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We feel instinctive revulsion toward religious groups requiring women to submit to husbands. For 20 years I’ve lived in a community with a theocratic church, Christ Church, that plays by those rules. I want to share some of the noxious ways they play out in real life. 1/9
First, women don’t all go along all the time, and those whodon’t defer are seen as sneaky and defiant. The local church publishes a list of “Brother owned “ businesses to patronize, in which it warns 2/9:
“Wives, do not do an end run around your husband. If he has said that you are not going to spend any money on whatever it is, then you should not try to get the service without spending any money. This just turns one sin into two”. 3/9
Wives who do not submit are punished and ostracized. I have a neighbor -completely untrained -who does “Christian Counseling” for the church. That often entails publicly reprimanding wives who don’t perform their duties to their husband’s satisfaction. 4/5
It’s not far from there to shaming women to stay in abusive marriages. A woman at another local churcha was brutally injured by her husband. The church convinced her to undergo their version of marriage counseling which emphasized forgiveness and the sanctity of marriage.5/9
She returned and was too embarrassed to complain when the abuse started again. He murdered her and their unborn child and set the house in fire with them 6/9
it’s not just wives put at risk by rules elevating the man in homes and churches. Children also must defer. Here are some terrible instances of CC normalizing the abuse of teens and even very young children. Abusers remain in the flock. http://moscowid.net/ 7/9
Submissiveness of wives extends to the bedroom, where the sex act is regarded as one of authority and submission rather than mutual pleasure. https://rachelheldevans.com/blog/gospel-coalition-douglas-wilson-sex 8/9
And women rejecting good Christian men are setting the stage to be raped. Not “asking for it” exactly, but “One consequence of rejecting the protection of good men is that you are opening yourself up to the predations of bad men.” https://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/2016/03/evangelical-pastor-doug-wilson-women-who-reject-patriarchy-are-tacitly-accepting-the-propriety-of-rape.html
I can’t say Coney Barrett’s brand wifely submission identical to Christ Church. But I can say the doctrine infects a wide range of matters in the public sphere, and makes her unfit to safeguard a constitution built on equal justice under the law.
