In a comment on a previous post John Hobbins perceptively wrote:
John wrote:
It’s possible to characterize Sarah Sumner as a soft egal or as a very soft comp. But on CBE, she was treated by most as some kind of traitor to the cause. Once again, fine, I should have expected it. That’s what movement blogs do.
I decided to ask Sarah which she is. She answered right away several days ago, but I’ve been waiting for her permission to post her answer. She just gave it. Here is what she wrote:
I think our new marriage book shows that I am really not an egalitarian. I cast three different models of marriage in our book:business model, democratic model, and biblical model. The distinctiveness of my beliefs comes through more clearly now, I think.
Also note that complementarians say they believe that women are equal to men in dignity, yet they qualify that equality as something that is true “before God.” In that I believe women are equal to men before people (on the basis that we both are created in the image of God, and as Christians both have the same Christ, same Holy Spirit within us) , I am not a complementarian. The problem with complementarians is that they want to say women are not equal to men “before people,” and yet also say that men are not superior to women. That is a blatant contradiction. The problem, I believe with the egalitarian point of view is that egalitarians do not want to acknowledge that equality in the Church, according to the Scriptures, is different from political equality that legally gives women “the right” to demand to be treated in a certain way. I believe the issue of equality is misunderstood on both sides. Maybe I should write a little article on this. Thanks for prompting me.
Hope that helps.
Sarah
I don’t think complementarians would accept Dr. Sumner as one of them since she has been senior pastor of a church. And egalitarians might question whether she is fully one of them. I suspect she does not fit neatly into either box. I know from what I have read by Dr. Sumner that she tries so very hard to be fully biblical. She has a kind of prophetic voice that calls all of us, whether egalitarians, complementarians, or neither, to be more biblical in the way we approach gender issues. Maybe Sarah is a complegalitarian! 
————-
UPDATE (Nov. 25) from Sarah: Wayne,
I’m so 20th century I don’t even know how to post on this, but you are welcome to, Wayne:
At this point in my life, I am not a blogger yet. I did, however, take a look at some of the comments posted and have found that you are a very thoughtful group of people. I appreciate your remarks and have been sharpened and instructed by them–thank you.
To be specific, I concede that the Bible itself is the only written word that fully shows the actual “biblical” model of marriage. I used that language in attempt to help people look more closely at Ephesians 5. But still, your point is well taken, Marilyn. Also thanks to you, John H. for noticing that my intention is to be honest about the strengths and weaknesses of both sides of the debate–and also of my own take on the matter.
In addition, I wish you could all see for yourselves my friendships with women; I don’t want to sound defensive, but the truth is that I have always had many women friends and enjoy great closeness with them. That I repented from being prejudiced against women is really to say that I repented from being prejudiced against myself. As for the comments about a wife being the main breadwinner and what that implies about her position in the marriage, all I can say is that I wish you could meet my husband Jim. Regarding Matthew 18, Jim and I both are convinced that shying away from applying it is very costly to both husband and wife. Jim and I know husbands who say they feel too uncomfortable to confront their wives in a Matthew 18 way, and we know wives who say the same. But not feeling comfortable about applying Scripture is not a good excuse for not applying it. I understand that it’s scary to obey Christ’s commandments–until you actually DO it and find out that His way works. The key lies in confronting the other person for THEIR sake out of love. When Matthew 18 applied and applied rightly, neither spouse has more power than the other regardless of which one makes more money. Jesus’ way levels the ground, so that both spouses can help each other obey the top commandment.
And for the record, I’m a teaching pastor, not a senior pastor. I say that in faith, trusting that anyone who hears me say that will know that I’m simply clarifying my own story and not trying to imply anything about women in the pastorate.
Blessings on you all,
Sarah Sumner
I think that, according to her book, Sarah Sumner would describe herself as one who has had prejudice against women without even realizing it. As God brings these things to her attention she has the humility to change. I don’t think she is at the end of her road of change just yet.
Cheryl,
I think Sarah firmly believes that both egals and comps are each in their separate ways unfaithful to the full biblical witness.
Before deciding that she needs to embrace your positions, you might think about whether her positions might trigger a change in yours.
I find it paradoxical that in Christianity Today, which asked a comp and an egal to write about the strengths and weaknesses of their respective positions, and to speak considerately of the opposing position, the comp they found did so very handily. The “egal” they chose was Sarah Sumner, and she of course has no difficulty in seeing weaknesses and strengths in both positions.
It made me wonder, how many evangelical egals are there as of now who are confident enough of the strength of their framework to point out its characteristic foibles and the ways in which the framework might be enriched by emphases typical of complementarianism?
I think it is something that first generation evangelical egalists need to ask themselves: what will it take before one or more forms of “biblical egalitarianism” cease to be equivalent to Platonic forms in heaven, risk-free and weakness-free, and become something human, that is, subject in actual fact to a tendency to be unilateral, subject in fact to abuses of a particular variety, and so on.
That is how it is with various versions of complementarianism.
It is not my experience that being egal creates a sin-free zone at all. A different set of contradictions on average, yes. A different set of risks.
This is what I find refreshing about Sarah Sumner. She is willing to be sympathetic and critical of positions people take on both sides of the issue.
As Wayne says, there is a real possibility that Sarah is being prophetic, but that would be in the sense of calling both comps and egals to greater faithfulness ot Scripture.
I am glad she is not claiming to be egal, as those kinds of claims are just confusing. I think Christianity Today had a recent article where they had 2 people, 1 of which claimed to be comp and the other egal write about what was WRONG with their side. I do not know whether it was the CT editor that decided SS was egal.
One way to see egalism is symmetry, what is sauce for the good is sauce for the gander and vice versa. Of course, this does not deny the INHERENT physical differences.
Sarah Sumner studied under Grudem. My personal guess is that she is trying her hardest to come up with some form of softer non-egalism that he might endorse, which is no small challenge. I wish her well in this endeavor.
As Cheryl pointed out, all of us are on a walk.
I am a huge fan of Sarah Sumner’s work. I don’t think it’s possible to be serious about understanding evangelical positions on marriage and women’s roles in the Church without engaging with Sumner’s arguments.
For that reason, I’m a bit hesitant to make a critical comment. But, FWIW, I think that Sumner’s naming of her model as “biblical” versus the “business” comp model and the “diplomat” egal model is unfortunate.
The true biblical marriage model is the original Biblical text. Everything else is someone’s theory and is subject to error.
I believe that we can all learn a HUGE amount by reading Sumner’s work. And, I continue to be surprised by the number of people who post here, who have not read either of her books.
But, just as Gary Ezzo’s materials are not God’s way to parent, Sarah Sumner’s books are not the Biblical marriage model.
P.S. to Cheryl: I agree with you. Sumner’s first book came across to me as ultra-soft comp. In contrast, her new book comes across to me as soft-egal.
Don,
At least three definitions of egal marriage come to the fore on the these threads:
(1) Symmetry, your approach, by which asymmetrical texts in the Bible are systematically revised for the purposes of contemporary ethical counsel to express symmetry.
(2) Equality in function (except for childbirth), as a right and, often, as a goal.
(3) A reciprocal authority arrangement.
I regard (1)-(3) as compatible with Scripture though not taught as such in Scripture.
It is possible to be an egal in the sense of (3) but not in the sense of (1) or (2). That happens to be my situation.
Sumner’s first book came across to me as ultra-soft comp. In contrast, her new book comes across to me as soft-egal.
That’s funny, Marilyn, becuase I just read her new marriage book and it came accross to me as extremely-soft-comp!
*shakes head laughing*
It is important to be aware that Sumner writes out of her personal situation and identity. She openly states that she is the major breadwinner in the family and her husband moves to be with her wherever her work takes her.
Therefore she is not complementarian from the perspective of many here.
I do not see that she adequately answers the question of what to do if a husband sequesters unilateral authority to himself. Even her typical response, that a woman get two or three witnesses to confront the husband, breaks down if the wife feels that is too confrontational and risky. It also breaks down if the witnesses take the husband’s side. In fact, she suggests that the woman keep on trying to get two or three witnesses that agree with her viewppoint on women in ministry and that ultimately the wife should try to get her husband to go to a different church, a church that recognizes women in ministry.
While much of her book seemed straightforward, especially the
head-body,
sacrifice – submission
love respect
model, I did not gain any practical insight into how a woman became the main breadwinner and therefore sequester to herself the power in her marriage that Sarah Sumner obviously has.
I did not find it all easy to identify her position as either comp or egal, nor did I find anything to criticize in her presentation, except that it fit only her own situation and would not help women who were not main breadwinners in their own marriage.
The main message I received was to become the main breadwinner and other things will be resolved, or find people who will give your husband advice that you ascertain he needs and call them in.
I would concur that to become self-supporting financially is key. But it is very difficult in a comp marriage.
Nonetheless, I think her basic paradigms might be okay, just not grounded in the reality of other women. I think she recognizes this, and considers herself to be exceptional to her sex, and distances herself from the circumstances of other women. This is admirable as a part of the dialogue, and may make her main ministry one of speaking to men. I do not think that Matt. 18 is enough for most women to gain the right to be treated as human beings within their marriages.
I can see why a man might like her book, but the distance between her circumstances and those of the average comp wife is simply not bridgeable.IMO
I have not read Sarah’s second book on marriage. I did see some red flags from her first book that would make me hesitant to think that she could represent an egalitarian marriage model. Sarah relates better to men and she has admitted that she has been prejudiced against women. In some sense I think she doesn’t totally relate herself to the average woman but has some characteristics that are more common with men. That isn’t bad per se because all of us are unique individuals and some of us are more comfortable outside the typical “role” that society or at least the Christian community sees us in.
The problem would come if one is going to give advice on marriage that would not relate to the average woman. By Sarah’s own admission she has carried on in her own individual thinking pattern until something forces her to see things differently. Her own words make me believe that she is on a journey that is individualistic that works for her. I think egalitarians should be able to agree that if Sumner’s marriage works in a semi-complementarian model, and this makes them both happy then we should wish them all the best. If one is going to say that choices that other people make in their marriages are wrong and unbiblical, then it behooves them to prove from scripture that those outside the marriage can judge what is right or wrong for you, when both partners are extremely happy in the mutual respect/mutual love model.
I think that once Sarah gets some feedback outside of her unique situation she will be more open to the marriage model outside her own experience. Giving options and wisdom to others is a very good thing however when one steps outside of advice and moves on to suggests that a marriage situation is “unbiblical” when the marriage partners are both happy and thriving and both using their God-given gifts for the benefit of the body of Christ, this appears to be most unfortunate and not something that we are called to do as Christians.
Thank you, Cheryl.
I think it is extremely important to understand that a woman who submits to a man that is financially or in some other way weaker than her, experiences submission in a completely different way than a woman who has no choice but to submit because the man is stronger.
I am glad I read her book because now I see why men and women come away from her books with completely different impressions.
Cheryl and Sue,
Your comments about Sarah Sumner seem off base to me. I say that based on reading, correspondence with her, and family who have had her as a professor.
I would encourage both of you to read her latest book before going further in characterizing her positions.
It is worth pointing out that Sarah and Jim Sumner are in active ministry to many couples through books, seminars, and in Sarah’s case, through university teaching.
Their approach by now has influenced the lives of thousands of families.
I think it is fair to say that their approach is received very well by people who do not like the nice little boxes and airtight categories and labeling some egals and some comps seem to think is very important.
Just as you, Cheryl, are respectful of couples who choose a version of complementarianism, I can assure you that Sarah is respectful of couples who choose a version of egalitarianism.
Yet she notes some weaknesses in both positions. I don’t see many comps or egals who are willing to lend an ear in this regard. That is what concerns me.
I don’t remember Sarah ever suggesting that it is key for a woman to be the major breadwinner in the family. I don’t think that is her message at all. Do you have a quote to that effect?
I do not have a problem with anyone who is respectful in their marriage whether it is a complementarian based marriage or an egalitarian model. The only problem that I have is when the marriage partners themselves have chosen a way that is best for them and they are functioning in love and are happy with their situation and they are told that their marriage model is unbiblical.
While I believe that the bible admonishes submission and sacrifice so that both favors the other partner, if a couple wants to do everything the husband’s way and the wife is happy and content with that, who am I to say it is wrong? If the couple makes it work by balancing the decisions by the one who is the most affected making the final judgment, who am I to say that what works for them is wrong? These are not unbiblical marriages and we are free to make things work in the way that makes us happy and content and allows us to serve one another with joy.
When the marriage is not a happy marriage and there is much friction, we can point them to ways to help make the marriage better, but good marriages should not be called unbiblical models and this is the concern I have.
I don’t remember Sarah ever suggesting that it is key for a woman to be the major breadwinner in the family. I don’t think that is her message at all. Do you have a quote to that effect?
I read her book in google books which allowed me extensive access earlier today. However, I have now reached my viewing limit.
What Sarah did say is that she is the main breadwinner and her husband moves to be where she has work. This is in Men and Women in the Church.
Her book is very personal and comes out of her own situation. This is her situation. She submits as the one who holds financial power.
She then provides an example of a wife getting two or three witnesses to support her, which was not helpful and then going into a deep depression. She notes how this woman was then able to get more supportive help later.
I simply point out that she offers no hope for the woman who cannot access appropriate support. I get the impression from her book that she is aware that being in an unhappy relationship is a mental health risk but she had not yet worked out an appropriate response to this situation.
Naturally it is not her intention to in any way deal with women in abusive situations in this book. No doubt her later book does this and I would be glad to see this quoted.
In reading her first book, I concurred with her simple approach to Eph. 5. I am very open myself to those who have a traditional marriage in which men and women exercise authority in complementary domains. I have stated this from the beginning and reiterated it many times, on the CBE thread for example.
I hasten to also reiterate that “complementarianism” as it is defined by those who use the term most commonly, and those who are teaching it in my environment, means that the husband has all authority and the wife has all submission.
Sumners is clear that she does not hold to this. She also does not hold to husband and wife having different domains of authority. She seems only complementarian in that she says the husband sacrifices while the wife submits.
I would argue that childbearing is sacrifice of one’s body and that the wife, by virtue of being a mother constantly sacrifices. So I do not feel that there is any contrast here between the husband and wife, myself.
I do not disagree, however, with anything that I have read of Sumner. I only suggest that she relates how she herself was able to come to an understanding of how she could herself become a woman teacher in the church. I did not feel that she addressed other issues.
I mention that she is the major breadwinner because I sense that she is unfamiliar with the experience of being under the power of another human being in a physical way.
I have no desire to disagree but only to point out the limitations of her perspective in my view.
Naturally it is not her intention to in any way deal with women in abusive situations in this book. No doubt her later book does this and I would be glad to see this quoted.
Nope. I just finished her second book a couple days ago.
I was really impressed with some aspects of it. I love how open and honest they are with their struggles. Wow, now that’s not something that you see in most Christian marriage books. What a breath of fresh air their transparency was. I *loved* it.
But there were some confusing aspects for me. For example, while spending a lot of time going over kephale’s possible meanings, there was NO time spent on going over “desire” in Gen. 3:16, just the authoratative assumption that “desire” means that a woman will want to control her husband. I was disappointed with that. It seemed odd, given the preoccupation with getting the “Biblical” meaning vs. going with our assumptions and all.
I also didn’t resonate with her take on what egals believe. I know that many egals see head as meaning “source,” but I’m an egal, and I see head/kephale the same way that Sarah does: it means a head, as in, on a body, as in, it’s a metaphor designed to indicate one-ness. I’ve read other egals saying the same thing. (Maybe “source” is the official egal position on kephale, I dunno—I think it used to be, from everything I’ve read, but I’m not sure if that’s a mainstream view now. ??).
My marriage has been abusive. I am hoping it can get to a point where it is not. I was excited to read the new marriage book for that reason. I was disappointed. The book was not helpful to me at all in that regard.
That’s okay, though. It’s not supposed to be, it never said it would, you know?
But, as I was reading it, it was very clear that the book was written from an *experiential perspective* (of a relatively young marriage), and so I think it’s fair to say that it’s going to be WONDERFULLY wonderfully helpful to those with similar experiences, and, well, probably not so much to those who are and have been experiencing something different.
Bottom line, though, is that while Sumner’s work has not been all that helpful to someone like *me,* I am STILL a stand-up-and-applaud-long-and-loud kind of woman when it comes to her ministry. Why? Because she’s the kind of voice that can get through to some comps that would NEVER be able to hear an egalitarian. I really appreciate her for that. I am so thankful for her voice and her obedience to her calling.
Go, Sarah!
Molly,
You are saying much of what I felt. She really speaks out of her own experience so clearly. This was a call to be a woman leader and preacher.
I am delighted with the sense of her person that I got from her first book. But, to me, it was as if I was reading the story of a woman from another planet. Fascinating. Her book is a welcome contribution, there is no doubt.
On kephale as “source” I believe this is much misunderstood. In Chrysostom he describes kephale as aitia, and some then translate this into English as source. Likewise, in Cyril of Alexandria we can read about Adam,
Therefore of our race he become first kephale, which is arche, and was of the earth and earthy. Since Christ was named the second Adam, he has been placed as kephale, which is arche, of those who through him have been formed anew unto him unto immortality through sanctification in the spirit. Therefore he himself our arche, which is kephale, has appeared as a human being: indeed, he, being by nature God, has a kephale, the Father in heaven. For, being by nature God the Word, he has been begotten from Him. Because kephale means arche, He established the truth for those who are wavering in their mind that man is the kephale of woman, for she was taken out of him. Therefore one Christ and Son and Lord, the one having as kephale the Father in heaven, being God by nature, became for us a kephale accordingly because of his kinship according to the flesh.
My sense is that arche here and aitia in Chrysostom have been translated into English as source. It is not a recent egalitarian notion but one grounded in the church fathers. I am not sure if Sarah deals with either Chrysostom or Cyril on kephale. But if she does not, then she writes off source without suggesting an alternative way to express what these writers were trying to get across.
I can’t begin to adequately explain how meaningful and freeing Sarah Sumner’s books have been to me. She paints such an appealing portrait of marriage, while being completely honest about the difficulty of two sinners seeking one-flesh unity.
To me, beauty and mystery are lacking from both the “traditional comp” and “symmetric/equality in function egal” models. For me, Sarah Sumner restored beauty to the Biblical texts.
To me, one of the major takeaways from Sarah Sumner’s model is that Biblical texts on marriage primarily speak to how husband and wife are to relate, not to their roles.
That is beautiful and freeing. The message of the Bible is not that we should try to recreate Victorian England in 21st century evangelical homes. In the current economic context, where productive activity occurs outside the home and global competition is imposing increased economic risk on families, there must of necessity be flexibility in roles.
Having said that, I do think that a case can be made that the almost complete lack of discussion of roles is naive and reflects Sumner’s personal experiences. She and her husband do not have children.
My take on someone else’s marriage is similar to Cheryl’s. If both spouses choose their system of relating and it is working for both of them, why would anyone claim something is wrong?
On what can be wrong with egal marriages, I can imagine someone thinking egalism is a higher principle than love (or other basic principles). One should always choose the loving thing, that is the highest principle. If that means egal marriage is not possible, then sobeit.
Don,
I beg to differ. The egal model is not God’s word on marriage. Rather, it is practical application material developed by fallible human beings trying to do their best to offer guidance to couples. It’s as full of problems as any other model.
I think that the attitude on the part of egals that nothing could possibly be wrong with their beliefs is why over 95% of comps responding to Wayne’s latest poll find the blog to be an unsafe place to post.
Over and over again, there are threads in which non-comp authors critique comp materials. With a couple of notable exceptions, I’ve yet to see egals willing to engage in serious self-reflection on the problems in their corner of the world.
Unless egals are willing to do that, meaningful dialogue is unlikely to occur.
Molly,
You say,
“[Sarah]’s the kind of voice that can get through to some comps that would NEVER be able to hear an egalitarian.”
That is very true. Too often, egalism seems to be part and parcel of a more general uncritical embrace of modern culture. That means it cannot get through to people who have been hurt by that culture or who have found it, as T. S. Eliot said, “hollow.”
However, I have yet to see an egal – beyond the preliminary attempts I have made on my blog and in comments – recognize truth in Sarah’s positions insofar as she seeks to get through to egals and provide a corrective to their positions.
It is also true that Sarah and Jim Sumner do not write with people who are married to a chronic abuser in mind. I could be wrong, but I think their ministry is mostly to soft comps and soft egals whose marriages are reasonably healthy in the first place. That covers a very, very large number of people.
Emerson and Sarah Eggerichs, on the other hand, clearly have a ministry that includes helping severely compromised marriages turn around.
Still, that still leaves to one side another target audience: those who are married to a pathologically abusive spouse. In terms of demographics, this audience is far smaller than the rest of the spectrum (basically healthy to mildly or severely compromised), but not for that reason less important.
Maybe no one has yet written a book that might be entitled, “What do I do if I am married to an abusive spouse?” Such a book would need to deal with the typical pathologies associated with abusive behavior on the part of wives, not just husbands.
Such a book would have to dare go where angels fear to tread, for example, into a discussion of mental illness, not to mention the general human propensity for self-destructive behavior.
More importantly in my view, such a book would have to deal with the whole question of suffering. When is suffering redemptive? When is it futile? Love endures all things, fine. But when does love endure the necessity of separation? When does love reach the point of saying, “Because I love you, we need to go our separate ways?”
Ideally, such a book would not be a pro-egal or pro-comp tract in the guise of a self-help manual. Though abuse has no justification in either a comp or egal framework, abuse nevertheless occurs in about equal rates among self-identifying comps and egals. So it has to be addressed apart from framework, as indeed is already done in secular sources.
Suzanne,
You say:
“I hasten to also reiterate that “complementarianism” as it is defined by those who use the term most commonly, and those who are teaching it in my environment, means that the husband has all authority and the wife has all submission.”
I don’t think it’s true that the majority of self-identifying comps see things so one-sidedly. Furthermore, there are plenty of excellent comp resources out there, books by Thomas and Eggerichs, for example, that are remarkably balanced on these issues. Indeed, so far as I can tell, these books and others like them outsell marriage books by comps of the variety you are familiar with by a long shot.
As Molly implies with respect to another category, soft comps (to which I would add soft egals), for whom resources like those of Sarah Sumner are going to be particularly useful, resources by comps like Thomas and Eggerichs might prove useful to people in a hard comp environment. People in a hard comp environment, after all, are not likely to be receptive to hard-line egalism.
“If both spouses choose their system of relating and it is working for both of them, why would anyone claim something is wrong?”
One thing that could be wrong is that we’re called to serve others. The couple you describe could be very happy – but very isolated – in their own world. That is a very clear and present danger of a model in which lots of time is spent dialoguing, because everything is up for negotiation.
All those negotiations create a sense of connectivity between the couple, but at the expense of connections to the broader community that Christ has called the couple to serve.
Over and over again, there are threads in which non-comp authors critique comp materials. With a couple of notable exceptions, I’ve yet to see egals willing to engage in serious self-reflection on the problems in their corner of the world.
I know that Wayne asked some well-spoken comps, including from CBMW, to join our team blog effort when it was first starting. They didn’t want to. I think some of the “safe/unsafe” comes from the fact that there are more egals than comps here, posting and commenting (or that’s what it feels like to me–am I wrong?).
I’m new to egalism, having grown up in the comp/patriarchal world and still very much in it. So, admittedly, it’s hard to do self-reflection about my experience and observations with the Christian egal position. I don’t experience it around me except in very rare occasions. I hope that will change.
Being in a comp church setting sets off what can only be post-traumatic stress sydrome, I think (self-diagnosis, of course). *sad sigh* I’d like to say I’m joking, but I”m not. As soon as they start in the roles stuff or the submissive woman stuff, I feel like I can’t breath, like my stomach is going to lose its contents, etc, despite my BEST of intentions.
The years may change that, and I do hope so. But I’m actively seeking a more egal environment and community of believers, so that I can stop curling into fetal position for protection (metaphorically speaking) and just enjoy being a part of a fallible bunch of humans following Christ.
(I have been enjoying a little Episcopal gathering in my area, hoping it might be a “home” for me)…
So, when I get to that point of having actual years worth of experiences, or even just months, lol, I may have some constructive critique to offer about the egal position and experience.
Warmly as Always,
Molly
Molly,
You raise an important point. So many egal bloggers here have little experience with egal marriage and are not attending egal churches. The result is lots of apples-to-oranges comparisons.
In particular, the reality of complementarianism is compared to the ideal of egalitarianism.
In a fallen world, the ideal of any framework appears to trump the reality of another. I do not believe this point is sufficiently acknowledged by many of the egal bloggers here.
If it were, I think there would be much more focus on understanding egalitarianism and much less focus on critiquing comps.
‘On what can be wrong with egal marriages, I can imagine someone thinking egalism is a higher principle than love (or other basic principles). One should always choose the loving thing, that is the highest principle. If that means egal marriage is not possible, then sobeit.’
I agree, Don, highest principles first.
The kind of compism that causes me concern and worry is the kind that overrides highest principles, and that kind can only be claimed to be the ONLY ‘biblical model’. In this way women are told (forced) to accept it and in that there is no freedom, love and justice. So I speak against ‘compism’ because highest principles are discarded when it is taught as the ONLY ‘biblical (right) model.’
If it were, I think there would be much more focus on understanding egalitarianism and much less focus on critiquing comps.
Marilyn,
I agree with you completely that perspective is so important. I see women who have full financial independence and are not in an abusive situation, as pragmatic egals. Some of us are not familiar with these circumstances. We don’t know what that would feel like. But we still feel that Christianity should have something to offer us.
In particular, the reality of complementarianism is compared to the ideal of egalitarianism.
In a fallen world, the ideal of any framework appears to trump the reality of another. I do not believe this point is sufficiently acknowledged by many of the egal bloggers here.
Oh, my, Marilyn, that is an EXCELLENT point.
I’d probably only make one caveat, because I believe that hard compism *is* abusive, in its very essence—therefore problematic in both ideal and reality. But I can quicky nod my head in assent to your above statement in regards to a soft comp framework.
Excellent excellent point.
FWIIW, I am not trying to compare ideals with reals, reality is always messy.
What I am trying to do is share my understanding of some verses, including learning from others, and showing that there are choices on how some verses are interpreted, and that one is not required to make the non-egal choice in interpretation. That is, that the verses can be understood in an egal way.
“…that one is not required to make the non-egal choice in interpretation. That is, that the verses can be understood in an egal way.”
Which, don, women like me greatly appreciate because we had NO idea there were any other options before.
I firmly believed that it was either male-rule or sin, that there were no viable scholarly theologically-sound Biblical alternatives.
