***
I received a private message on Twitter a week or so ago from an elder at a church. He reached out to me after reading Beth Moore’s letter to Christian men. You may recall that Beth Moore, in her letter, asked men to put away misogyny and act Christ-like towards women. Here are a few key paragraphs from Beth Moore’s letter:
As a woman leader in the conservative Evangelical world, I learned early to show constant pronounced deference – not just proper respect which I was glad to show – to male leaders and, when placed in situations to serve alongside them, to do so apologetically. I issued disclaimers ad nauseam. I wore flats instead of heels when I knew I’d be serving alongside a man of shorter stature so I wouldn’t be taller than he. I’ve ridden elevators in hotels packed with fellow leaders who were serving at the same event and not been spoken to and, even more awkwardly, in the same vehicles where I was never acknowledged. I’ve been in team meetings where I was either ignored or made fun of, the latter of which I was expected to understand was all in good fun. I am a laugher. I can take jokes and make jokes. I know good fun when I’m having it and I also know when I’m being dismissed and ridiculed. I was the elephant in the room with a skirt on. I’ve been talked down to by male seminary students and held my tongue when I wanted to say, “Brother, I was getting up before dawn to pray and to pore over the Scriptures when you were still in your pull ups.”
I’m asking for your increased awareness of some of the skewed attitudes many of your sisters encounter. Many churches quick to teach submission are often slow to point out that women were also among the followers of Christ (Luke 8), that the first recorded word out of His resurrected mouth was “woman” (John 20:15) and that same woman was the first evangelist. Many churches wholly devoted to teaching the household codes are slow to also point out the numerous women with whom the Apostle Paul served and for whom he possessed obvious esteem. We are fully capable of grappling with the tension the two spectrums create and we must if we’re truly devoted to the whole counsel of God’s Word.
Finally, I’m asking that you would simply have no tolerance for misogyny and dismissiveness toward women in your spheres of influence. I’m asking for your deliberate and clearly conveyed influence toward the imitation of Christ in His attitude and actions toward women. I’m also asking for forgiveness both from my sisters and my brothers. My acquiescence and silence made me complicit in perpetuating an atmosphere in which a damaging relational dynamic has flourished. I want to be a good sister to both genders. Every paragraph in this letter is toward that goal.
The man who contacted me told me that Beth Moore’s letter was read at their elders’ meeting. He asked me how men could practically put into place what Beth Moore was talking about. Yes!!! I will include his questions and expand them with some of my own. This is the kind of conversations we need to be having in churches.
- There’s a challenge – especially with some cultures within church that the issue stops at the question of sexual immorality and understanding that there were other issues about how men and women relate – especially how male leaders relate were maybe not so easy to grasp for some. How can male leaders engage in healthy relationships with sisters in Christ? How can men uphold integrity for themselves and women in their day-to-day dealings with women both inside and outside the church?
- That whole fear culture – how do we get beyond that?Is there a way to move beyond that in a healthy way?
- How can we talk helpfully and appropriately and honestly as churches in dealing with misogyny?
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Spiritual Sounding Board 
CH, “Comp men need an ego boost because they are not good human beings and they boost themselves by degrading and demeaning women and little girls. ”
I think this is pretty close to my experience. Authoritarianism confounds authority and worth. So, those who are in authority are considered more worthy – more holy, more good, more honorable. When non-honorable people find themselves in authority, they are still aware of their lack of worth, so they create that sense of worth by demeaning and degrading those around them by forcing submission and obedience to increasingly demeaning commands.
What we see in complementarian practice is a horrible caricature perpetuated by a steady stream of insecure and worthless men insisting on their security and worth by destroying it in those around them. I harp on Piper a lot, but much of what he writes is about creating self-doubt and self-loathing “worthlessness” – so that he can then portray himself as a pastor who has all the answers – “worthy”. I could link sermon after sermon where the members are reminded over and over of their worthlessness, while at the same time praising the leaders for their value.
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@KAS on June 17 @ 3:26 PM,
I want to thank-YOU as well for your kind words in responding to the pain I experienced; it gives me Hope as well and many blessings to you and yours.
Many here have experienced far, far, FAR greater pain that needs to be recognized and addressed as well. We need to listen to their voices, their choice of words, and the context of the testimonies here, regardless of gender, to fully know how to respond to that intense pain of the soul. In my faith journey, I am listening and learning from each and every individual here for our life experiences vary, and I need to understand the point of reference from which they come. This is an importance aspect of the concept of “ministering to one another,” not from the proverbial holier than thou attitude, or the concept of competing to define who is more spiritual than the other, or even being “god’s police force” in “fixing others.”
While I do appreciate the Holy Scriptures as instruction for all of life’s issues, I must remember that every page in our Bibles refers back to JESUS and His Teachings for no particular doctrine stands alone….without HIM. I know that I am not a Bible scholar, nor do I have that “Dr.” degree listed beside me name, nor am I a leader in the religious industrial complex, however, there are a few concepts that are easily understood, from which my faith in strong in Jesus, alone for my salvation.
I am completely in awe of these few verses from Jesus here, “But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they came together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, to test him. “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?” And He said to him, “You shall love the Lord with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.” These are pretty intense verses directed at the religious crowd of Jesus’ day, and in particular, are pretty powerful to us today. Who can boast and brag of obeying these two instructions from our Master, so perfectly, that we can blast others with other Scriptures to “correct and fix” others we deem/label as the lesser spiritual amongst us? Not I, said the little sheep. 🙂
One thing I learned from our LORD, directly through His Word listed above, during that time in my life when I was coming out of that deep, dark depression, oh, so many years ago, was this; although I loved God when I became born again of His Spirit, I had a most difficult time loving myself for I was constantly being told to “die to self.” This phrase compounded my depression and unworthiness according to the ways and vain philosophies of men and women who loved to hear the sound of their own voices and power they held over others within the organized c’hurch. While in my abusive Baptist c’hurch, the religious individuals kept preaching this too me, and yet, as I observed the fruits of their lives, I became confused, for they were certainly being pretty good to themselves in every aspect of life and I did not see the “die to self concept” very well. So I had to ask myself, “what exactly does the phrase ‘die to self’ ” actually mean and precisely, what does that look like in the life of a person born of the Spirit of our LORD?
It was only when I understood what Jesus was saying when He said, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” in context, that the spiritual “light bulb” was illuminated. There was no way that I could take care of others in a Biblical way because I was not “loving myself and taking good care of myself” in a healthy way. I was taking good care of my husband, my family, trying to please other difficult family members in earning their acceptance and love, trying to please those in the organized c’hurch, and trying to do good to my neighbors in making them feel better about themselves…….all the while, neglecting myself…….and I spiraled downwards pretty fast, realizing that people, especially the “RELIGIOUS” folks, are so very, very hard to please. Living in the land of “you are never good enough” is deadly to any soul, especially when it is disguised as “c’hristianity.”
So here’s the deal, KAS. I literally took Jesus’ Word, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” and began to understand that Jesus desires me to love myself in being healthy and whole through HIM. And when I can freely focus on His life changing words through His Spirit, only then, can I love my neighbor in a Biblical Way. Many religious folks will say, “that is being selfish,” however, Jesus didn’t have to put those few last words in that particular command. When I am healthy, whole, loving myself for the individual our LORD made me to be, and appreciating the life that He breathed into me, it is only then, that I can love and serve others in pointing them to Christ.
Jesus gave me life back, and my joy in realizing that I was not a “worm” any longer, according to the harsh teachings of the legalists/Pharisees/religious hypocrites amongst us…….but instead…..FREE!!! :)….. and experiencing that freedom and liberty that only can come through Him, our One and only Master and Shepherd.
And I am thankful for those “priesthood of believers” who truly understand Jesus’ teachings for it is they, that minister to me soul here, and elsewhere.
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My pastor highlighted that many times, the disciples had no idea where Jesus was. Jesus would go off by himself and pray in the wilderness or up on a mountain leaving even the disciples behind. So, even Jesus needed regular times where he backed off of serving others in order to recharge. And it’s noteworthy that the religious leaders of the day (and our day) had completely different expectations of what ministry looked like. The godly ministers of our day are the ones who wear themselves out to exhaustion being and doing everything in the church, which is why the most sought after leaders seem to be 25-35 year old men who have the highest levels of energy, and why they’re burned out after five years of ministry.
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@ Mark
“I harp on Piper a lot, but much of what he writes is about creating self-doubt and self-loathing “worthlessness” –”
From what I have read If a user can butcher the person they want to use self-worth, self-respect, and self-esteem it is much easier to own and control them. The used hates himself, feels hated, and hate-worthy. He cant get out of an awful situation because of his mindset.
I have been listening to Dr, Maxwell Maltz. He was a plastic surgeon and found that some of his patients still hated themselves after he helped them. He was such an empathetic man he started researching self-image. He sounds like an extremely compassionate man and an amazing critical thinker. He promotes Jesus and the Bible in what I have read about him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0kUrbx2JaQ Because of my dyslexia I listen to it at youtube.
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Carmen says,
I did that for many months, up until about a month ago. It brought my blood pressure down when I had him on “ignore” 🙂
I asked KAS on the last page of this comment box of this thread why he bothers to post here. And I seriously wonder.
I think it’s the wrong blog for him, since he likes to argue theology and so on.
This is not a blog for arguing theology (or not in the way he goes about it), and it’s not the blog for scolding people on not having proper etiquette when complaining about church or preachers who hurt them.
(I also don’t know why he’s allowed to continue to post here, or is not restricted to posting to another thread, because I think he under-cuts victims and inflicts more damage to the wounded, but it’s not my blog.)
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I wrote a blog post similar to what this guy wrote here, but I think he did a better job of it:
_If Anyone Can Abuse, Why Are We Still Talking Gender Roles?_ by Tim Krueger
Portions from that page:
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This really addresses the original post, what can men do to help remove misogyny in churches:
_4 Ways Men Can Combat Abuse in the Church_
Snippets:
Other suggestions on the page include:
-Learn from and elevate the voices of women (especially women of color)
-Hold men (including yourself) accountable
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Yes, I think this is an excellent point.
Treat abuse, sexual, physical, etc, and adultery and other such behaviors, as a deliberate choice. Way too many people treat them like ‘oops, this just happened, could have happened to anyone’. No.
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Another good page:
Ending Abuse: 4 Steps for Churches by Dr. Haddad
Snippets from that page:
….Traditional gender roles (men lead, protect, and provide; women submit and nurture) give men positions of power and authority by virtue of their gender. These roles enshrine male dominance as God’s will.
Even when men do not use this power to hurt others (many don’t), the system still defines male-female identity by a hierarchy of power. Can this be the will of the God who created male and female in his image and commanded them both to fill and subdue the earth (Gen. 1:27–28)?
…How can we address these problems?
Power, dominance, authoritarianism. In all four gospels, Jesus taught his disciples that “the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves” (Luke 22:26).
We hear a lot about servant leadership, but too often “servant leaders” live like royalty or wield enormous, unchallenged influence over their community. Yet, the Bible depicts leadership is as service, not celebrity.
…. Gender roles. Humanitarian organizations recognize that gender equality (not gender roles) advances education and economic growth while helping end abuse, illiteracy, disease, and corruption.
Where women are on leadership teams, workplaces are more productive and ethical. Marriages where authority is shared are happier and less abusive, with healthier children who flourish through adulthood.
What is more, gender equality is a biblical ideal, as egalitarian scholarship has shown for years!
For far too long, we have allowed gender to eclipse the moral qualities required of leaders. Scripture teaches that leaders should demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit, which is not gender-bound (Gal. 5:22–26).
The church has elevated masculinity, power, and celebrity above character. In doing so, we have unwittingly colluded with predators and have failed to hold leaders accountable. The time for change is now.
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Daisy, “Men are expected to use their power self-sacrificially, like Jesus. In practice, this often looks like building a power-balanced relationship. Is it a coincidence that imitating Christ makes us functionally egalitarian? I think not.”
This is so true. Even Paul’s talk about the body specifically states that the church ought to spend effort honoring the ‘less presentable’ body parts. In B-school we studied the Toyota Production System and American copies – Ford and GM. One of the questions we asked Toyota was, “why do you share all this valuable process information with your competitors?” The answer, “because we know that they will never implement it. The core of the system is placing the highest value on the worker turning the wrench, not the management.”
This is one area where the American culture and Biblical culture are at odds. We call narcissistic leaders who lord it over us “public servants” and hold them to a lower standard. We have pastors confessing clergy sex abuse to audiences who give them a standing ovation. We have a president who has admitted all sorts of sexual indiscretions and the Evangelical leaders are crawling all over each other to praise him and offer forgiveness, while at the same time throwing their own wives and those of other congregational members under the bus.
