they are a big part of the 200,000 leaving the SBC each year.
mot wrote:
Indeed.
And all of the smart men too joining the women fleeing the SBC, fed up with the abusive, un-Biblical teachings and authoritarianism.
Velour wrote:
What is left of the SBC is not much–the whole organization is on life-support. I have been a Southern Baptist member for 42 years and a pastor for approximately 10 years and I see no one in leadership that can save the SBC.
@ Ken F’s wife:
Anne, thanks so much for sharing your story and defense of your husband. He has gone to great lengths to share his excellent research and insights with us. I can relate as I spent a lot of time wanting to understand, too, but found few who cared until the blog. He has been an asset here.
I think this whole thing has been a big misunderstanding. For one thing, many here have spent too much time having comp (that is really patriarchy disguised) shoved down their throats or they are in sin. Their experience is giving an inch to comps is like giving in to strict gender roles or you aren’t a Christian.
This started with Patti asking about the truth in comp Ken mentioned. I know Patti and know she is sincere. I made a joke about the differences being two sexes.
I find your defense of Ken quite edifying! Reading your comment I have to relegate much of this to ‘first world’ problems. After what you and your family suffered, finding trust and sanctuary in such a husband is truly a blessing.
I hope you comment more and I hope Ken keeps sharing his research.
Velour wrote:
What was their response to this?
I’m sure they didn’t appreciate you bogging down their beautiful, pie in the sky, fantasy doctrine with such a heavy dose of reality. But did they receive your words at all or just try to get rid of you and your wisdom like some fly in their ‘anointment*’ soup?
(Yes, I know the proper would be ‘ointment’. But right now I feel like making fun of these men who fancy themselves to be ‘anointed’ but really aren’t.)
Daisy wrote:
Annnnd…your point is??
You can find horrible quotes from anyone way back then, if you look hard enough. Martin Luther said some utterly disgusting things about Jews, peasants, and his personal opponents. Does this invalidate the Reformation, in your view? If not, then why do these two quotes from Tertullian and Augustine invalidate the Patristic witness shared by both East and West?
Ken F’s wife wrote:
Thank you, Anne!! I love this site and everyone here, and I agree with most of the viewpoints expressed here, but I have also noticed an occasional tendency toward rushing to judgement, assuming the worse, and tag teaming.
Ken F wrote:
Ken, all you have to do is look at the status of men vs. the status of women all through history. Now, that is enough. I will not engage you again.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
Chip on the shoulder much?
Sheesh. Daisy’s comment was about the terrible things men have said about women from St. Augustine to PAT ROBERTSON. Does Robertson fall under ‘Patristic’ witness? Did you even go to the link? It probably DID include bad comments from Luther.
Yes, you most certainly missed the entire point of what Daisy was saying.
@ Catholic Gate-Crasher:
We can learn from the past but glorifying it as giving us some sort of timeless truth is part of the problem of not learning properly from it. I give you as exhibit A: John Calvin. Who has made quite the comeback as a spiritual hero who was really a despotic tyrant.
mot wrote:
Not just financially – time and energy, too! Not to mention food!
Daisy wrote:
Lord have mercy!!
Well, what do they say about Mary Magdalene, the Apostle to the Apostles?
The male disciples were certainly available. But, except for young John, they failed to show up at Calvary. Mary the Mother of Jesus and the other holy women showed up, at great personal risk. Then the Magdalene and her companions showed up at the Empty Tomb, while the male disciples were still in bed. They were the first witnesses to the Resurrection!
Given all this, I do not see how these dudes can dismiss or downplay the role of women in salvation history.
Lydia wrote:
As Christiane has said, though, no one is glorifying the Church Fathers. But IMHO it would be unfortunate to minimize their importance.
My husband once had a student who didn’t like a couple of things Plato wrote and therefore airily dismissed him. To dismiss one of the greatest thinkers on history out of hand — this is unfortunate indeed IMHO.
Meanwhile, no one has told me why I shouldn’t dismiss Martin Luther on the basis of the utterly indefensible things he said about the Jews. Isn’t what’s good for the goose also good for the gander?
Ken F wrote:
Yes!
people cannot treat others poorly over a long period of time without demeaning themselves in the process, but sadly I think it’s the children of such unions who suffer the most injury from witnessing what is going on in the home
@ Catholic Gate-Crasher:
Good thing you never tag team. (Wink)
Ken F’s wife wrote:
My ancestors immigrated to America in the mid 1700’s. I can not imagine what your family has been through. I can not imagine what you have been through, and what you still have to deal with. You are blessed to have a husband like Ken. I get the feeling Ken is blessed to have a wife like you. You are stronger than you think. Ha, you are obviously a fighter! Regardless of religious convictions, it does my heart good to see a wife defend her husband instead of the ever preached other way around.
Welcome to TWW. Come back soon! Given your family history, your personal experience, and yours and Ken’s beleifs, I, for one, would like to hear your take on some of the things discussed here.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
Why the binary thinking? It certainly does not romanticize it as so many tend to do. Same for the blood and cruelty of Catholic Church history.
We should learn from it. Not defend it. Same for the SBC and other religious groups who did evil in the Name if God.
Mara wrote:
Oh the pastors/elders thought I would be doormats or wall-to-wall carpeting like their Comp wives.
The chairman of the elder board called me at home and told me that I was to never contact law enforcement again about the Megan’s List offender, that I was to “obey” and to “submit” to my elders in “all things”. That this was “their decision”. Under California law, that’s called a Criminal Conspiracy and it’s against the law. It doesn’t matter if a gang issues the decree or a bunch of authoritarian/NeoCalvnist/pastors-elders.
The pastors/elders getting children abused, because their mothers “obeyed” and “submitted” and didn’t protect their children (a crime in California), can get the pastors/elders prosecuted for Aiding and Abetting, Obstruction of Justice, Intimidating a Witness and other crimes.
The senior pastor’s credentials are also bogus. A pastoral job that he claimed he had a John MacArthur’s church (Grace Community Church in Southern California), John MacArthur said was a lie and that my ex-pastor was only a volunteer, like scores of other people. (My ex-pastor excommunicated and ordered to be shunned a godly doctor in his 70’s, faithful husband for nearly 50 years, good father to grown children, gave of his time and money to the church, paid for and started the church lending library, invited and paid for my ex-pastor to join him on a trip to meet Rev. Billy Graham at his log cabin home in North Carolina. Hundreds of church members were ordered to never speak to him again.)
My ex-pastor claimed before all of us that he had “defended The Gospel” before “hostile liberals” at a “state college in Southern California while taking classes to become a teacher.
Since so many former church members accused him of outright lying (men and women, married couples, professionals, singles, highly educated, wealthy, middle-class) and leveled the same charges against the other pastors/elders, I checked for his teaching credential on the State of CA website. I couldn’t find it. I called the department. They had two supervisors get involved to vet his story. And the answer: Not true. And California has NEVER credentialed anyone with his name to teach.
Imagine that, another lie.
Next up, he claimed to have a “Ph.D.” (cough). LawProf, who posts here, researched it to back up what I found. It’s from a diploma mill in Missouri. It costs $299. Hey, would you like to be a Ph.D.? You know, in a few days it’s entirely possible.
