The 21st-Century Debate on Women in the Priesthood Part II: “Side-Notes” and Tradition
Alaina Mabaso | Friday, October 21, 2011 Here's part two from Alaina Mabaso. Staying with the theme of the ordination of women, Alaina shifts her focus to zero in on another inconsistency in the defense of an exclusively male clergy. She points to the problem of painting the proponents of change as heavily influenced by cultural forces while at the same time grounding the supposed doctrinal defenses of the status quo in traditional cultural assumptions. Another well written, easy read which provides valuable perspective on the discussion. Find Alaina's first contribution here. This is number two in the series, Women as Ordained Priests (or Not). -Editor.
This summer, I’ve had the privilege of helping my grandparents into a new phase of their lives. Though they grieve to leave the large, beautiful house where my Dad and his sisters grew up, they know the time is right to downsize.
I’ve spent the last few months purging, sorting and packing their belongings. As devout General Church members active in their community, my grandparents have gathered a lifetime of New Church publications, sermons and papers. Through them, I discover Church controversies in the voices of the time.
One clergyman’s paper from many years ago bemoans upheaval, doubt, and emerging challenges to the authority of General Church policy, especially on questions of proper gender roles.
These problems originated in the 1960’s, he says.
This reminds me of pundits who long for America’s better days. I wonder which good old days they mean – World War I or II? The Great Depression? The Cold War? Jim Crow? Vietnam? We forget how tough things really were just in time to think that our current problems are unique.
Something tells me that challenges to the status quo (whether within the General Church or in society at large) were not invented in the 1960’s. It just seems that way when that’s the moment we’re living in.
Warnings against the influence of our current cultural context continue to weigh heavily on debates of New Church doctrine and policy, and nowhere are these more evident than in the controversy over a female priesthood.
In his 1997 article, “Preaching By Women”, Rev. Walter Orthwein expresses this apparent conflict between doctrine and modern mores: “I assume that our customs have been influenced to some degree by the customs of the world around us; the church as a human organization is not a perfect expression of pure heavenly ideals.”
“The question I hope we ask in regard to every proposed change”, he says, “is whether it represents a move away from worldly thought toward our Divinely revealed doctrine, or away from doctrine toward the way of the world.” Orthwein admits that change is inevitable in the course of the church’s growth, so he is not against change in general. But, he warns, “let’s just be sure that each change is for a good reason, and not just to keep up with the times.”
It’s a distinction New Church members have always raised as they, like society at large, debate questions of gender roles.
Generations of girls at the Academy lived these debates like no-one else. They were forbidden to wear pants to school, shivering through the winter because the doctrine stipulated that pants were unfeminine. They learned that it was improper for them to hold jobs, because according to doctrine, professional roles were exclusively masculine. They were denied organized sports because the doctrine forbade competitive women. Now, most of us realize that the Writings offer little basis for the sartorial, professional and recreational prohibitions New Church girls once experienced.
Just as many people now insist that the Writings ban women from becoming priests, many New Church members likewise argued well into the 1980’s that a female presence on the General Church board would contradict doctrine.
For example, a 1975 letter in New Church Life calls the nomination of two women to the Canadian General Church board “disturbing” (New Church Life 1975. #465.)
Women are represented by their husbands, the writer argues. They can’t function rationally: “women, who are ruled by their affections, tend to become personally involved when it is necessary to judge the matter being discussed objectively.” In addition, “few women are skilled in forensic matters.” Women also impede the work of the board: “the presence of women in a council of men tends to inhibit the freedom of debate.”
Women’s presence on the board “is in opposition to the principles held by the founders,” and is due to “the new liberal thinking… and the modern trend.”
Bishop Louis King, in a 1988 letter to General Church members and friends, lays out conflicting clergy opinions on the issue.
Some believe that female board members are not allowed by our doctrine: “if women serve on the General Church Board we will go against the authority of the plain teachings of the Writings” concerning the importance of masculine and feminine distinctions.
