Advanced Search

Who is the Trinity? Totem Pole or Circle? 

Cascading Presentation: Ideas Have Consequences

What do Gen. 2:24-25 and Eph. 5: 21-33 have in common? When rightly understood, they both provide an almost formula-like description for a pleasurable, loving, faithful marriage of oneness. And both passages are built on equality and mutuality. Modern science teaches what the writers of Genesis and Ephesians could not have known.

The only “oops” in the creation narrative has become a way of life as Christian communities are structured with gender-based limitations. This seminar rehearses the narratives of Christian Scripture with its theological impact for challenging the practices of gender bias that have subverted the Christian imagination. 

The Bible presents a three-part story of human relationship with God and with each other. This story reveals that both man and woman were created equally in the image of God to fulfill an ideal—a “one flesh,” “naked and not ashamed” relationship. That was the crowning act of creation. The second part of the story recounts our fall from grace and the loss of the fearless love for which God created us. The final chapter of the story finds us redeemed, restored to wholeness with God and with each other, a new man and new woman, restored to new life in Christ.

Kari Kukkanen is a long-time board member of RaTas - Christians for Equality. He has retired from the teacher position at a Christian College in Helsinki. He has two adult sons.  

The Bible teaches equality and essential dignity of men and women of all ethnicities, ages, and classes, as all are created in the image and likeness of God. Since the church is called to be salt and light in the context in which we live, it is essential that the church recognizes and promotes the biblical understanding that leadership and service is based on the gifting of the Holy Spirit. The revelation of Triune God is the foundation of mutuality.

Lisa Sharon Harper takes us back to the beginning with deep exploration of Genesis 1-3 and considers its profound implications on the lives and calling of women right now.

Ideas Have Consequences: Justice Begins with a Consistent Reading of Scripture

Theologians are generally agreed that Genesis chapters 1 to 3 are foundational to biblical revelation, and in particular to a right understanding of the male-female relationship. Today, most commentators on Genesis and Pope John Paul II in a binding encyclical on all Roman Catholics, conclude that in God's good creation man and woman stand side by side, equal in status, dignity and leadership ability; the fall is entirely the cause of women's subordination.