There are days when I just can't think of anything to write about. Then stuff like this comes along:
The First Baptist Church dismissed Mary Lambert on Aug. 9 with a letter explaining that the church had adopted an interpretation that prohibits women from teaching men. She had taught there for 54 years.
The letter quoted the first epistle to Timothy: "I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent."
The Rev. Timothy LaBouf (e-mail), who also serves on the Watertown City Council, issued a statement saying his stance against women teaching men in Sunday school would not affect his decisions as a city leader in Watertown, where all five members of the council are men but the city manager who runs the city's day-to-day operations is a woman.
"I believe that a woman can perform any job and fulfill any responsibility that she desires to" outside of the church, LaBouf wrote Saturday.
God is still speaking but someone is ignoring her.
Someone should send LaBouf a copy of The Rev. Dr. Deborah Krause’s 2004 book 1 Timothy. I don’t know if he thinks women can write or not but after studying under Dean Krause I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that she is a top-notch scholar and preacher - one called by God - that LaBouf could learn a thing or two from about the role of women in church life.
