Let Freedom Ring. Conclusion

Posted on July 25, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

Will you speak up with me and claim your newbirth right?

It was in Jerusalem in 2006 that I made a stand for my own equality. Don and I were on vacation in Israel and equality was the farthest thing from my mind. But later, I realized that what happened there was the beginning of my journey that has led to writing this blog, and publishing my books advocating for women’s equality in the church and home.

The story begins this way:

Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon lay in a coma in a room near where Don and I stood at the Hadassah Ein Keremin Hospital in Jerusalem. We were standing at the same spot that Shepherd Smith of Fox News had stood just a few days before while he sent back a news report of the Prime Minister’s condition. But we were not there to see Ariel Sharon. We were there to see the synagogue where the famous artist Marc Chagall had created the 12 stained glass windows of the 12 Tribes of Israel.

As we prepared to enter the synagogue, Don was told to put a small hat on his head so his head would be covered before he entered the synagogue. He picked up a homemade hat made of black construction paper that had been stapled together to form a hat. This gave compliance to the head covering rule. A young man of 14 or so who was entering the synagogue for a brief visit, raised his arm and spread his hand over his head to form a cover for his head. I did not have to cover my head.

Don sat on one side of the synagogue while I sat on the other side. Our tour group consisted of Brenda who was our female tour guide, Don, another man, and me. We four were the only ones there, two men and two women, sitting on opposite sides of each other.

Another day we went to see the tomb of King David. It was in a small room, separated down the middle by a curtain. Men go through the main entrance, so my husband Don entered on one side while I had to enter on the opposite side which was the woman’s entrance. Men enter the “tomb” while women see the covered box through an opening in the wall, over which a curtain hangs. There was a woman under the table-covering lying prostrate on the floor, praying. I could see her feet moving under the ornate tablecloth.

Our next visit was to the Wailing Wall, a place of prayer, and a must-see for tourists when they are in Jerusalem. There is a courtyard where people mill around; down at the end is the Wall. We could see many men lined up against the wall praying, and rocking back and forth as they often do. Many were Orthodox Jews dressed in traditional black clothes and black hats. There was a section screened off which we learned was the women’s section. I was told that I had to go over there to a separate entrance if I wanted to stand by the Wall and pray. It was on a slight decline, and I could see chairs up against the screen barricade. Those chairs were placed there so the women could climb up on them to see.

“No!”

Thus began my protest. I stayed in the courtyard, refusing to be separated from the Prayer Wall. Proud. All alone. I was a Christian woman, and this is the 21st century. I will not be treated as if I am a Jewish woman. I have been saved by grace and given the freedom through Christ that He gave all his children, male and female.

Will you join me in standing—alone if necessary—in protest against the separation of men and women? Will you stand with me against assigned roles that men want to give women? Will you stand with me against the separate entrances where women are allowed to go only so far, and where women do not have the full relationship with God that many men feel is their “birthright?”

Will you speak up with me and claim your newbirth right?

I hope that as you read, you did not become too comfortable because you will likely see separate leadership roles in your church.

It is my hope that this will give you insight as to how prevalent this teaching is, how it is done, and how it affects your church. The good news is that it doesn’t have to be that way. You will be encouraged—no, you will be commanded—to get up and do something about it.

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave: A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

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Let Freedom Ring. Part 5

Posted on July 22, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

People have asked me “what does women’s equality look like for you?” Since churches and denominations have their own set of restrictions against women in ministry, each person’s picture would look differently. We have seen how the Southern Baptist Convention has responded to the threat of women’s equality.

As promised in Part 1, we are now going back to the story of the stolen birthright.

This is what I envision women’s equality to look like, so it is actually the end result. Let’s go back and begin with the similarity of the Old Testament story of Jacob, aided by their mother, who stole the birthright from Esau. The story begins in Genesis 25.

Jacob, through deception and opportunity, stole the birthright of his twin brother Esau. Esau was guilty of dismissing the importance of his birthright. This analogy has Jacob representing Christian men who pushed women aside even though men and women were both firstborn in the New Creation, and set to inherit the goods and possessions of the Father. Esau represents Christian women who now realize that they gave up their most valuable inheritance.

