Women in UCG

Compulsory reading over at Gary's Banned blog. It seems the lads gathered back in March to discuss whether women should be allowed to write substantive articles for church publications. The fact that there's any doubt on the matter is a real indictment. Gary hits the nail firmly on the head when he uses the "p-word", patriarchy.

The lads apparently haven't taken on board the evidence that a woman, Junia, is listed as an apostle in Romans 16:7 (for a fascinating discussion of this passage, how it has been misrepresented in many modern translations, and the implications, you could do worse than to hunt down a copy of Rena Pederson's The Lost Apostle: Searching for the Truth About Junia).

Not that we expect UCG to ordain women any time soon, or allow them speaking rights in worship services, more's the pity. To be fair, it might not be that the lads on the media committee are entirely averse to greater participation by women in writing and editorial content (though their hand-wringing hardly sounds enthusiastic!), but apparently there are grumblings from the Luddite fringe at the very prospect. It seems they didn't all pack their bags and migrate to COGWA. UCG seems to have simply continued muddling along the path of least resistance on this issue as if it's 1956, not 2016. The current unofficial policy seems to be that women can write an occasional bit of reflective fluff, but when it comes to important stuff (reader alert: another "p-word" follows) a penis is definitely required

Great to see Beverly Kubik speaking up on this issue.

Beverly Kubik asked if there was a well done study paper on the verses brought up today about women not speaking at church, because if you take these verses literally then women have to put gags in their mouth when they enter the building. She asked if there was a study paper and said we should have that when addressing this topic. Robin Webber agreed that there are many commentaries on this, and they could be put together. Mrs. Kubik said she would like to see an unbiased study into those scriptures.  

She went on to comment that we encourage discussion of the sermon after service and, if we take those verses literally then women can’t talk about the sermon after services. She didn’t feel that interpretation of those verses make sense with the context of rest of the entire Bible. When Christ came He showed more respect to women than had been in the culture prior to that. She asked why that was. She asked why some women are called “prominent women.” Why were they prominent, and what were they doing in the churches there? She feels we are so fearful of anything that comes near preaching for women, yet we have no problem with women singing scriptural words. She would like to understand why these lines are being drawn, and she wants to know what is right or isn’t right. She isn’t trying to promote any idea over another. 

The full COE report is online.

Women in WCG and its Daughters

The following ad appear in the latest issue of The Journal. Click to enlarge.

For those with long memories, there was a time when AW suggested Mrs Graham would make a fine WCG church president if and when Joe Tkach ever decided to do the right thing and surrender his sinecure. The project outlined in the ad seems a worthy and long overdue one, and the questions Sheila asks deserve consideration.

The front and back pages of The Journal are available as a free download. More on this issue of The Journal in a later posting.

Nothing like a Dame

The American usage of "dame" is a little different from that used in Her Majesty's Dominions. In Oz they usually think of Dame Edna, the finest flower of Moonie Ponds womanhood. Not the best example, but, well, you know what Aussies are like... In New Zealand (alias Godzone) we think of Dame Kiri Te Kanawa. Dame is the equivalent of "Sir", a title bestowed upon worthy individuals in the days before we colonials got stroppy and abolished such gongs.

In this honorific sense, Debby Bailey is quite a dame. Chosen not by Mrs Windsor, but by President-for-life Joe. For some people that invalidates her calling, but others are happy to acknowledge that her ministry is genuine, and a rare positive development in a negative sect. It may be shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic, but there's no doubting the bravery of those band members who played on in an attempt to keep panic at bay.

PTM (i.e. Greg Albrecht) has unleashed an article on women's ministry - quite coincidently no doubt (!) - in the latest Plain Truth. Evangelical author Doug Trouten has a dollar each way, hardly a ringing endorsement of WCG's new practice. Trouten calls the misogynists "Complementarians" and those that recognise women's ministries "Egalitarians." There's a list of books for further reading, all of which are sourced from conservative, agenda-driven publishers ("can any good thing come out of Multnomah?") Well, I suppose we should at least be grateful he didn't recommend something from the Missouri Synod...