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Lea, “On the second, I do not think poorly worded or angry cries are unrighteous, necessarily, but I do think God hears the heart, and the pain, and responds to it.”
I think we agree, just have different definitions of words.
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Katy,
We really appreciate your thoughts and contributions here too. 🙂
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Daisy, make your mind up. You complain that I hog too much space on a thread, and then complain when I don’t respond to everyone’s replies or comments. Which would you prefer?
On your own admission you (often?) don’t read what I write (as is your privilege), so why should I spend time replying when you do ask something?
For example, you state I don’t know how fair or realistic it is to hold Non Christians up to “Christian” standards up thread, following a post where I said I have never expected non-christians to keep to Christian standards of speech or conduct.
I don’t have time to respond to everything, neither do I always want to get bogged down in responding to egalitarian discussions. I am increasingly coming to the conclusion that it is indefensible anyway. I have other, very serious things on my mind at the moment, although try to keep life going as normal as much as possible.
Mark – thank you for bringing in a bit of common sense in this regard.
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KAS said,
You do sometimes “hog a thread,” (or you make every thread about you and/or trashing egal or promoting comp), but when you do hog a thread, you tend to ignore female input to only reply to males.
It’s rather rude and annoying that you make several claims per post, but when I or someone else invest time rebutting those claims, you ignore them.
Yes, I did ignore your posts for many months, up until about a month ago. And it was wonderful, as I was telling Carmen above.
Why do you keep posting here?
It’s not the right blog for you. It’s more a “victim recovery” place than it is a “challenge and debate with people over their behavior and beliefs blog.”
Many of the people who post here have been hurt by Christians or churches, and rather than just hear them and empathize, you like to play the condescending school marm…
And you lecture them on how they are not acting how you believe they should be acting when discussing their anger or pain. (Great job on pushing the already wounded further away from the faith and more towards atheism or agnosticism.)
You said,
You sure do like taking pot shots at egalitarianism and promoting complementarianism, though. You just don’t like getting push back on it, I suppose.
And you do this (promote comp) even though several people have told you time and again how comp has hurt them.
But you apparently don’t care about the practical out-workings of your comp, you only want to defend your doctrine.
You said,
You’re not consistent. You do keep scolding everyone on this blog, Christian or no, that they are not genteel enough or Christian enough or “whatever” enough in how they state their criticisms of various pastors.
But you have agnostics and atheists who lurk and/or post to this blog, and you do not offer caveats in your School Marm posts. You make blanket assertions about how people should be real nice and polite when saying negative things about preachers or churches. I’ve not yet seen you type, “But I am referring to Christians here only.”
–And btw, even Christians should be permitted some room, if they have been hurt, to lash out on blogs such as this, and express their anger, even in ways that you personally do not approve of, and without being lectured by you.
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Daisy – Let no evil talk come out of your mouths …. Let there be no filthiness, nor silly talk, nor levity, which are not fitting; …
That’s what the NT says about Christian speech. Is it too much to expect them to obey it? Have you never seen foul-mouthed survivor blog commenters calling out Mark Driscoll for being a potty-mouth? It would be funny if it were not so sad.
I’ve said countless times if any push-back against error or exposure of wrong-doing in the church is to have credibility, it cannot be based on evil talk. You cannot overcome evil with evil, only with good. By all means approve of those who liken John Piper to a concentration camp guard if you wish, but don’t expect any Piper fan with a functioning brain to take any notice of this, because they will see as malice. There is a reason for that.
I have differentiated what I mean by complementarian thinking from anything abusive time without number. What I believe the bible teaches on this has never led to the abuse of anyone, and could not by definition. So what’s the problem? The problem is a failure to see different people in different places use the same or similar terminology with different meanings or emphases.
And to say it again, I have limited time, especially at the moment, and more serious things on my mind than to answer every objection or comment, all the more so if any reply is likely to claim I approve the rape of little girls or am like the Taliban. Which is why I have kept putting off replying to CH’s questions in the unlikely event she or SKIJ is wondering.
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KAS, I think I get it.
SSB is not an ivory tower of theological opposition to Piper et. al. SSB is a hospital. People come in bleeding from emotional, physical and spiritual abuse. They need to understand why it hurts so bad and that they are not alone. Part of the healing process from abuse, at least in my experience, is intense anger. At some point, I realized that I was being ABUSED and not only that, but the very people that abused me continued to act as if they had done the very will of God.
This is a healing community. People are allowed and encouraged to tell their stories, and even encouraged to express that intense anger, and that intense anger often comes with strong words.
Then, it seems, you come in here and say that intense anger is not okay, that if we are going to change things, it’s better to be stoic and only speak “Christianese” when talking about abuse.
I say, that is NOT what I’m here for. I do want to provide cover fire for people who are struggling, in their recovery, through passages wielded against them, but I’m not here to go toe to toe with Piper, Driscoll, Wilson, Gothard or Patterson. That is for some other blog somewhere else.
I’m here to heal and I’m here to think through how various passages have been used against victims. And, yes, if someone like you comes in trying to re-victimize, I’m going to oppose you. If you want to argue comp. vs. egal from the ivory tower, I’m sure there are much better places to do so.
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@ KAS
“thank you for bringing in a bit of common sense in this regard.”
How is it common sense to go to a website for victims of spiritual abuse, to an article about minimizing misogyny in church, and post at the article were you have already seen multiple women say comp has caused them great pain in their lives that even if women wash their hands of comp husbands are still head of them?
It looks like you just come here to kick hurting people when they are down and to rub salt in their wounds. From your post to Dash about his mother sexually abusing him when he was a baby it was obvious you are a mean-spirited person.
Multiple people have suggested this to you and you cant go think, maybe I am being hateful and hurting people, and maybe I should stop. Why do you like to degrade and hurt people who are already hurting?
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KAS said
I’ve explained to you ten times over what the problem is 456,745 times up and down this comment thread, and previous ones, but you have apparently ignored those posts.
At this point, I do believe you may be a troll and are trolling us and this blog.
Part 1.
You’re doing it again, KAS.
You’re playing school marm and tone policing. You’re being patronizing, trying to man-splain to me what complementarianism is.
I am an ex- complementarianism, KAS. I grew up under complementarianism for many years, from the time I was a little girl to my adult years, so I know if better than you do.
Don’t explain what it is to me, I already know what it is.
You’re practicing the fallacy of “No True Scotsman,” saying that “No true complementairan would ever abuse his wife,”
– but KAS, “real” complementarian men often abuse their wives, and some molest and abuse little girls, as well.
Complementarianism is a doctrine that is used to justify male control of women, it does not exist to teach men to respect and love their wives, or to love and respect women in general.
Jesus already taught you to “love your wife as you love yourself,” and Jesus did not do that in the context of teaching “gender roles” under a man-made term such as “complementarianism.”
You do not need a gendered theology, a la complementarianism, to teach you that Jesus already thinks and taught you should love your wife and respect women in general.
Complementarianism exists only to offer a quasi- biblical- sounding rationale as to why men should be in power of women. It’s disgusting, it’s a distortion of what the Bible says.
You’re just doubling down, per usual, and re-stating your position that you think it’s fine to concentrate on how people say things than to listen to WHAT they are saying – style over substance.
You’re not going to get quasi-agnostic Christians such as me (I’m thinking of leaving the faith altogether) back into the house of God by behaving in the fashion you do. I’ve explained that to you a 100 times, but do you care?
Nope, you just keep arguing, “But the Bible says, But the Bible says, But the Bible says!”
KAS, you are appealing to YOUR INTERPRETATION of the Bible, which is incorrect.
Why should I listen or heed your interpretation of the Bible?
(Rhetorical question, because I have zero intent on going by your interpretation)
No, I am not going to expect a wounded Christian to have proper speech and be genteel in the moment, or in discussing their abuse and pain.
Even Jesus showed anger in the Bible, when he overturned the money changers table.
Jesus did not maintain a wholesome, “Let your speech be seasoned with salt” New Testament approach when screaming at the Pharisees and telling them they were a pit of vipers.
Your approach in how you think the abused or hurt “should” react is a form of legalism and is emotionally abusive.
When someone is wounded, or they come to the realization they were being abused by a person, system, doctrine, or church, yes, they will feel anger and maybe hurt, and don’t you dare lecture them that they have to behave strictly rationale and proper in the moment when they come here to this blog to rant about it.
Christians are not robots. Christians have emotions, too, just as Non-Christians do.
My parents taught me as you are doing here, and the parental values and the teaching I got in how to handle emotions stemmed from that horrid Complementarianism you preach:
I was taught – largely under complementarianism teaching – that it’s wrong, mean, un-biblical, or improper for a female to show anger and be assertive.
I was taught when someone is rude or abusive to me, that I am FORBIDDEN to express anger over it and defend myself, because that would not be feminine or godly or appropriate.
I was taught that the “godly” way to handle mistreatment (especially as a woman), under complementarian views, was to endure it in silence and do not fight back or protest, not even politely.
-That is a form of emotional abuse, KAS.
So even this “nice” type of complementairans you and my father and mother believed in IS ABUSIVE in and of itself and DOES DAMAGE to females, even though my Mom and Dad and you never punched me or raped me.
And this ‘nice” type of complementarianism and telling me to lack boundaries and act passively at all times screwed me up in many, many ways over my lifetime.
My parents shamed me and criticized me for showing anger, any time I showed anger.
You’re doing the same thing, telling me to stuff my anger down, or only express it in a KAS-approve manner by being super sweet about it.
Your comparison to Mark Driscoll on this matter is off base. It’s comparing apples to oranges.
Mark Driscoll initiates, we respond to him, two entirely different things.
Mark Driscoll says sexist, rude things from the pulpit and on his blog or his books. I’m not the one standing at a pulpit, or writing “Christian” books, insulting people and using vulgarities.
I’ve never even met Driscoll.
However, when I read about the disgusting trash Driscoll pulls, his sexist comments,, I get angry, and I come to this blog to say what a jerk he is.
I am reacting to what Driscoll is putting out, KAS, I’m not the one doing that stuff or forcing Driscoll to behave like that.
I don’t just sit around randomly saying obscene, angry things about people – they give me reasons as to why I rant on blogs like this.
I’m not initiating it, Driscoll is. It’s not the same thing.
Even Jesus showed anger over men like Driscoll and called them white washed tombs and vipers – you would have to apply your New Testament, cherry picked verses about “proper” Christian behavior to Jesus, and determine that Jesus was in the wrong for how strongly he spoke to the Pharisees and scribes of his day.
Obviously, given Jesus’ example, it’s not always wrong of bad to speak sternly or in an angry manner to or about someone when one sees one person or group being unjust to another person.
Showing anger and the type of anger depends on the context and motives.
You misapply the Bible, KAS.
Part 2.
KAS, your form of complementarianism causes abuse.
I was brought up under YOUR type of complementarianism, KAS.
I used to be just like you up until my mid-30s, when I finally rejected complementarianism.
I used to be a complementarian myself.
-Do you understand that and acknowledge that?
Even though you personally are not raping or beating your wife (or me), you are never the less abusing women and doing damage to any daughters you have by teaching and supporting complementarianism.
My parents were complementarian, and they did NOT rape or physically abuse me, but their comp beliefs still hurt me very much.
You use the same exact method of interpreting the Bible and passages about wifely submission and “woman should not preach” verses that abusive men are using.
Your form of complementarianism is sexism and it is abusive, even though your actions (you’re not hitting your daughter) are not manifesting itself in rape and physical abuse.
Complementarianism can cause emotional, relational, and financial problems for women who are raised under it, as I was.
Your type of Complementaranism, KAS, plays one role of a few as to why I’m still single over age 45, though I had wanted to marry, because your type of “nice” complementarianism taught me mal-adaptive ways of regarding and approaching men, sex, and dating (I could wrote ten pages on that issue alone but do not wish to go into detail now).
I’ve explained this to you many many times on this thread, and on previous ones, how even “nice” complementarianism is sexism and abusive, even if it does not result in rape or physical abuse, but you have chosen to ignore those posts.
I’ve written many posts on my Daisy blog explaining why and how your “Mr. Nice Guy” type of complementarianism hurts me and women, and I’ve linked you to other resources up and down this thread. You’ve chosen not to read them, apparently.
