This Sunday's sermon was not an easy one for Pastor to preach on because it concerned the infamous beauty contest in Esther 2 or as he called it, "The Bachelor, Persian Style." If you recall, King Ahaserus of Persia had just given his wife Queen Vashti the boot because she refused to come parade herself before his drunken buddies. So now he needs a replacement queen.
So he announces a contest in which the winner gets to be his new queen. Lucky her. But you know, it never fails to amaze me how even when a guy is known to be a jerk, women fall all over themselves trying to get his attention. Look at Henry VIII, for example. He never had any trouble getting women to go to bed with him. I guess they figured that like the stock market, past performance does not predict future performance and maybe this time things will be different.
So all these young virgins come to the palace to compete for the title of queen. They all went through a pampering regimen for about a year and then they would spend the night with the king. The downside is that after they lost their virginity to him they still belonged to him and if he didn't want anything more to do with them, too bad. They were sentenced to life in the harem. And being a female myself and knowing how my sex behaves I don't think life in the harem was much fun. Especially when there wasn't much in the way of entertainment or opportunities to do anything.
Well, Pastor warned us that we might be scandalized by this chapter. I'm not scandalized at all. So Esther made it to the top by using her vagina? What else is new? Women have been doing that ever since caveman days and probably even before. It's because we've put sex on a pedestal that we are shocked at it being just another transaction. But why is using one's genitals any more different than using one's voice or hands or any other part of the body to get ahead? And I really doubt that she went to the king's bed ignorant of what she was supposed to do or laid back and thought of Jerusalem while he was doing it. Remember, this was a competition. Esther may have been a virgin but I am pretty sure she was tutored in the fine points much like a Japanese geisha. Anyway she won. Goody for her.
Anyway, speaking of genitals, this Sunday was also the monthly lunch with the Pastor in which we get to ask him all kinds of questions. There were about 8 or 10 of us, mostly newcomers. I was going to ask about women in leadership roles in the church but another woman beat me to it. It's as I suspected. He does not believe that women should lead in the church and quoted Second Timothy. So if a woman did come to him seeking to be an elder, yes, there would be a problem. Well, as I told him, we must agree to disagree on that issue; I do not agree with what Paul says on that subject and like Martin Luther, "here I stand, I can do no more." (I don't think he liked that too well.) Someone else said something about separate roles for men and women and I said, "Yes, that reminds me of separate but equal, except the way it worked out was it was more separate than equal."
But afterwards I thought of several remarks I could have said if I were inclined to take him up on his offer to discuss it further in his office. One is, he feels that he has been called by God to start this church and be pastor of it. How would he feel, if when he approached the parent church, the elders had said, "according to this scripture blah blah you cannot be a pastor because you don't fit the qualifications?" I dare say he wouldn't like it. Especially if the disqualifying issue was not something he was able to change?
Secondly, and here I am being a real troublemaker (shame on me), please define "man" and "woman". There are people who look physically female but genetically they are male (in other words they also have that all important Y chromosome). Are they excluded from leadership? What about intersexuals (aka hermaphrodites)? And what about those who have undergone sexual reassignment surgery? I used to work with someone who did go from female to male. Is she/he excluded? She/he looks male but is actually XX; if you didn't know his/her's history, you'd be forgiven for thinking this was a man (which is what she/he wants you to think). This person is married, by the way, to someone who knows that her husband "used" to be a woman. Now isn't that an interesting dilemma if someone like that joins the church? Oh, I know, I am being BAD, but I can't help it, it is so much FUN.
Finally, and here's where it really hits home for a lot of people. Yes, the New Testament explicitly states that women should not speak in church or have leadership over men. Those are the words of Paul. The New Testament also--and this is Jesus speaking, so you'd better listen up--says that if you get divorced you are committing adultery if you remarry while your former spouse is alive. Not only that but you are forcing your new spouse to commit adultery as well. Now the American divorce rate is somewhere around 50 percent all across the board and very few of these people are resigning themselves to a lifetime of celibacy, so there are a lot of second marriages out there, including in this church. I dare say that if a couple who had been previously married to others presented themselves to Pastor for marriage he would happily marry them (provided they agreed with his other doctrinal views), without once raising the issue of whether their former spouses were still alive. So. Women cannot be leaders because it is contrary to Scripture, but divorced people can remarry even though that is also contrary to Scripture. There is a word for that but I am going to be polite and not say it. It starts with H.
