Two Thoughts on Women and the Church

I have written here before about how my faith has been bending since my move to DC two years ago. I grew up in a conservative church tradition which believes in a biblical mandate that women should not fill certain roles in the church. Since then I have been deeply involved with two churches that (at least in their church creeds) have no position on the issue. And I have met many people who, with varying degrees of certainty, believe every office in the church should be open to women. I've also encountered a few people who espouse the tradition I grew up in who I want to avoid aligning myself with (like the plague).

I am trying to see my way through the murkiness of this confusing issue. I have not come to many conclusions, but I have settled on two ideas where I believe the conversation must start:

1. If a community believes certain positions in the church should be closed to women, the implications of being wrong on this are dangerous. If it's true that the Bible makes no claim about whether men or women should fill roles such as pastor or elder, then such communities are denying women the ability to use gifts God has given them. The inevitable result will be confusion, pain, and disillusion for women who cannot understand why God has called them to do things he has denied them the opportunity to do, and why he only values these gifts in men. If we are not absolutely sure we are correct on this issue, and we default to a position that denies women these opportunities, we take an enormous risk.

2. Separate but equal is unequal. The popular view among mainstream traditional churches is that men's and women's roles in the church are complementary. They are not unequal, they are different, and they balance one another. I'm not convinced. When I attempt to look objectively at the traditional churches I've been exposed to, the complementary roles I see go something like "men are pastors, and women are... not pastors." I have tried, but I cannot see how the positions afforded to men (pastor, preacher, elder) and women (...) fit together in a way that maintains equality. It's not tenable. If you take the position that the Bible prevents women but allows men to perform certain church functions, I think you must accept that the Bible affords men a superior position in the church. It is impossible to have authority without subordination.

Here are two articles I found interesting while reading about these ideas:
Sojourners: The Persistence of Patriarchy
Christianity Today: Wounds of a Friend

Image: s13_eisbaer