Will and I had a conversation the other day about feminism and how so many Christians are ragging on it. Too many Christian men and women bash feminists and sincerely believe that the responsiblity for all of the chaos in culture these days can be laid solely on feminism.
I disagree.
If you want my two sense -and I'll give it even if you don't- feminism itself was not and is not the problem. The problem was men who twisted the Scriptures to usurp an unbiblical authority over women. What's worse, even the church was doing it. Who was defending the women who were being victimized by their husbands and were then being beaten over their heads with their Bibles to stop their "whining"? The fact remains, feminism was and is fueled by the lack of true biblical men, not vice versa.
I, for one, am grateful for the original feminist movement that rightly rebelled against such horrendous injustices. They saved an incalculable number of lives by protecting women from beatings, rape, and forced abortions.
And I'll add this just for shock value...
I'm grateful still for even the radical feminist movement that so influences our culture. I have a gut feeling that if we didn't have these people prying into our churches and forcing us to continuously examine what the Scriptures actually say about men and women, we would start getting loose with the Scriptures regarding gender, and then men would default right back to oppressing and abusing the weaker sex.
Name one male-dominated culture where female circumcision, prostitution, and polygamy isn't rampant. Good luck.
By closely scrutinizing our beliefs, our Bibles, and our behaviours, they force us to a higher standard of biblical understanding and adherence than what we'd do left to ourselves.
So shoot me.
2 comments:
Amen, Desley. IF the "church" had treated women the way Jesus did - protecting them from those who would harm them, honoring them, standing up for their rightly place,- then feminism would never had been needed. I pastor I heard recently said, "people tell me I should talk about mysandry [hatred of men] as much as I talk about misogyny [hatred of women]. I do not need to talk about mysandry, because if there would be no mysandry withour the hatred of women." I agree! What if in all the world, each of us were treated as equals - in all ways - there would be no "isms" anywhere. And isn't that the world Christ came to crerate? No Greek or Jew, male nor female, slave nor free..."
amen to kate and to desley... not much else to add to either one of oyu except it makes me happy to see two special people to me in the same place
Post a Comment