Sick to My Stomach

I feel sick to my stomach over what has been going on lately.

Largely, the craziness at the Stronger Men's Conference (or as Kristin Du Mez called it, the Mojo Dojo Casa Church), featuring a pastor who once called women "penis homes" (you can't make this stuff up) and another who told women (from the pulpit) the wedding day was for them and the wedding night was for their husbands so they should do whatever the husband wants - and then plagiarized his "apology". (Even the fact these men were invited to speak at a forum like this speaks loudly to the message of the conference.) Many others who spoke also are known to preach values of quiet, obedient women who stay at home and make themselves available for their man's needs while neglecting their own. The whole conference was a blatant display of unapologetic toxic masculinity - showcasing all the reasons why unbelievers hate Christianity.

And it makes me feel sick because that is not - that is not even close - to the message of Jesus.

Funny how Jesus never said women should stay home and listen to their men. Funny how Jesus never said, "if your eye causes you to sin, tell women to dress more conservatively". Funny how Jesus never tried to take away women's rights or control their bodies.

Yet this is what we are teaching our men.

My professor puts it this way: "We baptize cultural assumptions with Scripture and call them Christian values." We have taken in American ideology and are so convinced this is who we are supposed to be we perpetrate the same crimes of our country within our own churches. Crimes of sexism and racism and white supremacy and so on and so forth.

Oh, if Paul were around today, the letters he would write to the church in America...

Do we not realize how much this toxic masculinity hurts women?

Did you know, that in America...

- apprx. 4 women are killed every day by an intimate partner or ex-partner?

- 1.6 million women a year suffer brain concussions due to intimate partner violence?

- women earn 11-18% less than men for doing the same work, even with the same experience and education?

- over a lifetime, women will earn $400k less than their male counterparts? and therefore, also less retirement and social security?

- 50% of pregnant teens will never complete high school (as opposed to the teen fathers, who mostly will)?

- 1 in 5 women have experienced an attempted or completed rape?

- 81% of women have experienced sexual harassment or assault? #metoo

- women are more likely than men to live in poverty?

- over a quarter million girls and women disappear every year?

I would suggest toxic masculinity hurts men, too - partly because men can also be abused and raped, but also because of the standards and expectations put on men by other men as to what is "manly" or constitutes "being a man". 

We are a so-called first-world nation, and this is how we treat our women?

But, more disturbingly, this is how the church treats women? 

We have sidelined, oppressed, denied, neglected, and abused women for centuries, all over cultural patriarchal values which should have no place in the church.

It also disturbs me, how many Christian women have bought into these ideologies, accepted them, and now teach them to their daughters. And... scold other women for not holding to these ideals.

It's time for a reckoning. Because how are we supposed to be light and grace in the world, how are we supposed to share God's love, how are we supposed to convince others Jesus is the way, if all the world sees in us is oppression and hate and prejudice and violence??

How indeed.

Men. You can do better. Be better allies. Invite women to the table. Give space for women to shine with the gifts God gave them.  RESPECT women. Learn what consent means. Treat women as human beings with infinite value, not mere objects for decoration or entertainment.

Women. Support your sisters. If you're a happy housewife, great! Be a happy housewife. But don't expect all women have been given that calling. We can be called to many different things. 

Male or female - follow Jesus. Challenge the things you have been taught and raised with. Is this really how God designed the Church? Or have we merely been fooled into following the lies of our culture?