The Worst of ‘Christianity’ in a Single Tweet

 

This morning I was scrolling through my Twitter feed when I was stopped dead in my tracks by a tweet from a prominent Christian website.

It made me choke on my coffee.

Desiring God is the brainchild of renowned conservative, evangelical preacher John Piper. It’s a website that publishes articles with the stated aim of “helping people everywhere embrace a profound truth that changes everything about life and eternity.”

But the offending Tweet that I read from ‘Desiring God’ was neither profound — except in its wrongness — or true, or life-changing for that matter. In fact, I found the post downright infuriating. Before I explain why I’ll let you have a read of the offending Tweet for yourself:

Out of all the awful Tweets, this is up there. But, what is worse is that this tweet is actually a pull quote from an article entitled, “How Satan Undoes a Mom: Spiritual War in Motherhood.”

If you want to read the whole article, here’s the link. Have a barf bag handy while you read. For those who lack the stomach to read this tripe, let me summarize it for you.

Basically, the whole article explains how the home is one of Satan’s key targets. So women need to defend their turf from the forces of evil that seek to assail it… while the men are all at work providing for the family… presumably. It describes the different tactics that the Evil One uses to tempt women to sin because women are much more susceptible to that kind of thing. Nothing much has changed since the Garden of Eden, apparently. It urges women to spend less time on the Internet — because it’s crawling with all kinds of free-thinking women — and spend more time with their head in the Bible, in between child-rearing and domestic duties, while they sit faithfully under their husband’s headship.

Okay, I may have overstated it just a bit — but not all that much! You’re probably picking up my vibe. I’m not impressed. In fact, I’m angry.

Why?

Well, there is so much wrong with this that I don’t even know where to begin. In just a few short lines of text, this Tweet unwittingly manages to encapsulate much of what is wrong with Evangelical Christianity, both generally and especially as it relates to its treatment of women. Let me explain exactly what I mean.

It supposes a woman’s place is in the home

Perhaps the most disturbing thing about this post is not the content itself — although that definitely troubles me. Rather, it’s the fact that this Tweet and the article it links to were written by a woman.

Surprised?

You might have been forgiven for believing that it was a man who penned this article that perpetuates an outdated system where the power and authority in the church and in the home are skewed disproportionately in favor of men. purposes.

But no, it wasn’t written by a man.

The actual author is a woman named Tilly Dillehay, who describes herself as a pastor’s wife and a homeschooling mom (because, of course, she has no identity apart from who she is in relation to her husband and children). Tilly Dillehay blogs with her husband on their website and is even co-host of the podcast, where she and her husband talk about how to run a ‘Biblical’ household — one where the kids are safely insulated from the horrors of the real world with its nasty liberal agenda, and the wife is a stay-at-home mom, just as God intended her to be.

Tilly writes, “Mothers are stewards of the home, superintendents of the precious time called childhood, where Satan hopes to do his worst work.”

It makes motherhood the pinnacle of womanhood

I can think of another way that ‘Satan’ undoes women, and the chief deliverer of his message is often the church itself. It’s the lie that being a wife, and a mother is the pinnacle of womanhood, and all else is superfluous.

It’s a view that is preached both explicitly and implicitly in church. It is bad news for any woman who is non-heterosexual, has career aspirations, leadership aspirations, can’t or doesn’t want to have children, or simply has the desire to stay single for whatever reason.

In my last church, my wife recalls having a conversation with another lady who, upon discovering that my wife wasn’t a stay-at-home mom — that she actually had a job (Gasp!) — walked off in disgust.

If a woman wants to be a stay-at-home mom, she desires an admirable thing. But the woman who does not is no less admirable. My wife is so much more than a steward of the home. And it’s offensive to make womanhood so limiting and then call it ‘Biblical.’

Photo by Anthony Tran on Unsplash

It blames women for the fall

Tilley says in her article, “Women, from the very beginning, have been a special target for a certain pattern of deceit.”

Yes, Satan especially likes to target women because, hey… they are the weaker sex, right… apparently. I mean, he didn’t target Eve for no reason, did he?