Birthright – are you ready to unleash your harness

Esau said to his father, “Do you really have only one blessing, Father? Bless me too, my father!” And Esau wept loudly.

His father Isaac responded and said to him, “Now, you will make a home far away from the olive groves of the earth, far away from the showers of the sky above. You will live by your sword; you will serve your brother. But when you grow restless, you will tear away his harness from your neck.” Genesis 27:38:40

The story in the Bible moves from Esau to Jacob. It leaves us wondering what happened in Esau’s life? At what point did he “grow restless” and how did he tear away the harness from his neck?

We do not know, but we do know that Esau eventually found his strength and became mature in those twenty years that Jacob was gone. It is that strength and maturity that women have found also. We have begun building up our own herds and gathering our army, not to do harm, but as a witness of whom we have become.

Esau gathered his gifts and his army of 400 men and went to meet his brother. He wanted reconciliation between him and his twin brother.

However, Jacob heard Esau was coming and he was afraid his brother was coming to claim what was rightfully his. Jacob and his father-in-law didn’t trust each other, each taking advantage of the other. So, Jacob, too, had a large herd of animals. He set out to meet Esau and brought his herd of animals to give as a gift to his brother (to appease him).

Esau said, “What’s the meaning of this entire group of animals that I met?”

Jacob said, “To ask for my master’s kindness.”

Esau said, “I already have plenty, my brother. Keep what’s yours.”

Jacob said, “No, please, do me the kindness of accepting my gift. Seeing your face is like seeing God’s face, since you’ve accepted me so warmly. Take this present that I’ve brought because God has been generous to me, and I have everything I need.” So Jacob persuaded him, and he took it.

Esau said, “Let’s break camp and set out, and I’ll go with you.” Genesis 33:8-12 Common English Bible (CEB)

Esau who had allowed his birthright to be stolen, met his brother with his own set of gifts and forgiveness. Women, all of whom have had their Newbirth-right stolen, can do the same.

They were twin brothers – children of the same mother and father. Did it really matter which one came out of the womb first? Only in their culture did it matter. It did not matter to God. Just like men and women. We are twins, born of the same Father/Mother – giver of life. That birthright is reinforced in the New Creation, through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

We have grown restless. This is our wealth. These are our gifts.

  1. Begin the journey
  2. Gather your gifts
  3. Bring along your army of supporters
  4. Go with forgiveness
  5. Offer reconciliation

If you, too, are restless, and are ready to tear away the harness of male headship from your neck, speak up! Now is the time!

We have no malice and we are willing to meet our brothers halfway. We, too, have gifts to bring. With your family and my family together again, we will be able to do many things for the Lord. Will you start the journey?

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave: A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

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Let Freedom Ring. Part 4

Posted on July 18, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

Before the fundamentalists takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention, Baptists believed in the priesthood of the believer.  Those words are not spoken in Baptist churches anymore. It was a foundational belief that Christians did not need any go-between to come before God.  It originally had to do with the Catholic Church and priests who acted as the mediator between the person and God.  Protestants said that no priest was needed, and in fact, did not have the power to be a go-between.

Below is what Baptists say they believe, but do not talk about openly anymore:

Every believer takes part in the New Testament doctrine regarding priesthood.  Direct access to God, through Christ, was granted the moment the rebirth took place.  We need no intervention by any other human being on our behalf, “For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ (1st Timothy 2:5)?”  Although, all believers need and appreciate the prayers of others (intercessory prayer), being able to go to God in prayer and approach Him directly is assured by the Word of God. 

There are also contrasts to be seen in Scripture regarding how believers mirror their Old Testament counterparts who were priests.  We, like them, are set aside as, “A holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:4).”  What we are to offer up is indeed ourselves.  That is the best sacrifice God wants of us.  Paul told the believers in first century Rome to, “Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service (Romans 12:1).”

Why don’t Baptist mention this anymore? You see, they can’t. Because SBC Baptists have decided that they will teach that the husband is his wife’s leader, her spiritual leader, and the spiritual head of his family, and she is under his authority.

