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God as Father
Download a printer-friendly version in Scripture uses various metaphors in speaking of God, and “father” is a salient biblical metaphor for God. Because God is not literally a father (i.e., a man who procreates), God is, therefore, a father in a metaphorical sense. 
Read "Equal in Being, Unequal in Role"
Download a printer-friendly version in In response to reader requests, you can now read the chapter I wrote, "Equal in Being, Unequal in Role" which is Chapter 18 of the book Discovering Biblical Equality published by InterVarsity Press. This chapter is provided with permission of InterVarsity Press.
The Bible and Gender Equality
Download a printer-friendly version in What is Biblical Equality?Evangelical egalitarianism, or biblical equality, refers to the biblically-based belief that gender, in and of itself, neither privileges nor curtails a believer’s gifting or calling to any ministry in the church or home. In particular, the exercise of spiritual authority, as biblically defined, is deemed as much a female believer’s privilege and responsibility as it is a male believer’s. Biblical equality does not mean women and men are identical or undifferentiated. Biblical egalitarians recognize average differences (both learned and intrinsic) between women and men, and affirm that God designed men and women to complement and benefit one another. Although it shares with feminism the belief that unjust treatment of women should be remediated, biblical equality is not grounded in feminist ideology, which is derived from cultural factors and philosophies. Rather, biblical equality is grounded simply and solely in the properly consistent interpretation of God’s written word. On this basis, biblical egalitarians (a) affirm that the gifts and callings of the Spirit are distributed without regard to gender, and that all believers in Christ stand on equal ground before God, and (b) repudiate the notion that the Bible grants to men spiritual authority and other religious privileges that it denies to women. Continue reading "The Bible and Gender Equality"
Searching for Woman's Place in Evangelicalism
Download a printer-friendly version in A review of God’s Daughters: Evangelical Women and the Power of Submission by R. Marie Griffith (University of California Press, 1997). R. Marie Griffith’s inside look at the culture and beliefs of the Women’s Aglow Fellowship, an international charismatic Christian women’s organization, illuminates how and why so many evangelical women support and identify with the doctrine of female submission to male authority. This, in my estimation, is the book’s most valuable contribution. Continue reading "Searching for Woman's Place in Evangelicalism"
Where Do Biblical Egalitarians Go from Here?
Download a printer-friendly version in Since the early 1990s, the evangelical gender debate has become polarized and unproductive. We have learned much, solidified our arguments, and encouraged one another; but public discourse on the basic question of the relationship between gender and spiritual authority rarely informs and often offends. Continue reading "Where Do Biblical Egalitarians Go from Here?"
Review of Christel Manning, God Gave Us the Right: Conservative Catholic, Evangelical Protestant, and Orthodox Jewish Women Grapple with FeminismNew Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1999
Download a printer-friendly version in In this carefully done ethnographic study, religion professor Christel Manning offers an intriguing picture of the lives and beliefs of women in conservative religious traditions today. Manning surveys and assesses responses to feminist social values and the secular feminist movement by women in an Orthodox Jewish synagogue, a charismatic evangelical church, and a Catholic parish with a fairly large conservative constituency. She finds that religiously conservative women are not all alike; different religious traditions produce different responses to the issues and tensions in their lives and communities. Manning also finds that these women share many concerns with women in general (e.g., balancing work and family, ensuring good child care, winning cultural respect for motherhood, discomfort with certain aspects of the feminist movement), and that they have accepted and appropriated many feminist values (e.g., vocational choice for women, equal opportunity and equal pay in the workplace, equal opportunity for political leadership and other positions of authority). However, religiously conservative women’s appropriation of feminist values is highly selective and individualized when it comes to their negotiation of roles, responsibilities, and authority in the home, and it is nearly suspended altogether in their views of women’s place in the church or synagogue.