When I discovered, after serious and lengthy study, that an egalitarian message was just as scholarly, just as theologically sound, just as Biblical as the comp argument, I, well…switched.
The thing that had kept me entrenched in (hard) comp theology was that I didn’t think there were any viable **God-honoring** alternatives.
It’s important for God’s people to know that ample scholarship and prayerful-study supports egalitarian thinking, that it is NOT derived from accomodating to secular humanist/feminist thought (as is the frequent charge), but that it is Biblically derived and practiced with the desire to bring God glory.
In the comp world I came from, this was NOT what we thought, nor was it what we were taught.
John,
Could you please take a minute to expand on your comment about the three types of egal thought?
I understand reciprocal authority to mean that a couple would outline the various functions a family needs accomplished, agree who would be responsible, and assign decision rights to the spouse who had accepted the responsibility.
There would presumably be ongoing discussion about various decisions, with final authority residing with the person who has responsibility in a particular domain. Is that correct?
I think that I understand equality of function to mean that all roles/domains should be shared. I.e., co-parenting, co-providing, etc., with no one spouse having primary responsibility.
From reading threads here, have I picked up a decent operational definition of those two types of egal thought?
If so, what I’m not sure is of is how (1) symmetry differs from the other two.
One more question: Where does CBE’s “complementarity without hierarchy” fall? (Presumably, (2) equality of function, would not be a CBE position?)
When I see “complementarity without hierarchy” this means to me for a marriage that the spouses work together in a complementary fashion to succeed at their goals (his, hers and theirs).
That is, there is no one gender that is supposed to do X, whatever X is, unless there are actual physical constraints. So the couple gets to decide what makes sense for them, with the ability to change it as things change.
It might often BE the case that a husband works outside the home and the wife is a stay-at-home or part-time-work-outside-the home mom, if this is what makes sense.
By a symmetrical interpretation of some gender verses, I mean the spouses use the verses to discuss what is important to each of them; it could very well be that the husband says respect is crucial and the wife says love is key. If you notice, Eggerichs puts esteem (another word for respect) in one of 5 ways to love your wife. And one way to respect your husband is to “make love” to him. (I do agree love is much more than just that.)
I should write up more explanation of this.
Don,
Thanks so much for your response. I’m still not sure that I understand, but I think that your answer helped.
Let me ask another question. Do you see authority as tied to responsibility? If so, then what I see you offering is a generalized version of models 2 and 3. With respect to model 2, if the couple decides to co-share all responsibilities, then the couple co-shares all authority. With respect to model 3, if the couple decides to assign various responsibilities to the two spouses, then the authority is assigned to whoever took on the responsibility.
Is that your model? Or, do you decouple decision rights and responsibility?
Also, could somebody take a stab at explaining the CBE position.
On responsibility and authority, I have the following thoughts:
1. On authority, it is all to easy in my flesh to want to create a fiefdom, a power base from which to better control my environment. So I need to handle any authority given to me by God with a light grasp, ready to let it go, as I do not want authority to control me, like the ring in Lord of the Rings. We see authority corrupting people all the time, inch by inch. Power can be intoxicating, beware it.
2. On responsibility, no human has all the authority to accomplish their responsibilities all the time just based on their authority. The prez is charged with protecting the country, but sometimes he fails. For a job at work, it can always seem that if I just had more authority, I could do my job better.
3. There ARE situations where one needs command style authority, the military is the obvious example; and emergencies also may need this. I do not think a family is supposed to be like the military. I do not think a church is supposed to be like the military.
4. I can see where delegation of authority can make sense. One way to do dinner is to put someone is charge and if they want help they say so and if not, they say so. Another way to do dinner is everyone makes a contribution, like pot luck. It is possible to have too many cooks.
5. Just as a qualification to be a teacher is to be a learner; a qualification to be a leader is to be a follower, that is, a servant. Jesus taught this. To think ANYONE might claim to be a leader (for example, because of gender) yet not be a servant concerns me. And I do not mean claiming to be a servant-leader, I mean being a servant. Jesus gave us our example, washing the feet of others, which was the LOWEST task in a household.
Marilyn,
”I beg to differ. The egal model is not God’s word on marriage. Rather, it is practical application material developed by fallible human beings trying to do their best to offer guidance to couples. It’s as full of problems as any other model.”
I do not think this is the way to find unity or common ground. It may work better to acknowledge that people are free to choose whatever model that fits their marriage best rather than trying to force others to find fault with themselves.
”I think that the attitude on the part of egals that nothing could possibly be wrong with their beliefs is why over 95% of comps responding to Wayne’s latest poll find the blog to be an unsafe place to post.”
I’ve been thinking about that and wondered. It has been my experience that in every primarily comp forum I’ve been to in the past 12 years (from before I found egal forums) comps would severely demean, criticize, and eventually boot off anyone who thought differently on certain Scriptures. In fact, the ONLY places where comps and egals can have any amount of free exchange is on boards run by egal minded Christians. Thus it has become an opinion of mine that anyone who strongly supports a male only authority model of Christian life, simply does not feel safe when that model is not in place. In other words, if men are not held up as the authority figures, then they don’t feel safe. And to me that seems reasonable. It is different in tone when both men and women are given full freedom of expression, and all Christians are given freedom to disagree graciously. I’ve posted extensively in comp forums and there is a distinct difference. There is also the question of how does one feel safe when your opinions are disagreed with frequently? All I can say at this point is that at least here, one can disagree and still be respected. I don’t think comps have experienced what egals have gone through on their comp forums. And that is the point of egal forums, that no one should have to experience what egals have gone through on comp forums.
”With a couple of notable exceptions, I’ve yet to see egals willing to engage in serious self-reflection on the problems in their corner of the world.”
I rarely see comps give serious questions to their own models either. When they do, they often become some degree of non-comp. I do not think much common ground is found in finding fault with oneself or with others. It’s a negative kind of common ground. Christ came to set the prisoners free, to heal the brokenhearted, to make a bridge for us to come into the presence of God. IMO allowing each other the freedom to disagree is more healing than trying to influence people to admit to faults they probably don’t have. This is what I find troublesome with Sumners approach. It probably works great for fellow comps because they want egals to be wrong, whereas egals already make allowances for differences of opinions.
What I appreciate most about what you are saying is that you would like to find common ground with egals. Likely many egals would like to find common ground with comps. I think our common ground is in other places in Christ. We actually have more in common than not, if we look in the right places.
What are some of the places you think we have common ground?
Marilyn,
The CBE position can be found here:
http://www.equalitycentral.com/index.php?pager=goals.html
If you cannot view that let me know.
believer333,
My comments are made in the context of my experiences with this blog.
Take a look at the threads where the topic is CBMW or CBMW authors. I think you’ll find that 90% of those threads were initiated by egal bloggers.
Cut that same data a slightly different way. Take a look at the threads initiated by egal bloggers. You’ll find that lots of them are critiques of comp material.
In contrast, has there ever been a thread by a comp author targeted at CBE? Has there ever been a thread by a comp author that is a critique of egal material?
I’m not sure that I would state my primary purpose in posting here as finding common ground with egals. Nor do I think that the purpose of most egals posting here is to find common ground with comps.
Rather, I am trying to “work out my salvation with fear and trembling.” Roles and relationships in marriage and the church are an important part of that. I thought that I could learn from the examples of egals. As I learn, it could very well be that I see common ground. But, what I’m finding is that examples don’t appear to exist.
Here is one representative area where I had assumed that I could learn from egals: The Industrial Revolution has had a huge impact on the family. Productive activity has shifted from the home to the market place. What does it mean for a SAHM to be “manager of a household” when so many of the management tasks are now consumption-related? Does a model where he makes the money and she spends it really make sense? What domain-based authority exists for a SAHM?
How do you work out the issues that arise when wives work outside the home? For example, co-provision typically results in both husband and wife satisficing at their respective careers. If all couples adopt this approach towards work, what does that mean, for example, to the level of innovation and productivity growth for the society as a whole? Are we fundamentally altering what it means to cultivate the garden?
About four years ago, I sat down to sort through questions like the above. One of the things I did was to pose a version of some of the above questions to four evangelical Christian women who were public figures and whose work centered around gender issues. I explained that I worked outside the home, I wanted to understand the implications of my choices, and I wanted to honor God in my choices. I had a lot of questions. What material was there to help me prayerfully work out answers to my questions?
Two soft comp public figures did not respond to my inquiry. The most conservative of the four said she would pray for me during this difficult time. (She also told me that it was important for me to honor my husband by making sure that I did all the housework. I should have seen it coming!) The fourth public figure told me that she had exactly the same questions I did. She knew of nothing in the Christian literature that spoke to the issues we face. However, the secular literature had lots to say, and she gave me some great references.
While I believed her when she said that the comp literature didn’t have anything to say to me, I assumed she was wrong about the egal literature. Surely egals were thinking about these issues?!
But, I guess the answer is no. There appears, for example, to be no evangelical egal practical application material. However, I very much look forward to taking a look at Don Browning’s work (mentioned by John Hobbins) when my schedule clears in a couple of weeks.
Does that give you a better idea of where I’m coming from?
I may simply be in the wrong place, in that it appears that the issues important to me aren’t particularly front and center for most of the other bloggers who post here.
Hi Don,
Thanks for your post about authority. Your insights are relevant to all of us. Thanks for taking the time to outline them and share them with us.
Hi believer333,
Thanks for the link to the CBE document. I’m still not sure that I understand what the summary phrase “complementarity without hierarchy” means, but perhaps if I reread the statement I will.
Carrie Miles "The Redemption of Love" discusses economics and marriage from an egal perspective in her "The Redemption of Love". I thought it was quite good.
http://www.cbeinternational.org/new/pdf_files/free_articles/redemption_of_love_web.pdf is a review.
http://www.amazon.com/Redemption-Love-Rescuing-Sexuality-Economics/dp/1587431505/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226428313&sr=8-1 is an Amazon link.
As the links are long, you have to go to full page mode for them to work by clicking on the title in Orange.
Thanks, Don. I’ll check out those links.
” How do you work out the issues that arise when wives work outside the home? For example, co-provision typically results in both husband and wife satisficing at their respective careers. If all couples adopt this approach towards work, what does that mean, for example, to the level of innovation and productivity growth for the society as a whole? Are we fundamentally altering what it means to cultivate the garden? ”
Good questions. I don’t think all Christian couples need to adopt one model of marital organization. We are not all the same. We cannot fit into the same patterns. I don’t know what you mean by “cultivating the garden”. Men are not the only ones who cultivate gardens.
For some couples, each having a career works fine. I know a few couples like that and they are very happy. One even has 6 or 8 children, which the wife homeschooled to a certain age, and which she nursed her newborn at work. Not everyone can do that, hence let’s not try to fit every women into the same marital pattern. Some couples who both need to work do so with part-time employment and/or home based projects. Even running and participating in a flea market type of business can be a home business.
As to whether egals sort through those issues, yes they do. Some of the same questions arise, such as who does the housework. Maybe both do. Maybe some of it is hired out. As a senior I find it helps me greatly to hire out teenagers for helping in the yard and house stuff.
” What does it mean for a SAHM to be “manager of a household” when so many of the management tasks are now consumption-related? Does a model where he makes the money and she spends it really make sense? What domain-based authority exists for a SAHM?”
It would seem to me that a SAHM has a lot of domain based authority (IF the husband is not a patriarchalist). She manages everything there is to the physical needs of a house from interior decorating, cooking, cleaning, gardening, children’s activities, homeschooling, garage sales, etc. Depending upon how she approaches it that can be big. Even hiring teenagers to help with areas too large is within her ‘domain’.
” I had a lot of questions. What material was there to help me prayerfully work out answers to my questions?”
How about fellowshipping with other Christians who have the same or similar concerns? There is no Biblical answer to these questions. God is not a micro manager. Every cook has a different approach.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, believer333.
You are welcome Marilyn.
Christian egal women like to chitchat about ‘homey’ type of stuff too you know. SMILES
lol…On egal women and homemaking, my adventuresinmercy blog, I just linked to an egal who’s blog is TOTALLY home-makery and then some…
I’m still not sure that I understand what the summary phrase “complementarity without hierarchy” means…
I suppose I would ask, with the purpose of helping explain/define the phrase, this question:
Is hierarchy required in order to be complementary?
Marilyn, it was interesting to read your hopes about what this blog would do for you. I admit to not understanding many of the concerns and questions you mentioned. (I think my experience is just too different?).
Marilyn,
You write:
Take a look at the threads where the topic is CBMW or CBMW authors. I think you’ll find that 90% of those threads were initiated by egal bloggers.
Cut that same data a slightly different way. Take a look at the threads initiated by egal bloggers. You’ll find that lots of them are critiques of comp material.
In contrast, has there ever been a thread by a comp author targeted at CBE? Has there ever been a thread by a comp author that is a critique of egal material?
First, I was one of the original bloggers here, but I gave that up because circumstances prevent me from saying anything good about a system within which I have experienced so much violence.
For me, critiquing gender based authority, of the male over the female, is a health and safety issue.
How else do we deal with rape and beatings in the home? It is hard to call men to accountability within the home. In public spaces it may be easier now for women to rely on others, but within the home, one is often isolated and brainwashed by scripture verses.
The truth is that some women have been beaten and raped while phrases like “Wives are to submit” or “you have to obey” are shouted at them. This is a fact. These women are often in need of medical or other therapy at their own expense.
I have repeatedly asked others to critique egalitarian teaching, but it has not happened. My guess is that few people have experienced marital rape with egalitarian sermons being cited in the act.
I am sorry to be so graphic. I do perceive that women with these and similar experiences should not participate in a forum like this. However, many were in this forum from the first day. How do they get to feel safe?
I certainly do not see egalitarianism as opening up the way to a utopian relationship. Far from it!
For me, it is the only way to find my feet as a single mother. I understand myself as the protector and provider. This is a very complex role in my circumstances. I work, I seek therapy for my children, I deal with their complex medical issues on my own, and appeal through appropriate channels to the father of my children, when possible. I maintain an old house and car.
I have no relatives near me, and no men in my life to aid me in any way except to be friends and peers.
I do not in any way see how a complementarian doctrine could help me at all. I would rather see this life of mine as one which is entirely within the model of what God intended. I believe that God intended us to live a godly life within the circumstances we have rather than pine after an earthly ideal.
I appreciate your point of view and I do try to imagine where you are coming from. I think a lot about two career families and how that can be made practical. But it is not an immediate issue for me. It is hypothetical as are my experiences for others.
Homeyness – knitting, pies, tea and friendship. There is no comp and egal in this domain.
Here’s what I meant by my question about “complementarity without hierarchy”. When I’ve heard that phrase in the past, I’ve assumed that the “complementarity” being talked about is what complementarians mean by complementarity – complementarity in gender roles.
I.e., the wife assumes primary responsibility for the care of young children and the husband assumes primary responsibility for providing for the family (with wide latitude allowed for what words like “young” and “primary” mean).
So, I assumed the CBE model meant a very soft version of traditional roles, with authority shared between husband and wife.
After following the link that believer333 gave, I’ve come to the conclusion that I misunderstood the CBE position.
The CBE statement appears to make no distinctions in the roles of husbands and wives. There are also no distinctions in how husbands and wives are to relate to each other.
Don, I now see where you’re coming from when you say the couple can do whatever they want (as long as they stay true to general Biblical counsel applicable to all believers). And, after reading the CBE statement, I now hear you expressing the same argument that I read in the CBE statement.
Presumably, most egal couples voluntarily select a soft version of traditional roles and shared authority. But, unlike what I thought, that is not the official CBE position.
So, of the three models John outlined earlier, I see Don and CBE representing the first model.
Egals, am I understanding this correctly?
Marilyn,
I appreciate your desire to make sure that you are doing the right thing by God; we should all have that desire. But I don't believe that the "right thing" is found in models, or even in "right" thinking that is based more upon research or even tradition than godly wisdom. The "world" uses models but I think that the Kingdom of God operates by different means (and a different kind of model).
I believe it is a fallacy to even assume that any certain model from the past was the "right one," because the right one is not any particular earthly one — there are different ones even in the Bible according to different periods and cultures. And people are different; their circumstances are different, including their personalities, abilities, physical capacities, economic situations, etc.
I wasn't even aware of "egal" vs. "comp" thought until recently (a couple years ago, I think). I was aware of various things such as "tradition," feminism, and the like, but didn't base my thoughts on marriage or even what I should do in my life on any particular model or philosophy.
I also spent a lot of my life paralyzed by worry about whether or not I was doing the right thing. In everything!
The "answer" I have come to, or I should say that God has given me grace, faith, and healing to see and to live by, is that "right" is freedom in Christ to just be, trusting in Him, and to learn, and mess up, and learn from that, and forgive, and be forgiven. It is having a love like that of I Cor. 13, that confronts when necessary as both Jesus and Paul modeled (there's the right kind of model
), and that understands proper relational boundaries (the book "Boundaries" by Cloud & Townsend really helped in that regard. It opened my eyes to a whole new world!)
That is why I am neither comp nor egal — or I am both in some ways. And I am still learning and growing, and my marriage of nearly 21 years continues to grow, as my husband and I grow and mature.
BTW, I did respond (if late) to your comments and inquiries on a previous thread.
What are the 3 models? Can you quote them please.
John posited 3 types of egal marriage:
“(1) Symmetry, your [Don's] approach, by which asymmetrical texts in the Bible are systematically revised for the purposes of contemporary ethical counsel to express symmetry.
(2) Equality in function (except for childbirth), as a right and, often, as a goal.
(3) A reciprocal authority arrangement.”
P.S. I do not see myself as revising the Bible via symmetry, altho some might see it that way.
Here is a little more detail. Paul gives specific advice to husbands and wives in 1st century Greco-Roman-Jewish culture.
Some of it is clearly already symmetric, e.g, 1 Cor 7. For the things that appear non-symmetric, what might the reasons be? That 1st century culture was very different than ours, the Jews allowed polygamy, the husband could tell his wife to discard a newborn and it was expected she would obey. Perhaps Paul was saying something for emphasis, perhaps he was saying something to actually be different, perhaps he was saying different things because of the challenges of that 1st century culture.
Can we find that a wife is to love her husband elsewhere in the Bible? Can we find that a husband is to respect his wife? Even if we could not, do we really think that this means a spouse should not do these things?
Now it may be the case that for many/most men, they need respect and if wives do not know that; they might try to love them (as they would want to be loved) but also be disrespecting them and wondering why it does not work. And vice versa for the man.
So Eggerichs has some good insights, I would just go further than he does with those ideas and individualize them; after all people are individuals. Who cares in some sense what MOST wives/husbands think, what does your specific wife think or your specific husband think?
Thanks Don. I don’t see any of the 3 choices as egalitarian goals. It is not the purpose of those who believe in Biblical equality to bring about symmetry, or to claim rights that other’s must accept, or to force a reciprocal authority within marriage.
:^(
These are the three models I introduced earlier. As far as I can see, three definitions of egal marriage come to the fore on the these threads:
(1) Symmetry, Don’s approach, by which asymmetrical texts in the Bible are systematically revised for the purposes of contemporary ethical counsel to express symmetry.
(2) Equality in function (except for childbirth), as a right and, often, as a goal.
(3) A reciprocal authority arrangement.
As I pointed out earlier, it is possible to be an egal in the sense of (3) but not in the sense of (1) or (2). That happens to be my situation.
I do not see (2) equality in function in the household nucleus as a goal or an ideal. I do not see it as an ideal for society either – at least not in the blunt way some feminists advocate for, such that the world is imperfect for the very fact that some professions are dominated by women and others by men.
Still, I am concerned about some gender imbalances both in family life and in society (and not so much about others). But I do not want to get legalistic about my concerns.
I do not see (1) symmetry as a necessary consequence of being an egal. After all, it doesn’t follow. That is, I am quite willing to believe that sacrificial love offered by a husband is, typically (not absolutely), a wife’s greatest need, and that reverential respect offered by a wife is, typically (not absolutely), a husband’s greatest need.
That belief is not in contradiction with another belief, namely, that both husband and wife need love and respect.
All of these beliefs can and are held in practice by many soft comps and soft egals in my experience (though rarely verbalized in that way).
It’s a question of emphasis, whether Paul’s particular emphases are still valid today. The suggestion that they are is at the very least an excellent working hypothesis.
I don’t like (1) symmetry because I get tired of rewriting the biblical text to make it symmetrical whenever it isn’t.
I’m used to preaching on the text as is, though of course I also situate any single text in the context of the entire biblical witness and try to adjust for cultural changes but not to the point of eliminating the possibility that the text still speaks with its own voice.
But I don’t want to overplay the differences between Dan and myself. I symmetricize the text, too, not by law as it were, but whenever it seems that it might be helpful. This, I may preach on 1 Peter 3 where wives are encouraged to endure mistreatment for the sake of winning their godless husbands. That teaching, of course, needs to be explained very carefully in any case. But I will sometimes make a point of encouraging husbands to endure mistreatment as well with the same goal in mind.
By (3) “reciprocal authority arrangement,” I mean that overall authority is split “50/50″ on principle. Commitment to this principle is what makes my marriage egal. In practice, that means that on important decisions on which we may disagree, who will defer to the other is not decided by formula.
BTW, I’ve always enjoyed hearing children recount how their parents in the “love-obey” framework made the really life-changing decisions in the life of the family. As in, when to sell the farm, change town, change church, etc. Guess what? I’ve noticed that in most cases (unless the marriage was bad for other reasons, with a domineering wife or a domineering husband), the spouse whose views prevailed did so on the basis of acquired moral authority. In short, in a love-obey framework, the husband nonetheless will defer to the wife if she has in the eyes of all concerned the greater moral authority with respect to a specific issue.
Am I bothered when I prep a couple for marriage and the young woman says she grants overall authority to her beau on principle?
No, unless I have reason to believe that her reason for doing so is based on a choice to see her husband as a father and herself as his daughter. That is, when comp-ism becomes an excuse for childishness, it becomes ethically unacceptable.
BTW, at least here in the upper Midwest (Mara can chime in here if she wishes), a lot of deference is given to the matriarch of the family, according to the saying (is this just in Wisconsin?),
“If Mama’s not’s happy, nobody’s happy.”
I’m used to husbands spouting this, usually with a smile. It’s a very good rule when you think about it (not an absolute rule).
I want to emphasize how much I am in agreement with the notion that being involved in compegal is about working out our salvation as believers with fear and trembling.
I am used to looking for the good in viewpoints I do not agree with and I am used to being as self-reflective as possible about the fallout and unintended consequences of my principles in practice. I expect to find common ground in this way, and consider that a worthy objective as well, though it is not my primary objective.
I have not been disappointed on these threads.
I view egalism as focusing on loving/respecting one another as Christ has loved us.
I am very hesitant to think of men and women in terms of roles.
I’ve had so much “role” stuff stuffed down me that the very word makes my skin crawl (which is not to say that it is therefore an evil word/concept, necessarily, just to say that I am unable at this time to see it in a positive light due to a lifetime of very negative experiences with the concept of women’s roles).
I prefer to think that men and women are complementary, a concept that I think is entirely Biblical. However, to say that means they have roles to fill is taking it past what is clearly spelled out in Scripture.
I am a huge believer in reading the historical background behind a Biblical text, as opposed to ignoring it. I think most of the comp passages that “prove roles” are texts wrested from their historical context and used as if they were rules set down for all time. I do not think that they were.
I think they were instructions given to Believers in a specific culture in a specific situation. I think there is much to be learned from them. But I do not see them as commands for today, anymore than I see the six-times-commanded, “Greet one another with a holy kiss” as a rule for me today.
My super quick version on why I don’t think complementarity necessitates roles.
Love,
The Molly
Btw, my super quick version above is a hastily-typed view that is strictly my OPINION, and is not meant to be a blanket statement. It’s just this fallible human’s view on things as of this minute.
This comment was just approved but it was so far down, I didn’t think that Marilyn or Sue and the regular contributors/commenters would see it, so am cutting and pasting it for all of ya’ll. Maybe there is hope for the Complegalitarian blog, after all. *grins*
From carolh17:
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you to the creators and moderators of this blog. But in particular, thank you
to Marilyn, Molley, and Sue. I’ve sought out your comments for months now and each one has resonated deeply with me. Marilyn, you are one of the most gracious writers on the internet these days! Molley, your strength and openness are examples to me. And, Sue, thanks for being willing to write with the emotion that this topic deserves.
And to Emsolideogloria – thank you for writing such an objective, insightful, and nuanced post that I can no longer stand to stay in my 6-month-long lurking status.
On this blog, I’ve found women like me – sincere believers who just couldn’t reconcile the teaching they sit under with the obvious facts of their strengths, desires, and motives. You’ve given me the courage to just *ask* God to show me the truth on some of these matters. Before this blog, I felt that even prayers about these things were rebellious.
To the men on this blog: thank you too. I don’t mean to ignore you in my “naming of names”… it’s just that for men, isn’t it all ultimately theoretical? So I guess I’ve just placed a greater weight on my sister’s words. At the same time, I have been struck again and again by how men have *nothing* to gain by promoting women’s dignity in marriage and church but do so for the love of truth and love of their sisters. So thank you for that. And David (you’re the complementarian married to Lisa, right?) – your posts proved to me, at least, that you’re one of the few complementarians who *mean* it when they affirm the equal worth of women (fortuntely for me, my husband is another).
Really, I understand that this is a burst of emotion that’s rare for this blog, but I wish I could hug each of you! I actually have tears of gratitude in my eyes right now.
I’ve been lurking for a long time. Now that I’ve broken the ice, you can probably expect to hear more from me in the future. But for now, my comments will stil be infrequent and they will probably be more questions than answers. I just don’t know what I believe in these matters. I desire above all to be faithful to Scripture. What I’ve seen, however, is that the people on this blog truly desire that also.
Thank you one and all! Consider us introduced
November 11, 2008 6:49 PM
This is an apology for negative comments about the blog in my earlier post….I focused on where we’ve been, not where we’re committed to heading. And, I’m as much a part of where we’ve been as anybody is. I hope everybody can accept my apology.
Molly, I’m with you, I see complementarity as primarily reflected in how we are to relate to each other. The Sumners’ thoughts on that are really beautiful, aren’t they?
Bonnie, thanks for alerting me to your posts. I see that you’re blogging about Pepper Schwartz’s book right now.
Schwartz is a big advocate of the equality in function model (i.e., the second of the three egal models that John identified), isn’t she? She refers to this model as the “companionate model.” She argues that intimacy requires equality and that equality in marriage only occurs when all roles are shared 50-50.
For example, Schwartz believes that if a wife is a SAHM, equality in the marriage (and, hence, true relational intimacy) is impossible.