You cannot believe or teach priesthood of the believer when you give a husband spiritual leadership, or headship, over his wife.

Remember what Dr. Dorothy Patterson, one of the founders of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Biblical Womanhood, said “As a woman standing under the authority of Scripture, even when it comes to submitting to my husband when I know he’s wrong, I just have to do it and then HE stands accountable at the judgment.”   (Christianity Today 1998).

The Drs. Patterson (Paige and Dorothy) along with her brother, helped craft the Danver’s Statement on Biblical Manhood and Biblical Womanhood, and then in 1998, crafted the Baptist Faith and Message 1998 which inserted the section about a wife ‘graciously’ submitting to her husband, and then in the Baptist Faith and Message 2000, told everybody that women can’t be senior pastors. 

Priesthood of the believer is not talked about in Baptist churches anymore.  Now you know why.

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave: A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

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Let Freedom Ring Part 3

Posted on July 14, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

In the past 30 years, churches that traditionally had women pastors, Assemblies of God and United Pentecostal, are now dominated by male pastors.  They, too, have resorted to teaching that the husband has authority over his wife.  As one Pentecostal wife told me “My husband is the ruler in our home.” Their children were grown, but she still need a ruler over her. I see this as a direct influence of the Southern Baptist Convention fundamentalist takeover.

The non-denominational churches that have a husband/wife pastor team say that they allow women to preach (and we see they do because the wife preaches), but those churches do not have a woman as a senior pastor.  In many of those husband/wife pastored churches they teach that wives are to submit to their husbands. Equality just flew out the window.

A Methodist minister in England emailed me that the complementarian view is prevalent in their churches.  He said that they watch what we do over here, and are influenced by it. In our own country, even though Methodists embrace women as pastors, not all are on board with women’s equality in the home.  I attended a wedding where the Methodist minister of a very large church near here told the husband, “James, remember that you have the greater responsibility in the marriage. If she wants to go shopping, even though you would rather go to a ballgame, you must go with her.”  In those words, he gave the couple’s marriage to the husband.

There are a handful of religious denominations that accept women as equals, but ultimately, they have become the stumbling block against women pastors instead of being the standard.  These churches that have accepted women as pastors have also recognized that within their congregations there might be homosexuals. Of course there are homosexuals in other churches, but they are closeted.

Fundamentalists tell us that churches will be full of homosexuals if they allow women as pastors. They lead us to believe that any woman who feels called to preach is a homosexual. So, with that reasoning, both the pulpits and the pews will be filled up with homosexuals. Fundamentalists have bound themselves to homosexuality and many have bought into it. United Methodists split in 2020 over this issue and the new denomination is Global Methodists which was formed on the basis of being against homosexuality.

But, look at the Catholic Church. They do not accept women as priests, and yet we have been made aware that there are many priests who are homosexual. What is the connection there? They officially do not accept homosexuality.  In 2019, The New York Times estimated that as many as 75 percent of Catholics priests may be gay, with only ten of them formally “out.” And those who do come out – or are rooted out – may lose their livelihood, their housing, and their community.  (The Disappearance of the Closeted Clergyman by Kimberly Winston, April 15, 2025.) https://arcmag.org/the-disappearance-of-the-closeted-clergyman

Evangelicals completely ignore what Catholics do because in many minds, Catholics worship graven images, and eat the flesh of Christ and drink his blood, and do other strange things. So, is it just the Protestant denominations that accept women pastors that will have women lesbians as pastors? Why does that reasoning apply only to women? Why wouldn’t the same reasoning apply to men and make it a possibility that we would have male homosexuals as pastors? In other words, if you allow women to preach and it opens the doors to women homosexual preachers, wouldn’t it stand to reason that it would also open the door to male homosexual preachers?

Because if evangelicals taught that, there would be NO pastors.

Personally, I do not know a homosexual woman pastor. But what about the male pastors who are adulterers, homosexuals, pedophiles, child molesters, wife beaters, murderers, abusers, and sexual deviants? One of my SBC pastors molested his grandchildren and died in prison. Another one of my SBC pastors was heavily into porn and now has a website “helping other pastors turn from porn.”

