I was grateful to be a guest on The Albert Mohler Program yesterday to discuss the recent TIME magazine cover story, “The State of the American Woman.”
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Here’s a description of the show:
“Time Magazine has recently reported on the state of the American women. Though many modern women are more powerful and make more money than any generation previously, they are far less happy. As the family unit dissolves and the gift of motherhood is set aside for cultural achievement, women are losing a sense of sure footing and purpose in life. As Dr. Mohler notes today, women will find genuine happiness through the gospel, faithfulness to His Word, and love for the family of Christ.”
Dr. Mohler has an excellent article on the topic that you can read here. He writes:
“Feminism was never only about opening doors for women. In order to make the case for the vast social transformation that feminism has produced, the feminist movement aspired to nothing short of a total social, moral, and cultural revolution. Along the way, feminism redefined womanhood, marriage, motherhood, and the roles for both men and women.
“Nevertheless, it appears that most women are uncomfortable with this total package. Instead of producing a vast expansion of happiness among women, the feminist movement must now answer for the fact that women, by their own evaluation, appear to be less happy than before the revolution.”
The most obvious quote from Time: “Among the most confounding changes of all is the evidence, tracked by numerous surveys, that as women have gained more freedom, more education and more economic power, they have become less happy.”
A few points:
1. Happiness is a byproduct, not a goal in the sense that if you simply seek happiness you will not find it. It is also transient, a life is filled with moments of happiness and sadness and many other emotions.
2. With increased choices can come decreased moments of happiness, this is because one way to generate the potential for happiness is to be in bonded relationships, such as marriage or friendship. But these by their nature exclude some choices.
Don,
I understand your points, but I’m not sure what you are driving at.
Happiness is a byproduct, however the other large item in this seems to be satisfaction. Women, though empowered, seem less satisfied with the results of the revolution.
Men, on the other hand, typically derive satisfaction by many of the things women now seemingly have, but aren’t sure they want. I think that is the other item the article didn’t speak to: Men will, typically, abducate responsibility if they are not expected to take it.
That is where I see the feminist movement having an impact in the church as well. The effeminization of the church can be traced along the same lines as the feminist revolution. And boys are now being raised without expectations that previous generations took for granted.
Basically: If the women want it, the men will give it to them, but at the end of the day, the women really don’t want to be treated like one of the boys.
From what I have seen, both men and women simply want to be treated as human. And yes there are physical differences that need to be respected.
Don,
But that really doesn’t get to the heart of the article or the heart of society, does it? Of course men and women must be seen as “human” and therefore entitled to value and respect above anmials, but that is far too generic for this conversation.
Not sure what you mean by physical differences that need to be respected if they simply want to be treated as human.
Good program. Your quote (or near quote) of “we’re the most happy when we’re the most holy” summarized the issue the best. Sadly, many women have abrogated their God-given duties, and the fact that they’re less happy (less “blessed”) should be no surprise. To summarize what Israel should have learned in the OT: blessing for obedience, chastisement for disobedience. May the Lord raise up many young ladies in the next generation who will take seriously the task of being a “worker at home”.
SDG,
Dave
If only more women would stay in the kitchen, clean the home, and otherwise turn their brains off, then they might be happy!
Could not disagree more Dave.
Scott,
Instead of your assumptions, perhaps you should have asked Dave to be specific about what he meant. He didn’t actually say any of the items you mentioned.
A worker in the home could also imply: management of the household (perhaps a home business), teaching the children (home schooling), to name just two. Neither of those ask a mom to turn their brains off.
So, you would rather a day-care-center or babysitter instill their beliefs and worldviews into your kids then your wife’s and yours (if you are married)?
The devotion and love given to a husband and children by a wife who desires that the home be center of the nurture and admonition of the Lord in raising children and taking care of the family is not turning off one’s brain.
Read Proverbs 31 for a better explanation.
Nathan,
What assumptions am I making? Dave explicitly equates a woman’s happiness with staying at home in the fulfillment of her “God given duties.”
If your hermeneutic leads you to similar conclusions, then fine. But neither mine, nor my wife’s, lead to the same places. I’d say we’ve extensively studied the biblical evidence and have prayed for the Lord’s guidance throughout.
Nathan – The problem i see with Dave’s comment is that it implies there is a Biblically right vocation for women (being a worker at home). I think Scott was responding to this claim and don’t really think he meant that if a woman chooses to stay at home that she is turning her brain off.
Scott (#6),
How would your view fit with Titus 2:4-5?
“Young women [are] to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be dishonored.”
Scott’s point was crystal clear.
Scott, your answers could not possibly be more offensive. You assume that staying at home means turning your brain off. If that’s not what you meant, then you should really rephrase and better state what you mean. My wife has college and graduate degrees, and her brain and her training in theology/bible, computer science and accounting, I assure you, is called upon every day. She has never been more happy than she is now as a traditional, stay at home wife and mom. As she’ll tell you, it’s much more demanding of her than the corporate america jobs she had in Houston, Dallas, and Louisville.
Good piece, Denny. Thanks for posting.
Nathan,
You are absolutely correct. Thanks for the clarification. I apologize if I implied that a stay-at-home mom necessarily “turns her brain off.” That’s a bad choice of words and a poor attempt to drive a point home.
Denny,
I’ll be happy to interact with your question. But, I’m afraid that answering it will necessarily lead down the well tread path that brings out the usual suspects & 100+ replies on kephale!
Denny,
Should 2:4-5 be normative for today? What about 1 Cor. 11:5-6:
5 but any woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled disgraces her head — it is one and the same thing as having her head shaved.
6 For if a woman will not veil herself, then she should cut off her hair; but if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or to be shaved, she should wear a veil.
It appears that it’s not as easy as quoting a couple of verses and implying “this is how it should be.” Does your wife prophesy? Does she pray? If she does pray, does she cover her head? 21st century America is different than the 1st century Mediterranean. Figuring out the spirit behind the text is what we should be doing, not superficially and woodenly “doing what the Bible says.”
Barry,
Then how is it any less offensive to imply that a working woman is analogous to Israel’s disobedience?
Scott, what are you talking about? First, I said nothing about Israel, and second, does one offense justify another?
Barry,
I’m addressing the post Dave made, which was the point of my initial reply.
No, two wrongs do not make a right. But, I was not implying that a stay-at-home mother has her “brain turned off.” Far from it. I was hoping my last post made that clear. Again, I’m very sorry for poorly articulating my thoughts.
Titus 2 is Paul telling Titus in 1sr century Crete how all members of the body are to be taught. Yes there are different things to be taught to each of 4 groups of people in that culture.
What I object to is the (seeming) automatic assumption that Titus 2 was written TO us today in the 21st century with a vastly different culture. Yes, it was written FOR us, but it was not written TO us, it was written to Titus in 1st century Crete. Just extracting some verses as if they were written TO us is not good exegesis or application.
Don (in #17),
I pretty much agree with everything that you just said. So then, what significance does Paul’s words to Titus have for us? How do we apply these words in our context?
Barry – When you say:
She has never been more happy than she is now as a traditional, stay at home wife and mom.
What do you mean by ‘traditional’? Is this an American tradition or some other tradition? Are there other traditions that don’t include staying at home in which a woman can be happy or successful? Are there other traditions of which God approves?
Denny – How does your view fit with 1 Cor. 11:5 or 1 Tim. 2:9-10? Does your wife wear jewelry or have her head uncovered in church?
I realize this is a ridiculous question but it seems to be right in line with your question on Titus 2:4-5. Don is spot on…i don’t understand the impulse to use one verse to build a theology and in turn require a behavior across the board. If you’re going to do this, at least do it across the board.
A few things I noticed have NOT changed in spite of the Women’s Movement is the fact women are still exploited sexually in every media outlet, and the double-standard is alive and well. Guys are applauded for “scoring,” girls are labled ugly names for doing the same thing. That doesn’t say much for “female empowerment.”
If a man is successful in politics or the business world he is revered and admired. So often if a woman achieves the same status, she is called a disrespectful word. Is that really “breaking the glass ceiling?”
If a women gets pregnant out of wedlock, abortion is the man’s ticket out of “the problem,”yet she still bears the scars. This is the consequences of “choice.”
In my opinion,in spite of “you’ve come a long way, baby,” or “I am Woman hear me roar,” this study is eye-opening proof that liberation has come at a price.
Women ought to work. Work hard. Mine does. She runs a restaurant that feeds 9 people 3 meals a day. She manages a cleaning service that takes care of a residence that has 7 kids. She educates 6 homeschooled children, and is the nanny and nurse for a 5-month-old. Her hours are 24×7, with some time off during the night whenever #7 sleeps. And she puts up with me. She is a true working woman. Her pay isn’t what the career-minded women make, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
The Bible gives latitude in how this is implemented in each family’s life (Proverbs 31). Yet it doesn’t make it a free-for-all, catering to the whims and feelings of each person and culture and time. Clearly, the woman’s primary duties revolve around husband and (if so blessed) children. It is by Adam’s sweat (Gen. 3:19) that the income should be made.
If we’re going to chuck Titus 2:3-5, let me know, because then women also won’t have to: love husband, love children, be sensible or pure, and of course the whole submission can be tossed as well. To remove “workers at home” and call it “cultural” is exegetical suicide. If we apply that hermeneutic to all the Scriptures, we’ll be in trouble indeed.
Let’s face it — most women work outside the home because of money. And that gets us to the whole issue of lifestyle and materialism. I am not suggesting that every family with a “working wife” is materialistic, but many of them are. They are unwilling to live without the big home, the newer cars, the yearly vacation, the expensive clothes. How much better to be content with little (Prov. 15:16)!
I’ve probably offended. That isn’t my purpose. But we do need a call in our day, not to return to traditional norms, but to return to biblical mandates. God’s plans and roles for men are different than for women, and that is good. We are wise to submit ourselves to them, no matter what our cultural may think of it, and no matter how it affects our pocketbooks. And with that, we’ll be blessed — and women will find godly happiness.
Thanks for the good word, Dave.
So Dave, what about 1 Cor. 11:5-6? It would be exegetical suicide to not require your wife to wear a head covering. It would also be exegetical suicide if they wear any type of jewelry and would get us into trouble. Hermeneutically the key is finding what is timeless/universal and what is not. It is not blindly accepting everything as normative just because a couple of other aspects in the passage are. I’m almost certain you don’t consistently practice this hermeneutics. Nobody does (head coverings, jewelry, holy kiss, etc.).
I appreciate your words and your honesty, but don’t make piety & orthodoxy out of your social circumstances. The “biblical” evidence is far too diverse to maintain any consistent ethic for the vocation of a woman. Is she supposed to take care of the kids & cook? Yes, but so am I as a husband. In some families the roles may be reversed.
This study doesn’t prove anything about the “error” or “sin” of the liberation of women. What it proves is that our country still has a long way to go in terms of how women are treated & viewed. As long as we have dominant and oppressive men making them stay at home (note the use of the verb “making”) and home-school the kids & do all the house duties, they will never reach their true humanity.
Micah: Insert “biblical” (see Pr.31; Titus 2 for OT and NT examples.) Women can work outside the home, I think P31 is clear. However, that’s not to be her
As far as this hermeneutical discussion is going, Don, what makes any scripture applicable for today? What about “all have sinned”? “The just will live by faith”? Those are culturally bound too? Why or why not? As far as audience goes, not a single word of the Bible was written TO us, in a proper sense, since none of us are the original audience. Yet a text should be considered normative FOR us unless there is something in the context to suggest that it’s not.
“Let’s face it — most women work outside the home because of money. And that gets us to the whole issue of lifestyle and materialism. I am not suggesting that every family with a “working wife†is materialistic, but many of them are. They are unwilling to live without the big home, the newer cars, the yearly vacation, the expensive clothes. How much better to be content with little”
This struck a nerve b/c I have just been in deep conversation with several hurting pastors’ wives, who don’t have a choice whether or not to work. And sadly, while I feel Dr. Mohler and Denny were gentle in conveying their message, many in the church are not. Far from it.
Dave, yes, many women do work outside of the home because of money and it has nothing to do with materialism. Many of my friends, predominantly pastor’s wives, don’t have the option of NOT working. That or their pastor-husbands has to decide if he will work 2 or 3 jobs just to make ends meet, pay off seminary, pay for insurance b/c the church doesn’t provide it and it came with the wife’s full-time job that she gave up to be a SAHM, etc. And you know the couple of women I have spoken with in recent days live frugally, clip coupons, plan meals, and love being about the business of their home.
When these sorts of discussions happen, I am constatnly met with questions from them b/c they feel as if they are being attacked or put down, or being told they are less spiritual or godly b/c they do work, out of necessity, not materialism. (Cost-of-living is far greater in ceratin areas of our country. Yet, churches base most pastors salaries on attendance, not cost-of-living. So a church of 200 in rural Louisiana pays the same salary as a church in Seattle/Denver/Los Angeles of the same attendance. House cost in rural La. well under $100,000. Modest housing cost in Seattle area, nothing less than $250,000, if that.)
I think in the Christian community we often talk of women in general, but it would be interesting for the Christian community to take a survey of pastors wives of various denominations and see if they are working, why they are working, and how much they working. How are they handling this? Do their churches know? Do their churches care? How does this make them feel?
I know for me, personally, as a pastor’s wife, I have been there. This is the first time in our married life where I am NOT working outside of the home out of necessity. (Not sure if this will always be the case, but I am enjoying it while I can.)I am blessed. Still I do work, teaching music lessons in our home several hours a week.
Most of my pastors’ wives friends are not this fortunate. Yet, their working has nothing to do with materialism, rather putting food on the table, providing insurance, etc. Working so that their husbands get to see their kids once in a while, along with fulfilling all of the responsibilities of running a church or ministry area.
I will, also, say that just because a woman stays at home, doesn’t mean she is productive at home, or has her interests at home. I know friends who work outside of their home, yet manage their homes much more effectively and efficiently than those who consider themselves SAHM’s. Why? Because many, who consider themsevles SAHM, are never home, never being about the business of managing their home, volunteering here and there, doing this or that, with their kids in every activity under the sun.
Is this what SAHM means? Or even biblical mothering? Not to me. And I am not saying eveyrthing has to be Martha-Stewart-cooking, but many don’t even have meals together, even frozen ones. Yet, are still godly wives in the church’s eyes, merely b/c they don’t work outside of the home. REALLY?
Should this not be a discussion of the heart of the woman, the intentions of the heart? What both husband and wife have discussed, prayed about, etc.?
I know my husband is a very hands-on dad. He loves his kids (and me, too.) Yet, had I not worked all these years, and he had to get a second or third job, he would have never known our kids b/c he would have never seen them. Thankfully, when I did work, he was able to watch the kids, that or they were in our church’s preschool.
I am thankful for the new season that I am in, of being home, yet still working to take some pressure off of him. However, the time may come (possibly in the very near future, since we are church planters) where I will be the one going to work outside of the home.
And you know what, I still have a heart desiring to live in holiness, to follow Christ and with an intense devotion and love for my husband, my family and my home.
Just a thought….
The following is an appropriate and entertaining response to the article from William Shakespeare:
. “Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,Thy head, thy sovereign, one that cares for thee,
And for thy maintence commits his body To painful labor both by sea and land,To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,
Whilst though liest warm at home, secure and safe,And craves no other tribute at thy hands
But love, fair looks, and true obedience-Too little payment for so great a debt.
Such duty as the subject owes the prince,Even such a woman oweth to her husband;And when she is froward, peevish, sullen, sour,
And not obedient to his honest will,What is she but a foul contending rebel And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
I am ashamed that women are so simple
To offer war where they should kneel for peace,
Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.”
• Katherine giving her speech on what she has learned by being tamed by Petruchio.
