My Mental Caricature of a Conservative Complementarian

I love to jump on the bandwagon as much as the next blogger, and this bandwagon is just begging for attention.

Over at The Gospel Coalition is an interesting and alarming post about sex and subordination. Much of the anger and written response is to the following excerpt from Douglas Wilson’s Fidelity:

In other words, however we try, the sexual act cannot be made into an egalitarian pleasuring party. A man penetrates, conquers, colonizes, plants. A woman receives, surrenders, accepts. This is of course offensive to all egalitarians, and so our culture has rebelled against the concept of authority and submission in marriage. This means that we have sought to suppress the concepts of authority and submission as they relate to the marriage bed.

Now with all the snark I can summon: I can’t imagine why anyone would be alarmed by that sentence, especially if it was written by an intelligent white male conservative complementarian/theologian/prolific author and speaker.

I am not offended by that statement because I am egalitarian. I am not offended by that statement because my husband honors and cherishes me by encouraging me to exercise all of my gifts in teaching and speaking inside and outside of the home to impact both men and women, boys and girls.

I am offended because I am a Christ-follower who understands and takes into consideration the historical as well as the modern-day implications of using those words in a public forum. I am offended because I cannot read between the lines and assume the best of intentions when the words are from someone so learned and lettered. I am offended because as an Asian American woman whose gender and ethnicity come into play whether it is in the here and now or in the kingdom yet to come, those in power use words to put people like me “in our place”.

And my place is apparently to retake my ESL class, according to the response by Wilson:

Anyone who believes that my writing disrespects women either has not read enough of my writing on the subject to say anything whatever about it or, if they still have that view after reading enough pages, they really need to retake their ESL class. A third option — the one I think pertains here — they could surrender the a priori notion that I must be crammed into their mental caricature of a conservative complementarian.

Certainly I have again misunderstood Wilson’s intentions. Surely he didn’t mean to make fun of those who did not grow up with English as our first language. I realize that my role as a woman may be called into question by other believers, but at the end of the day we can all love Jesus together so long as it is with flawless English grammar. Correct?

I grew up in a complementarian world with shades not of grey but of Korea. They were the mothers and fathers of my peer group who sincerely believed that though the matriarch ruled the kitchen at church and at home and school (on Sundays), it was the role of men to teach anyone older than 13-ish about God and other important things. Math, reading and other things that would get us to the Ivy Leagues could be taught to us by women.

Much of my journey with faith and with faith in Jesus has been to reconcile and put into context the cultural patriarchy I grew up with alongside the deep faith and faithfulness that I ultimately embraced. But apparently my mental caricature of a conservative complementation wasn’t completed until today.

Gahmsah hahm nee da.

Would You Vote for Michele Bachmann

Personally she and some of her supporters scare the bejesus out of me. Revisionist history should scare everyone. However, the strength of the Tea Party is evident in this ridiculous budget stand-off/show-down, and this morning our friend, Margaret Feinberg, contributed to The Washington Post in a roundtable that discusses the issue of Biblical submission, servant leadership, women leaders, and the changes taking place in conservative Christianity. The article looks at questions including:

How do modern evangelicals understand biblical teachings on women’s roles? (I am a sucker for this question every time.)

How would a President Bachmann balance biblical submission and political leadership?

Check out the article here: http://wapo.st/oJoR8K

Power & Submission: Be Not Afraid

I’m being interviewed tomorrow by the media team at a conference I am speaking at – New Awakening 2011, and I’m being asked about my journey as a Christian leader. I have some thoughts brewing, but I would love to hear/read your thoughts on the topic of power and submission.

We don’t always do a great job of talking about either power or submission, especially when you mix in issues of race, ethnicity, gender and faith. As a Christian Asian American woman I can’t help but bring in those angles and issues. It isn’t “just” leadership/power. It isn’t “just” submission.

It’s complicated. It’s loaded. It’s important. And there aren’t enough “safe” places to talk about the issue. If we can be gracious, perhaps this little corner of cyberspace could continue to become one of those places where we don’t have to be afraid.

So, what do you think when you read this question:

(M)any women are rising up and taking estimable positions in today’s world. In your perspective, how can Christian women balance practicing power and submission?

Serving as a Rite of Passage and Mark of Faith

So yesterday I wrote about the realization that I had become an “ahjumma”. Despite what you think, I’m cool with it. No really. It’s OK.

But comments on my FB page are proving that some of my girlfriends are not so ok with it. It’s all in good fun, but has got me thinking about womanhood and how hospitality and service carry both the brokenness and the redeemed parts of my culture and faith.

My childhood connections between the acts of service I often saw the ahjummas performing were more often than not fond memories – very little baggage. My mother and her friends were in the kitchen at church or at home. Nothing more, nothing less. But as I aged how I perceived their place and those acts of service changed and became less positive (or even neutral) and more negative. Service became less about hospitality, mutual submission and loving my neighbor but more of  being put in one’s place and being subservient or less than a real leader. As a young woman, my place was to be in the kitchen, in the nursery, in children’s Sunday School, with my mother, in the shadows. I associated those places and roles rather negatively, mainly because those were the only roles open to me.

And being the kind of young woman I was, I bristled at the idea that somehow my breasts and uterus limited my abilities and worth. My understanding of what service and submission and leadership and worth transformed and redeemed by Jesus was very limited, and in the end I did not want to become one of “those” submissive and weak women.

But the laughter I shared with my girlfriends over cake and rice cake was hardly borne out of weakness. We chose our place – to stand willingly and lovingly beside and behind another friend to do for her what needed to be done for her guests. We weren’t the young girls who needed our mothers to tell us it was time to cut the rice cake. We were the women who simply knew. Our acts of service were both a blessing to her and to us, and that was borne out of knowing who we are before doing what we do. We may not want to be called “ahjumma” but I am beginning to think that how and why we serve marks some sort of rite of passage for us into womanhood with a unique expression of that womanhood as Asian American women. Just a thought I’m lingering within…

Perhaps that is part of the transformation I am still going through, managing the push and pull to love others through my acts of service precariously balanced against the tiredness and bitterness of serving others who do not appreciate all that I am doing for them. I am both Mary and Martha – mentally wanting to sit at Jesus’ feet while simultaneously creating a checklist of things to do. I am worried and distracted, independent but still bound to my parents and children, faith and culture.