Categories: uncategorized
Date: 27 April 2008 19:34:56
About three years ago I made the decision to leave the church I had been part of for a long time. It was a Newfrontiers church and I had been part of the organisation for about 10 years or so, attending various different churches.
My decision to leave was a tough one, and yet a good decision in the end. There were lots of reasons for leaving, among them were spiritual abuse, the lack of pastoral care and the obsession with building “large resource churches”. However, one of the main reasons I ended up leaving is because I am a woman. Being a single woman in a Newfrontiers church is almost impossible, and as the singleness thing didn't look like it was going to change in the near future I had no real choice. Whilst the leadership of Newfrontiers may insist that they are pro-women and will support women in various leadership roles (with the exception of eldership and apostolic roles) I can tell you that my experiences would suggest that this is not true. Auntie Billie and I used to work as youth leaders for the church and when the new leader arrived it was clear that he didn't want us to continue with that, so we were gradually edged out until we were forced to stand down. If you are a married woman it is somewhat different as you are deemed to be under the authority and headship of your husband.
So, as a single, outspoken and opinionated woman my choices were limited. Do I stay in a church which does not believe that I have a right to speak and vocalise what I am thinking and feeling? Or, do I leave? The choices were severely limited and neither looked terribly positive at the time. It seems to me that any church which does not give people the right to question or debate is a dangerous place to be. The fact that I became increasingly aware that I could not take my gay friends to church with me for fear that they would be subjected to homophobic abuse was appalling. In fact one of the earlier Newfrontiers churches I had been in had forced two of my gay friends to leave, and in recent months the same church has done exactly the same thing.
I don't think I am a hardcore feminist, and on many things my ideas are not too way out. However, I do believe that I have a right to speak. I do not think that I need a man to vet my ideas or process my thoughts for me. I have no desire to belong to a church which is so exclusive that everyone begins to look and sound the same. In my mind the glorious church is made up of people from all nationalities, races, sexualities, genders and ages. The reality is that I am unlikely to find this on earth, but I will keep hold of my vision as it is the only thing that truly sustains my belief that any sort of church is worth going to.