I’m pretty sure (though many authors do not address it) that the iconagraphy is actually fairly important. I believe that there were so many Mary’s in the NT becuase they were all priestesses. JC himself was supposed to be the priest king, later transformed into the myth of Prester John. It is why Mary’s descent from David was so important. Jesus’s death was a political death, hence the crucifixion. King of the Jews, remember? And yet he was also a priest.

On the other hand, the moment he stepped out and found himself an area where the women were all self-sufficient, independent, and strong-willed, he was overjoyed. In fact, when he heard a woman preaching, he was so moved that he had no qualms calling her a deacon.

The suppression of women seems to me just another way to hold a ‘boys only’ sign in front of the tree house.

This statement is beyond stupid and ridiculous. I honestly can’t decide whether I find it irritating or just plain funny.

who, in Christian theology, is the Son of God, Jesus or Paul?

In a society that was deeply misogynistic, Jesus treated women with the same respect and patience he showed men. Whenever this prejudice about the role of women in church comes up, I think of Luke 10:

“38As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. 39She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. 40But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

41″Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, 42but only one thing is needed.[f] Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” ”

Martha bustles about fulfilling the “role” of women at that time as hostess and servant, subordinate to men. Her sister took a place with the men as student, as an equal.

I also remember that Mary was the first to see Jesus after the resurrection, as told in John 20:
“10Then the disciples went back to their homes, 11but Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.

13They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”

“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” 14At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

15″Woman,” he said, “why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”

16Jesus said to her, “Mary.”
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher).

17Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ”

18Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them that he had said these things to her.”

Now, if Mary had done as Paul writes, she could not have obeyed Jesus by telling the others what she had seen. She’d have had to go to her father or brother, tell him privately, and have him tell the other disciples.

But Jesus told her directly to go and tell – the very same call that clergy experience – go and tell.

When God tells a woman to go and tell, no man should stand in her way, just as he would not want anyone to stand in his way, if God calls him to serve, to go and tell.

“Whether people should love each other, and God too, has nothing to do with the issue of whether women should be priests. ”

Your dismissal is predicated on a dishonest paraphrase. The law Christ gave is more than just ‘love your neighbor’ – it states ‘love your neighbor as yourself’.

Which means, as if it needs to be plainer, treat your neighbor as you want to be treated. It is re-statement of ‘do onto others as you would have others do onto you’.

Any man who wishes to be minister cannot deny women that role as well; if he does, he is not treating women the way he wants to be treated.

“I didn’t call anyone’s comments sin, but he called my comments sin.”

You also didn’t demonstrate that your comments are not sin, while I argued that they were. You also dismissed the spiritual beliefs of Episcopalians as “ridculous” (sic), even though Jesus warns us against calling our brother “Fool”

Matthew 5:22 (New International Version)

22But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother[a]will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to his brother, ‘Raca,[b]‘ is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.

And you attack their spirituality by labeling it “political correctness”, again without a shred of accurate evidence for the charge.

“David is the one who is trolling.”

Unless you want to be called a troll yourself, and your attempt to redirect Emily’s remark onto me indicates that you do not, then your quote above is also a sin against me as a person, a violation of Christ’s law. Please repent and give me the opportunity to forgive you. And then you can ask Emily to repent for dismissing you as a troll.

Your repeated false claims about the Bible are sin, missing the mark, in two ways – first in libeling the Holy Spirit by asserting that God is malevolent and unjust. And second by libeling GLBTQ people, asserting that our capacity for love and intimacy is worthy of death and damnation.

Now the following statement of yours is absurd, I’m sorry to say: “The Bible condemns what we now call homosexual behavior, even though it doesn’t use that specific term.”

What you are really arguing is that in your opinion, the Bible can be made to condemn anything you want – IF you ignore the actual language, words, terms, concepts that appear in it. One could take your argument and declare ‘The Bible really does condemn heterosexuality, even though it doesn’t use that specific term”. After all, there are hundreds more verses condemning specific circumstances and expressions of heterosexual love-making for every one of the verses used to vilify GLBTQ people. The very first curse on humans in the Bible, in Genesis 3, is specifically aimed at one of the functions of heterosexual intercourse – pregnancy and childbirth.

The verses used to construct “homosexuality is sin” are not about homosexuality. Most address expressions of idolatry – sex with priests and priestesses of fertility gods/goddesses, and the other has been fraudulently translated. Even though Paul had at his disposal two common, ordinary, used in graffiti ordinary, greek words for men who have sex with men, Paul did not use either in his letters.

Think about it. Paul did not use either of the words that his readers would have understood as ‘men who have sex with men’ – not in Romans 1, not in 1st Corinthians, not in any of his letters. Paul did not use the words that would communicate ‘homosexuals’.

Besides, if the standard you embrace is “read whatever concept you want into the text instead of the actual concepts used”

why even bother citing Scripture?

You might consider whether your willingness to sacrifice Christ command to love your neighbor as yourself on an altar of prejudice to “homosexuality is sin” is not a case of idolatry in the form of biblioatry.

“belief than smug self-congratulation – yet smug self-congratulation is exactly what their reaction to being told that the protesters are praying for them (“gentle laughter”) suggests.”

One could find “smug self-congratulation” in your posts, if one was going to be judgmental. But more importantly, your judgment is derogatory and abusive, an attack on the character, emotions and motivations of people you know very little, if anything about. Unless you want people to malign your motives, you’ve again violated ‘love your neighbor as yourself’.

Peace, joy and love, my brother.