Anonymous

Being a christian who doesn’t believe in the “women were put on earth to be submissive and quiet to their husbands” idea, and who is surrounded by people who do believe in it, I’ve heard a variety of sad things from both men and women in the church about women.

– One preacher said that Eve was the one destined to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil instead of Adam because “women are easier to deceive than men”.

– Another preacher preached an hour long sermon about women’s needing to dress more appropriately and said “None of you men in here can deny that when a woman walks into the church in a short skirt, you don’t gawk at her.”

– Yet another preacher made the statement during a sermon that boys should go to college when they finish high school but girls should stay with their father until they marry because girls shouldn’t be out in the world to be tempted.

– A preacher’s wife was praised by many women on Facebook after she made a post about how she was going to stop paying attention to politics and trust in her husband to guide them towards the correct candidate to elect for president.

– Another girl I know wrote a blog post about embracing the differences between men and women instead of shunning them. Okay, good for you. But then some of her differences to embrace was that she was emotional and felt deeply and he was good at keeping his emotions in check and being unwaveringly strong. Why should we embrace men being emotionless???

– I have heard the phrase a million different times that the husband is liken to God and the wife is liken to the church. Like, what? No??? My husband is not a god. I have heard so many sermons preached about how men should not compare themselves to God or act as gods, but then they turn right around and use this analogy for marriage?

– I read an article on how to be a submissive wife. Some of the ways included: Encouraging your husband to pursue his dreams, not rubbing it in his face when he was wrong about something, never treating him as an inferior or insulting him, dressing sexy to have sex with him and even sometimes initiating the sex. I feel so sorry for this woman because she literally thinks this is her role in marriage as a woman, but she doesn’t seem to realize that this is the role any person, male or female, should have in a marriage. If your husband thinks encouragement, basic human kindness, and wanting to have sex with him is your duty and he doesn’t owe you the same . . . there is a problem. What is his duty then? To protect you? Tell you who to vote for for president? Keep you from going to college so you don’t get tempted?

I love my church, I love my God . . . but sometimes the people really bother me.