Putting it into practice

One of the aims of the Sophia Network is to see the partnership that God created between men and women expressed fully in the world - in churches, families, businesses, schools, in every area of life. We want to see men and women working together because we think that’s how we work best. When God created the world, the one thing that was not good was that the man was alone. Sue Edwards writes, ‘Healthy faith families, just like biological families, need both men’s and women’s ideas, gifts and perspectives in order to thrive.’ Where women’s voices are silenced, or where men are excluded, then the body of Christ is impoverished and we can end up misrepresenting the gospel. Of course, there will always be a place for single-sex groups with a specific purpose (like the Sophia Network!) but we need to actively work at breaking down barriers, challenging unhelpful stereotypes and enabling both men and women to reach their full potential.

So what does that partnership look like in practice? It will be different for each person, but here are some suggestions for you to think about:

• challenging stereotypes, sexist attitudes, degrading humour and exclusive language that damage women and/or men when you encounter it in your church, your work and your relationships.
• if women are under-represented then proactively looking for gifted women when you need someone to speak, train, lead, write about, write for you, use as an illustration, preach about and so on, instead of immediately opting for the more obvious male candidates. At the same time, working to avoid any kind of tokenism or setting people up to fail.
• creating opportunities for women to learn, to be stretched, to do new things so that they grow in skills and confidence and the body of Christ is enriched – even if that means taking some risks.
• taking responsibility for your own integrity and accountability so that working relationships with the opposite sex are an opportunity for growth and not a threat to be avoided.
• recognising the wonderful and creative diversity that exists within both sexes, allowing people to be who God calls them to be and not expecting them to fit into neatly defined boxes.
• recognising the impact that the organisation of private life has on the public sphere, and, where appropriate, sharing domestic duties with the people that you live with.
• working towards an appropriate mix of men and women actively involved in any project that you participate in, or in any network that you belong to.
• consider using an inclusive language version of the Bible for your own study and in public contexts, and making sure worship songs and liturgy don't exclude.
• wrestling with theology and understanding of biblical texts that relate to gender to discover what they say to us as men and women today.
• helping young men and young women to relate healthily to each other, realising that they are brothers and sisters in Christ rather than aliens from another planet.

Any other suggestions? I hope to expand on some of these in future posts.

Comments

[Ali Campbell]

A challenge I have particularly encountered is the gender imbalance in work with different generations. The very old, predominantly women - the very young (up to about 10), predomiantly women . . . as I work with children, and support the church across a wide area in my role, I am wondering where the modelling of the genders working together with children is. It is ironic that here, as in other areas of ministry, that those with a national / strategic lead on children's ministry are men (despite the fact that in the local church they are under represented), Ishmael, Jim Bailey, Doug Horley . . . all great, but the question is where are the men in the local church - and where are the women when it comes to leadership and speaking nationally about children's ministry?

[Jenny Baker]

Thanks Ali - good observations. The gender imbalance is a problem in primary schools, childcare and early years education as well with relatively few men involved in spite of parents asking for them. http://blog.sophianetwork.org.uk/2009/01/a-job-for-the-boys.html One problem is that men who want to work with that age group can face suspicions about their motivation; another is the gender stereotype that it's women's work and not appropriate for 'real' men. How sad that either of those have currency. I actually think this could be a huge service and mission opportunity for the church if we had the vision to take it.

[Sharon Prior]

I totally agree with you, Ali. I have tried to challenge this several times with people who are running conferences for Children's Workers. So many times the ones up front talking about vision and strategy for children's work are men, as if women have nothing to say about this and yet the majority of workers on the ground are women. So I think we have a problem in both situations.

It is encouraging though, I am Course leader on the Children's Evangelism and Nurture Diploma at Cliff College and this year we have the most men on the course since it started 10 years ago. Still not a big percentage (9 men and 25 women = 26%), but they are there. We are praying that more men come forward for this kind of training.

We need to work hard to get women represented at a national level in children's work, it is hard to see what we can do, but we mustn't give up!