Much has recently been uncovered about male sex abusers within the leadership of Southern Baptist Convention churches. Nobody says that because some men are these things that we should deny all men from service in the church.

These churches that have allowed women equality in the pulpit and leadership positions cannot carry enough weight to pull women into equality. As I said, they have become a de facto deterrent.

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave:  A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

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Let Freedom Ring Part 2

Posted on July 12, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

This is where women lost their birthright in the Southern Baptist Convention, which has influenced non-denominational churches, Christian Nationalists, and has kept any real progress for women’s equality squashed down, rolled over, dejected, and denied.

How did we get to this point? As many of you know, my background is Southern Baptist. I worked for Baptist General Convention of Texas for almost 15 years. I was a Baptist for over 53 years.

The Café Du Monde in New Orleans was the site of the fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention.  Their plan was written on a paper napkin in 1967.  Paige Patterson and Paul Pressler were the architects of the plan, and they used their unique knowledge of the inner workings of the SBC to systematically put their people in key positions.  This stacked the dominoes in a certain way, and when they started to fall, they continued in the orderly fashion set forth on a table in a café.

Paul Pressler died in 2024 with his reputation tarnished as the unvarnished story came out that he was a pedophile and had sexually molested a young man for many years. Paige Patterson was also dethroned as President as Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Dallas and it is extremely likely that he knew what was going on in the hot tub between Pressler and the young man.

What began in 1967 was finalized in 1990 “This eleventh election (of a fundamentalist president of the SBC) seals the fundamentalist victory, and they celebrate at Café Du Monde in the French Quarter, where Judge Pressler and Paige Patterson had first conceived the whole plan for the takeover, many years prior.” (The fundamentalist takeover in the Southern Baptist Convention).

The story is outlined in “The Fundamentalist Takeover in the Southern Baptist Convention. A Brief History” by Rob James and Gary Leaser with James Shoopman, produced by Mainstream Missouri Baptists in 1999.  They didn’t know the rest of the story.  Here we are today in 2025, and what the fundamentalists sowed, we have reaped.

They earnestly believed that reigning in knowledge, cultural changes, and binding the scriptures to inerrancy would bring about a stronger SBC and growth.  They were successful, but they were wrong. (Read a 2025 news article about Christian Nationalism and see if you don’t see that is exactly what they continue to want for you and me – but likely not for themselves.)

SBC Membership Declines, so says the Baptist Standard, June 25, 2012, for the 5th straight year.  The record year for baptisms was in 1972. As I post this anew today in 2025, baptisms have never reached this record high again. The SBC continues to decline, but their hold on culture, churches, marriages, and state and national government has increased.

So what?  What does this mean? Why should you be concerned if you are not a Baptist? Perhaps you don’t even like Baptists, and think this has no meaning for you.

It affects you because Southern Baptists are the second largest denomination (behind Catholics) in the United States.

They have the seminaries that your pastor went to, and the seminaries that your youth minister who teaches your kids will learn in.  They give power to, and hold in esteem, such people as non-Baptists Wayne Grudem, Mark Driscoll, and a multitude of others outside the Baptist denomination, in believing that the pastor (who must be male) is in control of his church, and that women are to be eternally submissive to all males, forever. Wayne Grudem is co-author of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Biblical Womanhood with John Piper and this is a bible of sorts in Baptist seminaries.  His Systematic Theology is the teaching book at these same Baptist Seminaries and he, along with others, have devoted their theology around women’s lower status to man’s status before God and all males. These men listed have gotten old, but newcomers are still proclaiming their filth against women.

It affects you because the Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Biblical Womanhood (1987) came out of this family group – Paige Patterson, Dorothy Patterson, and her brother Chuck Kelly (past president of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary). The Danvers Statement shares some of the same language of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000. The Danvers Statement was adopted in 2009 as the Statement of Faith in Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary where Paige Patterson is president.

Churches do not remain static.  They are constantly changing and these changes are brought on by influences of larger churches. Just as hell-fire and brimstone is not the hot topic today as it was 50 years ago, the new hot topic is the bedroom and the husband’s authority throughout the home and in the church.  This came from somewhere and it is my belief that it was conceived on the paper napkin at Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans in 1967.

