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Contortion Time: A woman's fine in the Oval Office, but these guys draw the line at the pulpit
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Published: September 7, 2008
If the stakes weren't so serious, this would be pretty funny -- I mean the contortions some socially conservative Republicans have been going through as they embrace Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate.
It was obvious last week in St. Paul, Minn., that the hard-right wing of the GOP was ecstatic. Palin is staunchly against abortion, for abstinence-only sex education, not convinced about global warming, in favor of teaching intelligent design in biology classes, a gun-totin' member of the NRA -- and she's a good-looking woman ("she's hot" is the offensive term I've heard bandied about). They're so thrilled that she's right on so many of their most important issues that they're not just overlooking anything that might be considered a problem; they're enthusiastically spinning every possible negative into a plus.
At the same time that they were blasting "Democrats" and "the media" for any comment on the pregnancy of Palin's unmarried 17-year-old daughter, for example, they seemed to be reveling in it. Of course, no one should be singling out this child, who didn't ask to be thrust into the national spotlight. And it is admirable that the girl wants to take responsibility for her baby, and that the Palin family is being supportive. But does it strike anyone else as unseemly that so many in St. Paul seemed to be so overjoyed about the fact that the girl didn't have an abortion that they forgot that being 17, unmarried and pregnant is hardly a condition to be celebrated? Isn't it wrong to hold up a couple of kids who didn't abstain as a campaign rallying point?
Among all the conservative contortions at the convention, however, Richard Land, a prominent leader of the Southern Baptist Convention, should have earned the title of Pretzel King for his twists and turns. Land, the longtime president of the SBC's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, in an online interview with Sarah Pulliam for Christianity Today, said that he is "ecstatic" about McCain's choosing Palin, and that the women in his office "were absolutely giddy."
Then, without waiting for a question, he went on to say that his wholehearted support for Sarah Palin to become vice president -- and, quite possibly, the most important national leader in the Free World-- does not mean that he's rethought his position on whether a woman can be the leader of a church.
That's right. Land apparently doesn't see any inconsistency in thinking that it's fine for a woman to lead the nation but that it's wrong for a woman to lead a Baptist congregation, or her own home, for that matter.
I'm one of the many Baptists who felt out of place when doctrinaire conservatives began taking over the denomination during the 1980s. The church where I am a member is one that has moved away from the national and state Baptist conventions and -- gasp! --a woman was our interim pastor a couple of years ago.
Time was, Southern Baptists might squabble amongst ourselves, but we respected the right of individuals and individual churches to have different opinions on a variety of issues. That was one of the great things about being a Baptist: The only top-down orders came from On High, not from some church hierarchy.
That changed when the conservatives took control and decided to shape everybody up. In 2000, the Southern Baptist Convention voted to amend its Baptist Faith and Message to include, among other things, a couple of key points about women. One was that "While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture."
The other was that "A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church willingly submits to the headship of Christ. She, being in the image of God as is her husband and thus equal to him, has the God-given responsibility to respect her husband and to serve as his helper in managing the household and nurturing the next generation."
That still stands, and thus we have Richard Land twisting and turning himself to explain why there's no hypocrisy or contradiction when he says that it's fine for a woman to run the country but "women are not to be in charge of a marriage and women are not to be in charge of a church."
Land told Pulliam that a "secular reporter" had asked him whether he believes that Todd Palin, as the head of the Palin household, would be telling his wife what to do if she were vice president. That question, he said, is "asinine,' and then paraphrased former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher saying that her husband ran the home and she ran the country.
Don't get me wrong. I'd never argue that a woman can't be vice president, or president, simply because she's a woman.
But isn't it outrageous to glibly argue that it's OK for a woman to be the president of the United States but not OK for her to be the pastor of a church? A woman can lead us all into World War III if she sees fit, but she can't lead us in worship? She can tell the nation's generals and admirals what to do, but she must "submit graciously" to her husband?
Come on, guys. You can twist only so far before you break. You can't have it both ways.
If you're glad Sarah Palin is running for vice president, try letting women into the pulpit. You might find you like that, too.
■ Linda Brinson is the Journal's editorial-page editor. She can be reached at lbrinson@wsjournal.com.
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