However, others point out that women at the College are educated in business, religion, science and mathematics, and women serve as managers, executives and financial officers in other church and Academy positions – yet we bar them from the board: “Are we not inconsistent?”
“Let us not make spiritual principles out of historic natural applications,” King quotes.
Women who reply to the 1975 letter show similar sentiment. “The fact that the presence of women on boards was ‘in opposition to the principles of the founders’ does not make it in opposition to Divine order!” says one respondent (New Church Life 1976. #26.). If all board members, male and female, were qualified and committed to worthwhile goals, the sex difference wouldn’t stifle debate: this idea “is just part of our traditional conditioning.”
It’s not a new observation to many in the General Church: ministers opposed to female ordination may be “keeping with the times” just as much as women who claim that they should have the right to enter the priesthood – it’s just that the times ministers are keeping with are the times of the late 18th century.
The debate on whether or not our doctrine actually prohibits female priesthood is a great topic for another paper – in fact, I hear that Bishop Kline has recently commissioned one from a wise, experienced and capable woman.
To me, a problem with the debate itself becomes clear when ministers who warn against current influences go on to interpret doctrine primarily through recent cultural tradition.
The fact is, interpreting the Writings is a messy business, especially when it comes to determining God’s word on female priests. A large number of the teachings ministers draw on to oppose the ordination of women do not have explicit application to the question of female priesthood – rather, they are inferences based on various teachings about married partners, masculine and feminine inclinations, or the atmospheres of different parts of heaven.
But things really get complicated when we come to Swedenborg’s Spiritual Diary. Whether or not these posthumously-published passages should comprise holy doctrine is, again, a great topic for another paper. There are also plenty of fascinating debates over the translation – and therefore the real meaning – of passages of Spiritual Diary that seem to pertain to female priests.
The point here is that to interpret these strange, harsh passages, ministers can rely on popular cultural assumptions as much as the religious progressives whose “modern trend” thinking is opposed by the same ministers.
In "Preaching by Women", Rev. Orthwein comments on a translator’s response to Spiritual Diary 5936, a particularly troublesome passage when it comes to modern sensibilities.
Basically, the passage warns that women who “think in the way men do” about religious subjects, talk about them, or preach, “do away with the feminine nature.” Furthermore, though they might seem outwardly stable, women preachers develop base sensuality and a tendency to intellectual insanity. Women belong at home (according to certain translations).
Yikes.
Rev. Orthwein counsels that we should not fear this passage because of the risk that it will be used in too literal a way, to bar women not only from being ministers, but also from leading elementary school or private home worship, or thinking or talking about religion at all. He contends the passage is viable because we’ve been reading it “for over a hundred years” without deciding that women cannot perform these small-scale offices. Talking about religion or leading student worship “are things women in the church routinely do,” he says – therefore the passage couldn’t possibly be prohibiting these things.
“I think the church has taken it for granted all these years that giving worship for little children is not the same as the kind of ‘preaching’ meant by the passage,” he explains. “And the concern that the traditional reading of the passage would forbid all thought or talk by women on religious subjects is shown by long experience to be unfounded.”
It’s fortunate that Rev. Orthwein doesn’t subscribe to the most stringent possible interpretation of this passage. But it’s interesting to see that while he declares later in the same paper that a woman preaching is as much a “departure from reality” as a man giving birth, he implies that we can take related doctrinal interpretations of women’s roles “for granted” because of a cultural basis.
Rev. Jeremy Simons’s 2002 paper, “The Hazards of Ministry”, takes a very similar approach to interpreting this passage. He also affirms that Spiritual Diary 5936 does not bar women from thinking and speaking about spiritual things. Rather, “the issue is ‘speaking much,’ or obsessively, or professionally, on religious topics.”