• Act 5, Sc. 2, 162-180 from William Shakespeare’s play, “The Taming of the Shrewâ€
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Kenneth Bailey, who lived in the NE for many years, points out 2 things about Titus 2 that others miss.
1. Why does Paul tell Titus to have the older women teach the younger, when Titus is to do all the other teaching himself? The reason is that it was not culturally appropriate, because it would just be assumed that sexual immorality would take place by the culture.
2. The rationale for wives being in submission to their husbands is given, so that the word of God is not mocked. Who would it be mocked by? Certainly this is referring to pagans with their cultural expectations. The point is that the gospel goes out to cultures and ignoring the cultural expectations is not wise, rather, as far as possible, conform to them so as not to make a unnecessary stumbling block in that culture. This is NOT conforming to culture, rather it is attempting to make accepting Christ as appealing as possible in that culture.
Just finished to reading the article and was struck at how narrow it is.
The majority of the article focused simply on pay and how women were doing in the workforce. It mentioned briefly that women were more unhappy now than 40 years ago but it quickly skated over the point as it seemed to lead away from the author’s preconceived ideology and agenda.
So while we may rehash the same arguments on this blog I would challenge us to consider why are women more unhappy than 40 years ago and before the massive sucess of Feminism? And conversely recent studies have shown men are more happy than a generation ago. Why?
I wish the article would have addressed that the feminist agenda of lowering the bar for men is a careful what you ask for situation. Men are now taught to treat women just like they do other men (not better or with chivalry). Men now believe that women should carry half the provision load and then still do the majority of the jobs around the house (another win for irresponsible men).
And many of the men I interact with in corporate America every day are more than thrilled that women have embraced the idea to engage in casual sex with no commitment just like worldly men do. Men no longer have to take responsibility to have sex with a woman. There are no consequences to having sex because after all you just pay for the abortion; and if you do form a relationship she is not to be served like Jesus served the church but rather she needs to carry her load at all times. Also, each of these women live under tremendous pressure of continuously feeling they need to look like they did when they were 25 or their man will leave them for a woman that does. The pressure, stress, and fear that the modern woman lives with today is monumental and one all of us should realize comes out of a failed thesis that roles for men and women are bad. We reap what we sow.
Gosh no wonder woman are so unhappy.
Looks like Feminism got exactly what it wanted, and it was the greatest lie Satan could have ever told women.
I think it would be worth while if, instead of exagerating this out of all proportion, one could actually comment on the study.
There is no study that shows that women are “far less happy.” This doesn’t exist. Otherwise I would expect a citation.
There was a study gave these modest statistical results.
“In the early 70s, women self-reported their happiness at levels somewhat higher than men did. Specifically, 5.1% more of the women reported themselves “Very happy”, while 1.5% fewer reported themselves “Not too happy”.
30-odd years later, in the mid 00s, women’s self-reported happiness was closer to men’s, though it was still slightly higher. 1.4% more of the women reported themselves “Very happy”, while 0.1% fewer reported themselves “Not too happy”.”
From here,
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1753
So basically all speculation on why women are “far less happy” is nonsense, because the basic premise is not even demonstrated to be true.
Thank goodness a few women have commented to show that all canned and prepackaged opinions tend to be irrelevant and often disrespectful or real women.
I think Ryan’s comment nailed it. The irony is that women were actually convinced that it was in their own best interests to tell men to just treat them like other men, rather than adore, love and die for them.
If only it was simply men are to “adore, love and die” for women, but some men also get told they have a trump card AKA final decision. There’s the rub.
So when a woman does not agree, she is told she is not following Christ, not sticking to her role. And in many cases but not all, her spirit gets crushed. And I oppose that crushing.
I would agree with you Don Chauvinism is just as horrific and idea as Feminism. Neither are what God intended for us.
But I do not know of anyone on this blog advocating chauvinism but rather servant leadership, like Jesus and his bride.
Dr. Mohler said:
“Nevertheless, it appears that most women are uncomfortable with this total package. Instead of producing a vast expansion of happiness among women, the feminist movement must now answer for the fact that women, by their own evaluation, appear to be less happy than before the revolution.â€
I agree with Dr. Mohler.
Here are some things that I think make women unhappy in our day. IMO, the following are some of the consequences of the feminist movement.: easy-access abortion, “shacking up”, “hooking up”, using foul language, no-fault divorce, feminists telling women that they are abused and unhappy, teaching women to be sexually aggressive,
just to name a few.
Thank you for this great post, Dr. Burk. In the comment section, I especially appreciated Nathan’s comment #7, which is a response to Scott. I find it shocking that Scott would equate women staying at home and caring for their husbands and children with turning their brains off. (Scott comment #6). Scott, you need to talk to more women who are actually caring for their homes to see how wrong you are, my dear brother. Listen to Nathan, too. Maybe he can help orient you.
Then, the Christian feminists’ responses always amaze me. I have wasted many hours trying to figure out what drives them, and I have pretty much given up. At least the secularists are willing to do some self-analysis as we see in the Time magazine article.
Thank you for this lively and important discussion, Dr. Burk.
God bless,
Mrs. Webfoot
Sue I hesitate to engage with you because I find your posts to be a bit bombastic and polemic for fruitful discourse.
I would point out Al Mohler’s recent column on the matter that chronicles numerous studies showing that women are more unhappy than decades past. Even avowed feminist Maureen Dowd acknowledges this point, making it highly unlikely that is is simply “nonsense.”
I would challenge you to move past your locked in ideology and considered the objective data and evidence, even when it does not fit your settled ideas.
Mrs. Webfoot,
Please read the posts where I attempted, but apparently failed, to clarify my comments.I never equated women staying at home with “turning their brains off.” Again, I’m sorry to have even implied such.
Ryan,
I have read the evidence and the post I linked to provides access to the database. It makes a nice controversial talking point for a secular magazine, and modern life has its challenges for men as well as women, but the evidence does not support the notion that women are far less happy now than they were 40 years ago.
In fact, the only hard facts are that women are less than half as likely to be killed by their partner now, than in the 1970′s.
If we extrapolate from this and assume that women are half as likely to suffer violence in the home, as they used to be, then I think, for those women at least, their life is happier.
Yes, its true that those women might now be single, and not overhwelmingly happy, but at least they are alive and free from bruises.
Being able to work, being able to own propery, being able to vote, being able to get a divorce, believing in one’s own right and ability to make decisions – all these things are fundamental to becoming free from dehumanizing servitude and violence of the person in the home.
Even if only this portion of women are happier, and the rest are about the same – isn’t it worth it? I feel that the violated woman, the honestly violated, are put on an altar as a sacrfice, so the rest of the Christian community can pretend that the traditional arrangements between men and women are good.
I linked to statistics to support my point of view, and I can link to statistics on partner violence as well.
Can Dr. Mohler link to statistics to support the view that women are “far less happy” now than in the 1970′w?
Why doesn’t he?
If you find me bombastic, try to imagine your personality after half a lifetime of the teaching of silence for women in church and obedience in the home. Then imagine routine violence for every tiny infraction, even going to the bathroom without permission, as John Piper attests to. How did he answer that woman? What if his life had been like that. Would he submit his bodily functions to a partner’s whim for the glory of God?
Women are stripped of human dignity completely and then told that this is their cross to bear for Christ. And men think nothing of this, it is no big deal that some women live without the normal human liberty that a man assumes is his right.
The church has no answer for these women and it is time to admit it.
The farther behind this experience is for me, the more I am outraged that the church did not help, had no response, no answer, not a word of useful counsel.
There is a middle position.
I believe that Titus 2 is normative for today, and I work outside the home. Why don’t I see this as a contradiction? The Industrial Revolution. My husband and I have two children. Now that the kids are in school, managing my household is simply not a full-time job. There are other women for whom it is a full-time job. They fall into one or more of four categories: a) they have more kids than my husband and I have; b) their husbands work far more than 40 hours a week; c) they’re homeschooling or their kids aren’t yet in school; and/or d) their houses require significantly more upkeep than ours, often because the houses are very large.
I know of no happier women than my friends whose husbands’ work hours and personal preferences are consistent with their holding outside professional employment. All of us freely acknowledge that we view work differently than our husbands do. We don’t have the God-given drive to provide for our families that our husbands have. As a result, we believe that our husbands’ jobs should come first, and our careers are to fit around our husbands’ jobs, our husbands’ preferences, and the needs of our families. We value the option to choose to work, subject to our husbands’ preferences and the needs of our families.
We’re very happy. But, we’re aware that we’re also very privileged.
Scott:
Please read the posts where I attempted, but apparently failed, to clarify my comments.I never equated women staying at home with “turning their brains off.†Again, I’m sorry to have even implied such.>>>>
Scott, are you apologizing to all the stay at home moms and happy home makers, or are you making a lame attempt to defend yourself? I am having a hard time telling what you wish to acomplish.
Maybe you need to go to the chalk board and write 100 times, “Home makers and stay at home mothers have not turned their brains off.”
I know. With women these days, you just can’t win.
We value the option to choose to work, subject to our husbands’ preferences
Marilyn,
That’s just it. Some women have been allowed the opportunity to work or do some other thing, and other women are not given permission by their husbands.
But what I notice is that women who have been given permission by their husbands to work, appear to have no interest or feeling for those women who are denied the normal things by their husband.
There seems to be a feeling by women whose husbands are lenient, that women whose husbands are harsh and unfeeling have brought this on themselves, and don’t deserve the freesom to work or have any other rights. It is as if the suffering of these women somehow glorifies God. It doesn’t.
Well, I’m trying to say that I never said stay at home mothers turn their brains off!
I absolutely do not believe that! Far from it.
Dr. Mohler’s contention that feminism is responsible for the decline in happiness among American women in the last 30 years is unsupported by the data. First, it must be emphasized that the decline is very small and is only statistically significant because men’s happiness has slightly increased.
Second, the statistics used by Mohler don’t indicate what exactly is responsible for the decline. The researchers go to great lengths to demonstrate that there is no satisfactory explanation at this time. One might as well blame the rise of the religious right as feminism. There is simply is no known causal link.
Some things we do know. From the Time poll:
“Forty years ago, one-third of all workers were women; now nearly half are. Rather than increasing conflict or competition between the sexes, more than three-quarters of Americans (76% of men, 80% of women) view this as positive for society; only 19% say it’s negative. And that view holds regardless of age, race or political ideology: 81% of African Americans view it as a positive change, along with 84% of Latinos, 88% of Democrats and 68% of Republicans.”
The detailed article from the American Economic Journal cited in Mohler’s article again provides no support for his thesis. The article is entitled “The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness†and is worth reading in its entirety. Here are some of the relevant parts:
“If there are particular changes in men’s and women’s lives that explain the decline in subjective well-being for women, then one might expect to see differences based on the time period in life that we examine. For example, if female unhappiness is rising due to the extra pressures of combining home and market work then one would suspect that the decline in female happiness would be particularly large among women in their peak childrearing years or among women with young children in the home.†[pp. 207-208]
. . .
“Thus, trends in the gender happiness gap by age offer no evidence of particularly large declines for prime-age women (or any other group of women) relative to that of men. . . . This finding provides suggestive evidence that the decline in happiness cannot be explained by the peaking optimism of those participating in the women’s movement in the 1970s.” [p. 209]
. . .
“If the burdens of entering the workforce are playing a role in declining female happiness, then, perhaps, the decline in happiness will be concentrated among women who are employed. Panel B shows the results of an ordered probit of happiness on female × (Year − 1972)/100 and male × (Year − 1972)/100 each interacted with two employment status variables. This regression shows that employed and nonemployed women have experienced roughly similar declines in subjective wellbeing in the main specification shown in column 1 and when controls are added in column 4. Similarly, there are no differences by employment in the trend for males or the difference between women and men in the trends. There have been large compositional shifts in employment for women, but there are neither trend nor level differences (results not shown) in happiness by employment for women throughout the 35-year period.” [p. 209]
. . .
“A common suspect for the source of women’s declining happiness is the burden of balancing children and a career. In panel D, we first run regressions for the total population, in which we estimate female and male time trends separately for those with and without children. There are no statistically significant differences in the trends for women with and without children nor are there differences between these groups in the trend in happiness for men (or the subsequent trend in the happiness gap). Along with the decline in marriage has come a rise in single parenthood, both through growth in out-of-wedlock births and through divorce.17 Thus, we disaggregate the fertility results to consider trends in happiness separately among single parents and married parents, and between employed parents and nonemployed parents, to account for the dual burden of working parents. Once again, we see similar trends in happiness across these groups, casting doubt on the hypothesis that trends in marriage and divorce, single parenthood, or work-family balance are at the root of the happiness declines among women.” [pp. 209-210]
Thanks, Ex-preacher,
I understood the data to say that a) there is a 5% decline in women who state that they are “very happy”
b) no difference in how many women say that they are “not happy”
c) 62% decrease in women killed by their partners, and a similar decrease in violent assaults in the home.
Let’s examine some things we do know about “things we do knowâ€.
Positive, in what way? IMO, the problem with this type of survey is rife with variables. While there might be a positive aspect but there are also negatives.
Being a single mother, trying to work and raise a child is a positive? Just 30 years ago the majority of children were raised by a stay at home parent, most likely the mom. 66% of people think this change is a bad thing. Why the paradox? IMO, this is a result of atheistic materialism. While it is true that the lust for materialism is a sin and a flaw in human nature, atheism is unapologetically materialistic. It is also apparent that in the last 30 years Americans have become more secular and irreligious, hence more of a drive toward materialism. In the pursuit of greater wealth and material gratification, the next generation and the family unit must be sacrificed on the altar of atheistic materialism. To paraphrase Malcolm Muggeridge, when you remove God out of a person’s life that void must be filled, either with megalomania or erotomania.
Scott:
Well, I’m trying to say that I never said stay at home mothers turn their brains off!
I absolutely do not believe that! Far from it.>>>>
Okay, Scott, I believe you. Thank you for clarifying. We all say things sometimes that come out backwards from what we really think, so I’m glad that you made it clear that you don’t believe
that women who stay at home, caring for their homes and families, have turned off their brains.
This is a difficult topic to sort out. I think that it is safe to say that all of us are growing in our understanding of just what it means to be male and female made in the image of God for His glory.
Hey, take care, okay? Have a good week.
God bless,
Mrs. Webfoot
I work beside many single mothers who are teachers and this enables them to work part time, and have better hours for child-rearing.
For some, the father moved out and remarried a younger woman.
For others, the father was violent. I know of not one woman among those single who chose to be single. Not one has some “materialistic” reason for being single.
But I know for sure, that since we all have jobs and are comfortable working, that our children have not suffered a dramatic drop in lifestyle, or lack of basic needs.
How much better this than all the children in the poor house and orphanages a hundred years ago. Many children died at home, on the street and in orphanages from hunger and lack of basic care.
I wonder at the hardness of the Christian heart, that anyone would rather women and children live in violence or with a lack of basic needs, rather than promote an attitude which would prepare women to act with the self-sufficiency demonstrated by women in the Bible, ready to produce, provide and protect.
Sue I am not sure if you have been hurt by a man at sometime in your life and if you have am deeply am sorry.
Yet your comments are entirely extreme and unsupported for someone who poses to love data so much.
Your last reply to me was simply an unsupported diatribe in a false dichotomy between chauvinistic wife beating and feminism. To postulate that these are the two options we have is at best false and at worst manipulative.
I would sincerely advise you to refrain from engaging in discussions on the complementarian discussion until you are capable of explaining, communicating the position in a way that someone who holds to it would agree with. Until then you will simply be engaging straw men.
Ryan, have you read Mary Kassian’s books, especially her Feminist Gospel. We are having our consciousness raised by Sue – or at least she is trying to raise our conscience about the plight of oppressed women.