As we continue this discussion, we will see how a decision made 58 years ago has affected other Christian denominations.

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave: A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

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Let Freedom Ring Part 1

Posted on July 8, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

I like the story of freedom through Christ. Paul told the people of Galatia “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” (Gal 5:1).

One Sunday at my previous church, our praise song was “Open Our Eyes (we want to see Jesus).” The song says ‘we want to reach out and touch you, and say that we love you.’ Surely we hear the wistfulness in women’s voices when they sing this song. Much like Mary at the tomb the morning of the resurrection when she saw Jesus.

My pastor began to preach. I was glued to his every word. He told the story of Esau and Jacob. You remember the story. Jacob steals Esau’s birthright. The name “Jacob” means “supplanter, deceiver.” Jacob took what was not his to take. Through opportunity and deception, he received the inheritance of goods and position.

Jacob sought to make amends with his brother. God met Jacob on the way, and Jacob was engaged in a spiritual battle to account for what he had done. Jacob would not give up the struggle until he knew that he had received a blessing. This changed Jacob forever. He limped, but more than that, he had received forgiveness.

That was the Old Testament. In the New Testament, there is a ‘newbirth’ right, given by Jesus, where both men and women were set free. A new birth: a new right as sons and daughters of God. That was our birthright. We were free! Christ set us free from ‘institutional slavery and every kind of slavery,’ as one pastor said.

We were all firstborn, and set to inherit goods and positions. But something happened along the way.

The supplanters and deceivers came and women’s birthright through Jesus Christ was stolen from them. Women were made slaves again. Like Esau, we have been tricked and we have lost the precious birthright that came with Jesus. Yes, like Esau, we have sold our birthright for a bowl of pottage. We have received a bowl of beautiful words of flattery served with ‘equal-but.’

A birthright has been stolen. The birthright was a way of living, a position in society and family, something to be passed on to the next generation.

So it is today. And it has been stolen.

True freedom would mean a full birthright. To preach. To be a deacon. To serve the Lord’s Supper. To take up the offering. To pass out an attendance pad and worship bulletin. That is not a freedom that many churches are willing to give the women in their church.

This Fourth of July, as you ate your hotdogs and apple pie, women are still being oppressed by the very church that claims to set them free. What would happen if next July 4th, the women in your church can serve as God calls? What would happen if women reclaimed their full birthright given them by Jesus?

We will pick up the story of Essau and Jacob in Let Freedom Ring Conclusion.

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave: A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

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Freedom for Who?

Posted on July 4, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

Today is the 4th of July, and we celebrate this Declaration of Independence. Within the Declaration is this statement “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Eleven years later, on September 17, 1787 the Constitution of the United States was signed. We get goosebumps with the words of the Preamble “We the People.”  It makes us feel as if we are family with the whole United States, and all those who came before us. It is a powerful statement.

Today that sentence includes you and me, and all citizens of the United States, but that was not the original intent.

 “We the People” meant white males and it was understood that while they brought with them wives, children and servants, those wives, children and servants were not part of “We the People.” Only white males could vote; only white males could make laws; only white males could enforce those laws; and only white males could run for offices in the governing body.

It wasn’t until February 3, 1870 that black males got the right to vote by the 15th Amendment to the Constitution. Women were seeking their right to vote, but it was felt that the fight should be for black men to be able to vote rather than for women to vote. It would be another 50 years, 133 years after the statement “We the People,” before women got the right to be part of “We the People” with the 19th Amendment on August 26, 1920.

What  began with the Declaration of Independence, led to “We the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union.” When you read those words, remember that it took 133 years before that union accepted all its people as equal, and that did not come easily as Americans fought against each other in the Civil War, and in the courts, for the rights that should have come with “We the People.”

Well, did they just not know better, were they just responding to the culture of white males, and this caused the United States to leave out out women until 1920? You don’t think they knew better until 1920? This is a country that thought outside the box and decided that this new country would not be led by kings who had power over them, but by a man that would be the President elected by an electoral college.  Certainly not what other countries were doing.

