Liberalism

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Thoughts on "Hey John, Is My Femininity Showing?"

The offending podcast is here.

The way I'm reading it goes like this.

The basics

  1. John Piper is a Complementarian
  2. He believes that men should be the leaders in the home and church and further...
  3. women should not be in spiritual leadership positions over men.

The question the podcast answers the question: Can men use commentaries written by women?

The logic:

  1. Piper doesn't have a problem reading spiritual material written by women
  2. Piper does have a problem with a woman sitting in spiritual authority over a man, whether in a church, or seminary class.
  3. Therefore: the mere presence of a female body (in general) is offensive to John Piper.

Apparently, most egalitarians don't see the distinction between reading a book (sitting and gathering information) and sitting under teaching authority.

You don't submit to a book, you do submit to a teacher.

You can put a book down, you can give it away, throw it away, burn it...you can't do those things to a teaching authority. You can get yourself out from under the authority, but as long as you're in that class, you're under authority.

I understand that it's not the body parts, it's the authority. Piper makes that clear when he says, "whereas if she were standing right in front of me and teaching me as my shepherd< /strong>…I couldn’t make that separation"

This is not the voice of "femininity" - it's the voice of worldly feminism (which is antithetical to femininity.) It's the brand of feminism that cannot tolerate dissension, cannot respect differing viewpoints and must tear down those who disagree.

So Rachel, don't worry...it's not your femininity that's showing.

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By Dinesh D'Souza:

Here in the West, there are lots of liberal Christians. Some of them have assumed a kind of reverse mission: instead of being the church's missionaries to the world, they have become the world's missionaries to the church. They devote their moral energies to trying to make the church more democratic, to assure equal rights for women, to legitimize homosexual marriage, and so on. A small but influential segment of liberal Christianity rejects all the central doctrines of Christianity. H. Richard Hiebuhr famously summed up their credo: "A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgement through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross."

I have met liberal Christians who are good and sincere people. But their version of Christianity is retreating, in two senses. Liberal Christians are distinguished by how much intellectual and moral ground they concede to the adversaries of Christianity: "Granted, no rational person today can believe in miracles, but..." "True, the Old Testament God seems a mighty vengeful fellow, but..." "Admittedly religion is responsible for most of the conflict and oppression in history, but..."

This yes-but Christianity in full intellectual withdrawal, and it is also becoming less relevant. * * *

Unfortunately, the central themes of some of the liberal churches have become indistinguishable from those of the American Civil Liberties Union, the national Organization for Women, and the homosexual rights movement. Why listen to Episcopal bishop John Shelby Spong drone on when you can get the same message and much more interesting visuals at San Francisco's gay pride parade?

This is quote I try to keep on hand.

What really struck me was the "Christ's missionary to the world" vs. "the world's missionary to the church."

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From GetReligion:

"God does not answer our prayers. Jesus is not the saviour who saved the world by dying for our sins. Simply put, Christianity is “love one another.” Gretta Vosper, founder of the Canadian Centre for Progressive Christianity and a minister in Toronto, believes that the church, as we have built it and known it, has outlived its viability." (Amazon.ca)

Mollie (GetReligion) notes:

Lewis provides many details of what Christianity without Christ looks like. Vosper does not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, the miracles and the sacrament of baptism. Nor does she believe in the creeds, the presence of Christ in communion or that Jesus was the Son of God. There’s more:

In With or Without God, her book that was formally launched this week, she writes that Jesus was a “Middle Eastern peasant with a few charismatic gifts and a great posthumous marketing team.”

The Bible is used in her services, but it gets rewritten to be more contemporary and speak to more people. Even the Lord’s Prayer — also known as the Our Father — does not make the cut because it creates an image of a God who intervenes in human existence. And then there is the “Father” part that is not inclusive language and carries with it the notion of an overbearing tyrant who condemns people to hell.

Again, I am reminded of the words of Reinhold Niebuhr when he described the creed of liberals : "A God without wrath brought man without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross."

And yet...this is the goal

“The feminist movement in Western culture is engaged in the slow execution of Christ and Yahweh. Yet very few of the women and men now working for sexual equality within Christianity and Judaism realize the extent of their heresy. It is likely that as we watch Christ and Yahweh tumble to the ground, we will completely outgrow the need for an external God. We, women are going to bring an end to God. We will change the world so much that He won’t fit in anymore.”- Naomi Goldenberg (feminist) - emphasis mine.