At some future date, I think it would be interesting to blog about differences in the assumptions underlying the various comp and egal marriage models with respect to how relational intimacy (i.e., one-flesh unity) is to be achieved.
For example, I don’t think that most of us would agree with Schwartz that a 50-50 sharing of roles is necessary. (And, after reading about the problems she acknowledges to be inherent in equality of function model, I question its appropriateness for a Christian couple.)
Consistent with this, I’ve mentioned before an outstanding sociological study by Wilcox and Nock, What’s Love Got To Do With It, which finds that wives are happier in traditional than in egalitarian marriages.
FWIW, the authors used Schwartz’s companionate model as their definition of egalitarian marriage. I’m guessing that the study’s findings make more sense to everybody here, given the additional information that it is the equal function egalitarian model that is being contrasted to traditional marriage.
That’s all for a while.
carolh17,
Welcome to the blog! Thanks so much for your comment. As you’ll see from my previous two posts, it came at a time when I needed a bit of encouragement about my blogging! Thank you for your gracious words!
Schwartz believes that if a wife is a SAHM, equality in the marriage (and, hence, true relational intimacy) is impossible.
What I don’t like about that is that it equates work-for-money [or financial provision] with authority.
(This is also something that bothers me about Eggerich’s take on men being in authority *because* they provide financially, but maybe I just read him wrong–Marilyn?).
I think that is a capitulation to a post-Industrial outlook on what connotates value, NOT a reflection of Biblical truth.
The assumption that money-earning-equals-power is NOT a Biblically derived one.
In a Christ-based economy, service equals authority. He turned everything upside down. Love is power, and all of that paradigm blowing stuff.
So two spouses are free to decide that one spouse would be of best benefit by being the full-time-at-home person, and that WON’T impact the amount of power/authority they have in the relationship. It can’t. Not if the relationship is being run on Christ’s economy, anyway.
That’s my take on it, anyhow. And, yes, it is an ideal. Schwartz may be speaking a lot of truth in that some men may see themselves as “higher” than their wife if she is not earning money. In which case, earning money may be what that wife needs to do, in order to keep from being controlled by an immature man.
But I think it’s fair, at least, to heavily challenge the blanket assertion that money-making equals authority. Where is that concept found in Scripture? I am at a loss to find it there. Maybe someone else can point out what I’m missing.
Btw, carolh17, you are so kind to comment, and I think you just gave a whole lot of encouragement to everyone participating here. Thank you, ya sweet thang!
Welcome carolh17. I look forward to hearing more from you in the future.
Molly, I very much appreciated your super quick version on why you don’t think complementarity necessitates roles.
Hard lined ‘roles’ in Christiandom are simply death boxes to me. One has to lose something trying to fit into them. Christian egalitarianism is not a doctrinal position so much as it is an attitude toward my fellow believers in which I do my best to value everyone, look for the best in them, and seek God as to how I can be an encouragment to support them in becoming all God wants them to be. I’m still learning that. Secondarily, it means I do not believe there is any Biblical support for restricting a believers growth and ministry in the Body of Christ because of their gender, nationality or social status. And I’m still researching that. But I’ve actually spent many of my 38 years as a Christian researching the subject. And if I’m blessed, I might get to spend another 30 years researching it and other worthy subjects.
Marilyn (and Molly),
I wouldn’t say that, in Love Between Equals, Schwartz defines a peer marriage solely in terms of a 50/50 split; her analysis goes deeper than that. But she does speak of equity (in a way I don’t completely agree with, btw). Nor does she define equitable marriage solely in terms of who has the earning power, although she speaks of the “provider complex” – “a combination of roles that give the man the responsibility for financially supporting the family’s lifestyle and the woman all the auxiliary duties that allow the man to devote himself to his work.” The earner, according to her research, usually sees himself as having more decision-making power in the marriage.
Her main point, though, is defense of peer marriage, not necessarily egalitarian marriage, although, according to her findings (some 14+ years old now; things have probably changed somewhat since then, and she does admit that her study sample was small), nearly all peer marriages are egalitarian, usually in earning power but always in collaboration. (My marriage defies her categories somewhat in that it is closer to “traditional” in terms of employment and child care but is definitely peer, according to her definition.)
Though Schwartz sees things through a certain lens, thus tainting her read of some dynamics and limiting her understanding of them, she does take a thorough look at the inner workings of marriages and is dead-on in many of her insights. What she is aiming for but not quite reaching is what, imo, would be the perfect Christian marriage.
Marilyn, I agree that it would be very worthwhile to look at what constitutes relational intimacy, and how it can be achieved.
A brief note about culturally routinized roles.
Those of us who are commenting here are almost by definition going to be people who chafe under the yoke of preconceived roles.
But look around you. Think about what most people are looking for. A lot of people actively look for a set of pre-defined roles, even rules and regulations, that they can put on as one might put on a dress and a blouse.
This is why cults and cult-like organizations continue to flourish.
I don’t mean that in a necessarily negative way. A constant stream of men and women choose every day to forsake an environment that is full of choices for an environment that is blessed as they see it with few choices and a new kind of freedom.
Examples include a young man who has it all and chooses to become a Franciscan friar. I remember meeting in Rome a young nun in the order of Mother Theresa who had been a very successful fashion model (one look at her explained why), financially independent in a way most of us can only dream about, yet she gave it up and chose a different kind of freedom.
Furthermore, a lot of people like rules even if they have only a theoretical intention of following them.
A family I ministered to at one point in my ministry may illustrate. They were from Alabama, came from a conservative evangelical background, and began attending the United Methodist congregation (also evangelical, but “liberal” evangelical) in which I served in Wisconsin because it was within walking distance of their efficiency apartment.
A single Mom with two daughters, they would all tease me that the preaching was not strong enough. No bellowing against the chief sins of this world, like drugs, alcohol, teenage sex. No threats of hell-fire. What struck me is that these women wanted to be reminded that these things were wrong and would take them to hell, but they nevertheless were hell-bent on or at least incapable of exiting the world of unwed parenthood, alcohol and nicotine addiction, and so on, that was part of a pattern that extended over three or more generations.
All kinds of problems in this family that seemed impossible to address in a positive way. Addictive behavior of various kinds. Relationships with males that were always of the asking for trouble kind. An insatiable need for attention, which in one of the daughters manifested itself in “cutting” (razor blade to the wrists), binge drinking, binge sex, etc.
I don’t know for sure what kind of context might serve to bring healing to this kind of family (and there are lots of families of this kind in the world).
One thing I know for sure: the do as you please world they live in offers them almost zero opportunity to reach a positive equilibrium. These women needed less freedom, not more. They seemed to know it, but didn’t know where to find what they were looking for.
Extreme examples, perhaps. For me they illustrate the need to develop a marriage ethos that is full of positive structure without being legalistic, and full of authority without being authoritarian. They also illustrate the need to develop a community-based family ethos that does not see the nuclear family as a strong enough unit on its own to face the world with success.
A lot of families simply have no hope so long as they operate on their own, in glorious but destructive freedom and independence from other families and other people who model more positive experiences and values.
In short, I question the assumption that what is most needed today is a marriage model that maximizes the freedom to choose whatever structure or the lack of it pleases at least one of members of the couple.
Believer333,
I do NOT want to somehow make the spouses symmetrical, that does not even make sense to me.
What I do, for example, is look at a verse that tells a wife to respect her husband and see that as a specific emphasis that Paul was giving wives in the 1st century culture, where there was a temptation to disrespect him because he was being asked to be a servant. But both spouses are to respect the other.
And the husband was asked to love his wife, which was a radical upending of the expectation of ruling her. But both spouses are to love the other.
Etc.
Bonnie, agreed – it really would be useful to compare and contrast the various models with respect to what relational intimacy/one-flesh unity means and how it is achieved.
I’m not sure I have the knowledge or the horsepower to do that, but perhaps if several of us wrote about our respective models, we could put something together.
It’s been several years since I read Schwartz’s peer marriage book, which is a popular spinoff/followup to her academic book, American Couples.
My recollection is that to be in her peer marriage sample, the couple could deviate from a 50/50 split of shared parenting and shared earning by at most 40/60. If I’m remembering her sample criteria correctly, dual-career couples whose career choices led to differences in income levels, for example, would not be considered by Schwartz to be peers.
I believe that underlying her worldview are the two assumptions that a) spouses should be best friends; and b) consistent with Aristotle, friendship requires equality. Certainly, we see this in the story of Jonathan and David. Jonathan so valued equality in the friendship that he willingly ceded the throne to David.
While I can’t recall Pepper Schwartz mentioning Aristotle, his assumptions certainly seem to underly the framework she develops in Love Among Equals. Hence, the emphasis on attaining relational intimacy by deconstructing gender roles to get to the point where there is equality between the couple in the Aristotlian sense.
That is the appeal to Schwartz’s model. Relational intimacy is emphasized. Traditional comp models often miss this. Hence, the appeal of this model on that dimension. (ASIDE: that is my nascent attempt to see the good in a model that doesn’t appeal to me! I am trying to grow!)
I see my husband as my friend. No one knows me better than he does. There is no person to whom I am more accountable.
But, I also see Christian marriage as much different than companionate friendship + physical intimacy. Missing from Schwartz’s companionate model is the notion of one-flesh unity and the couple reaching out to serve.
In fact, Schwartz points out that one of the huge downfalls of the companionate model is the fact that the couple is more inward-focused and less oriented towards the community than are couples with traditional (or, presumably, other definitions of egal) marriage. That’s definitely a weakness to the model that a Christian couple adopting the model would need to be aware of.
What I think is wrong with the model is that Schwartz’s deconstruction of the provider and nurturer roles results in a deconstruction of gender. One of the results is that the couple loses interest in physical intimacy in marriage, which Schwartz acknowledges to be another problem with the equal function model.
Can this model be saved? I don’t know. I think that at a minimum it would be necessary to successfully argue that the deconstruction of provider and nurturer roles does not imply the complete deconstruction of gender. Schwartz isn’t willing to do that because (I think) she is leaning hard on Aristotle’s notion of equality.
In contrast to Schwartz, I think it might be possible to argue that although men and women spend equal time with their children, there is a contribution from a mother that is distinctly different from the contribution of the father.
Just rambling here……I’m not a fan of this model and don’t see an obvious resolution to the HUGE issues with the model that Schwartz identifies.
Bonnie, we could probably benefit from spending more time discussing Schwartz’s evidence on the male provider complex, too. Here, again, I think you and I may have had very different responses to the material.
When I read what Schwartz had written about provider roles, I was shocked! Here was a secular feminist attesting to the depth of the average husband’s desire to provide for his family, as well as teh average wife’s deep desire to have him assume that role!
Schwartz talks about the fact that this is so deeply ingrained that it’s viritually impossible to have a peer marriage without forcing a deconstruction of gender roles.
When I read that, I thought, YES! Her evidence supports the complementarians model – provider/nurturer roles that are this deeply ingrained are there by God’s design.
Time to sign off because I’ll start repeating myself…..He is wired to work/She wants to be able to choose whether to be at home or in the workplace….
I’m not sure how best to proceed, but I do think we could all benefit from talking more about the varying concepts of relational intimacy underlying the models.
Molly,
I’m with you on equating money-making with power! That’s not supposed to be the model. But, that sometimes is the model as lived out by sinners.
The model emphasizes authority, not power. The responsibility to provide is accompanied by the authority to carry out the responsibility for the benefit of the family.
I’m also with you on concerns about the gender-roles-on-steroids in parts of the comp world. As a former hard-comp, you’ve seen the negative to that world.
Then there’s the “let’s recreate Victorian England” version of comp gender roles, as well as the “evangelical arm candy” version. Neither is particularly appealing. On the other hand, it’s also true that spouses value both domesticity and physical intimacy in marriage.
FWIW, I do think that one thing we can learn from the sociological evidence on the equal function model (e.g., see my comments about Pepper Schwartz’s research above) is that the complete deconstruction of gender roles is not the way to go.
A final comment about gender roles. I just received an e-mail from a friend, gently chastising me for my earlier comment on this thread, in which I asserted that Sarah Sumner’s omission of any discussion of gender roles reflected the naivete of a woman who does not have children.
My friend pointed out that to someone who does not know my personal situation, the comment came across as insensitive.
So, after getting the ok of my husband (who had earlier consented to my blogging a bit about our marriage but asked that our children be kept out of my on-line discussions), I am now providing the context for my comment!
My husband and I have two young children. After a long struggle with infertility we adopted a few years ago. My comment reflects my personal experiences. It was not until our two babies arrived, that I understood why there is a hoopla about gender roles, as well as the difficulty a woman has in balancing career and family.
I wholeheartedly affirm Sarah Sumner’s argument that Biblical texts on marriage are fundamentally about how husbands and wives are to relate. But, my personal experiences suggest that gender roles can’t be ignored.
(Thanks, Jen, for gently pointing out my misstep in the earlier remark! You’re a dear friend!)
Hi Marilyn,
While composing this comment (which took forever b/c I was doing it while cooking breakfast, etc. with my children), your most recent comments came in. So this comment predates them — I will perhaps respond to them later!
In thinking more about the issues we’ve been discussing, I think I’ve honed in on a few matters that sum up my current thinking. I offer them in the hopes that they clarify some of what I’ve been trying to say:
(a) My main relational concerns with complementarianism as generally presented, which I see as both cause and result of its misinterpretation of Scripture, are
* the wife tends to be viewed not so much as someone who takes care of her husband as who enables him, and as someone whom he takes care of (a “patronizing” view of the wife)
* both husband and wife, but especially the husband, is given a pass on having to do the hardest of the hard work of crafting a complete two-become-one (intimacy), that is, accountability to his wife and proper (non-patronizing) accountability to God for his wife
The husband is precluded from both receiving all from his wife and giving all to her, and vice-versa, that I believe Ephesians 5 entails.
(b) My main concern with egalitarianism, also no doubt both cause and result of its misinterpretation of Scripture, is a lack of recognition and appreciation of the richness of gender differentiation. I applaud an egalitarianism that recognized and celebrates both men and women for all that they are, but not one that requires or assumes too much sameness between the sexes.
I do not believe that any of us need look to any particular marriage model as either example or validation that we have the right one or are doing the right thing. We answer to God, not to anyone else, or anyone else’s marriage. We must evaluate our marriages via Scripture before God, certainly asking and being open to one another within the Body for suggestions and help, but not creating an idol of any particular person or marriage model. Marriage is first a spiritual institution, not a cultural one.
Bonnie,
I’m in complete agreement with your last post!!
I would only add two things. First, the newer comp materials have as their primary emphasis, how the couple is to relate.
There is undoubtedly a different view of what one-flesh unity means and how that is accomplished than in the egal materials. But, the importance of relational intimacy is definitely emphasized.
Second, I agree with your comments about frameworks not being our primary emphasis!!!! However, as someone whose parents were not able to provide through example, a workable template for marriage and parenting, I find the various Christian frameworks to be a much more useful starting point for thinking about how God wants me to live in the contemporary cultural context, than a blank slate.
In addition, I find that an evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of the various frameworks sensitizes me to the areas in which I am most likely to struggle, as well as the areas in which a particular framework reflects culture rather than the bible.
John wrote: “In short, I question the assumption that what is most needed today is a marriage model that maximizes the freedom to choose whatever structure or the lack of it pleases at least one of members of the couple.” after giving an example of a family in chaos.
Is it possible to have too much freedom? Of course it is, when that freedom becomes an excuse for lawlessness. God is a God of order and organic things have structure. A believer is to walk in the perfect law that gives freedom, neither going to lawlessness, nor legalism.
So the question is what is the “law that gives freedom”? I do not think there is a one-size-fits-all version in the following sense. Some people have too much chaos in their lives, what they need is more structure. Some people have too much rigidity in their lives, what they need is more freedom.
However, they are the ones to figure out if they have too much chaos or rigidity, perhaps helped to see it by caring others. If they do not figure it out, they will not see a need to change.
What I think is wrong with the model is that Schwartz’s deconstruction of the provider and nurturer roles results in a deconstruction of gender.
Marilyn,
Only if we say that sole financial provider IS what “providing” is and primary-infant-nurturer IS what “nurturing” is.
Yet it’s Biblical to say that a husband is called to be a nurturer (after all, he’s the one commanded to do so in Eph. 5), and that a good wife is an excellent provider (see Prov. 31).
So I would be hesitant to say that we would lose proper gender comprehension if we didn’t keep men in a provider role and women in a nurturer role. It seems to me that Scripture doesn’t paint men as providers and women as nurtures, rather, that’s the way we look at it from our traditional cultural lens. So, messing with who provides and who nurtures might mess with our American traditional view, but I don’t think it would mess with a Biblical view.
The model emphasizes authority, not power. The responsibility to provide is accompanied by the authority to carry out the responsibility for the benefit of the family.
This one always loses me, in that I literally don’t get it. It seems like a real leap.
Providing money for the family equals authority? What about the stay-home wife who provides parental nurturing and a warm friendly home? How is that any less of a provision (of things necessary to a healthy happy family) than a paycheck is?
Men seem to have an innate need to provide financially, the study says. Well, when my first daughter was born, I had an unbelievable (surprised the heck out of me) *need* to quit my job and be with her, focus on her, make sure she was okay. It was so powerful that it blew me away (and really messed with my plans, as I’d signed on for a school year and she was born in the first couple months of my contract!).
How is my innate need worth less authority than my husband’s innate need? (Doesn’t his child receiving such love equal a great benefit to him, just as a steady paycheck equals a great benefit to me)?
Why is financial provision set higher on the scale than other kinds of provision? Why does financial provision prove *authority over*?
I truly don’t understand, except by saying it’s an appeal to the innate rules of living in a post-Industrial age society where a paycheck equals worth.
I think I must feel somewhat like you do when you expressed confusion as to what “complementary without hierarchy” means. Because that phrase seems clear and coherant to me, as the provider-proves-authority is clear and coherant to you…in fact, you’ve said in the past it was a major thing (if not the main thing) that proved male authority to you. Yet I must admit that provider-proves-authority makes zilcho sense to this brain!
lol… Thanks for bearing with me.
Those of us who are commenting here are almost by definition going to be people who chafe under the yoke of preconceived roles.
But look around you. Think about what most people are looking for. A lot of people actively look for a set of pre-defined roles, even rules and regulations, that they can put on as one might put on a dress and a blouse.
This is why cults and cult-like organizations continue to flourish.
I don’t mean that in a necessarily negative way. A constant stream of men and women choose every day to forsake an environment that is full of choices for an environment that is blessed as they see it with few choices and a new kind of freedom.
John,
I really appreciated you bringing this out and I agree with much of your reflections.
I know that, in part, I turned to patriarchy as a means of finding SAFETY. If a person goes out and peruses patriarch blogs by both men and women, they will find a common theme: “If you do things the world’s way, you will experience destruction. If you do things in God’s order, you will experience safety.”
(I can agree with that, to a point. We just differ, majorly, on what “God’s order” means).
I found a lot of safety in the idea that if I raised my children a certain way (a book that is a big time “God’s Way” book in patriarchal circles), we would have no problems and our children would all grow up to be missionaries and pastors and otherwise spiritual powerhouses.
I found a lot of safety in the idea that if I took on a certain role in my marriage, we would have a wonderful blessed home and would be spared all the problems of the people around us.
I look back now and see the absolute truth in the Psalmists words, when he sang that all people are like sheep. It is very true.
I think this is what is so difficult about the Christian life in general. “Walk by the Spirit, you say? No, no, just give me some rules, some structure, some clear-cut guidelines.” This is why the problem of Galatia has been a consistant problem of the church throughout church history and into today.
Along the lines of this discussion, a commenter recently came to my blog (AinM, under the “Praying for the Patriarchal Gods to Fall” post) and said,
“Thank you so much for your blog. I just found it. I have been living under condemnation for so long because I was so infatuated with the illusion of the patriarchal lifestyle ………and it looked nothing like mine.
My husband wanted me to work outside the home, I only have two children instead of twelve and my daughter wears pants!!!
I was beginning to think that somehow I must have missed the mark. That I must be under some great delusion about Christianity. All of a sudden the list of rules seemed safer and easier somehow. I kept trying to convince my husband that maybe we were living too free, but thank God he wouldn’t budge. If I hadn’t found your website. I would still be living under that yoke even now. Words can not express what your site has done for me.“
I am not sharing this to point out how great my blog is (lol–because just as many people hate it as love it-HA!-especially the patriarchy crowd), but to point out the great destruction that comes from adopting a yoke of strict gender roles, AND the desire (which is a desire in all of us and can be expressed in any direction, not just gender roles) to RUN from the seemingly “scary” world of walking by the Spirit and flee to the shelter of a law-based way of relating to God.
How does one define gender roles without succumbing to building restrictive boxes? I am not sure. I am not sure that gender roles are necessary at all. I think we can glory in our particular gender and work out the particulars of our own unique marriages, without needing predefined gender roles. ???
I have yet to see proof that gender roles are necessary, is I guess what I’m trying to say. They’ve about killed me, though, so my opinion is hardly surprising.
Btw, I am so thankful for you, Marilyn, as you express your desire to be a complementarian in a way that does NOT depend on forced gender role structure. ((hugs))
I’m just thinking out loud, but I probably believe that gender roles are necessary. In two senses.
A necessary good, in that most of us, maybe all of us, are overwhelmed if we have to reinvent a formula for marriage from scratch by mutual consent. So we look for a recipe of some kind, a version of complementarianism, or a version of egalitarianism. Or perhaps a recipe that is framework-neutral. Then we try to adapt the recipe to our situation.
A necessary evil, in that the letter will always kill. Only the Spirit vivifies. You can apply the best recipe in the world to the letter, but what good does that do if the basic basics of a relationship are unsound?
That said, none of the above is intended as a defense of either ideological compism or egalism. Both I feel set inflexible and one-sided goals when it comes to roles. Yes, there are comps and there are egals who are careful to add caveats whereby a SAHM is of course not necessarily the way to go, or not necessarily to be avoided. But adding caveats is not enough.
For example, where I am, a rural setting, the pressure for SAHM’s to be an important breadwinner in the family is strong not for cultural reasons, but for financial reasons. When I pastored in an exurban setting, it was strong for cultural reasons but not for financial reasons (husbands were often professionals or middle management and so more income was not usually needed).
In both cases, the support necessary to be an SAHM is insufficient, and church life is not up to snuff to make up the difference (except for those involved in MOPS, or are blessed with a strong intact extended family, or a church with a strong small-group fellowship system, etc.).
In short, society currently is not structured such that the majority of SAHM’s can be so in a way that is financially viable, culturally acceptable, and, let me add (I’ve been thinking about some of Suzanne’s comments), safe.
Why all this to-do about SAHM’s? Because, like it or not, it’s a gender role. So is being a working mom. So is being a SAHD (I’ve had the experience). So is being a working father.
In the end, of course, it is not about roles. A marriage and a family will always be, first and foremost, a reflection of the walk with God of the parts.
It’s a humbling, even a terrifying thought. But it’s true.
I do not see roles are needed in any sense, at least beyond the obvious physical capabilities or lack thereof.
The idea of a role is from being an actor in a play. One plays the role of Romeo or Juliet. When performing that play, an actor stays in a specific role or roles.
Life is not like performing a play, or at least it is not like it most of the time. Yes, we know scripts to do like mini-plays when we meet new people, watch a play, etc.
But most of the time we quickly move beyond the scripts. I encourage everyone to write their own scripts and use any roles they play to serve them and not serve roles.
A necessary good, in that most of us, maybe all of us, are overwhelmed if we have to reinvent a formula for marriage from scratch by mutual consent. So we look for a recipe of some kind…
Agreed, for the most part. I am so thankful for this conversation, because it’s helping me get to the root of some of my reflex-thoughts.
I don’t defined the above as “gender roles,” but more just parts we agree to play.
I think I would not have ANY problem with the use of “roles” IF the word was used accurately. Well, my definition of accurate, anyway. *grins*
Here’s what is probably my main point: What I learned as a complementarian was that a “role” is emphatically NOT a part that we play, but rather WHO WE ARE in our essence (see Piper’s little book on the essence of masculinity and femininity for more on that. He uses the word “roles” frequently to describe our actual essence).
For example, I currently play the part of a sahm. There are many things about being a sahm that I thoroughly enjoy. THere are things I thoroughly hate, but smilingly resign myself to them because this is the part that is best for me to play right now.
I don’t feel trapped here, because I am not told that this is who I am to be in my essence. This is merely a part, and it’s temporal in nature. For now, it is good. It is no cage.
However the popular complementarian (ie, Piper, Grudem) use of the word “roles” is not a limited part, but a definition of *essence.*
There’s the thing that makes me reflexively duck for cover, run for the hills, or whip out my six-shooter.
I can play a part for the good of the whole. But don’t tell me that because I’m a woman, I have to *be* _____ [Piper: affirming of male leadership in my life, seeking to support and nurture that leadership over me] in order to be a godly Biblical woman.
One, the choice of playing a part, is a gift I get to give. The other is a prison I’m locked up in and forced to act like I like it.
Recipes are good to get a gist of how to balance things. Recipes are nice because one does not have to think. But if what you are using the recipe for is important, then it’s best to just allow the recipe to give you a general direction and to put brain in gear to hammer out the details for yourself. Any really good recipe is made to be adjustable. Any really good recipe is open to improvement.
Notice how God does not give us detailed recipes but more like some fixed details yet mostly general directions in which details can be filled in by us. The OT which was a schoolmaster while Israel was growing, was a bit more detailed. And that is because we were less mature as a species. They didn’t graduate until Christ came and offered an invitation into the next school, maturity, by His death and resurrection. Many have chosen to skip “maturity” and just hoof it in life where they were without Christ, without God, without the instruction and equipping of the Holy Spirit. We who are Christians are in the real school of life, to gain maturity (we are to all grow into the fullness of the man Christ Jesus) by drawing close to God and yielding to both His written Word and the living instruction of the Holy Spirit.
In my view, a Christian couple should peruse the recipe’s that are floating around these days too numerous to mention. Then they can take what seems good and toss the rest as they adjust the recipe to fit their needs. Then with the help of God they can yield to the Holy Spirit to help them mature into one new entity, a mature union of two living harmoniously as if they were really one.
That’s my 2 cents! And the glory goes to God alone, as it should.
To all those who claim that egals spout sameness,
I don’t know where you heard this from but it appears to be a strawman (empty caricature) that gets presented for demolition every now and then. So go ahead demolish it. I’m right there with you. It’s not our strawman. I don’t know who he belongs to.