The pastors/elders told hundreds of church members one Sunday after service (we were required to stay) that a [dear[ woman [who wanted to flee that nut case church. she’s middle-aged, a professional, a wife, she volunteers with the mentally ill and the elderly in convalescent homes] was “not in submission to her husband” and that the pastors/elders had “worked with her for a “long time to no avail”. The senior pastor ordered that we “pursue her”, in other words a sic-em meeting and to criminally harass and stalk her. Like this isn’t America any more? She doesn’t have First Amendment rights to worship where thse wants. It was vile.
The poor dear disconnected her cell phone, her email, and moved out of the family home.
When I interviewed her, after I was excommunicated from that church on some trumped up charge, she told me that the senior pastor had come to her home and screamed at her at the top of his lungs that she was “to obey” and “to submit”.
The pastors/elders blamed me for a church member’s genetically inherited brain disorder – Dyslexia – and its attendant memory problems: short-term memory problems, working memory problems, and auditory memory problems. She couldn’t remember events, refused to take medical care (there is good care and support groups for her disability) and she accused me (and others) of “lying”. She says Jesus could heal her if he wanted to. Yes, he could. But he hasn’t. He expects you to kick it in gear, lady, and to avail yourself of what he gave you: medical care and support groups.
I was read about before hundreds of church members for being a liar. For someone else’s brain problems! She’s spent decades do nothing, by the way, about her problems.
The senior pastor and chairman of the elder board are now facing felony charges for the Unauthorized Practice of Medicine (including rendering a diagnosis when CA has never licensed them to practice and they have NO training).
Adult Protective Services now has to deal with the Dyslexic church member and get a social worker in to evaluate her and possibly put her in a court-ordered conservatorship since she lacks the mental capacity to get her own medical care.
Because the Seventh Day Adventists, who rent to my ex-church, are being drawn into this, some insiders at church who are questioning the abusive practices let me know about this
latest email the senior (lying) pastor sent out:
“Dear members-
One of our former members who is in the final step of church discipline, has recently been aggressively harassing some of our current members. She has been spreading malicious gossip.
The Mountain View police, the Sunnyvale police and the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department all say she is unstable and should be ignored and or avoided. So if she sends you a text or email, they suggest you ignore it and delete it with no reply. They believe if she receives no attention, that in time she will stop.
In the meantime ask God for protection over the Body of GBF.
Blessings in Christ,
Pastor Cliff”
It should be noted:
*I’ve never contacted ex-members or harassed them
*I’ve reported the pastors/elders to law enforcement
*I’m not mentally ill or unstable
*the California Attorney General has repeatedly accused my ex-pastors and elders of being “liars”.
*the Sheriff’s sex offenders said same about the pastors/elders and demanded to know what church that I went to that threatened me
*two church members, who may ratify the pastors/elders’ demands that we all commit criminal conduct, work for two local police departments: Sunnyvale (CA) and
Mountain View (CA). The church secretary’s husband works for Sunnyvale Police.
@ Gram3:
JMac and Piper got into it over women and prophecy:
Fallibility and Female Prophets
https://www.gty.org/resources/print/blog/B140317
^Sorry Mara for typos. I forgot to turn off autocorrect.
I don’t know why my ex-church said I was in the final step of church discipline. They banned me from church property (the chairman of the elder board) for not “obeying” and “submitting” to them. They told me that I owed them an apology for having a problem with them telling me that I was “destined for Hell” and “not one of us”
Here was my YELP review (online) of my former church:
“It was very disturbing to be a member of this church and to see the level of mistreatment shown by the GBF pastors/elders to adult Christians, an iron-fisted authoritarian control over adult Christians’ lives and demands for “obedience.” There were excommunications and shunnings ordered of dear Christians for any independent thought.
Grace Bible Fellowship of Silicon Valley is one of the growing number of authoritarian, NeoCalvinist churches spreading across the U.S. and it’s not *Biblical*.
*Heavy Shepherding. GBFSV practices the 1970’s heavy-Shepherding movement’s un-Biblical control of Christians’ lives by the pastors/elders. The Florida founders of this movement repented for its abuses and un-Biblicalness. The GBF pastors/elders have not repented and the damage is growing in the lives of the Body of Christ at GBF.
GBFSV copies the model of Mark Dever (Capitol Hill Baptist Church, Washington, D.C.
9Marks organization. It is a heavily criticized model, including by Conservative Christians, who have said that there is only ONE Biblical mark of a healthy church: Love. The other 9Marks are un-Biblical and it’s the Heavy Shepherding Movement all over again with new language.
*Membership Covenants. Members are told to sign them because they’re *Biblical* and back to a Biblical basic. In point of fact they aren’t Biblical and are used to exert authoritarian control over members’ lives. Jesus required people to sign how many pages to follow Him? Correct answer: 0 pages.
*Congregational vote. GBFSV wants your money but doesn’t believe in a true Biblical church honoring the Holy Spirit’s work in Christians lives and giftedness. It is more authoritarian control exerted by a few yes-men over the Body of Christ, hobbling the power of the Holy Spirit to truly work. I will never go to a church again that is run like GBF or any others like it. I will never give money to one again.
*Women. GBF pastors/elders promote Complementarian/Patriarchy doctrine and that women are to “obey” and to “submit” and basically be second class citizens. At GBFSV they live under the old Covenant and not the new one we are to have in Christ. GBF pastors/elders espouse the Council on Biblical Manhood Womanhood which teaches a Semi-Arian Heresy by Bruce Ware and Wayne Grudem called the Eternal [a lie] Subordination of the Son to justify the subordination of women. It is untrue and it is trinatarian heresy. GBF has put this man-made doctrine on par with The Gospel. If you reject Comp you reject The Gospel. Nonsense.
*Teaching. GBFSV does not permit Godly women to teach the Word of God. They base this on the writing of the Apostle Paul. Paul wrote Timothy about one woman — original text in Greek said “the woman” — teaching one man error. Paul wanted her to learn correctly first. The issue wasn’t her being a woman, the issue was error – and that would be true if it was a man in error. Manipulative anti-woman Bible translators conveniently changed the text to something Paul never said: I don’t permit a woman [plural, all women] to teach.
*Nouthetic Counseling. GBFSV pastors/elders believe that Bible is sufficient counsel for everything. They have no professional training and licensing, do not follow California law, and frequently cross over the line into the Unauthorized Practice of Medicine (a crime in California that can be prosecuted as a misdemeanor or a felony). This bogus form of non-counseling comes from the un-trained Jay Adams and his books. It should be called what it is: malpractice. Examples of the GBF pastors/elders doing same were: not getting an older woman alcoholic to the care of a physician to supervise her treatment and spending months with members discussing “gossip” and drawing pictures on the blackboard. In the end this woman, her adult children, and church members were harmed.
Additionally, the GBFSV pastors/elders held me responsible for the genetically inherited brain disorder – Dyslexia – of a woman church member. That woman, like the GBFSV pastors/elders, does not believe in medical care and says that Jesus could heal her if He wanted to. He could, but He hasn’t. He gave her medical care and special groups, which she has refused to use for decades. Instead she can’t remember entire events and accuses other people like me of lying. Dyslexia isn’t just a reading problem but a memory problem involving short-term memory problems, working memory problems, and auditory memory problems.
Excommunications/Shunnings/Stalking. A godly woman left GBF for a saner church and was harassed by church members on the orders of the GBF pastors/elders. A godly doctor was excommunicated for dissenting in private. I was excommunicated because the GBF pastors/elders blamed me for someone’s memory problems. A truly bizarre church!!!
