Church Fires Teacher for Being Female

Forums: Spirituality And Religion
Email this Topic • Print this Page

Time to purge the gene pool? ---BBB

Church Fires Teacher for Being Female
WATERTOWN, N.Y.
Aug. 21, 2006

The minister of a church that dismissed a female Sunday School teacher after adopting what it called a literal interpretation of the Bible says a woman can perform any job - outside of the church.

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, 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.

Mayor Jeffrey Graham, however, was bothered by the reasons given Lambert's dismissal.

"If what's said in that letter reflects the councilman's views, those are disturbing remarks in this day and age," Graham said. "Maybe they wouldn't have been disturbing 500 years ago, but they are now."

Lambert has publicly criticized the decision, but the church did not publicly address the matter until Saturday, a day after its board met.

In a statement, the board said other issues were behind Lambert's dismissal, but it did not say what they were.

Topic Stats
Top Replies
Link to this Topic

Type: Discussion • Score: 1 • Views: 6,595 • Replies: 144

No top replies

She was probably getting "uppity."

0 Replies

Doesn't sound right to me...now I can understand that a female shouldn't be head of the church...example: a pastor/priest...but a sunday school teacher???? It's either the men teach men or if there's no man to teach..then don't let them learn...that doesn't make sense either..Oh well...it is their church...maybe it's time for her to find another one.. Confused

0 Replies

lost lamb

lost lamb found wrote:

Doesn't sound right to me...now I can understand that a female shouldn't be head of the church...example: a pastor/priest...but a sunday school teacher???? It's either the men teach men or if there's no man to teach..then don't let them learn...that doesn't make sense either..Oh well...it is their church...maybe it's time for her to find another one..

Welcome to A2K; glad to have you hear.

The article didn't contain the minister's belief that women are too inferior to men to teach them. He says women should be silent and obey their men.

BBB

Here's more info about the letter the woman received from the minister:

Sunday school teacher fired for being female
Updated: 8/18/2006 5:53 AM
By: Amy Ohler

Since 1946, Mary Lambert has been a member of the First Baptist Church in Watertown, and for the past 11 years, she's been the Sunday school teacher.

But, last Thursday Lambert received a letter from the Diaconate Board telling her that she was dismissed from her position because the board had adopted the scriptural qualifications for Sunday school teachers. In short, this prohibits women from teaching men.

"I was astonished, absolutely astonished to pick up and read that kind of a letter without being talked to ahead of time about the possibility," said Mary Lambert.

The letter Lambert received says, "A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became sinner."

The letter was signed, "Thank you for your anticipated cooperation. Very truly yours, Kendra LaBouf." Kendra is the wife of City Council Member and Pastor Tim LaBouf.

"I've had a number of calls from people within the church being as astonished at the letter as I was, and the community at large seems to be at various sides that this could happen," said Lambert.

0 Replies

Christians that take this verse in first timothy to mean that women can't teach men in the church misconstrue the meaning of the text. IF we are to beleive that paul was meaning that women can't teach men, then he contradicted himself many times.
Priscilla along with her husband teach Apollos...(Acts 18:26)
Paul lists several women who labored in the church alongside the men (romans 16:1-4)
Paul commends Timothy's mother and grandmother for teaching him
(2tim 1:5)

This verse in first timothy doesn't mean a woman can't teach a sunday school class that has men in it, it means a woman can't have authority over men ie pastor...

0 Replies

I am not real familiar with the Baptist church when it comes to rules and regulations. Although I do know some Baptists. Are these rules made for all Baptists, or for individual congregations?

I must agree with kateforchrist03 when she says that the meaning of the verse is being taken out of context.

Also, is this dear lady teaching grown men? Because even if the verse meant what they are saying it means, she would not be teaching men. Boys perhaps, but not men.

I cannot imagine such silliness happening.

Perhaps the Pastor should also look at this verse...Galatians 4:4 But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law,

0 Replies

BBB--

Quote:

Welcome to A2K; glad to have you hear.

Freudian slip?