Christians who believe in Biblical equality do not believe men and women are without innate differences. We do not wish for men and women to look or act alike. We do not wish for Christians to all look or act alike. Thank God He made men and women different. But let’s not paint all men blue and all women pink trying to emphasize the differences or make new differences. God did a fine job that doesn’t need improving upon.
OK. End of rant! ((SMILES))
Molly,
I started to reply by repeating stuff I’ve said in the past. My husband needs authority to fulfill his responsibilities, he sees God as placing him over me in a protective role, etc. I believe all those things to be true. I believe that they describe both my husband and my marriage. But, I don’t think repeating my comp tape will address your fundamental concern.
So, let me deviate from the comp script for a bit. Before, doing that, however, let me couch my remarks by saying that they’re my personal opinion and are descriptive of the middle-class, suburban world that I inhabit.
To me, the problem is the Industrial Revolution. In the typical family, it is the wife who has primary responsibility for caring for young children. That role is as important as it has always been. But, the economic contributions of that wife have significantly declined over time.
Consider, for example, clothing for the children. My great-grandmother spun and weaved and sewed. Without the considerable skills that took her years to develop and the effort over months associated with creating each season’s attire, my grandmother would have been without clothes to wear.
In contrast to my great-grandmother, I make a quick stop at Target on the way home from work.
Now, I consider myself a savvy consumer, and my family benefits from my knowledge. For example, I know that children’s snow boots arrive at Target during the first week in October. If I don’t buy boots within a week of their arrival on my local store’s shelves, there will most likely be a stock-out. I’ll then be forced to waste a Saturday running around town searching for cheap boots, or, alternatively, shelling out a much larger sum at Stride-Rite. My mind is full of 1,001 bits of consumer info like that. But, unlike my grandmother, the knowledge needed to run my household didn’t require years of apprenticeship at my mother’s side to acquire.
Husbands understand this. They don’t esteem their wives, because they don’t feel that their wives contribute very much. At least, that’s what Pepper Schwartz’s research says in her American Couples book.
So, what is the solution? Secular egals argue that women need to work outside the home. They will then be valued to the extent they are able to contribute to the family’s economic functioning. Easier said than done. Christian egals (assuming I understand this symmetry model – still not sure that I do) argue that the authority assigned to the husband to fulfill his responsibilities should be shared with his wife. But, that doesn’t address the fundamental problem of the wife’s role.
My comp answer is that the respect/esteem husbands and wives are to have for each other is not to be conditioned on performance (economic or otherwise). I Peter 3:7 commands my husband to esteem me and to live with me in an understanding way, for the simple reason that I am a woman. He is to try to reach across the gender gap to seek unity with me and to value me, irrespective of what the culture tells him to feel about my economic contributions or lack thereof. He is to acknowledge that like him, I’m created in the image of God. My worth is not conditioned on my economic productivity.
Having said all that, I haven’t borne the cost of complementarity. I have training in a field where there is presently an international labor shortage. Right now, for example, the leading employer in my industry is offering five-year (obviously unpaid) maternity leaves. I’m pretty much able to exit and enter the labor market at will, as my family’s needs change. I realize how unusual it is to have that flexibility.
So, for other women, I don’t claim to have answers to the practical problem of how to balance. But, I firmly believe that I Peter 3:7 is the solution to the spiritual problem.
OK, this is a bit funny.
By accident I posted the last comment as a post on Complegalitarian. I MEANT to post it on my personal blog but hit the wrong button and ended up in the Complegal blog.
SIGH! Is this what it feels like to be a retired senior.
:^(
Or should we leave it ???
I understand better now. The distinction between roles and essence is very important. I would also add the distinction between status and essence.
One’s identity should not be too tied to one’s status or roles. Whenever I preach about the fact that in heaven one’s marital status will no longer matter, and the roles we now enjoy or not will be totally transformed, there are people who take offense.
But I think Jesus is clear about that. For Paul, too, the Christian life was so outward-focused that he counseled people who were married to live as if they weren’t.
Status and roles are relative to the Gospel, to the Kingdom, and so on, not the other way around.
Marilyn,
“My comp answer is that the respect/esteem husbands and wives are to have for each other is not to be conditioned on performance (economic or otherwise). I Peter 3:7 commands my husband to esteem me and to live with me in an understanding way, for the simple reason that I am a woman. He is to try to reach across the gender gap to seek unity with me and to value me, irrespective of what the culture tells him to feel about my economic contributions or lack thereof. He is to acknowledge that like him, I’m created in the image of God. My worth is not conditioned on my economic productivity. “
Nicely said.
Hi again Marilyn,
I’m glad we’ve found common ground! It sure helps as a point of departure for discussions like these, doesn’t it?
I have to say that I wouldn’t describe Schwartz’ intentions in her book as you do – she wasn’t proscribing egalitarianism as much as deep friendship (“intense companionship”) – what I would call intimacy. She made observations about what she found in her research (of a limited sample, as she admits) about the types of marriages in which these things could be found. She found peer marriage among only a very few traditional couples, and explains why. It wasn’t the amount that spouses earned in comparison with their spouses that qualified them as peers or not, but the depth of their relationship as a shared endeavor, as a friendship.
I agree with her that spouses should be best friends – I think that’s a given. It’s self-evident. This is why I see models that give a pass to something less than that as justifying, excusing, and enabling this “lesser-ness” rather than calling all of us to what, I believe, we are called in Christ. I would say that Schwartz believes that this friendship requires an equality and equity which by its nature precludes hierarchy, and I agree with her. The equality that I see her striving toward is that evidenced in Romans 12, I Cor. 13, Galatians 3:28, and Ephs. 5:21
I didn’t see Schwartz attempting to deconstruct gender. Traditionally-understood gender roles, yes, and I’m with her on that. But her issue as I see it is mostly about equality and equity, not deconstruction of gender. I just don’t see that equity has quite as many requirements as she fears it does. Perhaps this is what you are saying as well.
I really think she’s onto something, though, and the core of what she’s striving for, I think, is correct. I see her model as straining toward one-flesh unity, not away from it! She does acknowledge that peer couples may become too self-focused (what happened to Sheldon Vanauken in his marriage to Davy as described in A Severe Mercy), as you are saying. But, from a Christian standpoint, this is not because the spouses are peers, but because they are not first serving God. I think it is just as easy for a complementarian couple to exclude God as well as an outwardly-serving focus as it is for an egal (or any other type) one.
I see my husband as my friend. No one knows me better than he does. There is no person to whom I am more accountable.
Fantastic. And necessary. But…is this reciprocal?
I didn’t agree with what Schwartz said about sexual intimacy, but her claim wasn’t that equality in function leads to the doldrums, but over-familiarity. But I don’t believe that such doldrums are because of the peer model; in fact, I would argue that a true peer marriage is by far the “sexiest”! I believe this from having observed and pondered what seems to turn people on at the deepest level. It’s not porn or any of those things which people objectify because of what they symbolize – it’s what’s being symbolized. The mystique comes from something other than what she describes (I addressed this in my series on her book).
If you or anyone else are interested, I’m up for some sort of posting collaboration on one-flesh unity, or on examining Love Between Equals, or something like that, if the moderators okay it
PS – on authority and power; I think Schwartz equates authority with power, and authority certainly does carry power with it. But authority is not the same thing as responsibility, as I’ve said in previous threads. In fact, responsibility is subservient to authority; it is binding and accountable to that authority.
Marilyn, I missed this earlier:
Here was a secular feminist attesting to the depth of the average husband’s desire to provide for his family, as well as the average wife’s deep desire to have him assume that role!
Schwartz talks about the fact that this is so deeply ingrained that it’s virtually impossible to have a peer marriage without forcing a deconstruction of gender roles.
Without rereading the book to make sure and hopefully not misrepresenting her, I want to say that what I think Schwartz attests to is that many men’s identity and sense of worth and purpose is wrapped up in the provider role. This is different from him being hard-wired to be the bread-winner, although I do believe that this type of provision is an important part of the way God designed man — the creation mandate, and “working the ground” as in Genesis. But this does not exclude the woman from being somewhat of a breadwinner as well — see the much-referenced Prov. 31 woman, and the creation mandate.
Many just can’t do it so well when their children are very young, or don’t want to. But children aren’t young forever.
Some women do want to be financially provided for at all times. This isn’t due to hardwiring, though. It’s a difference based upon many factors — upbringing, personality, psychology, past experiences, or circumstances (such as having very young children, or being ill).
Culturally and economically-speaking, one element that gets neglected in discussions of economic provision for the family is the economic worth of home-tending tasks. In every time period including our own, much of this type of work was done by servant or slave labor, or (as today), paid labor. You know, Merry Maids, or the teenage girl from church, or the boy who rakes the leaves…even hired babysitters! If I didn’t do the housework (with which my husband helps, and so do our kids), we would need to pay someone to do it. Which would come from one of our paychecks! All these things are related.
Bonnie,
I would really like to see you post here. You are one of hhe few people here who really speak to me in a positive way, as someone that has not suffered in some way as I have.
I often feel like the trash. Too damaged to be repaired, but I can listen to what you have to say.
Hi Bonnie,
Yes! Let’s write about Schwartz’s book together. I’ll send you an e-mail at your intellectuelle e-mail addy to start the conversation.
Hi Sue,
When I read your message, I realized that I forgot to share an earlier experience with you.
In late October, I visited my mom, who lives in southern Minnesota. Her small-town hospital was recently purchased by the nearby Mayo Clinic. So, Mayo resources are now to be found throughout the building.
In the U.S., October was National Domestic Abuse Awareness Month. Prominently featured in displays throughout the hospital was Mayo materials with links to Lundy Bancroft’s website, along with the message that it was one of the best available resources for abused women.
I had intended to share this in real time, but my visit came when complegal comments were closed.
Bonnie,
”
“If you or anyone else are interested, I’m up for some sort of posting collaboration on one-flesh unity, or on examining Love Between Equals, or something like that, if the moderators okay it
I’m up for that. It’s one of my favorite views of a Christian marriage.
Sue,
Please don’t feel like trash.
I know, I know. Your feelings are your own and I cannot control them. I just wish you didn’t feel like trash.
I’ve read you on the CBE threads, I’ve visited your blog, I’ve seen your posts elsewhere.
I respect you as a person striving for truth in a twisted world (including sections of the church).
I enjoy your scholarship and your dedication to finding what scripture actually says in the face of hardened tradition.
Granted this site is not dedicated to those wounded and destroyed by off-balance teaching. But that doesn’t mean those who have been wounded won’t stumble onto it and find the beginning of healing. These can then be directed to places where their surpressed emotions and personalities can be release, where they feel safe to vent a bit and then hopefully move on to a more balance understanding of God and His plan for us all.
Cheryl’s Blog, Women in Ministry, has a good post going on this subject:
http://strivetoenter.com/wim/2008/11/12/spiritually-different-by-design/#comments
There are some excellent comments.
Bonnie,
”I want to say that what I think Schwartz attests to is that many men’s identity and sense of worth and purpose is wrapped up in the provider role. This is different from him being hard-wired to be the bread-winner, although I do believe that this type of provision is an important part of the way God designed man”
This is a good thought. I also think it is part of males being physically stronger. Part of being in God’s image is a desire to give support/help/assistance out of one’s strengths. God Loves because He IS Love in its very essence. When we have a skill, a physical or spiritual ‘gift’, as Christians we should desire not to hoard that for our own personal benefit, but rather desire to use it or give it to the benefit of other humans, as well as to benefit life itself. A man’s strength is part of his beauty as a man. Giving this strength to other’s gives him an honor, a value, that may be a deep intrinsic need. It is good.
However, it does not mean that only men are to be bread winners even if they by reason of their strengths are the primary ones.
1 Tim. 5: 8 6 But she who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives. 7 And these things command, that they may be blameless. 8 But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
As you can see, this admonishment by Paul to provide for one’s own is addressed to widows (women) not widowers or husbands. Of course the principal can apply to anyone. But it is noteworthy that Paul addressed it to women. IMO women are just as accountable to see that their children’s needs are met as the fathers are. Prov. 31 (authored by a woman) shows us that even thousands of years ago in a culture far different than today, women were able to do other things to provide for their families.
All righty, then, we’ll do it! Thanks for all the comments.
Sue — you are not too damaged to be repaired! {{{hugs}}} I once thought that about myself (I have been damaged, but not in a marital situation), but God can do anything. He’s in the redemption business — nothing is too damaged for Him!
believer333,
I’ve never used the TNIV. After reading your post, I realized that my impression of the TNIV may be mistaken.
I thought that it was a gender-accurate translation. I.e., when the text referred to a man OR a woman, plural would be used. In contrast, when the text referred to a male (female), the male (female) gender would be used.
With respect to provision, the text you cite uses he and his. I thought that implied provision for the widow by a male member of the extended family. But, that’s not what I hear you saying.
Marilyn,
That wasn’t the TNIV I used. It was the NKJV. Here is the TNIV
6 But the widow who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives. 7 Give the people these instructions, so that no one may be open to blame. 8 Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
This is smack dab in the middle of the admonitions to widows. The next statement is admonishing widows not to live for pleasure , i.e. themselves. If one is living for oneself and not reaching out to others, then one is not suitable for God’s service. The list of widows was thought to be something of a women’s ministry in the church. If a widow was not willing to take care of her own how can she be considered worthy to take care of the body of Christ. But the wording (anyone) is such that it also can apply to those who are not taking care of the widows in their extended family. That is my take.
The context of 1 Tim 5 is that widows need help. Their believing relatives are to take care of them if they have any. If they meet some guidelines, the church should take care of them.
The reason is that wives were often much younger than their husbands, sometimes 15-20 years younger. So the husband would often die first.
Thanks, believer333 and don! Those cites help. The widows are vulnerable, and relatives have a responsibility to care for them. Agreed. Just wasn’t following the earlier point about verse 8 referring to the widows.
My qualm with the verse is that some have used it to infer that ONLY husbands were responsible for providing for families. Scripture just doesn’t say that. Actually everyone is to use their own personal resources, whatever that may be, to care for families and extended families.
Marilyn,
Thanks for mentioning Bancrofts book. He does not discuss male entitlement as a church phenomenon, but just comments that in general male entitlement is a component of violent crime.
MARILYN said:
To me, the problem is the Industrial Revolution. In the typical family, it is the wife who has primary responsibility for caring for young children. That role is as important as it has always been. But, the economic contributions of that wife have significantly declined over time.
Consider, for example, clothing for the children. My great-grandmother spun and weaved and sewed. Without the considerable skills that took her years to develop and the effort over months associated with creating each season’s attire, my grandmother would have been without clothes to wear.
In contrast to my great-grandmother, I make a quick stop at Target on the way home from work.
…
Husbands understand this. They don’t esteem their wives, because they don’t feel that their wives contribute very much. At least, that’s what Pepper Schwartz’s research says in her American Couples book.ENDQUOTE
Not sure if this has been addressed or if its too late to reply, but I am troubled by this view that modern SAHM’s “don’t contribute very much”. I have a husband who was raised to evaluate the worth of people based on the amount of money they make and he would fit Pepper’s profile of failing to esteem me, but that does not make his (or Pepper’s) judgement valid.
I have 8 children I have been pregnant 11 times. I was pregnant and nursing for 16 years. I have changed approximately 40,000 diapers, I have matched hundreds of thousands of socks. I homeschooled for 5 years.
I did home renovation on our homes which increased their equity. Although we were poor enough to receive medicaid and WIC (food for pregnant women and young children), we were able to buy our present house outright due-in large part- to my ability to pinch pennies. I never went to Target. I went to thrift stores. Groceries come from Aldi and Save a Lot. I make casseroles for the family of 10 with a pound or two of ground turkey. My older children got to college and did not know what to do at a fancy restaurant (with all the forks and whatnot) having never been. My children have many memories of car breakdowns as we never drove anything newer than 10 years old or costing more than $2000 total and paid in cash. My oldest daughter expressed surprise to discover that other college kids have spent an entire lifetime and never broke down!
These days, we are out of our personal “great depression”. My husband went through numerous job changes and now works away in another city. After a lifetime of job struggles and borderline poverty, he is finally “valuable” by his father’s definition: he makes a lot of money. I still SAH, and I drive @150 miles per day keeping up with the various activities of my children- 5 are still home and attend public school. I feel very burnt out and drained and at times being alone all the time with every bit of responsibilty for the family is extremely overwhelming. So, I hired a cleaning lady. I also bought a 4wd vehicle to drive around the children as the 15 passenger rwd van was unsafe in the snow (as well as old and unreliable). So, yep, I did spend some of his money (and I heard about it too)
Marilyn,
Larry Burkett’s “Women Leaving the Workplace” might give you another perspective on the value of SAHM. A woman can save lots of money which she was formerly spending on her transport back and forth to work, daycare, professional clothing, lunches out, etc. And she can save more because she has time to shop more carefully (thrift stores?) and cook meals from scratch for the family instead of buying fast food because she is tired after a long day’s work. I recall some of his numbers proving that after factoring in these extra costs of working, a low paying job only netted a dollar an hour
And what is having mommy home to love them worth?
Gem asked:
And what is having mommy home to love them worth?
It’s worth far more than any loving mommy could ever be compensated for or for any government to give her tax credits for.
Our children benefitted so much from having a loving mother there for them all the time. She set aside the missionary career we shared, for our children’s home years, before they started school, to devote to our children. They now rise up and call her blessed, as it says in the Bible (Prov. 31:28).
Gem,
I absolutely agree with your point about the value of a SAHM (and with Wayne’s response). There is no replacement for the loving and nurturing that a mother provides!!!! That has not changed over time. I apologize if I didn’t camp out on that point long enough to make it clear!
My comment was directed at the point that Molly makes – a sinful society measures an individual’s worth according to his or her economic productivity. That is not the measure used in God’s economy!!!
Too many Christians have adopted the world’s standard. It results in an undervaluing of the relational contribution that women make in the home.
As I Peter 3:7 says, a husband is to esteem his wife as a fellow heir of grace and value her because she is a woman [who makes the contributions in the home that women uniquely make].
I think the only place where we disagree is the Larry Burkett analysis. Here, our differing opinions may simply reflect the fact that I have two children and you have eight!
I think Burkett’s analysis makes sense when applied to women whose children aren’t yet in school. That was me for a very short period of time; you for a much longer period of time.
But, from a financial standpoint, his numbers ignore lots of stuff (e.g., contributions to her pension plan, the cash outflow on additional training before she re-enters the job market, the falling expenditure on day care once the kids are in school, etc.)
I think Burkett adopts the wrong strategy. I do see the economic contribution of SAHMs as having declined over time for the average (small) family. The importance of a mother’s love and nurturing, however, never declines.
That is what matters to God and that is what Christian churches should be teaching all of us to value.
MARILYN said: In contrast, has there ever been a thread by a comp author targeted at CBE? Has there ever been a thread by a comp author that is a critique of egal material?
,,,
So, I assumed the CBE model meant a very soft version of traditional roles, with authority shared between husband and wife.
After following the link that believer333 gave, I’ve come to the conclusion that I misunderstood the CBE position.
The CBE statement appears to make no distinctions in the roles of husbands and wives. There are also no distinctions in how husbands and wives are to relate to each other.
Don, I now see where you’re coming from when you say the couple can do whatever they want (as long as they stay true to general Biblical counsel applicable to all believers).
ENDQUOTE
Unless the choice is for her to be a SAHM. I hear some of the things at CBE as disrespectful of that choice. Took me a very long time before I would even read there because they seem to say the same thing as hard core 60’s feminists- “get out to WORK. SAH is contemptible, inferior, and a marriage killer”
eg. http://www.cbeinternational.org/new/pdf_files/free_articles/PPWIN05_preato.pdf
These are comments paraphrased from what has been posted here on Complegalitarian by BOTH sides- self professed comps and egals:
“being a stay at home mother is a luxury which can only be afforded by the wealthy”
and
“in the modern economy with all the labor saving devices what does a SAHM DO?. She just SPENDS the money which her husband makes”
Such comments come across to ME as insulting and demeaning of the incredible sacrifices SAHM’s make to do what they do.
In Indonesia, a poor mother has heard these messages, so she goes back to work as a house servant for $15/week…. only formula costs the same as it does here, so she waters it down greatly (with life endangering water) and adds sugar to it. If the baby survives infancy, he/she will be handicapped by the poor nutrition. Is it a “luxury” for that mother to stay home and nurse her infant??? OR, maybe its GOD’S DESIGN for her to do so??? (radical, eh!)
MAIRILYN said:To me, the problem is the Industrial Revolution. In the typical family, it is the wife who has primary responsibility for caring for young children. That role is as important as it has always been. But, the economic contributions of that wife have significantly declined over time.
Husbands understand this. They don’t esteem their wives, because they don’t feel that their wives contribute very much. ENDQUOTE
Then husbands should be corrected! They won’t be by reading the CBE website. Their lack of esteem for a “non-working” wife will be validated. Nor will they be by attending church nor am I aware of any bestselling books chastising them for this failure to respect their wives. They should be pointed to their biblical calling to nourish, cherish, honor, and live with their wives in an understanding manner. They should STOP measuring her value by utilitarian materialistic standards. That’s how the culture has slid into abortion, rejecting handicapped babies, and euthanizing infirm elderly (not that she is “like” these, she is not, she is very productive, but not appreciated for it)
WAYNE said Our children benefitted so much from having a loving mother there for them all the time. She set aside the missionary career we shared, for our children’s home years, before they started school, to devote to our children. They now rise up and call her blessed, as it says in the Bible (Prov. 31:28). ENDQUOTE
and the reason they can do that, Wayne is because YOU have esteemed your wife:
“Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value.” Proverbs 31:11
Unfortunately, my own children are crippled and blind in their perspective in some ways by the role model they have seen
Marilyn,
”a sinful society measures an individual’s worth according to his or her economic productivity. That is not the measure used in God’s economy!!!”
Absolutely correct. And yes, because Christians are still human, some Christians make that mistake too. However, please do not think to attribute that as a part of Christian egal’s beliefs. It would seem a bit humorous to see someone staunch in the beliefs of Biblical equality thinking money productivity makes one more equal (as in some are more “equal” than others). Hehe
IMO SAHM’s are to be deeply praised for their inestimable contributions to the family. And frankly I don’t think hiring out for help if possible (other families children can be cheap and strong) distracts from a SAHM’s contributions at all. Biblically, Paul admonishes young wives to manage (rule) the household. This does not mean she HAS to do it all by herself. When SAHM’s economically must do it all themselves it is draining. Some women cannot physically or emotionally hold up under that kind of strain. Those who can and do are phenomenal jewels, like Gem.
However, it is good to note that there is no Biblical requirement for a wife to actually stay at home. Proverbs 31 does a pretty good job of revealing that even around 3000 yrs. ago women bought real estate, managed businesses, as well as managed the running of the household. Husband and wife often worked together in the business of the family as well, even including apprenticing some of the children in it.
The idea that a wife should be compelled to stay at home versus work outside the home came from the old style English of KJV of oikouros in Titus 2:5. In fact it is not the best translation. And you are right that it is also in response to the corporate revolution when everyone’s business was outside the home in contrast to everyone’s business being in families before.
oik – refers to home
ourous – refers to watch, keep, guard, preserve and similar.
A more accurate rendering might be to guard the home. This fits in nicely with Paul’s admonishment to Timothy that the young wives manage/rule their household. How a wife goes about guarding and managing her household is really between husband and wife and not up to anyone else to decide for them.
Now just for clarity, in the premonition that some might misunderstand what I’m saying and why, let me repeat that I am totally and completely supportive of SAHM’s. They are inestimable jewels to families. And those SAHM’s who do so from necessity as well as preference, and manage to survive can not be praised or valued enough IMO.
” The importance of a mother’s love and nurturing, however, never declines.”
And that is the crux of it all. As well, the importance of a father’s love and nurturing is inestimable and a lot of damage is done to children who lack it.
Gem,
“Such comments come across to ME as insulting and demeaning of the incredible sacrifices SAHM’s make to do what they do.”
I’m really sorry that you’ve been hurt by careless comments. Sometimes people don’t write clearly what they are actually thinking. That is the trouble with text only communication.
To my understanding neither CBE nor Christian egals disrespect SAHM’s. Although there may have been a time in the ongoing fight between the forced restrictions of patriarchalism and women who simply were tired of being told how to live their life, where things were said that shouldn’t have been.
I know many egal SAHM’s. And many of them homeschool as well. You might be surprised how many.
Please accept heartfelt hugs and appreciation from me Gem. I think you are wonderful and wish I lived near enough you to invite you over or visit you.
:^)
gem wrote: “Unless the choice is for her to be a SAHM. I hear some of the things at CBE as disrespectful of that choice. Took me a very long time before I would even read there because they seem to say the same thing as hard core 60’s feminists- “get out to WORK. SAH is contemptible, inferior, and a marriage killer”"
I have not read anything from CBE that came across to me that way. Preato was not saying SAHM is inferior that I could find.
I have not read anything from CBE that came across to me that way. Preato was not saying SAHM is inferior that I could find.
The way I “hear” his paper is that “working” women- which he seems to equate with “egalitarian”- have more satisfying and enduring marriages. That “traditional marriages” are only satisfactory to 18% of respondents. The question is WHY? because she is staying home and is therefore “unequal”? I say no, the problem is not the marriage framework, the solution is not for all women to go “get a job”, the problem is disrespect of her.
To ME it sounds like his solution would be for everyone to run their marriage with the wife and husband both working (for pay) instead of for husbands to be taught and discipled to actually APPRECIATE, VALUE, and RESPECT their wives who are SAHM’s. From the paper I gather that “Redeeming marriage” comes from women “working” (for money) instead of from Christlikeness. That’s how it comes across to ME, anyway (and I doubt I’m the only one who “hears” it that way and recalls 60’s radical feminism).
So, like Sumner (the topic of the thread)- who is the major breadwinner and works full time- CBE has a target audience- the ones like Sumner who want to work full time, especially in pastoral ministry. They are entitled to address their articles to their audience…. and like Marilyn (but for different reasons) I don’t resonate with their position which doesn’t make for a very “big tent” IMO.
Preato was not saying SAHM is inferior that I could find.
Of course not, Don. I can't imagine him being THAT insensitive.
But he DOES say:
1. "egalitarian"=wife working
2. wife working=satisfying marriage
3. wife NOT working (for pay)= "traditional marriage"
4. traditional marriage=only 18% "happy"
——> marriage with a SAHW is clearly "inferior"
Do you really think any SAHW would want their husband reading that??? especially a husband who is chronically disrespectful???