_Even Warm and Fuzzy, True, Correctly-Implemented Gender Complementarianism practiced and taught by KAS is Harmful to Women, and It’s Still Sexism_
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I was still wondering, KAS. And I have no doubt that you’re busy, and have many important things in your life to deal with (including your daughter’s suffering). The same goes for me — that’s why I’ve yet to answer some of your questions, or to point out (as I promised to do earlier) some of your previous comments that might be hurtful to CH and work against finding answers to this thread’s main question.
At the same time, I trust that you will be gracious enough to recognize the immense pain that Christianity Hurts is going through, and which you may well have exacerbated (again, I will try to explain how, perhaps this weekend). And I hope that you intend to answer her questions when you can. Since you keep seeking answers to your questions — to which Daisy and others have already responded — it’s only fair that you return the favour.
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Serving Kids,
Has KAS even been spiritually abused, or hurt by some Christians or doctrines, as the rest of us has here have been?
I never saw KAS post as such.
Seems KAS is here only to promote complementarianism and to shame the rest of us for how we post.
I’ve asked KAS several times why he even posts to this blog, and he’s been here for about a year or more, when he has expressed several times over that he does not approve of our tone, how we express emotions, or our language.
By all means, KAS, find another blog to post to that meets your picky, KAS-approved language.
I already gave you a link to one such forum already, the CARM site.
KAS, you’re highly repetitive.
And I’m tired of it.
You’ve been here over a year, and you keep lecturing us on…
We get it, KAS.
It’s old. It’s tired.
What is it you’re trying to accomplish with the on-going defense of complementarianism and the nauseating and condescending tone policing?
What is your goal for posting to the blog?
You don’t show a deep or true concern for victims and empathizing with the wounded, but only in debating or defending your doctrines.
Most of us posting here so far (the blog regulars) don’t agree with you and never will.
It’s been a year or more now. Please, move along.
Consider posting to CARM (Christian Apologetics) instead. Or try Rapture Ready Christian forums.
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KAS, “What I believe the bible teaches on this has never led to the abuse of anyone, and could not by definition.”
This hit me when Daisy quoted it. I want you to really analyze what the words here are saying. There is an “and”, so there are two separate statements, and I think the second is the most critical to dissect.
“What I believe the bible teaches on this could not [lead to the abuse of anyone] by definition”
While I agree that biblical teaching could never lead to abuse, you are not saying that. You are saying that your interpretation, by definition, could not lead to abuse. Are you really that prideful that you think you have the corner on biblical interpretation. I’m going to admit that I really struggle with certain passages now. They are the ones that I used to focus on in the comp. debate, but when I started reading the Bible asking God to highlight egalitarian verses, I realized how many verses are ignored or interpreted away. I’ve brought them up, and you continue to ignore them. Why does Paul tell all believers, male and female, to strive for greater spiritual gifts, and especially that they would prophesy – a gift clearly meant for the worship service based on other passages, and a gift Paul specifically says is for the edification of all – and then tell women that they should never use it in worship?
What I will say about “soft” complementarians – I was one once – is that we pick and choose what we hear. I realized that I had been hearing a different message when I talked with my brother (comp. elder) about what was preached. Essentially, we came to the conclusion that the comp. preaching was for the 80% of people who were prideful (abusive?) and needed (emotional abuse?) to be put in their place, but I don’t think that works. The 80%, who are inclined to lord it over their wives, hear that they rule and their wife submits. It’s the 20% who hear the sacrifice part, but those are already those who are inclined to sacrifice. So, the message becomes ear-tickling. The abusers hear what they expect to hear (that they are the king of the castle) and the sacrificial husbands hear what they expect to hear (that they need to do MORE).
The problem, then, is that the elders (generally the 80%) in solving marital issues focus on the 80% problem – wifely submission, and ignore the problem of lording it over. My comp. abusive former church is an object lesson in that. It’s spiritually and emotionally abusive to the core.
“What I believe the bible teaches on this has never led to the abuse of anyone”
I think you’re wrong here. Just take the ESV uproar over Gen 3:16. Comp. theology throws Eve under the bus. It says that women naturally want to usurp authority/headship from the men. But, if that theology is correct, wouldn’t you see it in practice? Even comp. pastors I’ve heard said that, in practice, women only fill leadership roles when men abdicate. So, if the Bible (according to you) says one thing and nature says something different, is it the Bible that is wrong, is it nature that is wrong, or just perhaps, could it be your INTERPRETATION of the Bible that is wrong? Instead, if we see Gen 3:16 as the curse of Patriarchy, then we realize that Patriarchal theology is going to creep in to every human system, then isn’t this EXACTLY WHAT WE SEE IN NATURE? Survival of the fittest. Rule of the strong. Abuse of the weak. What did God cry out against in the OT? Abuse of the orphan and the widow – the weak. Shepherds who got fat off the sheep they were supposed to be tending, while the flock was battered and bruised by the wolves.
That is the core problem with complementarianism – it turns the curse into a blessing. Instead of men lording it over women being a bad thing, comps teach that it’s holy for men to enforce submission.
This is exactly what Doug Wilson teaches in the infamous “dishwashing” section in “Federal Husband”. When the wife doesn’t do the dishes, the husband first “blames himself for not being a good husband” (victim mentality), then shows his wife how it should be done, then expects her to do it (puts her in her place, with no comment about being sacrificially loving and understanding WHY she can’t/won’t do the dishes). If she doesn’t do it, then he brings the matter to the church. In Reformed-speak, only salvation issues are brought to the church, because any unresolved issue could result in excommunication. The church applies increasing pressure until the wife is either doing the dishes (put in her place) or excommunicated.
And this is fascinating from an 80%/20% view. You see, Wilson just wrote a book that supposedly is about the husband’s role towards his wife, and in it, there is a section about the husband “lording it over” the wife. Would Christ bring the wife before the elders for not doing the dishes, or would Christ take on the task of doing the dishes? (Remember that Jesus washed the disciples’ feet, which was the lowest of the low household chore)
But, back to the blame. The husband apologizes to the wife first. For what? Joel Beeke uses this same tactic in his book on family worship. He apologizes for abdicating his “role” in disciplining his wife/family. The husband is sorry that he did not punish his wife earlier for neglecting her responsibility.
Doug Wilson and Joel Beeke aren’t ignorant. What they are preaching is what they believe the Bible says, and it’s the logical consequence of the same interpretation of the Bible you have. They cite scripture after scripture based on a complementarian premise that makes the husband/father the priest (Christ?) of his household and is responsible for punishing his wife/kids when they doesn’t submit. You just choose not to go that far.
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Here’s a suggestion, Mark.
Maybe the problem is the Bible itself. You know, the one men wrote. Interpretation depends on the man who’s reading it, illustrated perfectly by the comments on this thread. It might have something to do with the reason there’s so many ‘strains’ of Christianity.
Seems to me, either you’re all right or you’re all wrong.
(I’m betting that idea will go over like a lead balloon). 😉
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Carmen said
One guy coined the term P.I.P. (pervasive interpretive pluralism) to describe this situation.
Guys like KAS keep promoting their particular interpretation of the Bible as being the same thing as the Bible itself, or as though their interpretation is infallible, and they’re not willing to consider perhaps their interpretation is incorrect.
These pages describes KAS, and guys like him, perfectly:
_Unpublished: Being Biblical Means Being Doctrinally Tolerant_ – Experimental Theology
_Richard Beck: The moral implication of interpretive pluralism_ – Ineternet Monk site
I’m not a Roman Catholic and don’t agree with them on everything either, but aspects of their critiques of the “Bible Only” view, the Biblicist view, which are mentioned in some of those links I just shared, are spot on.
From Experimental Theology blog:
The fact is there are equally conservative, good Christians who reject complementarianism and who see gender mutuality or egalitarianism as being taught in the same Bible that complementarians use.
(That’s not even factoring in how some male biblical scribes and translators have, down through the ages, intentionally, or due to unconscious bias, deliberately translated the Bible to omit women, or in favor of men, or to limit women, to say that women have to submit to men, etc.
I could cite links with examples on that. Or you can find them on your own via Google.
Before you go arguing that your holy text teaches subordination of an entire group of people, based on an in-born trait (e.g. biological sex), you better be damn sure one hundred times over that your interpretation of the text is infallible, correct, and that there have not been translational errors or omissions that crept in over the centuries.)
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Sorry, just saw this and it hit me, by KAS:
KAS, this is very disingenuous of you.
I can explain for you, if you like, how it is some people draw a comparison between the Taliban and the rape of girls to your version of Christian gender complementarianism.
You should be able to see it on your own, though.
No woman should have to do your homework for you on that score.
It should be self-evident to you how Islam’s misogyny and control of women is the same as Christian complementarianism and how both are born by their religious world views and holy texts.
I could explain it for you.
But. Your take on this is dishonest, because I went out of my way on several replies in this very thread and/or on the first page of this comment thread, to explain how even putting rape and the Taliban aside…
Your type of complementarianism – the nice, biblical sort – is still sexist and abusive.
I already connected the dots for you in showing how your type of sweet, Jesus-loving, complementarianism is still sexist and abusive.
I quoted you links to my own Daisy blog where I explained it in detail in specific posts on my blog.
And yet, you act here as though you’ve only had more extreme examples tossed at you (rape, Taliban), when that is not the case.
I specifically have called out your nice, biblical, loving sweet form of male- head ship- servant- leadership over and over in the comment box, telling you and explaining how that sort is also harmful to women and creates negative consequences for women.
You don’t respond to those, but only complain about the more severe examples.
Complementarianism does not have to produce rape or broken bones in a woman to be shown how harmful it is:
Complementarianism can also produce low self esteem in a woman, financial problems, problems forming and maintaining healthy dating relationships with men, equitable platonic friendships with men, women, and co-workers on a job, etc. etc.
I could go on and on in all the ways the “KAS” form of complementarianism is sexist and harmful.
(I’ve explained before here and over on my own blog.)
I don’t have to point to black eyes, broken ribs, or child rape to do it. How convenient you keep ignoring my points on this only to fixate on dismissing the more severe examples.
(But yes, your type of comp. also produces the more severe cases you’ve seen posted by others.)
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Carmen said
You Tube channel:
_Christianity Diversity_
If I remember right, the guy who runs that “Christian Diversity” channel started out as a Christian but became an agnostic.
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It’s not such a bad thing Daisy. 🙂 There is life post-Christianity even if wounded. It is possible to keep on keeping on. Easy? Not necessarily but possible. ❤
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Daisy (and others) have you seen this article? Seems relevant!
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/06/there-is-no-biological-difference-between-male-and-female-brains/563702/?utm_source=atlfb
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Lea, I’ve read that at one of the prenatal stages, a male brain is flooded with testosterone. That is one of the theories about transgender development – that sometimes males don’t have that happen, so they grow up feeling “female”, and likewise, some females whose brains get flooded with testosterone grow up feeling “male”.
I did a quick google search, and apparently, testosterone has effects on developed brains as well.
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Thank you for the link, Lea. I have shared it over on my blog, with links to similar studies below it:
_There Is No Biological Difference Between Male and Female Brains_
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Doubling down on Male Lead of Women (Complementarianism) is not going to put a dent in, or stop sexism or abuse of women and girls, in or by Christians or in churches.
Male Hierarchy in Christianity (“complementarianism”) has been the status quo for the last few hundred years. It only adds to and prolongs and enables sexism in the church. It has not stopped sexism or the abuse of girls and women.
Insanity is trying the same thing over and over again, expecting different results.
Trying even more complementarianism is not going to solve the problem of misogyny or sexism in Christendom.
Complementarianism sure has not helped eradicate sexism lately, what with all the stories in the media of Paige Patterson and other complementarian Christian men turning a blind eye to male rape of females on Christian campuses or husbands abusing their wives.
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I think at a minimum, complementarian camps need to do significant soul-searching to understand how the message that they are proclaiming is leading to the re-victimization of abused women, the promotion of tone-deaf and abusive men, and the absence of protection and justice or the very same weak and underprivileged people that caused OT prophets and Jesus himself to rail against the societal and religious leaders.
Looking at the Paige Patterson case, what we hear is that Patterson didn’t represent the views of the SBC. How is that? What specifically did he miss? If SBC is going to dig in their heels on complementarian theology, then what changes are necessary to prevent men like Patterson from rising in power.
This is the very thing I railed against in my own denomination. The very law and order of the church set up a system where the churches must be self-policing. In order to hold one “Paige Patterson” accountable, many elders need to take a stand against abuse, and that is a very unpopular stand to take. Who is going to put their neck out against Patterson, a well-respected, influential and powerful leader in the SBC, to provide a voice for some faceless, nameless victim who says he treated her viciously and unfairly.
