The CBE Scroll

Among responsible and useful methods of promoting egalitarian thinking — writing about it, supporting organizations like CBE that promote it, seeking out churches that put it into practice — my favorite is what I call the “auntie model”:  consistently giving loving ideological nudges to those in my closest circle, especially the little ones.

I grew up in a patriarchal family and church.  Though I have had my “aha!” moment and embraced the egalitarian position, most of the rest of my family continue in the patriarchal tradition.  And they take “be fruitful and multiply” seriously: just three siblings have given me (so far) 13 nieces and nephews, none older than 8.  For the most part, their parents are not actively cultivating gender bias, but if there’s one thing kids are good at, it’s picking up on and interpreting adult signals!  So in addition to trying to influence the “big people,” I also have regular opportunities to steer little minds in a new direction, to provide tiny course corrections in the context of a non-parental but just-as-safe-and-unconditional relationship.

Nearly every conversation opens a window to subtle worldview adjustment.  As evidence, I present the following transcripts, all real interactions with my precious little buddies:

NIECE:  Aunt Mindy, why do you have so many folders and file boxes in your office?
AUNTIE:  I guess I’m the kind of person that likes to be neat and organized.
NIECE:  But you’re not a person — you’re a woman!
AUNTIE:  Interesting observation!  Yes, I am a woman, and you will be too when you grow up.  Sit here with me for a second and let’s talk about a big word: “personhood”…

NIECE:  One of our hens is stupid.  We’re going to get rid of her.
AUNTIE:  How do you know she’s stupid?
NIECE:  Because she doesn’t lay eggs!  She’s a girl chicken, it’s her job.  What kind of girl chicken doesn’t want to be a mother?
AUNTIE:  You know, sweetie, God designed hens to do more than lay eggs.  They also eat grubs to keep pastures clean and fertile, they scratch at the dirt and keep it aerated, they help other hens with big families raise their chicks, and they give their feathers and their meat for people to use.  So just because she’s not laying eggs doesn’t mean she’s not valuable to the farm…

NEPHEW:   Wife, make my dinner!  Daughter, make my bed!
AUNTIE:  Whoa – what are you talking about?
NEPHEW:  We’re playing house.  I’m the dad.
AUNTIE:  Oh, I see.  Well, Dad, do your wife and daughter have names?  Yes?  Don’t you think it would be a lot more respectful to call them by their names?  I agree.  And while you’re at it, wouldn’t you really show your love for them if you offered to make them dinner?…

AUNTIE:  So you really like science, huh?  You think you might want to study that in college?
NIECE:  Girls don’t go to college.
AUNTIE:  Really?  Says who?
NIECE:  Well, my dad went to college, but my mom didn’t.
AUNTIE:  That’s true.  College isn’t for everybody.  But I went to college, and there were lots of girls in my science classes.  And some of my professors were girls, too…

You get the idea.  And, no, I am not brainwashing them or disregarding their parents’ authority.  I don’t tell them their parents’ hierarchical structures are unbiblical.  I just stand in their lives as a glimpse of a bigger picture, an alternate voice, a different vision of the world than the one by which they are most often surrounded.  My hope is that they will grow up knowing good people have different ways of understanding these issues rather than unthinkingly parroting what was demonstrated at home.

What a privilege to be an egalitarian auntie!

Questions to start the discussion:
What does the “auntie (or uncle) model” look like in your situation?  Do you employ it in your biological relationships, or perhaps honorary ones with friends’ children or kids at church?  Have you, over time, seen fruit from such endeavors?  And — bonus points for this one! — have you learned anything from your interactions with these little ones about your own blindspots/hang-ups in how you relate to or value others?

On Sunday morning, September 13, 1953, my father faced a really tough decision. My mother was in labor at the end of a troubled pregnancy that had included a late-term case of hard measles. She was headed to the hospital. But Dad was a fundamentalist preacher in a small church and had an obligation to lead the service and give the sermon. The problem was that he had no men to call on to give the sermon.

Enter his mother. She was a deep Christian with a thorough knowledge of the Scripture and led a life of service. She was there to help with the pregnancy. After careful, if hurried, prayer, Dad asked my grandmother to take the service. She agreed to do so.

At least two church members walked out when this woman went up to the pulpit. She would not “usurp” a man’s place by standing behind it, so she stood to one side and down a step.

If I could go back in time, I would rather hear that sermon than witness my own birth. As far as I know, it was the only sermon she ever gave. As the years progressed, my father grew a little more tolerant of women, at one time telling me “women are the backbone of the church.” Unfortunately, he never reached a point where he felt they should teach men. Unless, of course, it was his mother and he had somewhere very important to be.

I’m wondering if other people have had experiences with “breaking the rules” that have had an input on their lives perhaps edging them away from complementarianism; examples of the Spirit overriding human error to use His chosen minister to do His will? I’d love to hear about them.

“There’s a video I want you to see,” my roommate Kate told me earlier this week. “I think it might be really bad.”

Of course that piqued my interest. “Bad” You Tube videos come in many different flavors: Would this video be poor quality, offensive, or just plain bizarre? With wide eyes and low expectations, I turned toward Kate’s computer.

As it turned out, the video’s humor was based on a grossly exaggerated negative stereotype of a U.S. American man of one culture hitting on a woman of another at the cinema. Kate had been introduced to the clip after the Bible study she co-leads, and while she chuckled at it ridiculousness, she found it completely offensive, inappropriate, and unfair.

Against the opinion of many friends, I agreed that the video was racist, and I was frustrated the skit had aired on a major television network. However, after further consideration I realized it does convey a sliver of truth. Even if its portrayal of women and men of certain cultures is inaccurate, it shows that someone somewhere finds the way certain men relate to certain women disgusting. This focus on supposed differences can lead us to consider a larger issue at hand: If not as the video portrays, how do we behave when we’re interacting across both gender and cultural lines?