QUOTE from the article:
egalitarian marriages are happy
marriages. …
While some hierarchicalists may argue that wives working
leads to divorce, Dr. Booth refutes this notion…. Based on theresults of this long term study, he says emphatically that “women working does not cause divorce.”¹⁹
… most of the couples (82%) where both spouses perceived
their relationship as traditional were mainly unhappy.²⁰…
Wives, in traditional marriages,
suffered significantly more depression and other mental
disorders than men, working married women, and unmarried
women. In traditional marriages, wives had been beaten at “a
rate of more than 300 percent higher than for egalitarian marriages”
I’ll give you a clue, the SAHM’s aren’t “depressed” because they aren’t “working”. The solution is NOT to get them out there “working”.
Gem,
I understood the article in a completely contrasting way. I read “traditional” as “hierarchical” with no reference to working or SAH. I disagree that the traditional marriage is necessarily hierarchic so I don’t agree with his nomenclature but rather with his conclusions.
My mother had eight children and she did stay at home and my father ran a business and was an elder in a Brethren assembly where women must be silent. In every visible way, this was a traditional marriage, but in fact, it was not a hierarchical marriage. By no means.
My mother was better educated than my father, she made major decisions for the welfare of her children. My father always repsected her and depended on her. There was no hierarchy between them. This is where some people have said some things about me that is simply not true, that I am against traditional marriage.
I am against unilateral hierarchy in marriage. I work, and have worked for most of my marriage, although not all. We moved many times and I got entry level jobs over and over. I have only two children. My marriage may have appeared egalitarian from the outside. (I doubt it, but hard to tell.)
My husband decided how many children we would have – only two were permitted. He decided when and how much I worked. I did not have a career. I worked. That’s it.
I was neither a SAHM nor a career woman. I had to do everything I was told at home and often people would remark on the masculine decor of the living room. No wonder.
I felt completely deprived of the SAHM experience that my mother had because of the absolute hierarchy that I was under.
But work was spoiled for me too. I had to leave and return at a certain time or else. I eventually got over that. But I often drove to work with tears streaming down my face, and returned with a feeling of descending doom as I drove home.
Personally, I do not think that working at home or elsewhere has anything at all to do with the egal/comp spectrum.
However, I absolutely agree that the hierarchic marriage in which the woman does not have financial independence to alleviate her condition of being under, is incredibly depressing. I do not think that Sarah Sumner would ever recommend something like that. I think she means that a career woman should be kind to her husband. Little do most of us know about that.
Gem,
”the problem is not the marriage framework, the solution is not for all women to go “get a job”, the problem is disrespect of her.”
Agreed. It is just as wrong to imply that all women would be happier if they got a job as it is to imply that all women would be happier if they didn’t work. And respect is always going to improve a relationship. I’m for letting couples figure out the financial aspects of their marriage between themselves.
Since I’m not familiar with the person you are referring to I really don’t know what he meant. Why don’t you find a way to contact him and ask him. If he really did infer what you think I’m sure it would be helpful to him to hear another side to the issue. Why is he discussing working wives at all. Is he trying to dispute some patriarchalist idea that wives are not supposed to work?
”But he DOES say: 1. “egalitarian”=wife working 2. wife working=satisfying marriage 3. wife NOT working (for pay)= “traditional marriage” 4. traditional marriage=only 18% “happy””
Interesting, because I don’t agree with any of those. Although, regarding Traditional marriage as in the husband having all authority to which the wife must submit, I do not consider a happy choice for the majority of wives. Even those who think its their Christian duty struggle majorly with it.
Why don’t you find a way to contact him and ask him. If he really did infer what you think I’m sure it would be helpful to him to hear another side to the issue.
Because I don’t feel like wasting time where I won’t be heard. Sometimes I feel like I speak klingon or something for all that people understand what I am trying to say…
Sue is giving him the benefit of the doubt, but I would assume Sue would do that seeing how she is a self professed egal agreeing wholeheartedly with the mission of CBE .
But, SUE, read the following:
Wives, in traditional marriages, suffered significantly more depression and other mental disorders than men, working married women, and unmarried women.
Your mother was not among “men, working women, and unmarried women” so she must be- by Preato’s definition- “in traditional marriage” which he states only have an 18% happiness rate compared to an 81% happiness rate for egalitarian marriages
see page 4(pdf) 23(pub) left column
http://www.cbeinternational.org/new/pdf_files/free_articles/PPWIN05_preato.pdf
Gem,
Sue is giving him the benefit of the doubt, but I would assume Sue would do that seeing how she is a self professed egal agreeing wholeheartedly with the mission of CBE .
I was labeled egal and have never denied it – that’s it. Frankly I am single now and just go about my business without any concern for these ideologies in my day to day life. I have never been involved with CBE in any way although that does not mean that I disagree with them.
I know lots of non-Christian egal women who don’t work but are SAHM’s. I don’t think whether you work or not has anything to do with anything, except that if a woman is badly treated, she is better off if she has financial support. That’s it.
But, SUE, read the following:
Wives, in traditional marriages, suffered significantly more depression and other mental disorders than men, working married women, and unmarried women.
I did read that sentence in the study. This was simply a citation from one of the 8 studies that were reviewed by Preato and in no way expresses his opinion on whether women should work or not.
I think you are misrepresenting Preato because you are not admitting that he cited this as part of the data but he does not endorse this, nor did he even write it.
I think it is statistically defensible that women who stay at home in today’s world suffer statistically more depression than women who work. This does not mean that women should work. It may mean that traditional social frameworks that support the SAHM are not as healthy as they once were.
I do not think that whether women should work or not is an issue. It certainly is not for me. I have often felt quite left out of a circle of women who were able to develop their domestic life more than I have.
I think it is very sad to see this as an issue at all. However, I do see how this would be a handy demographic indicator for gathering data. It is easier than asking how many women are in hierarchic marriages, for example.
The New Dictionary of Christian Ethics and Pastoral Theology defines marriage as a copartnership of equality where ‘neither may lord it over the other’. This represents an egalitarian view of marriage. Egalitarian marriages are described as mutual partnerships without forced roles and are characterized by a high degree of intimacy.”
This appears to be Preato‘s view of egal marriage.
”While some hierarchicalists may argue that wives working leads to divorce, Dr. Booth refutes this notion. Based on the results of this long term study, he says emphatically that ‘women working does not cause divorce’.”
This appears to be making a refutation of a hierarchalist viewpoint, rather than promoting working. He goes on to discuss the importance of sharing authority and leadership of the family. When he says further down that women in egal marriages are “by far the happiest”, I did not get the impression that he was referring to working or not working.
On the right side of the 4th page, he writes:
”This research suggests the following: First, it effectively challenges hierarchicalists’ notion that sharing authority destabilizes marriage. Second, it suggests that hierarchy actually destabilizes and leads to the demise of marriage. Third, it provides evidence that suggests egalitarian marriages produce healthy, happy, intimate, and stable marriage relationships.”
Again this has nothing to do with working or not but rather has to do with a relationship based on sharing of authority rather than male dominated unilateral authority. IMO he is taking a somewhat strong stance by not acknowledging that some marriages do fine in a unilateral authority vested in husband, although my guess is the number is low.
It is possible that you may be misunderstanding what Preato has written because of some verbal triggers in the phrases he used.
I think you are misrepresenting Preato because you are not admitting that he cited this as part of the data but he does not endorse this, nor did he even write it.
I don’t think so. What I quoted above is not in quotation marks nor is there any indication that it is quoted from a source. In that section he IS analyzing data from several different research studies. He is analyzing that data in his own words with some quotes interspersed. I think the language of “traditional marriage” juxtaposed against “working women” is not in quotes and belongs to Preato.
It is possible that you may be misunderstanding what Preato has written because of some verbal triggers in the phrases he used.
I suppose.
It is also possible that the section is poorly written and that I am not the only one who happens upon things like that at CBE and wonders if the critics are right that they are hostile to SAHW’s and “traditional marriage” in a manner similar to radical feminists of the 60’s.
Gem said,
I say no, the problem is not the marriage framework, the solution is not for all women to go “get a job”, the problem is disrespect of her.
Absolutely. And in all fairness to Pepper Schwartz (mentioned earlier in the thread), this is what she says as well. However, not coming from a Christian perspective, she sees achievement of peer marriage as much more difficult for a traditional couple (basically, one with a working husband and a SAH or near-SAH mom) than an equally- or near-equally-earning couple.
But the missing link, as you’ve pointed out, is that the equality in a “traditionally-earning” couple comes from true equality in Christ. Schwartz states that it is possible, though seemingly rare, for a such a couple to have a marriage of "intensity and collaborative partnership" in which spouses share decisions and have "equal status" and equal say over "important and disputed questions." In other words, all the characteristics of a great Christian marriage!
So I say to Christians everywhere, let's show this to Pepper Schwartz & the whole world!
some marriages do fine in a unilateral authority vested in husband, although my guess is the number is low.
How could this be known. My experience is that in a marriage of unilateral authority, all information sharing is tightly controlled. The wife does not express herself to others without permission – ever.
If the wife does express herself, then already there is a certain amount of power sharing, however small.
Gem,
Here is the quote,
Dr. Diana R. Garland, Professor and Chair of the School of Social Work and Director of the Center for Family and Community Ministries at Baylor University, discusses marriage relationships in her book, Family Ministry: A Comprehensive Guide. She points out that research conducted in the mid-twentieth century revealed the following:
“Wives, in traditional marriages, suffered significantly more depression and other mental disorders than men, working married women and unmarried women” (Bernard 1982).
“In traditional marriages, wives had been beaten at “a rate of more than 300 percent higher than for egalitarian marriages (Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz 1980).”
“Violence is more likely to occur in homes where the husband has all the power and makes all the decisions than in home where spouses share decision making (L. Walker 1979).”
Garland cites numerous research studies since the 1950s that have “consistently revealed that egalitarian couples have more satisfying marriages than traditional marriages (Bean, Curtis and Marcum 1977; Blood and Wolfe 1960; Centers, Raven and Rodrigues 1971; Locke and Karlsson 1952; Michel 1967).”[19]
I have indicated the inset and cited sentences. See this link.
Even Garland is citing Bernard 1982 so this information is third hand and is not an indication of Preato’s values on women working.
Marilyn,
”It is also possible that the section is poorly written and that I am not the only one who happens upon things like that at CBE and wonders if the critics are right that they are hostile to SAHW’s and “traditional marriage” in a manner similar to radical feminists of the 60’s.”
Agreed that that section could be poorly written. ((SMILES)) :^)
But no, honestly. egals are truly truly NOT hostile to SAHM’s and/or women who don’t work. Though we may be somewhat hostile to the concept of ‘traditional’ marriages (as in all authority vested in husband to which wives must submit), especially those of us who have suffered in them.
Sue,
there are a lot of interesting and different people in the world. And there are some women who like to be dominated. That type of woman would do quite well in a patriarchal unilateral authority marriage. Personally, I don’t think it’s the healthiest model, but as an egal I believe in people’s right to choose. The problems arise when Christians try to force that model on everyone as the only model.
believer333,
No big deal, but just to clarify, your last comment was addressed to me. It began with an excerpt from a comment Gem made, so was meant to be addressed to Gem?
“Wives, in traditional marriages, suffered significantly more depression and other mental disorders than men, working married women and unmarried women” (Bernard 1982).
Thank you Sue for digging around and finding that. The above is NOT in quotations as a citation in the article on CBE. It reads NOT as quotes but as Preato’s own words in the midst of his analysis of several research studies.
So, the editing was sloppy making Preato’s intent quite easy to misread and misunderstand.
Bonnie,
Pepper Shwartz’ research is cited by Preato… so with quotations missing, no surprise that he comes off sounding like her and the other researchers where quotations are missing.
page 4 in the pdf, page 23 in Pricilla Papers
http://www.cbeinternational.org/new/pdf_files/free_articles/PPWIN05_preato.pdf
I searched for “traditional marriage” on the CBE website. Here is a quote published in CBE’s E-Quality from a book:
from link
They were committed to an egalitarian relationship and were able to find jobs that allowed them to share in the care of their son. However, making decisions about the care of their son became more and more difficult. Then, to their surprise, Jason’s feelings began to change. Though he believed cognitively that child care should be shared by husbands and wives, Jason began to feel aggravated that he had to spend so much of his free time in child care. As he began to pull back Sara began to feel both angry at Jason and guilty about not spending more time with their son. They came to a counselor when they began planning for Sara to quit her job and she recognized the underlying resentment about the unfairness of such a plan. They became aware that “down deep” they both thought child care was “women’s work.”ENDQUOTE
Again, sounds like the definition of “egalitarian” and “equality” is that the wife “gets to” have a job (for pay). “Child care” is “resented”. I really think they need to get some writers who have “traditional marriages” which are “egalitarian”!!! (Does such a thing exist??? If not, WHY NOT???)
Bonnie, I LOVE your thoughts! Too bad you aren’t egal. YOU could write for them!
QUOTE BONNIE:
the equality in a "traditionally-earning" couple comes from true equality in Christ. Schwartz states that it is possible, though seemingly rare, for a such a couple to have a marriage of "intensity and collaborative partnership" in which spouses share decisions and have "equal status" and equal say over "important and disputed questions." In other words, all the characteristics of a great Christian marriage!
So I say to Christians everywhere, let's show this to Pepper Schwartz & the whole world!
ENDQUOTE
“No big deal, but just to clarify, your last comment was addressed to me. It began with an excerpt from a comment Gem made, so was meant to be addressed to Gem?”
OOps! Must have had you on my brain screen, while I was reading Gem’s words. Sorry! :^) BTW, I’ve addressed something to you and awaiting your answer in the Sameness topic.
Hope ‘church’ is good this morning in your end of the world.
Blessings!!
Gem,
You are an excellent sleuth. You remind me of a friend I affectionately nickname Sherlock. I’ve always appreciated your ability to dig around and find things often missed by others.
Cyber hugs to you!! :^)
Gem,
”Again, sounds like the definition of “egalitarian” and “equality” is that the wife “gets to” have a job (for pay).”
I don’t think that would be an accurate conclusion from that excerpt. What was the topic. Why were that couple’s problems being shared. One must submit the minor points of a discussion to the major or main points properly or we misread the intent of the author. I don’t see equality in a marriage as a wife having to have a job. But it would be a part of equality that if the wife wanted to have a job or a career, then it would be honoring to work the family routine out so that she could do that. There is a difference between being compelled to do something and doing something out of an exercise of free will.
Here is a summation from “It Takes Two”:
”Many couples who consciously want to live in a marriage that gives both partners equal rights struggle with social and psychological pressures to function in traditional hierarchical patterns. Partnership marriages take more work than traditional marriage and can create more open conflict. The resulting frustration can lead to internal pressure to retreat into traditional over/under types of relating. Either partner might find it easier to follow traditional patterns to avoid an immediate conflict.”
Here is a summation from “From The Editor”:
”Egalitarian marriages require constant communication along with clarification and re-evaluation of each partner’s responsibilities. It’s challenging work, and unless we are proactive about it, it is very easy to miss the opportunity to build a mutual marriage full of creative energy by falling into traditional roles that might not make sense for an individual marriage”
Gem,
I found that Preato’s article on the CBE site was accurate. It has this,
She [Garland] points out that research conducted in the mid-twentieth century revealed the following: Wives, in traditional marriages, suffered significantly more depression and other mental disorders than men, working married women, and unmarried women.
However, it is missing (Bernard 1982), so it is not obvious that Preato is quoting Garland, who is quoting Bernard. Funny that the reference was omitted.
The bias against stay at home Moms is strong in secular culture. I appreciate the honesty of those who imply that SAHMs risk depression and who knows what else at higher rates if they don’t become working mothers.
Faced with this approach, which is often identified with THE egalitarian approach, no wonder those who self-identify as egals are a declining number.
My experience: complementarianism is a very attractive position for SAHMs.
Perhaps there are egal SAHM authors who write convincingly about the joys of being a SAHM in an egal marriage. If someone knows of such an author, I would be pleased to know more. Comp SAHM authors are a dime a dozen, and fill the catalogues of a publishing house like Crossway. The book market for SAHMs is obviously huge. As far as I know, soft comps have a corner on it.iah
John,
”Faced with this approach, which is often identified with THE egalitarian approach, no wonder those who self-identify as egals are a declining number.”
It may be THE SECULAR egal approach, but it is not the Christian egal approach. And among Christians, more and more Christians are self identifying as Christians who believe in Biblical equality. And more of those are going from soft comp to egal. When God first began to show me this in Scripture, I thought I was entirely alone until I ran across Paul Jewett’s book, ‘Man as Male and Female”. It took several more years before I found that there were others.
At the same time, it is a known problem that often SAHM’s risk depression if they don’t make sure they have things to interest themselves and activities among other women. Everyone needs a social life. This does not mean that there is anything wrong with being a SAHM. Also, many SAHW are well aware (or should be) that if they invest everything in a husband they are not getting along well with, it could possibly end in divorce with them left with no resources. This still does not mean there is anything wrong with choosing to be a SAHW.
Perhaps there are egal SAHM authors who write convincingly about the joys of being a SAHM in an egal marriage.
I know of one, but only by accident. Not being a SAHM, I don’t look for those topics. The reason there are so many comp authors who write about that subject is because the whole image of womanhood as a comp/traditional/patriarchal woman is wrapped up in being a wife and mother. While many egal women are reading books about Bible study and how to rightly interpret Scriptures, the Patriarchal women talk almost strictly about wifery, mothering, children, etc. I’ve been on a Patriarchal women’s list for years. The few times that doctrinal questions come up, they are mostly squelched. I’ve been told that most homeschooling material has a bent toward traditional patriarchy. Complementarian is too ‘soft’ for them.
Question ….
given the rather widening variety of soft comp to hard patriarchalist belief systems on how a marriage works best, why is it so important for many comps to try to define it. As well since many comp marriages look amazingly like Christian egal marriages, why so much negative viewing of egal marriages?
My mother was a SAHM and thoroughly egalitarian in her relationship with my father, although in appearance in a “traditional” marriage. I am often puzzled at how to communicate that it is not the activities and domains but it is the treatment of wife as one who functions “beneath” and “under” that I protest as debilitating.
My mother raised us on literature such as the biographies of the reformers, missionaries and revivalists. We were also familiar with the letters of Susanna Wesley and Susanna Moody. There is Anne Hutchinson, an American founding mother and SAHM. Also Catherine Booth would no doubt classify herself as such. These women were all SAHM’s.
I am very disturbed at the sense that women are being divided by this. As if it matters.
Believer333,
Paul Jewett is a name I have not heard for a while. The question many people ask faced with this pioneer of egalitarianism among evangelicals: is being egal by definition a package deal that includes being pro-choice and in favor of the ordination of women to the pastorate? It was for him, and since the vast majority of Christians, evangelical, Orthodox, and Roman Catholic, are soft comp soft egal in marriage but pro-life and traditional when it comes to excluding women from the pastorate, Jewett simply does not speak for them. Nor does the Christian egalitarian movement he pioneered breathe an ethos that is anything like home to them.
I just returned from a weekend with a thousand high school age kids, an event called Convo that brings together United Methodist youth from across the state of Wisconsin.
The UMC is a diverse church but the bands and main speakers at this event are usually evangelical (this year Brad Duncan, Sonic Flood, the Jersey Guyz). The basic template of the entire event is soft egal. Women in leadership is something that is modeled at all levels beyond the main speakers and bands. Indeed, on Sunday morning, an African American woman preached, our bishop. Egalism is not taught so much as simply lived out.
Even so, the situation has already reached a tipping point in a direction that no one expected. The leadership is now overwhelmingly feminine to the point that it is male youth who have become fish out of water. Indeed, they are attending the event is disproportionately low numbers.
The youth that went from my own church were all girls. So I had “girl talk” non-stop for 48 hours.
I knew this already, but I think it is worth pointing out. Female youth today continue to look, generally speaking, for a male counterpart to realize their deepest needs. They remain incredibly vulnerable because their focus is so much on their needs.
A few of the speakers succeeded in calling the youth to a goal beyond themselves and their own fulfillment, but many described Christianity as if it were a path to self-fulfillment and wish-fulfillment.
I remain convinced that life in general and marriage in particular are destined for failure unless they have a goal beyond themselves – as we say in our marriage liturgy, to go out into the world and serve your neighbor.
That’s the framework that is needed, not egalism or compism. A goal-oriented marriage in which the goals are defined in terms of Christian discipleship is the only framework worth calling Christian.
One can be either comp or egal within that framework. It matters little. What matters is a focus on living out Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 25 as individuals, as couples, as a family.
John wrote: “Faced with this approach, which is often identified with THE egalitarian approach, no wonder those who self-identify as egals are a declining number.”
I would like to see some statistics on this. Do you have any?
My mother was a SAHM and thoroughly egalitarian in her relationship with my father, although in appearance in a “traditional” marriage. I am often puzzled at how to communicate that it is not the activities and domains but it is the treatment of wife as one who functions “beneath” and “under” that I protest as debilitating.
Sue, I enjoy your testimony of your parents relationship. Theirs sounds like a healthy complementary marriage of equals.
The tangent onto this is because Marilyn(?) asked why no one ever looks critically at CBE articles, while Compegal has post after post looking critically at CBMW articles. I remembered my impressions of CBE and how put off I was, so I though I would post on it. Marriages like your parents "traditional marriage" are not represented at CBE. Where the words "traditional marriage" are even used, they are used with a negative connotation. I have been surfing around the website some. The more I am reading, the more I am taking away from there that their concept of "equality" means a "working" (for pay) wife and does not include SAHW & SAHM.
"equal" begins to look like code for "same"
believer333,
I’m not sure I understand where your last question is coming from. The comp authors I read (e.g., Emerson Eggerichs and Gary Thomas) write from a desire to help struggling couples.
In addition, comp authors also write from a I Peter 3:15 perspective – they are prepared to give an account of the hope that is within them.
What surprises me isn’t the availability of comp application materials, but the lack of availability of egal resources. I would have assumed that there are egal authors with similar motivations for writing.
Before finding this list, I spent a lot of time with the secular egal literature. I came to the conclusion that the equal function version of the egal model isn’t appropriate for Christians. It deconstructs gender, and it encourages the couple to be too inward focused. Personally, I think it is beyond redemption. At a minimum, the model is wrong, wrong, wrong for my husband and me.
I came to this list to learn about the Christian egal model(s). I thought that there would be a lot I could learn from Christian egals because comp resources are focused on SAHMs, and I’m not a SAHM. So, I thought you guys would have something to say to me.
I wanted to learn what you have to say about the unique issues that dual-career couples face. I think that one of the most important of these issues is stewardship. Stewardship of financial resources is actually the easy piece. The Bible is pretty clear on that one: move your money and your heart will follow. Not always easy to do, but there is no doubt about what it is that should be done.
What’s not so clear is the time piece. When both husband and wife are involved in the work force and children are at home, there is less time to serve others. Yes, we can brighten the corner where we are and reflect Christ’s love in the work place…blah, blah, blah. But, isn’t more asked of us than this? Isn’t this question HUGE? Don’t egals face it all the time? If so, why aren’t they writing about the tradeoffs they make?
It looks like Don Browning has something to say about this. (HT to John Hobbins for the Browning recommendation.) Browning appears to advocate a model that has both parents working ¾ time. I haven’t spent sufficient time with the book to say more, but Browning’s arguments appear to be similar to those offered by comp author Nancy Pearcey in her evangelical worldview book, Total Truth. (Pearcey doesn’t cite Browning, but could have been indirectly influenced by him because his work predates hers.) So, I’m slowly learning that materials are out there. It’s just that I initially made the mistake of thinking that CBE would be a good source for those materials.
From what I’ve been able to figure out, CBE’s primary product is a critique of the comp world. I was raised in a fundamentalist Baptist church that was opposed to secular education for women. So, I don’t need an organization to outline the weaknesses of the traditional comp model for me. I know those weaknesses because I lived those weaknesses.
Rather, I want to lean on the wisdom of Christians who are farther down the road than I, to help me discern how God wants me to live my life.
Molly,
Back to an earlier comment of yours that I didn’t have time to pick up on when you posted it…..what is it about Jim and Sarah Sumner’s book that made them sound like comps to you?
The section that caused me to label the second book egal (rather than the middle ground, meta-framework label I attached to the first book) is on pp. 61-63. The Sumners conclude the chapter:
“In Ephesians 5, the husband specifically is commanded to love his wife as Christ also loved the church. Yet here again, the analogy between husbands and Christ breaks down. The parallel is limited because while Christ is head and Lord and Savior of the church, the husband is strictly the ‘head’ of the wife.”
It sounds as if you had the opposite reaction to one or more other passages. Out of curiosity, what were those passages?
I am a near-SAHM in a straining-to-be-peer marriage. My husband works 50+ hrs/wk and I, as a pro musician (trumpet), play the occasional gig and teach weekly private lessons. I love doing this, and my husband encourages me to work as much as I can.
We both homeschool our three children (whom as infants/toddlers I breastfed and basically attachment-parented) although I do most of it.
My husband has naturally followed his father’s progressive-traditional model (what Schwartz would probably call near-peer) while I have perhaps aimed for a more egal marriage without really knowing that’s what I was doing. (I have also overcome various over-dependencies of the type John Hobbins mentions.
I think my husband wants ours to be a peer marriage, but needs to unlearn some patterns. I myself have been learning how to make the peer marriage I want a reality. After nearly 21 years of marriage, we are getting there!
Marilyn,
Here are some of the category of Christian egal literature on CBE. By no means is it the ONLY Christian egal literature available regarding issues of Christians and Biblical equality.
Abuse & Psychology
Bibles & Reference
Biblical & Theological Studies
Children & Youth
Christian Living
Curriculum & Devotionals
Ethnicity, Class, & Gender
International & Foreign Language Resources
Introductory Resources on Biblical Equality
Multicultural Communication & Missions
Relationships, Marriage, & Family
Women & Men in Ministry
Women in Church History
Women of the Bible
There are 63 books listed in the Relationships section. By no means is this the sum total of Christian books on relationships from a mutual respect model of marriage.
Most are about how to go about a Christian marriage of mutuality, such as:
As For Me and My House
Before the Ring
Beyond 'I Do'
Beyond Sexual Stereotypes
Biblical Methods of Conflict Resolution
Biblical Submission Within Marriage
Building Healthy Marriages and Families
Building Your Family to Last
Families Where Grace Is in Place (an excellent book)
There are a few about parenting, single women, and teenagers. Have you checked out any of them. None of them are specifically on critiquing the comp world as you suggest, but I am sure that the subject of what hierarchalists teach about marital relationships comes up.
