According to several historians, that was among General Robert E. Lee's favorite verses.
Oh that we would have leaders like that today.
Posted on 09/28/2014 5:32:33 AM PDT by SkyPilot
The leaders of a new, Christian movement think they’ve solved a centuries-old mystery: why men are absent from church. But their answer isn’t politically correct.
They believe Christianity has become feminized.
There are generally more women than men in every type of church, in every part of the world, according to church growth experts like Patrick Johnstone, author of Operation World.
A traditional explanation is that women are more spiritual than men. But the leaders of this new movement suggest that the church’s music, messages and ministries cater to women. One of the leaders is David Murrow, author of a provocative book Why Men Hate Going to Church (Nelson Books), who spoke with Biola Connections.
The result of this feminization is that many men, even Christian men, view churches as “ladies clubs” and don’t go — or they often go to please their wives. Murrow’s solution is to restore a masculine ethos. Many men’s ministers, including some Biolans, agree.
But isn’t the reverse true — that the church is controlled by men?
True, 93 percent of senior pastors in America are men, according to evangelical pollster George Barna. But, the majority of attendees in a typical church are women. Barna goes so far as to refer to women as “the backbone of the Christian congregations in America.”
“[I]t’s not too hard to discern the target audience of the modern church: a middle-aged to elderly woman,” Murrow said in an interview with Faithreader.com.
The same claim was made by an earlier, more academic book, The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity (Spence Publishing Company), by Leon J. Podles, a senior editor of Touchstone Magazine. But Murrow’s book has had a bigger impact among evangelicals and has been featured by the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.
(Excerpt) Read more at magazine.biola.edu ...
I understand that Christianity has always appealed to women.
From the time when the bible reveals to us that Jesus ministry was supported financially by women: “Luke 8:3 and Joanna the wife of Chuza, Herod’s steward, and Susanna, and many others who provided for Him from their substance.” we read that the Church has had a unique appeal to women.
As castigated as the Apostle Paul is about being anti-woman, the opposite is really true. The requirement that elders and deacons be husbands of one wife only was pro-woman. His requirement that husbands love their wives as Christ loved the church was very pro woman. And, to be honest, we read of women who were among the keys in his outreach: Lydia who opened up her household, Lois & Eunice who loaned out Timothy, Priscilla who was a fellow laborer.
What isn’t taken into account by many is how the other religions of the day treated women: if they weren’t fertility deposits in one religion then they were beasts of burden in another. Christianity was a refreshing breath of air for women.
For these exact same reason, thinking women realize today that their real good lies in stable monogamous homes. THAT is one of the prime reasons why women relate to the church in droves.
I do think it’s true about men that they tend to discount activities led by women. That is one reason I believe that God has placed men in the positions of elder in the church. There was also research a few years back that showed that the areas considered important by the father were also the ones considered important by the children....both male AND FEMALE children.
So, having men in leadership roles in the church is necessary if a church wants men to attend at all. And having men following Christ is the best prediction that their children will continue in the Church in ensuing generations.
The presence of women in the Church is a good thing, for Peter says they can win their husbands by means of modest proclamation of Jesus in their homes. But having men in the church signals to other men that Church attendance is an acceptable male activity.
I was going to post a photo, so I Googled "Women Abused Islam." Quite frankly, I was so sickened by what I saw that I cannot view any photos further right now.
Jesus flouted convention by speaking to the woman at the well, by praising Mary Magdalen in at the dinner in His honor, and by so many other manifestation of His divine personality.
The horrible, irony of our day is that the great majority of Western women have not seen what you said - they believe Christianity is "patriarchy" and it robs them of things such as guilt free abortions.
God made us male, and female. There is no disputing that. In congruity, there is nothing more beautiful.
However, there is a reason books such as "Wild At Heart" appealed so much to Christian men. The Western Christian church, like much of the culture, allowed itself to be overly feminized. This is reflected in our sermons, worship, and gatherings.
Psalm 144:1 Of David.
Praise be to the Lord my Rock,
who trains my hands for war,
my fingers for battle.
Ferguson MO wouldnt be the hell hole it apparently is if the families there had Men as their LEADERS.
where are the COURAGEOUS men who will put an end to the degenerated cultures through IMPROVING them?
Feminism has polluted the entire society...at one level or another.
According to several historians, that was among General Robert E. Lee's favorite verses.
Oh that we would have leaders like that today.
Agreed. Without men, without fathers, society falls apart. What was it Gloria Steinem said?
Every pathology of society today is because fathers and men have been subjugated and shut out.
God gave men and women gifts - the gift of men was leadership. The Christian worship service today, largely, has become overly feminized and has shut men out.
