Christianity and Gender Equality - Women Bring Restoration

The special opportunity to address Regent University Chapel was indeed an honor, particularly to discuss women’s history month, and the realities women face today. (You may view the message at http://www.regent.edu/acad/undergrad/current_students/spirit_life/chapel.cfm

A discussion of Christianity and gender equality offers some explanations and answers to the key theories of feminism, the projected solution to all problems in women’s lives. Some of the latest published examples reveal, however, that women are not all that happy in post modern America.Economic researchers Justin Wolferts and Betsey Stevenson have just published “The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness,” and here’s what they say in a New York Times Freakonomics response to their feminist critics: “Our research is simply about documenting a fact: since 1970 women’s self-reported happiness has fallen, relative to that of men. This seems paradoxical, given the tremendous strides made by the women’s movement.” WHY?

TIME Magazine’s cover story in November was “The State of the American Woman” and the sub-title was “A new poll shows why they are more powerful – but less happy.” WHY?

A recent New York Times piece by Maureen Dowd discussing the unhappiness phenomenon among women in that “women are getting gloomier and men are getting happier” and asking the salient question “Did the feminist revolution end up benefitting men more than women?” WHY? Has Feminism produced unhappiness for women? Can Christian scholarship offer any insight?

There are 4 concepts women (& men) must deal with regarding Christianity and Gender Equality:

1. Pregnancy;
2. Identity;
3. Equality;
4. The Church.

This outline sets forth these concepts in a context of law offered by feminists, contrasted with grace offered by Christ alone.

Pregnancy: (Let’s Get Real About Pregnancy)

• LAW - Feminist Solution: Sacrifice the life = Abortion. Main legal reform effort by all feminists is the basic claim that women should have more control over their bodies. Though there are more than million mission women globally they continue to argue for “choice.” Mallika Kaur Sarkaria, Lessons from Punjab's "Missing Girls": Toward a Global Feminist Perspective on "Choice" in Abortion, 97 Calif. L. Rev. 905, 906 (2009).
  
  
• GRACE - Biblical Solution: Sacrifice for Life. Women have a natural life giving power that is a joy to experience. Pregnancy is not the enemy, but it is a Romans 12:1-2 experience. A woman’s body is the altar of sacrifice for life and for all future generations. I have argued elsewhere that women’s rights have been consumed, even cannibalized (to the great dismay of most women) by reproductive rights. Lynne Marie Kohm and Colleen Holmes, The Rise and Fall of Women’s Rights: Have Sexuality and Reproductive Freedom Forfeited Victory? 6 William & Mary Journal of Women and Law 381 (Winter 2000). Reproductive capability is sacrifice of self for the gift of life. (Much like Christ!)

Identity: (Does Anyone “Get” Me?)

• LAW – Feminist Solution: Deconstruct Gender. Critical Legal Theory scholars have (successfully) argued that gender is (merely) a social construct,[1] and can be deconstructed by law (i.e. abortion). BUT This overlooks the transcendentally ontological elements of gender, causing inherent principles to be customarily dismissed to the immense detriment of gender equality.
  
  
• GRACE – Biblical Solution: God Knows Who(se) I am

Genesis 16:7-15, as “the God Who sees me,” Hagar in Genesis 16:13. “She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her:”You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.” Beer Lahai Roi means “well of the Living One who sees me” (Heb.).[2]

John 4: The Woman at the Well. “I know everything about you.” “Sir, I can see you are a prophet.” vv. 17-19 Jesus Christ’s life and words John 4, freeing the Samaritan 4x-divorced-and-now-cohabiting woman at the well.

Gender Equality: (Let’s Play Fair)

• LAW: Feminist Solution: Abolish Gender Distinctions. Gender equality in American jurisprudence is an important objective, so much so that the Supreme Court of the United States has tried to remedy gender disparity in education by affording women a quality military education in the VMI case,[3] and the United States Congress has funded protecting women from violence in VAWA,[4] yet inequitable treatment of women persists.[5] What’s almost worse is that contemporary Christians seem uncertain about gender equality.[6] Prof. Michael Schutt’s analysis recognizes the potential for corrupt human nature in the process of discerning and regulating gender equality: “A Christian perspective on gender equality demands an integrated analysis.”[7]
  
  
• GRACE: Biblical Solution: Galatians 3:28, 5:1. Lynne Marie Kohm, A Christian Perspective on Gender Equality, 15 Duke J. Gender L. & Pol’y 339 (2008): Christianity has had a transformative effect on law. And gender equality is important both to law and to religion. This concept is rooted in the freedom offered by Christ, which is freedom indeed. It is about freedom, rather than fairness.