And that is the core problem that may never be solved on this side of eternity. Standing with the victims always comes with a political and financial cost.
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Sometimes some men tune out women but respond to other men (or people with male screen names) – I’ve seen this on this blog with KAS and whom he chooses to respond to most often:
_Study: male political reporters retweet other dudes 3 times more than their female colleagues_
A quote from the page:
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~ Daisy
As a long-term Christian participant on a Christian spiritual abuse forum I wrote and engaged with countless participants under a gender-neutral username. As time went by I changed my username to a female name and at that point I got all kinds of feedback. ‘I thought your were a man.’ ‘You’re a woman?’ ‘I had no idea.’ ‘I thought you were a moderator.’ I asked them why it is that they thought I was a man. The number one response was that I spoke/wrote with authority. It was a very telling time for me as I then watched all interaction from both male and female participants, wane and quite simply, communication and interaction with me ceased.
Many years later while visiting with a senior pastor in our home he told me with my husband present that he could understand why the men in the church didn’t like me. He stunned me at first. It was very quiet and I inquired as to why the men would not like me. His response? “You are intelligent, you know your Bible and you are a good speaker.”
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Zoe –
I used to be a moderator at a heavily visited Christian forum.
Many of the posters there were Independent Fundamentalist Baptists, and they are very big on the Complementarian shtick – they adhere to most gender stereotypes, they believe women are weak, women should submit to men, etc.
I got all kinds of static from them when or if I asked them to follow the forum rules.
I noticed when I logged in using a male name, they were suddenly very, very respectful towards me, they didn’t argue, they just did as I asked.
Also check out some of the articles in this post I did (link below), about how people treat women differently if the woman posts under a male name or goes transgender (ie, presents as a male – grows a beard, etc – the difference is like night and day):
This post is long, but if you scroll down it, you’ll see the examples I mean:
_On Men Not Believing Women and Being Blind to the Sexism and Harassment Women Often Endure_
There’s also an example in that blog post in the reverse: a man had to share his woman co-worker’s e-mail account for a week or two.
He forgot to erase the woman co-worker’s name from the sig line and put his own name in there, so customers he contacted assumed that he was a woman (before he realized what was going on). Anyway.
When he was replying to men as a woman, he said he noticed he was treated terribly. He was not treated with as much respect, etc, as when he signed off with his male name.
Men automatically gave him the benefit of the doubt and assumed he was competent when he signed off with his male name, but not when he was accidentally signing off under a woman’s name.
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Complementarianism (with its belief in “male headship” etc) is part of the problem, it’s not a solution:
_Women Saw #MeToo Coming 100 Years Ago. When Will We Listen?_
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Mark – you have written some long posts; my reply will have to be shorter and limited.
I don’t ever recall saying you should never be angry, and I don’t know where you got this from. There is righteous anger and unrighteous anger, but we are allowed to be angry over evil going on around us.
I have been defining what I mean by complementarian – that the verses in the NT addressed to wives are for wives only (which is the submit doctrine, however you understand it) and those addressed to husbands are for husbands (my endless repetition of love, cherish, nourish, live considerately, bestow honour). Regarding the husband verses, I have yet to have a reply to my question as to where you get abuse out of these instructions.
I have never claimed my understanding and interpretation are perfect. My main difference with egalitarians is that apostolic teaching on marriage and the 1 Tim 2 stuff are for today, not culture bound to the NT era. Seeing as how my husband verses alluded to above are verbatim from the text itself, I don’t see where a difference in interpretation is possible regarding their content.
Regarding 1 Cor 14 and the ‘silent women’ verses, I have stated before I believe in the full participation of women in the meeting, including praying and prophesying. I have been in a church trying to implement this.
Paul has alluded to what he means by the law in v34, no need to speculate. Egalitarians I have read spectacularly miss the point when they so there is no law in the OT forbidding women to speak, it is fascinating to behold.
As to the silence itself, I’ll give you a clue. Paul expressly forbids the church to forbid speaking in tongues in the public meeting. However, earlier on he says if there is no one to interpret, let each of them keep silence in church and speak to himself and to God. There is no contradiction here, neither is there a contradiction between women praying and having to be silent as instructed in v34f. The question is when do women have to be silent, and it is not too difficult to have a reasonable understanding of when that should be by looking at the context, even if rigid dogmatism is better avoided. 1 Tim 2 also sheds light on this, as it is remarkably parallel in content.
There are no MSS that do not have these verses, even if arranged differently in the text, so I see no reason to doubt their authenticity. This is a textual critical question and should not be decided on the basis of we don’t like what the verses appear to say.
That’s how I understand it at the moment, and if differing interpretations shed more light on the subject, I am happy to amend what I believe about it accordingly. Attempts to show me that the gifts of the Spirit here are ‘not for today’, or that the teaching on men and women is ‘not for today’ are not likely to get very far!
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Daisy – I have no desire to get into overly detailed discussions of complementarianism. It doesn’t dominate my thinking.
My direct answer to the question posed in the thread (remember that?!) was that in pushing back against abuse of women in the church, this perenial egalitarian/complementarian debate should be set aside where everone takes the bible seriously. Everybody work together.
If, however, you insist that complementarianism is itself abusive, I beg to differ. I have never met an abusive complementarian husband – imperfect, yes – and any husband who is abusive could not have derived any justification for his abuse from the bible itself.
The couple I learnt the most from on this subject was one where the wife had come out of an abusive marriage. They were really sensible about it in their approach, and if the doctrine itself were abusive, then by rights she jumped out of the frying pan into the fire. She didn’t!
If a man claims to be complementarian and is at the same time abusive, trying to counteract this with egalitarianism is unlikely to work. I can well imagine such individuals obsess with the wives submit verses, thinking they must enforce this. I am utterly opposed to this attitude and understanding.
Rather than attempt to argue ‘submission is mutual’, drum into such men precisely what the apostles addressed to husbands, and make sure they do it. You could, in addition, emphasise the enormous number of places in the NT where God does indeed treat everyone equally, where there is no egal/comp disagreement.
The pastors or whatever you call them ought to be active in this where abuse has occurred, but of course under egalitarianism we are all equal and no-one has the right or authority to interfere in such circumstances! This is where egalitarianism for me collapses under the weight of its own internal contradictions.
I restrict my posting because of time, where comments are clearly based on not reading what I have already said and/or the imputation of views to me I do not hold, and where imo you get bogged down in discussing things you have given serious thought to for years with people who have absolutely no intention of doing what the NT says where they don’t like it.
So I will push back against abuse, but what people do in their own personal lives regarding how marriage works is between them and God, and we are all going to have to give an account at the judgment. Wives who put down their husbands at every opportunity or husbands to lorded it over or were harsh their wives will all have to give account.
Much more fruitful is a discussion of how to put the stuff into practice in a sensible way rather than only ever concentrating on when it has gone wrong.
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~ Daisy
20 years personal experience in IFB churches 🙂
I bookmarked your links (thanks) and will have a look.
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“His response? “You are intelligent, you know your Bible and you are a good speaker.””
And why shouldn’t you be? The majority of Christian men I grew up with hated a woman with a bloody passion if she acted and talked like an adult. They would lie and say she is acting like a man.
My grandfather, a Southern Baptist preacher, told me he found Donna Reed from It’s a Wonderful Life to be the most attractive woman he ever saw because she had a childlike innocence, but, he knew she was not innocent because she was a mother.
My mother and grandmother pretended to be little girls because my grandfather and father were not attracted to adults.
It says so much about a man who is turned off by women who talk like and act like grown-ups.
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“If, however, you insist that complementarianism is itself abusive, I beg to differ. I have never met an abusive complementarian husband”
This is extremely arrogant of you KAS.
You do not know if you have met an abusive complementarian husband. When my father and grandfather died they did not know anything about me. I told them nothing because they were extreme misogynist; they died thinking I loved and respected them. The truth is I found them to be disgusting, embarrassing, and never trusted them. Most abusive victims keep the abuse secret.
You have been told that because of complementarian women and little girls were abused and that complementarian ruined lives and childhoods. It is selfish and disrespectful of you to tell the victims of your ideas that they were not abused by your ideas. Comp hurts women and little girls. Comp hurt me as a sexually abused little girl.
You have not even got the nerve to answer if a woman can tell her husband no to sex. It seems you would want everyone to know she can, and that comp is not pro-sex slavery. If a woman has to have sex with her husband against her will she is a sex slave. Even though my comp family says there is no such thing as rape in marriage.
You don’t even have the nerve to answer if a woman can tell her husband no. It seems you would were you can show people comp does not want women to live like little girl slaves.
You would not answer if a woman can divorce her husband for beating her.
I was born and raised in comp and learned in comp that if I did not get married the second I finished school God would hate me.
I learned if I did not give birth a million times God would hate me.
I learned if I did not let my husband have sex with me anytime he wanted God would hate me.
I learned if my husband raped me it was not rape and I had to take blame for it and God would hate me.
I learned if my husband beat me I had to take blame for it and I could not divorce him for beating me and God would hate me. Basically, comp taught me if I did not live like one of Ariel Castro’s victims God would hate and condemn me.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ariel_Castro_kidnappings
As a child, my biggest dream was to get the right to one day be able to tell men no and never have to have any kind of sex again. Comp told me if I did not sign up for more of my childhood God would condemn me.
So KAS in your ideas of comp what does the woman have to do?????
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Hi Daisy! I saw this article as well the other day. I don’t really do twitter, but the data was interesting.
I also saw a thing posted suggesting women use only their initials on resumes to avoid bias. I’m not sure I can do that in my system, but it’s a good suggestion. Many authors do this for the same reason, because men are more likely to read books by men.
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Zoe, I thought my user name was gender neutral, because the way I pronounce it is. I didn’t realize it would be more commonly pronounced in a feminine way. It would be interesting to see what would happen with a truly gender neutral name.
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CH, as a big fan of It’s a Wonderful Life? This is NONSENSE. Donna Reed was, at no point in that movie, childlike. She knew exactly what she was doing way before she married and had kids. Your grandfather, and I wouldn’t say this unless I thought you would approve, was an idiot.
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~ Christianity hurts
After 20 years of the stuff I quietly said to my husband on our way home from church one day, I’m not going back. I cannot stand to listen to the dehumanizing of women from the pulpit any longer. (That’s the short story.) When we got home we talked further. He never bought into the IFB stuff. He always honoured my strengths, abilities and knowledge. I’m very fortunate. He continued for two more years as our daughter was a teen and involved in youth group and friendships so it was difficult to cold turkey her out of there. Eventually, getting a job kept her out of church on Sunday’s and after two years my husband came home and said, “You’re right.” I had no idea what he was talking about, so I said, “about what?” He responded: “How they treat women in the church.” He did not return.
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“where comments are clearly based on not reading what I have already said and/or the imputation of views to me I do not hold, ”
Comments are based on what you have said. It sounds like you want abusive victims to shut up, especially if they are going tell the truth about how comp has hurt them.
I grew up with many comp men in my large family and I have never read a post by you that made me think maybe comp men are not all selfish, disrespectful to women, misogynistic, hateful, heartless, and mean-spirited.
You showed your true comp man colors by telling two victims of toddler sexual abuse you know people who have been through worse and have handled it better.
Every comp man I have ever known was especially hateful to victims of sexual abuse, even if it was young childhood sexual abuse, you did not prove otherwise.
It is obvious mean-spiritedness towards women and abuse victims is normal in comp men.
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KAS, I’ve found the response that I offered weeks ago to this very question of yours. It’s on the comment thread to the (semi)recent post regarding Fred Butler. Please follow the link below if you want to know my thoughts.
https://spiritualsoundingboard.com/2018/04/24/fred-butler-metoo-and-the-worldly-culture/comment-page-1/#comment-385046
I’m preparing another comment to you, but work, exhaustion and poor health might keep it from being completed for some time. In the meantime, please do answer CH’s questions. They require only a simple yes or no, and represent a prime opportunity to prove that she’s wrong about you.
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KAS, “Regarding the husband verses, I have yet to have a reply to my question as to where you get abuse out of these instructions.”
I think you choose your words poorly here. I’m not contradicting the instructions. I’m contradicting your interpretation of the instructions. You seem to be posturing here into a catch-22 where you can take your interpretation and say, “but the Bible says”.
In this case, we’re talking about the meaning of words. For example, you choose “submit” to mean two different things – one meaning in “submit to one another” and a different meaning in “wives submit to your husbands”. You’ve been very clear that these mean different things, but there is nothing except your complementarian lens that dictates the difference in interpretation.
