Recently Published
Pastorals and the Canon: Closing Thoughts with 2 Timothy 3:10-4:22
Lesson 25: "Christians who stress the inerrancy and inspiration of both testaments of our Bible often refer to 2 Timothy 3:16—'all scripture is inspired by God....’ But there are two problems with such an interpretation. First, when 2 Timothy was written (late first or early second century), the only scriptures the early Christians had were the scrolls of the Hebrew Bible, our Old Testament.”
Ash Wednesday Thirteen Ways
February 2020 Poetry Selection
I have never trusted
a priest with
my whole heart,
not one.
I have never trusted
a priest with
my whole heart,
not one.
Persistent Themes and a Striking Omission — 2 Timothy 2:1-3:9
Lesson 24: “In spite of the potential shame attached to followers of Jesus’s gospel, as Jouette Bassler’s commentary notes, the author of 2 Timothy never mentions the most embarrassing and shameful event in Jesus’s life—his crucifixion by the Romans, a punishment meted out only on criminals and runaway slaves.”
The Power of a “Last Will and Testament”: 2 Timothy 1:1-18
Lesson 23: "Second Timothy [is] the final letter attributed to the apostle Paul, and one which appears to unite and authenticate his entire corpus of thirteen epistles. But If you have followed the lessons of 1 Timothy and Titus, the other two of the three letters known as the “pastoral epistles,“ you become aware of a different tone or flavor as this letter begins.”
Redeliverance
January 2020 Poetry Selection
God, did you have to walk gingerly
after giving birth to me
Had you grown heavy with the weight
of my becoming
God, did you have to walk gingerly
after giving birth to me
Had you grown heavy with the weight
of my becoming
Titus 3:1-15—Submission, Salvation, and Ethics
Lesson 22: "We cannot help but notice that all the above names are men. No women are mentioned in any leadership capacity. In contrast, Paul’s letters to Rome, Corinth, Philippi and Colossae all mention women leaders. Paul greets nine women out of 29 names in Romans 16.”
Saying No in the Community
"Churches rely heavily on volunteering women to take on childcare responsibilities, cooking, fund raising, and administrative duties, usually without pay. In fact, women who are already conditioned to take on nurturing tasks may find it more difficult to say no, and perpetrators of abuse take advantage of that."
Titus 2:1-15—Household Organization and “Healthy Teaching”
Lesson 21: "The entire chapter concerns five groups of people in the churches of Crete: older men, older women, young women, young men, and slaves of these households. The slaves presumably also represent a range of ages and genders, but they all have the same role: to 'give satisfaction in every respect [to their owners] . . .not to talk back, not to pilfer'(vv. 9-10)."
Magnificat
December 2019 Poetry Selection
I sealed my fate with my yes—
soul sanctified, body broken
confluence overflowing
I am the Lord’s servant
I sealed my fate with my yes—
soul sanctified, body broken
confluence overflowing
I am the Lord’s servant
2020 CFT Gathering
2020 Christian Feminism Today Gathering
"WALK Humbly, ACT Courageously"
July 16-19, 2020 Cincinnati, Ohio
God has told you, human one, what is good and what the Lord requires from...
You Might Have Missed...
Election Woes
Letha,
I know this is a new direction from our letters this past week, but I need to talk to you about the election! Specifically,...
Christian Feminism To You
Speakers Bureau
Let our speakers bring the inclusive message of Christian feminism to you. Check out our available speakers and presentations here.
Editor's Picks
Calling God “She” — It’s Just Another Pronoun!
To linguistically portray God as a father, or God as a woman giving birth, or an eagle, or a sacred wind, all of those things put a limiting image up to represent God. And, for that matter, so do the three letters, G-O-D. All the ways we choose to refer to God are images, all are limited representations, all are potentially idolatrous symbols. But all our metaphors and ways of referring to God are not necessarily idolatrous. Only potentially.
From Kingdom to Kin-dom—and Beyond
But in the larger context of the New Testament, both “kin-dom” and “kingdom” make sense. The Apostle Paul plants small house churches, and when he writes to them, he calls them adelphoi—sisters and brothers—united in a kin-group not by blood but in a common loyalty to the Lord Jesus, over against the Lord Caesar. To these tiny outposts, Paul promises the coming victory of God over all other empires, through the return of his representative, Jesus.
How to Help a Victim of Domestic Violence
If someone is being abused, they feel responsible for the abuse. Why this logical inconsistency? Because if everything is the victim's own fault, they have the power to change it. I would advise you not to take that sense of power away, but, instead, to model what it is like to not accept responsibility for what the abuser is doing.
No Longer Trapped: Insights on Spiritual Abuse Recovery
Survivors of spiritual abuse can feel justifiably averse to anything having to do with God or spirituality after emerging from the war zone of spiritual abuse. However, cutting off the aspects of oneself that are yearning for healthy, edifying connection to something other than the self—the essential definition of spiritual expression—can be equaling damaging.
When Evangelicals Were Open to Differing Views on Abortion
"There was a time in the not too distant past when the majority of Protestant Christians, including those who called themselves evangelical, did not consider the point at which a fertilized ovum or developing embryo or fetus becomes a human being to be clearly defined, indisputable, and settled for all time."
Latest Book Reviews
Christian Feminism and LGBT Advocacy: Let’s Move Away from Slippery Slope...
"The call for change is about acknowledging and honoring the dignity of whole categories of people who have been regarded as 'less than' or 'lower than' or 'unequal to' the privileged groups that determine who benefits from a society’s social arrangements and rewards. In other words, justice movements form in order to challenge the hierarchies that have been set up to keep whole groups of people 'in their place.'"
There Is More than One Christian View on Homosexuality
"But when it comes to homosexuality, many people have the impression that there is only one religious or biblical view – only one way to consider the question of equal rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people. That view, in the minds of many, is that any and every same-sex sexual expression is sinful in the sight of God."
To Revere the Image of God in Every Person
It is my prayer that all of us will eventually learn to recognize and revere the image of God in every person of every conceivable gender identity, along with the many other diversities of appearance, belief systems, preferences, and whatsoever differences may occur to us.
From the Archives
Who Can Nurture? More Thoughts on Parenting
Dear Letha,
It is a very curious thing for me to sit back and try to look with a “beginner's mind” at all these notions...
Recent Comments