Sue is a sincere, but radical, Christian feminist. According to her testimony – which she has given in many places on the internet, – she lived with an abusive, Christian husband. It was liberal Christian feminists who helped her see the bondage that she was in.
She is now “free” and wants to free all women.
The problem with radical feminism, even of the Christian kind, is that many of us women don’t want to be liberated. We are quite happy, actually. That is frustrating for a real feminist such as Sue. Even Marilyn’s middle of the road stance is too uncaring for Sue, it seems.
We cannot possibly think of being happy until all women are free.
This is the attitude of many radical feminists and, IMO, one of the reasons why many women are afraid to say that they are happy even if they are. If we women are not living up to some version of the feminist ideal then we have no right to say that we are happy.
We are supposed to be free, but not free to be irresponsibly, unashamedly happy.
I stand corrected. You apparently know every woman in the country, how they think and their circumstances from your personal experience. It is unfortunate that those women from the Time survey lied when it found “Women no longer view matrimony as a necessary station on the road to financial security or parenthood.â€.
I am also sure that in every one of these cases if the father was not violent, these women would not be single.
Strange, I thought you said “materialistic†reason was not a factor. I don’t know but a â€drop in lifestyle†sounds an awful lot like materialism to me. I guess having that large screen TV, designer jeans, fancy car, beauty treatment, etc, is more important than spending time or nurturing the moral and ethical development of a child.
And this is because…..?
I am amazed at your power of omniscience. This describes exactly what Christians are like. I was just wondering wouldn’t it be nice that some guy is beating his wife right now?
One of the strange consequences of QM is the multiverse interpretation. I wonder if this interpretation is true, if it is possible that some times these universes can intersect.
Mrs, Webfoot? “My dear Bagginses and Boffins, Tooks and Brandybucks, Grubbs, Chubbs, Hornblowers, Bolgers, Bracegirdles and Proudfoots.”
I think you make some good points and thanks for filling me in on Sue.
I think this is the problem I have with feminism. What does free mean? Free from what? I am just curious. Do feminists view every housewife as an oppressed slave? Are complementary Christian women unhappy in denial and their husbands are sadistic wife beaters? I don’t know but some of us complementarian Christians actually believe and try to live in obedience to the Bible, Eph 5:25, Col 3:19 .
I guess having that large screen TV, designer jeans, fancy car, beauty treatment, etc, is more important than spending time or nurturing the moral and ethical development of a child.
That is disgusting! Absolutely disgusting! I have none of those things and I do not aspire to ever having them. I was drop dead shocked at Mary Kassian’s photoshoot.
No, I mean things like the girl and the boy not having to share a room when they are teenagers, having a bicycle perhaps and things like that, dental appointments also.
I abhore those things you mention and consider such things the domain of those who spend their money on themselves. I am talking about taking children away from violence and despair into a life where they have a roof and food and no violence.
Clearly you have no idea that this is something that some women have always needed to be able to do. Women need a salary to pay rent and buy food. Can’t you imagine that?
I begged Mary Kassian to write even one post about women in this situation but she was too busy styling her nair and making sure her boots match her outfit. I can’t even imagine the world of the biblical man and woman, where strategic clickery of the remote is taught by CJ and nairstyling is modeled by Kassian.
I came out of this culture but I cannot fathom it.
But there are many other women now blogging about their broken lives. Who is going to pay for these women to get trained, find a job, raise their children and so on. Is someone out there renovating church basements for these families, or do these women need the dignity of work and providing for their family.
You still supply no statistics that women are far less happy now.
And what makes me a feminist – that I do to work and pay the bills? Do I ever say that staying home is not the role of women? Do I ever criticize a woman for obeying her husband and for working or not working outside the home?
No, I do not criticize other women for their lifestyle except Kassian who mortifies me because most Canaadian women are not like that, but no, I just want other women to understand, those women who told me to submit – that there words supported a criminal offense for many long years.
It is not only me, but the women who blog at submission tyranny, emotional abuse, women submit, and many other blogs. I see those women coming out with their story too. It is not just one, it is the shame of the church.
I want to know – is there someone here who thinks I am a radical feminist for escaping violence and providing for my children? Speak up.
Many children died at home, on the street and in orphanages from hunger and lack of basic care.
This was because their father was either dead, unemployed, drunk, ill, absent or whatever and the mother could not support the family.
But I get the impression that some people think that these women and chldren are worthy sacrifices on the altar of gender role religion.
Ryan,
I apologize. I realize now that the culture gap between us, after you mentioned designer jeans, and all that – is far too great to ever be bridged.
I am saddened that it was CBMW who supported my pastor in preaching submission, but did not advise him to offer shelter to the abused at the same time. I believe this kind of thing is criminally negligent.
We know that at least 10% of homes are in some way violent. A pastor of 1000 people should not be encouraged to deny the existance of violence in the home.
It is only the laws of the last few years, very recent ones, that enabled me to escape. I could never have gone to someone for help.
No, Mrs. Webfoot, those who helped me were a few friends and neighbours, women, who had not attended church in a long time. Some Christians I confided in felt that my escape was clandestine and therefore not righteous.
You may have confused me with someone else, as I remember you once did before. But I bear you know ill will and hope that you some day realize that the battered woman is usually silent about her plight until afterward, and that is why one must realize that there is always a risk that submission is being preached to the violated.
So, what I did was plan my escape myself, but a few friends helped me carry it out. I was able to take a few books with me.
Sue, I sympathize with what you must have gone through. Believe me when I tell you that I understand how difficult it must have been to break free of a situation that you have been conditioned in for years. John 8:36
I think we have more in agreement than we thought. I agree with you that those who told you to submit to an abusive relationship were wrong, that is not what the Bible teaches. I am happy for you that you are freed from that relationship and is now self sufficient. I also agree with you that you are not the only one in this type of relationship.
However, I hope you do not extrapolate from your own personal experience to generalize that your circumstances is an accurate representation of society and the Church as a whole. Finally, do not allow bitterness to linger in your heart. Bitterness can cloud your judgment and harden your heart against what God can give you. Your experience has taught you that sinful human beings will let you down. I know God can make things right. Joel 2:25
Thank you, Dennyreader,
No, I don’t think all of society is like this. I struggle with this. Domestic violence occurs at the same rate in the church as in society as a whole. Since many women die in the abusive situation, statistics are hard to evaluate. My sense is that perhaps 10% of women, – among my personal Christian friends, it is more like 20% – and some men, live in intolerable conditions.
The problem is that most women cannot reveal what is happening until they have planned their escape, because it is so dangerous to say a word while still with the abuser. That is why it is a silent crime, and the pastor should never preach submission of women, without offering shelter and physical protection as well. One woman should never tell another woman to submit – it can contribute to a crime. I say this as my experience. I don`t mean it always will, but that the risk is there – the probability is there.
I never experienced any help from Christians, so I can’t share what that would be like. I found the police to be exemplary and non-Christian friends had a non-judgmental way of pitching in to help.
I feel that CBMW shaped the discourse in our church, along with the teaching of Ware and Grudem. Since there is no way to comment on the CBMW site, I protest here. Sorry for taking your time, but 10% of women sacrificed to the hell I lived through is way too many.
You are right. Christians can do more and should do more to help women who are in these abusive relationships. If a woman tells me that she is being beaten by her husband I would report that creep to the police and find her some place to hide out until the situation is resolved. Christian should be judgmental with respect to the abuser not the person being abused.
However, I think you might be unfairly conflating what CBMW espouses, which is intended for a healthy Biblical relationship for marriage and ecclesiastical function with the aberrant sanction of spousal abuse.
CBMW teaches masculinism (males on top) and what the Bible teaches on gender is part of the debate between egals and non-egals.
Even tho I am egal, I do think a non-egal marriage can be Godly, but it depends greatly on how mature the husband is and how much he declines to use the very power that CBMW teaches he has.
DennyReader suggests that the decline in women’s happiness is the result of “atheistic materialism.” He presents no data to support this and seems to be conflating two very different meanings of “materialism.” Further, this flies in the face of the study’s conclusion that happiness among both men and women in secular Europe has increased in the last 30 years. “However, while US women also experienced an absolute decline in well-being, the subjective well-being of European women has risen in an absolute sense.”
In international surveys of happiness, Iceland usually ranks at the very top. Iceland also has the world’s highest percentage of women who work outside the home, elected the world’s first female president, have very little religion, and boast a very generous welfare system.
ex-preacher,
Considering the scope of the article was the “American Woman” what constitutes satisfaction or happiness in Europe or Iceland is irrelevant to the discussion. America is a highly religious country and always has been, even as Europe has moved toward a more secular state.
Although, based on your glowing statements, it sounds like you should move to Iceland!
Sue:
You may have confused me with someone else, as I remember you once did before. But I bear you know ill will and hope that you some day realize that the battered woman is usually silent about her plight until afterward, and that is why one must realize that there is always a risk that submission is being preached to the violated.>>>>
No, Sue, I don’t have you confused with anyone.
What do you think about the CBE’s refusal to sign on with the CBMW to a joint statement against domestic violence? Are you in agreement with the CBE on that?
Sue:
And what makes me a feminist – that I do to work and pay the bills? Do I ever say that staying home is not the role of women? Do I ever criticize a woman for obeying her husband and for working or not working outside the home? >>>>>
Sue, in other places you are a self-defined Christian feminist. That’s what makes you a feminist. Why do you call yourself a feminist in some places, and dodge the moniker in other places?
If I were a feminist, I would wear that title like a badge of honor, yet the Christian feminists avoid the term like the plague. Why is that? I can’t figure that out myself.
Sue:
I begged Mary Kassian to write even one post about women in this situation but she was too busy styling her nair and making sure her boots match her outfit. I can’t even imagine the world of the biblical man and woman, where strategic clickery of the remote is taught by CJ and nairstyling is modeled by Kassian. >>>>>
Sue, here you are engaging in a kind of ad hominum. IOW, because Mary dresses well, we should not take her seriously.
Then, Mary has addressed the issue of abuse. Here is just a small sampling of what she has said on the subject.
http://www.marykassian.com/index.php?s=abuse
You know what breaks my heart about the egalitarians? It is their almost complete refusal to address female on female or female on male violence – not to mention the subject of mothers who abuse their children.
Sue, you have a right to express the concerns that you have. I’m just not all that convinced that you care about all aspects of abusive behavior. I know that you care about women who are being abused by their Christian husbands. Are you concerned about children who are being abused by their Christian mothers? Are you concerned about husbands who are being abused by their Christian wives?
I have begged egalitarians to look at all sides of the domestic violence issue, and so far there has been very little interest in the dark side of female behavior. So, I quit taking the egalitarians seriously on the subject of abuse and domestic violence. It seems to be one-sided and decidedly agenda-driven to me.
Some have called “abuse” the feminist stalking horse.
You see, Sue, as a woman I do believe in equality. I believe that women are just as sinful as men and just as prone to violent reactions and actions as men are. Since we are smaller, we express ourselves differently, but the human heart is just as depraved in the female model as in the male.
Besides, I believe the statistics of Family Life Today. They have stated that something like 15% of all couples experience violence some time during their relationship. That stat would include all kinds of couples, not just the married. Abuse is more prevalent among those who “shack up.”
Female on male and female on female violence is on the rise, too. If we include such things as relational aggression – which is the form of bullying that girls and women are most likely to engage in – then the picture changes.
I agree that it is a topic that the church should address. I don’t agree that it is not doing its job. Can we do better? Yes.
Is it as bad as you, Sue, portray? No way.
No, I do not ignore female on male violence and I referred to it above. It exists and I would never recommend the submission of the male to female in marriage. That would be a good reason for not doing so.
Please site where I self-identify as a radical feminist.
Duh, did I say that I had some sort of data to support this? Did you not read my qualifiers in the beginning of my comment? I said, IMO(in my opinion), the problem with this type of survey is rife with variables. Causal conclusion drawn from these studies are specious at best.
As far as my assertion that “atheistic materialism†is the cause for decline in unhappiness, it is at least as valid as your comment “One might as well blame the rise of the religious rightâ€. The difference is that I think I do have a better case. Notice that in these surveys I didn’t see anything about people trying to pursuit holiness and trying to live out a Biblical way of life. On the contrary, every measuring criterion was based on the mundane and materialistic fulfillment.
Do you not realize that philosophical materialism ultimately leads to the pursuit of material gratification? Atheists, like Bart Ehrman implies this in his book “God’s Problemâ€, Steven Weinberg and your soul mate John Loftus have suggested this when he said this life is all that there is, make the most of it. Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow you die. From an atheist point of view you are nothing, you come from nothing. Is it not your goal to make the most of your meaningless existence? How do people like Hitler and Hugh Hefner live out their atheistic material belief? Is it not through megalomania and erotomania?
Let me remind you once again that Europe is very religious, but if you will once again acquiesce that not everyone who call themselves Christian is truly Christian, then I will file this claim to be use at a future time against your arguments. In terms of secular Europe, I don’t know how happy they are or the details of any study to support this. For the sake of argument, I will take your word that this is true. This however proves nothing. Happiness and unhappiness both can be the result of atheistic materialism. This just means that atheist happiness and unhappiness is predicated on the attainment or deprivation of materialism.
Contrast this to Christianity our happiness is not based on external circumstances, but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, we belong to Christ Jesus. Our peace and joy come from the fact that we will spend eternity with our God and Savior who created and loves us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. This beats Iceland any day.
However, I think you might be unfairly conflating what CBMW espouses, which is intended for a healthy Biblical relationship for marriage and ecclesiastical function with the aberrant sanction of spousal abuse.
I think that up to 20% of marriages have a significant abuse of either a physical or emotional nature.
What I don’t understand is this – if we know that preaching submission keeps a woman in an abusive situation longer, because it discourages her from developing independance, it restricts her communication with others who might help her, it deprives her of the training and experience she needs to survive in the workplace, why does no one ever confront these issues with practical advice? Why preach submission of women for those few marriages that can benefit from greater submission of women, and not preach escape to the women who need that?
I would be very interested to see if Mary Kassian will ever discuss abuse in marriage on her blog. So far, I have not seen it, although I have read the posts linked to.
I was very upset at her revealing personal information about a girl who phoned her son. A girl phoned my son once too. She is the daughter of a contributor to the ESV Study Bible. She is a lovely and intelligent young woman who I would be proud to know. (At this point, I know longer have contact with her, so I am sure she won’t recognise herself.) Where is Kassian’s human touch?
Mrs. Webfoot,
I scanned some of the articles you linked but did not read all of them.
Typical advice to a woman in an abusive situation is to have an emergency plan – car, cash, important documents, someone to call with perhaps a code word, etc. Does Kassian ever give any advice about an escape? I saw comments to the effect of “I know it’s hard but God can redeem even the worst situations” but I did not see where she says something like “if you are physically in danger, here is some practical advice…” Would you happen to have a link directly to an article where she fills in that sort of advice?
Dennyreader,
Being told that you are being abused because your prayers for release from abuse are not effective since you lack faith and also cannot demonstrate perfect and total submission, also leads away from happiness. Throw in the accusation that the person is a rebellious and radical feminist, and this is why she is being abused, and then blame her for her lack of contentment in the Lord.
Matthew,
Tears come to my eyes. If only some had said those words to me when I was younger. I did develop a plan over the years in total isolation, without a word to anyone. The emotional deprivation is severe when the church, when everyone around you, denies that what is happening to you, can happen, does happen. It is a kind of solitary confinement of the mind.
Hi, Sue,
No, you haven’t self identified as a radical feminist. I call you that. this is the dictionary usage that I am employing in your case.:
“3. favoring major changes: favoring or making economic, political, or social changes of a sweeping or extreme nature”
http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_1861697732/radical.html
You have self-identified as a Christian feminist. There’s no law against either form of feminism.
You can call yourself what you want, and in other places, you have idientified yourself with the Christian feminism label.