Did the founding fathers not have women anywhere to give a voice? You need to read this book by Cokie Roberts Founding Mothers, and that will change your idea that it was the men only who founded this new country. 

“Founding Mothers, an intimate and illuminating look at the fervently patriotic and passionate women whose tireless pursuits on behalf of their families — and their country — proved just as crucial to the forging of a new nation as the rebellion that established it. While much has been written about the men who signed the Declaration of Independence, battled the British, and framed the Constitution, the wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters they left behind have been little noticed by history. Roberts brings us the women who fought the Revolution as valiantly as the men, often defending their very doorsteps. While the men went off to war or to Congress, the women managed their businesses, raised their children, provided them with political advice, and made it possible for the men to do what they did. The behind-the-scenes influence of these women — and their sometimes very public activities — was intelligent and pervasive.” Quote about the book.

Today, remember that our equality begins in the Declaration “And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” Like everything else that women get, we will have to fight for true equality for women.  Nobody is just going to hand it to us.

We will continue this new series “Let Freedom Ring” during the month of July. 

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Waiting for my Juneteenth

Posted on June 19, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

Banks are closed, no mail today, and I wonder how many churches observe this day. Today is Juneteenth, designated a Federal Holiday in 2021. The following is my blog post about Juneteenth in 2011 and we are still waiting.

Note: It is now 2025 and the Southern Baptist Convention met last week and voted for the second time whether or not to kick out any and all affiliated Baptist churches if any woman (volunteer or staff) had the title of Pastor after her name. Thankfully, it failed for a second time, but it will show up again another time at the SBC Convention.

Specifically, the vote was 3,421 in favor of kicking a church out of the SBC if they had a children’s pastor, etc, and 2,191 against kicking them out. The majority want churches kicked out and it will come up at the Convention again.

June 1995, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) issued a public apology for the role they played in harming African-Americans by promoting slavery. They harmed African Americans in several ways. The SBC was formed because the National Baptist Convention did not want slaveholders in the convention. So the south formed their own group which they called the Southern Baptist Convention. After the Civil War, they made segregation laws and Jim Crow laws, and continued in their harmful discrimination of the Black man.

 Juneteenth is a day we traditionally recognize as being the day that slaves in Texas learned of their emancipation which happened two years earlier. It wasn’t to the slaveowners’ interest to tell the slaves they were made free by the government, so they didn’t.

Finally, the government caught up with them and on June 19, 1865, more than 2,000 federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, to take possession of the state and enforce the emancipation of its slaves. Ever since then, June 19 has been celebrated and called Juneteenth, by Black Americans.

I am waiting for my Juneteenth by the Southern Baptist Convention. A day that they will come to us and tell us what we have always known, but what churches have kept from us, that we are free from bondage and that they welcome us as equal citizens of Christ.

It is a long time coming. It took two years for the slaves to learn they were freemen. We have waited longer than two years. More like 2,000 years.

At the Southern Baptist Convention last week (as I wrote this in 2011), they acknowledged that SBC churches are losing attendance and new converts (as indicated by a reduced number of baptisms). They don’t know why a once thriving and gospel center denomination is on the decline.

Ed Stetzer, (at the time, he was president of LifeWay Research) an SBC entity, said, “I also think that Southern Baptist churches have struggled because they’re not engaging their communities well, and so I think there are some methodological shifts that need to take place so that the gospel can be understood in a new generation among people who live where we are — not where we were.” 

I would like to tell Dr. Stetzer that it is not only a new generation, but the female half of the population that needs to see the SBC methodological shift.

Stetzer goes on to say he is hopeful leaders will recognize the changes that need to be made. “We need to engage ethnic leaders and [the] next generation, and we need to be more focused on what we’re for and less on what we’re against.”

“I pray that all of us will see the urgency of the moment,” said Thom S. Rainer (at the time he was president and CEO of LifeWay Resources). “We must make the Great Commission the heart of all we do and say. These latest numbers should be received with a broken spirit and a God-given determination to reach people for Christ.”

What about the women, I would like to ask Dr. Stetzer and Dr Rainer. Are you just concerned with the ethnic leaders and the next generation of young men? Or could you possibly be concerned about the next generation of young women who feel the call into ministry, and who are more than willing to lend a new voice to the Great Commission.