“Engaging in religious conversations, leading occasional discussions, and giving occasional speeches are not what is meant,” he explains. The passage happily condones women’s religious discourse as long as it’s not done often, and as long as the women are not recognized and paid for their work (they must not speak in an “official capacity”). According to Rev. Simons, the passage allows women to lead public worship services and prayers to “groups of women” and “students or children”. It is when women lead worship for “the general public” that Rev. Simons emphasizes a range of grave outcomes, including the assertion that it’s “very likely” a female minister would become obsessed with material and sensual things, and would become “crazy”.
Rev. Simons’s stipulations are interesting. I think we must ask whether New Church women are allowed to lead worship for certain people, take the Master of Arts in Religious Studies program or give occasional religious speeches because the Writings permit it, or if we infer that the Writings permit it because we’ve become comfortable with women doing that over the years.
And when we subtract children, students, and women from Rev. Simons’s “general public”, who is left?
When he effectively subtracts everyone but the men from his definition of “the general public”, Rev. Simons warns women that the risk of insanity appears only when they presume to lead men in worship.
Do the passages he quotes actually make that distinction? Or is sexism melding with comfortable, existing church practice to create this interpretation?
I’m not promoting a more stringent interpretation than Rev. Orthwein and Rev. Simons espouse. Neither do I want to denigrate their scholarship, or their devotion to the wellbeing of their communities. Rather, I want to point out that in this case, their doctrinal interpretations may be unwittingly born of an investment in current customs as much as doctrinal study.
Perhaps most telling of all, Rev. Simons admits that passages that “speak directly about women in relation to doctrine, preaching, and public prayer do not have a central place in any treatment of the clergy in the Writings.” Instead, these passages on women and priest-like roles are mostly “side-notes” which “merely confirm the long-held assumption that priests should be men, an assumption that has been remarkably consistent over time in the great majority of human cultures.” In other words, these passages are not key pieces of New Church doctrine: rather, they are valuable because they confirm a larger cultural status quo.
Rev. Simons’s own goal in writing the paper is “to discourage women from taking up the ministry as a profession, and to confirm the long-standing Christian tradition of a male priesthood.”
Am I the only one worried that a doctrinal paper states as its goal the continuation of a “long-standing tradition” that excludes women?
One of the last things I helped my grandmother to pack was a bookcase bursting with editions of Swedenborg. Along with various listings, concordances, quotation books, and related New Church literature, they filled several boxes: sober, frayed navy-blue hardbacks alongside inviting new editions, soft covers rich with color and gilt. Thick, dusty battalions of Arcana Celestia rubbed shoulders with the much slimmer “Divine Love and Wisdom”, and various editions of Conjugial Love were a veritable tour through the ages of the church.
Looking at the way the piles of Swedenborg’s books covered the floor, the New Church’s feast of doctrine struck me afresh. With the sheer bulk of the books sprawling around me, the absurdity of denying their interactions with our culture is clear. How could such a giant collection – translated, read and interpreted by so many people for well over two centuries - stay sealed within its own intellectual and spiritual realm? How could the Writings not form our cultural preferences as much as our cultural preferences form our understanding of the Writings?
Ultimately, Rev. Orthwein does not admit this possibility in “Preaching By Women”. “Until recently, I think the church as a whole saw this and was agreed on it, the women as well as the men,” he asserts of a negative view of female priests. It’s that modern thinking which is the trouble: “I have to question whether the new thoughts on this subject reflect a deeper understanding of the Writings, or whether they represent influences from the world around us,” he warns.
If women’s desire to serve in the priesthood is merely a factor of our liberal times, is it an irrelevant coincidence that widespread cultural perceptions of women’s limited roles concurred with the General Church founders’ understanding of doctrine? Were people in the church founders’ time more in tune with the Lord’s true will for women simply because they lived over a century ago – a better, more orderly time, free of the problems that modernity brings?
What is a hundred years to the Lord?
We must do away with the reflexive assumption that “the way of the world” always represents a departure from doctrine. The passage of time has brought many human and spiritual improvements to our way of life: for example, modern racial equality is surely closer to the Lord’s ideal than the segregation of the past. On a much smaller scale, few would argue today that the General Church organization was better off before women began contributing to its administration.