I think it’s good to know where someone is coming from. It helps one to interpret what they are saying and why. I “outed” you, as if you needed to be “outed.”
I am a staunch Complementarian. If you call me a “patrio”, I won’t cry.
God bless, Sue, and take care,
Mrs. Webfoot
LOL, I am not in the word faith camp. When Peter cried for help he lacked faith but Jesus saved him. Maybe you are being facetious but you’ve got to learn to separate “abuse†from feminism or Christian sanctification. For that matter it doesn’t even matter if you are not a Christian. Abuse is an unbiblical behavior and it doesn’t matter if you are a Christian or not.
Another reason why EP’s beloved secular Iceland is not where you want to be.
I guess to really foul things up you need a secularist according to EP. Iceland’s de facto bankruptcy
So then women should not be told that if they are submissive enough or pray hard enough, or believe enough, then the abuse will stop. It will not stop.
They need to be told, simply this – you that are rude and obnoxious women, you need to submit, and you that are being belittled and abused, you need to get up and find a safe house. Then someone needs to immediately put themselves or the police between the woman and her abuser, or the husband and his abuser, and make sure that she or he never sees their abuser alone again in their life.
That would make a good sermon.
Matthew, I am not Mary Kassian, but you are free to ask her whatever you wish to ask her and to read all of her articles and books. Skimming her articles will not give you a very clear picture.
I can tell you what I do. I can tell you what an attorney from Doug Wilson’s church told me when I asked him what his church would do. I can tell you what our church does. I can tell you what Mark Driscoll says.
I can tell you about one man my husband worked with whose wife was beating him. He had a hard time convincing people, since he was kind of a big guy. Many men will not hit a woman, and will allow themselves to be beaten. Also, what does a little boy do when his mother is demeaning him verbally and beating him?
I still don’t know what a Christian feminist would tell a child or a man who was being abused and threatened by a woman. Sue’s answer was pretty lame, IMO. I would like to hear greater compassion for all who are abused coming from the feminist side if I am to take their alleged concerns about abuse seriously.
I’m not convinced myself.
Denny is right. Abuse is sinful. It is not a gener-specific behavior in and of itself, but men and women tend to abuse in different ways.
Even so, most people are not abusive, and most people are not being abused. It’s still a pretty small minority of people who are either victims or perpetrators of abuse. Does that make their suffering any less? No, it doesn’t, but it certainly doesn’t make Complementarians abusive people by definition – as some egalitarians would have us believe. Hey, I know of egalitarians who have gotten into trouble for being over-bearing and arrogant in their ministries.
No one has a corner on the sin market.
The abused first line of defense is God Himself. The story of Hagar who was driven out into the wilderness is an example. God took care of her and her son. Remember Hagar?
Genesis 16:13 (English Standard Version)
13 So she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.”
Then, Matthew, Sue doesn’t need to be rescued. She’s playing you like a piano.
Mrs. Webfoot,
Some complaints of the abuse victims I have known in church are:
- when they speak up, the church attacks THEM instead of confronting the abuser and helping to break the cycle of abuse,
- the church minimizes and ignores abuse,
- church leadership offers counsel that makes the situation worse, not better,
- church fails to offer practical advice to those who are in dangerous situations.
Your answer, unfortunately, illustrates some of these very problems. In the 400 words of your response, no practical suggestions for someone in danger. You don’t need to attack Sue or feminists, tell me I’m being played, or minimize the reality of abuse in order to give a practical suggestion for what victims of abuse in a dangerous situation should do. I have seen the reality and damage of abuse. Answers like the one you gave here made the situations of which I speak worse, not better (these situations had nothing to do with Sue).
I was not trying to attack you. I was following up on the link you offered; I had hoped it would have practical advice for victims of abuse. I was disappointed when I didn’t see any so I asked you to help me fill in the blanks.
Mrs. Webfoot, I would urge you to develop a pastoral answer that will help make abusive situations better or, failing that, help to rescue victims. It may well be the difference between making someone else’ life worse or making it better.
I can tell you about one man my husband worked with whose wife was beating him. He had a hard time convincing people, since he was kind of a big guy. Many men will not hit a woman, and will allow themselves to be beaten. Also, what does a little boy do when his mother is demeaning him verbally and beating him?
These scenarios happen and they are terrible. So what should the church’s response be? Sadly, church leadership often has an instinct to cover up the problem or blame the victim. This site has some good stuff: http://www.recoveryfromabuse.com/wordpress/
I am curious to know what resources others would recommend?
Mrs. Webfoot,
In the sidebar of your blog you cite the Danvers ststement responding to –
“the upsurge of physical and emotional abuse in the family.”
In fact, domestic violence has decreased significantly with the increase in laws supporting women and the increased ability of women to earn a living. The sad thing is that for the victims, half of 5 million (or whatever the exact number was) is still 2.5 million. For those that are of that number, it is still too high.
Rather than turn back the clock, the church should assess what changes in society have reduced the violence, and then seek to emulate that.
So Matthew, what is your practical advice for victims of abuse?
Sue, do we still need more laws? Would you answer Matthew’s question for practical advice be every woman needs to be earning a living? Is earning a living the guarantee for women to not get abused?
Dennyreader,
No, earning a living is not the one right answer. But having a sense of oneself as a provider and protector of one’s family, as a self-sufficient individual in terms of basic needs, is essential.
Some women have a vision for being able to retrain and enter the marketplace. Other women have contributed to their husband’s successful career and have legal right to benefit from this.
Some women need to enter the workplace while they are still married, since their husband’s work status is not secure. Other women may never need to work outside the home.
The laws I am thinking of are no fault divorce, and the ability of the police to issue a warning of criminal harassment charge rather than simply invoke a restraint order. It is less confrontational and offers more protection from violence.
Essentially, it is a retraining of the mind that protects from abuse. It is the belief in the inviolable nature of one’s human dignity. There needs to be teaching that man is not entitled to female submission. This creates a hunger in some men for total submission. They think that this is their right. This attutude is fostered by wrong teaching in the church, and on TV both.
If submission of the female is not qualified with a set of law books the length of a room, setting out the female right to access to the toilet, to access to the telephone, access to some privacy, then some women lose all.
But what about the women who are gifted in some area that is best experienced outside the home, like Marilyn. Why is it that the husband can decide eacb one for his wife if she is allowed to further her education, use birth control, and work outide the home.
Why should this not be negotiated. Since it is clear that divorce is not more prevalent among egalitarians, why not admit that egalitarians function very well and are able to manage their lives without male overall leadership. It is not necessary, but is often a deterrent to the woman getting the help and support she needs in trouble.
I have no set vision of how a woman should live her life, except that she has been given by God, equal responsibility for her famly, equal potential to care for and provide, and therefore must have equal authority, equal liberty to be responsible – for her own safety and for that of her family.
You said family, so in order for a woman to have a sense as the protector of her husband and children, she must be self-sufficient and be able to provide for their basic needs, is that right?
So if she didn’t contribute to her husband’s success then she does not have a legal right to benefit from it, is that right?
So by following these advice that you gave will guarantee that women will not get abuse?
And this will eliminate spousal abuse?
I can agree with this.
Are all submission evil?
Do you think that a woman is any less gifted because she is a housewife? Do you think you have the right or the ability to judge the decision of someone else’s husband?
Sure, you can function as an egalitarian. It is not Biblical but if that doesn’t matter to you then go for it.
So far you’ve said nothing that could guarantee the elimination of spousal abuse. All I seen is your promotion of feminist power piggybacked on the guise of spousal abuse. IOW, you should be ashamed of yourself for using these tragedies to promote your feminist ideology.
I am not guranteeing anything. But submission to abuse, reinforces abuse. You can’t guarantee that a spouse will not be abused and I can’t either. Does that make it wrong to try to reduce the incidence of abuse?
Do you think that a woman is any less gifted because she is a housewife? Do you think you have the right or the ability to judge the decision of someone else’s husband?
I have not even come close to insinuating any such thing. I can tell you that the women my age are not “housewives” period. Some work in the home, and some work outside the home. Some are artists and authors, teachers and administrators, some are musicians.
I have a great deal of respect for a dear friend who was not allowed to go to university by her father, and never allowed to work outside the home by her husband. Her artwork is stunning.
But does she look down on me for working outside the home? Not at all. I am not a judge of how other women live. And I do not know why others set themselves up as judges of other women.
Yes, every adult must see themselves both as someone who is ultimately responsible for self and family and someone who is ultimately interconnected with others. I don’t know how that will work out for the individual but thinking that a man will “protect” you is going to prove false for many women, through illness, financial downturn, or marital failure.
There are many women in the Bible who took on the provider role. There is nothing wrong with that. I am not saying a woman must have the financial provider role, but I am saying that she must consider in some way, that the role of provider is hers as an adult.
I don’t think she gave any advice for a person who received a imminent death threat. I don’t think she gave any advice to the person whose house is burning down either. What sort of practical advice would you give to these two persons? Maybe she should have some practical advice on her website for these people to have a car, cash, important documents, so they can leave at a moments notice.
I mean really Matthew, do you think that a woman is not smart enough to make the kind of preparations that you’ve advised if she believes her life is in danger?
How? What specifically did Webfoot said that would make which specific situation you spoke of worse?
Where do you come up with this stuff? Who believes in submitting to abuse?
Good then you won’t have a problem with the women who are gifted in some area decides to submit to their husband and stay at home. That certainly does not diminish their gifts nor their human dignity does it?
I actually don’t have a problem with much of what you said after that. The problem only comes when a woman tries to usurp her authority over what God has ordained as the roles for men and women and in the context of the church. That unfortunately would lead us into the complementarian and egalitarian debate.
Good then you won’t have a problem with the women who are gifted in some area decides to submit to their husband and stay at home. That certainly does not diminish their gifts nor their human dignity does it?
I have never even thought any such thing.
The problem only comes when a woman tries to usurp her authority over what God has ordained as the roles for men and women and in the context of the church.
I am far more concerned with what happens in the home. It is Susan Hunt who wrote so eloquently that male church leaders do not support women who live in abusive situations. I think she has a grip on the severity of the situation, but I don’t see any complementarians blogging about how women can release themselves from the “final say” of their husband in order to go to counselling or have private phone calls or whatever it takes to plan a bail. Its not that easy.
The CBMW blog is accurate in saying that 10 out of 10 men are selfish – as are women also. But then, every husband is selfish, and in some way abusive, at some time. Everyone will demand of the other something that is not in the interests of the other, but treads on their well-being. It is in human nature to do this.
So, submitting to that behaviour increases it. Of course, we all submit to a certain amount of abuse, of some kind. The question is this. Does a woman have the right to decide when she will submit and when she will not? Does she have veto power, or does her husband? If the husband has veto and final say, then some women are deprived of all rights of their person, bit by bit. Some are deprived by belittlement, some by violence, and some by lies.
A man who suffered this from his wife would be counselled to take on personal authority. I believe that the same is true for women. Preachers should preach submission and assertiveness, side by side. They should never ever preach the final say, and veto power of the husband.
This is an abrogation of basic human rights. Some men curtail their wives telephone privileges, some require that the wife asks permission to leave the house, others that she recounts the content of all conversations with the children, and others that she only vote for the candidate of his choice. Some men get two votes and their wife none at all.
Is Hunt a complementarian or a member of the CBMW? Can you actually find something from CBMW or some accepted representative voice from complementarians that espouses your jaundice view? You continue to shamelessly use abuse to malign complementarians and promote your ideology.
First, every husband needs to be reminded that his authority in marriage comes from God, is defined by the Word of God, and is to be modeled after the sacrificial, loving relationship of Christ to the church. In no way is this authority a license for selfish tyranny or boorish abuse.
I am beginning to wonder if you are being deliberately deceptive or willfully ignorant.
Selfishness is a problem for 10 out of 10 people, Tripp said, which obviously has an adverse affect on marriage. In contrast, 2 Corinthians 5:14-15 teaches that Christ died for people so that they might no longer live for themselves but for Him, Tripp noted. To work through a self-focused perspective toward a Christ-honoring approach to life and marriage, Tripp said, spouses must uncover and be honest about their selfishness.
Sorry, can’t link directly to gender blog at this moment.
Here is Susan Hunt’s article. She seems to be a well-known complemnentarian. Women need to take on initiative and leadership, instead of filling the gender role of “receiving and responding.”
Oops.
http://www.cbmw.org/images/jbmw_pdf/13_2/defenders%20of%20women.pdf
DennyReader #78,
So Matthew, what is your practical advice for victims of abuse?
I alluded to some in #67 about having an emergency plan. I linked to some in #76.
I think it is critical to understand the cycle of violence. Many abusive homes tend to cycle from explosion to honeymoon to walking on eggshells and then explosion again. Victims stuck in this cycle easily blame themselves. The abusers and victims tend to act like nothing ever happened in the quieter phases and the victims tend to feel if they just do this or that differently, for example, if they just submit better, then the explosion won’t happen this time. But the pattern is a part of the abuser’s lifestyle – it is how the abuser operates. He/she is going to repeat this regardless of how well you submit or how hard you try to please him or her.
I don’t have a one-size-fits-all answer. Honestly, a part of me wonders how sincere you are in asking me. But I feel it is important that church leadership understand this cycle and the instinct that the whole family has to cover it up and how easy it is for a home to appear to be a good home on the outside yet in actuality be a power structure that is inflicting wounds and damage behind closed doors. Same as enabling an addict, enabling an abuser is not loving to either abuser or victims. The right thing to do is call the police if it’s physical or sexual. If it is verbal and mental but not physical then other interventions are needed. Bottom line: truth in love. Don’t enable. Don’t cover up. Don’t accept excuses. Don’t hold victims down. Do help victims realize they are important, significant, loved, supported and it isn’t their fault. Do help abusers change. Do help redeem relationships. Do understand the cycle of violence (applies to verbal as well as physical) and deal with it proactively.
DennyReader – here are some questions for you. What is your practical advice to victims of abuse? Do you think abuse happens under-cover in homes that look good on the oustide? Do you think “abuse” is just a tempest in a teapot? Are you prepared to help victims stop blaming themselves and actually step out and make a change?
Matthew,
Re abuse: For good materials from a complementarian perspective, I recommend Dr. Steve and Celestia Tracy at http://www.mendingthesoul.org.
FWIW, there are some passages in the NT that apply to abusive homes. From 1 Tim 3, a church leader should not be an alcoholic nor should he be quarrelsome or violent. He should be above reproach. Every verbal/physical abuser I’ve known and every sexual abuser I’ve known of would fail these tests. Matthew 18 and 1 Corinthians speak to confronting and dealing with sin in the church. Galatians 6 speaks to gently restoring someone who stumbles. I could add passages to each of these categories but these give the idea.
Here is a bottom-line, bare minimum consideration: a church that is prepared to exercise church discipline against homosexuals or couples living together before marriage must also be prepared confront and deal with the sin of physical or verbal/emotional abuse in the homes of its leaders. If a church leader is found to be someone who cycles through a pattern of tension building up and then exploding and spewing hurtful, damaging words at his family, the church must deal with this in some fashion. Hopefully, change and restoration will occur but if not, church discipline must at least be considered here if it is exercised in the area of sexual sins previously named.
Here is an inadequate response: “well, by definition, no true complementarian abuses his wife or family. By definition we complementarian husbands pursue loving our wives as Christ loved the church. Anyone who does differently may claim to be in the club but by definition they are not one of us.” Defining abusers out of our circle is a nice word game but it doesn’t deal with the real problem that abuse really does exist and it really does happen. It happens in liberal and conservative churches alike and churches need to be prepared to deal with it, not define it away, ignore it, blame the victim, or other enabling responses.
