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Violet, my atheist blogging buddy, has a post up entitled Lessons for Christian Ladies. She links back to one of my posts.
I love it when Violet posts because she always makes me laugh, mostly because she is so concerned about any ideas having to do with submission to God, or the slight possibility of women ever submitting to men, in any context, ever.
It’s the false stereotypes of Christian women that amuse me, that and the kinky implications and under currents. This is a somewhat snarky response, rather than a serious one, so you’ll have to forgive me there.
She begins with
1. Call your husband ‘master’ or ‘lord’.
I admit it, we do this sometimes, but usually only at medieval fairs in full costume. I did call my husband master just the other day, but it was simply a casual reference to how he was the master at making fried chicken. I don’t refer to him as lord very often, except once in a blue moon, such as, “here’s your coffee, m’lord.” Believe it or not, I am actually an ordinary woman, so along with all those pet names we have for each other, there is also the occasional, “you have got to be kidding me!” or, “fine, whatever!” or any other expression of frustration that comes to mind in the course of marriage to a man.
2. Remember to cover your head because you’re not the god God’s glory, you’re a man’s glory!
You actually got me there, Violet. I cannot even explain this one, but it’s the oddest thing, in the presence of all that is Good and Holy, I actually want to cover my head. It’s instinctual, it even permeates my dreams. Sometimes I joke about having Catholic DNA or perhaps some ancient bit of genetic memory from my foremothers who all wore hats or scarves, but the idea of covering my head is somewhere deep inside and I cannot explain it. Perhaps it is a bit like Jewish men who wear a hat so they will always remember God is above them?
Bear in mind that you are a mere afterthought and accessory.
Violet means women. I’m laughing here, but I certainly am not a mere afterthought! For all I know, I may well be the new and improved version! Just kidding. I am wonderfully and fearfully made, finally chiseled out of bone even. Not to put too fine of a point on it, but you could even say, women were one of God’s first gifts to the world. We are in no way an accessory, a helpmate perhaps, a partner.
Wait, actually, my dictionary says an “accessory” is a thing “that can be added to something else in order to make it more useful, versatile, or attractive.” I think I may have to plead guilty to that one, too. I have certainly made many men more “useful, versatile, and attractive.” Ahem, not intimately, but just generally in the course of my paid work. Is that such a bad thing?? Do we not want “versatile, useful, and attractive” men in the world? Have you seen what happens to men when there are no women around??!
Okay, all snarkiness aside, submission is simply born of love. It is just a natural response to having built a bond and trust with someone, whether it be a relationship with God or a relationship with an ordinary man. It is biological, emotional, psychological, it is simply a reflection and a response to love. It just means to accept or to yield. The opposite of submit is to resist and fight. In the context of love, to resist and fight is somewhat foolish, because it will wall you off from something good. We are called to resist, fight, struggle against unpleasant things, not love.
Love in our culture has been misused, misappropriated, and misrepresented for eons. There are women in the world who have very damaged perceptions of authority due to having been abused and wounded by other broken people. These things are all true, but to heal from that is such a worthwhile goal, because no one should be doomed to go through life afraid to submit to love.
When fear of submission becomes a dominant theme in our lives, not only are we compelled to attempt to dismantle human biology, we’re often compelled to try to rid the world of God Himself. A futile effort, I assure you, because God’s not going anywhere, and all we really accomplish is to deprive ourselves of something wonderful, while walling our pride off with endless fear.
See, there's this thing called biology... 
Oh Violet, if you only saw my wife and I interact for like, five minutes…
I showed her Violet’s little list and she couldn’t stop laughing.
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LOL! So true. I have to laugh, because the idea of “Christian Ladies” also has the power to strike fear in some men’s hearts. Today at work some came to the door and you should have seen all the men trying to flee out the back door 😉
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I don’t know what the Bible would say because I’m not an expert on it, but common sense tells me it’s better to submit to your Christian husband, your earthly surrogate standing in for God, than to submit to a godless tyrannical government in Washington. My attitude is never to submit to the government unless it’s dictates are in line with natural law.
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Good point. It’s a really a strange idea, never submit to God or to a husband, but surrender all to government because they are always a benevolent force for good??! I don’t understand the logic behind this idea, in fact I find it rather scary.
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That’s exactly what our culture teaches: that men are pigs; and religion is for fools. But you can trust the Government/Media/Academic Complex because they have nothing but society’s interests in mind.
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Interesting IB.
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To atheists, Churchian Gamers, and femihags, Love is a concept that needs to be resisted. That’s why they all hate the concept of submission.
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First of all…a little snippet from the “About Me” page of the post Violet referenced…
“I am a mid thirties,white male. I was born in and lived around south-eastern Michigan for most of my life. I was divorced and remarried and I have children from a previous marriage.”
Excuse me? Not exactly a shining source. But, then again, such is human nature. Most people look for the easiest way to express someone else’s thoughts rather than seeking the true source and forming their own.
Secondly…It sounds like someone has read the book “A Year Of Biblical Womanhood” which was pure heresy.
Actually quite sad to see people so focused on what someone else thinks, or believes, they don’t have the time to figure out, or express, what THEY actually think, or believe, in a concise, intelligent manner.
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You make a good point. I read that biblical gender roles piece and I can empathize and translate what is being said there, but so many of these kind of statements come from divorced men who are frustrated, who are struggling to figure out what makes relationships so difficult, and they tend to focus entirely on women’s perceived sins. Women who have been hurt will tend to point fingers exclusively at men. Then non believers grab snipets of these conversations and declare this is the word of God, this is scripture, this is just how all Christians are.