This essay doesn’t claim to solve the controversy over the ordination of women. But I do argue that proponents of change should not see their sincere beliefs and desire to serve marginalized as disorderly social trends, versus the doctrinal high ground of traditionalists, who claim to rely solely on God’s Word, even as they themselves justify their doctrinal positions by pointing to what is commonly done in General Church culture. As this debate moves forward, I would like proponents of the all-male priesthood to admit that people advocating for female priests are not the only ones influenced by the world around them.
Alaina Mabaso
Alaina is a Philadelphia-based freelance writer whose work appears in several venues. She also writes and illustrates humorous real-life essays on her blog at Alainamabaso.wordpress.com, where you can find information about her book, “The Conjugial Culture: A Derived Doctrine of Sex in the New Church.” Alaina is currently working on a second book for Swedenborgian audiences, about the intellectual life of New Church women.Wondering about the inspiration for this article? Look up the New Church, which is based on the theological writings of Emanuel Swedenborg.
Reader Comments (88)
great essay!
But could you start calling that group who don't already have women in the ministry, "the General Church," despite the logo which brands them as "The New Church?"
The Swedenborgian Church of America, which predates the GC, ordains not only women, but also openly gay people.
I would like to second Kay's comment. The issue of "women in the priesthood" is just a tiny bit artificial. There are branches of the New Church where this is no longer an issue. There are branches of many other churches or religions where this is not an issue. Likewise, any women who feel a call to lead in church matters are not prevented in any way of forming their own church, make their own guidelines or rules, based on their own understanding of the Word. The General Church is in no way dis-allowing women becoming priests. The GC has a worldwide membership of about 5000 people (if my info is correct). Can someone please make the percentage calculation here against the 7 billion members of the human race?
Stephen,
Although I didn't attend Hannah Reynold's (sp?) workshop at the GC Assembly, someone who did attend told me how one of her points was something along the lines that she feels particularly attached to the General Church and so doesn't want to be a minister in any other church--she wants to be a minister in HER church, the GC. This struck me, because up until then, I had also thought along the lines you express: the New Church is the New Church whether it's GC, or Convention or something else, so if a woman wants to be a minister, just join one of the branches of the NC that does allow women as ministers. But since hearing Hannah's statement, I've changed my mind. As a woman who was raised in the General Church and come from a lineage of GC ministers, I have a sense of identity with the GC as the unique branch of the NC that it is. So if I were to want to become a minister, I'd want to be one in MY church--it would feel artificial to just join Convention solely because they allow women as ministers. So even though, as you say, the GC is a very small contingent of the New Church at large, it's smallness and uniqueness does not negate the fact that the issue of women as priests (or not) in the GC is still relevant and worth discussing.
To me, the fact that other branches of the NC have come around to have or always have had women welcomed to pursue the priesthood as a vocation can add much to the current discussion. If I could make the time, I would like to study the evolution of those decisions. Although this issue is acute in the GC, I think this series on the subject is in part to discuss the topic of women in the priestly role on a global scale as well, if anyone feels called to offer thoughts in that respect.
I consider myself a conservative Swedenborgian (or New Christian, or whatever else we are called). In other responses, I have expressed opposition to "gay marriage", to the ordination of practicing homosexuals and to abortion for any reason except to save the mother's life.
This is to introduce myself again - I am no liberal.
However, I find nothing in the Bible or in the Heavenly Doctrines that would stop the General Church from ordaining women priests. We might decide to not ordain women priests because that could cause unnecessary division, de-focus us and distract us from the urgent task of increasing membership to levels that will make us a viable nation-wide and world-wide denomination rather than a little clique of no more than a few thousand. Once we are a real denomination/church in terms of head count (maybe a few hundred thousand), we can start ordaining women.
