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• Wednesday, December 14, 2005 09:31 PM

  Right idea, wrong verse.

  There are lots of misogynistic passages in the Bible; Lynn Harris just happened to choose one that's rather weak. Get up before the crack of dawn and make breakfast for the whole family? Hell, I'd like to see a teenager take on that task. You want an example of a truly alarming passage? Try 1 Timothy 2:12-15: "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety."

  So, let's see here. St. Paul, the most influential of the early Christian leaders, thinks that women should shut their traps in church and not ask questions or become religious authorities, but let the men teach them. Why? Because Eve was taken in by the serpent first (never mind that Adam believed her, the loser). But never fear--woman's more sinful than man, but if she breeds enough, she too can be redeemed. Lovely.

  And as usual, the defenders of the faith come out in full force to make the obligatory "Christianity is actually about peace and love and social justice!" spiel. Call me crazy, but I don't think the intended readership of these Christian teen magazines are budding liberation theologists.

  —Marianna Trench Read Marianna Trench's other letters
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