are christian wives respected?

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Such as...?

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Better be careful with those testable claims...

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To be fair, as long as his wife and himself agree on the point there is no real reason to "prove" it to others. If according to their beliefs women are more prone to temptation and therefore submit to the "leadership" of the husbands then so be it. While ok for them it doesn't have to be ok for everyone else, nor do they need to be "saved" from their oppresive husbands as they are content with their position. Women run the household, raise the children, the men provide for and protect the family, and the lot live according to the rules of Jesus. Not my cup of tea personally but I can't find fault in it.

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This is not inferiority, but simply a difference between men and women. It does not mean a woman is inferior to a man. We recognize that, in our case, it's not a woman's role to lead the family, nor is it a woman's role to lead a church.

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I can't wait to hear what the justification and evidence is for this claim!

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I doubt there will be any justification and evidence that can be presented that will make you happy, but there is none needed. This is a personal matter for them and other Christian families that is justified by their beliefs in the bible. And no matter how alien the rreasoning seems to you or myself it will make perfect sense to others. That is what matters. Much like a "leaderless" marraige might seem bizzare to a strict Catholic, as long as all parties invovled understand and agree to the situation there is no harm to us outsiders and try as we might, we will probably never really understand the "whys."Personally, my marraige is run by my wife, as I lack the energy or drive to argue over the little details, but that is just me. My best friend is the exact opposite, he and his bride-to-be argue all the time about the small things, neither one wanting to give in. To each his/her own.

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I'm sure you dislike this concept and you are free to do so. Just because you dislike our views does not mean that they are wrong.

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Just because you like your views does not mean they are right.

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Lots of people like discrimination on the basis of race as well as gender. How are they different, in your eyes?

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If his wife has no problem with the marraige then his view is right for him.That is the difference between this view of marraige and sex/race discrimination. People who are the subject of discrimination are not happy to be on the recieving end, from what we've read his wife not only accepts her place, but welcomes it. For them their thinking is not only fine, but "right." He's only been saying that for numerous posts, its a collaboritve deciscion he and his wife came to as to how the marraige would work, it wasnt him forcing his wife to marry him and then making her submit to his will, which is what you seem to think is secretly the case. I doubt his wife needs to be saved from him.

I was just thinking about the scriptures that deal with "wives submit to your husbands", and I noticed it does not say "husbands force your wives to submit to you.------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

For the most part, I agree with your analysis of my words. You are right about them not needing any evidence or justification about how they wish to run their individual lives.I do think that Satcomm needs to Biblically support his idea that women are not suited to be spiritual leaders, however. It would seem that this is a clear indication that his religion feels that women are inferior to men, spiritually.I disagree with your last comment:

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If his wife has no problem with the marraige then his view is right for him.

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That is the difference between this view of marraige and sex/race discrimination. People who are the subject of discrimination are not happy to be on the recieving end, from what we've read his wife not only accepts her place, but welcomes it.

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There are many accounts of ex-slaves and also people in the former Soviet Union after the collapse saying that they felt that their lives were worse after they got their freedom, because life was more of a struggle.I never said that there was nothing at all attractive about the kind of submissive, passive role that these Christians are advocating for the women. It is certainly easier in a lot of ways to not be ultimately responsible for certain important things in the marriage. I can see how it is a lot easier to allow yourself to be told what to do. I can also see how feeling "taken care of" all the time by your husband would be a plus for many women. Men would obviously get a lot of satisfaction out of leading the family bacause it is a feeling of power and responsibility.In general, though, I don't think that convincing women that leadership roles are not appropriate for them for the sole reason of their gender is a good thing to do. I mean, if a woman is a devout Christian and has been taught all of her life that the way she could serve God the best was to be submissive to her husband and to not aspire to lead a church, how comfortable do you think she is going to be in any leadership role outside her home and church life, especially if she has to lead any men?I imagine that it is often more difficult and more of a struggle to work things out between two partners in a leaderless, egalitarian marriage compared to one in which there is a leader and a follower. Similarly, it is a lot more difficult to decide what to do in a successful democracy than it is to decide what to do in a dictatorship.

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For them their thinking is not only fine, but "right." He's only been saying that for numerous posts, its a collaboritve deciscion he and his wife came to as to how the marraige would work, it wasnt him forcing his wife to marry him and then making her submit to his will, which is what you seem to think is secretly the case. I doubt his wife needs to be saved from him.

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I am not saying that she does.I am simply trying to understand the reasoning and internal logic, so to speak, of this arrangement.I want to understand the paradoxes that are told to me by all of these men repeatedly; "I am the leader, yet I submit. My wife is free to disagree with me, but I make the descisions. She can forbid me from doing something, but she does not lead me. I am the spiritual leader, yet my wife is just as capable of receiving God's message as I am."I also originally started talking about this in response to Tranquility Base's assertion that this "man as leader, woman as follower" marriage model was the best, most successful way to arrange a marriage.I cited divorce statistics which said that several Christian groups which promote this arrangement actually have higher than average divorce rates.[This message has been edited by schrafinator, 02-20-2003]

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I was just thinking about the scriptures that deal with "wives submit to your husbands", and I noticed it does not say "husbands force your wives to submit to you.