*Credentials. Snr pstr’s *Ph.D*. is from a MO. diploma mill.
**************************
I learned that I know more than I thought I did & I will never listen to authoritarian men again!”
Mara wrote:
I often see many complementarians (the men) paint a picture of how difficult and taxing it is to be the “servant leader” to his wife. It’s such hard work, they say, as they mop the sweat from their brows with a hanky.
Considering comp is mainly practiced by middle class American families, exactly how difficult is it for the man to lead? All that amounts to is the husband gets to control the TV remote and what shows they watch in a lot of those marriages.
Ken F wrote:
Companies charge women more for the same products, which is why I sometimes buy the men’s versions.
The Pink Tax: Why Women’s Products Often Cost More
http://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/articles/2016-02-17/the-pink-tax-why-womens-products-often-cost-more
Under the “social” category – I believe most of that is conditioning, not in-born.
Ken F wrote:
Why Aren’t Women Advancing At Work? Ask a Transgender Person.
https://newrepublic.com/article/119239/transgender-people-can-explain-why-women-dont-advance-work
Ken F wrote:
A lot of men do this to women… explain to women things women already know, or tell us what we think and how we feel. I think that’s the reason behind the coining of the term “mansplaining.”
“Rebecca Solnit: Men Explain Things to Me”
https://www.guernicamag.com/daily/rebecca-solnit-men-explain-things-to-me/
Binary thinking? Is that what pointing out inconsistencies is called these days? 😉
@ Catholic Gate-Crasher:
?
Patriciamc wrote:
The Bible foretold in Genesis that women would have things far worse than men: the man would exploit the woman’s tendency to look to man for protection and stability and use that to rule over her.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
I don’t put stock in Luther, Calvin or the early church fathers.
I just provided a link showing many quotes from history to the present of Christian men who have said sexist things about women- some of whom were church fathers, because you and someone else were talking about them and I think what they said about women.
Deb wrote:
This is so needed! I have been asking, "Where is the Dietrich Bonhoeffer?" in this situation. Finally, someone cares enough to state the truth! and to hold the false teachers' feet to the fire in regard to all the damage they are doing! Note the recent articles about Chaplain Dewitt and his legacy of prison rape based on teaching women inmates about submission. In looking up how to spell his name, googling prison chaplain rapist, many other cases surfaced. Sick. The theological debates about the Trinity lack empathy for what is happening to women as a result of these false teachings. Finally, there is a place and there are leaders with backbone and knowledge to address the harm being done.
@ JYJames:
That quote on my comment should have referenced Deb’s commitment to get to the bottom of the Comp teaching. Thanks, Deb, and sorry about my lack of nimbleness in commenting.
Gram3 wrote:
The flip side is when you read a comment that seems outrageous, treat it as intended irony. If it was irony the author will appreciate you got it, if they meant it seriously it will drive them nuts that you think they are pulling your leg.
@ Ken F’s wife:
Dear Ann, I am so, so sorry for the horrific things you have endured. My heart goes out to you. Your post was very powerful.
I have been grieved following this discussion because I always read Ken’s posts with interest and benefit from the things he shares and I also value those who seemed perturbed with him. I hope that we can value each other and give each other the benefit of the doubt on this site, irregardless of gender.
Ken F wrote:
This is so true and right now irl I am witnessing a difficult and tragic situation where the husband -a gentle and kind man- is the recipient of indescribable abuse but is bullied into thinking he must continue to love ‘as Christ loves the church’ regardless of his own physical/emotional health or personal safety. He keeps all of this private and suffers in silence. It is so difficult for people to realize that spousal abuse can go both ways. I often read resources I think he would benefit from but they are worded as though only women can be abused and men are always perpetrators, and I feel like that would just rub salt in the wound.
@ Irene:
“Yes, I am being sarcastic!”
++++++++++++
i’m so glad!
pro-patriarchy campaigning really bums me out — it’s very depressing & disappointing to me, how otherwise normal human beings can so happily embrace something that is so wrong on so many levels, and use God to sell it. it’s unconscionable.
contrast that with
Nancy2 wrote:
IMO, women in the SBC have been the backbone of all tasks in the SBC. At the SBC church I pastor if it was not for the all around efforts of the women we would literally have to shut the doors as nothing would ever get done.
mot wrote:
This is the absolute truth, especially in smaller Southern Baptist churches. Since most SB congregations have 200 members or less (according to Ed Stetzer’s study), this would be true in the majority of Southern Baptist churches.
Will Southern Baptist women continue to tolerate creeping patriarchy? We’ll just have to wait and see.
@ JYJames:
I made the adjustment. 😉
Deb wrote:
I think a lot of people are just leaving when this happens in their church. The patriarchists are so absolute and narrow, it ends up being pointless to discuss anything with them. They just walk in and take over, with the support of all the SBC entities now. The ones I’ve encountered spout Piper, Grudem, and Mohler without really having studied anything for themselves, and missing nearly the entire point of the New Testament.
ishy wrote:
My experience is that when conflict occurs in many churches people do leave. They are Christians and just do not have the stomach for the ugly fight that is going to happen.
@ Ken F's wife:
I was very touched by your story and am grateful that you and Ken have such a wonderful relationship.
I hope you understand that what makes our blog somewhat unique is that we value open dialogue. I believe it is one of the strengths of our comment section.
Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:
Preach it!
Deb wrote:
From my experience the paranoia among Southern Baptist ministers is unreal. They are constantly concerned they are going to be called in on the carpet for anything they say that could be construed as supporting Women in the Ministry.
It is like a group of spies, spying on each other.
Emily wrote:
Paige Patterson. He told a woman he was happy her husband hit her because it led to his salvation.
@ Ken F’s wife:
This is a very interesting response to wake up to!
I am glad to know that Ken is a good guy. I actually never doubted it, so I’m not sure where both of you are coming from. He did seem to be getting rather angry and I didn’t like the thought of getting into some sort of ‘men had is worse then women’ discussion. Oddly enough, one of the things I was thinking of when I mentioned women not faring well In wars was the rape of German women post ww2, and Russians as well by German soldiers. Sadly, this is a historical pattern as well going back thousands of years in war and I am so sorry your family had to suffer.
I never accused Ken of lack of empathy, though he accused me of accusing him. I thought tempers were getting high and maybe it would be good to cool down. Hopefully now, the morning after, they have.
Jeff S wrote:
He is one of the two men who lead the TAKEOVER of the SBC. A purely evil human being IMO!
@ Lea:
And if that sounded insufficiently sympathetic, it’s a combination of feeling blinded by all the awful things I really really don’t remember saying about Ken and not having had my coffee.
Regardless, welcome and I do hope you comment more often.
Lea wrote:
What was done to the women in Anne’s family in WWII is a horrid, perfect example of patriarchy at it’s worst. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if many of the men who committed those atrocities professed themselves to be orthodox Christians. I’m not just pointing fingers at Russian soldiers, either. Women are often used to hurt and shame the men in wartime.
We need to pray for Anne, that she will find some personal relief and peace from the awful acts that were committed on her.
Jeff S wrote:
To the best of my knowledge, those remarks by Paige Patterson were made at a CBMW event in the early 1990s.
Jeff S wrote:
I guess it’s a good thing PP isn’t a full-blown neo-cal. That woman might not have survived if her husband had not been one of the Elect. (sarcasm off)
Deb wrote:
That one comment by Patterson should have been condemned by the SBC leaders but he has always gotten a pass from his fan boys in the SBC. He is thought of almost as a savior by some in the SBC.