So he announces a contest in which the winner gets to be his new queen. Lucky her. But you know, it never fails to amaze me how even when a guy is known to be a jerk, women fall all over themselves trying to get his attention. Look at Henry VIII, for example. He never had any trouble getting women to go to bed with him. I guess they figured that like the stock market, past performance does not predict future performance and maybe this time things will be different.
So all these young virgins come to the palace to compete for the title of queen. They all went through a pampering regimen for about a year and then they would spend the night with the king. The downside is that after they lost their virginity to him they still belonged to him and if he didn't want anything more to do with them, too bad. They were sentenced to life in the harem. And being a female myself and knowing how my sex behaves I don't think life in the harem was much fun. Especially when there wasn't much in the way of entertainment or opportunities to do anything.
Well, Pastor warned us that we might be scandalized by this chapter. I'm not scandalized at all. So Esther made it to the top by using her vagina? What else is new? Women have been doing that ever since caveman days and probably even before. It's because we've put sex on a pedestal that we are shocked at it being just another transaction. But why is using one's genitals any more different than using one's voice or hands or any other part of the body to get ahead? And I really doubt that she went to the king's bed ignorant of what she was supposed to do or laid back and thought of Jerusalem while he was doing it. Remember, this was a competition. Esther may have been a virgin but I am pretty sure she was tutored in the fine points much like a Japanese geisha. Anyway she won. Goody for her.
Anyway, speaking of genitals, this Sunday was also the monthly lunch with the Pastor in which we get to ask him all kinds of questions. There were about 8 or 10 of us, mostly newcomers. I was going to ask about women in leadership roles in the church but another woman beat me to it. It's as I suspected. He does not believe that women should lead in the church and quoted Second Timothy. So if a woman did come to him seeking to be an elder, yes, there would be a problem. Well, as I told him, we must agree to disagree on that issue; I do not agree with what Paul says on that subject and like Martin Luther, "here I stand, I can do no more." (I don't think he liked that too well.) Someone else said something about separate roles for men and women and I said, "Yes, that reminds me of separate but equal, except the way it worked out was it was more separate than equal."
But afterwards I thought of several remarks I could have said if I were inclined to take him up on his offer to discuss it further in his office. One is, he feels that he has been called by God to start this church and be pastor of it. How would he feel, if when he approached the parent church, the elders had said, "according to this scripture blah blah you cannot be a pastor because you don't fit the qualifications?" I dare say he wouldn't like it. Especially if the disqualifying issue was not something he was able to change?
Secondly, and here I am being a real troublemaker (shame on me), please define "man" and "woman". There are people who look physically female but genetically they are male (in other words they also have that all important Y chromosome). Are they excluded from leadership? What about intersexuals (aka hermaphrodites)? And what about those who have undergone sexual reassignment surgery? I used to work with someone who did go from female to male. Is she/he excluded? She/he looks male but is actually XX; if you didn't know his/her's history, you'd be forgiven for thinking this was a man (which is what she/he wants you to think). This person is married, by the way, to someone who knows that her husband "used" to be a woman. Now isn't that an interesting dilemma if someone like that joins the church? Oh, I know, I am being BAD, but I can't help it, it is so much FUN.
Finally, and here's where it really hits home for a lot of people. Yes, the New Testament explicitly states that women should not speak in church or have leadership over men. Those are the words of Paul. The New Testament also--and this is Jesus speaking, so you'd better listen up--says that if you get divorced you are committing adultery if you remarry while your former spouse is alive. Not only that but you are forcing your new spouse to commit adultery as well. Now the American divorce rate is somewhere around 50 percent all across the board and very few of these people are resigning themselves to a lifetime of celibacy, so there are a lot of second marriages out there, including in this church. I dare say that if a couple who had been previously married to others presented themselves to Pastor for marriage he would happily marry them (provided they agreed with his other doctrinal views), without once raising the issue of whether their former spouses were still alive. So. Women cannot be leaders because it is contrary to Scripture, but divorced people can remarry even though that is also contrary to Scripture. There is a word for that but I am going to be polite and not say it. It starts with H.
