“I think women are foolish to pretend they are equal to men. They are far superior and always have been.” William Golding (author of Lord of the Flies.)
A few days ago I posted the above quote on my Facebook page as whimsical nudge at some men who lord their ‘superiority’ over women. As a father of 6 intelligent women of whom 4 are contently unmarried, and the husband of one strong wife, I have learned to see life from a different perspective. As one who was once considered a male chauvinist by his fellow high school students many years ago, I have had a long learning journey.
Conservative churches often highlight the role of the stay-at-home mum caring lovingly for her children and supporting her husband. That is what my wife did in our family, as well as volunteering in arrange of organisations, from church ministries to toy libraries with time that was left over. She strongly believed that was her calling. I hasten to add that there are many women who would like to do that, but economic necessity has made it more difficult.
But conservative churches haven’t been good at celebrating singleness – particularly single women. The apostle Paul writes about it very approvingly in 1 Corinthians 7. Singleness is a gift that can be used in our Kingdom mission. It enables a focus on God’s calling. However, churches have often found it hard to work with this ‘celebration of singleness’. Male dominated church councils have kept women at arm’s length and have seldom created or developed positions that these women could fill.
My daughters all love and serve the Lord and his kingdom but none do it in the denomination they grew up in. One has been an elder, another is a deacon, still another is committed to Christian education but all this outside their denomination of birth. This is both a cause for happiness and sadness. Happiness because they are serving God, sadness because the church that baptised them has no real place for them.
Yes, we all have equal value in the eyes of God but women who have sought to live by Biblical values and not feminist tropes have had to have a higher standard of grace to withstand apathy and rejection.
One group stressed the love of God. It was the mantra and truth that they continually espoused but this was never really unpacked. Then later, I heard the same message in a totally different setting. Jesus loves you and wants you to be happy. One of the implications was that ‘sin’ in the traditional sense, was irrelevant because whether it was one’s sexual inclination or activity, divorce, or , in fact, anything else that hindered one’s happiness, lots of things we considered wrong in the past, were now passe because after all, God wants us to be happy.
wall debates we are currently hearing on the radio, TV and internet with regard to same sex marriage I am astounded at the lack of biblical literacy by those representing various iterations of the church. The lack of understanding of Christianity’s foundational text, a poor comprehension of Church history and thoroughly shoddy theology leaves one aghast at those representing and giving voice to many denominations in Australia today.
I haven’t written a post for a long time but the current debate about “Same Sex Marriage” has had me pondering. I have been particularly disenchanted, on the whole, by the debate among Christians and I believe the quality of the debate (or, more correctly, the lack of it) reflects a far deeper malaise in our churches, that is, Biblical illiteracy. This has is a problem that has been a long time coming and which I believe has been caused by a poverty of preaching in general.
one of those award certificates pasted onto the facing page.
Travels from Ur 