Leif
Ten years ago, as I did my chaplaincy residency at Jefferson University Hospital, I had the privilege of making a presentation to my colleagues on "my religion," the New Church. As I began to describe General Church policies, a cherished colleague asked about the ordination of women, and I will never forget her crestfallen and disappointed look as she, a searcher, realized that she would never be at home in this church. Her look saw right through to my divided heart as I tried to explain the policy in an unbiased way. So too, will newcomers see right through to the heart of our divided church and the struggling marriage within. Although it might seem painful to some now, ordaining women would ultimately lead to a more healthy church, one that can really sustain growth, and provide a spiritual home to many that would otherwise be estranged by the GC approach to women's roles.
Beautiful series of comments - thanks to all for your thoughts. Kay and Stephen: the point about not equating the General Church with all New Church denominations is crucial - thanks for bringing it up. Having grown up almost totally cloistered within the General Church, I can say that sadly there is a culture there with little to no interest in connecting to other New Church branches, or educating General Church students about other branches of the church. Perhaps other students in other societies had a different experience, but that, unfortunately, was mine, and I think that is a factor in my occasional tendency to equate all New Church branches with the one I was raised in. It's a bad habit that needs better education.
Chelsea: thanks so much for your response on why it's still important to pursue the issue in the General Church, even though other branches do ordain women.
Lief: Thank you for reading, reflecting, and responding. I'm compelled to say that I find your response more than a little humorous, though I am very glad to learn that despite your very conservative stance on several issues, you'd support female ordination (as long as it occurs at a far-away point in the future, not NOW). Your response about not getting distracted from the growth of the church or sowing discord by ordaining women completely misses the current reality - droves of people have left the General Church (or like me, were raised in it but failed to join it) because, in part, of its policy about women. Declaring that we should wait to ordain women until the church has grown from several thousand to "a few hundred thousand" echoes perennial arguments against integrating divided societies - whether the divisions are by gender, race or sexuality: Sure, let's give everyone equal treatment SOMEDAY, but not now - so let's just make the disenfranchised group wait until we all feel a bit more comfortable with letting them in. The painful work of bestowing equal treatment will be easier at some misty future time.
Alaina, You spelt my name wrong but that's better than spelling it "Leaf" as some do, to the bristling of my Scandinavian sensibilities :-)
I have a few questions - why do you classify and equate sexuality with gender and race? By 'sexuality' I believe you mean sexual perversions and not the natural gamut of erotic play open to married couples.
Why do you think it is in the distant future when there will be hundreds of thousands and millions in the General Church?
Isn't the Great Commission one of the church's top priorities? Should a tiny church such as ours waste time and resources over some culturally correct left-wing agenda, and dilute the need of the hour to spread the message?
Mind you - I am all of ordaining women as long as satisfying a few animus-possessed egos (cf. Jung) does not override other, more important priorities.
Leif not Lief not Leaf
I meant, "I am all FOR ordaining women" not "I am all OF ordaining women".
Alaina, reading this was like drinking a cool glass of water on a hot day. Brava.
First of all, bravo Alaina. I am one of those many young adults who has felt driven away by Church policies on gender and sexuality, and you've done an excellent job of representing the position. I love that you've pointed out the contradiction of the 'dangers of modern thinking' approach. I've always seen it as extremely hypocritical. Church policies are heavily influenced by old culture, just as my opinions are influenced by new culture.
I'd like to take a moment to respond to Leif. You asked, "why do you classify and equate sexuality with gender and race?" The fact is that for many people in my generation these issues seem to be quite the same. I myself am in the process of writing a thesis challenging church policy on homosexuality. I don't want to hijack or distract from this discussion. I just want to point out that the dominant scientific perspective holds that sexual orientation as just as inherent as race or gender, so discrimination based on any of these is viewed by many as equally unfounded. But again, this is not a discussion about homosexuality, so let's not get into it. I just wanted to explain the perspective in response to your question.