Something evil about firing a beloved woman professor of Hebrew at SWBTS because she was a woman, when her husband was very ill. Dr. Sheri Klouda even sold her blood to help pay her husband’s medical expenses.
If a man can do that to a woman with a sick husband, then something is not right with his soul.
siteseer wrote:
Regarding point 1.
I think I gave a link to a page that has an interview with Custis-James, (who wrote ‘Malestrom,’) about how complementarianism (patriarchal views) harms men too. You can read some commentary on that book here:
More Men in Support of Malestrom
http://www.missioalliance.org/more-men-in-support-of-malestrom/
Regarding point 2.
Almost any book I’ve read that discusses abuse has the author explaining that he or she uses female pronouns when referring to victims because most often, most victims are girls or women, but these same books do note that men sometimes are abused by women.
They just ask men to mentally substitute the words “he” or “him” in place of “she” or “her.”
I read a book primarily aimed at married people, though I am a never-married woman.
It was a book about verbal abuse. I have a sibling who is a verbal abuser.
Any time the author illustrated her concepts using married couples, I mentally swapped out the word “husband” with “sibling” and was still able to glean a heck of a lot of valuable information from her book.
mot wrote:
Mot, as a 60+ year Southern Baptist, who has been active in various lay ministries for the past 40 years, I sadly agree with your observation. Denominational leaders have turned inward, debating theo-politics and vying for position rather than preaching the Gospel. A once-great denomination has lost its outward focus to go into the world to fulfill the Great Commission. It doesn’t take a highly educated man of the cloth to know that when Calvin gets more air time than Jesus, you are done as a city on the hill! The best we can hope for at this point, is for a remnant to rise from the ashes and pick up the Banner of the Cross to go into the world once again with Jesus on their lips and the power of the Cross as their energy. I personally put more faith and hope in local SBC churches here and there to accomplish this mission, rather than national SBC entities. It will take men of God to get us out of this mess; I don’t see many of those in national leadership these days, but there are still some in SBC pulpits across the land. May God put a fire in their bones for the days ahead!
Deb wrote:
YES! “… not forsaking meeting together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.” (Heb. 10:25)
TWW is definitely a meeting together of hearts and minds. No one parks their brain before logging into their computer. (If they do, they do not get away with it in the online assembly of this crowd, thank God.)
And thanks for making the adjustment to my earlier comment.
Jeff S wrote:
“So what if I rack him til he die? For I shall have Saved His Soul.”
— “The Inquisitor”, Mark Twain’s Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court
And I wonder if he too smacks his wife around.
“WOMAN, SUBMIT!”
Lea wrote:
Having just come into this thread and skimmed over it, I think Ken was responding to the comment “a man probably wouldn’t think that this could be a sensitive topic”. I know I had quite a negative emotional reaction when I read that, and I can see why Ken became defensive. No one enjoys it when others make assumptions based on our gender.
That being said, it’s also the kind of statement that is probably coming from a place of pain and real hurt because of what patriarchy and male dominance has done, and so as much as a statement like that causes some negative emotions in me, I try to extend as much charity as possible.
mot wrote:
And whoever squeals on the others (“I DENOUNCE DANTON!” “I DENOUNCE ROBESPIERRE!”) gets brownie points and hero medal.
Baba Saddam had no fewer than SEVEN sets of secret police, all spying on each other for disloyalty. (Even Stalin didn’t have more than two or three.) Because if they’re always infighting each other and cutting each other down, none can get powerful enough to raise hand against Saddam & Sons.
ishy wrote:
The NEW Trinity.
A New Trinity who demands human sacrifice (of wimmenfolk).
Velour wrote:
They finally got a stake and fagots together for the witch-burning?
Daisy, thank you for that link on the pink tax. I didn’t even know about this! I am just about due for more razors, so I’ll keep an eye out for pricing next time I shop.
@ Max:
Another excellent comment, Max!
Jeff S wrote:
Which was not written by me. I can see where you might have a response, but I think what the author meant was more that it was potentially ‘triggering’ to some women? Not that all men are lacking in empathy.
But to start in on veterans and wars and men have it worse just seemed like it would go nowhere good. Maybe it wasn’t my place to jump in, but I certainly never felt I was being mean to Ken, so it was rather shocking that his wife felt the need to jump in and defend him from me for stating that war can suck for both men and women!
I think there was a misunderstanding somewhere. I’m not sure if he conflated my comments with others, or took offense at me alone. Maybe he’ll pop back in later and tell us.
ishy wrote:
“But in vain do they worship me, teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men” (Jesus).
@ Lea:
I think things just kind of escalated from there 🙁
Daisy wrote:
I think with ‘man’ being used as a generic for mankind, I am pretty used to subbing in ‘woman’. I find it clunky when writer are constantly writing ‘he/she’ and so on.
I think if you just explain where the book it coming from, maybe it would be easier for him to read it?
siteseer wrote:
I will say it is very difficult for me to understand the concept of physical abuse from woman to man, simply because of the general size and strength disparity. Emotional/verbal I have no problem understanding being genderless. [It also doesn’t help that the last man in real life who told me he was abused by his wife turned out to be a liar-which is a statement of fact and not meant to be disparaging to your friend. But trust on this point is low right now]
Jeff S wrote:
It’s shocking to me, because I seriously never usually get into it with anyone!! I try to be very careful what I say.
Lea wrote:
I definitely know of a man who was attacked by his wife wielding a kitchen knife. That being said, it is true that women can rarely have the physical dominance that a man can. Men physically have a natural advantage at intimidation (and therefore control).
Lea wrote:
And this is the bottom line, because at the end of the day, all abuse comes down to the emotional abuse. Physical abuse is usually non-persistent. Wounds (most of them) heal eventually. Our bodies are amazingly resilient. What makes physical abuse so harmful is the emotional component- that someone who we are supposed to be able to trust is harming us. Even long after the physical wounds have healed, the emotional damage continues.
In the end, whether it’s financially, physical, sexual, or any other kind of abuse, it comes back to the emotional impact. And men can suffer abuse at the hands of women.
But having said that, in our culture, men have so much more power (not just physical), I think it’s far easier for a man to be abusive and the impact can often be much greater. I know it my own situation, what my ex-wife did to me would have impacted me so much worse had the genders been reversed.
Deb wrote:
This asks the same question (about Christians in general, not just Southern Baptists):
The Resignation of Eve: When Adam’s Rib is No Longer Willing to be the Church’s Backbone
http://resignationofeve.com
I was brought up in Southern Baptist churches, and they’ve lost me on the gender stuff, and maybe a few other topics.
Ken F wrote:
It was men, for the most part, who had to pass and ratify the 19th Amendment. My ggrandfather worked alongside his suffragette and educated wife in that endeavor.
My dad was my mom’s biggest cheerleader and supporter in her artistic and business pursuits as she was his, until he died. My step father was a big supporter and encourager of women going into ministry. He still is at 97.
I would not necessarily call all that empathetic but just and right. There have always been honorable men out there seeking to do the right. I thank our Lord for them.
Jeff S wrote:
John Piper said women should endure that treatment “for a season.”
But I do think I see Emily’s point. The vast majority of people will agree that domestic violence is evil, horrible, and wrong.
So of course complementarians would be quick to condemn domestic violence, but their actions negate their professed beliefs.