Meanwhile high pitched shrieking has been heard on a couple of the more Herbolatrous discussion groups.

Left wing WCG's first female elder: The Leninists and Marxists are clapping their hands. (Elijahforum... Elijah being SuperHerb I guess)

What is just as interesting is that, despite such examples of bilious invective, most folk seem reasonably relaxed about WCG's move, even those among the Sabbatarian splinters. Maybe we should give some credit to the person in the picture, the best woman minister the COGs never had, Pam Dewey. Pam is a popular speaker, loyal COG member, website creator and published author. More than that, despite never being ordained as an elder (husband George has that distinction) Pam is a fine role model for confident women's ministry, a truly remarkable person and, in the best British sense of the word, COGdom's leading Dame. If Debby can do half as well she'll be an outstanding pastor.

Pastor Debby

The Worldwide Church of God finally has its first woman elder.

Debby [Bailey] was commissioned in 2002 as part of the pastoral team in the Pikeville congregation. She is active in the community, serving on the National Day of Prayer Committee in Pike County since 1997, where she has served as chairman for the last five years. She also has been involved in a jail ministry to female inmates for almost three years. Debby has been elected as the 2007 vice president of the Pike County/Pikeville Area Ministerial Association, in which she has been active for a number of years. She is also chairman of the July Jam committee, which is an outreach to the youth in the community through Christian rock music. Debby and her husband, Eddie, married since 1979, have an 11-year-old son, Max.
(From Joe's Weekly Update for Jan. 31)

While it certainly won't be a panacea for WCG's woes, it's probably a good move (all the better because Debby wasn't one of the names tossed around by the more cynical among us as the most likely to be ordained first.) Of course it will upset the more patriarchal in our midst, but what else is new. Fulmination alert! Batten down the hatches and secure the teapot, tempest ahead!

Congratulations Debby. Let's hope your groundbreaking ordination will lead to some cracking in the hierarchical mindset.

And Joe sod pottage

On December 13 Pastor Generalissimo Joseph Tkach wrote:

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
The Worldwide Church of God has now completed the doctrinal study on the topic of ordaining women to the office of elder. As an introduction to the completed study, we have prepared a video presentation, which you can access by clicking on this link: www.wcg.org/women.htm The final chapter of the study is attached to this e-mail update, and will appear in the new issue of Together, which will be mailed today.

Which in most churches would be good news, proof that the community of believers was moving ahead into the twentieth century, and might eventually meet up with the rest of us in the twenty-first.

Yes, I'm definitely of the view that the priesthood of all believers means ALL believers, not half the believers. No exceptions. The trouble with the splits and splinters is that most have absolutely no concept of the priesthood of all believers: it's too dangerous to promote in a rigid, totalitarian sect. Even WCG fudges the issue by using the watered-down substitute “ministry of all believers.” Priesthood means responsibility, and that responsibility is on each and every one of us, not a ministerial elite.

Regardless, within the next fifty years I'd predict that there'll be a woman in the office of Archbishop of Canterbury and women ordained to the Catholic priesthood. The sexism that has been institutionalised in the historic Christian denominations can't survive any more than the tolerance of slavery survived the nineteenth century.

So here comes the Tkach church to climb on board the bandwagon. But wait just a minute...

Why would any decent, sensitive, self-respecting woman want to buy into the WCG concept of leadership? Leadership without accountability. Leadership without representation. Leadership that preens and postures as “Episcopal” when it's no such thing.

We know why so many blokes wanted to be ordained. Status. Not many cared for the genuinely pastoral side of ministry, few pursued theological enquiry beyond the stale crumbs offered at Ambassador College. But to stand above the common herd on a stage, strutting behind a lectern and having the sheep hang on every word; that can be quite a trip.

The new, downsized WCG may be a little different, but last I heard Joe Jr. hadn't tendered his resignation and announced a new policy where the church (the people or the local congregations) could choose its own president. Joe is President for Life, a bit like Robert Mugabe.