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True. It is easier to take the lazy route of focusing on another persons perceived sins than focus on God and what He has to say about our own.
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Loved reading this.
Funny how the actual living out of biblical principles differs from the reading of them as an outside observer. You fleshed out the bare statements nicely in your response (snarky or not). 🙂
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I’m glad one of your readers went to the original post, as I’m not clear why you think you’re being snarky to me. I was just borrowing his work and giving it a wider airing.
“Okay, all snarkiness aside, submission is simply born of love. It is just a natural response to having built a bond and trust with someone, whether it be a relationship with God or a relationship with an ordinary man.”
Em, no. Submission on a regular basis, as a standing feature of any relationship with anyone, is a bad idea. We’re all individuals with individual strengths and areas we should be directing or leading. That’s the nature of co-operation. I wouldn’t want a relationship with anyone (be that work, friendship or love) who submitted to me as a matter of course. I can’t quite imagine what’s wrong with the Christian men who seek such a messed up relationship, and the Christian women who have nothing better to offer.
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“We’re all individuals with individual strengths and areas we should be directing or leading.”
LOL, everyone always wants to direct and lead! Under those conditions there can be no team work. Haven’t you ever heard that saying, too many cooks, spoil the soup? I really don’t want responsibility for absolutely everything. It’s entirely too much work.
“I can’t quite imagine what’s wrong with the Christian men who seek such a messed up relationship, and the Christian women who have nothing better to offer.”
Oh, ouch, Violet! Christian women who have nothing better to offer? That’s so demeaning! Now see, without at least the tiniest bit of submission, there can be no love. You perceive Christian women as defective, weak, messed up, having nothing better to offer. You cannot even submit to the possibility that some of us are rather smart, relatively happy, and chose to live our lives in the context of marriage. It’s actually not all that weird, people have been doing it for centuries.
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My comment about Christian women who habitually submit because they believe they should, having ‘nothing better to offer’ is a comment on what kind of brain-washing and personality suppression process they must have gone through to feel this way. As I’ve said on many an occasion, I don’t believe for one minute that you submit to your husband. You manipulate your husband, perhaps in the guise of submission, but even then, I’m sceptical. As for Ann below, she states that it’s mutual submission, which is just really basic co-operation.
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“I don’t believe for one minute that you submit to your husband. You manipulate your husband, perhaps in the guise of submission, but even then, I’m sceptical.”
Hmm, fascinating, Violet. I suppose there could be a kind of manipulative quality to submission, if one considers how making yourself more appealing to a husband tends to make him more accommodating to you.
I’m laughing here, but if I do have these secret powers of manipulation, I seem to be woefully unarmed and unequipped, because honestly I cannot even get the guy to eat his veggies. He’s very good to me, but I cannot even imagine trying to get him to do something he did not want to do. For example, he is not taking me to see the new Cinderella movie, even though I have asked and attempted to convince him all week. I shall have to go alone or with someone else because he’s just not having it 😉
So what is the opposite of submission here? I suppose we could fight about it for the next couple of weeks and I could threaten, plead, beg, refuse to yield, and attempt to force him to comply, but that sounds rather miserable.
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Do you do request posts? I’d love to see some more examples of how you submit to your husband. Because if your best example is not attempting to force him to go see Cinderella, then we’re maybe talking about different things. 🙂
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Thanks Violet, I do love requests and I shall try to do my best to talk about submission.
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I look forward to it. With specific examples, because all this vague chat about submitting really means nothing if we can’t understand how it works in reality. By the standard of your Cinderella comment, submission is essentially not forcing someone to do something against their will.
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Here you go, did my best.
https://insanitybytes2.wordpress.com/2015/04/18/submission/
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I felt that ouch too, except I think what Violet is referring to is the habitual submissive “doormat”, and the domineering individual, not the healthy, balanced Christian men and women we know and look up to
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Well, it seems like even a habitual submissive doormat should be worthy of some words of encouragement rather than accusations of having nothing better to offer.
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Yes, I agree, but I think that might have been the reference anyway. Maybe Violet will clarify.
I know for myself as a staunch women’s lib kind of a lady, I struggled with any kind of submission, but I learned that it’s necessary for a marriage relationship to work, and biblically it works both ways, as men and women are to submit to each other.
I agree that cooperation is necessary in any other relationship and so submission becomes an element there too. Give and take makes the relationship work. If it’s done well, in a healthy way, it will work to benefit both parties.
I think the biggest problem is always with submission to God anyway……submission to each other follows that, always borne out of love, as you suggested.
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Since we’re talking about Biblical roles for women, and more importantly what the word “submissive” means, I was dismayed to find that there wasn’t any Bible verses linked here. So I’d just like to say that 1 Peter 3:1-7 sufficiently explains the term. Just one atheist throwing a Bible verse out there.
Also, I don’t think “submission” is being used in the 50 Shades of Grey sense of the word. At least I hope not. But hey, whatever adults consent to in the privacy of their own bedrooms is their business.
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” But hey, whatever adults consent to in the privacy of their own bedrooms is their business.”
Just as long as there aren’t any Christian values going on there, in which case it apparently becomes every non believer’s business.
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I’m happy we agree on the meaning of the Bible verse!
And that’s quite a fancy straw man you’ve constructed there, IB. Should I provide a hat for it?
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