Not all that long ago there used to be just one conversation in the church when it came to gender – ‘what does the Bible say about the role of women?’ Now I think there are at least two additional conversations around gender. The two additional conversations are much bigger and louder, currently, than the one mentioned above. Firstly around how we even understand the word ‘gender’ at all and in particular how that relates to the fast developing and aggressive transgender movement (I’ll put out a links reading list on that one soon). Secondly, around how we understand men and women (traditionally understood) and their relation to each other in society and the church particularly in light of the #metoo movement.
This set of articles relate to the first question – what does the Bible teach about the role of women in the church. This has been a current conversation for us at Grace Church Stockholm as we’ve worked our way through 1 Corinthians and engaged with chapters 11 & 14 in particular. As a multicultural church we have a diverse range of backgrounds and it’s been interesting to hear both people question and critique the dominant western narrative as well as help shed light on the Bible.
The usual disclaimer applies here and that is I’m not particularly endorsing anything here nor is it supposed to be some sort of exhaustive primer on either view, I’m just sharing what I’ve bookmarked in the last few months as I continue to read and think about this issue.
On complementarity
In the summer Andrew Wilson organised and hosted a conference called THINK on the subject of complementarity. Here are the sessions and also a few critical responses.
Helpful chart from @AJWTheology on complementarity pic.twitter.com/QB949wXK7O— Patrick Schreiner (@pj_schreiner) August 31, 2018
- THINK Session 1: The Case for Complementarity
- THINK Session 2: Society, History and Culture
- THINK Session 3: Creation
- THINK Session 4: Anthropology
- THINK Session 5: Redemption
- THINK Session 6: Ecclesiology
- THINK Session 7: Sexuality, Marriage and Singleness
- THINK Session 8: Summary and Conclusion
And some responses
- This conference asked big questions on gender roles in church. Here are 3 views on what happened
- The Future of Complementarity: When Newfrontiers became accidentally feminist
- For a robust rebuttal head to these posts from the Christian Feminist Network
- The future is bright; the future is complementary
- The Complementarity Tango
On the gender debate
- Much Ado About Gender Roles
- The “patriarchy paradox”: why both complementarians and egalitarians may have got it wrong (and right)
On egalitarianism
On complementarianism
Similarity, Vulnerability and Complementarity – basically links to this talk
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