Many of them generally teach women that they are in some ways “deserving” of such mistreatment, or that they should stay and up with it (“submit more to your husband / divorce is always a sin, never an option”).
Ishy,
Sort of a YRR version of The Handmaid’s Tale?
One of my biggest interests is theology and how ideas spread and affect people. My husband is a smart guy, but I feel like the theological powerhouse in our marriage, which is something I’ve felt necessary to conceal among church folks over the years. It doesn’t fit the paradigm of the husband as leader in all things. Besides, didn’t Paul say that a wife with theological questions should ask her husband at home, as women were not to speak in church? Of course, that assumes he does know more than her.
Jeff S wrote:
I think sometimes my mind just rebels at things. They are hard for me to fathom. But I know they do happen.
Jeff S wrote:
I think the same could be lies. A stranger lies, a politician lies…you aren’t so impacted because there was no trust. But someone you trust? Someone you love? Devastating.
Lea wrote:
I don’t know if I want to debate it with anyone, but I will say…
I do think that most women have had it worse than most men over history.
Even God predicted at the Fall that men would rule over women, because the woman’s tendency would be to look to a man for protection and provision, rather than to God, and many men are happy to exploit that.
Most cultures have had a male hierarchy. Women don’t win under those types of cultures. Not only do women face many of the same issues men do, but a whole other set of problems unique to being a woman.
I don’t think life is a picnic for all men, but I think women face additional hurdles that men do not.
I was surprised to see the negative reactions you got from others yesterday. Maybe what you said was misunderstood or just taken the wrong way.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Yes, I am thankful I could reach back to that, and I really do understand how difficult it must be for young women who have only known this mutant strain. Thankfully, there are many more young women who are studying theology seriously, and I think that will be the ultimate cause of Female Subordination’s demise. Those young women have been educated at conservative seminaries, so the “liberal” label cannot be used effectively on them.
Daisy wrote:
To be fair to John Piper, what he said women should endure for a season was harsh words. Physical Abuse he indicated they should deal with the next day.
Neither is OK (I just explained what I think about emotional abuse), but I just don’t want any of his defenders to have a foothold in thinking his position was misrepresented.
JYJames wrote:
I will admit to doing so on occasion, when looking at LOL Cat photos and other goofy online entertainment. 🙂
Daisy wrote:
Easily. It’s not to say there have not been situations of the reverse, but men do tend to dominate women.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
They are so busy kissing up to the powers and they could careless who they crush. And these men are mostly pastors.
I haven’t had a chance to read all the comments but the article itself is very interesting.
Based on the reading on this blog, the common thread with complementarianism, church contracts, focus on laws and patriarchy can be summed up in one word:
“control”
I think I’ve said this before but it appears that rather than embrace the positive strides we (as a society) have made in the last couple of centuries, the reformed movement seems to fear them.
Nothing happens in a vacuum, everything is connected in some way. The bible is as much a product of history as it is divine word.
For what it’s worth, it is really only in the last 20 years or so that women (in my province anyway) have not had to put their careers on hold. I worked as a nursing assistant for many years in the late eighties/early nineties. In our hospital (it was a mental health facility) the majority of nurses were women yet the administrators and supervisors were mostly men. This is because women often had to put their careers on hold (or leave them or go to work part time) to raise the family. Now with maternity leave available (at least here), women (and men too can access this as paternity leave) can take up to a year away from work that is subsidized by employment insurance (government fund that employers, employees & government contribute to). This was a great boon to us when our kids came along & my wife went back to work without any sacrifice to benefits or status. For a long time my wife worked evenings & I took the day shift and as a result I was very involved in child rearing. There are lots of “Dad” moments that I will cherish forever.
However this opening of doors for women (& other marginalized groups) has in many ways changed our society. There is more discussion and in some cases hard conversations are coming to the forefront.
Christianity is no longer the dominant voice in Western culture. I’m not sure that this is a bad thing, unchallenged religion (or political belief for that matter) never leads to a happy ending, as both history and the stories shared here can attest.
But this opening of doors, messy liberal democracy – imperfect as it is, also provides Christianity and by extension Christians with a safe base to discuss, challenge and engage the society as well. Most of us here do not need to worry about Inquisitors or secret police knocking at our door because of our discussions. However the so-called Calvinists here just want to put up barbed wire and keep their “sheep” in their pens. Complementarianism is just one tool they use to control the thinking of both men and women.
I’m not a fan of comp thinking, I firmly believe that men and women are equal in every way (yes I know men can’t have children). The bible is a product of its time. A “non-comp” example would be how warfare is conducted. In the Old Testament it was perfectly acceptable to exterminate & enslave your enemies. Christians would no longer consider this an appropriate response to the treatment of enemies . Well…most Christians would anyway.
Peace.
@ Jeff S:
It is probably like me being around the comp world too long and the subtle teaching that all the world would be right if women just do what the bible says and submit more. I was never even around full bore patriarchy but the message was there. I just could never accept the premise. And it seemed to be the working premise in most of evangelicalism but was foreign to how I was raised. I could not connect the dots of how it became accepted doctrine. No one ever talked about it being a biblical stance when I was a kid.
But it can wear a person down when everyone seems to be on board so I decided to study the ‘biblical’ premise. I say all this because reading a blog post that focuses on this can have the same effect on men, I think. My view is that there is no truth to comp doctrine because the premise is flawed and a bit too Greek pagan dualism for me.. Biological differences are a given but we are believers and therefore must look at the whole person. We don’t separate the spiritual from the physical. Do we?
As to women bringing a unique perspective to situations, I have to wonder if that is a result of nature or nurture. Women have historically operated in a mode available to them. That might have meant manipulation instead of force. Poison instead of a sword. Persuasion instead of force and so on.
The spiritual aspect to this some seem to ignore perhaps because they don’t believe in evil is that evil despised women from early on because Messiah was promised through woman.
Ken F wrote:
I hear you. It isn’t a male thing or a female thing but rather a lust for power thing. The reason we end up talking about men in this context is because men have complete power in most conservative churches and certainly in the SBC. I have said before that, if women held that much exclusive power, we would have a lot ov women to talk about here. And hopefully we would be talking about that. Because a body does not function when the parts are competing for power over the other parts.
Jeff S wrote:
That has been talked about before on this blog, but it didn’t seem to create offense on those occasions.
We’ve had pro-complementarian men drop by who don’t seem to see why so many women here (or on other sites) object to complementarianism.
Myself and a few others tried to explain to them, since, in many ways, males benefit more from complementarianism, of course most men are going to be blind to why so many women find comp offensive or terrible.
I do think complementarianism ultimately harms men too, but it seems to harm girls and women more often, or more deeply, or in more obvious ways.
But a lot of complementarian men are happy to defend complementarianism. Since many men usually benefit from complementarianism in many ways, I suppose it’s only natural they don’t see a problem with it.
Imagine being told the ONLY reason you cannot preach or teach is due to your gender – men are not allowed to preach or lead.
You’re being limited not because you’re unqualified or uneducated, but because you were born a man. And that’s something you had no control over, but for the rest of your life, you can’t do X, Y, and Z, just because you were born male.
You’ll also be told, if you’re a woman, by some types of comps, that your ONLY purposeful duty in life or role is to marry and have children. So you’re a “nothing” if you’re single or infertile.
Max wrote:
I am encouraging the SBC church that I pastor to fund directly local missions, state missions, and International Missions. I have only been a pastor at this church for a few months and the church just voted recently to fund a local mission project.