You also talk about “headship” meaning leadership. That is also a western idea that has been read into the Bible. Just as we read way too much into parables (e.g. the rapture) we read too much in a simile. husband:wife::christ:church::christ:god these are all comparisons that are made and you can see why the Eternal Submission of the Son (ESS) proponents start putting wackiness into the christ:god simile, because the misinterpret what “head” means.
So, where you get abuse is when one class of people “women/wives” is told that they are to subjugate themselves (interpreting submit to mean obey as complementarians do) to another class of people “men/husbands” because that’s what the Bible says(TM). And, in the same way, that men are, by default leaders “heads” over women because that’s what the Bible says(TM). And, of course that is backed up by what we see in the quote. Complete equivocation between your INTERPRETATION of the Bible, and what “God hath spoken(TM)”.
To make this brutally clear, when you get your head out of your butt and realize that what you interpret the Bible to say is not one and the same with what the Bible says, then you have a chance of being teachable. For me, it took abuse at the hands of people who used the same interpretation of scripture that I had, and justified themselves based on that scripture (obey your Elders) to get my head out of my butt.
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Serving Kids in Japan, I hope your health improves.
Regarding CH’s question, I suspect the answer to ‘can a woman say no to sex (or possibly anything else)” for most of these folks although I can’t speak for KAS is ‘she can, but it would be a ‘sin’. Which is basically spiritual blackmail.
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The truth is, he’s gotten many, many responses. He just rejects them all by saying ‘that’s not real comp’. Which is a logical fallacy for a reason.
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@ Serving Kids in Japan
Much love and please get well soon 😉
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Serving Kids in Japan,
Praying that your health improves and your burdens are lifted to a “lighter” schedule, so you can get fully rested up and can continue serving others.
There are many of us in agreement here with your gentle request that KAS give an answer to Christianity Hurts and others, with regards to the word “No.” Who is privileged amongst us to be able to utilized such a word?
I was pondering this verse again as the “yes and no” debate continues with gender inclusive attachments added regarding the simple word, “No”; Jesus speaking here, “But let your “yes” be “yes” and your “no” be “no.” For whatever is more than these is from the evil one.” Matthew 5:37
So am I to understand that those words are only reserved for one gender and not the other?
And another question…..do complimentary men only make “mistakes,” or do they “sin” as well? I have heard it said that certain Christians “make mistakes” while others committing the very same act, are engaged in “sin,” with regards to gender, leadership and hierarchy within the c’hurch.
KAS, please honor Christianity Hurts with respect to her question as there is much to learn here, and a few good testimonies to be shared in ministering to you. It is my prayer she will be treated like the intelligent human being that she is and be given an honest answer from your heart.
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Mark,
Your comment is very powerful.
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KAS,
People seem to be frustrated with you. Please answer the questions that people are asking you before going on any further.
To everyone else: If you have asked KAS a question which has not been answered, please remind KAS your question so he does not have to scroll to search for them.
Thank you.
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KAS, this is a colossal waste of my time, I feel.
This thread has devolved from its original intent and topic, which was, “how can we fight sexism in churches,” to, “KAS wants to be convinced that egalitarianism is right and keep defending complementarianism.” And that is not the purpose of the thread.
We are going in circles.
I have explained and explained to you over and over again that complementarianism is abusive and sexist at its core, not just in this thread but in older ones from months ago:
Complementarianism teaches that men are to have power, authority, and control over women just on the basis of gender, but the Bible says, “You shall not lord authority over another person.”
Complementarianism does not exist to teach men to love and cherish women, but only to offer cherry-picked, taken out of context verses to justify male control of women. That is one reason it is abusive in and of itself.
The Christian church has been complementarian for decades now, and not only has it NOT stopped abuse of girls and women, it has been utilized by men in power to enable the abuse or in some other cases, to cover it up – even comp men such as Al Mohler and J D Greear have admitted to this fact in the last month.
Complementarianism does not stop abuse or sexism, it fosters both, as we’ve all seen in the ‘Church Too’ phenomenon where many women have stepped forward to explain how sexism (under comp) in Christianity has hurt them..
KAS: I have explained over and over how comp has personally hurt me, and I’ve given you many links to articles by myself and other people with examples.
I’ve also given you many links showing how the Bible does not teach male headship.
KAS said (and I don’t now have time to read the entire post or respond right now)-
Complementarianism abused me, and the abuse I endured under it was indeed taken straight from the Bible, the very same Bible and interpretative method you use, KAS.
There are abusive complementarian men.
Just because you don’t personally know of any does not mean they do not exist.
There are men who explicitly point to the “wives submit” Bible verse to justify why they verbally, emotionally, sexually, or physically abusive their wives.
I’ve seen this mentioned in books about domestic abuse and relationship issues by Christian therapists who counsel abused, Christian wives.
Read testimonies by Christian wives at the blog “A Cry For Justice” (link on right side of this blog). There are numerous Christian wives on there who say their complementarian Christian husbands beat them, verbally abused them, or controlled every facet of their lives.
Even the kinder, gentler biblical version of comp you follow causes women damage, psychological damage, as it did to me. My parents raised me complementarian. It damaged me a lot.
The complementarianism you believe in is the same exact thing as Codependency – and the rest of the Bible has instance of God telling anyone who believes in him to NOT be practice codepdent behavior.
So, who do I listen to, KAS and complementarians who tell me to practice codependent behaviors, or the God of the Bible who says he detests codependency?
Your complementarianism, with its motto of, “women equal in worth to men just not in role” is the SAME exact mindset as American racists who discriminated against black people, and they tried to justify it by saying, “Blacks are equal in worth to whites, just keep them separate from whites, and give them sub-standard accommodations to whites.”
I lived as a complementarian from the time I was a kid up to my mid-30s. There is nothing you can say or do to convince me it is “biblical” or “the plain teaching of Scripture” or to go back to it. Comp is a bunch of sexist hog wash.
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KAS quote
_Bible Passage Used to Stop Women Become Ordained ‘Added Later’, Academic Claims_
The Handmaidens Conspiracy: How Erroneous Bible Translations Obscured the Women’s Empowerment Movement STARTED by JESUS CHRIST by D. L. Howell_
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Fixed Link:
_The Handmaidens Conspiracy: How Erroneous Bible Translations Obscured the Women’s Empowerment Movement STARTED by JESUS CHRIST by D. L. Howell_
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Lea: re: your post mentioning Donna Reed.
I’m a conservative, but I’m fed up with other conservatives who revere marriage and the nuclear family to the point they began worshipping both years and years ago.
For decades, a lot of other conservatives have enjoyed pointing to “Leave It To Beaver’s” wife and mom television character, June Cleaver, as the ideal, in part because June is a stay- at – home- wife and mom who does not work outside the home.
A few years ago, I read an interview the actress gave.
She said during the filming of “Leave It To Beaver,” her two or three children were small. She had to hire babysitters or nannies to look after her children while she went to the studio every day to film “Leave It To Beaver.”
Irony.
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Christianity Hurts quoting KAS:
KAS, you need to accept the fact that while you personally may not rape or physically abuse girls and women,
The very women on this thread you have been conversing with have been hurt one way or another by complementarian men or by complementarianism itself.
And not all the complementarianism we’ve mentioned was complementarianism “done wrong” or complementarianism that was “not taken from the Bible.”
You keep arguing the _No True Complementarian Fallacy_.
Please do explain all the up-roar with the American Southern Baptists, and the bru- ha- ha over Paige Patterson, and Al Mohler’s recent admission of problems with complementarianism, (brought to light on Twitter by the “Church Too” hash tag and discussion by Christian women online), if all that sexism and mistreatment was not caused, prolonged, or aided and abetted by their very belief and teaching and practicing of … complementarianism?
The vast majority of the abuse of women being discussed by Christian women on Twitter under the “Church Too” hash tag was carried out by complementarian men under complementarianism,
using the same method of Biblical hermeneutics that you use to defend male headship of wives and no women preachers.
It was not egalitarianism, atheism, Islam, Hinduism, Wicca, or Star Wars fandom, that caused all that abuse and sexism being described under “Church Too.”
The Christian women in a lot of the “Church Too” threads and Tweets were attributing their mistreatment and abuse to biblical complementarianism.
Men are using the very same Bible you use to abuse women and to adhere to sexist views, KAS. And they point to the same Bible verses you do about women, marriage, preaching, etc, to defend and excuse it.
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Daisy, Mary Tyler Moore had to convince CBS to let her character wear pants on the dick van dyke show, because of how ridiculous it was that Donna Reed was always wearing a pretty dress and heels when she presumably was cleaning and so on and so forth during the day.
So this silly perfectly primped housewife thing wasn’t even real. It was TV.
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Mark said,
Something else KAS apparently has not wrangled with, but I have in the last few years since I’ve been in a faith crisis…
And I think I already mentioned this up thread, but here it is again…
Biblicism and P.I.P. (pervasive interpretive pluralism).
There is more than one “correct” way to read the Bible.
Conservative Christians who all say they take the Bible as being wholly God’s word, they believe in inerrancy, and they say they’re taking the Bible literally, all disagree with each other on many, many topics.
KAS should read
_“The Blue Parakeet” (2nd ed.)_ by Scot McNight,
and maybe read _Peter Enns blog_ (which is not to say I necessarily agree with McNight or Enns on everything).
By Richard Beck (in a post entitled, “Unpublished: Being Biblical Means Being Doctrinally Tolerant”):
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Mark said,
Mark, I find trying to talk to “soft” complementarians (e.g., KAS) so difficult.
It should be pretty self-evident as to why and how even “biblical” complementarianism is sexist and abusive.
Complementarianism at its heart is antithetical to the messages of the Bible, (that says all are created equal, there is no male or female in Christ, God created the first man and women to rule the world TOGETHER, Jesus said not to lord authority over others, God does not play favorites, etc)…
But complementarians come along and want to normalize or interpret the Bible, in passages that mention marriage and women, in such as way to teach and defend concepts that Jesus Christ taught against.
Jesus did not limit women or strip women of authority, agency, or power – Jesus empowered women, just the opposite of complementarianism, and he did so in a sexist / patriarchal / complementarian culture and religion of his era.
Complementarianism is a misuse of the Bible to teach the repulsive notion that all men should be allowed to rule over women, all women should have to unilaterally submit to all men (or to husbands), and women should be barred from certain functions not because they are inept and stupid, but merely for having female genitalia (an in-born trait they did not choose and cannot change).
Complementarians mis-use the Bible to discriminate against women now the way American Christians used the Bible _to discriminate against black people in the U.S._ in the 19th century.
I’d think many complementarians can recognize how 19th cent. Christians “got the Bible’ wrong on slavery, but these same comps claim to not see a problem with how they are using the Bible to maintain sexism as a status quo, as if to say there is a type of sexism that is “godly” and “biblical.”
Telling all men that God chose them above women and to rule over women as “leaders,” or whatever terminology one wishes to use, is obviously sexist and abusive on the face of things.
I can’t believe “soft” comps such as KAS are blind to this.
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Lea said
Yes. I’ve even given him a few links here and there on this comment box (and I think older ones in months past) to egalitarian sites that explain the “husband verses.”
We’ve already explained ten times over how the complementarian application and/or interpretation of those verses is obnoxious, sexist, and abusive, but it falls on deaf ears.
I’d still like for KAS to explain how complementarianism is supposedly so wonderful for protecting girls and women, when we’ve been seeing many news stories in months past of how complementarian men have been routinely abusing women and girls in church, and they use complementarian teachings in part to excuse or cover-up this sexism and abuse.
(And these are “real” complementarian men abusing or promoting abuse, or covering it up, such as Southern Baptist Paige Patterson.
These are men using the Bible to justify why and how they abuse women, or to deny women equal opportunity.
Doug Phillips is a “real” complementarian man who sexually harassed his teen-aged nanny (whose name is Lourdes)… Philips uses the same Bible that KAS does, and agrees with KAS that wives should submit, and women should not lead men or be preachers.
“Real” complementarian men fired that Christian lady who was teaching Hebrew language classes at a complementarian Christian college – they fired her for being a woman. By all reports I read, she was a favorite instructor and was quite good at her job.)
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Lea said,
On a related topic. I’m not quite sure where I stand to being practical vs. looking good in fictional works.
On the one hand, I find it pretty cool that Lynda Carter (as Wonder Woman) looked great while fighting villains, but at times, it looked a little impractical in those high-heeled boots she wore.
