If we want to stand on the steadfast knowledge that the gospel of jesus proclaims one-ness - absolute inclusion, unity and justice for all - we HAVE to know what the Bible has to say about it. Hagar (slave, foreign, female) became the very first theologian in the story of god’s people… Every single martriarch (Sarah, Rebekah, Leah and Rachel) was met in her deepest need, by a God who showed them he was different: by blessing her, by including her in the story (a culturally unheard of thing at the time) and by saying, in the context of desperate need: I remember you. They may have been read to us otherwise. But THIS is what they’re about.
The Adulterous Woman: One Forgiveness Step Too Far
The scandal of grace is more outrageous than we can ever know. The Adulterous Woman who is brought before Jesus in John 8, provides us with one of the most evocative and famous interactions in all of the gospels, but it’s also one that provides many questions. What did Jesus write in the sand? Why did the Jewish leaders walk away, and what can we take from what Jesus said to the woman, after he told her she was not to be condemned? There is SO much more to this scandalous interaction than meets the eye…
Head or Head? What did you even mean, Paul?
No male or female in Christ, Jesus? So what about 1 Corinthians then? Most of us agree that because our cultural context is so different we can ignore the specifics of what Paul writes to men and women about head coverings, but bigger questions need to be addressed about the relevance of the bible, and indeed, what God actually thinks about male and female today. Hannah has wrestled with these questions for a lot of years, as a wife, mother, feminist and co-leader of Bread. If we come back to Paul’s motivation we see this passage has its roots in the origins of gods plan for mankind: oneness. It’s not that gender is obliterated in the kingdom of God, but rather the division that broken gender distinctions have caused since the fall. This is the redemptive power of Jesus.