Sadly I do not trust the local, state, and international mission board to get the majority of the money to the related project. I do not think I am the only SBC pastor to think this way.
Gram3 wrote:
Agreed. And that may very well be the driver behind the increased emphasis on “the beauty of complementarity” in the New Calvinist movement. If they can prevent spiritually mature women from exercising their Biblical mandate to teach younger women of faith the truth about this issue, they can still influence them to buy the lie about gender roles. But sooner or later, reformed “girls” (as Chandler loves to call his female followers) will wake up and get the heck out of the movement (with or without their husbands/boyfriends in tow).
NJ wrote:
You’re welcome. You can find a billion more articles about the subject, if you do a search for “pink tax,” or any phrases about women having to pay more for the same products as men.
I used to buy hair gel from a hair care section at WM (Wal-Mart) that seems geared towards women.
I was searching WM’s site one day, and saw that the site said my local store stocks a BIGGER bottle of hair gel for like a dollar or two cheaper than the kind I had been getting from the woman’s section of the store.
I thought, “that is odd, how come I never noticed that cheaper brand before?”
So, the next time I went to W-M, I looked for that bigger, cheaper hair gel. It was placed in the hair section for men. Which is why I overlooked it.
Even though I know about companies charging women more for some products, I still sometimes fall into a trap of ignoring men’s product aisles.
The store had put manly-man products from ‘Old Spice,’ (about shaving beards and such), next to the cheaper men’s hair gel, which is another reason I zoned that out when walking by it, since I don’t have a beard to shave.
I’m all about cheap price. I don’t care if the product isn’t pink, flowery, and doesn’t smell “girly,” if it’s cheaper and works just as well, I’ll buy it.
Anyhow, there are a million more links about this topic out there, here is just one more:
‘Pink tax’ angers women from New York to London (Feb 2016)
http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/03/news/female-male-products-pricing-boots/
Ken F wrote:
IMO, you are right that you should not be judged differently lest we be guilty of what we say others are guilty of doing. I think it is a human reality to react based on our history, and for women in the conservative church, that means a lifetime of being judged guilty and having to prove our innocence because we are all guilty of Eve’s purported sin, and that sin was apparently not atoned for by Jesus’ death and resurrection. FWIW, you sound like one of the good guys like Gramp3.
Daisy wrote:
I think it was different because in this case, it sounded like the comment was directed not at a view of Complementarianism, but Ken’s statement that he was shocked for being understood in the worst possible way.
Him being shocked at being taken the worst possible way is not the same as not realizing this is a sensitive topic. As near as I can tell, Ken understands it’s a sensitive topic, and so he took offense at someone stating he didn’t understand the sensitivity because he’s a man.
Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s how I read it. I don’t know that I should belabor the point, being an external observer and not really involved. I’m only trying to help others understand how reading that comment felt to me as a man (I did feel like my voice as a man was devalued), and that I empathized with Ken. I thought his next response escalated the tension, unfortunately.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Someone once said that heresy is an overemphasis of a long-neglected truth. The version of complementarianism that the New Calvinists are peddling is of this sort. My wife and I have a simple agreement as Christians regarding our respective roles in the Body of Christ. She allows me to exercise my spiritual gifts; I allow her to exercise hers. We are a team for the cause of Christ – no overbearing patriarchy (or matriarchy) in our home.
Jeff S wrote:
See, and I thought he took the comment that someone wanted to hear what he thought was true in comp the worst possible way as well. (ie, he said there was truth and then didn’t really articulate what he meant where it seemed to fit in natural conversation). So it felt like a big misunderstand at the beginning. That sadly escalated.
mot wrote:
As more churches should do! While some may call this approach denominational rebellion, you will one day stand before Holy God not SBC leaders to give an account for loving the lost so much that you launched a direct mission to reach their souls for Christ.
Lea wrote:
Yes, I saw this as well.
Lea wrote:
As one author of a book I read about abuse brought up, women have been doing this mental gender-swapping substitution for ages and ages, because the default view for books, movies etc., has been male.
Even in entertainment, this is the case. Since I’ve been a kid, and there have been few compelling women leads in shows or movies, I’ve been mentally placing myself into the role of the male protagonist for years now. I do it without thinking much about it.
But I think a lot of men are offended or shocked that they may have to do it on occasion – did you see the tremendous backlash a lot of males had to the new ‘Ghostbusters’ being played by women? Some of them really resented that the male characters were exchanged for women Ghostbusters.
Was 2016 Ready for an All-Female Ghostbusters?
http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/07/ghostbusters-backlash/491834/
This part of that article reminded me somewhat of gender complementarian churches:
Lea wrote:
Another thing I wanted to say about your post but forgot before. That book I read about verbal abuse focused on male verbal abusers – husbands who abuse their wives.
I read the book primarily because my main verbal abuser in my life has been my SISTER (a woman) – in addition to a woman boss I had years ago. So, it can certainly go both ways, gender-wise.
mot wrote:
Especially not when:
They beg for funding in the name of that unsubmissive heretic, Lottie Moon…..
Force people to agree to and sign non-disclosure agreements …..
Demand that wives sign “woman submit” agreements before her manly man can start a planter church …..
Cook up some clandestine plan and seal the documents for 15 years……
Operate in the red for years before the info goes public ……
Oh, there’s more, but my monster migraine is derailing my thought train.
Ken F’s wife wrote:
I’m very thankful you did. I regret that I did not read your story until today, and it is a sobering story indeed, but also a story of hope. I think you provide a valuable perspective here, so perhaps you will consider posting again. I hope so.
Deb wrote:
Oh there is more! As Patterson tells the story (that cannot be verified, btw). Supposedly, A young married woman approached him about an abusive husband. Patterson tells her to go home and pray even in front of her husband. If I remember the story correctly he told her to get on her knees by the bed when he was sleeping. He even told her she may have to take some more abuse but that her prayers would work eventually. Then a bit later the husband comes to him to thank the great Patterson for his sage counsel because now he is saved! People ate this up! An evangelical notch on the belt story!
First of all, I don’t believe the story for a minute. But let’s say it’s true and put the malpractice aside for minute. Why on earth is it the wife responsibility for the man’s salvation? If that is the case what about abusing husbands who are professing Christians? Pastors? Elders? Do they get “re-saved” from a wife’s prayers? Does a long time Christian abuse others?
So it became the wife’s responsibility for the husband’s behavior to change through her fervent prayer . I have no problem with a wife praying for her husband…… at a safe distance. Although I do think the abusing husband has the ability to know right from wrong. For example, It is doubtful the abusing spouse practices his abuse at work. Sigh.
Aside from the doctrinal malpractice, Patterson indicted himself. He counseled a woman to go back to a dangerous situation and even submit to more abuse. That makes him a crackpot right up there with Piper. Women are expendable but men aren’t.
My take is the whole story was contrived to sell their pet doctrine. People fall for this stuff all the time. My time on the board of a crisis center taught me to know better. The only chance that woman had that her husband might change is to get as far away from him as possible for a very long time. And often women who go through that grueling process and financial devastation of getting away and starting over usually don’t even want to go back and take the chance he really has not changed for the sake of the children. Why allow that to become their normal again? But most women, sadly, go back because the husband and said sorry and declares he really changed this time.
CBMW has been corrupt from day one.
I always write “he or she” and I usually don’t feel like it’s clunky unless you have to do it multiple times in the same sentence.
