We The Feminist Lites

I think my kind of feminism is what Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie calls Feminst Lite. 

This is me :

Feminist who believes in equal rights for men and women, and who also believes in the Biblical model of womanhood- in and outside marriage. In marriage it's with the infamous submission, outside it, it's a celebration of the uniqueness of being a woman.

I don't believe that men are "naturally superior", rather I believe God has bestowed different responsibilities on men and women in a marriage that the order of headship and submission gives room for. This difference in roles comes with no qualifier of what's more or less important.

To me, the bottom line of  Feminism is having a choice, a real choice. Not the kind of choice that is available on paper, but gives room for systemic misogyny, where taking a maternity leave can severely damage my career.

Photo credit: richard evea via Foter.com / CC BY-SA

I think both views - Feminism and Submisison, clash because, Submission and Headship in marriage have a nasty history of being misused and used out of context. The key there is 'in marriage'. Women are not called to submit to all men. Wives are called to submit to their husbands, and that's part of a larger system (see Bible reference), in which Husbands are called to love their wives to the point of dying for her if need be. I think that's the analogy Chimamanda refers to as "male benevolence as the basis for women's well-being". 

Because many feminists are birthed out of years of seeing ridiculous things being endured, women's achievements belittled and/or stifled, I understand that many are particularly sensitive to any deviation that appears to allow oppression to continue. Far from this, a celebration of Biblical manhood and womanhood doesn't make allowances for oppression; it's more about serving fully in the uniqueness of our capacities in a way that gives God high honour. To me, it says "Hey God, I believe that in your infinite wisdom you created me well." I, like Elizabeth Elliot, beleive that "In order to learn what it means to be a woman, we must start with the One who made her." 

And at the end of the day, I believe what I believe because I'm a Christian first before I'm anything else. If my primary world view comes from being Feminist, perhaps I'd be tweaking my Christianity for Feminism and not the other way around.

I think that as a society, we leave a lot untapped and do ourselves as much a disservice, trying to contain all women into the box of homely service, as we do belittling the expressions of women's differences from men. All in one woman, I can be as much as God lets me be; I think if He needed just one of us, He wouldn't have created us Male and Female.

My opinions about these kinds of things are constantly evolving, and I know better than to assume there's only right answer.  But for the sake of lending my voice to the Feminist Lites out there: celebrating womanhood and fighting systemic misogyny to allow the full expression of all that it means to be a woman, here I am.

PS: reviveourhearts.com is a daily awesome resource for women learning to love Jesus.