Much of the books on CBE are about equality in Scripture. IMO it is the most Biblically oriented collection of Christian books gathered in one place. When I’ve gone to some Christian book stores, I haven’t seen this good a collection of books that actually study Scripture. Way too much is about people expounding their ideas about this or that such as homeschooling, who should work and who should do the finances, etc. , with not nearly enough real research into what Scripture says. I am hugely disappointed with the lack of quality of content in most Christian bookstores. I can’t find good research books there. I’m sick of the frivolous stuff they put in the women’s section. I don’t need a “Christian” book on cooking or exercise or sewing. I don’t need pink bible covers, and pretty book marks. I want a place that provides selections on the early church fathers, dictionaries of theology, Hebrew word searches, etc. I had to really look around to find good resource books and rare found much at Christian bookstores. What is that about??
BTW did you read my response to your question about the meaning of "complementarity without hierarchy"? Did it answer your question?
Marilyn, you said,
When both husband and wife are involved in the work force and children are at home, there is less time to serve others. Yes, we can brighten the corner where we are and reflect Christ’s love in the work place…blah, blah, blah. But, isn’t more asked of us than this? Isn’t this question HUGE?
For what they’re worth, here are my thoughts. Each family’s situation is unique. I believe in whole-life stewardship, in giving our entire lives back to God. What that looks like for each individual and family is going to be different, but it includes everything — work, play, relationships, etc. Everything we do as Christians can be a ministry.
After a tithe (of whatever %age), I believe that family must be provided for first. The job of parents is to raise their children. This is hard, consuming work, but the best, imo, that a parent can offer both God and the world.
There are also seasons in life. When the children are grown and on their own, there will no doubt be more time for other service than when they are small.
Balancing all the elements of living is not easy, especially in a family like mine which is so atypical. We literally have no model to follow. (Not that we probably would anyway…) Yes, it is difficult to forge a path, but forge it we do, and happily, in service to Christ.
We take opportunities to offer our gifts to our church and community and volunteer when we can, but also take care of ourselves so as not to unnecessarily burden others. We say “no” to a lot of things, because we have learned (and continue to improve upon living) that rest is as important as work, and that doing fewer things well is much preferred to doing more things less well.
Cheers to you, Bonnie,
Marilyn,
Since you reminded me about Lundy Bancroft I looked up a couple of passages in “Why does he do that?”
In writing about the former legal system that did not enforce consequences, he says,
“This legal history plays an important role in shaping today’s cultural views among males – and females – about the abuse of women. It is likely to take a number of generations to overcome the accumulated impact of hundreds of years of destructive social attitudes. The culture that shaped these laws, and was in turn shaped by them, is reflected in people’s continued willingness to blame women for “provoking” abuse, to feel sorry for men who face legal consequences for intimate violence, and to be highly skeptical of women’s reports of abuse.” page 321
About religious beliefs he writes,
“I have had numerous clients over the years who explicitly rely on religious quotations from scripture to justify their abuse of their partners. Similarly, religious prohibitions against divorce have entrapped women in abusive relationships. The book When Love Goes Wrong published in 1985, describes a study of conservative Protestant clergy that reported that 21 percent said that no amount of abuse would justify a woman’s leaving aher husband … ” page 322
So a key points are:
- talking about women as those who are “rebellious” or who “provoke”, is a key component of abuse.
- religious quotations are used to keep women in obedience to their husband’s personal whims
- a rigid non-acceptance of divorce is a great difficulty since women often do not want to publicize the role of abuse in their divorce
Bancroft advises that a man cannot give up his abusive behavior unless he surrenders his sense of entitlement and accepts that his partner has rights that are equal to his. This comes from long experience.
Believer333,
To answer your question, I think that comps are worried that society is going to he** in a handbasket and Christians are following. They are trying to preserve what I think is a somewhat mythical social model based ostensibly upon theology (and an idealized past) but is really more of a knee-jerk reaction against modern social change, both good and bad.
They see egalism as the fruit of 1960s radical feminism and anti-establishment-ism that is turning the world upside down.
believer333,
Thanks for the comment about complementarity. It was very consistent with both the other comments by egals over the past few days and my perception that CBE egals don’t tie their discussion of complementarity to gender, per se.
Of the practical application books on the CBE website, what one or two titles are most commonly recommended?
believer333, it’s ok for us to disagree! I see a need for quality practical application material. You don’t. I consider a vision for Christian marriage to be incomplete without an explicit discussion of gender. You don’t.
To paraphrase Billy and Ruth Graham’s comments about their marriage, if we agreed about everything, this discussion would serve no purpose!
“Of the practical application books on the CBE website, what one or two titles are most commonly recommended?”
I’m probably the wrong one to ask on that. I’ve only read a very few books on marriage. Heirs Together by Patricia Gundry is excellent. I bought a bunch and give them to newly marrieds.
She also wrote a really good Cookbook.
In my environment (Upper Midwest, United Methodist, diverse socioeconomically, ethnically, politically, etc.), self-identifying egals among young people have become rare. As rare as self-identifying feminists.
I enjoy talking with people in many settings. I do straw polls constantly. BTW, the fact that so few people self-identify as egals does not mean that they are non-egals. But it is an index of the fact that secular egal culture is a point of departure for them, not necessarily a point of destination.
They are certainly not reading the books in CBE’s list. Not that I have noticed. I go to the local Christian bookstore (Zondervan-affiliated) only to discover that CBE style books are not stocked. Apparently, they don’t sell. It looks like the best sellers are Emerson Eggerichs and Gary Smalley.
People who once identified on an existential level with equal rights things have often moved on.
Their commitment to the cause if there still is a commitment is political in nature. That is, their marriages are pretty traditional (full of domain-based hierarchy; little equality in practice), but in a theoretical sort of way, the good guys and bad guys are still the same.
They understand and perhaps identify with Hillary Clinton, and vote for her and others like her, and if they are lucky, are not married to someone like Bill Clinton. Whatever their blind spots (we all have them), by and large they are also, I would add, very fine people.
It’s possible to find self-identifying egal Republicans, but it is a bit like finding needles in a haystack.
I am not comfortable with “hard” versions of complementarianism like the version propounded by Bruce Ware. I am not comfortable with neo-evangelical authors like Paul Jewett either.
There is a middle ground in the comp-egal continuum that runs from authors like Emerson Eggerichs and Gary Thomas to Sarah and Jim Sumner to Stuart and Jill Briscoe. In the upper Midwest, these authors are an excellent cultural fit.
Outside of my confessional context, self-identifying Christian egals are rarer still. Most evangelicals who are part of straight up evangelical denominations do not self-identify as egal and certainly not as feminist.
But that does not mean that they think of marriage in patriarchal terms (unilateral submission). On the other hand, they do not think of marriage in terms of mutual submission either.
Whatever terms they use, healthy marriages in this setting are characterized by mutual deference, sacrificial love, and the expectation that the husband provide servant-leadership. Those, at least, are my observations.
I also have many Catholic and Orthodox friends (often ex-evangelicals, though that is not a good term; in fact, many of my Catholic friends refer to themselves as evangelical Catholics). They do not self-identify as egals either, and certainly not as feminists.
These friends benefit from seeing marriage in more sacramental terms, as a crucible of suffering but also as a means of grace.
The understanding there is light years away from the concept of marriage as a means of self-fulfillment. The self-help culture is relatively foreign to this demographic. Devout couples in the Catholic and Orthodox setting are being nurtured as couples through regular worship, the practice of prayer and Bible reading as a family, and through small group involvement.
I mention these things so as to point out the obvious. A blog like compegal is a nice place to make friends and perhaps even find a little support.
For a few people – like me – it is a place to float ideas and warn people away from false gospels, of which the world is replete. To be clear, I consider both comp-ism and egal-ism to be false gospels.
A blog like compegal cannot replace being in fellowship with flesh-and-blood Christians on a daily basis where you are.
We live in a polarized society, and polarized people look for settings in which everyone thinks like them. My own observation point – a non-ideological egal environment with streaks of traditionalism and the oldest couples living according to the love-obey framework – is different from that of others.
It would be great to hear more from Marilyn and others who attend self-consciously comp churches. It would also be great to hear from people who attend self-consciously CBE-style churches.
How do things work in practice? For example, it is obvious that divorce and spousal abuse occur in these contexts no less than in my predominantly soft egal context. How are they handled?
It can also be illuminating to hear about how things work in such settings from people who have left those settings. But it is necessary to exercise caution.
Here is an analogy. We all find it instructive to listen to ex-Christians, what it was that turned them away. What we discover however is that the reasons for leaving are almost always a curious mix of misunderstandings and genuine differences.
It’s sometimes possible to clear up the misunderstandings – though ex’s usually don’t want to; that would throw their choice to leave in doubt.
The genuine differences in any case are very often worth identifying. It emerges often enough that ex-Christians are such for a reason: they genuinely do not agree with the fundamentals of the Christian faith.
Within the comp-egal debate, things are both the same and different. One’s Christianity is not, or should not be, at issue, though the polarization that occurs within the debate is not without its dangers.
As a theologian, red flags go up big time when I hear about a Bruce Ware who is unable to pray to Jesus or a Frank Viola whose Christology seems far away from orthodoxy.
In the compegal debate, occasionally someone will move in one direction or the other, usually, however, while staying within the framework of departure. For the rest, it becomes necessary to agree to disagree.
In any case, at a certain point, theory has to give way to practice. In a CBE style church or a self-consciously comp church, what happens when the rubber hits the road? What happens when couples divorce, a baby is born out of wedlock, an abusive relationship is uncovered, a young man or young woman self-identifies as gay or lesbian?
The above are four questions I ask with a certain insistence among Christian friends who have a heart for the gospel, Christians who see the gospel not as a means to pass judgment on others, but as life itself, precisely in the above cases.
Theory is nice to talk about. It is a clean, antiseptic environment, like a bathroom that has just been cleaned.
But I am a pastor. I frequent used bathrooms. Many of them look like the bathrooms I cleaned one summer when I worked the night shift at a Holiday Inn. I rarely have the luxury of walking into a clean bathroom. But that, after all, is what we should expect if we’ve read the Bible with care.
Marilyn says:
“I want to lean on the wisdom of Christians who are farther down the road than I, to help me discern how God wants me to live my life.”
I’m trying to catch up to you, Marilyn.
BTW, that’s also why I love being a pastor. In any given congregation, there are those whose Christian walk is far superior to mine. They help me along greatly.
John wrote: “There is a middle ground in the comp-egal continuum that runs from authors like Emerson Eggerichs and Gary Thomas to Sarah and Jim Sumner to Stuart and Jill Briscoe. In the upper Midwest, these authors are an excellent cultural fit.”
All of the authors you mention are in the softer side of non-egalism, but they are still non-egals.
As an egal, I appreciate anyone that moves away from the harder more extreme forms of non-egalism. The only middle ground soft non-egals occupy is between hard non-egals and egals.
Then John wrote: “To be clear, I consider both comp-ism and egal-ism to be false gospels.”
You statement seems wrong in at least 2 ways:
1. Even tho you endorse softer forms of compism, you still dink it in statements like the above. This means I cannot model what you believe, as it does not cohere.
2. No one is saying these models are gospels, I wish you would not confuse the gospel with a marriage model, it just seems unhelpful.
Hi Don,
I would love to hear what about the Briscoes’ beliefs causes you to label them as non-egal. They are, for example, among the orginal signers of CBE’s Statement on Men, Women, and Equality. I would have thought that would give them pretty impeccable egal credentials!
Ditto for the Sumners. What about their beliefs causes you to label them as non-egal? (See my earlier comment to Molly for the section of their book that had me move them from the meta-framework to egal category.)
Don,
I’m wondering why you regard the Sumners and the Briscoes as non-egals. On what grounds?
If the Briscoes must be considered non-egals, then I think you had better consider me a non-egal as well.
Perhaps I was too cryptic in my comment. By “comp-ism” and “egal-ism” I do not mean all forms of complementarianism and egalitarianism.
I mean the ideological, “my way or the highway” forms. The forms that say the Bible rules in egalitarianism / complementarianism and rules out the other.
For the rest, I don’t think it’s helpful to suggest that there are no egals and no comps who think in “it’s my way or the highway” approach. Indeed, Christianity is deeply divided on the issues.
Did you know that there are Christian denominations in which you cannot become a minister unless you are in favor of the ordination of women? There are also denominations such as the SBC in which if you come out for it, your SBC pastoral identity may not be able to be denied you, but you are likely to be shunned in consequence.
Apparently there are congregations that affiliate with CBMW or CBE (I wouldn’t mind knowing of examples in Wisconsin if there are any). That sounds like the issue is being made one of status confessionis (that is, the faith stands or falls on it). On another issue, congregations in my denomination occasionally affiliate with national organizations on GLBT issues (in favor of the denominational stance, which holds that homosexual practice is incompatible with the Christian faith; or against that stance). In that case, too, people come close to shunning you if you don’t agree with their stance.
Now if you can shun someone and still say that the gospel is not at stake, I have issues with that.
The ordaining/preaching/leading of women is a HUGE no-no in my neck of the woods, conservatively churched that I am. There is NO WAY a pastor could get hired in most of the churches I know of (which is quite a few, since my husband was a minister and worked with many of them) if he believed that women were allowed to preach. No WAY. It is a fundamental issue.
It wouldn’t matter how great the guys spiritual life was, how amazing his sermons were, etc—-belief that a woman could stand in the pulpit would be a deal-breaker, period.
It’s interesting to note how the various issues intersect. I have many colleagues in the clergy who are women, some of them dear dear friends. Many of them preach up a storm, too.
Often, however, they choose to pastor less than full-time, or prefer to be an associate pastor, without the full responsibilities of leading a congregation. Then there are a few standouts who are excellent senior pastors, with gifts to beat the band.
In short, there is choosing that goes on very often among my female peers in ministry that rarely happens among my male peers.
As a general rule, my male peers are more role-invested. My female peers are more “status”-invested (as in married with children, usually).
The hardest part in the shift from a pre-feminist world to the present has been that the old model involved a package deal: a pastor and his wife.
The gifts of the pastor’s wife, or lack of them, often made more of a difference than those of the pastor. In the old model, the pastor could almost be incompetent and it wouldn’t be a dealbreaker, so long as his wife knew what she was doing. LOL.
It continues to be difficult to function well as a pastor without one’s family as an active component of one’s ministry, There is so much modeling that goes on.
So in my case, and that of my wife Paola (she is a new church pastor), it’s lonely work at times. She cannot be a pastor’s wife for me, nor can I be a pastor’s wife for her. Our poor PKs get dragged from church to church – not that they are suffering, especially not Anna, who is 5. Giovanni, when he was that age, was part of two congregations as well, and was genuinely disappointed when he was limited to one. But it’s different when you are a teenager.
However, the disjointedness we experience is part of a larger change in which people are not spouses to each other in a meaningful sense in society, or present themselves to the world as a unified family. Just individuals in more and more cases.
The impoverishment is great. After all, it takes a village to raise a child. And a village is not the same thing as a loosely tied aggregate of monadic individuals.
I don’t think Christians have thought these things through nearly enough. Of course Browning is right that we should all work 3/4 time. After all, almost everyone out there is frazzled with a spouse, kids, full time work, school, sports, church, etc.
The problems are severe enough that it is not obvious that the setup that is extremely new, historically speaking, in which both husband and wife work outside the home for 40-80 hours a week, has a future in the long run.
I see something like the Danvers Affirmation as a (in my view clumsy) attempt to address those issues.
Whether you are egal or comp, these issues cannot be ignored. The marriage model one espouses has to address them, and not merely on a rhetorical level.
“They are, for example, among the orginal signers of CBE’s Statement on Men, Women, and Equality. …… Ditto for the Sumners.”
There is a D. Stuart Briscoe. But no Sumners.
John,
” So in my case, and that of my wife Paola (she is a new church pastor), it’s lonely work at times. She cannot be a pastor’s wife for me, nor can I be a pastor’s wife for her.”
Haven’t you heard of a pastor’s assistant, or even associate pastors? :^)
believer333,
Thanks for clarifying….I didn’t mean to imply the Sumners had signed the CBE statement.
I attend a 4,000 member comp church with no denominational affiliation, located in a not particularly affluent metro area of around 500,000 people. Ten years ago, the church was comprised disproportionately of people from the local university and was located close to the university campus.
With the deliberate intent of reaching out to a hurting and economically stressed community, a new building was constructed in an area easily accessible to the lower income families who represent the metro area’s demographic. If you build it, they will come! The church has doubled in size and there is now considerable socio-economic diversity in the church.
Women hold senior staff positions, but do not have the title “Pastor.” Women occasionally give testimonies during worship services, and women associated with para-church ministries are occasionally interviewed by a member of the church’s male teaching team. But, women do not preach. Nor do they serve as elders or deacons. We are without a senior teaching pastor. The former senior teaching pastor affirmed soft comp beliefs, but came to us from an egal mega-church, where he led the men’s ministry.
Men are VERY involved in children’s ministries. In fact, I believe that beginning with pre-school programs, approximately 50% of teachers and helpers are male. It did not used to be this way. But, along with the move to a new location came an influx of economically struggling single moms. When word went out that the only chance many of our children would have to experience a male role model was if men became involved in children’s ministries, children’s ministries no longer became “women’s work.”
Large numbers of newcomers in particular (who, typically, are new believers with significant “hurts, hang-ups, and habits”) have been helped by the church’s Celebrate Recovery program (a Christ-centered 12-step program developed by Saddleback). Evidence that this program has resulted in much more than temporary, cosmetic changes in the lives of many of its participants is found in the number of the program’s graduates who are involved in the church’s outreach activities long after their involvement in Celebrate Recovery is over. Based on the experiences at my church, I strongly recommend this program.
My husband and I were attracted to the church for two reasons. First, deep in the culture of the church is the attitude that it’s ok to come out of hiding and that honesty about our sin is a prerequisite to spiritual growth. I, in particular, really needed to stop faking it. As a child, I spent approximately 15 hours a week at church. My head was crammed full of knowledge, but that knowledge wasn’t transforming my heart. Second, we’re a multi-ethnic family, and we wanted a church that looked like us.
There are two things that I miss about the egal church (that was affiliated with one of the rare denominations that is both conservative and egal) we used to attend. First, I can no longer attend the Bible study led by the senior teaching pastor. After a couple of years with Precepts, I now attend BSF. Second, when women like me (i.e., grad degrees, dual-career marriages) move to town and visit my church, they rarely join (because of concerns about gender roles). This has forced me to grow by reaching out to women at my church who aren’t like me.
While some women who are members of the church have some concerns about restrictions on women’s service in the church, this isn’t as big an issue as you might expect. I believe that the reason for this is that it doesn’t matter what your gifting or gender is – we have lots of hurting children who would benefit from your presence in children’s ministries.
There are negatives to a large church. But, I’ve found the positives to outweigh the negatives. I no longer know, for example, what issues are before the elder board. I focus on my service and my relationship with God.
Marilyn wrote:
I attend a 4,000 member comp church with no denominational affiliation, located in a not particularly affluent metro area of around 500,000 people. …
Thanks for sharing your personal experience with these two churches, Marilyn. I think that if church leaders are not strident, or condemning of other possible gender roles for ministry, any loving church can be blessed by God. Even the strident ones can be, but they tend to create strident members and sometimes doctrine trumps spiritual change.
I’m grateful for growing Willow Creek egal churches as well as growing comp churches. I’m grateful that God chooses to work with each of His flawed children and ministries in which they are involved.
John wrote: “Did you know that there are Christian denominations in which you cannot become a minister unless you are in favor of the ordination of women? There are also denominations such as the SBC in which if you come out for it, your SBC pastoral identity may not be able to be denied you, but you are likely to be shunned in consequence.
Apparently there are congregations that affiliate with CBMW or CBE (I wouldn’t mind knowing of examples in Wisconsin if there are any). That sounds like the issue is being made one of status confessionis (that is, the faith stands or falls on it).”
First off, those lists by CBE and CBMW are those that churches decide to join; the whole point of those lists is that just being a evangelical protestant does not say where a church stands on that question, but this does not say those not on the list are not evangelical prots; that is going too far.
Another point is that Baptist churches are run by the congregation, so the congregation decides for themselves, this is different than other denoms, in effect, Baptists are almost non-denom. There are a few women SBC pastors, I agree they are rare but they exist.
And yes, there are some denoms that say one must be one or the other to be in their denom. And CBE and CBMW maintain lists of such.
John further wrote: “Now if you can shun someone and still say that the gospel is not at stake, I have issues with that.”
I agree this is where the rubber meets the road. Speaking for myself, God has told me in no uncertain terms that I am not to separate over this and many other non-core issues, and I am not to do this EVEN IF another separates from me.
The only ones I have heard that “shun” or similar are the more extreme non-egals, but anyone might do it. I do not think it is a good witness to do this, but each makes their own choice.
However, not separating is different that choosing which church I attend. There are many factors that affect my decision and one of them is their stance on egal/comp issues.
”Men are VERY involved in children’s ministries. In fact, I believe that beginning with pre-school programs, approximately 50% of teachers and helpers are male”
That is awesome to hear. I really appreciate seeing men AND women involved with the children, from pre-school on up.
”Large numbers of newcomers in particular (who, typically, are new believers with significant “hurts, hang-ups, and habits”) have been helped by the church’s Celebrate Recovery program (a Christ-centered 12-step program developed by Saddleback)”
At a previous church there was a Celebrate Recovery program. It did very well. We are considering it in our church now. The only thing I didn’t care much for was the closing off of newcomers, although I understand the reasons.
”While some women who are members of the church have some concerns about restrictions on women’s service in the church, this isn’t as big an issue as you might expect. I believe that the reason for this is that it doesn’t matter what your gifting or gender is – we have lots of hurting children who would benefit from your presence in children’s ministries.”
I’ve heard that before and left those churches. Many years ago I participated in children’s ministries. While I enjoyed the children, my heart call was to dialogue and help my peers, both men and women. I delight in being able to encourage adults to deeply study the Scriptures together.
”There are negatives to a large church. But, I’ve found the positives to outweigh the negatives”
That’s nice to hear. There has been a lot of bad ‘press’ about large congregations. Good to hear some positives. :^)
Thanks for sharing your prior church’s positive experiences with Celebrate Recovery, believer333. It’s really neat to see that this program is a common denominator across comp and egal churches.
JOHN said:
People who once identified on an existential level with equal rights things have often moved on.
Their commitment to the cause if there still is a commitment is political in nature. That is, their marriages are pretty traditional (full of domain-based hierarchy; little equality in practice), but in a theoretical sort of way, the good guys and bad guys are still the same.
They understand and perhaps identify with Hillary Clinton, and vote for her and others like her, and if they are lucky, are not married to someone like Bill Clinton. Whatever their blind spots (we all have them), by and large they are also, I would add, very fine people.ENDQUOTE
GEM:
Fascinating that “their committment to the cause [of equal rights]” would lead them to vote Hillary and yet have “little equality in practice” in their marriages. IMO, they have selected the worst of both worlds.
I commend to you our sister Rebecca Merrill Groothuis most recent blog where she wonders, laments, and attempts to answer “Why should belief in biblical equality entail left-wing political persuasions?”
However, the disjointedness we experience is part of a larger change in which people are not spouses to each other in a meaningful sense in society, or present themselves to the world as a unified family. Just individuals in more and more cases.
I deeply regret the alienation and loneliness that this paragraph betrays. I hope you can accept empathy without feeling that the answer is to put women UNDER authority.
I have simply no desire to damage men, but I read the UNDER AUTHORITY paradigm as a great hobbling, as the desire to control women for the gain of men. It is very painful.
I would like to think that there is a world where women are happy to be spouses to their husbands and don’t have to be coerced into it by authority.
I wish you well and I hope that some day men who want women to be there for them will be able to experience that in a peer relationship.
I don’t think I have ever spoken to the issue of a woman having a career equal to her husbands, except in that sometimes a man can be unemployed or ill, and a woman should be able to step in.
There is a well known non-Christian (AFAIK) journalist for the Vancouver Sun who quit to spend more time at home. I see no reason why women have to be put under authority like little children. It is outrageous and demeaning.
I had better to stop now. Men who want this kind of thing from a woman are pretty scary to me. There must be such a thing as a committed free will marriage. I saw my parents have it, and I do have friends who have this – egal friends, who are very happy together and who actually are spouses to each other.
Did Molly or Don explain what it is about Sarah Sumner’s take on things that makes her a non-egal? I was hoping for an answer because it is an interesting question.
I am pleased that an egal like Rebecca Groothuis uncouples her egalism from a liberal political stance. This is rarely done, yet needs to be done.
Unless Christian egals emphasize their differences with secular egal culture, they will naturally be understood to be Trojan horses of that culture.
BTW, and perhaps I differ on this point with GEM, I see good as well as bad in the legacy of feminism.
It's late & I must get to bed but just want to say that, were I a betting woman, I'd wager that there are, or have been, more "egal" traditional marriages than may be evident. I'd bet that women (and, by extension, men) have been grappling with finding equity and equality (not sameness, but equality) in terms of honoring their duties in their marriages for a long, long time. As both I and others (including Pepper Schwartz) have said, the traditional model of marriage does not preclude equity and equality!
The Catholic church teaches that men and women are of equal dignity and entitled to equitable treatment at home, work and in other arenas. But it holds that Christ defined the priesthood as an all-male corps modeled on himself, and it is powerless to change that.”
This is a fascinating point. According to this article women are entitled to equitable treatment in the home. This is why I have never spoken against Catholicism or any of the traditional mainstream churches. Clearly it is one thing not to have leadership in the church and another altogether not to have equal status in the home.
I enjoyed that article too, gem, thanks (and I linked to it in a comments discussion on my AinM blog).
John and Marilyn,
I have two really huge assignments due too soon, way too soon, and haven’t had a lot of time to work on them as stuff in my own family has been really busy (I’ve been taking on some extra childcare for my brother, long long story). So when I am finished with these things, particularly a giant of a paper due by 8pm my time tomorrow (cough, cough, choak), then I will be able to pull out the book and give you page numbers and stuff to go with my surprised feeling that Sumner was not egal. (I don’t know why I thought she was, but if I can remember correctly, it was the series of posts that Scott McKnight did on Jesus Creed that caused me to assume she was, though he likely never said so—-who knows). I should clarify though and correct an earlier statement…I don’t know if I’d label her “comp” persay…just definitely not egal, yet living practically in what seems to me to be a very egal marriage. I was…I supposed left really confused! But that could be a lot more my fault than hers, because I do admit to skimming the second half of the book…
So…will you take a rain check?
Er, make that “to soon, way to soon.”
I type even faster than I read. Scary.
