Women’s Group Contending for Complementarianism in Australia, Part 2

Editor's note: As reported Tuesday on Gender Blog, the Anglican Church in Australia has been fighting a battle over biblical truth on the issue of women's ordination for much of the past two decades. Anglicans there recently moved to ordain women as bishops, but one group of women known as ‘Equal but Different' (EBD) has organized to contend for biblical truth in Australia. EBD formed in 1992 in response to a push for female ordination by the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Australia (ACA). The organization exists to promote and defend the biblical pattern of relationships between men and women in both the church and home. Gender Blog interviewed Claire Smith, one of the group's leaders. Today is the second of a two-part interview with her. 

Gender Blog: How has your group been received among Anglicans in Australia?

Claire Smith: We are aware and have contact with Anglican women and men around the country who have remained faithful to the biblical teaching. As best we can, we try to represent, encourage and minister to those people - some of whom have had to leave their churches rather than sit under ministry they consider to be conflict with Scripture. They are grateful for the ministry of EBD.

Others who believe the Scripture teaches identical roles for men and women have not been so accepting. Robust debate is one thing, but regrettably, some members of the EBD Steering Committee have been verbally persecuted for their attempts to promote and defend biblical teaching.

Gender Blog: What do you see as being at stake with the issue of gender roles in the church and home? What are some of the mischaracterizations of complementarianism that you are hearing in your country?

Smith: What is at stake with the issue of gender roles is primarily the authority of Scripture as God's inspired Word, and beyond that, the temporal and spiritual welfare of individuals and the strength of families and churches, since these are matters of Christian obedience and the blessings that come from living according to God's wisdom.

Some egalitarians of course seek to justify their position from the Scriptures, but invariably they do not accept the plain reading of the text; and/or allow one text of Scripture to silence others they do not accept; and/or base their arguments on rare or novel meanings of Greek or Hebrew words; and/or depend on historical reconstructions as the background for NT texts so as to marginalize the text's application to the modern church; and/or overlook the non-culturally specific reasons the NT writers use for their teaching about the different responsibilities of men and women, such as Genesis 1-3, the relationship between Christ and the church, and the relationships within the Trinity.

The most recent misrepresentation of the complementarian view is that it justifies domestic violence and abuse. The Sydney Diocesan Synod in 2007 passed a motion saying that such aberrations cannot be justified by, and are entirely contrary to, the biblical complementary pattern of relationships for women and men. Domestic violence and psychological and spiritual abuse are contrary to God's Word and contrary to the loving headship of a husband, and intelligent, voluntary submission of a wife.

Gender Blog: Does the fact that the group is composed entirely of women take some of the heat off the issue? Do you find that you have more credibility in asserting this teaching among women in Australia or are they merely dismissive of your views?

Smith: A founding rationale of EBD was that this issue was one in which ‘a woman's voice' needed to be heard and that men who were seeking to oppose identical ministries for both genders could easily be dismissed as ‘sexist' or ‘misogynist.' In this respect, it has been helpful to be a ministry organized by and directed to women.

Increasingly however, as the not-unrelated question of homosexual and lesbian clergy and same sex unions appears on the horizon, often promoted by the same proponents of women's ordination, EBD may have to rethink our focus on ministering to and speaking only for women. Thankfully these innovations, although accepted in other Australian denominations, have not as yet gained sufficient momentum within the ACA to force legislative change. Praise God and may it ever be so!