The Church: (Organized Religion)

• LAW: Feminist view: Church oppresses women. Christian religions have been prominent in misunderstanding Jesus Christ’s revolutionary treatment of women as created in His image, thus misunderstanding gender equality, gender significance, and actually being among the most significant abusers of gender equality, and most effective at oppressing women. J. Lee Grady, 10 Lies the Church Tells Woe: How the Bible Has Been Misused to Keep Women in Spiritual Bondage (Charisma House 2000). My concern is that Contemporary Christians seem uncertain about gender equality.
  
  
• GRACE: Biblical View: Universalism (men and women together made in God’s image Gen. 1:27). Sarah Sumner, Men and Women in The Church (InterVarsity Press 2002); Reconstructing Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, (John Grudem and Wayne Piper, eds., Zondervan 1998).

What is needed in the gender debate? Law &Grace? The law always points to our need for grace. Indeed, we need the transcendent point of reference, Jesus Christ – who fulfills the law with Himself, and extends that freedom to us by His grace. A Christian approach allows the engagement of postmodern feminist legal theory ‘in a way that accepts its challenges and enters into its perspective’ while analyzing its foundations as completely dependent upon Christianity. There can be no feminist theory, no gender equality, without Christ.

The most salient point is that nothing needs to be added to Christianity (including feminism) to enjoy gender equality or value. It is as unnecessary for a Christian to be a feminist as it is for a Christian to be a humanist. Anyone who believes that feminism and not Christianity establishes the fair treatment of women does not understand Christianity. A Christian worldview already encompasses the highest view of humanity, the highest view of women, and the highest view of men. Therefore, principles of truth rooted in Christianity are responsible for gender equality.

Since equality is based on Christian freedom, anyone who believes in equality has been shaped by Christian freedom, which means that feminists have been shaped by Christian presuppositions. Likewise, authentic Christians ought to embrace anyone who upholds true gender equality. Therefore, feminists ought to seriously consider the Christian foundations of any claim to gender equality. It may be equally accurate to state that anyone who believes in treating women fairly does so from inherent and transcendent notions founded in Christianity[, and evident in foundations of law].

The idea that one who believes in gender equality ought to be a Christian rather than a feminist becomes the focus. This leads to a brief explanation of why I am not a feminist.

I’m a Christian, not a feminist. As a Christian I am a follower of Jesus Christ. (Matt 16:24) I confess and profess that Jesus is Lord and believe in my heart that God raised Him from the dead (Romans 10:9). My calling is to become like Christ (Romans 8:29), and to do that I must love, serve and worship Him foremost. (Matt 22:37). If I were a feminist my focus would be on women and equality and power. Rather, I am a Christian. My focus is on Christ, and His truth and grace and power, (John 1:17), which allows men and women to submit to one another in love and respect, in full submission to Christ (Eph. 5:21).

As a Christian, I do not function in a feminist paradigm. Some may believe feminism is defined as “belief in the principle that women should have political, economic, and social rights equal to those of men,” (Webster’s Dictionary) or what might be gender equality, however that is not what feminism is about. Feminist Legal Theory (or FLT) has become a huge area of jurisprudence promoting an existential essentialism that is focused on women and women’s subjective experiences alone. It has cannibalized the movement for women’s rights with reproductive rights alone. (See The Rise and Fall of Women’s Rights: Have Sexuality and Reproductive Freedom Forfeited Victory? 6 William & Mary Journal of Women and Law 381, (Winter 2000)(co-authored with Colleen Holmes). A feminist paradigm is destructive to women, and as a woman who loves Christ, I don’t function in a feminist paradigm.