Well, now I’m up (Good Morning, everyone!) and my mind is still going. Not sure if this thought fits in this thread, but:
My theory on marriage models (which pretty much underlies everything I say about them), is that everyone deeply desires the deepest possible esteem and intimacy. Whether or not they actually want it from their marriage is another story. (They should, of course, and most probably do.) But, humans being human, many either don’t know how or are unwilling (iow, incapable) to do what it takes to achieve such intimacy. (Or, are ‘unequally yoked’ to someone who is less willing and able to create more intimacy than they are.)
True intimacy (and the equity and equality necessary to it) are not achieved by following any marriage model other than one in which spouses are willing to do what it takes to create it.
John,
I am pleased that an egal like Rebecca Groothuis uncouples her egalism from a liberal political stance. This is rarely done, yet needs to be done.
My church’s denomination (Evangelical Covenant) is egal, though not everyone in either my church or denom is (though I’m certain that few even know what “complementarian” means or have even heard of it; they would think of it in terms of “traditional marriage”), and does not favor either political side (i.e., allows for both). Of course, like any other organization, it is not monolithic, but its official statement is unaccepting of homosexuality, for example. Overall, I think it is egal without being liberal, and certainly many members of both my church and the denom. are the same.
(BTW, Scot McKnight is an Ev. Covenanter, though he is not representative of them all.)
Molly,
you should get a job doing the News bylines. One of them can’t type fast enough and its frustrating to the readers. We have CNN I think with bylines at the gym for the stationary bike riders. :^)
Another comment on “traditional” vs. “egal” and “comp.” vs. “egal”:
As has already been discussed, “traditional” is not necessarily synonymous with “comp,” and both “comp” and “egal” may refer more to ways that husbands and wives relate than with whether they have a traditional work situation.
But again, “tradition” in this case usually refers to the one in which the husband works full-time and the wife stays home (or doesn’t work for pay). But there have always been variations on this (in Western society), and I think that in our current society we are seeing efforts to return to a more fluid and flexible means of supporting the family economy.
In pioneer days, in a farming family, for example, you had everyone working on the farm, so that everyone’s effort contributed to the income. You had women producing crafts, etc. which were traded or sold. If a family owned a store, everyone in the family helped. Which gender did what was in many ways a matter of suitability and practicality. There was also a lot of community involvement; everybody helped out everybody else. This was in everyone’s best interest.
Yes, you had certain gender-assigned positions, such as the clergy, and doctors, and proprietors of stores were generally the head of the household — being the male. In the case of clergy and doctors, that was no doubt as much due to tradition than anything set in stone, and in the case of proprietors, it was simply what was practical. But there was some fluidity, and it was generally acknowledged that behind (or beside) every married working man was his wife. Likewise, men helped out their wives with their duties, and everyone helped, as they could, whomever was in need. Head of the household was a position of honor, not necessarily one with a list of job requirements. The requirements were understood in terms of what was decent, and fitting.
This is why I am wary of attempts to over-define these things (both relational and task-related). A simple sense of decency answers a whole lot of questions as to who should do what, or at least gets one thinking in the right direction.
But, to get back to the traditional model, there’s also a downside to moving away from that. In 20th century traditional society, women did a lot of volunteer work (and men did too — this was community support). Except in smaller communities and churches, I think this sort of dynamic has changed. Women want to be paid for their work; they then are too busy to volunteer. The men are too, and so, in the push for a higher standard of living, volunteering has suffered. This is what leads to the government dole and endless appeals for funds to hire help to cover what used to be done by volunteers.
I don’t think that volunteering has to disappear, though. There are many who have way too much time on their hands (meaning, they use it for less than noble purposes). If people in general would spend their time better, and in a more generous way, and if people would become more inclined toward community and helping one another out, then again, a good deal of what we argue about in terms of who should do what, might become moot.
We are all at the mercy of the way our society and our cities and towns are structured, economically and otherwise; our options are expanded or limited by the same. We can work and fight for change yet we must also live within the circumstances. This is why we should not allow our circumstances to define us, but how we live and love each other within them.
(Sheesh, I wrote a book, sorry)
Bonnie,
Nothing to add, but I wanted to thank you for sharing your thoughtful comments (both the most recent and earlier posts) on how to live out our Christian beliefs in the contemporary context.
Suzanne,
I can’t make heads or tails of most of your last comment, but I do wish to thank you for your empathy.
The situation my wife and I are in is characteristic of the life of most couples in which both members are professionals and work long unpredictable hours.
Those of us who are in this situation almost without exception perk up at the analysis of a sociologist like Browning. You evinced no interest in his proposals but that could just be that you are in a very differenct socioeconomic place.
I made no mention of an UNDER AUTHORITY paradigm. Those are your words and reflect your experiences, not mine.
I am in favor of an *authority on behalf of* paradigm. I see that paradigm as workable in both a comp and an egal framework so long as the larger context is 1 Cor 13, Rom 12, and Phil 2.
John,
I appreciated your sharing of your and Paola’s experiences as a two-career couple. What you said resonated with me. I would like to revisit the themes you raise, but after I’ve had a chance to read Browning next month.
I think we would all benefit from this discussion. For example, issues of community formation in the absence of extended family are relevant to all of us, not just to two-career couples.
BTW, of the Browning titles that are available on Amazon, is there one you would recommend as the best starting point?:
Equality and the Family
The Equal-Regard Family
From Culture Wars to Common Ground
Marriage and Modernization
I know that I’m going to have more questions than answers! For example, I wonder what Browning’s model of both spouses working 3/4 time implies about the cultivation of our collective garden.
Presumably, social capital formation increases, which has an indirect positive impact on the ability of current and future generations to form intellectual and economic capital.
But, I wonder about the direct effects on the formation of economic and intellectual capital. Typically, for example, we associate breakthrough thinking with individuals who have a single-minded focus on solving a particular problem or dedication to a particular cause.
Successful academic researchers, for example, score pretty high on the obsessive-compulsive dimension of psych tests. Is that lost? If so, as Christians, should we care?
Anyway, I look forward to reading the book! Thanks for alerting us to Browning’s work.
Thank you, Marilyn, for your kind words. I appreciate very much what you bring to this blog as well.
I wanted to add something I meant to include in my last comment, which is that roles and circumstances often change over time in a marriage. One of the most common is that, before children, both spouses work full-time. Then, when children come, the wife cuts back or eliminates completely her financial contribution to the household. Or, the husband loses his job and needs to rely upon the wife’s income for awhile. Or, both spouses part-time it for awhile until, say, kids come along and it becomes necessary for the wife to cut back, so the husband gets a full-time job, or more. (That’s what happened in my case). These sorts of changes should not change the basic way that spouses relate, although it often does, as Schwartz indicated in Love Between Equals.
This is why the way spouses see their marriage (and themselves) should not be contingent upon who is or isn’t contributing financially to the household. Terms like “collaboration,” “partnership,” “equity,” and “equality” come into play, for a truly peer marriage.
John,
I couldn’t help but think of you and your beloved wife… I have often wondered if God’s intention, HIS crowning jewel of witness in the world is for a husband and wife to reflect HIM together in ministry… sort of like a “return to the garden”… and along the lines of the ministry of NT contemporaries Priscilla and Aquilla.
I know that around here Methodist churches are really tiny and have “circuit preachers” who come to 3 churches for an hour each on a Sunday morning BUT isn’t there a BIG Methodist church where you could minster TOGETHER? And don’t the Methodists move you around where they want you and move you every couple years lest you “bond” with the congregation (at least that’s how it is for a friend from college days)? But, John, there are other denoms which might have more opportunity for team ministry for you and Paola.
I hope you will pray about the possibilities and potential. A couple like you is rare and I wonder if you should be serving TOGETHER? (I think I hear you longing for something like that. Could such a longing also be a CALLING?)
I went to a WILD conference once (Women In Leadership Development) and I attended the pastors track. (I did it rather passive aggressively as a form of “rebellion” against my husband’s constant preaching against any form of leadership of women, though I did not TELL him I attended the pastors sessions with a bunch of SHOCK-women pastors-SHOCK- he still doesn’t know… ) Anyway, this was in the Wesleyan denom which accepts Methodist pastors I think and I met several women who co-pastored with their husbands.
I can’t make heads or tails of most of your last comment,
Now you know what if feels like.
The situation my wife and I are in is characteristic of the life of most couples in which both members are professionals and work long unpredictable hours.
I know many two teacher families, and two prof families, and I do not think that they have the stresses that you have. Most of them are very devoted spouses to each other. I think your situation is particular to your occupation and I feel sympathetic for the difficulties peculiar to your situation.
Some of my two prof family friends are very happy that way, and in other couples the husband is a prof and the wife a part time teacher. They are all very comfortable with this. I would have liked that too.
Those of us who are in this situation almost without exception perk up at the analysis of a sociologist like Browning. You evinced no interest in his proposals but that could just be that you are in a very differenct socioeconomic place.
Thank you for understanding that I have never heard of Browning. When I was married I had no influence whatsoever on how my marriage was conducted. Now, I don’t have a marriage. I have little personal interest in marriage issues at the moment.
I made no mention of an UNDER AUTHORITY paradigm. Those are your words and reflect your experiences, not mine.
This is the paradigm of those who write and preach the message in my environment. That women are restricted from the pulpit and from having final say in the family. They are UNDER.
I am in favor of an *authority on behalf of* paradigm.
What would that look like? I have only seen two results from compism.
1) Women cannot do x. y, and z;
2) women must submit to their husbands for their entire life and seek to fulfill his goals.
What I perceive are two parallel conversations that do not overlap.
For me, egalism is after the model of Gordon and Maudine Fee. Do you know them? This model is particularly powerful for me because my administrator at work attended Fee’s church. So, for me, I have taken for granted that this is egalism.
It is anti-abortion, anti-divorce, anti-liberal, and evangelical. I will tell you two things about the Fees. First, I have seen Gordon Fee cry as he describes an acquaintance who was unfaithful to his wife. Any kind of marital pain causes him deep pain. I understand that he does some marriage counselling. He is very emotional about marriage breakdown.
Second, I have never before seen so clearly a wife that loved her husband as Maudine does. (Okay, my parents were good together.) But Maudine was there with her husband during his last teaching session watching out for him because of his ill health.
This, to me, is egalism, frank, open love and kindness to each other, and to others. That is all I have seen. This is my model.
I have also sat under the sermons of two other equally famous complementarian theolgians who blame all divorce on women, who call divorced women those who “resist authority” in their life, etc. etc. They just list all the bad things they can about modern women. Those sermons were very painful to me.
I experienced those sermons as abuse. The church I attended with 1000 members denied that they could possibly have any problems with abuse in their church so they had no mention of it and no ministry for abused women. And then the sermons about the rebellious women! And a founder of CBMW in that church!
This is complementarianism to me.
And the Fees are egalism to me.
Does this explain my environment any better.
I see those here who are two career couples, those like the Sumners, where the woman is already equal in every way, and they then talk about how to be complementarian. But where is the help for those women who endure being treated as a lesser life form?
I see your situation, which I do not think would be solved by your having more authority on behalf of your wife. I see it as a particular problem associated with the heavy toll on clergy families. The clergy wife is a traditional role with expectations that is very hard for any modern couple to deal with. I think this is a particularly difficult situation.
I also think, John, that you have vastly misunderstand who I am, and how little I want to promote the obligatory two career family.
I simply want women to be treated as human beings.
Suzanne,
You say,
“I simply want women to be treated as human beings.”
I want that, too, but I want far more than that, and I notice that in the NT the goal of marriage is far larger than your concern.
My point has been and remains: I know many men and women who treat each other very admirably as human beings while living their marriage in one of the following frameworks:
(1) a traditional “love-obey” framework
(2) a soft comp framework
(3) a difficult to label framework non-egal, non-comp framwework like that of the Sumners
(4) an egal framework
I also know of abusive relationships lived out in all of the above frameworks, as well as the hard comp framwork.
To judge by your descriptions in your last comment, your experience is very different. You have the most experience with the one framework I have least first hand experience with: hard compism.
The range of my experiences makes it impossible for me to suggest that traditional, neo-traditional, or egal frameworks are a problem per se. They each have specific risks and specific strengths, to be sure.
Where we differ is that you recognize the risks of non-egal frameworks, but not their strengths, and your recognize the strengths of the egal framework, but not its risks.
“I simply want women to be treated as human beings.”
Amen, Sue.
You were very blessed to have such an excellent example as the Fee’s devotedness to one another. To me that is what true oneness in marriage is about.
In relationships one takes authority on behalf of another when they are not able to do so for themselves or not willing to do so. It is not the ideal. The ideal is that we all be perfect like Christ is perfect. But where one is unable, we who are able are to support and assist.
On the other hand, to take authority on behalf of another when they are able to do so for themselves and want to, is abusive IMO. It is taking away freedoms, involvement, and part of their very life. It is hindering them from growing in that area. Such a relationship is shattering an important element of unity and oneness.
GEM,
Thanks for your sweet comments. I have many complementarian friends who think the world of my wife’s ministry (she is a new church start pastor) and try to fit her into their categories.
They want me to say that she ministers under me, but she doesn’t. She does minister under the authority of men and women in the hierarchical structure of the United Methodist Church – I am thankful for this hierarchy, as I’ve mentioned before; it is one of the strengths of the UMC. But the hierarchy goes according to non-traditional rules. That is, her direct superior at the moment is male, but there have been times in which her direct superior (and mine) has been a woman (the District Superintendent) whose direct superior was a woman (our bishop.
Indeed, we have had a string of woman bishops in Wisconsin, some of which are spoken of highly, others, not so much. Women no less than men in authority have a hard time avoiding two extremes: micro-management on the one hand, and “creative anarchy” on the other.
Paola and I pastor churches that are large enough to have one or more pastors on staff. But Paola would be the first to say that she is not cut out to be a co-pastor. She is a charismatic, creative person and in particular, when she has worked with a senior pastor, she ends up upstaging him or her. Can’t be helped.
This brings me back to another detail typical of ideological forms of egalism. It’s the notion that peer-to-peer forms of authority are best on principle, that hierarchy by definition is bad.
What a load of hooey. Co-pastoring for example has a very spotty track record. It sometimes works with husband and wife teams, but beyond that atypical situation, a chain of command approach has, so far as I know, a better track record.
Authority *on behalf of,* I submit, is freeing for all concerned.
When believer333 speaks of “taking” such authority, the die is already cast against that type of authority.
Authority on behalf of only functions well if it is informed by consent. In government, on the job, in domain-based hierarchy in marriage, and so on.
Many egals on these threads say they are not against authority or hierarchy. But it seems to me that they box in the exercise of authority in ways untrue to real life.
Which brings me to Marilyn’s comment about the realism of a 3/4 time proposal. It’s true that a 30 hour work week for a professional is out of the question. The question for me is not how many hours I work. That is always going to hover over 60 for someone who is as driven as I am, and as my wife is.
The question for me is how much time, a 1/4 time, a 1/2 time, I find for my spouse and for my children. Then I compare that with the full time my mother gave us five kids, and then three more, as I was growing up, and I despair.
Even taking into consideration the law of diminishing returns, how can anyone say with a straight face that the status quo is, for a majority of families, a healthy setup? I understand Browning’s proposal in this light, though it does not apply very literally to professionals.
Paola and I had four hours together today, just the two of us, for the first time in years. She asked me to accompany her to Milwaukee where she was fingerprinted, part of the process of getting citizenship. Then the starter on the car went out, out of the “divine blue” shall I say, and we had a grand old time going through the questions on the exam she will take for citizenship, while waiting for the tow truck for two hours.
She got a huge kick out of the fact that this supposed know-it-all couldn’t name all of the justices on the Supreme Court (I forgot Breyer), explain why they are called justices and not judges, could not name all five major wars in the 1800’s, and so on.
My goodness, it really is true that our newest citizens will know more than those who are citizens hy birth.
John wrote: “My point has been and remains: I know many men and women who treat each other very admirably as human beings while living their marriage in one of the following frameworks:
(1) a traditional “love-obey” framework
(2) a soft comp framework
(3) a difficult to label framework non-egal, non-comp framwework like that of the Sumners
(4) an egal framework
I also know of abusive relationships lived out in all of the above frameworks, as well as the hard comp framwork.”
There are hard comp marriages that work. For that matter, there are free/slave marriages that can work.
Whenever there is a power asymmetry, the risk is that the one with the most power will use it for his own purposes. If he never does that, it can work, IMO.
“There are hard comp marriages that work.”
I suppose that might be the case.
It is also true that power asymmetry creates a greater risk of abuse.
But in the workplace, in society (government and the governed), in the armed forces, in the church (or almost all churches), in the family, and in most marriages on a domain by domain basis, power asymmetry is practiced.
That’s because hierarchy has many advantages, not just downsides.
Authority *on behalf of,* I submit, is freeing for all concerned.
I completely agree…only if we can all agree that the above statement is talking about an ideal, not a reality.
In reality, some of us (like Sue, like me) have been governed by men who’ve truly believed they were acting *on behalf of* us, acting in our best interests. And because some of us (like Sue, like me) were taught that a woman’s place is to submit to her husband’s authority, we had to follow.
Authority *on behalf of* is better than authority *over.* But in all cases, a hierarchy is only as good as the people who are in it. If we are to be chastised for idealizing an egalitarian arrangement, we must also be careful not to idealize a hierarchal one.
Sue,
I really appreciated reading your last comment. Thank you for continuing to be brave enough to put your heart out on the line.
To judge by your descriptions in your last comment, your experience is very different. You have the most experience with the one framework I have least first hand experience with: hard compism.
And I believe that women should simply be rescued from hard comp lives and the rest is simply a matter of interest.
What do you mean by “authority on behalf of.” How would that look? Would the husband have authority on behalf of the wife that was not reciprocal?
Where we differ is that you recognize the risks of non-egal frameworks, but not their strengths, and your recognize the strengths of the egal framework, but not its risks.
What strength does a comp relationship have over an egal? I have not seen this mentioned. I don’t know what it is so I can’t recognise it. I don’t think anyone has mentioned any, have they?
I know some of the comp men have wives that simply go to another church. They have no interest in being comp, so they just live separate lives but in the same house. That is how I see comp marriages – just two individuals who gave up talking eons ago. I know lots of comp couples and this is what many look like to me.
Molly,
Your point is excellent.
The question then is, what makes for positive, life-enhancing *authority on behalf of,* and what makes for its opposite?
In earlier comments, I explored this in terms of making sure that the most basic framework involves a stress on 1 Cor 13 and Phil 2, in other words, a joint commitment to the three theological virtues, faith, hope, and love, and the principle of mutual consent.
It is my sense that when those emphases are in place, traditional, neo-traditional, and egal frameworks all work to the advantage of both spouses.
Suzanne,
I won’t answer your specific questions about healthy comp marriages. I’m not the best person to do so. People like David Lang and Marilyn have described marriages of that kind in some detail. You can ask them for more detail if you wish.
You ask:
“What do you mean by “authority on behalf of.” How would that look? Would the husband have authority on behalf of the wife that was not reciprocal?”
On a domain by domain basis, yes. I’ve described this before. In an overall sort of way, yes, if the marriage is comp. Once again, David and Marilyn are better sources than I on how that works for comps today. I have often described how that worked and still works for those raised in the “love-obey” framework, a framework, BTW, very strong on domain-based hierarchy. It is out of that culture, too, in Wisconsin, that we get the saying,
“When Mama’s not happy, no one is happy.”
John, you wrote,
I want that, too, but I want far more than that, and I notice that in the NT the goal of marriage is far larger than your concern.
My concern is this. Christians should ensure women basic dignity, basic basic normal human dignity. And then when that is somewhat resolved, at least some attention of any kind paid to that, then talk about the fancy stuff.
On a domain by domain basis, yes.
So, does “authority on behalf of” go by domain? That is, both husband and wife have authority to act on behalf of the family? Or just the husband?
And how does this relate to the idea of authority OVER, and the notion that the ESVSB is based on – that the Son is subject to the authority of the Father and obedient to his will … and that is how human relationships should be. Is the wife subject to the authority of the husband in “authority on behalf of” or not? If so, wouldn’t this still be “authority over?”
I mentioned domain-based authority months ago on the internet as what I saw as acceptable and natural. But I have never seen this term used by comps in writing. Is it? I have not seen a citation for either “domain-based authority” or “authority on behalf of.” I introduced both concepts some time ago, and now these are put to me as compism. But I have no evidence for why this is being done.
All I know about comps is this
- women cannot do x, y. and z.
- husbands get final say, however the husband defines this
Are you saying that this is not how compism is?
I am baffled. All compism seems to fit these two criteria. How does this empower women? And how is this a building up kind of authority?
I have to admit that I have lost a thread of thought here, so bear with me.
“When Mama’s not happy, no one is happy.”
I am asking you to believe that there are those who just stand up at theological seminaries and call all unhappy women “rebellious resisters” of the truth. The subtext is that they are going to the hot place.
Co-pastoring for example has a very spotty track record. It sometimes works with husband and wife teams, but beyond that atypical situation, a chain of command approach has, so far as I know, a better track record.
I do not deny the necessity of chain of command nor hierarchy in certain instances (the armed forces, for example, or structure of a large organization). In these cases it is necessary for them to function properly. But…is this necessary in a marriage? It is not necessary or in any way desirable in a deep friendship, as Pepper Schwartz points out; indeed, she claims (and I can’t see how it couldn’t be true) that deep friendship precludes hierarchy.
To your words above, I would hazard that a good part of the reason neither co-pastorates nor some marriages work well in a peer arrangement is because the partners are not truly cooperative or collaborative. In such a situation, the only way to keep the peace and get anything done is for one to “lead” and the other “follow.” I’ve seen many a situation like this, and it makes me so sad! Because of pride, selfishness, insecurity, you name it, two good people can’t get along unless one assumes a position over the other. They cannot honor one another as equals. This is wrong!
Christianity cannot ensure things like basic dignity to anyone. No one can. Not even a totalitarian system with the best of intentions, like that imagined in a brilliant movie, the Truman Show, is able to keep people from hurting themselves or other people.
What Christianity does is teach people things like Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, and Philippians 2. If people practice Christianity in that sense, there is no way that they will take the basic dignity of another person away from them. Along with all the fancy stuff, the ordinary stuff is given as well.
I know as well as anyone that it is not that simple. I know what it’s like when mental illness and Christianity (or any other altruistic ideal) combine. They combust into a raging fire. The years I served as a pastor in which my superior, the senior pastor, was in and out of the psych ward with bipolar disorder, were difficult, sometimes hellish.
The way the world is, if someone is vicious enough, by disease, intent, or a combination thereof, to take away the dignity of another, there are plenty of circumstances in which they will be able to do so.
I finished confirmation class a couple of hours ago. In the candelight of a communion service, people recounted the things they are thankful for, as well as the horrors of life. Out of 15 people in the room, 3 are victims of incest (1), severe physical abuse by a mother (2), or severe verbal abuse by a father (1). Another 5 have a close relative who is a victim of abuse. Another 7 were mute. Who knows about them. Well, I know about one.
As usual, abuse correlates strongly with divorce, split custody, broken homes, foster care, mental illness, etc.
All of these things are incredibly painful. I realize you think the answer is to criminalize things that are now legal. Make it more difficult for people to hurt others and hurt themselves.
I could be wrong, but my impression is that if you take away a particular means of destructive and self-destructive behavior from people, they quickly find another, more efficient means.
I believe in repression, don’t get me wrong. Freud said that repression is the foundation of civilization.
But that’s just Romans 13 remixed. It’s not the gospel. The gospel is in the rest of Romans, 5-7, 8, and 12.
My co-teacher in confirmation class is a survivor of incest. She is a gutsy person, to say the least. Her faith is stubborn and strong. She has refused to let circumstances make her an unhappy person. Not her marriage to a man who does not understand her. Not the incest. Not the fatal rare disease she carries in her body, which should have taken her life 5 years ago, but for reasons the doctors at Mayo cannot explain, has not. Already as a teenager, she heard about a twenty year old who was brutally raped at knife point behind a convenience store. She called the young woman up, older than she was, and counseled her and her fiancee with six straight months, telling them that if she could get through incest, they could get through rape.
To this day, they send her a card once a year thanking her for saving their life.
Out of evil good can come, says my co-teacher. If she can say it, and mean it, and live by it, perhaps the rest of us can, too.
You give good reason, John, why women need to make decisions and not be brainwashed into being under someone elses authority.
I wouldn’t be so frantic if I did not believe that there are other women out there like me that aren’t being helped by anyone.
I think everyone who is a victim of a crime wants to prevent this for others.
John’s reference to his experiences with a bi-polar superior brought back some painful memories of my own.
My dad’s first wife, who died of cancer when she was in her late 30s, was bi-polar. The pain she caused her family is almost unspeakable, and its effects are still seen in the lives of my half-sibs and their children.
From the rare conversations with my dad about that period in his life, I have concluded that love and respect – irrespective of whether the terms are as defined by a comp model or an egal model – are concepts that a manic spouse is physiologically unable to process.
I know what it’s like when mental illness and Christianity (or any other altruistic ideal) combine. They combust into a raging fire. The years I served as a pastor in which my superior, the senior pastor, was in and out of the psych ward with bipolar disorder, were difficult, sometimes hellish.
So…you have my curiousity aroused. I know it’s slightly off topic, but what would your advice be to someone who is married to a bipolar person?
I agree with Marilyn.
There are sicknesses such as bipolar disorder and Alzheimer’s which make it impossible to apply the specific advice Paul and Peter, not to mention Sarah and Jim Sumner, gave with sane people in mind.
I think the key with bipolar disorder is that the one who has it fully acknowledges that he or she does, and accepts the guidance of others on that basis.
If the mentally ill person lacks self-awareness, damage control becomes a constant necessity.
I wish I knew of silver bullets, but I don’t.
Hum.
The more I research, the more I am realizing how very hopeless my personal situation may be.
John: “Christianity cannot ensure things like basic dignity to anyone. No one can.”
Sue: “You give good reason, John, why women need to make decisions and not be brainwashed into being under someone elses authority.”
Yup and Yup.
The above conversation from Wednesday was going through my head this morning when I pulled out a notebook of scriptures for review.
I Corinthians 6:1 Jumped out at me.
“Do any of you, when he has a case against his neighbor, dare to go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints?”
Sure, we cannot ENSURE basic dignity to anyone.
Yet Paul makes it clear that injustices between believers should be dealt with in the church.
I think the word “neighbors” throws people. Husbands and wives don’t look at each other as neighbors. Yet “Love thy neighbor as thyself” applies to husbands and wives. So do scriptures concerning conflict.
I do believe in gender differences (borrowing from another thread). But I don’t believe that gender differences disqualify women from leadership positions. I believe keeping women out of those positions makes the church less able to make a balanced decision in the case of an abused woman. Not just an abused woman but any woman.