Of course, the fact that Adam stood there, like some passive, dumbstruck mute, failing to do anything whatsoever to prevent the supposed fall of humankind is merely incidental. Adam blamed Eve. Men have been blaming women ever since.

Take the purity culture movement, for example, where men in the church shamed women’s bodies by making out that women are the cause of their sexual temptation and any occasion where they fell into sexual sin.

It presumes women have nothing of value to say

“Some of Satan’s best work is accomplished by women talking to women, in the floating world of disembodied souls on the Internet,” according to Dillehay.

Of course, there is a double standard at play here that gives evidence to an antiquated and misogynistic spirit. Satan’s best work is accomplished by a woman talking — and presumably listening — to another woman, but clearly, the same doesn’t apply to men. Men are perfectly safe to talk to. Satan has never used a man to lead a woman astray. The danger is obviously in women being led by other women. After all, no toxic posts or comments are being created by men on the Internet, are there?

Ridiculous!

But of course, in many evangelical churches, the pulpit is the domain of men, as if being male automatically makes one more qualified to teach. Yes, it’s dangerous — sinful even — to let women teach anyone… apparently! Patriarchal churches use esoteric biblical texts removed from their cultural context and apply them verbatim to the modern-day to justify this kind of thing. “I do not permit a woman to teach or exercise authority” (1 Timothy 2:12) is a favorite of the gatekeepers of the misogynist boy’s club that is patriarchal church leadership.

It reinforces the power differential in the church

Dillehay takes us back to the Garden of Eden when she asserts that Satan still uses the same question against women that caused Eve to stumble: “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit? Did God really say . . . ?”

She then manages to transition to: “Did God really say, ‘Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord’ (Ephesians 5:22)?”

Well, no.

It was the apostle Paul who said that.

And men latched onto it and abused it to assert and maintain power and control. In fact, within fundamentalism, anything and anyone that encourages women to step out of the man-made boundaries of patriarchy is viewed as “Satan’s work.” In reality, Satan just sits back and watches as fundamentalism fails God’s daughters over and over again.

I remember the very last time I attended a board meeting at my conservative, evangelical church. The group — all men, of course — had gathered, and a decision needed to be made that required some legal advice.
“What a pity we don’t have any lawyers who come to our church that we can refer to for this matter,” Said one of the board members.

“My wife is a lawyer,” I spoke up.

“True,” replied the board member, “What a shame she is the wrong gender.”

And the rest of the men chuckled knowingly.

God does not limit women the way the church does.

We men overlook the fact that in the Bible, women direct armies, defeat prominent enemies, save communities from genocide, give birth to God, fund Jesus’ ministry, sit at his feet as disciples, and are the first witnesses and preachers of the resurrection. They are church founders and leaders, prophets and apostles. Women are co-laborers with God and men and image-bearers of God who are meant to participate in God’s work in the church and the world.

And we conveniently forget that Jesus’s inner circle consisted of many women — a ground-breaking and counter-cultural advancement in its day. Moreover, the early church was full of faithful and influential female leaders — women like Phoebe, Chloe, Junia, Lydia, Eudia, Syntyche, Susanna, and Priscilla. Ever heard a sermon on any of these women?

Me neither.

And you won’t, in male lead churches.

It isolates women

I was part of the church for three and a half decades. It’s a sad indictment on the church that I never felt particularly emotionally safe sharing too personally in that space. You would always wonder a) if people would judge you and b) if your sharing would go further than the person to whom you were divulging your personal struggles.

So, I wouldn’t blame any woman who turned to the world beyond the walls of her church for support, encouragement, and advice. Dare I say it, she might even find that support on the Internet.

But, this article instructs women to retreat back into their spiritual enclaves where they can be ‘protected’ from new and supposedly dangerous ideas found on the Internet, and live perpetually in the lonely echo chamber that is evangelical Christianity.

