And Jeremy is right, we all base criteria on things outside of a Biblical context. But while I may have an opinion on say, handguns, I don’t likewise express that everyone else should therefore express the same view, that all should own handguns, or that all should use them.

I believe in choices, to do right or to do wrong. I likewise believe that God gives us the same choices to do right or do wrong. I’m just as likely to have dinner with Fred Phelps as Martin Luther King Jr. and, possibly, equally likely to enjoy both companies.

However, I have two questions regarding this argument –

1) What are the “correct” Biblical interpretations that guide our lives? Who decides what the “correct” interpretations are?

2) Unless we live in a vacuum, none of us are only formed by the biblical story. We are formed by many many different stories and world views. While certainly some people deliberately put God into an ideological box, I think most of us do so unintentionally. There is no pure reading of the Bible — we always bring ourselves to the text.

Even my friend Somasoul does this. He may argue the “biblical view” or the “traditional Anabaptist” position on voting or the role of women, but throughout the pages of YAR, he has made arguments that draw not from the Bible or tradition, but from other points of view. His defenses of handguns and “free market” capitalism are not based on a “biblical” view, but another set of criteria.

Neither do I, sister.

Let’s start with this whole “it’s not biblical” argument. Are we agreeing that if something isn’t biblical, that it has no credence for us as Christians? Because Christians believe a surprising number of things that don’t have clear biblical grounding–abortion, for example. Heck, we even tout family values while naming ourselves for someone who once said that if you wanted to follow him, you would have to leave behind your mother, your father, your brother. It’s not that we shouldn’t be in favor of children or families (however that looks), just that we should be wary of what we say is biblical and what isn’t. Just a hundred years ago, there were men of a certain skin color who surely had brilliant minds but spent all their days in the cotton fields because there were people–Christians!–who believed that was their God-ordained place.

To say that women in leadership isn’t biblical is also to ignore some great stories in the Old Testament, as well as the scholarship on Paul that has emerged in the past 30 years. I recommend starting with The Politics of Jesus–John Howard Yoder argument was basically, in a culture and a time when women were little more than chattel, why would anyone have had to tell them to be silent in the church unless something in the life and manner of Jesus had presented a radically different way of understanding their place on earth and in heaven?

This is to say nothing of choices made by translators and editors; most biblical scholars agree that of all the books written by Paul (and not all attributed to him were), that even the phrases, such as in Galatians, where it says that women should be silent in the church, were added after Paul wrote the letter. Paul also tells of women who seemed to be his benefactors or were doing work he approved of, but how often do we hear a sermon about them? How much women are mentioned also seems to be, to some extent, the choice of the author–Luke mentions more women than any other gospel. No one, incidentally, ever mentions who cooked the Last Supper.

If women aren’t speaking up, then you men are missing 50 percent of your potential to solve problems, to empower disciples, to further the reign of God. If women aren’t speaking up, the responsibility is yours. And if the answer you come up with is that someone has to make dinner or stay home with the kids, then you’re so sadly far from the upside-down radical vision of God’s will on earth as in heaven, of the banquet in which there is space for everyone.

Tim’s comment:

I’m one of the men who was involved in the discussion you referenced on YAR. Initially I was chastened by your comment, but I’ve done some more thinking about it, and I think when it comes to anti-sexism work, women shouldn’t always have to be the ones defending equality. Sometimes men need to confront men about sexism and not expect women to do the work.

Maybe no one’s going to change anyone’s mind, but blatant sexism and oppression need to be challenged. Silence is not the solution.

Urbanmenno’s response:

I actually think there are a lot of men on YAR who do a great job of speaking up for women’s equality and I applaud them. And I don’t have a problem at all with the men defending the good fight. Particularly since it can be really hard as a female to keep having these kinds of conversations over and over again — soul-killing actually.

I drew attention to the post not to chastise any of the men involved. I saw the post and resulting comments more as another example of where women are talked about and not talked with. It would be interesting to take that particular post and ask the general YAR audience why didn’t women comment on it …

Is it the ratio of men to women on YAR? Is it a matter of picking your battles and the women didn’t feel like fighting this particular one? Was there some subtle unwelcoming thing?

“Silence isn’t the solution” is totally accurate … and I’m glad that the men weren’t. But why were the women?

Ironically, it strengthens the position you perceive me to have while weakening the position I supposedly am against!

That is hysterical!

Whenever someone brings up the gender identity of God or female leadership in the church this is the conservation I’ve always had…………The conversation NEVER has been Biblically based. Rather it is always culturally and politically based.

I’m referring to conversations I’ve had. Not conversations that others have had.

Sorry if I confused you.

You can check the site Godde.com for the types of conversations I’ve experienced. Conversations that contain lots of “it makes me feel”s and “My thinking”s and little to no Biblical reference.

My question: How do our feelings trump the feelings of Paul or Jesus or James or Peter or David?

I have no problems with the idea of God being both male and female, or neither, or all……..I have a problem when we make God fit into our cultural/political opinioninated boxes.

I’m an anarchist. I have other anarchist believer friends who try to get God to fit into an anarchist box. Others try to get God to fit into their capitalist box. Still others, a socialist box. The list goes on.

These people say:

I believe in anarchy, God must too.
I’m a feminist, God must be too.
I like money, God wants me to have money.
I hate gays, God hates gays too.

I ‘m sure there’s some edumacated term for this. I’ll call it, simply: justification of our preconceived notions.

(again, I’m not making any argument that God is anything, merely frustrated by the means people come to their own conclusions.)

The conversation NEVER has been Biblically based. Rather it is always culturally and politically based.

That’s an argument and an emphatic one at that.

For the record, I’m not arguing anything, I’m just asking questions.

What is the historical role of women in the church?

