Some thoughts that I've been stewing over for a while:

Are women disqualified from being leaders in the church (pastor, apostle, elder etc) because they are women by 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1?

A #theology thread.

No. And here's why:

Paul the Apostle broke that his own rule. He was unmarried and by the application of his own rule was completely unfit for serving as a church leader.

Additionally, our modern church does not apply those qualifications equally. We do not demand a man be married to only one wife, we accept people who have been divorced.

We accept men who do not have children, we accept men as leaders whose children are disrespectful, we accept men who are given to anger, unable to teach, in-temperate, etc etc.

In fact, the modern church is willing to accept any person as an elder who is socially acceptable to the group. The only policy given by Paul that we actually apply universally is the idea that the leader be male.

That unequal application of Paul's guidelines shows that in fact we are not worried about following the guidelines but maintaining a male dominance.

And then we have to bring up Junia. A Romans 16:7 Paul specifically mentions Junia as a fellow apostle. Junia is a woman's name. Paul greeted a woman as an equal apostle.

But that's just Paul who is writing in a specific cultural context. What about Jesus? From a Jewish mindset 12 was important. Finding 12 disciples is highlighted in the gospels which were written by Jews. But it is clear that Jesus had many more disciples other than those 12.

Only a few of those additional disciples out followers are named and as far as I can remember, all of the ones named are women. Given the cultural context where boys could disciple to a Rabbi and girls could not...

it's not surprising that the Jews would not consider them primary disciples. However I think it's obvious from the way Jesus declared his resurrection to a woman first that he indeed considered those women to be among his primary followers.

And what about Galatians 3:28? Paul is talking about how we are all equal in our salvation and mentions several class dividers of the time. Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. Paul specifically says we are all one and those divisions are gone.

So how do we make that work with the first couple passages? Paul starts the chapter with a statement "Here is a trustworthy saying..." Is it possible that that specific section in Timothy is supposed to be advice, not law, similar to Paul recommending that Christians stay single?

Is it possible that Titus was also speaking in a specific cultural context not to be prescriptive for all of Christianity but instead to allow for the error of Greek/Roman culture to have space to grow into the fullness of unity in Christ first instead of alienating them?

And what of Priscilla? She was a fellow teacher with Paul and her husband Aquilla. Between Priscilla and Aquilla, she is mentioned first, showing the author possibly considered her the more important one the mention.

They instructed Apollos more adequately in the faith according to Acts 18, and it is believed that we have Apollos to thank for the book of Hebrews. So its reasonable to think that if you like the book of Hebrews, you like the teachings of Priscilla and Aquilla.

If you've read this far, I congratulate you for at least listening. It's taking me almost four decades to get to the point where I'm willing to consider this viewpoint. It's incredibly unpopular and considered heretical among many Christian circles.

I don't expect you to change your mind today on what I say alone. But I hope you've at least read what I've said and accepted that I, as a fairly conservative evangelical Christian, think this way with good reason.

@thejuniaproject @bcastlemiller @SkyeJethani @scotmcknight @drewdyck Please say something if I'm way off base here on anything. I'd love some input on all this.