On the contrary, I function in a biblical paradigm. I function in a biblical paradigm that holds truth as transcendent, based on the creator of men and women (not based on men or women themselves). This is a Christian paradigm. Christians do not have to be feminists to believe in social justice or gender equality. Feminism is not something that needs to be added to Christianity in order for the church to honor women. In fact, the man who foremost honored women was Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ was revolutionary in His view of, value for and treatment of women. From associating with the woman at the well (John 4), to teaching Mary and Martha (Luke 10), to entrusting women as the first witnesses to His resurrection (Matthew 28) Jesus treated women with respect, dignity and equality. The gospel itself is pro-women.

It is as unnecessary for a Christian to be a feminist as it is for a Christian to be a humanist. These worldviews do not need to be blended, as a Christian worldview already has the highest view of humanity, and the highest view of women, and the highest view of men. In fact, anyone who thinks that treating women fairly is a feminist thing to do rather than a Christian thing to do does not understand Christianity. Feminism owes any concept of gender equality to Jesus Christ alone.

Furthermore, when I as a woman (or as a man) squabble about power or personal status, I display a lack of faith in God’s plan. When disputes arise between men and women, or over men and women, and particularly in the church, a lack of faith is displayed in God’s plan. In fact, it was for freedom that Christ set us free, and free indeed (Gal 5:1). Free to be reconciled to God (2 Cor 5:18) in Christ, where there is neither male nor female. (Gal 3:28)

I am not a feminist because I am a Christian, indwelt by the living God who died for me, offering me life by His loving grace. My identity is in Christ, and the power of His resurrection. I am created by God as a woman, equal in personhood and potential and possibility for all He’s called me to in this life and for eternity. Feminism is about women’s power. Christianity is about Christ’s power. And my life as a woman is about Christ’s power in me.

Gender equality transcends civil law and can be accomplished through the transformative power of Jesus Christ. Yet humans resist surrender to Christ, and fall short of this moral code. Therefore, humanity will always struggle with gender equality. Feminism has not brought a satisfactory remedy to the lack of gender equality, but neither has religious Christianity. The hope is that this struggle can be a part of recapturing the intellectual life of the law & Christianity[8] even if Christians (including myself) are slow to embrace this challenge.

Harold Berman wrote regarding the relationship between law and religion, “In many areas of American life law reform will not work because law will not work…until it recovers its relationship to universal truths concerning the purpose of life itself.”[9] We can seek that reform/Transformation by including religious perspectives in the law affecting gender – there is hope: Richard Niebuhr aptly stated, “Every moment and period is an eschatological present, for in every moment [women and] men are dealing with God.”[10]

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[1] Katharine T. Bartlett, Gender and Law: Theory, Doctrine, Commentary 871 (1993).

[2] Quest Study Bible NIV at 23. Furthermore, the Lord blessed her with a promise similar to Abraham’s: Gen. 16:10 (v 11-12, ominously prophetic).

[3] United States v. Virginia, 518 U.S. 515, 519 (1996) (holding that “the Constitution’s equal protection guarantee precludes Virginia from reserving exclusively to men the unique educational opportunities VMI affords.”).

[4] Violence Against Women Act, Pub. L. No. 103-322, 108 Stat. 1902 (1994).

[5] For Women, Equal Pay? No Way, Time, May 7, 2007, available at 2007 WLNR 7902764 (describing the conditions of unequal pay for women today). In FY 2006, the federal Equal Opportunity Employment Commission resolved 23,364 charges of sex discrimination in the workforce and recovered $99.1 million in benefits for aggrieved individuals, not including benefits obtained via litigation. Sex-Based Charges: FY 1997 – FY 2006, U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment Commission, Jan. 31, 2007, http://www.eeoc.gov/stats/sex.html.

[6] See Joe E. Trull, Women and Other Creatures: The Gender Debate, 7 J. Christian Ethics (April 1997).

[7] Michael P. Schutt, Redeeming Law (InterVarsity Press 2007).

[8] (something which J. P. Moreland in his book Love Your God With All Your Mind: The Role of Reason in the Life of the Soul 187-200 (1997) promotes).

[9]. Harold J. Berman, Faith and Order: The Reconciliation of Law and Religion 15 (1993).

[10]. H. Richard Neibuhr, Christ & Culture 1 (Harper Collins 2001) (1951).at 229.