Last I heard the church's board was still largely a rubber stamp body made up of appointees. No prizes for guessing who appoints them.

And now women are eligible to be inducted into the old boys club? I suppose a few will be tempted to snuggle up to the offer. Maybe that'll be a good thing in the longer term. A year or so ago AW suggested that Sheila Graham would make a great church president, and most readers agreed! But the compromises needed will be, one suspects, more than most Christian women could stomach. Accepting the baubles of office in such circumstances is a bit like Esau selling his birthright for a bowl of pottage.

Meantime, just watch the last remaining conservative, middle aged, tithe paying blokes balk at the prospect of having to listen to a woman preach!

Junia not Junior

I suspect most readers of AW are blokes, judging from the gender balance of the comments. The old time WCG was a blokes' club with not just an all male ministry, but (and this was highly unusual) a preponderance of men over women in the general membership. This caused problems for the single men, exhorted to be maintain a high moral standard but unable to marry outside of their faith (and for most of the church's history outside of their “race” as well.)

Which is why most of the eligible bachelors scrubbed up with particular care for the Feast of Tabernacles. A chance to impress was too important to miss!

But what about the women? In some ways women have been the forgotten 50% of the Church of God. No women as preachers of course, no women as administrators, no women consulted when it came to the latest flip-flop over divorce and remarriage or make-up. For years even the by-lines in church publications were exclusively male, women apparently made inferior writers as well.

Today the new-look Tkach-WCG has, thankfully, made most of that history. They're even looking at the issue of women in ministry, though that reform is slow in coming, and you've got to suspect that, despite the advocacy of Sheila Graham and others, there is a lot of resistance. A cousin of mine, a fine and sincere man who has stood by the WCG through thick and thin, has written a paper opposing the idea.

So, let me introduce you to Junia, woman and apostle. Her story is a fascinating one. She's been hiding away in Romans 16 for nigh on two millennia, but precious few blokes seem to have noticed. Those that have, more often than not, have felt the need to perform gender reassignment: poor Junia has been shorn of her femininity and morphed into a man.

Check out Romans 16:7. “Greet Andronicus and Junia, my relatives who were in prison with me; they are prominent among the apostles, and they were in Christ before I was.” (NRSV)

Compare the same verse in the NIV where Junia goes under the knife to emerge as Junias, a male.

No, this isn't a trendy new feminist re-reading of the trusty old KJV, the KJV has Junia correctly identified, as did the early church fathers (mainly composed of misogynists who'd make Rod Meredith look positively enlightened by comparison.) Even Fred Coulter's translation (gasp!) gets it right - though I doubt he thought through the implications.

Junia, a woman who was “prominent among the apostles”? What gives?

Rena Pederson comes to the rescue with “The Lost Apostle: Searching for the Truth About Junia.” Pederson is a Washington journalist, not a theologian, and a “moderate Methodist”, not a COG member. Her book, however, illustrates the doggedness of a journalist who knows how to go after the facts, find the people “in the know” (she has interviewed a “who's who” of Christian scholars) and then present the findings in a highly readable, accessible way. I particularly enjoyed her account of meeting with a gaggle of Vatican scholars at the Pontifico Instituto Biblico:

"Surrounded by male scholars at the table, I had the feeling that this was what it must be like to have lunch at the Elks Lodge. I had envisioned a defensive or hostile reaction from the church scholars, but the institute professors exuded a gentlemanly curiosity about my topic. As it turned out, studying the women of the church was not high on their list of scholarly pursuits. It was like asking them what they thought about hormone replacement therapy."

You won't trip over theological verbiage, but you will get a fantastic insight into how women have fared in the Christian church down through the centuries, and who knows, just maybe you'll end up agreeing with Joe Jr. that the issue really does need addressing.

Agreeing with Joe about anything is a scary thought, but he's got to be right about something occasionally. And, just quietly, I think the various COGs would be much improved if some of the wooden-minded blokes stepped aside to make way for a few multi-tasking females. Any one of the service-minded secretaries who make coffee and clean up after Dave Pack would be a definite improvement, don't you think?