Then you had Buffy in the ‘Buffy’ movie and TV series who usually wore jeans or sweat pants with sneakers to slay vampires.
If I were a super hero such as Wonder Woman and Buffy, I’d probably go the Buffy route and wear sweat pants with sneakers to fight baddies. It looks more comfortable.
As to housework. I’ve never once in my life dressed up in heels and pearls to vacuum or do dishes or anything. I usually go jogging, then come back home in my grody, sweaty work-out clothes, then do housework, then I take a shower and change.
But it’s ridiculous that so many other conservatives out there hold only one type of woman up as some ideal we must all follow (like June in pearls and skirts), and some of them actually may argue this is all “biblical,” when actually, it’s just their personal preference, probably based on their cultural norms.
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Daisy, “I’d think many complementarians can recognize how 19th cent. Christians ‘got the Bible wrong’ on slavery, but these same comps claim to not see a problem with how they are using the Bible to maintain sexism as a status quo”
I think this is a really compelling argument against comp. theology. The instructions for slaves were more close to children – “obey”, and there are many parallels between Paul’s instructions for wives, children and slaves.
The consequence of that is that the very same answers to the slavery question that the church settled on:
– slaves are not genetically inferior to their masters
– slavery was an important cultural phenomenon for Paul to deal with, but Paul’s instructions towards slaves are not justification of the institution.
– Paul specifically calls out a slave, Onesimus, as a partner in ministry which underscores the Spiritual gifting of slaves.
could be used in the same way to end patriarchy
– women are not genetically inferior to men
– patriarchy (both within the Jewish religious system and in pagan societies) was an important cultural phenomenon for the Bible to deal with, but Biblical instruction does not justify the institution
– Jesus sends women (as prophets) to give instructions to the disciples. NT authors specifically call out women who are doing ministry in the church, both physical and spiritual.
Not that it will ever end, just as racism has just been pushed under the surface…
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re: Doug Phillips
Not only that, but Doug Phillips was a pastor and leader of an organization “Vision Forum” dedicated to training men to place themselves in leadership positions in their homes, their workplaces and their governments.
Intriguing that Phillips’s complementarian theology allowed him to treat his underage female nanny as a sex toy, and when it was revealed exactly what had happened, his justification for why he didn’t do anything really bad and why he still deserved to be a pastor and president of his non-profit was “I didn’t ‘know’ her in the Biblical sense”. Not only that, but his comp fan club completely agree with him.
Isn’t it intriguing that what was vastly ignored in all of this was all of the emotional and spiritual abuse that led up to this. Not only that, but the emotional and spiritual abuse of his wife that led her to stand up for him. And, of course, the standard “throw the woman under the bus” theology. According to the lawsuit: “He further repeatedly told Ms. Torres that he loved her, that he would take care of her, and that what they were doing was not wrong. He also stated that if it was wrong, it was completely her fault.”
His theology allowed him (Gawd’s ordained servant) unquestioned authority over his church and his non-profit, such that he could take advantage of a family who had little understanding of American culture and the English language to essentially enslave their daughter, not just sexually, but as a live-in caregiver, while the “church” told them how wonderful he was and how wonderful of an opportunity it was for their family.
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per Daisy and from one of her links she gave me to her blog. _On Men Not Believing Women and Being Blind to the Sexism and Harassment Women Often Endure_ Apologies, I don’t have in front of me how to make a hyperlink to your post Daisy.
During my high school years I had a math teacher that started every year telling the girls to not study engineering or to pursue higher education in university as they were no good at math. Every. single. year. In addition to this he set up a delivery that certainly wore many of us (female students) down. He separated the boys from the girls. The boys to his right, the girls to his left as he looked out over the class. I always sat in the front which put me in a place of never feeling safe to his verbal abuses. His mockery of the women left us unable to compute anything, or to participate at all. By third year many of his female students dropped out of academic math and those who remained failed. I was one who failed. For my 4th year and a repeat of 3rd year academic math, it started like all the other years. When class ended I went to the Principal’s office and told him I quit Mr. C’s class and would like to drop to Applied math. Short story, that’s what I did against his recommendations. I told him I simply couldn’t sit there for another year and be demeaned because I was a girl and to be told I wasn’t capable of higher education.
On my way into the 4th year Applied math class taught by the 5th year Academic math teacher I was stopped where she pleaded with me not to do this. Please she said, you won’t be able to go to University (where I was headed) unless I completed Academic maths. We talked for a long time and I told her I simply could not tolerate his abuse to female students and if they can do something about it . . . and she told me she had already tried. I wasn’t the first, nor would I be the last (more to the story.)
She told me he is like that with his female colleagues too and that as the senior math teacher she had tried for years to get something done about it but couldn’t. Finally, she stepped aside and I went into her class. I finished all her assignments early, and then did the grade 13 math homework (I was in grade 12) that she had posted on the board for her grade 13’s.
This all happened on the first day of school. The second day of school, another Academic level female classmate of mine showed up in the Applied class. The third day, yet another. The fourth day, another. Still nothing was done.
Years later, my dad, who was then a Principal in a college, told me he owed me an apology. He had noted that the high school math for female students from that high school were all in applied math despite the fact that they were all students in the academic level. He decided to interview some of them over the years. After several years he saw the pattern. They had all had the same math teacher as me and they had all failed their 3rd year academic math. (What I’ve left out here is the rest of the story where I advocated for myself and fought tooth and nail with respect, reason and truth to present a case for myself and others against this abuse and harassment. Didn’t get me anywhere. I even reasoned profusely with my parents who were both educators.)
Back to dad. He apologized for not listening to me years earlier and taking up the cause. He told me back in those days, a teacher’s word was taken over a students.
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Many thanks to all for your kind thoughts. My illness is nothing serious — I simply caught a cold over the weekend, and hoped that it would get better on its own. But it hasn’t, and I wasn’t able to go to the clinic until this morning. I’ve got some stronger meds now, so hopefully I’ll be on the mend soon.
All prayers much appreciated! 🙂
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KAS/JA re: Unanswered questions – I spent time today parsing through the thread. I probably didn’t get all of the questions, but here are the ones I found:
Thread 1: Does the Bible command silence of women?
KAS: Kathi – ever since I have given this much thought, I have believed gifts are given freely to both men and women on an equal basis. Prayer and prophecy. I helped lead a church years ago trying to put this into practice. Easier said than done, but to try to get men and women to participate fully. You can’t make people do anything though, can you.
Kathi: KAS said, “If women were allowed to exercise spiritual gifts as the NT allows, I suspect this would prevent so much of the argument about this, take the sting out of it.”
So, women are allowed to exercise spiritual gifts except if they’re gifted in leadership and teaching? I know we aren’t going to agree on this, but I’ll keep pushing back. When half (probably more like over half) of the church is not allowed to use their spiritual gifts then you’re not seeing women as equally created and gifted by God.
KAS: This was the answer I was hoping you wouldn’t make! If you allow women freedom with all of the gifts except a teaching ministry in a mixed gathering, this is not silencing half of them, unfortunately a common response though.
SKIJ: KAS, With regard to teaching, instruction in doctrine (cf 1 v 3) he says to the women in 2 v 11 Let a woman learn in silence [quietness] with all submissiveness. So we have a teaching and learning in church context here.
But how do you know that this is in the context of a local church? Paul doesn’t mention “local church” at all in this passage. How do you know that he wasn’t talking about some particular woman (or group of women) in the Christian community who were taught bad doctrine, and were trying to pass on to men faulty stuff that they’d learned about creation? That makes a lot more sense to me than trying to squeeze gender hierarchy out of Paul’s instructions. Mark’s ideas above seem quite pertinent to this passage.
KAS: Paul has alluded to what he means by the law in v34, no need to speculate.
Commentary: There are two questions here for KAS. The first line of questioning is why the Holy Spirit would give women gifts on an “equal basis” and then prohibit women from exercising those gifts? The second line of questioning is whether Paul specifically commands women to be silent, when and why?
(note that KAS failed to respond to the line of reasoning that women’s silence was not commanded in the OT, and that “law” in egal. literature has been found to reference the “traditions of the Rabbis” which was misogynistic teaching that Jesus himself opposed.
Thread 2: Daisy: What are KAS’ suggestions on how to eliminate sexism against women and girls in Christianity? Has he cited any ideas so far?
So, has KAS given any ideas on how churches can combat sexism?
Thread 3: Mark: You want to interpret the OT and NT in completely different ways – the OT through the lens of the culture and the principle of general equity, yet you want to reject that very interpretation when it comes to the culture and general equity of the NT. Isn’t that hypocritical?
Commentary: there are many repeated questions about interpreting the passages. Here are specific ones:
1) How can submit be understood as requiring authority when we are told to submit to one another? (There is a lot of unanswered dialogue here)
2) How can “headship” be explained as leadership and submission of will as in the three similes without falling into the ESS heresy?
3) What context requires us to interpret the “women” passages in the NT as being specific commands to women for all times in all places, vs. other passages mentioned, such as “holy kiss”, “meat sacrificed to idols”, “fence around the roof”?
Thread 4: CH: Can a wife in comp tell her husband, “no”?
Can a wife in comp tell her husband “no” to sex?
Can a wife in comp divorce her husband for beating her?
KAS: Christianty hurts: I looked at your three questions and was about to reply when it occurred to me that I have already in effect answered all three of them multiple times. Would there be much point in saying it all again, I don’t seem to be being heard despite the repetition.
CH: Can a wife say no to her husband? Yes or no.
Can a wife say no to sex with her husband? Yes or no.
Commentary: I haven’t seen any responses to this here or elsewhere.
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Mark, you’re doing some work there.
As for this: Yes or no.
Yes or no questions rarely get answered. Men who believe something truly terrible often don’t want it on record. So they go all 50 words of circles to avoid it and act like they answered.
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Hi Lea,
Maybe I didn’t understand your statement clearly enough, but I wouldn’t completely isolate men about beating around the bush, it is a phenomena that some women do, and do quite well.
I would rather focus on what Mark’s statement and either agree or disagree. We have a lot of sensitive males and females that would consider that sexiest if the word “men” was replaced with “women” like this:
“Women who believe something truly terrible often don’t want it on record. So they go all 50 words of circles to avoid it and act like they answered”
I have a daughter I love dearly who was experiencing choppy waters during the economic meltdown who stayed with us for a spell after we moved. And the nature of her personality is beating around the bush.
We had a room set up for her, but she proclaimed the mattress wasn’t firm enough for her back. I told her I’ll buy a new mattress as my wife wanted her to keep things tidy. My daughter said it wasn’t necessary, I insisted that it wouldn’t be a problem. As it turned she admitted she didn’t like the room as the floor space wasn’t big enough for her clothes. She refuses to use dressers.
It took my wife 10 minutes to get a straight answer out of her.
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JA – KAS,
People seem to be frustrated with you. Please answer the questions that people are asking you before going on any further.
I’ve noticed this, but frustration on this is mutual (that’s not intended as a facile joke).
I don’t mind answering people’s questions within reason, but not where they are repeating things that if they had paid attention to what I have already said would be unnecessary. That happens a lot.
There are some who, if I let them, would commandeer my every waking moment with questions, and I am not going to allow them to do so. With limited time I also have to make a judgement call on how sincere such questions are. (I have been convicted of spending – if not wasting – too much time on the internet in the past.)
It’s frustrating when Mark, for example, tells me I believe a husband being ‘head’ means ‘leadership’, when I have explicitly said I am unhappy about American evangelicals like Piper advocating this.
Daisy said basically there is nothing I could ever say to her that would change her mind. That’s a dangerous mentality to adopt – and I am said to be unteachable! I’m not particularly trying to change her mind, but to see that other people in other contexts see things differently. But why spend hours replying to her points if she has already rejected anything I say in advance?
There is a huge cultural difference between Britain (and Europe) and the States. I’ve derived my views on the complementarian issue from British evangelicals rather than American (Roberts, Andrew Wilson, Pawson), and I have noticed UK evangelicals, whilst agreeing with the basic framework of complementarianism in the States go on to distance themselves from it when manifested in the form of CBWM or Piper. I would include myself in this.
The debate on this is vastly more polarised in the States than in Britain. Absolutely no differences between men and women versus men should have all the say in everything. Each side caricaturing the other. It doesn’t have to be like that.
JA – did you know that the term ‘survivor’ as in survivor blog or survivor of abuse is almost unknown in the UK? At least in my experience. When people come across it in the context of abuse for the first time, they think it odd, the two don’t collocate.
I’ll try and get round to answering some of the points Mark has highlighted in his long post, but you might need a little bit of patience.