I think it’s pretty clear historically that women have tended to take strong leadership in new movements as they emerge, such as the early church, the early Anabaptist movement and the Azusa street revival which birthed the Pentecostal movement. Then as these movements are institutionalized and allow themselves to be assimilated into the culture and climate the leadership becomes almost entirely male.

I’m afraid the historical reality is the opposite of what you’re arguing. Movements rediscovering the bible through the movement of the holy spirit tend to be much more open to female leadership. Dominant politics and culture (selectively quoting and manipulating scripture) are what lead to patriarchy.

This is, without a doubt, a possibility. While I doubt that emergent itself is doing this it is possible that Christians as a whole are only purchasing books by male leaders because males exude “confidence” or something…….

But God will do what God will do with our co-operation or without it. More questions:
Is this new movement faltering due to a lack of female leadership?
Can the movement complete it’s task without women?
What is the historical role of women in the church? (I know lots of people will hate that one!)

Consider this (and I could blog about this in depth):

Genesis 3:17
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.”

Man was cursed to work tirelessly. To provide for himself, his offspring, and his partner. This is not lorded over him, rather, nature itself demands this of man. That he work lest he die. It is nothing he does to himself, nor does anyone enslave him. It’s a simple truth.

Likewise:

“I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing;
with pain you will give birth to children.”

No one gives the woman pain during childbirth. Childbirth is simply painful. No one beats a woman while in labor. A fact of nature that any woman has.

“Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you.”

Perhaps this is not a commandment for men to rule over their wives. Perhaps, like all Genesis 3 curses, this is a fact of nature. Perhaps men don’t lord over woman (though they sometimes do). Perhaps it is ingrained in a woman’s nature to submit to men. *GASP!* I’m not saying men should rule over their wives with an iron fist, perhaps women just defer to men more than men defer to women. And perhaps this isn’t so much cultural as it is biological.

*awaits stones*

Here’s a different way of considering this:

What if God is working through both men and women in the emergent movement and the New Monasticism movement, but because we are fallen and the systems we are a part of are fallen we only notice, affirm and enable the men?

“Sure… so what do you when a woman says “God has called me forward” and others confirm it, but an opposing group says, “God doesn’t call women forward.””

But that is not happening. Emergent Village was formed on the principal that women should be in leadership roles. And these other “groups”, Steenwyk’s Misseo Dei, and Claiborne’s entities, Wallis’ recent fame, and Bell’s amazing books……….no human put these men on the forefront of this “emergent” thing, they just sort of happened.

I think some people are more interested in what’s between someone’s legs than what God is doing. Look around, something big is happening, and God happens to be using (mostly) men.

Have you read the book? What did you expect?

Well… being that the Bible was written in a very distinct political, cultural, and power dynamic, I am pretty confident in saying that you cannot discuss Biblical principles without looking at how it related to the context at the time, and in turn how it relates to the current context.

Simply put: “Who has God called forward?”

Sure… so what do you when a woman says “God has called me forward” and others confirm it, but an opposing group says, “God doesn’t call women forward.”

I don’t think that is so “obvious.”

Can you explain a bit more what you’re trying to say?

If the (fallen) structures that WE have put into place are pushing men into leadership and holding women back from responding to Godde’s call and taking active leadership roles, then don’t we need to talk about the “relevant cultural and political issues”?

I think we can all agree that this should be obvious. We just think have different understandings about what that “obvious” answer is.

Then we would disagree.

Who are people listening to? Why?

Simply put: “Who has God called forward?”

You’d think this obvious.

The conversation NEVER has been Biblically based. Rather it is always culturally and politically based.

huh?

I have had numerous conversations about gender identity and gender roles (both within and outside of the church) that have included many, many hours talking about how these issues related to Biblical teachings and Biblical theology.

Of course… you absolutely cannot talk about the theological and Biblical aspects to this conversation without talking about the relevant cultural and political issues that are directly tied to the theological issues.

As to the gender issues within both the Emergent movement and the New Monasticism movement (don’t tell Shane/Chris I called it a movement… they don’t like that!), it is a definitely a problem.

As Tim pointed out, the “spokesMEN” are all men. There are numerous amazing women within the New Monasticism movement whose voices are not being heard. Some of that is by choice - many of the women involved have no desire to travel the country and do book tours, or write on big mainstream religious blogs. Instead they often desire to just do what New Monasticism is - live intentionally and simply in community with other sisters and brothers as they pursue peace and justice together.

Don’t get me wrong - I think there is a place blogs and book tours and speaking engagements, but I know that many of the women in the movement are not at all interested in doing it.

But I do have significant concerns with the lack of female voices both within Emergent and within New Monasticism.

Whenever someone brings up the gender identity of God or female leadership in the church this is the conservation I’ve always had:

Me: “So what do you think about women in leadership in the church.”

Someone who supports gender equality in the church: “The balance of power traditionally has been men. One must understand the gender dymanics of the culture, past and present, and the oppression of minority groups.”

The conversation NEVER has been Biblically based. Rather it is always culturally and politically based. When people boil down matters of theology to matters of political power those people seem, well, silly.

My impression is, this becomes more than a social issue within the church. It has theological implications like very little conversation about dominant male images for God. Of course in the same circles language for God, as I’ve seen it, is remarkably traditional and almost always relies on trinitarian language of Father, Son, etc. etc.

When it comes to voices questioning destructive forces in mainstream North American culture, then I think the emergent stuff has been very helpful. When it comes to God-talk, I think this movement has presented very little that is new. In fact, it seems to disregard the creative theological work of the last 50 years and simply goes back to very traditional ideas about who/what God is.

A final disclaimer. I feel like I just made a whole bunch of big generalizations and relied on unhelpful categories like “conservative.” Sorry. I don’t like that…