Is your church Egalitarian?

#Mutuality 2012 was initiated by Rachel Held Evan's and I would highly recommend reading her blog and others on the subject, particularly this one. I had an interesting discussion on twitter about the different context in the UK as opposed to the US. The debate does seem to be framed a little differently in the UK and rather than people describing themselves as egalitarian or complimentary (words which mean very little to a lot of brits) we tend to state weather or not we believe women can be in leadership.   But does that limit the horizons of what is actually a much broader conversation than simply about leadership, what we are actually discussing is the very nature (and humanity) of women.

So here are my thoughts for #Mutuality 2012. They are essential a series of questions which stem from a question I have been asking for a while how do churches that believe in 'women in leadership' move beyond this question and ask how can we make churches a place where men and women experience equal and equitable opportunity, discipleship, healing and power?

Is your church Egalitarian?

Has your church/denomination ever conducted a gender analysis?

Does your church/denomination have equal numbers of men and women in each area of ministry?

Are the topics preached about equally relevant to men and women?

What is the average income of the men and women in your congregation is their a differtial? What about your paid employees?

Do the men and women in your church have equal amounts of caring responsibilities?

Is your church/denomination actively speaking up and campaigning about violence against women and patriarchy?

Do the people in your congregations challenge sexism and derogatory language?

Is your church equipped and ready to support women who have experienced gender based violence?

Are the young people and children taught about the damaging effects of stereotyping?

Are adults actively supported to identify the limiting effects of stereotypes in their own lives and move towards greater discipleship in Christ?

Is your church Egalitarian?

These are just some of the questions we need to be asking if we want to truly work towards mutuality.