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D, Marks statements are questions to kas that he should answer. No one is asking what my answers are.
This is silly. I would not take offense at the second statement but it is not the topic. Why is it so difficult to take things in context? This not a situation for your ‘notallmen’ing. Thanks.
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Good Morning Lea,
Maybe you wouldn’t take offense, but there are those with a much more sensitive mental state, because of the severe abuse they have endured. Maybe they aren’t as strong as you are.
There are some women that hate men as well as there are some men that hate women. There are some women that blame men for decisions they made on their own, and there are men that do the same thing toward women.
I’m very careful not to isolate gender in my statements.
Because of the amount of abuse that the victims have endured (including myself), I’m doing the best I can to use kinder words so I don’t become a verbal abuser myself and make you and others feel like a victim or retaliate.
In fact I have apologized to those who have severely practiced push back toward me because they weren’t understanding what I was saying. Some criticizing me because being a man I wouldn’t understand. interestingly, when I apologized if any thought I was being rude, I was told that I wasn’t rude, but instead I was being too sensitive.
I have seen a fair amount of cursing by victims directed at others they don’t agree in this format. So what I’m seeing is some victims are turning into verbal abusers themselves. Who knows what they are putting their loved ones through in there personal life.
I know I had to pinch myself a few times from the anger that passed through my mouth after I endured abuse.
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D,
It sounds like, while helping her get back on her feet, you were trying to set a healthy boundary of asking her to pick up after herself. That sounds like a reasonable request in exchange for free rent. After all—her leaving stuff strewn all over the floor could cause people to accidentally trip and fall.
What you described reminded me of something that Lundy Bancroft wrote about in the book Why Does He Do That?
“From observing Tom’s behavior, we learn one of his unspoken rules—you do not tell me to hurry up. I get to take as long as I please. If you pressure me, I will punish you by taking a lot longer.”
Then Bancroft describes the type of person that he calls Mr. Sensitive. This type always acts nice on the surface. But in reality they are going to label you as the problem. Anytime you try to set healthy boundaries with them, they blame you for something—trying to guilt you into giving them what they want which is the ability to avoid personal responsibility without any consequences.
This type always finds fault with how you say things. There’s never a good way to communicate with them. Lundy writes:
“You seem to be hurting his feelings constantly, though you aren’t sure why, and he expects your attention to be focused endlessly on his emotional injuries….”
“When your feelings are hurt, on the other hand, he will insist on brushing over it quickly. He may give you a stream of pop psychology language…None of these philosophies applies when you upset him, however…”
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Just to clarify,
Please don’t use any of this as a way to blame victims who are trying to heal and process the emotions from their sufferings. There’s a big difference between real victims and the “Mr. Sensitive” types.
Victims have experienced pain and trauma from real crimes committed against them.
On the other hand,
Mr. Sensitive types try to label your healthy boundaries as “crimes” against them. That somehow you are hurting them by setting those healthy boundaries. When in reality what’s happening is that your boundaries require them to take personal responsibility in their own lives. That’s why they are fighting your boundaries because they feel entitled to getting away with avoiding their own actual responsibilities.
D,
I’m not saying that your daughter was that type of person. She’s probably a lovely person.
Just that I understand the pattern of behavior you were describing when you referenced the type of people that use “sensitivity” as an excuse to disregard other people’s healthy boundaries.
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KAS, “It’s frustrating when Mark, for example, tells me I believe a husband being ‘head’ means ‘leadership’, when I have explicitly said I am unhappy about American evangelicals like Piper advocating this.”
I can only understand your thoughts from the lines of argumentation you take. When you talk about headship, first you have openly rejected the concept of “head” = “source”, which is the egalitarian position, second, when talking about “submitting” you reject the concept of mutual submission, even when the question of “submit to one another” is mentioned – you specifically claim that “one another” in this case is not generically “all”, but some amalgamation of authoritative groups. You also, if I interpret correctly, claim that headship involves hierarchy, and that Biblically speaking, we Christians should not be opposed to hierarchical relationships.
So, now I’m trying to understand your argument. For you “submit” seems to mean “to some authority”, and headship implies authority and hierarchy. Can you give a non-marital example of an authoritative, hierarchical relationship that does not imply or convey a sense of leadership?
Personally, this is much of why I left my comp. church. There were a lot of microscopic “exegetical” answers to these sorts of questions, but when they were taken macroscopically they were utterly incomprehensible. At the same time, I realized that comp. people really HATE when the implications of their “exegetical” arguments are explained back to them macroscopically.
Since I’m unfamiliar with UK comp. theology, I don’t know how they get around the authority = head = leader conclusions that American comp. theology has generated. Specifically, the Christ:church::husband:wife simile, that you bring up often, is primarily used to bring words like obey, sanctify, submit, love, lead into the marital relationship.
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Avid Reader,
Thanks for sharing.
As silly as it seems, my daughter isn’t unique about not keeping things on the floor when there are available dressers that are empty.
My daughter is a lovely red haired beauty. Her lifestyle since she left home at 19 has been somewhat like that of a bohemian well into her 30’s.
I didn’t take enough phycology classes to understand the uniqueness in all of us. I grew up strict so I didn’t know how to mentor a free spirit to embrace enough goals to take care of herself. Her artistic nature limited her desires to work a regular 8-5 job until she reached the age of 30. She’d probably make a great actress, but most actors are starving and her morals are higher than those willing to take their clothes off in front of a camera or work for the likes of Weinstein in order to make huge paychecks..
Growing up, my mom was a free spirit herself, but somehow managed to force feed her will on me to be a conformist, Maybe it was because she worked as a single mom for a spell, and had 5 kids with me being eldest, I had to pick up the slack, which was Ok, accept she had a vicious temper and took it out on me if I couldn’t pick up after the younger kids leaving a toy out, before she got home from work.
My daughter is sensitive, about leaving her things on the floor, in her eyes that is where they belong. I even went to Walmart and purchase 10 totes so she could semi-organize her clothes and things. She was a little skeptical, but realized it worked.
I have been gentle with her, because she is very sensitive. She is in her 30’s and wanting to get married and I have suggested that if she doesn’t get rid of clothes she hasn’t worn in 10 years, then she won’t be making room in her life for her fiancé’. Her eyes watered a little and now she is making some adjustments. Truthfully I hope her fiancé’ isn’t a neat freak.
I’d like to emphasize that some of the problems in society is we tend to “force our will” on others, never taking into account that we simply aren’t wired the same. so instead of having a more nurturing conversation verbal collisions occur.
A free spirit doesn’t know it, but they too, can be very aggressive about force feeding their lifestyle onto others. Giving a gentle response is the only way they can be reached and even then they will take offense.
But the way we communicate is what really matters and I’m relieved that my daughter and I have a very strong relationship and she is also realizing the benefit of communicating in a calm way.
Being calm, is what stimulates the mind.
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D, what are you even talking about?
I was referring to a specific question, that has been posed to KAS multiple times, that Mark highlighted, that is yes or no. He does not wish to answer yes or no. I was speculating on why this happens. I was not talking about the abused or ‘all’ men or ‘all’ women. That was perfectly clear from what I said, as I said men ‘who’ act in this specific way.
As interesting as your stories about your daughter, and her clothes on the floor, and her free spirit or whatever are? They had nothing to do with the conversation at hand. I’m not sure if you truly don’t understand what I’m saying or are gaslighting, because all you’ve done is change the topic. Multiple times.
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D, cursing in general does not make one a ‘verbal abuser’. There is a lot more to it than that. Cursing a specific person out, is different from using vulgar language. These are distinctions that should be made and I really don’t think it’s right of you to speculate that they are putting their loved ones through anything just because they’ve used language on the internet that you don’t approve of. Rethink that last line, because I haven’t seen anything from any victims on here that make me think they are abusive to individuals in their circle.
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Lets all take a deep breath here. I was about to write a comment on how the Mr Sensitive types use that as an excuse against women in the church.
Whenever women raise important issues that need to be addressed, the Mr Sensitive types will blame women for not saying things exactly how Mr Sensitive wanted the communication to happen. That’s another form of misogyny in the church which is the topic of this thread.
However if my discussion with D on personality types belongs in another thread, please let me know where you would prefer that discussion to happen.
Let’s remember that we all struggle with verbalizing our feelings. Sometimes the words don’t come out as eloquently as we intended.
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Discuss whatever you want to discuss Avid! I was only addressing the things addressed to me.
I did read Bancroft’s book but it’s been a minute.
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Daisy, I’ve been thinking about the “No True Scotsman” fallacy. I think it is a very clever way to wave away any potential negative practical aspects of a belief.
Thinking about parenting… if a child turns out well, then the parents deserve credit. If a child has issues, they are the child’s issues. At least this is the belief in the church. In society, it seems somewhat the opposite. When there is a mass-murder, it seems that it is so difficult to believe that a person could do that that suspicion immediately moves to the environment, specifically parents, social circles, school, etc.
So, someone can say that complementarian theology is not abusive, that it’s the happiest solution for husband and wife, etc., but when evidence to the contrary is shown, then the evidence is waved away because, (of course), true complementarian marriage would be happy.
Also, this is a presuppositional argument. If I come to the table already assuming that comp. theology is true, then I will hold to that theology unless there is an indisputable contradiction. Now, nothing specifically wrong with that, as long as I’m willing to change in the face of those contradictions. However, if I can “No True Scotsman” away the practical implications and “exegetical” away the logical implications… while, you might as well be debating a chunk of concrete.
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Mark, confirmation bias comes into play here too, I think. They only see stuff they think is working on comp, they discount the rest.
“Confirmation Bias is selective thinking where information that confirms a preconception is: (1) automatically noticed (2) actively sought (3) overvalued and (4) accepted without reservation. On the other hand, information that contradicts the preconception is: (1) automatically ignored (2) not sought (3) undervalued and (4) rejected out of hand.”
I mean, tons of people do this, but it’s pretty easy to see it all over these discussions.
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You may not think there is nothing wrong with cursing on a public forum where the abused is looking for safe harbor, or when a victim is directing a curse word at someone who may have endured a lot of abuse, but there are some of us that do and wouldn’t do that to you or anybody else..
Fortunately I read in a recent post by Julie Anne, that stated in her rule guidelines that she doesn’t want contributors cursing.
Swearing is spreading on negative energy, and spreading negative energy in a site where there are those who have endured negative energy and trying to escape it, is causing this site to harbor it.
If you have endured abused, and were strong enough to not get testy with loved ones spreading verbal abuse and venting or turning them into victims, then this is a new concept for you.
I also admire your strength not to not victimize others after the abuse you have endured. My mom wasn’t as strong as swearing rolled off of her tongue.
There is a fair amount of gender isolating occurring, not only in this thread but in society.
There are those in this thread that specifically suggest men as the cause of every bad decision a woman has made. Men do the same toward women.
Maybe you weren’t trying to isolate men, maybe I misunderstood you, heck I’ve been misunderstood a few times in my life time.
By appearance, you isolated men in general with this comment which in my view suggests it is men (as in all men) who beat around the bush:
“Men who believe something truly terrible often don’t want it on record. So they go all 50 words of circles to avoid it and act like they answered.”
Like I suggested, I’m very careful not to isolate women or come across as generalizing all women. But rather I look at the individual.
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“Men who believe something truly terrible [This is a SUBSET of men, very clearly defined] often [THIS is a clarification that all men even in this subset do not do this] don’t want it on record. So they go all 50 words of circles to avoid it and act like they answered.”
Read what is written, please. It was referring to men because I was talking about KAS and other comp defenders, who are men. This is a lot of qualifications. It has nothing to do with abusers, honestly, except I’m sure they talk in circles too sometimes. Say what you mean and own it. That is my point.
And if you look after my comment, you will see that KAS wondered along and used approximately 1000 words to say he was too busy, rather than answer simple yes or no questions.
As for the swearing, do or do not swear, as you like. If you have a problem with what someone specifically has said, quote it. I have never cursed at you that I can recall, although if I drop a curse word on occasion I wouldn’t be surprised at myself. I generally try not to here.
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Also, PSA. Not everyone here has been abused. Some of us are just advocates.
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D, quote them if so. It is possible you have completely misread them, as you have done to me.
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Lea, thanks for your input.
I can see why you replied to KAS, maybe it would’ve made it easier for me if KAS and company was isolated, instead of men.
Like I suggested there is a fair amount of gender isolating by woman who hate men and men who hate women, already in this world.
Swearing is spreading negative energy. Spreading negative energy around those that have endured physical, mental and verbal abuse, further victimizes some victim.