This is important to non-Southern Baptists because at the convention Russell Moore made this statement “We are the anchor of the evangelical world.”

Whether he is right or wrong about that, Southern Baptists have tremendous influence over other evangelical denominations in how they practice their faith, and what they teach.

Until the SBC gets serious about the decline and looks at all the reasons people are leaving, which includes abuse of women in the homes due to patriarchy, and lack of respect for women as whole persons before God, they cannot begin to grow and prosper and win the world for Christ.

Southern Baptists’ membership decline continues amid other areas of growth

Women are waiting for our Juneteenth.

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Tribute to Martin Luther King

Posted on January 20, 2025 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

In 1961, I went to work for the Houston Lighting & Power Company. It was my first job, and immediately I encountered female discrimination. It surprised me because I had never even thought that the restrictions placed on women were discriminatory. They were, but I did not know it, similar to the way I was not fully aware of how blacks were discriminated against. To me, it was normal; it was just the way it was.

Of course I had heard of the marches and civil unrest that was taking place in the South, but it did not affect me. I remember the first time I saw a black person eating at a large department store food counter in downtown Houston. I also remember riding a Greyhound bus as a kid, and the blacks had to sit in the back. I remember “coloreds” water fountains. I remember picking cotton and the blacks picked in one field, while we whites picked in the other.

It was in the 1970s that I learned that women, white or black, could not get credit in their names. I still use the credit card that I was able to get in my own name, instead of my husband’s name. Women had a hard time getting jobs in the professional fields. For blacks and for women, it did not miraculously change overnight. It still is a hard fought battle.

So I honor Martin Luther King this day. He had a great effect on my life as a white female. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 gave blacks, and white women, the same rights that white men already had.

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The Christmas Gift

Posted on December 23, 2024 by bwebaptistwomenforequality

 

Thirty years is a long time to wait to see what your Christmas Gift will actually do. Two thousand years ago, the Christmas Gift came with no instructions, but with lots of promise. Kings journeyed far in order to see for themselves this Gift, and to bring gifts of their own in honor of this birth.

The people wanted a mortal savior, but their hero arrived as a baby, and with his own life in danger. What could he do to help them against their enemy? They expected their savior to be a man among men, and they would rally behind him. They wanted another David with a bag of stones.

Jesus did not have a bag of stones.

“Suppose one of you has a friend who comes at night when the house has been closed and the doors have been locked, and everybody is sound asleep. He knocks on the door. He tells you that someone has just arrived at his house from a long journey, and he needs some bread to feed them. Will you tell him that it is late at night and that the kids are in bed sound asleep, and to quit knocking at your door, because he will wake up the whole household?

No, you get up to stop the racket of the knocking, not because it is your friend at the door, but because you want the knocking to stop.”

The Christmas Gift says,“I am not that way. Just ask and it will be given, seek, and you will find it, knock and it will be opened. What man is there among you, when his son shall ask him for a loaf, will give him a stone?”

“Therefore, however you want people to treat you, so treat them; for this is the Law and the Prophets” (paraphrased Luke 11:5-10 & Matt 7:5-12).

Father, we have traveled far, and we are knocking at your door. We have been at the church house, but the doors are closed, and the people are inside sound asleep. We are your children, and we are asking for a loaf. We have had the stones. We’ve been turned away by men for centuries, and now we are standing at Your door. We are hungry for the bread and for a place at your table. Hear our knock, our Father.

Will you join us in praying to the Christmas Gift for the whole loaf?

See Shirley Taylor in Baptizing Feminism Documentary Trailer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg5CmgjF2wM

Books by Shirley Taylor available in Print and Kindle on Amazon

The Biblical Marriage Myth: The Devil Comes Calling
The Power of a Book: The Street Evangelist
From Wife to Widow: What I know Now
Beyond the Grave: A Christian Dilemma
Raising the Hood: A Christian Look at Manhood and Womanhood
Women Equal – No Buts: Powered by the same Source
Dethroning Male Headship: 2nd Edition

 

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