Look at the case brought before Jesus of the woman caught in adultery. Where was the man caught in adultery in that society where men ruled? Did the law of Moses say only women are to be stoned for adultery?
Oh, Molly, there is always hope. An example of hope can be found in the story of Kay Jamison. She is a psychologist and a university professor who holds joint appointments at UCLA and Johns Hopkins. She is also bi-polar. Her best-selling memoir, An Unquiet Mind, depicts her journey from initial diagnosis to acceptance of the diagnosis (i.e., acceptance of the drug regimen that stabilizes her moods). As is true for most people with bi-polar disorder, her journey was a long one. It was measured not in weeks or months, but, rather, in years. But, she made it.
That’s the key, I think: acceptance of the diagnosis.
BTW, that applies to us all. We are sin-sick people. As soon as we pretend otherwise, we cannot possibly receive the help we need and that we are offered through the saving work of Christ.
I’ve been wanting to respond on the topic of mental illness but wasn’t quite sure how. I’m still not, but will take a stab. I think that it appears in people in varying degrees; some people live quite “normally” with mild cases such that they are never diagnosed by a professional. Or, it comes and goes, in much greater degree in some than in others. My hunch is that most people are somewhere on this continuum.
Serious bipolar/depression runs in my family of origin. My father was hospitalized several times and then died by his own hand; my brother has been hospitalized. I am pretty certain I have bipolar/depression tendencies as well, although they’ve never been diagnosed. But I was bulimic for many years (my family doesn’t know.) But I never sought treatment, for various reasons.
Because of all this, desire for health/healing — deep, lasting health — has been a very strong motivator in my life. I have learned that a great deal of what claims to represent health really doesn’t! So many “prescriptions” are either ignorant or a sham, whether well-intentioned or not. (Actually, I’d go so far as to say that intention that ignores evidence that it’s not attaining what it claims, yet still preaches its message, isn’t well-intentioned; it’s selling snake oil. It is exploitative and manipulative.)
Satan is the great Pretender, the great Deceiver. He makes the good look bad, and vice-versa. I’m convinced that a great deal of mental illness involves being so deceived, on a profound level.
The material which has been most helpful to me over time is that which has illustrated the true difference between good and evil. It has helped me discern this difference in both myself and others — books by C. S. Lewis and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Boundaries by Cloud & Townsend, writings of Thomas Merton, Martin Luther's biography, and a gem I just read — Cornelius Plantinga, Jr.'s Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin. There have been many others.
I am so grateful to God for what He has taught me that I can’t express it, though I wish I could. I try to do so by passing on what I’ve learned. He has healed me and shown me good beyond what I ever hoped, because it was beyond even what I could envision! My relationship with my mother is restored beyond what I ever thought possible. My marriage has overcome difficulties. Not that such recovery was easy — good grief, no. I’ve had a lot to reckon with, both within and without. (And the reckoning, if on a smaller scale, goes on.)
But I’m sharing all this as a testimony to God in Christ, and as an encouragement to those who may need it. I don’t share these things readily, but when it appears that it may help someone else, then I must speak.
So, Molly, and Sue, and Marilyn, and anyone who’s ever experienced or known someone with mental illness and experienced the effects of it, I have prayed for you all. And I can testify that there is hope!
I am not aware of having dealt with mental illness at all. I don’t think it was a factor. I perceive that there was a belief system and perhaps an over rigid upbringing that caused a certain lack of mental flexibility. However, in work and relationships outside the family, there was never any sign of abnormal function, in any way. All was very controlled and set within an overall context of normalcy but conservative and rigid values.
I would have been happy to pass some of it off as mental illness, but it does not appear to be the case, nor has anyone who knows us ever suggested that it was a factor.
I continue to attribute much of what happened to pervasive misogyny in his family and rigid Christian boundaries, combined with certain personal tendencies.
I do not even in the tiniest way, believe that men should have authority over women, as long as we exempt those men who are mentally ill from the equation. I believe that the notion that women should be under male authority comes from a deep hatred of women, such as I experienced, and that women are deeply scarred by such an experience.
BTW, that applies to us all. We are sin-sick people. As soon as we pretend otherwise, we cannot possibly receive the help we need and that we are offered through the saving work of Christ.
I think John hit it on the head here. We are all sin sick people. Everyone is sin sick. That means that here is not one individual on this planet, male or female, who should be given “authority” over a full time live in life long mate. That is a recipe for the deepest misery, unless it really is a poodle or some other pet.
PS I let my dog have off leash play in the woods every day.
I agree that “authority over” is bad, not just in the husband-wife relationship, but in all relationships.
‘Authority over” as used here expresses abusive authority, a domineering approach to another human being. It expresses something that is wrong, a veritable evil. It does not matter whether the person “over” whom authority is exercised is a spouse, a child, or an employee.
But there is another kind of authority. It is “authority on behalf of.” All relationships are needful of this kind of authority. A sin sick world needs positive authority more than anything else, in particular, the kind that Jesus exercised, whereby the crowds noted that he had real authority.
Real authority is what Jesus modeled for us, in the power of the keys (forgiving and retaining sins), sacrificial love, and in yielding to the moral authority of the Syro-Phoenician woman (authority on behalf of her daughter; more generally, pikuach nefesh in Jewish thought, whereby the need to avert a life-threatening situation requires setting aside the dictates of framework and law).
Real, life-enhancing authority, which authorizes and delegates, applies to the husband-wife relationship, and it works both ways, in both comp and egal frameworks.
The basis is domain-based hierarchy. That is, there are domains in which my wife takes the lead, and I follow her lead. In those domains, she exercises “authority on behalf of.”
Likewise, there are domains in which I take the lead, and she follows my lead.
The parceling out of domains will be by mutual consent in either framework. The Bible praises the parceling out of domains, and the trust on which it is founded in both the Old and New Testaments as I have demonstrated before.
I am in sharp disagreement with fellow egals who fail to develop positive concepts of authority and hierarchy. Egalism is compatible with a marriage model that emphasizes the importance of the exercise of positive authority on the part of husband and wife, and the liberating quality of hierarchy in that setting, but is not a substitute for them.
It appears that no other self-identifying egal on these threads is willing to do more than concede in principle that things like positive exercise of authority and domain-based hierarchy are necessary components of a healthy marriage.
The concession, I would suggest, is not enough. As with the question of gender-specific advice, it is not convincing to suggest that you are fine with it, and then leave out practical consequences.
The kind of authority exercised in a marriage should be, biblically speaking, peer-to-peer authority. But this is not the same thing as saying that the exercise of authority in marriage is not along hierarchical lines. It is hierarchical on a domain-by-domain basis, and, in a complementarian framework or traditional framework, in terms of overall authority.
But in case of disagreement, “authority on behalf of” is also granted in an egal framework to one of the parts, not both. The exercise of such authority will almost inevitably feel like “authority over.” There is simply no way to avoid this problem. Egals fool themselves if they think they can.
Some egal marriages fail precisely because a couple imagines that the principle of mutual consent will get them through every situation. It does not and will not.
Sooner or later, usually sooner, someone gets in the habit of exercising veto power, or a pocket veto, even and precisely within an egal framework. I have observed this over and over again. It is one of the subtle risks of an egal framework.
In a comp framework, the risk is out in the open because, on a default basis, overall authority is delegated to the husband. If the relationship is fundamentally sound, that is, if love and respect characterize the marriage, the overall authority granted to the husband is exercised with fear and trepidation by the husband, with the result that he will, as the occasion requires, yield to the gift-based or moral authority of his spouse.
Just as Jesus yielded to the moral authority of the Syro-Phoenician woman – her authority on behalf of her daughter.
We are in a sin-sick world. The solution is not law (though we need laws).
The solution is certainly not to suggest that a husband should not exercise authority on behalf of his wife. Indeed, the more such authority he exercises (and his spouse exercises), the better.
The exercise of authority is not a zero-sum game. Indeed, the more positive authority God exercises on our behalf, the more authority in the same positive sense is granted us.
Again, the solution is certainly not the suggestion that a wife should not exercise authority on behalf of the husband and the whole family. The more authority is delegated to the wife or shared by her according to mutual consent, the better. If the authority is on behalf of, the authority the one on whose behalf it is exercised is not thereby diminished.
The solution to our sin-sick is the gospel. Being right with God and each other is based on faith (trust and believing that the other is better than oneself) by grace alone (forgiveness).
Or, as Paul says, we have nothing, literally nothing, except by means of three things, faith, hope, and love. Living in this way is not a fancy extra. It is essential and necessary.
Those who settle for less, whether they realize it or not, settle for a miserable fraction of that which God wants for us.
I agree that “authority over” is bad, not just in the husband-wife relationship, but in all relationships.
And that is what I have been arguing. It really is that bad. That is the teaching that I have been protesting. It is evil.
The solution to our sin-sick is the gospel.
I persist in my obscurantist thinking that legal improvements such as women being able to earn a living, own property and vote are still useful. I do not believe that the “gospel” as an isolate is sufficient in our society. It is just because of the gospel that women’s lot has improved. Men just have to decide if they want to be part of the problem or part of the solution.
I have no theology of “authority on behalf of” within marriage, for the simple reason that this is not my need right now. It is not the need of half of women. They need to have authority on behalf of their children or their parents or whomever is under their care. They are not trying to restrict their children or parents from having authority, they are trying to enhance their lives. I have yet to see where egals do not believe in this.
However, any theology that teaches that women are not providers and protectors make women who are just that, feel like they are thoroughly disrespected and not recognized. Much of the rhetoric I hear from some people, makes me, as a single woman, feel seriously disrespected. I feel like people are saying that I do not care for, or have authority on behalf of my children.
Fortunately I do have an unusually strong and positive relationship with my children, so all the remarks which make me feel that egalitarians are missing the mark as parents I recognize as completely untrue. They are highly hurtful to me, but I know they are totally wrong.
The rhetoric of disrespect for the single egal mother has gone on long enough. Let’s say some things that are not about marriage for a change.
Let’s just imagine that a man could look on a single woman as someone who solves, throughout a week, all the same problems that other couples take two people to cope with.
And now because she is a woman, do we imagine that she couldn’t really be doing that because she needs a man to have authority over/on behalf of or whatever.
I want to talk about the reality of the “other” half of the world – those who are not married for a change of topic. I live without male “authority on behalf of” much better than I once lived under male “authority over.” So given the choice between the two, there is only one answer.
Sorry, Sue. I didn’t mean to misrepresent your situation. I also in no way meant to give anyone with mental illness a pass. I think that’s something that our society does in many cases, some rightly (criminal, for example) and some wrongly; but it should never be a complete pass. People so deranged that they are not responsible for their actions belong in a special facility, away from those whom they might harm!
I merely meant to say that not all cases of mental illness are hopeless, and that I think that all of them involve sin-sickness, perhaps even more extreme than the “usual,” which must be dealt with in order for true healing to take place.
SUE said:Let’s just imagine that a man could look on a single woman as someone who solves, throughout a week, all the same problems that other couples take two people to cope with.
Sue, I commend you for the job you are doing!
However, correction: for some couples, there is such a handicap, such immaturity, that the responsibility of coping falls to one. She needs to be vested with the authority to do what she needs to do to protect her family. I think North American culture gives her that authority. I think GOD and the BIBLE recognize her authority. In Titus 2 "KEEPER" of the home is GUARD and PROTECTOR not "domestic servant"!!! However, some versions of "christianity" succeed in robbing her of her authority.
I think that being single might be easier in many ways than coping with a seriously crippled version of "one flesh". Crippled is apparently the rule judging by the divorce rate among Christians.
SOW bad doctrine wrt marriage—>
—>REAP death of marriages
Bonnie and Gem,
Right on!
Bonnie,
I merely meant to say that not all cases of mental illness are hopeless,
This is what I think too. I think mental illness is an illness and can be dealt with in some cases more easily than those who simply hold to what they think is “right belief” or their own sense of “authority.”
Suzanne,
You say,
“given the choice between the two [living under authority over in the bad sense, and living without male authority] there is only one answer.”
If that is how you see your situation, I am not about to argue.
Many of us however experience the joys of authority on behalf of, whether we are comps or egals. It is a thing of beauty.
John wrote: “Many of us however experience the joys of authority on behalf of, whether we are comps or egals. It is a thing of beauty.”
I agree that any authority that one has is supposed to be used to benefit others and the community.
My question to you is who gets to decide whether something is a benefit or not?
My answer is that while it is true the parents decide for a child, an adult decides for themselves as long as they are not harming another.
Thanks, Sarah, for adding further thoughts.
Agreed, Molly. Thanks, Sarah, for following our discussion and for your additional comments. Molly, thanks for alerting us with your comment.
Sarah’s words about Matthew 18 were convicting. I claim to shy away from that passage out of concerns about spiritual abuse. But, if I’m honest, I think that a good part of the reason that I don’t apply that passage is pride.
When I said, in response to Marilyn asking me how I viewed my devotion to my husband,
“I seek to know him, as a person and as a man, by observation and talking with him. I also think of doing right by him, which includes staying committed to our goals and plans together (and making them together) and helping him do the same.”
the italicized part involves holding him to the sort of account as in Matthew 18. It involves holding him accountable to our particular plans (which we’ve promised to uphold together) as well as our callings to truly love one another in Christ (a mutual goal). Of course, he must also do the same for me
I should add: I don’t see my duties as a Christian as separate from my duties as a wife; in other words, doing right by Christ is the same as doing right by my husband, and vice-versa. Same as everything I do.
If that is how you see your situation, I am not about to argue.
Then it would be really nice if you kept to that offer.
Many of us however experience the joys of authority on behalf of, whether we are comps or egals. It is a thing of beauty.
As far as I am concerned, it goes without saying that every woman wants to be part of a couple (in my case heterosexual) and have someone who does something to benefit them.
But – given the choice between not having that; or being UNDER someone else’s authority, I choose the former. The latter is an inhuman way to live, and I am sorry that there are women who live UNDER authority in their marriage. It is as lonely as not having a partner, because when you are UNDER authority, you do not, of course, have a partner. You are also restricted from many normal friendships.
That is why I will not concede that it is okay if some people want to live that way. Either it is vastly mitigated by tradition and other factors, or it is not a decent way to live.
I also wish to thank Sarah for following this discussion. Her clarifications in the update to the original post are helpful and to the point.
Don,
You say:
“My answer is that while it is true the parents decide for a child, an adult decides for themselves as long as they are not harming another.”
For Christians, however, that answer has limited scope and is not entirely satisfactory.
First of all, all of our decisions are to conform to God’s will for our lives. It is not about deciding for ourselves.
Secondly, in a marriage, either tie-breaking authority is delegated to one member of the couple (traditionally, the husband) – let it be noted that the exercise of tie-breaking authority will be rare in any healthy marriage – or it will be up for grabs on a case by case basis (the non-traditional approach).
Problems can and do arise in marriage models of various kinds, but problems are minimized if passages like 1 Cor 13, Rom 12, and Phil 2 are foundational to the marriage relationship.
Suzanne,
I respect your personal choice completely.
As far as mitigation of inequality (practical, theoretical, or both) is concerned, I see such mitigation as one small part of what Paul and Peter accomplish in their counsel.
It is possible to live according to a patriarchal arrangement and be faithful to their counsel. Indeed, many have and still do around the world. But it is literally impossible to be faithful to their whole counsel and be abusive of one’s spouse.
Paul and Peter’s larger goals, however, are quite different from the goal of mitigation, and therefore they make matters worse, not better, from the point of view of those whose primary or even exclusive goal is to lessen the chances that a woman is abused by a man in a marriage.
Thus it is possible for Peter to call on wives to endure abuse for the purpose – and only if that purpose is served – of winning a husband to Christ.
John wrote: “Secondly, in a marriage, either tie-breaking authority is delegated to one member of the couple (traditionally, the husband) – let it be noted that the exercise of tie-breaking authority will be rare in any healthy marriage – or it will be up for grabs on a case by case basis (the non-traditional approach).”
And here is exactly the point, the wife can say she does not agree that the husband is the tie-breaking authority. This claim depends on her consent, if she consents it is true; if not, then it is not true. If the husband or anyone else violates her consent, it is a boundary violation.
Don says,
“the wife can say she does not agree that the husband is the tie-breaking authority.”
Or she can say that she agrees that the husband is the tie-breaking authority. I just married a bride who determined that on her own, without prior consent from her groom!
In the egal marriage model, it can go either way. In the traditional and complementarian models, it cannot. That is the difference. It seems to me that all three models are supportable from scripture. I know which one is connatural to who I am, but I see no grounds for criticizing the vast majority of Christian couples around the world who conceive of their marriage in traditional or neo-traditional terms, so long as ! Cor 13 is the touchstone of their marriage.
John wrote: “In the egal marriage model, it can go either way. In the traditional and complementarian models, it cannot. That is the difference. It seems to me that all three models are supportable from scripture. I know which one is connatural to who I am, but I see no grounds for criticizing the vast majority of Christian couples around the world who conceive of their marriage in traditional or neo-traditional terms, so long as 1 Cor 13 is the touchstone of their marriage.”
1 Cor 13 says that agape love “does not insist on its own way” and I agree that a marriage should demonstrate that.
Perhaps you do not see the contradiction in what you wrote, so I will spell it out for you. 1 Cor 13 flies in the face of the idea that one gender gets their way whenever they decide to get it. One cannot follow 1 Cor 13 and ALSO mandate wifely obedience. You get to pick one but not both.
Don,
You say,
“One cannot follow 1 Cor 13 and ALSO mandate wifely obedience. You get to pick one but not both.”
So far as I can see, this is not the case.
If the fact that 1 Cor 13 impresses upon us that “love does not insist on its own way” rules out the possibility that the one who loves expects obedience from the one she or he loves, then Paul could not have commanded that children obey their parents, slaves obey their masters, and wives submit to their husbands in all things.
On your reading of 1 Cor 13, Paul could not have done any of these things. But he does.
It is true, nonetheless, that even the most hierarchical of organizations, for example, the army, the commander in the field still does well not to insist on his own way. Recognition of this fact is also found in manuals of war.
In short, the contradiction you imagine does not exist.
John,
A child is not an adult responsible for their actions (the parents are) and a slave has sold their services.
I am surprised you cannot seem to see the difference between a wife and a child or a wife and a slave. Or perhaps you do not see any difference?
Or perhaps you do not accept the implications of the difference in verbs Paul used, even tho you just quoted them?
If a husband is to submit to his believing wife with no qualifications per Eph 5:21 and a wife is to submit to her believing husband in all things, this is just different ways of saying the same thing.
If something is said once or 10 times by God, it still counts.
Don,
You say,
“If a husband is to submit to his believing wife with no qualifications per Eph 5:21 and a wife is to submit to her believing husband in all things, this is just different ways of saying the same thing.”
As you know, the interpretation you espouse of 5:21 is not one I can accept in good conscience.
If it were valid, it would be equally valid to say that this passage requires that a parent submit to his or her child without qualification. Paul would also be saying that a master must submit to his or her slave without qualification.
This follows from your own understanding of the structure of the pericope, by which 5:21 introduces and is valid for the whole down to 6:9.
Do you have evidence that anyone in antiquity understood the passage as you do?
However, even though I differ with you and other biblical egals on the correct interpretation of Ephesians 5:21, I affirm with you that an egalitarian marriage is just as capable of modeling love and respect as is a comp or traditional marriage.
I don’t understand the question, “Is Sarah Sumner a complementarian or an egalitarian?” In her book, “Men and Women in the Church,” she so clearly states that she finds each of these positions to be lacking and offers a third option that does not neatly fit with either. This is foundational to everything else she explores in the book.
I am not (I promise I am not) speculating on others’ motives when I ask: is the need to identify Dr. Sumner as one or the other driven by our inability to see this issue through a lens other than polarization? Are we so married to these two positions that we cannot embrace a biblical interpretation that falls into neither of them?
odooley wrote:
I am not (I promise I am not) speculating on others’ motives when I ask: is the need to identify Dr. Sumner as one or the other driven by our inability to see this issue through a lens other than polarization? Are we so married to these two positions that we cannot embrace a biblical interpretation that falls into neither of them?
You raise a very important point. I’m sorry that my question at the end of the post was not clearer. It’s what is called an inclusive-or question, as opposed to an exclusive-or question. But even at that, it’s still not as clear as it should be. I realized at the time I wrote that post that Sarah did not self-identify as either an egalitarian or complementarian. I should have worded my question at the end differently so that it did not have the appearance that I was asking which one of these two options–and no other–was Sarah?
You are exactly right that one does not need to identify as a member of either camp. In some ways I think I’m not a member of either camp myself. Perhaps that’s why I’m so concerned about trying to bring greater understanding and reconciliation among the parties. Maybe I am what the blog name says, a complegalitarian!
Whatever I am, I know that I want to be fully biblical and not hold to any other beliefs, no matter how logical they might be, which I cannot fully support from biblical teaching. It sounds like that’s where you want to be also. Maybe we should have more blog posts about this “other” option. I’m not even sure how to define it, at this point, so if you have any ideas, I would welcome them.
We could call you guys, “The Mysterious Middle,” or, maybe the “The People Who Don’t Fit In Either Box, ” or, “The Misfits,” but…then again…perhaps you are the “Altogether Above It All’s”…?
Yeah, Molly, but a rose by any other name is still a rose! Don’t we smell nice?
Btw, this makes me want to ask a question. When you said that you want to be fully biblical, do you consider historical background a part of being biblical, or do you consider biblical to be “text only” in nature?
Now, the cup of coffee is gone, and I suppose that means I can’t sit here in pajamas anymore… (I got to sleep in this fine morning PAST 8 o’clock, for the first time in…I don’t know how long, maybe a couple months, and OH i feel so good and relaxed…aaaaahhhh)…
From what I sit, the “mysterious middle” is so mysterious that I do not know how it can even exist by the “law of the excluded middle”. That is, once one defines egal, for example, then everything that is not egal is non-egal. For example, in marriage, egals say neither male nor female gets to make a final decision in regards to the couple simply by the fact that one is male or female. If you do not think this is true, then you are non-egal, as least as far as I can see.
Molly asked:
Btw, this makes me want to ask a question. When you said that you want to be fully biblical, do you consider historical background a part of being biblical, or do you consider biblical to be “text only” in nature?
Molly, if you are referring to the historical background of the biblical text, the answer for myself is a strong yes. If you are referring to historical background of interpretations of particular Bible passages, I am growing in appreciation for this background, as well. We conservative evangelicals have sometimes thrown the baby out with the bathwater with our insistence on Sola Scriptura. I think sometimes we dismiss historical interpretations of the Scripture even more than those who first coined the notion of Sola Scriptura (who, I suspect, would not be comfortable with all aspects of how we conservative evangelicals today use and interpret the Bible).
Don wrote:
From what I sit, the “mysterious middle” is so mysterious that I do not know how it can even exist by the “law of the excluded middle”. That is, once one defines egal, for example, then everything that is not egal is non-egal. For example, in marriage, egals say neither male nor female gets to make a final decision in regards to the couple simply by the fact that one is male or female. If you do not think this is true, then you are non-egal, as least as far as I can see.
Don, having grown up with classical Aristotelian logic, as you probably have, I can identify fully with what you have just said. In terms of strictly Western logical categories, you are right. And I’m not suggesting that I am part of mysterious or excluded middle. I just am not comfortable wearing a categorical label. It’s a relational thing with me. And it’s also my attempt to be open to Semitic logic that pervades the Bible so much. We wrestle with biblical paradoxes and “mysteries.” Somehow it all makes sense to God. I struggle with logic and the Bible and interpretation of it and truth and our grasp of it. But I don’t give up just because everything in the Bible is not stated as clearly as I would prefer. There are so many things in the Bible that I do know are taught wo clearly, such as loving one another, submitting to one another, preferring one another, serving one another, etc. I think my wife and I have an egalitarian marriage. But I also know that I have inherited some aspects of my patriarchal ancestry which makes some assumptions about male and female roles in terms of housework, etc. I’m trying to be more considerate of my wife (especially since she has been sick for several years) and share housework more. And we always discuss our decisions together.
Since that may come across as too “fuzzy,” let me just say that I identify a lot with what Sarah Sumners has said, which I quote in this post, about whether or not she is a complementarian or an egalitarian. She speaks biblical truth to both sides in a way that I appreciate.
So, is Sarah a complementarian or an egalitarian? I’m not sure she wants to be considered either. She has grown in her understanding of what it means for her to submit to her husband, Jim. And he has grown in his understanding of how he can sacrifcially love her. I suspect that he also “submits” to her, in a way that is in harmony with overall biblical teaching about how we are to act toward each other.
I’m not disagreeing with you, Don. I’m trying to explain how I struggle as I try to become more Christlike in terms of our marriage and how I treat women in ministry. I don’t want to follow my tradition if there is a better pattern taught in the Bible.
I am also big on doing our best to have a Hebrew mindset rather than a Greek one.
I also am not a big fan of labels, so if Sumner wants to claim she is not egal and not comp, it would help if she would explain what she IS.
Even tho I am egal, I agree egal is not the highest principle, love is; and justice, mercy and freedom are higher than egal in my thinking also and perhaps others.
Don wrote:
I also am not a big fan of labels, so if Sumner wants to claim she is not egal and not comp, it would help if she would explain what she IS.
Yeah, I understand. But I suspect that Sumner would rather not be labeled. And I know that feeling also. I don’t like to be labeled. There is a fair amount of baggage that goes with labels, including being misunderstood, accused of being unbiblical (by either side), etc.
I’ll tell you, in summary, what I have come to believe, over time:
I believe that husbands and wives are to submit to each other, just as all Christian in the Body of Christ are to (Eph. 5:21). Christian women are not exempted from this toward their own husbands (Eph. 5:22).
I believe that husbands are to sacrificially love their wives, as Christ loved the church.
I believe that the warning to one or more women in 1 Tim. 2 was about a particular local problem. I don’t believe that 1 Tim. 2 contains a prohibition on women not to preach or have positions of spiritual authority. (And as soon as I say that, many of my Christian friends will think that I have gone “liberal” or heretical. And our missionary income depends on trying to stay in the good graces of those who donate for our salary.)
I don’t find any passage in the Bible that says that the gifts of God are distributed according to gender.
OK, you can probably figure out what category I might be in from what I have just said. But please don’t say the category label too loudly. I don’t have too many more years until retirement and I’d like our missionary income to remain until then. Ahah! So now we know the bottom line!
And I really do want good fellowship with those who disagree with me and believe that there is a hierarchy of roles and that women must not have authority over men within the divinely established hierarchy. I launched this blog so that those who disagree over gender issues might learn to talk to each other without condemnation.