Sorry if this comes off as preachy. It is a subject near and dear to my heart. I believe that this is part of what God has in mind when he tells his people to defend the fatherless and widow – that is, I believe God wants us to speak up for victims who are powerless. I am not trying to escalate any war of words with these thoughts. I am hoping that these thoughts will spark people’s own thinking about dealing with this ugly problem.
Marilyn,
Thank you very much! I was not familiar with Dr. Steve and Celestia Tracy and am glad to know about them. The article here http://www.mendingthesoul.org/2007/04/clergy-responses-to-domestic-violence/ looks like a great resource.
What other sites and ministries like this are out there?
I do recall that CBMW did come out with something that claimed that if someone was an abuser they were not a comp. This puts the cart before the horse and is like saying that if someone is a sinner they are not a believer, yet we are all sinners.
CBMW would serve its constiuents better by admitting that some of its adherents abuse and then working to prevent that.
Kudos to JBMW for printing the great essay that Sue linked to in #90. Also available here: http://www.cbmw.org/Journal/Vol-13-No-2/Defenders-of-Women
I encourage people to stop what they are doing and go read this essay by Hunt and the article linked in #94.
I think Steven Tracy has been officially disowned by the CBMW.
http://johnploughman.wordpress.com/2009/05/
I find everything Tracy says is very true to reality. However, he does not address the long process of taking the crime from silent and invisible to some kind of action. What can a pastor say even when he is not aware of any domestic violence, and how can the pastor get a woman who has been brainwashed into submission, whose veins are coursing with the chemicals of fear, to take the first step?
Here is what that JBMW article did not say.
1. 10 out of 10 men are selfish
2. every husband is selfish
3. every husband is in some way abusive, at some time
4. everyone will demand of the other something that is not in the other’s interests
5. everyone will tread on the other’s well-being
I have an idea. How about Sue you write a book and every Christian buy one and throw the Bible out and use your book as the Divine Text.
I understand the psychology of abuse. I came out of an abusive church. The problem with what you and Sue is promoting is nothing short of propaganda. Who do you think you are preaching to? Do you think complementarians are completely tone deaf to the problem of abuse? Even CBMW published the article Sue linked to educate the church on this issue. Unfortunately Sue has completely distorted what she read into an attack on men and to promote her feminist ideology.
Seriously, Matthew do you consider what Sue is doing a form of abuse? She is constantly blaming all men and good Christian leaders with a broad brush as contributing to the culture of abuse. This sort of maligning innocent people, do you consider that a form of verbal and mental abuse?
WRT your questions, I’ve said very early on that I believe and understand that there are real abuses. I have no tolerance for any form of abuse, but more importantly the Bible does not tolerate abuse. Am I prepared to help? I lived through it my friend.
What you and Sue need to do is detached your egalitarian agenda with the issue of abuse and stop using it as a straw man to beat the complementarians with it. I could just as easily replace the word complementarian with egalitarian in your “Here is an inadequate response:†routine. It proves nothing and solves nothing. If you want to talk about abuse, talk about abuse. If you want to talk about Biblical roles of men and women, then talk about their roles. But stop trying to conflate the two and mischaracterize what the other side is saying.
It is incomprehensible to me that a modern woman would care to follow a God who has over and over demonstrated such a low regard for women. You can re-interpret and massage the texts all you want, but the God of the Bible is a blatant and unrepentent misogynist. Ponder this lovely text from God’s perfect law on the punishment of rapists as commanded in Deuteronomy 22:
28 “If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, 29 he shall pay the girl’s father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the girl, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.â€
Please show me the text in the OT where a woman may leave or divorce her husband if he abuses her. There are whole chapters dealing with mold and mildew, but none on dealing with an abusive spouse. Even Jesus allowed only adultery as an acceptable reason for divorce – not abuse or abandonment.
Another indication of the low regard for women is that adultery in the OT is essentially a property crime. A sin is committed when a married woman has sex with a man who is not her husband. But if a married man has sex with a woman who is not his wife, it is not adultery unless she is married. If she is married, then the sin is against her husband for the man has “stolen” another man’s wife.
This is why it was a sin for David to have sex with Bathsheba. Not because David was already married (to multiple wives), but because Bathsheba was already married to Uriah. The sin was against Uriah.
Nathan said to David:
“I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. 9 Why did you despise the word of the LORD by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own.”
It was perfectly fine for David to have multiple wives and have sex with unmarried women, but a married woman could only have sex with one man.
“Ponder this lovely text from God’s perfect law on the punishment of rapists as commanded in Deuteronomy 22:
28 “If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, 29 he shall pay the girl’s father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the girl, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.–
Hmm, what’s your point? This is actually a GOOD thing for the woman, considering the fact that the culture at the time (just as it still is in most Muslim areas) made that woman unfit for marriage. This makes it so that she is provided for. Not all of God’s laws in the OT are “perfect,” but rather pragmatic. Look at what Jesus said about the divorce laws… He said that they were put in place because God knew that people were hard-hearted and needed some compromise to keep the peace.
“It was perfectly fine for David to have multiple wives and have sex with unmarried women, but a married woman could only have sex with one man.”
You read too much into the text. See my comment above.
Because something happens in the Bible doesn’t mean that God views it as good and proper, particularly in the Old Testament. He allowed for compromise on some issues because He knew that otherwise, people wouldn’t even try to live up to His standards.
That is a complete cop-out. There are plenty of things in the OT law that were counter-cultural and difficult to follow. You are now going to explain away the disgusting elements by saying, “Well, God had to compromise with the culture of the time.” Baloney. Why couldn’t God have said that a virgin who had been raped would be purified and that no one could hold it against her? Instead, he ordained procedures for determining if a woman was a virgin. If she wasn’t, she was to be stoned at the town gate. No rules for men being virgins.
David in the Psalms calls the law perfect over and over. Was he wrong?
“No rules for men being virgins.”
How exactly does one prove that a man is a virgin? Pretty easy to do so with a woman, not so much with a man.
The culture around the Israelites held the woman responsible for a rape… God said the man was responsible, not the woman.
Complete cop-out? This is a phrase that is thrown around to carelessly and to often.
All of the Bible needs to be interpreted in its proper context and just because someone does so does not mean they are guilty of a “cop-out.” The work of understanding the Bible is difficult and just because it does not immediately square with our modern sensibilities does not mean its what we think it is.
In addition, if it is now incomprehensible to follow the God of the Bible than on what grounds should we even care about the treatment of women and being abusive toward them?
I am just curious how your grounding your moral outrage toward the mistreatment of women.
“I am just curious how your grounding your moral outrage toward the mistreatment of women.”
Brilliant comment, Ryan.
Except that “your” should be “you’re”…
otherwise, it was brilliant.
“interpreted in its proper context” = have the repugnant parts explained away
My moral outrage comes from the use of reason. Reason is a much better tool than an ancient book of tales and fables written by semi-literate Middle Eastern sheep-herders thousands of years ago.
ex-preacher,
Why do you even care? You have already said that God should not be followed, so why are you following a blog that is devoted to God and His Son Jesus Christ?
Your comments on this blog are often malicious and are not curious. Your name alone gives away your vindictiveness to the gospel. If you are truly an ex-preacher, then quit preaching. It is one thing to argue with the opinion of Denny on his posts, but you are only desirious of arguing with God.
We get it! You hate God!
How exactly does “reason” lead you to believe that we should treat women (or anyone, for that matter) “nicely”? It’s equally valid to reason that the best way to treat another person in this meaningless life is to do whatever gets you the most happiness in the moment and helps you out the most. So for many men, logically that would mean treating women like crap and sleeping around. To what standard to you want to force others to live by? Yours? Why? Who made you god?
“We get it! You hate God!”
Speaking of which, why exactly do you hate God? You probably said this before, but what led to your unbelief (in human terms, at least)? It’s fine and dandy to not be keen on some Mosaic Law, but most people need something much more personal to make them reassess their belief system than some ancient law that doesn’t even apply to them.
It is much better to be an atheist who has no regards for women. They are nothing more than a weaker animal that can be dominated. Human dignity is nonexistent. You can do anything to anyone as long as you feel good about it. I can’t imagine a worse scenario than falling into the hands of an amoral atheist “survival of the fittest†jungle.
Reason? Such a tricky term and so subjective.
The Nazi’s had pretty good reasoning (based on their worldview) to commit genocide, eugenics, and abuse others.
Darwinism would reason that I should subscribe to survival of the fittest and that if a woman is weaker than me then there is no valid reason for me not to exploit her for my gain. My only obligation is to survive and procreate so why should I be outraged if women are abused?
My question still stands to you ex-preacher.
If that was only true. With an open minded skeptic you can productively answer their questions and reason with them. EP is not interested in seeking truth. An atheist mind like EP’s is like a black hole, you can shine light on it but no light will come out.
It is much better to be an atheist who has no regards for women. They are nothing more than a weaker animal that can be dominated. Human dignity is nonexistent. You can do anything to anyone as long as you feel good about it. I can’t imagine a worse scenario than falling into the hands of an amoral atheist “survival of the fittest†jungle.
I used to think this also. But now I know that it is a jungle inside the church as well. Every human being is selfish, male or female. But some have more aggression. Why give a blanket rule for the male to have power over the female.
I was in a major “soft comp” church, and there was absolutely not one word spoken about abuse, no resources, total denial. I am not maing this up. 1000 people and not even one tiny mention of the possibility of abuse by the submission preaching pastor. This is two or three years ago, and major famous theologians in this congregation.
I felt like a throwaway. Much better to preach submission for that stray female who doesn’t know to submit. But let’s not preach about the possibility of abuse. Oh right – once they did and it was only to mock and make fun of any woman who could be abused. My daughter was there and the pastor said, “oh, no one has walked out yet.” But she stumbled out in tears and got a ride home from one of the elder’s wives. This woman had quit this church some years before in disgust. A few elders wives were voting with their feet but I wasn’t even aware of the extent of that since the congregation is so large.
Well, I can tell you what makes me the happiest – staying away from feminists! They “tax my gig.”
So, I’m going to work on my personal happiness and let the discussion go on without me. Please excuse me for not responding to comments directed towards me. It’s not that I don’t love you. I do love you and pray God’s best for you. I pray that we will seek God and grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
I also hope that all of you good folks will look at the abuse subject in a more global and a less gender-specific way. I hope, too, that you won’t allow yourselves to be manipulated emotionally by those who are pushing a very specific agenda.
Denny, you are a brave soul. God bless you, brother. You have a fine blog. I plan to go back to lurk mode.
Atheism is neither a philosophy nor a worldview. It is simply the lack of a belief in a god. To lump all materialists or all atheists together when it comes to worldview, would be like lumping together everyone who doesn’t believe in the tooth fairy as holding the same worldview.
Within the broad grouping of materialists and atheists, you will find a huge variety of views with regard to life philosophy, ethics, worldview, morality.
I think it is very irresponsible and shortsighted to suggest that all materialists are immoral or amoral. Certainly, some materialists and/or atheists are very immoral. It does not follow that their lack of morality stems directly from their materialism. There are also immoral people who call themselves Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu or Jewish.
In terms of worldview, I would classify myself as a humanist. I would guess that the vast majority of atheists today also consider themselves humanists. There are also completely selfish jerks who are atheists.
I believe that humans can find and have found general agreement among themselves on ethical behavior. There is not 100% agreement, but there is an amazing amount of consensus. I would go so far as to say that humanists have as much agreement on ethics among themselves as you would find among Catholics or just about any Christian denomination. How is it that humanists can find so much common ground despite differences in culture and history and without a common holy book? We use reason and experience. One of the foundations is the principle of doing unto others as we would wish done to ourselves. While Christians recognize that as the “Golden Rule†spoken by Jesus (Matthew 7:12), they may not be aware that very similar formulations occurred among teachers before Jesus, including the Rabbi Hillel, Confucius, the Buddha, Greek philosophers, and various other great teachers.
I would point to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (easily found at the UN website) as an example of the common wisdom of people representing all major religions and philosophies. Notice, if you will, how much further advanced and civilized it is than the Old Testament or even the New Testament. Where the OT, Jesus, and Paul allowed for slavery, the Declaration does not. Where the OT allows for situations where genocide might be appropriate, the Declaration does not. While the NT calls for the eternal torture of some based on religious beliefs, the Declaration does not.
What about all the evil done in the 20th century by what has been called “Darwinist-inspired materialists�
First off, I don’t think we can blame Darwin entirely. Darwin and others simply observed the “what†of nature, not the “ought†of morality. Just because the strong eat the weak in the jungle does not mean that strong humans ought to eat weak humans. Let’s remember that the law of jungle was in effect long before Darwin came on the scene. Yes, some people, notably Herbert Spencer, promoted “Social Darwinism†as an ethical system. This was embraced by many people who were already oppressing the weak and liked that this philosophy could justify their behavior. (Side note: interesting that most conservative Christians today have fully embraced the economic Darwinism of the free market system.)
Nathan,
Believe it or not, I’m here to try to help you. This may be difficult for you to accept, but if the scales ever fall from your eyes I think you will thank me. In the meantime, I don’t really care if you hate me. It’s pretty difficult for me to hate a nonexistent being. I do hate what millenia of superstition have done to human beings. You could say that I hate the Christianity, but love the Christians.
Sue, as a feminist why do you hate women so much. Why must you tell them that they are worthless and have no dignity?
You won’t understand if you don’t have God in your heart. You see, Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7
This might be true, but why did you lied about what CBMW said or are you so twisted with hate for men and women that you saw what was not there?
I know what you mean, it is much easier to lie about what others believe and said than to face the truth.
I have to add that you guys have an amazing ability to turn a blind eye to the atrocities and inanities of the Bible and focus your attack on me. I would probably have done the same when I was a Christian since that is far easier than actually defending the absurd teachings of the Bible.
LOL! Seriously this is so funny. What is the next line? “To Serve Man”?
“I believe that humans can find and have found general agreement among themselves on ethical behavior. There is not 100% agreement, but there is an amazing amount of consensus.”
Yep, because God has written His law on our hearts. If you don’t have a standard outside of yourself or your society, then you have no right to tell another that they can’t do something. By what standard can you tell David that he was wrong for sleeping with Bathsheba or think Solomon was immoral for having 1000 whores for his personal use or Joshua for killing all those Canaanites? If man is his own god and his conscience and reasoning his own moral standard, then one can’t tell another that he is wrong. You can’t go to that remote cannibalistic tribe and tell them to stop eating people. To them, that may be the highest form of morality.
You don’t recognize the self-defeating nature of your worldview as it pertains to morality… which means you have deceived yourself MORE than the postmodern multicult fools who think no culture is better than another. At least they recognize the logical end to believing that man chooses his own moral standards.
“I have to add that you guys have an amazing ability to turn a blind eye to the atrocities and inanities of the Bible…”
I haven’t turned a blind eye to any of it. You continue to be intellectually dishonest about slavery in the Bible (the slavery of that day was NOT the same as the slavery America is familiar with). I’ve addressed all of the other issues. That you have no good reply to my explanations is not my problem, it’s yours.
Also, if you want a deeper explanation of the holy war in the OT, read this: http://www.amazon.com/Show-Them-No-Mercy-Canaanite/dp/0310245680/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256674642&sr=8-1
The argument that the slavery referenced in the Bible and practiced in ancient times was somehow “kinder and gentler†than slavery in the American South has been refuted repeatedly, but many Bible defenders still cling to it. Slavery in ancient times was often far more cruel than typical 19th century Southern slavery, and Southern slave owners were often kinder than typical slaveowners in ancient days. The fact is that slavery is slavery and the Bible endorses it over and over.
Southern pro-slavery apologists routinely used Genesis 9 (the condemnation of Ham’s descendants to slavery since he had seen Noah naked) to defend racialized slavery. Race-based slavery is clearly endorsed in Leviticus 25:44-46
44 †‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can will them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.â€
For a moment, let’s suppose that the Bible did not endorse race-based slavery. Are you saying that you’re ok with non-race-based slavery? Is slavery fine with you as long as all races are enslaved on an equal basis?
