The editors of the The Los Angeles Times weighed in on the topic of women in ministry on Sunday (HT: Albert Mohler). The editorial talked mainly about the state of affairs in the Roman Catholic Church, but there was some commentary about Protestant churches as well. The editors conclude that continuing limitations on women are due to tradition in the Roman Catholic Church and the Bible in Protestant churches (texts like 1 Timothy 2:12). They write,
“In either case, the arguments that keep women from full participation are attributed to a higher authority. So why do they sound so much like the complaints about assertive women that long have issued from the mouths of men?”
The editors’s complaints boil down to two things: a charge of sexism and a criticism of authority. With respect to the former, we would have to disagree that all those who take a traditional view are simply motivated by sexism. For principled complementarians, the issue is this. God has spoken in creation and in His word, and He in fact does have the authority to define how the sexes should relate to one another in the home and in the church. Make no mistake. What the editors of the LA Times are resisting is not merely the conventions of men, but the very authority of God.
[For biblical answers to frequently asked questions about this topic, see the website for the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.]
2 Comments
Don Johnson
Denny wrote: The editors’s complaints boil down to two things: a charge of sexism and a criticism of authority. With respect to the former, we would have to disagree that all those who take a traditional view are simply motivated by sexism. For principled complementarians, the issue is this. God has spoken in creation and in His word, and He in fact does have the authority to define how the sexes should relate to one another in the home and in the church.
Don writes: I do think the traditional teaching (before 1900) WAS sexist in many ways. One needs to separate the traditional teaching from the new comp. teaching on this aspect.
Of course God has the authority to tell us how to order family and church, the question is what is that ordering. One should study all sides to this in order to reach a conclusion.
Brian Krieger
While it might be fun to rehash the comp/egal discussion, I’ll stick with only slightly on subject items:
1) “In terms of political slant, the [Los Angeles Times] has moved to the left of The New York Times…†Now that’s saying something.
2) Am I supposed to refer to myself in third person for this comment?
3) Can CBMW get a blog spell checke ditor?
BK