The Ghostbusters thing was worrysome more about the men who insisted they weren’t offended because of the women rather than those overt about it. There was clearly some bias going on (not because it was disliked, but how passionately it was disliked).
The comments surrounding the latest Mad Max movie were more overtly ridiculous.
Lydia wrote:
Even better, the wife had one or two black eyes! Praise the lord! Sigh.
Jeff S wrote:
I think Hollywood’s habit of remaking everything is deadly dull, personally. It is rare that the remake is anything comparable to the original. I would rather they do something written specifically for women.
Lydia wrote:
Yes. Feel free to pray for him. From across town.
Lydia wrote:
That is wonderful. I wish that had been the case in my life. My father though is a consistently critical, negative guy who never (or very rarely) praised me.
My ex fiance’ demanded that I give him encouragement and praise him, but he was unwilling to do that for me. I just don’t have much experience with anyone (but men especially) giving me encouragement.
I think it’s great to hear there are other men who do that for other women, but it’s such a foreign thing to me.
Daisy wrote:
Old Spice was orinally created for women. So was the Ford Mustang muscle car.
Get over it and grow up, boys!
I always buy shave cream from the “men’s” section, unless I have a coupon or there is a sale on the women’s stuff. Dermatological allergies force me to read the ingredient lists on hair gel, shampoo, body lotion, etc. — target audience is not an issue for me, but the ingredient label is!
Gram3 wrote:
I second that!
Anne, please come back.
Gram3 wrote:
I wish complementarians would stop saying anyone and everyone who disagrees with complementarianism is a liberal. I’ve been conservative from youth to the present.
But a lot of complementarians are very fond of insisting anyone (especially women, it seems) who disagrees with their view is either a feminist, has been influenced by secular feminism, or is a liberal.
I’ve been conservative and right wing over my whole life, I began questioning comp via Bible study alone (not from reading feminist literature), so it drives me nuts when they toss around the “liberal” or “secular feminist” tags.
Daisy wrote:
I wish that for you! *hugs*
Daisy wrote:
I think a man who is not a good man would make it all about control. I think a man who is a good man will be weighed down with the responsibility of “being Jesus” to his wife. That is one reason this ideology is so toxic to men as well as women. As women, I think we gloss over the damage done to men. A guy who disagrees with Female Subordination is considered less than a real man in these circles. Or less than a real believer since he is considered rebellious against God every bit as much as a woman who gets uppity.
@ Jeff S:
Oh sorry. I did not mean to misrepresent Piper. I just remember in the context of discussing abuse in some way, he felt women should put up with it. I didn’t remember a verbal/ physical abuse distinction.
Gram3 wrote:
Bingo.
Bill M wrote:
So true. 🙂
Lea wrote:
Not all men are physically stronger than their wives.
Also, decent men will never raise their hand back at their wives and the abusive wife knows it and takes advantage of it.
When you are dealing with a malignant narcissist, a psychopath or borderline person, lesser physical strength is a moot point, anyway.
Think of the kind of abuse that was done to James Duncan. You do not need to be physically more powerful to bully and threaten a person in all sorts of crafty ways.
I know you didn’t mean it this way, but even you subtly questioned whether a man can even be abused. This is what you run into in so many resources. Abusers cut the victim off from every other relationship in their lives, from every person or situation that could be supportive. They are good at convincing the victim that it’s his fault, if he just did everything right, all would be peaceful. Men *rarely* come forward because they will not be believed or supported, they may even be ridiculed. I guarantee, if you have known men who were abused, you would not be likely to have been aware of it unless it was a family member or someone close enough he could not hide it.
Secular resources I look at are more likely to use non-gender words like “spouse abuse” instead of “wife abuse” but, unfortunately this guy does not trust anything that isn’t specifically Christian.
Daisy wrote:
It’s a way to easily write people off by applying a generic label that effectively means “to be ignored”.
Even worse is their view of “feminism”, which they treat as bad word. It really weakens the image of Christ in the world when his followers ascribe negative connotations to these words and use them to write others off.
siteseer wrote:
That is honestly not my intent. I am saying I have been actually trying to understand this, to comprehend it, for a while now. I still have trouble, though.
Lydia wrote:
Just like Driscoll and the Machete Man?
Daisy wrote:
No apology needed at all. The distinction shouldn’t even matter. But you know how people will be jumping on any inaccuracy and miss the forest for the trees 🙁
Jeff S wrote:
Communists always denounce dissidents as Fascists and Fascists always denounce dissidents as Communists.
@ Catholic Gate-Crasher:
You lost me. How does pointing out the cruelty of men leading the Reformation, invalidate it? It happened. It is a historical fact. Analysis of history can keep us from repeating it if we are wise and willing to discuss it.
Gram3 wrote:
In the words of high school whispering campaigns, “(FAG! FAAG! FAAAG!)”
siteseer wrote:
Bears repeating. Gramp3 and I are trying to help a man and his family who are in a similar situation. The elders blamed him and believed the abusive wife. It really reminds me of HUG’s posts about how an abuser can maintain the innocent face while shifting blame to the one who is not to blame. Jeff S posts have also been helpful on this topic. Until you have seen this particular dynamic, it is difficult to imagine that men in this system can be horribly damaged by it.
Lydia wrote:
They do teach that or imply that. And the flip side of the coin is where they teach all that is wrong are those horrible, left wing secular feminists who want to live life as they see fit.
It’s also bothersome how they view societal corrective as being female subordination, rather than sharing the Gospel.
The Bible talks about sharing the faith, which can help individuals (which can possibly change a culture somewhat for the better too, I guess), not trying to fix culture by telling women to submit to men.
Nancy2 wrote:
At Voices they are already begging for money to be given to Lottie Moon. Until I hear a logical explanation as to why 1000 missionaries were brought home I will not go out of my way to encourage my church to give to Lottie Moon.
siteseer wrote:
Which is why I specifically said it is only physical abuse that I have trouble understanding. I know that it happens. I think this is probably because I mostly think of me, and just about every man I’ve known seems to have been stronger, even skinny wiry guys. Certainly a weapon like a bat or knife (as mentioned by Jeff) would even the field a bit…
mot wrote:
Kiss up, Kick down.
The game of Power Struggle.
Gram3 wrote:
I have found them helpful as well.
@ NJ:
I always buy male packaged razors. Another tip: I buy my female teen, male sports socks. Typically Cheaper.
Jeff S wrote:
So good to see you posting here as I make my way down the comments from yesterday. Totally agree with your take on negative emotions, personal history, and extending charity. It’s difficult when the medium is electronic, but we can try.
@ Max:
(SBC men of God to get us out of this mess) “I don’t see many of those in national leadership these days”
+++++++++++++++++++
so, sounds like there are a few? who are they?
Lea wrote:
And that is what makes it doubly difficult for a man who has been threatened by his wife with a weapon to get people to believe him. Female on male DV happens, and I think it happens more often than we know because of shame. I get what you say about personal experience shaping how we evaluate information and how it affects our ability to trust, and it’s really good that you take that into account.
Daisy wrote:
I wouldn’t say that I intentionally stayed single; that’s just how it turned out. However, I *can* say that getting married just wasn’t a huge goal in my life. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve rather gotten used to the notion that it probably wouldn’t have been a good idea to inflict a depressed Aspie on children. I went through that with my mom (in her case, schizophrenia) and you know, it was a *challenge*. It’s still a challenge.