You also asked, "Should a tiny church such as ours waste time and resources over some culturally correct left-wing agenda, and dilute the need of the hour to spread the message?" I think, as Alaina said, that you are missing the point here. What I will call right-wing church policies stand as a direct obstacle to spreading our message. A huge number of individuals hear that we don't ordain women, or reject homosexuals, and decide then and there that our message is worthless and outdated. Views that you have labeled as a left-wing agenda are actually increasingly the majority opinion. Gallup polls in 2000 showed that between 70 and 73% of Americans support the ordination of women (http://www.gallup.com/poll/11146/Women-Clergy-Perception-Reality.aspx), and the number has definitely risen in the ten years since. (As for sexual orientation, in 2008 Americans were equally divided as to the morality of homosexuality; http://www.gallup.com/poll/108115/Americans-Evenly-Divided-Morality-Homosexuality.aspx). These polls are only of Americans, but I'm going to assume based on historical trends that Europeans are even more liberal. The point here is that these opinions aren't the loud voices of an opinionated and distracting few; they are the voices of a growing majority. To ignore these voices would be extremely irresponsible for a church that hopes to expand. And no, I'm not suggesting that we should always abandon doctrine in favor of public opinion; I'm suggesting that we should abandon old culture for new culture. I don't think we disagree that the doctrine itself isn't the source of the limitation on women in the ministry.
Kesley, thanks for a well-articulated response. I would be really interested to read your dissertation.
Leif, as a person named "Alaina Mabaso" (not Alanna Mobaso or Elana Mabasco or any variation thereof), I can relate to the woes of misspelled names and regret getting yours wrong. I also get the Scandinavian sensibilities - I'm a Synnestvedt.
I think it's really important to avoid ad hominem attacks in debate, and, as a writer, making sure I don't degenerate into this keeps me up at night. But I also sometimes fear that I avoid saying things that need to be said, for fear that the remarks will be too personally pointed. But here's a case where I feel compelled to speak up briefly in response to your comment.
First, I invoke "sexuality" merely to illustrate, as Kelsey iterates, that people in our society face and have faced discrimination because of their sexual orientation. Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, so if someone feels that homosexuality is morally wrong, or even a "sexual perversion", that opinion is their right, but that religious/moral belief shouldn't strip civil rights from others in our democratic, equal-rights society. Unfortunately, there is a certain class of people who, whenever anyone invokes any part of the debate over sexual orientation - such as civil rights - immediately dive into thinking and speaking about sex acts. This reveals much more about the speaker than it does about anyone who is homosexual. (Sorry to hijack the female priesthood discussion with this.)
The amount of time it would take for the General Church to boast millions of members is irrelevant here. In this case, I'm merely making the point that even if the General Church were to attract that many members by next month, it's still not a good enough reason to delay or deny the enactment of equal status among church members.
I admit, aspects of your comment made me angry. But more than I'm angry, I'm sad. You've shown your true colors, and you are not alone in the General Church by a long shot. You say you're not opposed to female priests, but from what you say, I infer that you truly are opposed. You see the movement to ordain women as a "waste" of time and resources, nothing but a "left-wing agenda", and a dilution of the church's mission. You're ostensibly "all for" ordaining women not because it's right, but because it might satisfy a few egos on the way to "more important priorities".
Your disdainful, hypocritical tone brings home to me the grief that generations of women (and their supporters) in the General Church have felt. Your confusing, painful words about sexuality and about women's role in the church represent the heart of what delays or prevents the necessary evolution of a humane society at large, in any context large or small. I apologize if what I say is needlessly personal. But sometimes it's necessary to speak up and call things what they are. Many others simply recede into themselves and away from the church. I recently learned that only 17% of Academy graduates actually join the church. Perhaps a more inclusive attitude toward women would not undermine the church, as you fear, but strengthen it. Perhaps, instead of fleeing the church in droves, more young people would finish their education with a sense that the General Church is where they want to be.
Kesley,
You just confirmed my fear about the "new culture" vs. "old culture" idea.
Some traditional churches oppose the ordination of women based on passages from the Epistles which, while interesting, aren't core scripture for the New Church. There is nothing in the Gospels or in Revelation that would preclude the ordination of women, or in the Heavenly Doctrines.