Photo by Vitolda Klein on Unsplash

It labels people as inherently wicked

Tilly Dillehay states in no uncertain terms, “Our children, like us, are conceived in iniquity and born in sin. The enemy of our children’s hearts is already here; it’s already inside the camp.”

Yes, the evangelical version of Christianity teaches children that they are intrinsically evil. They did nothing wrong, but just by being born and being alive, they are evil.

Has anyone ever considered that this is a horrible thing to teach children, not only because it is categorically false, but also because it is precisely the wrong message children should be taught, which is that they are intrinsically wonderful, noble, and lovable and that they have boundless potential for goodness inside them?

Aren’t we made in the image of God? What was it that God said when he completed his creation? He said it was good. I don’t buy into the idea that people are evil before they are born. It’s a ridiculous notion that evangelicals cling to and support through some fairly creative Biblical interpretation of verses like Psalm 5:15, which says:
“Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.”

Now you might think that’s pretty clear. But this is a Psalm of David. In other words, it’s poetry. Is poetry meant to be taken literally? Would you take a poem and build a doctrine out of it? I wouldn’t have thought so.

It perpetuates a culture of fear

Let’s talk about Satan for a moment.

Tilly Dillehay says in her article, Satan is “waging war on women.” (By ‘women,’ she means women who are married with children, by the way. The rest of the women are of no concern to Satan… apparently).

As if women didn’t have enough on their plate without being convinced that they are in some kind of cosmic battle where is there is a demon under every rock. But unfortunately, demonizing the secular is a favorite pastime of many within the church.

The world is dangerous. Public schools are dangerous. The Internet is dangerous! Talking to other women is even dangerous. You will be led astray!

Evangelical Christianity teaches us that there exists a powerful, evil Devil. A most dangerous demon. Beware! This fills us with needless fear and dread and teaches us that the world is a dangerous place, with a malevolent demon lurking in the wait.

If Satan does, in fact, exist, I’ll bet the one thing that annoys him more than anything is people who live as if he doesn’t exist — enjoying the beauty and wonder and mystery of the world without fear.

So, I think I’ll live as if he doesn’t exist.

It amounts to performance-based religion

At its very heart, the overwhelming message of Tilly Dillehay’s post to women amounts to nothing more than, “Just sin less, and stop making excuses!”

So much of evangelical Christianity is nothing more than “sin management” dressed up as something life-giving and wonderful. It’s not wonderful. It’s burdensome, exhausting, and guilt-producing. If you fail, then God is angry with you and Satan has defeated you!

The constant striving to do the right thing, believe the right things, say the right things, all day, every day — it wears a person out. On the other hand, I have heard that radical self-acceptance is much more life-changing than constantly beating up oneself for one’s sins.

Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash

It fails to see its own hypocrisy.

“One of Satan’s favorite ways to seed his destruction in our day is through social media and podcasts. The Internet is a new way that women, even those working at home, can regularly access a steady stream of advice, solicited and unsolicited.”

Dillehay warns her readers of the dangers of listening to podcasts and reading blog posts (presumably like this one).

In so doing, she fails to see her own hypocrisy. “The Internet is one of Satan’s favorite ways of leading you astray,” says the blogger, who hosts a podcast with her husband. Presumably she means, content other than her own. Her stuff is safe — completely untarnished by the forces of evil that lurk in the dark corners of the web.

You can’t help but wonder if this is just a desperate ploy to stop women from getting online and discovering that it’s not okay for the church to keep women (and men) isolated and controlled.

…

You’re not doing Christianity any favors

As a man, I find the idea that God would somehow ascribe the same intrinsic value to both genders but then establish and ordain a system where one gender has an apparent ontological need to be led, decided for, directed by, and subject to the other, quite appalling to be honest. Only men would be capable of creating such a system — a power and control ideology that amounts to nothing more than sexism.

What is worse, I feel that ‘Desiring God’ has built an entire brand based on these warped ideas of ‘Biblical’ gender roles.

If I feel this way as a man, I can’t imagine why any woman would want to be part of this system?

As for Tilly Dillehay — I feel for her.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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