There are some things I wish I could change about my life (I wish I’d learned Arabic at university instead of Spanish and French; alternately, I wish I’d been forced to take math), but not marrying is not one of those things.
Lydia wrote:
I’m wondering if they get that idea because there is some verse or passage of the New Testament that says something about a Christian woman being able to “win over” her unbelieving spouse through quietness and meekness or whatever.
At the end of the day, the Bible says it’s up to the Holy Spirit to draw and convict, not a wife or any woman, so I think some Christians take some verses and twist them or misapply them.
And you can certainly pray for a man to be open to accepting Jesus from a distance. I don’t see why a wife should feel pressured to stay under a roof where she’s being abused.
Daisy wrote:
I think this verse gets misapplied to abusive situations far too often. To me, it’s about a regular probably otherwise decent spouse who is, say, a pagan (given the time period) or general unbeliever. The bible does have this theme of people leading by setting a good example, and I see this as another part of that maybe?
Not ‘go home and submit to horrific treatment without saying anything about it in hopes that someday your husband will grown a conscience’.
Heads Up:
Denny Burk has posted something about Mary Kassian. I haven’t read it yet.
Jeff S wrote:
Now that you mention it, yes, I recall a lot of men were griping about the female lead of the new Mad Max Fury Road movie.
I see what you mean about the guys who probably do hate the new GBs (Ghostbusters) because the male characters were replaced with women ones, but those men claim that isn’t the reason. They swear up and down they hate GBs on other grounds not on sexist reasons.
I try to give some of those male critics the benefit of the doubt about it. Maybe they do think it’s a poor movie based on the script – but –
The sexist-laced complaints about the new GBs movie began about two years ago, before the move was released. Just when it was merely announced women would be in the movie (not men), male trolls on You Tube and other sites were pitching fits about it. So it’s kind of hard to believe that sexism was not involved.
Women have been picturing themselves in the male movie roles for many, many years now, so I don’t know why so many guys object to having to do that themselves when the roles are filled by women.
Daisy wrote:
Yes, 1 Corinthians 7:15-16 is used to pressure many to stay in abusive marriages in the hope they will eventually convert the abusive spouse.
I had, for a blessed period, a pastor who was an awesome teacher and skilled at Greek and he said the way this is worded in the Greek, it’s more like saying “what makes you think you can save your husband [or wife].” I see that in the way the amplified Bible puts it:
@ Daisy:
Despite the early tragedy, I know I was blessed to grow up like that. That is one thing that drives me in this debate. There are too many grown women now that have absolutely no idea what it is like to be valued and validated in that way. Comp thought literally took over evangelicalism for 2 generations. The irony is now that many are waking up to the fact that it is not even practical in application. But instead of analyzing the doctrine, they pay it lip service but live their lives in more practical ways without questioning the premise and how damaging it is.
Let’s put aside the typical clobber verses and their ridiculous interpretations and focus on other passages that indict the comp warriors in their caste system view such as 1 Corinthians 12, for starters.
@ Jeff S:
Another thing about this, too. Because Hollywood (like gender complementarians) often present only one or two depictions of women, I cannot usually relate to women characters I see in movies or TV shows anyhow.
Even if there is a woman character in a movie or show, I normally end up identifying more with some “average joe” male character.
I cannot relate to the usual women characters in movies. There’s the harpy, mean, shrew girlfriend character -I can’t relate, because I’m not like that. I cannot relate any longer (and did not want to even years ago) to the always-helpless, passive damsel- in- distress.
I couldn’t relate to the sexy, vixen women characters who hit on men constantly, to the snobby, make-up obsessed teen cheerleader girls, etc.
All of which means I ended up seeing the movie or show through the eyes of some MALE character who was closest to me in values, personality, or temperament.
Even if a woman is in a movie, because the women are so often cliched or poorly written, women like me sometime end up still identifying with the male characters anyway. Hollywood should probably work on that.
siteseer wrote:
And a smart man knows he will be arrested if he leaves a mark on her while defending himself. I do not envy police officers who have to sort these things out because the truth is not always obvious. Manipulative people will manipulate and liars will lie because that is what they do.
Nancy2 wrote:
Oh yeah, Old Spice and other products marketed to men now were originally intended for women:
4 Things Now Considered Manly (Were Created for Ladies Only)
http://www.cracked.com/blog/4-manly-products-that-were-originally-meant-women/
The wrist watch was once considered to be for women. Men didn’t want to wear them for a long, long time because wrist watches were considered feminine. I once linked to an article on this blog about it.
At times I buy shaving cream, I will buy men’s shaving cream, since it costs less (not always. sometimes the prices are identical for men vs women).
Daisy wrote:
1 Peter. Written to believers who lived among unbelievers. Women and slaves did not have other options in the first century.
mot wrote:
Seasoned missionaries, who knew the cultures, knew the languages, to be replaced by greenhorns fresh out of boot camp.
Regarding male victims, when I was blogging for ACFJ (which adopts the “he” language for abusers), this was something that I had do wrestle with. Barbara and Jeff are quite clear that they believe that men can be victims, but that they choose the male abuser language because there is a general power imbalance against women, and because it reads easier. But they qualify it often enough I think people know.
One thing I learned having access behind the scenes was just how many men will claim abuse fraudulently. I am AMAZED at the discernment Barbara and Jeff have at vetting men, because often with initial comments/contacts that seemed harmless to me, they would identify the man as an abuser. And when they pushed back a little, he would respond in full force revealing he was exactly what they said. Yet they vetted me and believed me to be honest and true, to the point they even asked me to write for them.
The very first thing I wrote for ACFJ I did as an unnamed guest post. I worked so hard on it. I told my story. I hoped it would help people. I hoped it would provide some insight. And the very first comment I received was questioning of my validity, asking how well Jeff and Barbra knew me, and saying much of what I said was “triggering”. It hurt a LOT to be questioned like that, and just because of my gender.
Jeff and Barbra jumped to my defense and said they were confident of me, but it felt bad being judged for my gender. However, after I got over that initial hurt, I came to understand that commentor was coming from a place of fear, and I was widening her perspective in a way that was very uncomfortable for her. And it was ultimately good, even if we both hurt a little. It took me a long time to get over that, just because it was the first thing I put out there, but I pushed through because I felt like it was worth it. And that commentor was not healthy at that time, but after pushing through and sticking it out, I saw her become more healthy. And we had positive iterations (to the point, I don’t think she remembered questioning me). This was me learning to give grace when giving grace hurts.
But the thing is, I get it now. I understand her fear. I get that I live in a world where women are continually behind the power curve. Where men have an inherent advantage. And while my ex-wife was abusive, had the genders been reversed it would have been soooo much worse for me. When I left, I had money. I got custody. I had resources. And most importantly, I was believed. Even though I was still judged and pained, I had many things going for me just because I was a man. I don’t ever forget that, and it’s why I respect so many female survivors so much after hearing their stories. I barely survived emotionally intact, and what I went through pales in comparison to so much of what I’ve seen women go through.
I think the male perspective needs to be heard. I don’t think it’s only a female problem. But I also think that we need to realize that this conversation is taking place in a culture and within a history where women are inherently subjugated and treated as lesser, and that does impact what we say.
Lea wrote:
Thank you. 🙂 I hope so too. It would be nice.
Lea wrote:
Thanks you two 🙂
siteseer wrote:
So, just to add, it is really saying the opposite of what it’s used for.