God’s Word for Women
Download a printer-friendly version in Luke 1:39-56There they were, an unmarried teen-aged girl and the aging wife of a priest, in mutual amazement at God’s divine plan. Of all the people on earth at that time, they alone knew that the Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, was even then being formed in Mary’s womb. The most astonishing, exciting, world-shattering news ever given to anyone was delivered by the Holy Spirit, directly and initially, to Mary and to Elizabeth. Continue reading "God’s Word for Women"
Strange Bedfellows: Strategies Shared by Darwinists and Traditionalists
Download a printer-friendly version in It all began with a dinner table conversation that my husband and I enjoyed with Phillip Johnson and his wife a few years ago.1 In listening to Johnson’s quiet complaints of how the prejudices and presuppositions of Darwinists have shaped public discourse on the question of life’s origin, I recognized a familiar pattern. Much of what Johnson had observed concerning the contours of the debate between Darwinists and creationists, I also had observed in the debate between evangelical traditionalists and egalitarians.2 Continue reading "Strange Bedfellows: Strategies Shared by Darwinists and Traditionalists"
Leading Him Up the Garden Path: Further Thoughts on 1 Timothy 2:11-15
Download a printer-friendly version in Ever since I set forth a more-or-less representative egalitarian interpretation of 1 Timothy 2:11-15 in Good News for Women, I have felt somewhat dissatisfied with this approach. Although I found it considerably less problematic than the traditionalist interpretation, still it left me with some nagging questions. For instance, if women at Ephesus were not to teach or to have authority in the church because they were deceived or unschooled, why were they specifically prohibited only from teaching or having authority over men? And if Paul were addressing women and men in general, why did he speak in terms of “a woman” and “a man”? It has seemed to me that the peculiar wording of the prohibition holds important clues to Paul’s original intent in writing these words to Timothy at Ephesus. I have also suspected that the reference to Adam and Eve is not merely illustrative, but integral to the meaning and purpose of the prohibition. Both the standard egalitarian and traditionalist interpretations fall short of resolving these questions and concerns. Continue reading "Leading Him Up the Garden Path: Further Thoughts on 1 Timothy 2:11-15"
Questions That Mislead the Gender Debate
Download a printer-friendly version in Political polls unnerve me. The questions are carefully phrased such that one’s answer must support the perspective of the pollster (not unlike the classic question, “Have you stopped beating your wife yet?”). When those who set the agenda also pose the questions, the debate easily veers off into conceptual territory that is favorable to those who are framing it. We need to keep an eye out for questions that serve more as assertions than genuine queries. Continue reading "Questions That Mislead the Gender Debate"
Southern Baptists and the Subordination of Women
Download a printer-friendly version in The Southern Baptist declaration that the subordination of women is an essential Christian belief is but another sad chapter in the history of biblical misinterpretation and illogic in the church. Thinking they must protect the flock from the egregious errors of secular feminism, the denomination has fallen into the equal and opposite error of asserting a hierarchy of male authority. Their certainty that this is what the Bible “clearly” teaches is ill-founded. As a Puritan divine once said, “There may yet be more truth to break forth from God’s Word.” Continue reading "Southern Baptists and the Subordination of Women"
Logical and Theological Problems with Gender Hierarchy
Download a printer-friendly version in The debate over biblical teaching on gender roles has focused primarily on the exegetical intricacies of a handful of controversial texts, with neither side able to answer completely every objection or difficulty with their position. After more than two decades, it seems clear that this approach is not exactly moving the discussion toward resolution. Perhaps there are other perspectives from which this disagreement may be assessed more productively. Continue reading "Logical and Theological Problems with Gender Hierarchy"
Sexuality, Spirituality and Feminist Religion
Download a printer-friendly version in For many evangelicals, there is only one sort of feminism—the sort that rejects the authority of the Bible and replaces it with a religion that is devised by women and for women. This attitude is not entirely without basis; for the kind of religious feminism that has received the most publicity and recognition does reject biblical authority. In fact, it seems that most people on both the conservative and liberal sides of the theological spectrum are, at best, only faintly aware of a truly evangelical feminism that is grounded in a view of Scripture as authoritative in its entirety. Continue reading "Sexuality, Spirituality and Feminist Religion"
Biblical Submission within Marriage
Download a printer-friendly version in What we have been told the Bible teaches versus what the Bible really teaches1. The man is the head of the home, which means he is to run the home, and other family members are required to submit to his God-ordained leadership. Response: The New Testament says that the man (or husband) is the head of the woman (or wife), not that the man is the head of the home. Moreover, when Paul says this (in two NT passages), he does not use “head” to mean the “boss,” or chief executive, whom underlings must obey. In modern English, “head” is used metaphorically primarily to refer to the person in charge, but in ancient Greek it was also used as a metaphorical reference to “origin” or “source of life.” We need to interpret this term in its cultural context, not according to some cultural pretext of our own. Continue reading "Biblical Submission within Marriage"
Women, Religion and the Culture War
Download a printer-friendly version in At its yearly convention, the largest Protestant denomination in America passed a statement opposing abortion, pornography, homosexuality—and female pastors. For Southern Baptist leaders, these issues hang together. They assume that on their side of the culture war, Christians must oppose these practices as a piece. It is only the liberal, secular, or religiously compromised people on the other side who think differently. The press has also tended to present the issue in these polarized terms. Continue reading "Women, Religion and the Culture War"
Women Keep Promises, Too!