Every (sub-)cultural group has its own flirtation norms, meaning that when individuals of two cultures interact, they’re often playing by two sets of rules. Men and women are frequently on separate pages already, so compounding that existing divide with an ethnic-or class-based cultural gap can make communication quite complex, especially when it comes to initiating (or stalling) romance.

I think for us as egalitarians, these cultural differences make life pretty darn tricky. Sometimes the male-female scripts of a particular culture don’t seem to match up with my egalitarian ideals, and it’s easy to rush to (sometimes inaccurately) label others as sexist. My lack of cultural fluency sometimes leaves me confused about whether a man is hitting on me or how I might respond appropriately, which might in extreme situations lead to cases of potential sexual harassment, as one culture would define. And obviously, ignorance paired with prejudice leads to the kind of media portrayal we saw in this video.

The long-term solution, I think, is to pair our work for local and global gender equality with intentional efforts to understand people that are culturally different from us. As we get to know them and better get to know ourselves, we’ll be able to live together with less miscommunication. Greater clarity in all relationships will benefit cross-gender relations, as well, as we begin to understand the rules that dictate flirting, friendship, and the like. Plus, confusing—even offending—each other gives us practice embracing patience and grace.

In the meantime, any thoughts on navigating male-female interaction across the cultural divide?

I think there’s nothing more important than revision. When God matures us and leads us to a new vision or better understanding, we must revise our way of thinking even if it’s a complete embarrassment to ourselves. Looking back on my life, I can see so many times when I was sure of a thing and then it turned out differently. I don’t have regrets about following Him down those paths because of the lessons I learned as a result of them, but it’s funny how in the end, it was not as I was so convicted about.

For example, having an egalitarian view for marriage and the church is completely different than what I had taught and been so convinced about for so long. Only a few years ago, you would find me teaching that men should lead and women should follow. I taught it quite passionately — but even so, what always bothered me was that it always required so much defending. I saw the difficulty in the position when it came to couples who didn’t fit the mold. What about couples where the wife is the more naturally gifted leader and the husband, the follower? “Well,” it was explained to me, “the wife needs to hold back and give the husband a chance to lead.” That sounded all right to me theoretically (after all, the wife has the opportunity to ‘deny herself’), but in practical terms, I saw that it just meant that the wife would continue to come up with the ideas and visions and then have to prod and persuade her husband toward those ideas. It often becomes a subtle game of manipulation as she convinces him that something was his idea, because if she were to remain silent (in order to not lead), then they would not go anywhere. But as I have seen it, the wife rarely stays silent in this situation. The reality is that most couples end up having a more egalitarian marriage than they would profess. It just wouldn’t work if pure hierarchy was the modus operandi. God really has given women brains, gifts and visions — and without her voicing them, a couple really might possibly miss out on God’s will.

I can see though how despite encountering these real-life obstructions to the complementarian mindset, revision might not take place. When I think of a Christian community which I was involved with for many years, I just think of how its culture is built on the hierarchical way of life, and if things were to change, it could cause the whole structure to crumble.

To revise when God gives you new revelation requires true humility and courage. It means you have to admit you were wrong somewhere — and it means you need courage to step forward in a whole new direction.

In what ways have you had to make revisions in your life as you have followed God in your journey toward biblical equality?

One of my most trying journeys during college has been learning to give others grace: to forgive my roommate, to be patient with other white people’s ethnic journeys, to stop calling myself “an evangelical that doesn’t like other evangelicals.” One of the areas I still struggle with is in giving grace to women and men that don’t see eye-to-eye with me on gender issues.

Every year our UNC InterVarsity chapter holds two events called Ladies’ Night and Men’s Night. Each involves one gender performing comical skits and serving food to the other, as a way to show them appreciation and honor. While attending Ladies’ Night and working on Men’s Night are great fun for most women in our chapter, for me, they are bittersweet. At some point every year, I always wonder why we do them in the first place.

It doesn’t seem to matter that the past two years the men have sponsored significant gender justice events about relationship violence or sex trafficking around the same time as Ladies’ Night. When I go to Ladies’ Night I can’t help but feel frustrated that most of the men in the chapter don’t know much about sexism, despite their genuine desire to honor women. The skits and desserts are a good time, of course, but are these people actually committed to the issues I care about as a woman? Beyond cosponsoring one sex trafficking movie?

Quick as I am to judge, reflecting on grace has brought me an interesting realization this year: “giving grace” to others isn’t just about forgiving or bearing with one another, not simply about avoiding rash reactions or sticking in a relationship. Grace literally means “gift,” and many times I think I’m giving someone the gift of my forgiveness and patience. But what’s really crucial? Is it my ability to give something that’s lacked? Or my ability to receive? Why is it that I think I am above receiving the gift of Ladies’ Night from these men that genuinely love the women in our community?

I’m coming to think that perhaps my issue isn’t “giving grace” after all. Perhaps it’s a problem of willingness to receive grace, a gift—to accept love when it doesn’t feel like the demonstration of love I want. While true reconciliation will necessitate men’s understanding more of what is meaningful to me as a woman and their action to correct ongoing gender injustice, part of reconciliation is my job too.

The Lord is showing me that humbly accepting whatever good gift I am offered by men is essential if intergender unity is to ever be achieved in the Body of Christ. After all, God accepts love and worship from imperfect humans. Who I am to reject the creativity, excitement, and goodwill of these men? Of course, grace is difficult, whether I’m giving or receiving, but over time I am being taught to say of both, “I will with God’s help.”