Churches extend misogynistic legacy
I liked my Sunday school teacher. He embraced tangents.
At least, he embraced most of them, but one long-ago Sunday, I asked him why a woman wasn’t allowed to preach in our fundamentalist Christian church, where we had no piano to accompany our scary hymns, and where only people baptized by immersion were going to heaven.
To me, it wasn’t a weighted question. The weekly news magazines that came to my house were telling me that women were burning bras and demanding equality, so looking up at an all-male revue in the pulpit didn’t make sense. Besides, I read my Bible, and the Jesus I knew included women. In my Bible, everyone had a seat at the table; he never told anyone to keep silent in the assembly.
The Sunday school teacher’s answer did not satisfy me, so I kept asking. He eventually excused himself and when he returned, he was followed by my mother.
I have relatives with long criminal records, but no one — to my knowledge — had ever been kicked out of Sunday school. My mother crooked a finger and I followed her across the lobby. We sat down on pews in an empty room. I was waiting for my punishment, but instead, she smiled and nodded — twice. That was water to my parched tongue and as we know, water will go where it can, into every cleft. The same goes for truth, but truth sometimes takes longer.
The recent news that members of the Southern Baptist Convention would stand by their decision to expel congregations lead by women pastors was not a surprise. It was, however, a huge disappointment in the one-stepforward, two-steps-back dance of evangelical Christendom and modernity. Among my brothers and sisters, latter-day interpretations of Scriptures mar faith groups’ ability to stay relevant and be of service.
The Southern Baptists, an iteration of which has been around since before the United States was a country, was born in 1845, when Southerners formed a faith group to distance themselves from their anti-slavery cousins in the north. This is a stance the church has since repudiated, but along with a tragically flawed view of equality, Southern Baptists have dragged into this century a misogyny that is all too common among Christian churches. By closing the door on women leaders, these organizations have consigned themselves to a dusty bin that is both anachronistic and unscriptural.
Because what happens when a faith group cleaves to misinterpretations that create a theological second-class citizenry? The door to potential abuse is kicked wide open, and those second-class citizens leave the pews and they don’t return. Southern Baptists have been measuring their decline by a loss in membership at an average of 3% a year in the last few years, but it’s not just the Baptists who are hurting. In 2021, Gallup said that for the first time since they began measuring in the 1930s, fewer people pledge membership to a church than those who skip the whole thing. The percentage of so-called nones — people who are religiously unaffiliated — hovers around 20%.
I can hear the members of my old church chalk up low membership to an increase in sinners, but they are making that argument to an empty sanctuary.
If this was just a church problem, it would be bad, but the influence of theology on our politics is profound. Such a blighted convention vote affects the rest of us because the distance between the belief that God considers women less-than to policies that embrace that notion is barely a baby step. Despite their losses in membership, Southern Baptists remain an outsized political force whose members tend to skew conservative. The U.S. Congress includes nearly 70 Baptists, with roughly 20 of them of the Southern branch. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is a Southern Baptist, as is Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. Baptist News Global, which took Graham to task over his questions to thenSupreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson about her church attendance, calls Graham “a reliable and top-rated ally of the religious right.” (For what it’s worth, the scandalplagued U.S. Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, is one of ours, a member of the Church of Christ, and yes, we have added him to our prayer lists.)
I left my fundamentalist church, though some of the theology still makes sense to me (especially the parts about service). I once said I would return to the pews when the elders and deacons (all men) hand the mic over to women, with the speakers turned on. I am not holding my breath. When as influential a group as the Southern Baptist Convention voted to extend their misogynistic legacy, they pushed that day off even more. I’d say I’d add them to my prayer list, too, but my list is getting longer by the day. study hours for each course. Finally, times for the other activities associated with the college experience (e.g., club activities and friends) are included. This is a tentative schedule. Students will adjust their schedules weekly as the semester progresses. Once students complete their charts and see their schedules on paper, they realize that their schedules are not overwhelming, but manageable. This reduces stress and anxiety.
This practice also acts as a motivator. When students earn good grades because of this discipline and their hard work, they will be motivated to continue to follow their schedules.
Kevin Synnott Lecturer, College of Business Eastern Connecticut State
University