You are an ethical relativist on slavery, while I am an absolutist. I’m not okay with slavery ever for anyone. Slavery is wrong now, was wrong in America from 1619 to 1865 and was wrong in biblical times. With regard to daughters, the Bible even provides a mechanism for Israelites to sell their daughters into slavery (see verse 7) in Exodus 21:
2 “If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything. 3 If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. 4 If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free.
5 “But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’ 6 then his master must take him before the judges. He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he will be his servant for life. â€
7 “If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as menservants do.â€
You have a very poor understanding of ethics. There are many ethical systems that rely on reason, experience and common sense apart from any divine revelation. Read up on Immanuel Kant for starters.
Reason is not subjective, anymore than math is subjective.
Fine, since I have to spell it out… in most cases, the slavery discussed in the Bible refers to mutually agreed bondservitude. In other words, a poor person recognized that the only way that they could make a living and feed himself or his family was to offer his services (or those of a family member, like his daughter or son) to a wealthier person. What’s so wrong about this? It wasn’t race based, and it wasn’t done without compensation, and there were rules that kept the “owner” from abusing the contractual agreement. No one’s freedoms were violated, and everyone got cared for. Without the slavery laws as put forth in the OT, you had either mass starvation or mass forced enslavement.
“There are many ethical systems that rely on reason, experience and common sense apart from any divine revelation.”
Actually, not really. We live in a Judeo-Christian world, and your sense of right and wrong is significantly informed by the Judeo-Christian ethic. You don’t appreciate or realize this, apparently, but without Christianity, you would be vastly more immoral (by your own standards, much less God’s) in your conduct toward others. You can’t divorce your reason so easily from the Judeo-Christian context in which you live.
“Reason is not subjective, anymore than math is subjective.”
Math follows rules created by God, just like reason does. Reason doesn’t work outside of those rules and a proper understanding of the Rule Giver.
Utter nonsense, Darius. Please provide references for you claims.
The “utter nonsense” was a reference to your claims about biblical slavery, but it could also apply to your other post. What proof do you offer for your latest assertions?
How is it that so many non-Christian societies (take Japan for instance) have higher moral standards and lower crime that the US? Why does largely secular Europe have lower crime rates than the US? Why do the highly secular parts of the US have lower crime rates than the Bible Belt?
EP, this is common knowledge about Biblical slavery. I am sure if you do a little Googling, you find plenty of links to better inform you. I’d start with something as simple as Wikipedia… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bible_and_slavery
“How is it that so many non-Christian societies (take Japan for instance) have higher moral standards and lower crime that the US?”
Seriously, THAT’s your argument? I have to laugh if it is. A lower crime rate means better morals??? First of all, “crime rate” is a complex term. A country or city could have a zero crime rate if they don’t have any police (or their police don’t do anything about crime). This is currently a big problem in the UK, where police are rewarded for lower crime rates, so they just don’t bother with most “small crime” like burglary and assault. Having a higher crime rate in a country many times means that crime is taken more seriously there rather than that there are more immoral people living there. As renowned British author Theodore Dalrymple recently said, “For me, the high imprisonment rate in the United States is a sign of social health, not of social disease.”
That’s your proof? If you think the streets of highly religious Washington DC or any other US city at night are safer than the streets of Tokyo or Paris, you’re smoking something mighty powerful.
I was merely pointing out the absurdity behind your use of crime rates.
You connected crime rates to moral standards… I don’t think one follows the other. Just because a society is built around certain moral views doesn’t mean it follows them down to the man.
This is the reason I scoff at the EP when he said his “use of reasonâ€. When Christians try to explain something to him, that is just “interpreted in its proper context†= have the repugnant parts explained away, but when he does it then it is fine.
This is complete deception. This is what an atheist will tell you when he tries to build a veneer of neutrality to lure you into his confidence. But it has been demonstrated EP has repeatedly equated individual behaviors to the system as a whole. But he is the only one who is allow to do that, you of course cannot equate blatant atheist behavior to his system of belief. He is not like those other bad atheists, he is the good atheist. No, don’t lump him with tooth fairies.
Humanists sound so much better doesn’t it? It is just an invented term to further obfuscate their atrocities and baseless foundation for morality, purpose and meaning. Don’t believe it. Sh…, I’ll let you in on a secret, other atheist don’t believe it either.
Yet with all that brain power, not a single atheist/humanist have been able to explain how he is more than a subspecies of catarrhines made from the mindless collection of star dust. There is no difference in the creation process or essence between pieces of rock, a cockroach, or a walking and talking primate. EP had plenty of chances to make his case. I certainly have given him enough opportunity to do so. To their credit there are some atheists honest enough to admit that they are amoral. Their existence is meaningless and without purpose. Unfortunately this doesn’t sell very well, hence let’s change the name and call ourselves humanists, and let’s not ever talk about the foundation of our belief system. An atheist can always create a set of codes or morals to try and live by, but that code has no relevance beyond the nose that created it. No one is obligated to live by anything you or an atheist conjures up.
I looked at the wikipedia article. Do you seriously think that helps your case? Southern slaveowners were almost all Christians and they claimed to obey everything the Bible taught about slavery. All the Bible would have had to say is, “Do not practice slavery.” Did God/Jesus know that southern slaveholders would use the BIble to justify their practice? Did he care?
No Darius, you got to remember it is a black hole. I am serious, EP is a proselytizing atheist. He is not interested in seeking the truth. His hope is to throw as many attacks out there and hope some of it will stick.
I have been through all this with you DennyReader and demonstrated – very convincingly in my view – that reason is the only possible source of ethics. As I recall though, you never offered a single iota of evidence to back up the legitimacy of your “morality.” Not one shred of proof. You seem to think that making your blind assertions and insulting me is a good substitute for actual arguments and evidence. It’s not. Is your case that feeble?
No Darius, you [have] got to remember it is a black hole. I am serious, DennyReader is a proselytizing Christian. He is not interested in seeking the truth. His hope is to throw as many attacks out there and hope some of it will stick.
Are you serious EP? Just declaring that you use reason is “very convincing� This is not even rational. I have been the only rational one in our discussion. It’s been a one way street. Go ahead keep repeating it that is very convincing. Let me just give you a clue. Everyone can reason but they can come to a very, very different moral value.
If you don’t know the foundation of my morality, I will be happy to explain it all to you, but I suspect you are only interested for the sake of avoided to explain yours. So when you answer my question then I will answer yours, since I asked you first.
Please support your claim that I made blind assertions. And do not have such a thin skin and claim that I’ve insulted you. I’ve told you the truth and you don’t like it so you think is an insult. My arguments against you have been sound, if it was not so you would have given a rational defense of it by now.
Cute EP, but I have not the one who claims to have reason but uses a double standard.
Let me just recap what EP calls his “very convincing” argument for a foundation of atheistic morality, purpose and meaning. Everyone will be able to see that EP never even got close to where that foundation is.
You don’t see why, well let me try to explain it to you again. If you are going to question my moral values and judgments then it is only reasonable to see if you are capable of moral judgments yourself. If you are incapable of moral judgments as I have postulated then your inquiry is irrelevant. And as a man/woman who claims to base your foundation on reason, it seems to me you might be a poor practitioner of reasoning. Just stating that you would use reason and experience is not sufficient to support that foundation. You need to provide the how and why they are capable of creating that foundation.
…
But again I want to be helpful so let me start the ball rolling and summarize what some of the great atheists from your past have said about your belief system. Human beings are nothing than the random collection of star stuff. We are formed by the random collision of atoms, without purpose and without meaning. Life is absurd and the fundamental question is should we commit suicide. “Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul’s habitation henceforth be safely built.†– Bertrand Russell. So let’s get started and build that solid atheistic foundation of morality, meaning and purpose based on these wisdoms from your forerunners.
To say your foundation is reason and experience is circular. How did you arrive at the conclusion that reason and experience are a valid foundation? Through reason and experience. Circular.
Dennyreader,
Could you provide evidence for your attacks on me. Lacking that, I shall have to assume that they are meaningless. I can’t make any sense out of them.
I have been convinced by the statement of concern about the TNIV that Christians have few standards of truth and fairplay.
I really can’t believe what has been said on that score. I interviewed Jim Packer and found out that he can’t remember the statement, and hasn’t read the book by Poythress and Grudem, but he signed the statement and endorsed the book anyway.
He seemed quite shocked that I thought he had read the book. Truly surprised that I thought he would read a book by those two men.
I finally realized the whole thing is propaganda with not a true statement in the lot. My complementarian pastor asked me if I could convince Dr. Packer to remove his name so our church wouldn’t look so silly perhaps. When I heard how people talk about these things behind the scenes, my eyes were opened.
All this stuff about autheneteo meaning “to have authority with a positive overtone,” as Carson says, is not supported by any evidence at all. There is no evidence either that Junia was only well-known to the apostles. It is all a game.
The Bible may not be terribly kind to women at some points, but just to make sure that women are in submission the translators putty up any possible loopholes and think that no one will notice.
Not much morality in the way the study of Junia has been done. I think that taught me a lot about exegesis. It was in some way my final lesson.
The new post by Carson about how “submit to one another” REALLY means “some among you are to submit to others among you” has demonstrated that exegesis is simply a way to make anything in the Bible mean the opposite of what everyone always thought it meant, whenever this is deemed necessary.
Sue and ex-preacher you both have made the same mistake when it comes to morality.
My claim was not that an atheist cannot act moral, its just that he or she has no good reason or obligation to do so.
Appealing to human consensus is well..a cop-out. What if the Nazis win WWII and human consensus becomes that killing Jews and experimenting on babies is morally good, does that make it right? Well under the consensus model it does. What if a society decides that it is okay not to let women vote or that certain races should be enslaved? Well if consensus says its okay than it must not actually be wrong.
This is classic moral subjectivism you fall into here ex-preacher; as your grounding for morality has become human agreement.
But still even human consensus cannot be supported under the worldview of atheism. I am after all just a cosmic accident of atoms who is biologically wired to survive and reproduce, just like any other animal. There is no such thing as caring about the death or exploitation of others. In fact Alexander the Great was the most faithful to the atheistic moral implications when he said “might makes right.”
So please before you go on arguing against atrocities in the Bible or treating women poorly you must ground this objective “ought” you are demanding.
It’s funny that you are all using reason to try to disprove the validity of reason in determining what is right.
Humanism does not teach that “might makes right.” That’s the theist’s position.
I do not appeal to consensus, but to reason.
A question for Bible followers: If you were a soldier in Joshua’s army and were commanded to butcher the Canaanite women and children, would you obey the order to plunge your sword into the belly of a pregnant woman?
Still dodging ex-preacher.
What do you mean by reason? And why am I obligated to follow it? The Nazis used their reason to carry out their actions and believed them to be moral.
What if my reasoning leads me to different moral conclusions or even utilitarianism in which we should experiment on some humans to save many more? Sounds reasonable. No?
Plus as an atheist you have to explain why I am any different than any other animal and should not just act in a Darwinian fashion of survival at any cost.
And stating that “might makes right” is the position of the theist is just nonsense. It indicates to me you are grasping here and have not really thought these things through.
I’ll tell you what, Ryan. Answer my question and I’ll answer yours.
That would be a problem if that indeed is what we said. What you’ve either failed to grasp or deliberately trying to avoid, is that reason and experience alone in and of itself can not be a foundation for morality, meaning and purpose. It does not tell us why and how something is moral or meaningful when everything is a random purposeless collection of atoms. I know you don’t like it and tries to ignore what I am telling you but this is as much for the benefit of the lurkers as it is for you. In order to create an atheist foundation of morality and meaning you must make sense of the fact that the random, meaningless, and purpose universe that created you and don’t care if you live or die actually has moral values and meaning. Otherwise your morality is nothing more than a random biochemical interaction that is inside a meaningless shell. I realize it is tempting for you to create and knock down a straw man than to face the cold hard facts, but that is the reality of atheism.
75. Sep 28, 2009—9:10 pm | Permalink
You proved once again why atheism is contradictory and untenable. You’ve said before that morality is when you have decided yourself, without benefits or threats, that this is the right thing to do. But now you are saying someone like Hitler who has decided for himself that killing other is a good and moral thing is unacceptable. As a matter of fact you go so far as saying even if everyone believes differently than you do, they are still wrong and you are the sole guardian of truth. This is the height of pompous and arrogant.
As an atheist: I have no problem to butcher the Canaanite women and children, because I have no moral construct to make me feel guilty by plunging my sword into the belly of a pregnant woman. Survival of the fittest. Their death is a gain to my tribe. It isn’t any different than a lion tearing into the flesh of an antelope mother. As a matter of fact that beast is actually a cousin of mine.
Your question is irrelevant unless there is such thing as right or wrong. So you have to tell me first how you could even be outraged at such a thing.
I have posed multiple questions to you multiple times and you keep ducking them. I understand why though, because all of your outrage and indignation collapses when you face the truth that atheism does not even allow for such a thing as moral outrage. Ironic.
Don’t feel bad Ryan, EP has been ducking my questions for over a month.
EP, you have yet to answer our question about how you can base your morality on reason. I’ve answered plenty of yours… the ball’s in your court, if you ever bother to return serve.
I have a feeling you don’t understand what we’re talking about, so that’s why you keep ignoring my questions. “I use reason to find my morality” is not an answer to “How can you base your morality on reason and consensus?”
Wow, three swings and three misses. No big surprise there.
Darius,
Perhaps you have an answer for this. Do you think that Eph. 5:21 means that a) Christians should submit to each other, or b) that some Christians are supposed to submit to other Christians? This was Carson’s topic yesterday on the gender blog, I think.
If you pick a) then you are in tune with Calvin and the early church fathes as well. If you pick b) you are in tune with Carson, Grudem and Burk.
How do you decide which? Do you use reason, or some other faculty to make this decision?
Correction: none of you actually took a swing. You just closed your eyes, stuck your fingers in your ears and started humming loudly as the ball whizzed by.
Sue, I have no problem with using reason, just like I have no problem doing math. But only if they are both based on a standard outside of ourselves. In and of themselves, they have their limits. When it comes to morality, one can’t truly reason oneself to a universal standard. You can claim that treating women or blacks as equals is a good thing, but you have no basis to enforce that claim onto others.
What EP doesn’t recognize is the inherent prejudices that he has based on his life as an American raised in a Judeo-Christian society (albeit one that is rapidly self-destructing). He wants to use some of the morality that he has received without acknowledging the standard from which it came. “Reason” is not enough to make him feel moral outrage if all we are is a bunch of cells that survive as best fits our needs. The moral outrage he feels is given from God via his conscience (even if it is warped in some areas, as everyone’s is to some degree before they come to Christ). An atheist LOGICALLY can’t have honest moral outrage except at something done against himself. He can feel moral outrage, but he has no explanation for it.
Christians don’t have a problem with evil, atheists do. Christians explain evil pretty easily, atheists cannot. Of all animals, why do only humans show a propensity for sadism and evil behavior? Why, if this is merely a survival-of-the-fittest universe, do humans do things that are so opposed to such an idea purely to enjoy the suffering of another? Why did the terrorists in India spend so much time torturing that Jewish couple when they could have spent it much more “productively” killing mass amounts of people to further their political goals? Why do humans have emotions, when they tend to be fickle and decrease our chances of survival? Why do we think some things are beautiful?
“You just closed your eyes, stuck your fingers in your ears and started humming loudly as the ball whizzed by.”
Like you’ve been doing from the beginning? I’ve shown you the courtesy of answering many of your questions, correcting you on quite a few spots. You have not shown me the same courtesy, choosing instead to avoid TRULY answering my main question (which others have also posed): What is your standard? Reason itself is not a valid answer. Even some of your fellow atheists recognize that.