There victims that have endured abuse, that end up victimizing, new victims.
Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t think this site wants current victims to victimize new or other victims.
Typically, cursing is a form of anger, it is hard to communicate in a rational way when anger is in the mix.
After reading Julie Anne’s rule guidelines I think my assertions are correct.
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Lea, I would have to go back and search the archives in this thread to find what I read and there have been a few. Though, I should’ve rephrased my statement of using the word hate, I should’ve used the term “being and acting hateful”, Thanks for fact checking me, as I too have to pay attention as to what I write.
And yes the first comment I made validates that I may have misunderstood your comment when I wrote this to you:
“Maybe I didn’t understand your statement clearly enough, but I wouldn’t completely isolate men about beating around the bush, it is a phenomena that some women do, and do quite well.”
Thank you for graciously responding back to me.
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Lea,
There is no middle ground with hate and love.
Typically the amount of gender isolating being practiced negatively in society and even in churches, whether it is men or woman that are doing it, is that lot of time being sexiest.
When this type of negativity is occurring, I fail to see the love.
I learning even from you, what we say or write needs to be either understood or ask questions and also isolating gender instead of an individual can be considered as sexiest.
In a world where its being reported in the news that if one disagrees or wants to have a discussion or even uphold the law of the land, we either are sexiest, racist, chauvinist, Nazi or a Feminazi, all of which creates more negative energy and hate for one another.
Even misogamy in churches is defined by some, as hated toward women so I’m not seeing a whole lot of love going on.
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@ KAS
Would Jesus answer the question if a woman who had been sexually abused as a child asked him if she can say no to sex with her husband?
Are you not supposed to act like Jesus? Do you worship Jesus or comp? A comp man would act prideful and childish and not answer the question.
You have gone on about how comp is not abusive and when asked a yes or no question you won’t prove it isn’t.
You keep posting these long post about how you do not have the time. Answering the quistion would take less than two minutes. One word has two letters the other word has three.
Are you scared to answer the questions because after you do it will prove comp is abusive?
If I told someone I love you but you are not allowed to refuse me sex or tell me no they would think I was stupid, evil, and pro-slavery.
It will not take long and you can prove your assertion that comp is not abusive.
Can a woman tell her husband no to sex? Yes or no?
Can a woman tell her husband no? Yes or no?
Can a woman divorce her husband for beating her? Yes or no?
” I’ve derived my views on the complementarian issue from British evangelicals rather than American”
It looks like you have much in common with American complementarians.
You do not think women can be preachers.
You have implied women had it better before the 60s.
You say woman are more emotional than men.
You say you do not have a problem with hierarchy.
You tell sexual abuse victims such things as you know people who have had it worse and responded better. American comps like to be hateful jerks to sexual abuse victims.
You have implied you think a woman should not divorce her husband for beating her.
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D, when people comment on a specific problem that is present, wherever it is present, that doesn’t mean they hate someone. I certainly don’t hate men, even ones who think women are beneath them.
But I’m not putting up with it either and I’m not going to be kissy faced in calling it out. I hope you aren’t misreading hate into legitimate criticisms of specific behaviors because it seems unhelpful.
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I think I have to drop the comp/egal debate. I have yet to see someone change who has not suffered abuse at the hands of those who hold comp doctrine. There was something gut-wrenching for me when I saw church leaders circle the wagons around an abusive elder, while threatening the members who took a stand against him. They were using the same passages. Respect, obey, submit.
KAS, I pray God will open your eyes, but I definitely don’t hope that mechanism to be used on you. It was a very dark time.
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I haven’t read every single comment since I was last on here, don’t know if I should.
I sometimes tire of being sucked into the KAS’ complementarian debate, or the disingenuous posters on this blog who like to come into threads about male- on- female sexism and male- against- female violence to argue that “women are just as bad as men.”
Mark said,
By this point in time, we’ve seen far too many complementarian men acting badly and / or espousing sexist or abusive views of women-
Every one from ordinary complementarians mentioned as being abusive husbands on “Cry For Justice” blog (and sites like it), to more famous complementarians – John Piper, Paige Patterson, Mark Driscoll, Douglas Wilson, Doug Phillips, et al…
For any complementarian to wave ALL those men away as being “false complementarians.”
You cannot convince me that all of the many complementarian men I’ve read about or come across who advocate sexist beliefs, or whose views enable abuse of girls and women, are “not true complementarians.”
There is one thing that all these men have in common, and it is not gender mutuality or gender egalitarianism, that’s for sure.
One of the very things that all these men have in common, the ones who either abuse women themselves, or who use the Bible to justify it, diminish it, or enable it, is KAS’ complementarianism (which encompasses things such as a complementarian interpretation of “male headship).
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KAS said
I was a complementarian myself from the time I was a kid up until around age 35.
I do believe I’ve mentioned that many times before. Did you not realize I am a former complementarian?
I finally saw what a bunch of un-biblical, sexist garage comp is. Why would I want to return to something I have rejected?
Based upon your attitudes, I don’t think you’re willing to consider that complementarianism is false, nor do I believe that you’ve done much reading from or by egalitarian sites / authors.
Sometimes I am refuting or addressing points you have raised, which may or may not be in the form of a question.
You keep making assertions, but when I refute them, you typically don’t make any response to them but go on to talk to Mark about something.
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Re … Zoe ~JUNE 28, 2018 @ 4:39 AM
That sounds awful.
In one university I attended, I had a very sexist male professor (not a math one, though, he taught a different subject).
His mistreatment of women in class was so bad that even the male students noticed it, but they told us ladies in class one day (one day when the professor was out sick) that they were too afraid to confront him and say anything.
But they said they felt bad for us. They could tell that the prof was ten times more nasty and disrespectful to the women students than to the men. But they didn’t know what to do about it.
Sometimes, every once in a while, if the sexism is super obvious, even other men may notice it.
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Mark quoting KAS:
Regarding this comment by KAS:
“but to try to get men and women to participate fully. You can’t make people do anything though, can you”
If you read studies about this topic, women generally are hesitant to speak up in classes or in meetings at jobs due to several gender stereotypes in many cultures.
Girls and Women are not encouraged in many nations to be assertive, bold, and talkative – but boys and men are.
Many girls and women are afraid that if they speak up at all, it will be perceived as speaking “too much,” and the men (and maybe other women present), will view them as being bossy or egotistical.
I could go on and on, but you can go Google for the research papers that talk about how women and girls are held up to different gender expectations to boys and men, which makes many of them too afraid to speak up in groups.
Mark said,
The only suggestion I saw KAS offer once or twice was to say that churches should instill and practice Complementarianism.
Which rather begs the question, does it not?
Complementarianism is at the heart of what is causing and/or enabling sexism in the church to continue.
Even MORE complementarianism is NOT going to solve sexism or abuse of girls and women.
One step to eliminating or curtailing abuse and sexism in churches would be for Christians to realize how un-biblical complementarianism is, and reject it.
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KAS said
I asked you earlier (as in several days ago) if you’re American or not, maybe you don’t understand some of us because of a cultural difference of some sort, but you did not reply to that.
Now you are saying you are in or from the UK?
Comp is comp.
Both are teaching Male Headship and unilateral female submission.
I’ve read news articles and anecdotes about Complementarianism in Australia from Aussies on other sites, on their own blogs, and in news reports from Oz itself.
Even though all these nations have some differences in detail, men in Australia and churches there are just as bad – the abusive men in Australia are using female submission verses and male leadership authoritarian interpretation of verses to justify or minimize the abuse of Christian wives by Christian complementarian husbands.
This is an Aussie news report of complementarianism causing or enabling domestic violence in Christian churches and Christian marriages:
_‘Submit to your husbands’: Women told to endure domestic violence in the name of God_ – ABC News, Australian branch
Even if you, KAS, wish to go the route of arguing British (or Irish, or where ever you are living) complementarianism is “better” than the American variety…
-It seems odd to me that you have expended a lot of effort trying to correct the American women in this thread over their negative experiences with American complementarianism, to try to assure us that Complementarianism is really quite lovely, we are wrong and should consider (British?) complementarianism.
Do you expect me to go to the UK, attend a complementarian UK church, and marry the first complementarian UK man I meet over there?
And again, for the 100th time,
I was raised under the more genteel, mild-mannered, lovely, “British-esque,” type of complementarianism you are espousing, and it damaged my ability to have healthy dating relationships, impeded my ability to marry, and it messed me up psychologically, and gave me negative views of God the Father.
Your form of Comp turned me into a great big Codependent Doormat.
It’s no better than the CBMW or John Piper type of comp.
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KAS said,
So you’ve never been deeply wounded by a Christian, a Christian church or doctrine, and to the point you developed depression, P.T.S.D., and/or stopped going to church, and/or drifted from the faith and have considered becoming an atheist or agnostic?
I think I asked 3 to 4 times up thread why it is you post to this blog, because I honestly cannot figure it out from your posting habits.
You seem to want to be very analytical, intellectual, and to debate theology with people who are still firm Christian believers and in line with all of conservative Christianity, so…
I gave you links above to such sites (CARM and Rapture Ready Forums), because this blog really is not a theological debating venue per se, but those other sites (such as CARM) are.
People do sometimes debate or discuss theology here, but they’re aware and sensitive to the fact that emotions are or can be involved, and they are talking to people from whom Complementarianism or Calvinism, or whatever, are not mere intellectual, abstract issues to argue about for the fun of it.
Many of us posting here have been negatively, personally impacted by these teachings.
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D said,
Wow, you’re at it again.
You and some other guy who post to some of these threads try to take threads about complementarianism – and this one is “how can men reduce sexism from the church” – to make it all about, “women are rotten, horrible people who hate men.”
I’m not a liberal, but…
This reminds me of fellow conservatives who got bent out of shape over the motto “Black Lives Matter,” to argue, “but white lives matter too!”
Well, yes, but the term BLM was not intended to convey that the lives of non-whites don’t matter.
The focus of BLM term was to discuss violence against people of color, usually by white people, and specifically, whites who work as police officers.
(Note: I am not in full agreement with BLM on every subject, but I at least note that I understand what their motto means).
You’re doing the same thing.
Take a thread about sexism against women in churches – which is almost always carried out by MEN, who hold all the power in churches, due to complementarian beliefs in male authority over women, and try to make women out to be bad or horrible.
Most surveys and polls I’ve ever seen indicate that most violence in the world is carried out by men, not by women. Most mass shooters are men, not women.
Most sexism and domestic violence in the world is male on female, not male on male or female on male.
_Men Are Responsible for Mass Shootings – How toxic masculinity is killing us. _
_Capital Gazette: US mass shooters and their history of violence towards women_
I am a female. I had a female boss who harassed me terribly for two years at one job I had.
That doesn’t change the fact that a lot of workplace abuse consists of male- on- female. You wouldn’t find me in a thread entitled “How to curtail workplace harassment of women” by going into the threads to argue, “some women bosses are just as bad as some male bosses.”
D said,
I’d be very careful about these sorts of statements.
Girls and women are raised under different gender stereotypes than men, ones which make them more vulnerable to being exploited by abusive or dishonest men, and, as such, they may not truly be making choices on their own, or only choosing under confusion, mental instability, or duress.
So your comment there, depending on the context or to whom it is applied, can be very victim-blaming.
You, D, said,
This is what KAS has been arguing here.
I view this as being another form of victim-blaming (depending on the timing or context).
When victims come into healing, and they look back upon mistreatment, it’s normal and healthy for them to feel anger and to express it.
And this blog is a venue where those who have been hurt by churches, and who are now angry about it, can come and vent.
This sort of blog is not the time or place to expect or demand proper etiquette at all times. It’s tone deaf and tone policing, and it’s condescending and rude, as I’ve explained to KAS ten times over already.
You said,
Not everyone is you. Not everyone is going to handle recovery in the same way or at the same pace as you.
I’m sick of goody- two- shoe Christians who come on to a blog like this and demand that everyone, or just the “Christian” posters, post in only a wholesome, goody-goody, G-rated fashion.
I roll my eyes to the back of my head every time I see this.
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D said
That’s a rather victim-blaming statement.
Most of those women were sexually assaulted, coerced in to remove clothing, or were flat-out raped by Weinstein.
In other situations, a fraction of the women – due to gender stereotypes and social conditioning – did not realize they had a right to say No to sexual advances by a man like Weinsten in the first place, some were afraid if they did not go along with his advances, they would be black-listed and unable to get further work, and yet others thought if they didn’t cave in, he would forcibly rape them (he would hit them or strangle them).
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