In “Four Decades Later: Credentialed Clergywomen in the Evangelical Covenant Church,” sociologist Lenore Knight Johnson conducted scores of interviews with ordained Covenant women and found that statistically few women serve in senior or solo pastor roles. For him and millions of other American evangelicals, the Bible is clear: women were created to complement men in ministry, family, and public life.Ī little closer to home, Covenant women clergy have been waiting for more than 40 years for the church to deliver on its promise not only to ordain women to pastoral ministry but to integrate them fully into pastoral leadership. “When you literally overturn the teaching of Scripture to empower people who want power, you have given up biblical authority,” MacArthur said.
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MacArthur continued: “Just because you have the skill to sell jewelry on the TV sales channel, doesn’t mean you should be preaching.” Later during the same conference panel, he asserted that the church has been “caving” to women preachers and feminists whose only goal is power, not equality. During his Truth Matters conference several months later, author and evangelical pastor John MacArthur was asked to respond with a phrase to the name “Beth Moore.” His quip, “Go home!” was greeted with guffaws and applause from a largely white, male audience of Southern Baptists committed to the denomination’s official complementarian theology that excludes women from ordained ministry, emphasizes female submission, and argues that men and women have different but complementary roles and responsibilities in marriage, family life, and religious leadership. Moore’s Living Proof Ministries focuses on women’s discipleship, and her ministry has impacted the lives of millions of women around the world.īut Moore had become increasingly vocal, speaking out against sexism, and Southern Baptist leaders were swift to respond. On Mother’s Day in 2019, Beth Moore preached from a Southern Baptist pulpit, as she had done more than a dozen times in her 40-year career as a Bible teacher, conference speaker, and author.
Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation Kristin Kobes Du Mez