Sue, regarding your question about Carson: I am not sure about the answer cause I don’t really care about this issue. I know that no matter what anyone says, you won’t overlook your past experiences, so why do I bother? You’re merely hear to stir up disunity in the Body. I’m sorry you’ve had bad experiences, but it’s time to move on and get over yourself. Plenty of people have had bad experiences with churches, but that doesn’t mean they turn bitter and borderline heretical in their theology.
PEOPLE ABUSE THE BIBLE! That’s a fact of life… understand that and you’ll stop doing likewise.
This should get you started.
- – - – -
From “Objective Morality
Based on Scientific and Rational Reasoning”
written by Eugene Khutoryansky
http://ar.vegnews.org/morals.html
My purpose in writing this is to argue for the existence of an objective morality based entirely on rational and scientific reasoning. By “objective morality” I do not simply mean that morality exists in the sense that various societies consider various actions to be immoral. What I mean is that certain actions are inherently right or wrong regardless of what any society thinks about them. In other words, I mean that there is an “objective morality” which exists independently of human beliefs and human civilization.
There are many people who have the opinion that it is not possible to believe in such an objective morality without also believing in concepts such as God or an eternal soul. I believe that they are wrong. I will attempt to show that an objective morality exists and that this morality is the same regardless of which religion, if any, is correct.
Many people believe that without a religious framework, the only possible conclusion is that all morality is nothing more than a human construct without any objective existence. In other words, what morality a person or a culture accepts is like picking a favorite flavor of ice cream. Some individuals prefer strawberry ice cream, other individuals prefer chocolate, and no person’s preference is “more correct” than another’s. In a similar manner, they argue, different individuals and different societies have various favorite moral belief systems, and just as with ice cream, no particular set of moral beliefs is “more correct” than any other.
A common argument for this type of thinking is the following. Throughout history, different cultures have had vastly different moral systems. In fact, on almost any moral issue, it appears that there is absolutely no agreement or consensus shared by even a majority of the cultures throughout history. In addition to this, there appears to be no way to prove the superiority of one moral system over another using logic alone. So the only way in which one moral system can actually be the correct one is if religion is the tie breaker. That is, whichever value system the “correct religion” advocates is the correct value system. Otherwise, there is no way to decide between them.
I believe that this type of argument is easily refuted. In order to argue for the existence of an objective morality, I will have to do more than just point out the flaws in lines of reasoning such as this. I will have to provide my own arguments that an objective morality does exist, and I will have to discuss where this morality “comes from”. I will also have to explain a process by which we can attempt to determine what it is. This is what I intend to do. I would first, though, like to take some time to point out some of the errors in the reasoning above. There are two points that the argument above makes. The first regards the lack of consensus regarding morality. The second involves the inability to prove the superiority of one moral system over another using logic alone.
continue reading here:
http://ar.vegnews.org/part1.html
Let me second what Darius T said. Sue I am truly sorry for what happened to you. It was wrong, inexcusable, and evil.
I pointed out earlier that I think you have yet to grasp what Biblical complementarianism really is. I would recommend you read Dr. Craig Blomberg on this subject as he clearly articulates the self-sacrificing nature of male servant leadership. And when you can actually speak of complementarianism in a manner in which someone who subscribes to it would agree with, then you might be more ready to engage in fruitful dialogue on the topic.
@EP
I answer your question and instead of answering the mound of questions I have posed to you I get a silly and banal baseball analogy. Lame.
Ryan,
Where did you answer this question:
“If you were a soldier in Joshua’s army and were commanded to butcher the Canaanite women and children, would you obey the order to plunge your sword into the belly of a pregnant woman?”
Just drop the leadership part and I would agree with you.
Sue, regarding your question about Carson: I am not sure about the answer cause I don’t really care about this issue.
You don’t regard this as a moral issue that Christians should be concerned about? I am afraid I can’t idenfify what kind of Christian doesn’t care about basic moral issues like this.
I watched Denny Burk, Jim Hamilton and John Starke discuss how women were more honoured way back when. And I thought of how the aggravated assault and rape statistics have dropped by two thirds along with the domestic homicide rate.
Steven Tracy claims that now 10% of women are abused phycically. And this is a significant drop. Just think of how many rapes, assaults and homicides the Hamilton-Starke-Burk coalition are referring to when they talk about how women were more “honoured” in the good old days. How honouring is rape, assault and homicide?
I really cannot imagine how anyone could be as callous and disregrading of the physical well being of women as was demonstrated in that discussion. Exactly whose mother, wife, sister or daughter should be put out on the streets in remembrance of the good old days.
I started commenting here before I left the violence of my life. I dragged everyone through the nonsense about authenteo and many other things. Slowly it all came together. There are no answers to these exegetical questions, it is all a mirage. No one ever answered any of my exegetical questions. John Starke blogged about how wrong I was on the creeds but now he admits he has no idea of the answer, and is not interested in finding out either. More important to reinstate the good old days when women were honoured by a heightened rate of all those good and women-honouring activities.
I hope no one here really believes that these crimes honour women.
EP instead of making read through another article that I suspect will once again lead us nowhere, why don’t you highlight the specific parts that answer our questions? Or do you think that just by throwing out an article without any specifics is an answer.
I am pretty sure that this guy is clueless just by reading this statement.
In case you might have ADD, let me remind you what the question is for the umpteenth time. Tell us why and how something is moral or meaningful when everything is a random purposeless collection of atoms. In order to create an atheist foundation of morality and meaning you must make sense of the fact that the random, meaningless, and purpose universe that created you and don’t care if you live or die actually has moral values and meaning. Otherwise your morality is nothing more than a random biochemical interaction that is inside a meaningless shell.
How about you answer my question?
If you were a soldier in Joshua’s army and were commanded to butcher the Canaanite women and children, would you obey the order to plunge your sword into the belly of a pregnant woman?
I don’t see the point in answering any morally related question to an atheist who is by definition amoral. You have no way of determining if the answer was good or bad beyond your own nose. This is why I’ve been trying to help you build that long awaited viable atheistic foundation to judge what is moral or immoral. So far you have none. All I am hearing from you is just some random noise from a random accidental collection of molecules from a meaningless shell. I am sure someone with the ability to reason can understand our hesitation to answer just some random noise.
Since DennyReader seems to have forgotten much of our previous exchange, let me refresh his memory.
DennyReader wrote:
Do you not agree as an atheist that the modern Homo sapiens are the result of a random purposeless and meaningless interaction between matters?
MrAtheist wrote:
Yes. But it is the genetic fallacy to assume that we cannot have meaningful lives because our biological origins did not have meaning. That is an inference that makes no sense.
MrAtheist writes:
That is a textbook example of the fallacy of composition. You are claiming that the worldview of the atheist cannot have properties (such as meaning) that individual components (the physical matter) lack. This is false. For example, I am a father, but none of my atoms are fathers. I am a teacher, but none of my internal organs are teachers. As a whole, I can have properties that my components lack. So pointing out that atoms are “meaningless†or that human bodies are “objects†does absolutely nothing to show that atheists can’t have meaningful lives. Yes, I can be composed of meaningless atoms, but that does not mean that my life must be meaningless. That is just a fallacious inference.
(After DennyReader falsely claimed that You say that John Loftus “admits that there is no reason for the atheist to be good.â€)
Loftus argues that atheists do have a reason to be good. He advocates an ethic that he calls “rational self-interest.†He distinguishes this from selfishness and argues that all moral codes are based on self-interest, including Christianity. Indeed, he says, Christian theology contains the greatest reward (heaven) and threat (hell) system ever devised. Christians are encouraged to be good to gain heaven and avoid hell – even if being good means the genocidal killing of babies (as in the book of Joshua).
One more point – from the beginning of this discussion, you have been comitting the fallacy of consequences – This “is an argument that concludes a premise (typically a belief) to be either true or false based on whether the premise leads to desirable or undesirable consequences. This is based on an appeal to emotion and is a form of logical fallacy, since the desirability of a consequence does not address the truth value of the premise.†(wikipedia)
You say that atheism leads to bad morals, therefore atheism must be false. Your premise is false, but even if it weren’t, your logic is faulty. By this reasoning, a religion that produces an even higher level of moral behavior – says Mormonism or Buddhism – must be true. I would rather know the truth, even if it is uncomfortable, than believe a comfortable myth.
Let’s go over the fallacy of consequence again. You say that atheism is amoral. You further postulate that in a society where everyone is an atheist, there would be essentially moral anarchy(sort of like Switzerland or Japan, I suppose). Please don’t get hung up on the exact words. You and I know that this is your basic argument. Besides your false premise, you are wrongly stating that the desirability of the consequence dictates the truth of the belief.
You say that “No one is obligated to live by anything you or an atheist conjures up.†This might have some validity to it, except that “rational self-interest†is universal. The job then becomes to convince others to act in their own self-interest and to create a set of laws that reflect this. Certainly, there will be some who refuse to do this, but that is why laws are set up to deter and/or apprehend such individuals. Rationality is a far better basis for law than creating laws because your deity said to. The problem there is that not everyone agrees on whose deity is the real one. Furthermore, vast numbers of people who agree on which deity, can’t agree on exactly what laws this deity wants.
Alan Dershowitz said “Morality based on religion is often no morality at all. If you do it because of heaven or hell, or because an instruction book told you to, it’s not morality. It’s morality when you have decided yourself, without benefits or threats, that this is the right thing to do.â€
One of the most basic principles that emerges from rational self-interest is that one should treat others the way one wants to be treated. We immediately recognize this as the Golden Rule from Matthew 7:12, but this principle predates Jesus.
Some examples:
“When a good man is hurt, all who would be called good must suffer with him.â€
– Euripides
“All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.â€
– Aristotle
“What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.â€
– Confucius, The Confucian Analects 15:23
Hinduism: “This is the sum of the Dharma (duty): do naught to others which would cause pain if done to you.†Mahabharata 5:1517.
Islam: “Not one of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.†The Prophet Muhammad, 13th of the 40 Hadiths of Nawawi.
Jainism: “One should treat all creatures in the world as one would like to be treated.†Mahavira, Sutrakitanga 1.11.33.
Judaism: “What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. This is whole Torah; all the rest is commentary. Go and learn it.†Hillel, Talmud, Shabbat 31a.
Sikhism: “I am a stranger to no one; and no one is a stranger to me. Indeed, I am a friend to all.†Guru Granth Sahib, pg. 1299.
Taoism: “Regard your neighbor’s gain as your own gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss.†Lao T’zu, T’ai Shang Kan Ying P’ien.
Zoroastrianism: “Do not to others whatever is injurious to yourself.†Shayast-na-Shayast 13:29.
Native American Spirituality: “We are as much alive as keep the Earth alive.†Chief Daniel George.
Baha’i Faith: “Lay not on any soul a load that you would not wish to be laid upon you and desire not for anyone the things you would desire for yourself.†Baha’u’llah.
Buddhism: “…Treat not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.†The Buddha, Udana-Varga, 5.18.
DennyReader writes:
Atheist morality is totally subjective and vacuous. Which is why if you want to kill millions of unborn babies, this is perfectly acceptable to most atheists because no one else have the right to tell the other person what to do, right?
MrAtheist writes:
On utilitarianism, Kant’s categorical imperative, John Rawls’s contractarianism, and other nontheistic moral theories, one can most definitely tell others what to do. Because you are not familiar with nontheistic ethical theories, you make the typical mistake of thinking that all nontheistic moral theories are subjective moral theories. There are nontheistic, subjective moral theories, but the most popular ones in the field of ethics, the “major players†in the field, are not subjective.
Hitler was irrational. Genocide is never in one’s self-interest for a rational person. This why a rational person can condemn all genocide – whether ordered by Hitler against Jews or by Yahweh against the Canaanites.
I do not accept “might makes right†or “popularity makes right.†Reason makes right. Even if everyone in a society favors doing something irrational, that does not make it rational. Likewise, if everyone in a society thought that 2 + 2 = 9, that does not make it so.
You are troubled that there is no outside force to say what morality should be. That’s true. All we have to make a good society is reason and experience. I’m sorry if that’s enough for you. That’s what was used to write the Constitution and what we use to make new laws. That’s what was used to write the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document far superior to the “perfect law†of the Old Testament.
Again, every great thinker and most religions and philosophies have concluded that treating others as we wish to be treated is the only rational foundation for society. The fact that it is universal is not what makes it true. It is rather the fact that it is true that makes it universal.
[Towards the end of that thread, DennyReader does make a statement that I pretty much agree with]
DennyReader: “I am not able to prove atheism false just as atheists cannot prove that theism is false.â€
Read the article EP and he makes the same errors you do.
He mistakes the argument of the theist as being about the existence of morality, which simply is not the case. We are arguing about the obligation, the duty, the binding command of morality. Not if morality exists.
The article confuses the “is” of morality with the “ought.” What makes the truth that rape is evil wrong for everyone? Notice I am not arguing for is it wrong, but if the atheist tells me that raping is wrong for everyone he must explain how it is binding for everyone. His own reasoning and cultural consensus is insufficient.
So the question still stands to you: in a Darwinian worldview in which we are just animals what makes anything I do wrong, when all I am compelled to do by my biology is survive?
So if I ought not to kill babies for fun you can not tell me why. To say the universe says its wrong and morality is like gravity; it just is (what your article argues for) is silly. The universe and its physical laws are impersonal and do not issue imperative commands to cosmic accidents who will soon enough suffer heat death and all that they did be deemed mute. Commands require commanders.
Ohh and I did answer your question and the irony still remains.
“Your question is irrelevant unless there is such thing as right or wrong. So you have to tell me first how you could even be outraged at such a thing.”
Darwinism does not allow for right and wrong, only survival.
What Ryan just said… the writer of that article doesn’t have a clue.
“Genocide is never in one’s self-interest for a rational person.”
Clearly, you haven’t read about the Rwandan genocide. I have read a couple books about it, and it was all couched in the idea that killing the Tutsis would be economically beneficial to the Hutus, since they would inherent the Tutsi land and livestock. A lot of “rational” people killed their neighbors and best friends while acting out a Darwinian morality play.
Morality is like gravity? That is silly argument coming from an atheist. As a Christian, I agree, because the same God made them both. Gravity wouldn’t exist without God, nor would morality.
That’s not an answer, Ryan. It’s an excuse for not giving an answer.
Interersting that Rwanda is considered the world’s most Christian nation. Ask them now if they still think they acted rationally. They actually were acting out a biblical morality play.
Darwin explained the “is.” We have evolved to the point of understanding rationality, so we can go beyond the “is” to the “ought.”
And still, not one of you will answer my question. I wonder why.
I just wasted a lot of time reading this thread… Shame on me.
But I have one comment:
The most telling thing in this entire thread is that Don Johnson never directly answered Denny’s last question directed to him.
And I think I know why…
(My comment got filtered out because of too many links. Sorry I have to take out the links so hopefully it won’t be too confusing.)
Before I start on EP’s giant list of straw man arguments, let me demonstrate that EP is a liar and a deceiver. I don’t say this lightly.
Now I can excuse EP for making a mistake if this was the first time he accuse me of with this false claim, but this is not the first time. I responded and showed him the exact time index of an audio where John Loftus admits that there is no reason for an atheist to be good. Look at this exchange.
I first linked to this Loftus audio on “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52566″>62. Sep 26, 2009—2:57 am
EP then replied with this comment on “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52583″>63. Sep 26, 2009—8:31 pm
I then responded with the exact time index to support my claim. “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52587″>64. Sep 27, 2009—1:13 am
You might say, maybe EP didn’t read your comment where you gave him the time index. But he did read that comment because he quoted from that same comment where I gave him the time index.
