Jimmy Carter leaving the Southern Baptists? Yes, and this one’s for the ladies

Once again, Jimmy Carter has proven that he may be the best ex-president of the modern era: This time, the devout Christian is leaving his beloved Southern Baptist church over that institution’s refusal to support more equal treatment for women. In church terms, this centers around two crucial issues: ordination of women and that oft-misinterpreted Bible passage about women being subservient to their husbands. Here’s what he said in an essay in The Age:

At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

How about that? This is serious business, given that Carter has been with the Southern Baptists for 60-some years now, and has been identified with the church going back to his days in the White House. And it’s a courageous stand, if you ask me.

I should know: I’m the proud spouse of a Presbyterian minister, and I think about how much good my wife Amy has been able to do in many roles as a result. She’s been a hospital chaplain and currently serves as the associate pastor of Lincoln Park Presbyterian Church in Chicago. If she had not been ordained, none of this service would be possible. The same goes for many, many other ordained women in Protestant denominations everywhere, including the United Church of Christ and Episcopalians. (I send a shout out to my “sister,” the Rev. Angela Kaufman, Minister to the University at Texas Christian University.)

As for the Southern Baptists, they’re great people. I spent many years writing for Christian Single magazine, a publication funded by the Southern Baptist church. Just because the Baptists do not believe the same as I do doesn’t mean they should be condemned; Christ warned about such stone throwing in Scripture.

That said, I hope and pray for a time when more conservative denominations consider the many gifts women have to offer as ordained women. It may take some time, but I am heartened by taking the long view: Go back about 150 years or so, and even the most progressive liberal churches in America condemned a certain drink as the devil’s brew:

No, not alcohol … but coffee.

Which is pretty ironic given that today, I can’t think of a single church that doesn’t have a coffee hour.