While I was quietly minding my own business, controversy about Christian gender roles and relationships began heating up and, if the social medias are any indication, has reached a rapid boil. I am old enough to remember when the term "complementarian" was created in order to put a warm and gentle face on what was widely considered an outdated and sexist (even if Biblical) understanding of the husband-wife relationship. Now it appears "complementarian" has become a synonym for "male chauvinist pig-dog" and is indistinguishable from the irredeemable "patriarch."(By the way, this is why I never label myself with terms created by evangelicalism or the broader culture. Their meanings tend to drift without warning while the phrase "Westminster Standards" remains entirely stable, and "presbyterian" mostly so.)
As I've tried to get up to speed on why so many pairs of undies are bunching up, I've been surprised to see that discussions are centered around the same old Biblical texts such as Genesis 3:16, 1 Timothy 2 -3 and Ephesians 5. Some might think me cocky, but I honestly believe there's not much more to be discovered in these texts: they say what they say and have been pretty well exegeted; while some misogynist wingnuts may apply them improperly, the spiritually and mentally stable know how to answer those misapplications.
To be clear, I'm surprised not because a goodly number of Christian folk are generally dissatisfied with common understandings and applications of Biblical principles of gender and role relationships. With them, I feel very strongly that something is missing. What surprises me is that so many are asking the same old questions and expecting different answers.
To be even more clear, I don't have answers. But I do have questions, questions which I am shocked to find that very few are asking but which are manifestly apparent from even the most cursory reading of 1 Corinthians 11.
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