An organization needs a “man’s man” in order to attract other men. Most men don’t want to follow a feminized man (like Obama, many pastors). Most men also certainly don’t want to follow a woman (unless it is a very unusual woman like Margaret Thatcher). The only way you’re going to get most men to attend church is to have manly men in charge. It’s just the way that men are built. Women need to understand this.
I think xzins, who led men and women who went into combat, understands this. What I think he was saying was that Christianity, unlike all other religions, honors women like no other.
As for my opinion, I believe that people who have spent their entire lives in the United States or the West (and I am not talking about the vacation for a few days here and there), have NO IDEA what the rest of the world is like. They know what they know, and the United States and the West still retains the Christian foundation, although that is eroding at a terrible pace.
If you were to spend a month in a Muslim country, and see the worst of the worst on a day to day basis, you be horrified. So would most Americans, especially American women. They have no idea how they have it versus women the world over.
The staff is male, but the paying customers -- the ones who decide which church to attend, whether to tithe, and how much -- are increasingly women. And so the women call the shots.
Isaiah 43:11
Zechariah 14:9
Malachi 3:6
“By law, public sentiment, and religion,–from the time of Moses down to the present day,–woman has never been thought of other than as a piece of property, to be disposed of at the will and pleasure of man. And at this very hour, by our statute books, by our (so-called) enlightened Christian civilization, she has no voice whatever in saying what shall be the basis of the relation. She must accept marriage as man proffers it, or not at all.” [Susan B. Anthony, arguing in favor of liberalizing divorce law. CHAPTER XIV. VIEWS ON MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE. Eighty Years And More: Reminiscences 1815-1897 (1898) by Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Initial text entry and proof-reading of this chapter were the work of volunteers Teresa McEachern and Mary Mark Ockerbloom. A Celebration of Women Writers: Mary Mark Ockerbloom, Editor. University of Pennsylvania. Accessed 23JUL14. http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/stanton/years/years-XIV.html]
“I tell them I have worked 40 years to make the W.S. platform broad enough for Atheists and Agnostics to stand upon, and now if need be I will fight the next 40 to keep it Catholic enough to permit the straightest Orthodox religionist to speak or pray and count her beads upon.” —Susan B. Anthony, to her Association
The Bible Resolution and Susan B. Anthony’s comment, NAWSA Convention, Washington, D.C., January 23-28, 1896
http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/history/dubois/classes/995/98F/doc49.html
Beecher-Tilton Scandal
http://www.brown.edu/Facilities/University_Library/exhibits/RLCexhibit/beecher/beecherms.html
Moses Hull: another one like Beecher.
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/naw:@field+%28SOURCE+@band%28rbnawsa+n8312%29%29:@@@$REF$
As to the authority of the husband, this has always been weaker among the poor peasants because, out of necessity, their womenfolk have to do more manual labor than the women of the richer classes and therefore have more say and greater power of decision in family matters.
With the increasing bankruptcy of the rural economy in recent years the basis of men's domination over women has been undermined. With the rise of the peasant movement, the women in may parts have now begun to organize rural women's associations; the opportunity has come for them to lift their heads, and the authority of the husband is getting shakier every day. In a word, the whole feudal-patriarchal ideology and system is tottering with the growth of the peasant power.
Protect the interests of the youth, women and children -- provide assistance to young student refugees, help the youth and women to organize in order to participate in an equal foot in all work useful to the war effort and to social progress, ensure freedom of marriage and equality as between men and women, and give young people and children a useful education.
In agricultural production our fundamental task is to adjust the use of labor power in an organized way to encourage women to do farm work.
In order to build a great socialist society, it is of the utmost importance to arouse the broad masses of women to join in productive activity. Men and women must receive equal pay for equal work in production. Genuine equality between the sexes can only be realized in the process of the socialist transformation of society as a whole.
I was listening to a radio show, and former pastor said that other pastors at a convention told him to not follow his heart with his sermons, but pay most attention to "growing his church." It was akin to politicians who care most about getting reelected. He said the phrase was "nickels and noses." I was appalled hearing that. But, it makes sense if your paycheck, career, and livelihood depend and how big your church is, versus the message of the Gospel.
The more I think about your comment, the more I realize it is true.
That is going to be my new tagline.
As long as the women control how much is donated, which church is attended, and perform most of the volunteer activities, then THEY are the ones in control, as THEY are the ones who must be kept happy if the church is to continue as a viable organization.
If you want to attend a masculine service, the only way to do it is to collect a few like-minded friends and have your own Bible-study group. Be forewarned, the women in your lives won't like it.
I think the opposition to the traditional Latin Mass from the senior Catholic hierarchy, is that they recognize that women won't like it, that the women prefer the post-Vatican II services. Watch the video of a Latin Mass. It might just be me, but there just seems to be something very masculine about it.
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