Educating Women

It is finals week at Cedarville and as I watch students scurry through the cold from one frantic exam to the next, I am reminded how fortunate we all are to be at a place that we are able to learn and expand our minds, especially those of the female gender. Today I read the amazing statistic that one in four countries around the world do not provide formal education for their girl children (read more about this at Just Tryin'). It was not until late in life that I felt the pull toward higher education, well, at least it was not in my twenties! Education has opened so many doors for me. I am a different person today than I was before I went back to college. Yet I think many Christian females still feel that education is a man's world. Most of our Christian professors are male, most of our learning in higher education comes from males, and few aspire to degrees beyond the bachelor's degree. There is no doubt about the glass ceiling that exists for women in higher education. It permeates the board room, the deans and VP positions, and even the paychecks. The reality for women in higher education is that they will work twice as hard as a man to climb the ladder from the classroom to positions of power, especially in the Christian college environment. Just being a woman in the classroom in a Christian environment is an anomaly. So, as we take a break from education over the next weeks, I will also take a deep breath as I step down from the ledge of my gendered walk here and fortify myself for a new start in the new year. There will be little wiggle room on the ledge - there never has been for women. Still, I find it an exhilarating and provocative profession!

Evangelicals & Divorce

This month's issue of Christianinty Today has an interesting article on divorce. Here is an excerpt:

If nothing else, it may suggest a reason why the divorce rate is so high among evangelicals—though, of course, that's merely speculative. Our current understandings of marriage inadvertently pit husband and wife against one another: as leader and assistant, or as two individuals protecting their prerogatives. The Ephesians metaphor moves to a climax, so to speak, of the two becoming one. I can't help but wonder if the divorce rate in the church might decrease if we would recognize the mystery of God fusing a husband and wife into "one flesh." It's not very disturbing for a leader to break up with his assistant, or for two equal individuals to decide to go their own ways. But it is utterly disconcerting to imagine a bloody rupture between a body and its head. That's why God hates divorce (Mal. 2:16), and that's why he commands every husband to cleave to his wife.

(http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/011/30.59.html)

It has puzzled me for a long time why our divorce rate matches that of the secular world. We spend so much time talking about abstinence, waiting for your "true love," and roles in marriage that you would think we would be more committed to the institution of marriage.

Recently my body has taken a real hit. I can relate to this article! I discovered I would do whatever was necessary to take care of the hurting spots! It is my opinion that more marriages would be improved if husbands treated their wives as they would their hurting bodies!

One thing I disagreed with in the article is that the term "Christian feminist" is used as a way of escaping submission. I don't hear any evangelicals advising women to NOT submit. What I do hear is a call for mutual submission. Somehow, calling for each of us to submit to one another has been translated into women refusing to submit!

Let me know what you think.