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I never said that anyone was forced to submit.I do think, however, when a girl is brought up her whole life being taught to submit, and that it was God's will that she do so, and that she would be considered a bad Christian wife if she didn't submit to the leadership of her husband, it doesn't often have to get to the point of "forcing".The girl is trained to want to submit long before she ever gets married.

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I do think that Satcomm needs to Biblically support his idea that women are not suited to be spiritual leaders, however. It would seem that this is a clear indication that his religion feels that women are inferior to men, spiritually.

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I am quite sure he does need to support his idea Biblically since its a biblical idea. Catholics and some Protestants definetly feel women are inferior to men spiritually I am sure, due to the lack of female Priests and worship leaders.

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I disagree with your last comment:

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If his wife has no problem with the marraige then his view is right for him.
That is the difference between this view of marraige and sex/race discrimination. People who are the subject of discrimination are not happy to be on the recieving end, from what we've read his wife not only accepts her place, but welcomes it.

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There are many accounts of ex-slaves and also people in the former Soviet Union after the collapse saying that they felt that their lives were worse after they got their freedom, because life was more of a struggle.

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I never said that there was nothing at all attractive about the kind of submissive, passive role that these Christians are advocating for the women. It is certainly easier in a lot of ways to not be ultimately responsible for certain important things in the marriage. I can see how it is a lot easier to allow yourself to be told what to do. I can also see how feeling "taken care of" all the time by your husband would be a plus for many women. Men would obviously get a lot of satisfaction out of leading the family bacause it is a feeling of power and responsibility.

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In general, though, I don't think that convincing women that leadership roles are not appropriate for them for the sole reason of their gender is a good thing to do. I mean, if a woman is a devout Christian and has been taught all of her life that the way she could serve God the best was to be submissive to her husband and to not aspire to lead a church, how comfortable do you think she is going to be in any leadership role outside her home and church life, especially if she has to lead any men?

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I imagine that it is often more difficult and more of a struggle to work things out between two partners in a leaderless, egalitarian marriage compared to one in which there is a leader and a follower. Similarly, it is a lot more difficult to decide what to do in a successful democracy than it is to decide what to do in a dictatorship.

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As a rule I would wholeheartidly agree with you. However there are a few differences between ex-slaves, people in the former Soviet Union, and Christian wives. The first and foremost is that christian wives have the freedom to explore other options if they wish, which according to the divorce rates is probably what they do. Unfortunatly I don't think there will ever be a rule you can go by, its just the way Satcomm and his wife are, and if they are happy there really is no reason to question it because its very doubtful we will get a satsifactory answer, since the answer won't lie in logic, but rather faith.

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For them their thinking is not only fine, but "right." He's only been saying that for numerous posts, its a collaboritve deciscion he and his wife came to as to how the marraige would work, it wasnt him forcing his wife to marry him and then making her submit to his will, which is what you seem to think is secretly the case. I doubt his wife needs to be saved from him.

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I am not saying that she does.

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I am simply trying to understand the reasoning and internal logic, so to speak, of this arrangement.

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I want to understand the paradoxes that are told to me by all of these men repeatedly; "I am the leader, yet I submit. My wife is free to disagree with me, but I make the descisions. She can forbid me from doing something, but she does not lead me. I am the spiritual leader, yet my wife is just as capable of receiving God's message as I am."

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I also originally started talking about this in response to Tranquility Base's assertion that this "man as leader, woman as follower" marriage model was the best, most successful way to arrange a marriage.

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I cited divorce statistics which said that several Christian groups which promote this arrangement actually have higher than average divorce rates.

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Therein lies the problem, there is no logic. Its faith. I can't explain why it works for them, nor why my marraige works for me. But as long as it does its all good. As a man the idea of my wife listening and obeying me sure would be a welcome change, however its the religious stuff that apparantly goes with that setup I can do with out, so instead I bow my head and obey my wife to save my sanity. I fear I am not alone, that is MY saving grace.

My wife only became a Christian a month before we got married. She was a very independent young woman, with absolutely no religious backround.------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

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Therein lies the problem, there is no logic. Its faith.

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The problem as I see it is not that their arrangement is faith-based and illogical.The problem seems to me to be that they want to have their cake and eat it too; they want it to be faith based and considered logical.Otherwise, they would not have tried so hard to explain things in a logical manner to me.

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My wife only became a Christian a month before we got married. She was a very independent young woman, with absolutely no religious backround.

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Quite surprising indeed.Tell me, would you say she had a strict upbringing?

Quite the opposite.------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

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The problem as I see it is not that their arrangement is faith-based and illogical.

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The problem seems to me to be that they want to have their cake and eat it too; they want it to be faith based and considered logical.

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Otherwise, they would not have tried so hard to explain things in a logical manner to me.

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All I can say is that for them it is logical, the fact that they believe it so deeply makes it impossible to not see it as logical. Not sharing the belief allows us to see the illogic for what it is, and that is why a reasonable answer(to you or me) will never be forthcoming, there never can be one unless we share their belief. It would be like going to some cannibal tribe and asking them why they eat their enemies, we know the reasons don't make sense but to them they do.