This quote comes straight out of the comment with the time index where Loftus admits that there is no reason for an atheist to be good. Now by bringing this up again and accuse me of making false claim against Loftus when he knows full well that is not true, I can only conclude that EP is a liar and a deceiver.
Now on to debunking EP’s giant straw man. The story of David and Goliath comes to mind except I am not at the level of David and his straw man is a house of cards, so maybe the analogy is not as apropos.
Before I dig in let me remind EP and others what my position is, so when you see EP’s smoke and mirror you can contrast it back to what I’ve really said. I will use a quote from comment “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52587″>64. Sep 27, 2009—1:13 am as my reference. It is about as concise as any that I’ve stated.
Let me make one more clarification. An atheist denies that there is a god, no creator, no one created matter it just exist. The consequence of this belief is that from the big bang to matters on earth, it is nothing more than the product of a mindless, meaningless, purposeless, amoral process. This is an atheist fact and well accepted by atheists themselves. This is the landscape that EP has to build on. Let’s start.
EP thinks that by creating a term “genetic fallacy†he would be able to solve the problem. Did I say an atheist cannot have a meaningful life? No. Of course an atheist can have a meaningful life, but any meaning that he has is outside of his atheistic landscape. This is exactly what he is doing when he detaches meaning from his “biological originsâ€. The atheist is saying it doesn’t matter where, why or how we got here, we are here and we will create our own meaning.
Again with his terms. Let me try one myself, EP has cognitive dissonance. The only way he can claim any sort of meaning is to disconnect himself from the fact that he is nothing more than a random collection of atoms, that clumped together for no purpose whatsoever. The concept he calls meaning is nothing more than random biochemical interaction inside a meaningless shell. Does a rock have meaning? A rock is more than the constituents that makes it up? What about a cockroach? It is also a lot more than just a collection of atoms? Does it have meaning? If you squash a cockroach did you smash all the meaning out of it? The same creator that created that cockroach, created the atheist. If a giant asteroid hits Earth and destroys every living creature on it, does that have meaning? Will the Sun shed a tear? Will the universe stop expanding? If you reconnect atheism with its creator and back into its landscape then you’ve sucked all meaning, purpose and morality out of it.
EP is being very deceptive. Why didn’t you include my responses to your droning if you claim to be refreshing my memory of our exchange? Let me refresh your memory. You brought this up on comment “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52583″>63. Sep 26, 2009—8:31 pm I then responded with this comment “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52587″>64. Sep 27, 2009—1:13 am
You then use a long comment to repeat yourself in “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52593″>65. Sep 27, 2009—12:27 pm and again in “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52610″>71. Sep 28, 2009—2:48 pm After repeatedly insisting that I’ve committed this fallacy, you are the one that actually stepped into it.
I tried one more time to correct your misrepresentation in comment “www.dennyburk.com/?p=5340#comment-52616″>75. Sep 28, 2009—9:10 pm .
Wow, you must be desperate if you think this is some great victory for you. I assume you did understand that I was referring to proof in the scientific sense. And you do know that in science there is no such thing as absolute truth, right? In any case I did not set out to prove that atheism is false. I’ve only wanted to prove that if atheism is true then atheists are amoral, meaningless and purposeless. I think I’ve accomplish that.
(My comment got filtered out because of too many links. Sorry I have to take out the links so hopefully it won’t be too confusing.)
Before I start on EP’s giant list of straw man arguments, let me demonstrate that EP is a liar and a deceiver. I don’t say this lightly.
Now I can excuse EP for making a mistake if this was the first time he accuse me of with this false claim, but this is not the first time. I responded and showed him the exact time index of an audio where John Loftus admits that there is no reason for an atheist to be good. Look at this exchange.
I first linked to this Loftus audio on post=5340#comment-52566 #62. Sep 26, 2009—2:57 am
EP then replied with this comment on post=5340#comment-52583 #63. Sep 26, 2009—8:31 pm
I then responded with the exact time index to support my claim. post=5340#comment-52587 #64. Sep 27, 2009—1:13 am
You might say, maybe EP didn’t read your comment where you gave him the time index. But he did read that comment because he quoted from that same comment where I gave him the time index.
This quote comes straight out of the comment with the time index where Loftus admits that there is no reason for an atheist to be good. Now by bringing this up again and accuse me of making false claim against Loftus when he knows full well that is not true, I can only conclude that EP is a liar and a deceiver.
Now on to debunking EP’s giant straw man. The story of David and Goliath comes to mind except I am not at the level of David and his straw man is a house of cards, so maybe the analogy is not as apropos.
Before I dig in let me remind EP and others what my position is, so when you see EP’s smoke and mirror you can contrast it back to what I’ve really said. I will use a quote from comment post=5340#comment-52587 #64. Sep 27, 2009—1:13 am as my reference. It is about as concise as any that I’ve stated.
Let me make one more clarification. An atheist denies that there is a god, no creator, no one created matter it just exist. The consequence of this belief is that from the big bang to matters on earth, it is nothing more than the product of a mindless, meaningless, purposeless, amoral process. This is an atheist fact and well accepted by atheists themselves. This is the landscape that EP has to build on. Let’s start.
EP thinks that by creating a term “genetic fallacy†he would be able to solve the problem. Did I say an atheist cannot have a meaningful life? No. Of course an atheist can have a meaningful life, but any meaning that he has is outside of his atheistic landscape. This is exactly what he is doing when he detaches meaning from his “biological originsâ€. The atheist is saying it doesn’t matter where, why or how we got here, we are here and we will create our own meaning.
Again with his terms. Let me try one myself, EP has cognitive dissonance. The only way he can claim any sort of meaning is to disconnect himself from the fact that he is nothing more than a random collection of atoms, that clumped together for no purpose whatsoever. The concept he calls meaning is nothing more than random biochemical interaction inside a meaningless shell. Does a rock have meaning? A rock is more than the constituents that makes it up? What about a cockroach? It is also a lot more than just a collection of atoms? Does it have meaning? If you squash a cockroach did you smash all the meaning out of it? The same creator that created that cockroach, created the atheist. If a giant asteroid hits Earth and destroys every living creature on it, does that have meaning? Will the Sun shed a tear? Will the universe stop expanding? If you reconnect atheism with its creator and back into its landscape then you’ve sucked all meaning, purpose and morality out of it.
EP is being very deceptive. Why didn’t you include my responses to your droning if you claim to be refreshing my memory of our exchange? Let me refresh your memory. You brought this up on comment post=5340#comment-52583 #63. Sep 26, 2009—8:31 pm I then responded with this comment post=5340#comment-52587 #64. Sep 27, 2009—1:13 am
You then use a long comment to repeat yourself in post=5340#comment-52593 #65. Sep 27, 2009—12:27 pm and again in post=5340#comment-52610 #71. Sep 28, 2009—2:48 pm After repeatedly insisting that I’ve committed this fallacy, you are the one that actually stepped into it.
I tried one more time to correct your misrepresentation in comment post=5340#comment-52616 #75. Sep 28, 2009—9:10 pm .
Wow, you must be desperate if you think this is some great victory for you. I assume you did understand that I was referring to proof in the scientific sense. And you do know that in science there is no such thing as absolute truth, right? In any case I did not set out to prove that atheism is false. I’ve only wanted to prove that if atheism is true then atheists are amoral, meaningless and purposeless. I think I’ve accomplish that.
Dennyreader,
No display of illogicality can change for me the fact that CBMW wants to turn back the clock to the days when women were three times more likely to be raped, beaten and killed.
It just doesn’t make any sense at all. Who would feel that way about women and why?
I just don’t see Christians as moral agents any more.
Oh please this is such jibberish. How can you still claim that you use reason? You’ve evolved to the point to go beyond the “is†to the “ought� How? What evidence do you have that this is true? There is not a single shred of scientific evidence that the “ought†is a product of biological evolution. There is not a single shred of evidence from logic and reason that the “ought†is from an atheistic framework. You should be ashamed of yourself to even dare to make that kind of statement.
I realize that several comments ago. I wish you all the best. I sincerely hope you will enjoy your life. At least thank God that you live in the U.S. where no one can force you to submit to anyone.
Yes, I do thank God for the laws that make my life possible. I remember clearly when my church protested no fault divorce. I remember then how grateful I was that it was passed as a law, because I knew I would need it.
Sue I think many of us have tried to be kind to you, but you really should be give up the posture of operating out of constant bitterness and anger.
To accuse the CBMW of wanting to turn back clocks to where women are more likely to be beaten, abused, raped, and killed, steals all credibility you have on writing on this subject.
It is just another example of you writing on a subject or about others in a way they would not recognize or agree with. Your conversations will be lonely, unfruitful, and polemic until you learn to be more charitable.
I think this thread has run its course. EP, I would only ask you you go back and think through the MANY questions that have been posed to you and gone glaringly unanswered. I am fine if you want to be an atheist but spare us the moral outrage that imposes a self-made ought, upon others.
What must have happened is that Denny, John Starke and Jim Hamilton have no idea that violent crime against women had decreased and women are safer today in many ways, although there is still huge room for improvement.
The laws regarding rape and domestic violence have changed enormously making life safer and better for women in many ways. This must be acknowledged. Did Christians make these changes? I don’t think so.
We should celebrate these improvemnets and thank God for them. I do.
“The laws regarding rape and domestic violence have changed enormously making life safer and better for women in many ways. This must be acknowledged.”
Are you kidding me? Women have it much worse now in the West than they ever did before.
Wow, all that verbiage and yet my simple question goes unanswered.
Does any Christian have the guts to answer?
If you were a soldier in Joshua’s army and were commanded to butcher the Canaanite women and children, would you obey the order to plunge your sword into the belly of a pregnant woman?
Maybe you’re waiting for my answer to that question. Here it is: I would not obey such an order. Furthermore, I would do everything possible to keep others from following this order. That’s just how I roll, morally.
Darius: “Are you kidding me? Women have it much worse now in the West than they ever did before.”
According to the Bureau of Justice statistics, the rate of rape has dropped from 2.8 per 1,000 in 1979 to .8 per 1,000 in 2008. Still, the incidence of rape in the U.S. is far higher than in Western Europe or Japan.
Since I am one of those statistics, I feel this as if my life and personal safety were considered a throwaway so that people can argue that women are safer under submission.
The facts, however, demonstrate that women are in more danger from their intimate partner than from any other danger in their life. It is many times safer than in the past, but there is much room for improvement.
Clearly there are many factors that make women safer, but going back to the good old days is not one of them.
ex-preacher,
The answer to your question (without the butcher statement) in it is: yes.
The Israelites were commanded by God to serve judgment on a people who refused to repent though given 400 years. If I were one of the Israelite men in Joshua’s army, I would have destroyed the Canaanites.
However, remember that Jesus, our brother and Savior, who came to share the gospel with us in order for us to avoid the same calamity, will also bring judgment one day to the world that is refusing to repent and will destroy them and send them to hell.
So you think because I affirm that there are only two categories of people (those forgiven by God’s grace and the cross of Christ) and those awaiting judgment that that makes me a butcher?
Or… it could mean that I have the antidote to everlasting judgment, but I can’t force people to receive a vaccine they don’t want.
If you were a soldier in Joshua’s army and were commanded to butcher the Canaanite women and children, would you obey the order to plunge your sword into the belly of a pregnant woman?
No, but I would have followed the commands of God given through Joshua (which was to slay the city, yes). Don’t recall a command to “your sword into the belly of a pregnant woman”. I’m not sure how the spirit moved back then to know, but marching around a city that then spontaneously crashes to the ground might have been a clue, I suppose.
And EP, no, you would have followed the orders. It was the consensus of all of those people. That’s how reasoned atheist-based tendencies go. Atheistic reason would have been an arbitrary group consensus (actually, arbitrary isn’t fair. It would have been a man-based set of criteria to better that group). While I don’t understand why or really even how it was enacted, God worked to demonstrate it was He giving the command (the walls falling) that was to be followed. I don’t necessarily enjoy the thought of it, and, to be 100% honest, I can’t explain how or why it worked out the way it did.
And I’m with Lucas. I wasted a lot of time catching up on this. Shame on me.
I just don’t see Christians as moral agents any more.
Very telling. As is the thought that somehow no-fault divorce is good. It may have some beneficial side effects (such as the ability to more easily get out of an abusive situation), but hey, pagan sacrifices also fed many people.
I think it’s also interesting that you levee an accusation against someone who likely can’t defend themselves.
I do second (or, at this point third/fourth) Darius and Ryan in that any abuse against you was unbiblical and sinful as was anyone who tried to explain it away. My heart and my prayers go out to you. I’m sure a little too late, you might say, but, still, they are extended.
No fault divorce clearly has its problems. However financial issues should be dealt with under the law.
In fact, no fault divorce has been linked to reduced domestic homicide and assault as well as possibly reduced female suicide.
Since even a complementarian like Steven Tracy considers that 10% of women are in this kind of situation, why is it just me? Why don’t you think of the 10% of women that are similar to me? Is our life and safety to be sacrificed on the altar of biblical womanhood and the submission of women?
PS Who have I attacked that can’t defend themselves?
If the topic is gender and theology, Sue and I typically disagree.
But, I share Sue’s concerns about CBMW’s stance on domestic abuse.
Here is the problematic sentence in CBMW’s statement on abuse:
“In instances where abusers are unrepentant and/or unwilling to make significant steps toward change, we believe that the Christian community must respond with firm discipline of the abuser and advocacy, support and protection of the abused.â€
In other words, an abused wife will receive NO protection and NO support from her church unless the church leadership has made a determination that her husband is “unrepentant and/or unwilling to make significant steps toward changeâ€.
In other words, if a woman arrives on a church’s doorstep showing visible signs that she has been abused, nothing will be done to help her if, when her husband is approached by the church, he appears contrite.
This is why Sue is angry and asserts that Christians are not moral agents.
Marilyn,
It is more than that. I attended the 1000 people congregation with many exemplary complementarian leaders. They preached submission of women.
They never once mentioned abuse – not once. I went and asked the minister’s wife, “for a friend” if there was a booklist of titles on abuse that I could put on my blog, and she said that this church had no resources because there were no abused women in the church.
These people knew me and my family well. You have no idea how well and how long this can be kept a secret.
What I am saying is that there should be preventive preaching, not of the kind where Driscoll yells at abusive men, but rather, it should be direct teaching, more like Boundaries, where women are told how to set personal boundaries, and how to take over authority and control of their own lives.
Women need to be told directly and openly that they have all personal rights over their own body, to not get pregnant, to be able to go to a gym, to leave the house to work, to go to the doctor, to undertake normal life sustaining tasks, without needing permission from a husband.
I know this sounds crazy but the “submission in all things” does in fact reduce some women to not having bathroom rights.
This is NOT a joke.
But, instead, after the pastor knew what happened to me, he associated with Bruce Ware, and the youth pastor shortly after that preached on total submission and openly in his sermon, mentioned abuse of wives, and in a laughing and mocking tone, he said that all women with a husband like his wife were happy, and that any wives without such a husband as him could line up after the service for “therapy.” This was said as a joke, and everyone laughted, but my daughter stumbled out in tears.
I feel that Dr. Packer and Dr. Ware have deeply influenced this congregation.
Women need to be taught personal authority in the home. This is a must.
As Susan Hunt says, women MUST be involved in the teaching about domestic abuse.
Women must be told they have the same rights that Marilyn has to work. Her husband gives her this permission but the next husband does not. I had permission to work, but I could only leave the house at a certain time, and I could never work late. I had to be home at a certain time.
While my husband was allowed to skip being home for supper whenever he needed to, I was never allowed to be away at mealtime. I was not allowed to go to the gym or to do many of the things that other women think are normal I couldn’t get my hair cut or take the children to have their haircut.
But I had a good job and no one thought that I was being controlled and abused.
I meant that the youth minister said that if a woman had a husband li