Download a printer-friendly version in Or, the Christian Life is for Both Men and WomenPeople both within and without the church have been expressing amazement over the rapid growth of Promise Keepers, the Christian men’s movement that was founded by Bill McCartney in 1990, and which drew a little over one million participants in 22 cities in 1996. Men involved in this movement are finding the inspiration to live righteously as honest and loving husbands, fathers and friends. They are learning to take responsibility for their families, to be faithful to their wives, to care for their children, to avoid pornography, to be involved and responsible members of their churches and communities, and to regard people of other races as their equals. In all of this, Promise Keepers offers a bracing antidote to the poison of male irresponsibility that evidently has become pandemic in American society. What can one say in response, but what everyone seems to have said already, namely, that PK is doing a vitally good work in the lives of many people in the church today? Continue reading "Women Keep Promises, Too!"
Feminism Goes to Seed
Download a printer-friendly version in Modern feminism, which has always left a great deal to be desired, had at least one legitimate concept at its inception in the 1960s and 1970s, namely, the notion that women, as well as men, should have the opportunity to aspire to be all that they can be; it should not be assumed that the fixed essence of femaleness is being in the service of a man. But note that at the root of this eminently reasonable claim is the quintessentially feminist beef that women have always ended up with a mere sliver of the pie of cultural power. Aha! says the antifeminist, all this talk of women using their talents to the full for the general good is a mere rhetorical cover for their real agenda of gaining the upper hand over men—upsetting the balance of power in society at large and in personal relationships. This prospect, of course, terrifies the average man. Continue reading "Feminism Goes to Seed"
Response to Thomas R. Schreiner’s Review of Good News for WomenThemelios Vol 23:1
Download a printer-friendly version in In his review of Good News for Women, Thomas Schreiner maintains that my case for gender equality is not biblical, but is based on merely cultural ideas. My thinking flows out of the “western, democratic and enlightenment view of equality,” and is not derived from the biblical text. The central argument of the book (in Part 1) is based on my view of equality (not the biblical view), which I “impose” on the biblical text in order to derive an egalitarian interpretation—a method which, “if applied to other areas of evangelical theology,” would have “deleterious” effects indeed. Schreiner professes more concern over my “deleterious” method than my conclusions, which he dismisses as old news—such old news, in fact, that my discussion (in Part 2) of the texts traditionally used to support gender hierarchy “does not warrant its publication.” Continue reading "Response to Thomas R. Schreiner’s Review of Good News for Women"
Complementarianism—What’s in a Name?
Download a printer-friendly version in The meaning of “complementarian”—a term invented fairly recently by some who oppose biblical equality—is not exactly self-evident. To illustrate: After my husband, Doug, had expressed concern to one of his students that the new pastor of a local church might restrict women’s ministry, the student returned to Doug with what he thought would be received as good news: the pastor was a complementarian. Doug then had to explain that although it sounds quite moderate, this term actually designates a position that is quite restrictive of women. Later, I mentioned to a friend that this pastor referred to himself as a complementarian. “What’s that?” was his similarly bemused response. Continue reading "Complementarianism—What’s in a Name?"
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Read "Equal in Being, Unequal in Role" Searching for Woman's Place in Evangelicalism Where Do Biblical Egalitarians Go from Here? Strange Bedfellows: Strategies Shared by Darwinists and Traditionalists Leading Him Up the Garden Path: Further Thoughts on 1 Timothy 2:11-15 Questions That Mislead the Gender Debate Southern Baptists and the Subordination of Women Logical and Theological Problems with Gender Hierarchy Sexuality, Spirituality and Feminist Religion Biblical Submission within Marriage Women, Religion and the Culture War Response to Thomas R. Schreiner’s Review of Good News for Women Complementarianism—What’s in a Name? Favorite Articles
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