0 Replies

Intrepid..Im baptist our church is a conservative Sbc church but we allow women to teach men....Each baptist church is autonomous and is governed within their individual church... so this view given by this first baptist church isn't a view that all baptists churches take.......

0 Replies

Baptist huh kate.
Question. How old is the earth?

0 Replies

Quote:

Baptist huh kate.
Question. How old is the earth

depends on what view ya take......moderate (liberal) baptists believe in evolution...conservative christians either believe the earth is about 10,000 yrs old or they believe the gap theory which can answer why the earth may be way older....i fall into the conservative category....but i haven't decided yet whether i believe in the gap theory or not

0 Replies

Humm.
So then you have no idea what you believe in this respect? (somewhere between 10k and an indefinite amount of time)
Gotcha.

0 Replies

no actually i tend to believe the earth is about 10,000 yrs old ...taking the stance the creationists believe....but i know many educated christians that believe in the gap theory...as of yet i havent seen enough evidence either way...nor is it a big concern to me as it has nothing to do with my salvation........

0 Replies

Intrepid wrote:

Also, is this dear lady teaching grown men? Because even if the verse meant what they are saying it means, she would not be teaching men. Boys perhaps, but not men.

It is an Adult Sunday School.

Statement of the Pastor

0 Replies

Noddy

Noddy24 wrote:

BBB---quote]Welcome to A2K; glad to have you hear.

Freudian slip?[/quote]

Yep, Someone posted a reply before I could edit my typo.

My bad!

BBB

0 Replies

Walter Hinteler wrote:

Intrepid wrote:
Also, is this dear lady teaching grown men? Because even if the verse meant what they are saying it means, she would not be teaching men. Boys perhaps, but not men.

It is an Adult Sunday School.

Statement of the Pastor

Thanks, Walter. I think of children when I think of Sunday School. I am lead Sunday School teacher in my Church and we have 3 female teachers. IMO, it is better to have women teaching young children because it is so close to a mothering situation.

Then again, we do not think that a woman cannot teach....We have women teaching seminars for both male and female adult participants.

We take that verse to mean a woman is not to teach a Priest or other Minister of the Church. We would, therefore, not have women Priests. However, we consider the women members of the church a very valuable help and resource who are accorded the respect that they are due.

0 Replies

intrepid i agree with you........teaching men in a sunday school class in no way makes a woman their authority figure...that verse, I beleive also means they cant be pastors .........

0 Replies

(I think I'm going to send JoefromChicago over here. It may explain something to him.)

0 Replies

kate4christ03 wrote:

no actually i tend to believe the earth is about 10,000 yrs old ...taking the stance the creationists believe....but i know many educated christians that believe in the gap theory...as of yet i havent seen enough evidence either way...nor is it a big concern to me as it has nothing to do with my salvation........

Sorry to be so ignorant of these various religions and factions and whatnot... but it doesn't matter anyway... all that is at issue here for me is how anyone could think the earth is only 10,000 years old. That is so young. Ask any geologist. Don't religious people study geology? Good Lord. There are volcanoes and fissures older than this.

0 Replies

Church Fires Teacher for Being Female
welllll, this simply shows that the pastors, church administrators and their governing bodies need to have a better review of their bible, because somewhere there in that bible with respect to pauls letters, it clearly says that women when preaching or doing similar things have to just cover their hair with a cloth(eg like how a catholic nun does) as a sign of respect for ........

0 Replies

What I find amusing is that for 53 years, they were perfectly fine with her teaching the class.

Here's another article about the same thing:

http://wwnytv.net/72k/full-story.asp?uid=12059&area=home+page

Note the following excerpt:

Quote:

The letter was signed by church clerk Kendra LaBouf, who is married to Pastor Tim LaBouf.

Lambert said she believes there's more to her dismissal than meets the eye.

She said she and Pastor LaBouf have had differences of opinion concerning the direction of the church.

Tim LaBouf, who is also a member of the Watertown City Council, did not respond to repeated attempts for comment.

It sounds to me like this situation has far more to do with religious politics than religion itself.

0 Replies

Church Fires Teacher for Being Female

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know