While I support the ordination of women, I think that might take us down a slippery slope to where the Swedenborgian Church of North America (the other New Church) is. The "new culture" agenda seems to come packaged with other items such "gay marriage". That is what worries me.
Leif
In my analysis (which is, I will freely admit, not well researched), the Doctrines for the New Church are quite clear that marriage is between a male and a female and anything else is out of order. However, they seem to me to be much more open to interpretation on the ordination of women. On the flip side, they seem to be pretty clear that women shouldn't be things like doctors and lawyers because they're just using the wisdom of the men around them (and curses! I cannot find that passage right now!).
The heart of the problem seems to be lack of a thorough analysis or consensus of what aspects of the Writings are merely descriptive and which are actually proscriptive. Does Swedenborg really think women can't write? Or had he just never encountered one who could? Did God actually say that women cannot write? What about women being scientists, lawyers or ministers?
Disclaimer: I have no interest in being a minister whatsoever. I do not support women being completely barred from all forms of paid ministry by the General Church, but I also don't know how we can a) identify qualified female applicants (as presumably the criteria would differ from males) or b) if ALL ministry roles are appropriate for women and c) how we could transition to ordaining women in the near future without splitting an already small church. Maybe some of these will be addressed as this series unfolds...
Leif, what exactly is your fear about new culture vs. old culture? My fear is that our church will die out along with the old culture, rather than adapting to the new one. At some point we need to realize that the new culture is the majority. We are the people that this church has to appeal to if it wants to survive. I don't see this as a dangerous view because I don't think we are talking about changing actual doctrine for the sake of the masses. The only real doctrine is the written word itself, and no one here is suggesting we abandon that. The rest, the 'official' interpretation, is just cultural dogma. I'm suggesting we reject our outdated dogma before the church becomes a relic of the 18th century. I'm pointing out that there is a very big issue when a huge number of people who read the books see an entirely different message from what the Church is saying. This is not a sustainable model.
The fear of dividing a small community doesn't make sense when you realize that it's already divided. Perhaps there is the illusion of cohesion simply because those who are alienated by the church tend to leave, rather than sticking around to argue. But when you talk about a divided community, those young adults who are driven out before they ever confirm themselves have to be counted. Even so, the argument within the community is clearly alive and well. We are already divided. Continuing to support outdated dogma is the real danger to our cohesion, because an ever increasing majority of faithful New Church people are rejecting the General Church based on their outdated policies.
Finally, I don't believe in slippery slope. It's a logical fallacy. People don't gain momentum in decision making, we approach each new idea on it's own. Women in the ministry and gay marriage are two separate theological debates. A decision in one area has no effect whatsoever on a decision in the other.
To all of those who say that allowing more liberal stances will help church membership, the Swedenborgian Church of North America (http://www.swedenborg.org/Home.aspx) allows all of the things you want.Yet, it is one third the size of the General Church and is decreasing in size! Talk of slippery slopes into oblivion!
We already have a left wing of the New Church (http://www.swedenborg.org/Home.aspx) and a right wing (http://www.newchurch.org/http://www.newchurch.org/). Why do we want two left wings instead one?
(I am not arguing against women's ordination here.)
Leif
Leif, I don't know how to communicate to you that the words you use can only be taken as dismissive and condescending, which others have pointed out as well. Could you read this message, which is just exactly yours with the sentiments reversed, and not take away from it that my primary aim was to offend you?
"Should a tiny church such as ours waste time and resources over some historically preserved right-wing agenda, and dilute the need of the hour to spread the message? Mind you - I am all for preventing the ordination of the women as long as satisfying a few non-actualized infantile egos (cf. Jung/Freud) does not override other, more important priorities."