To me this is more of an honesty issue than a logical one.If they would just admit that they think that women should be submissive to them because they are the man and the men should lead the marriage and also have power that the women don't, instead of trying to make it appear as something else, I would accept that. I wouldn't respect it, but I would accept it.Instead it seems to me as though they are dressing up the same old male dominance as a "kinder, gentler dominance" in order to make it more palatable to themselves.This is where the crazy illogic comes in.Either that, or they actually have an egalitarian marriage and they only think they are the leaders because their wives let them think that.

Here I thought we were having a conversation and you just want to call me a liar.We follow God's guidelines for Christian marriages that is clearly outlined in the bible, out of obedience to God, NOT as an excuse to be controlling.Just because you don't understand it, doesn't it make it male dominance.------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

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Here I thought we were having a conversation and you just want to call me a liar.

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We follow God's guidelines for Christian marriages that is clearly outlined in the bible, out of obedience to God, NOT as an excuse to be controlling.

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Just because you don't understand it, doesn't it make it male dominance.

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Then explain to me how you can submit and lead at the same time.Explain to me how a leader does not have some kind of power that a follower does not.Explain to me how having unequal power in the marriage is not, at some level, dominance and submission, even if the participants agree to the arrangement.I am sorry that my conclusion makes you uncomfortable, but the fact that I have repeatedly asked these questions about the nature of the claims you and others have made without getting any answers leads me to the idea that you just choose to live without addressing the glaring logical contradictions.

I thought the reasoning behind the leadership role came about as a result of the excuses made by both Adam and Eve when they ate the fruit they were forbidden not to. Eve said, well the devil tricked me and made me do it, and Adam said, this woman you gave me tricked me and made me do it.Therefore, according to my perhaps limited understanding, God decided that instead of them making excuses and accusing each other He would make Adam ultimately responsible. So since Eve was so easily influenced by sin and Adam wanted to make excuses and blame his own mistake on Eve, that now Adam would bear the burden of seeing that he and his wife were not lead astray and would take the fall ultimately for both of them. And for Eves part in their demise she would have a difficult childbirth, or simply put it would hurt like the dickens but she would always by design from that day forward want a husband and children.It seems to me that Adam could have easily avoided this burden had he just owned up to eating the fruit and said oops my bad instead of blaming it on Eve. As for Eve, well obviously she liked red shiny things and she did after all get lead astray and then tried to trick Adamaccording to the bible. If you think about it, Adam got a pretty heavy burden, whereas Eve, although still accountable, has her husband to lean on.Whether or not anyone agrees with the arrangement is irrelevant, but it’s my simplistic understanding of why it is as it is in marriages that are faith based. It is your own individual choice whether or not you want to enter into a marriage that is equally yoked, however it is highly advisable according to the biblical teachings, and most certainly for these reasons alone.If you don’t see eye to eye going into it, then your relationship won’t work. The bible teachings are a design or how to book for a Judeo or Christian way of life, but its still your decision and free will to abide by it or not. Lots of people pick and choose what they want to live by and what they don’t in the bible, I think most people would agree you cant do that and call yourself a true Christian or Jew. I live by the Old Testament alone, (that and some critical thinking).Some would label me a Jew and not a Christian, either way I don’t really care, but I would never marry someone who thought differently, more specifically live by the New Testament, it would just never work. So it must be a choice to play the game by all the rules or not, as long as everyone knows exactly what they are and that they are in agreement whom is it hurting?I am not married but I liken it to the following example. I could work for a guy that sees me as his lesser partner, I choose not to, I work for someone who values my opinion, however I certainly can appreciate the fact that ultimately it will be him that takes the fall for bad decisions and not me! LolhehehehAlthough I am certain there will be some repercussion for my participation, but it is he that will take the brunt of the heat for it. However I would never intentionally entice him to make a bad decision because I respect him and we are on the same team, I depend on him and trust his ability to make sound decisions, otherwise I wouldn’t be here, and vice versa.Thus we see eye to eye and that is why he hired me and why I continue to choose to work for him, because we are equally yoked so to speak on how we view a working business relationship. There are certainly many people in my company that doesn’t see our standard mode of business the same way we do, who cares? It works for us.[This message has been edited by Harmonization, 03-07-2003]

I think that the post previous to this one is excellent, about Adam making excuses to God, blaming his sin on Eve. So God decided to make man accountable for the couple to avoid this happening again. I wish that Adam had not done so as the thought of being accountable to God for my marriage is at times a heavy thought.Schraf,I have thought alot about how two people can submit at the same time, I did not want to give you a shoddy answer or some Christian cliche answer that is why it has taken so long to respond on this point.If both man and wife submit their own individual will, for God's will for the couple.By putting aside our individual will, we are each submitting one to another, and ultimately to God.I know this is a short response but does this make sense to you or do I need to think on this some more?------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.[This message has been edited by funkmasterfreaky, 03-06-2003]