Church Chronicles: Aunty Feminist Goes to Church Review

It is understandable now that we are in women’s history month to talk about a woke subject–feminism. 

It was scary and somewhat brave to broach this topic, as it is a sensitive one that is more often than not spoken about among church ladies. It’s not for a lack of them not being aware of these things, but it’s more of being selectively mute about it in church. Yeah, the Church is not a circus where everyone speaks of whatever comes to their minds and makes it a rowdy place. But then, these issues are being discussed everywhere else.  

And it’s such an issue that keeps some female believers, especially those who are new believers or simply don’t know where to stand, unsettled and worried that they might be doing something wrong by believing in such ‘worldly’ ideas.

Then, the story ends with a short note from the writer that says ‘to be or not be in a woke/rapidly changing world’ which is a question to which one of our esteemed readers gave a response.

This whole stuff could be soo confusing and frustrating sometimes. This is why a close relationship with God is recommended. This will ensure you’re so sure of whatever you are doing. Where God tells you what to do, what, how to act, how not to. Having a backing in God sure boosts one’s confidence.

Oloruntoniloba Rosemary Kayode

I took no stand in this story but only attempted to showcase each side–the side that gave in to the existing tradition without questioning it (probably had no reason to question it and that’s fine) and the woke side. When a woman seems to be ambitious and thrives to get into places that are dominated by men, she deviates from the traditional no-question side to the woke. 

If this were a game, the first round would be Aunty’s biology vs her ambition. The bell will ring at the start of the game and fists will start getting thrown till one of the two succumbs to the other. The next round would involve equity vs equality. Ladies are no longer fighting for equality. It’s now for equity. And next comes the round where the test of people’s understanding of feminism comes into play. It’s going to be feminism vs womanism/motherism/all other types of feminism.

The Bible is a two-edged sword and when it comes to controversial issues, humans will most times just side with the edge that they agree with instead of trying to understand both edges. 

“Let your women keep silence in the churches…And if they will learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home,”

I Corinth 14:34-35

This is what some Christians quote when they show their displeasure at women doing things that were thought to be for men–Pastoring/Church leadership in this case, as most argumentative cases concerning this Bible verse go.

I’m not going to lie, that Bible verse still gets me fired up negatively every time I see it. Especially if you read 1 Timothy 2:12 too. This review is not to get anyone riled up unnecessarily, in fact, the intention is the opposite. 

This is to acknowledge that such a thing as a patriarchal society exists and that some Christian women will keep getting caught up in the web of ‘to be’ or ‘to not be’ when they are meant to make decisions that involve the idea of feminism no matter how much they run away from it. 

The stay-home-mums among them believed that they were fulfilling the God-given roles of a woman. Unlike those who furthered their education like Aunty did, to the detriment of getting married. Her mates were raising godly kids to the Glory of God.

Aunty feminist goes to church

I know so little about feminism and I’m still very confused about the idea. But a friend recently told me that the feelings of unfairness that I had weren’t feminist, but womanism, or maybe motherism, or some other type of feminism. Till now, I’ve not had the time to see for myself what womanism meant. 

But her explanation centered on the fact that feminism isn’t what it is painted to be. And that the general idea involves other things that a Christian should never be in support of. For example, lesbianism. 

The truth is that most people who support the idea do not know much about it. To them, it’s just them showing their support for an idea that seems good. Just like Adam and Eve ate the fruit in the garden because it was a delight to the eyes.

I’ve seen several instances where people came together just because an idea seemed good–not because they truly understood the entirety of the idea. And when they started becoming too emotional about it, things went wrong. 

By emotional, I mean they start to do things like throwing the little home training they had to the winds because their emotions took over. And when you get emotionally invested in something that you should approach logically, it clouds your judgement and you make decisions that end up as gross mistakes. And the whole idea itself would have a legal ground to be thrown into the nearest trash bin by people who were against it in the first place.

Does that make feminism bad? Some women had to fight to allow women to vote politicians into power. And while it might or not be feminism, it sounds like it.

If anything about this subject is to be seen from the Bible, throughout the Bible, God showed support for women–something that the previous Bible verse might be screaming the opposite of. Jesus for example, even while he had no female of the 12 disciples ( For reasons people have various theories of), refused to judge the woman who got caught in the act of adultery. He instead turned the tables by asking a question that had them on their heels. 

It was funny because what kind of religious society only sought to punish one out of two people for a sin that took two people to commit, according to the law of Moses?

If anything, Jesus pushed the norms in his years of ministry on earth, which included treating women as important.