I don't bring this up to shame you, but to point out what I think is a much more significant cultural divide than any kind of political inclination people might have. I just don't see how there could be any more important priority in the church right now than for its members to act lovingly to each other. If a church cannot implant even that basic cultural understanding into its members, I don't know that there's much of a worthwhile message to spread. Religion and doctrine don't exist for their own sake, and if they do, I eagerly await their abandonment to the annals of history. Likewise, Jesus was not a traditionalist, and he never advocated for maintaining the status quo. His work was to help us understand how to get over ourselves so that we could extend our compassion to as many other people as our hearts could bear, while yearning for ever deeper connection to that loving source that gave us life. I don't see how preventing women from following their honestly-felt call in any way serves that most fundamental goal.
Annika -- I'm curious, why should the criteria be different for male priests and female priests? Even if there are some functions of the priesthood that are more intellectually oriented, there are also functions that are much more volitional. All people meet the basic criteria (a will and an intellect). But everyone has different talents. Each person will approach the job in his or her own way. If they have the right skill set, how does gender factor into it?
Leif, the fate of the Swedenborgian Church of North America (which I know almost nothing about) really can't be used to illustrate what always happens to Swedenborgians-gone-liberal. It also isn't correct to lump all left-wingers together and all right-wingers together, and to assume that the Swedenborgian Church of NA serves one group and the General Church serves the other. These are generalizations and oversimplifications to the point that they lose their relevance to the discussion.
I consider myself a liberal General Church person. If all reformers gave up on or were driven away from their home communities, what kind of world would this be? Is polarization and division preferable to growth and compromise? If I refused to spend time with anyone who challenged or pushed me to see things in a different way, I would be a much more foolish person. I would have less real conviction in my beliefs, but I would cling to them with greater arrogance.
Dylan,
I want the General Church to ordain women. But I want this change to come about in an orderly manner and not as a liberal coup d'etat, which will lead to a series of disorderly and unscriptural policies such as many in this discussion want introduced (such as marrying men with men and women with women). Regarding women's ordination, I do not think that urgently satisfying the self-actualization needs of a few is more important than the church's mission to teach and spread the word, and to shepherd those who take refuge under its wings.
What are we arguing about? Let's work together to bring this about, and let's know our limits as imposed by the revealed will of the Lord. Let us not turn a good reform into a series of ugly disfigurements of the church we all love.
Leif
I would like to express my surprise. With all the comments having been made by intelligent, articulate people strongly in favor of ordaining women as priests, not a single reason, argument or position has been advanced which is drawn from or based upon the Writings and makes a credible statement in favor of not excluding women from the priesthood.
I wonder, too, about the heavy reliance on emotive arguments coupled with secular reasonings. What is wrong with appealing to the texts of your church? Are they not known? Or is it felt that these texts somehow are irrelevant to the stance that has been taken?
Swedenborg made it quite clear that anything can be confirmed from the Word. And it can be confidently stated that he meant falsities as well as truth. This can be confidently stated for the simple reason that he explicitly said so. It necessarily follows, then, that--regardless of whether it be true or false--it can be confirmed from the Word that it is not improper for women to be ordained as priests.
I am not suggesting that the position that it is not improper to ordain women as priests is false. What I am suggesting is that if it is believed to be true, and if Swedenborg is right that anything can be confirmed from the Word, then holders of this position can find confirmation of it in the Word.
I also suggest that a position supported by the Word carries considerably more weight and is far more enduring than emotive arguments coupled with secular reasonings, no matter how well articulated and/or vehemently expressed the latter may be.
AC 1937, Actually the opposite is true. The ball is in the other court. Those who oppose women's ordination need to find a scriptural basis for the exclusion. As I said, the proof text for excluding women from the priesthood are from the Pauline and pseudo-Pauline epistles which Swedenborgians do not regard as scripture scripture.
No one can read all of Swedenborg. All that we can do is search the massive corpus. I haven't seen a single proof text from the Swedenborgian corpus (the Heavenly Doctrines) that could be cogently used to bar women from the priesthood.
My only concern is the logistics of this reform, and the fact that those who vehemently want this justified reform also want a few other unjustified reforms. I am not making this up - those who have responded on this panel have indicated what their basket of must-haves is. It does not stop with the ordination of women.
Leif