Why Michael Patton is still wrong about women in pastoral ministry

Michael has lots of excellent questions for egalitarians. Go here for the questions. The egals who have responded on his thread play right into his hand. They use their powers of imagination to minimize gender-based differences. A total waste of time.

I am an egal, a father of one son and two daughters, the husband of one wife, a sibling in an uproarious family made up of 6 sons and 2 daughters, married into another awfully vivacious family, thoroughbred Italian and proud of it. When we have extended family reunions, the number of little tikes and teenagers with raging hormones runs into the dozens. I teach 7^th and 8^th grade confirmation. I lead a Russian Novels club for high-schoolers. I prep mostly twenty-something couples for marriage. I watch marriages flourish, others decompose, still others become strong as steel after the worst offenses of wife against husband or husband against wife.

Gender differences, I’m convinced, matter very much. What it means to train boys to be “men” and girls to be “women” is at the top of my agenda as a pastor, as a father, as a wannabe thoughtful person.

This dawned on me with heart wrenching power ten years ago. My son Giovanni attended a very well-run elementary school in Madison WI, a grand educational project of social engineering of the kind old-fashioned liberals were not afraid of - and I give them credit for it. Most of Giovanni’s classmates were bussed in to the school, situated in a gentrified enclave. Lots of black and Hispanic kids, almost 100% of whom qualified for free lunch. 

I would walk to the school every afternoon, meet Giovanni, and we would walk home together. It was my chance to go over the day with him and hang out with him, which is half of fatherhood. Giovanni loved school. He was almost always the last kid out of the building. While waiting for him, a ritual began with the other boys as they waited for their bus to come. It began on a midwinter afternoon in knee-deep snow. I made a snowball and pelted one of the boys who looked bored and forlorn. He flashed me the biggest smile I’ve ever seen and before long, I was engaged in a battle royale with a half dozen black and Hispanic boys surrounded by a rim of onlookers. They loved it when I hit them and they loved it even more when they hit me. They loved it even more when I charged them and wrestled them in the snow. The brutal facts are these. I was only the male all day long who interacted with them as a male. They went home, if they were very lucky, to a single Mom who was not on dope. They had few if any male school teachers. Somehow complementarians and egalitarians alike think it’s no big deal that there are very few male elementary school teachers. A curse on the blindness of both complementarians and egalitarians.

A great case for having both men and women in the pastorate can be made on the basis of gender differences. The chemistry of one’s ministry is different, quite literally, depending on the gender, male or female, of the pastor, and the gender, male or female, of the parishioner. It’s a situation fraught with danger in all of the possible permutations. It’s a situation fraught with unique opportunities in each of the permutations. Is this so hard to see? I could tell story after tender story of what that means in real life as a male pastor. Paola could tell story after story of what it means in real life as a female pastor.

Chemistry. It matters, and it is gender-specific. It can be leveraged in a holy, God-honoring way.

Michael Patton’s questions are excellent ones. If taken seriously, they are a great argument for having women in the pastorate. 

Comments

[JohnO]

Hmmm... not sure I would agree that I (and fellow reply posters) have minimised the differences between male and female. Rather, I hope that what has been suggested is that there are indeed differences, but they have no bearing on whether an individual is any more or less capable based on gender alone.
I wonder if you are falling into the same trap, mistaking cultural conditioning for fundamental differences. Your snowball fight example simply shows that some kids love a snowball fight and after a dreary day at school, a bit of fun is going to be picked up enthusiastically. I'm not sure it shows any fundamental male traits at play. And, arguably, the school itself may err too much in a gender-neutral approach, hence the enthusiastic take-up of a release form it.
Then again, maybe you're just one of the exceptions CMP keeps saying egals are. ;~)

[#John1453]

I wouldn't say that all the egals on CMP's blog are minimizing the differences between the sexes per se. They are, however, minimizing them as being significant in relation to certain roles, such as leadership roles. Furthermore, and here is where CMP has done a disservice to his readership, they are dealing with a thread where the lead has redefined terms that are well known in the debate and literature. That is, he has defined them in terms that equate sex with North American gender and, more importantly, that define egalitarians exclusively as those who minimize or dismiss sex differences.

The redefinition is neither accurate nor helpful, but the complaints of egalitarians have been ignored; instead CMP coopts their position by defining anyone that recognizes any sex or gender differences as "complementarian". The consequence is that the egalitarian argument is forced into a mould not of its own making, and those who are not careful in their arguments get sucked in.

When I first started reading CMP's two blogs on this issue, I was on the fence on the issue, though I had read far more "complementarian" material than "egalitarian". I have moved significantly in the direction of egalitarian specifically because of the posts and my reflection upon and further reading of relevant material.

One particular issue that has become apparent to me is that "complementarian" is a complete misnomer, and serves no purpose other than to attach a positive label to the movement. There is nothing at all complementarian about that position. A complementarian position would have a number of roles or areas of life or responsibility divided up between men and women, such that men would need women to do what is not reserved to men and vice versa. That is not the case, though. All of life and roles and responsibilities is made open to men, whereas women are excluded from (at least) two areas that are reserved exclusively to men: leadership in the church, leadership in the home. The only area "reserved" to women is childbearing, which is obviously a physical impossibility for men. There is no dividing up areas of life between the sexes; men get it all, and women get two less things.

So-called "complementarianism" is really "hierarchism" or "subordinationism". Now, perhaps Biblically they can make an argument for that, perhaps not, but at least they should be honest and clear about it.

regards,
#John1453

[JohnFH]

JohnO,

You so miss the point. How long will you folks go on pointing out that gender-based differences are not absolutes but come in bell-shaped curves and other Bayesian entities? Of course they do!

That doesn't make such differences less important, less constitutive of culture and life, less wonderful, or less valuable as points of leverage in accomplishing positive change.

Social scientists have no problem thinking through these things. Some of them dedicate entire research lives to gender-based differences of various kinds. Whether they study geese or chimps or homo sapiens sapiens, they have no trouble describing typically male and typically female traits.

Egalitarianism need not be so ideological, so perversely incapable of thinking that some of the very most important facts of life can only be thought of in probabilistic terms.

I have no idea how to cure you of your black and white thinking.

I assume you are a believer in the Bible as the word of God. How do you square your black and white thinking with advice such as that found in Prov 13:24: "Whoever spares the rod hates his son"? Obviously, that role-specific advice is true if and only if all other things are equal, which they never are. Nonetheless this piece of advice, rightly understood, is perfectly trustworthy.

First of all, the advice has to be re-enculturated in a specific changed context, which means that I don't take a rod to my child, but I spank him (and sparingly). And if your subculture abstains from all corporal punishment whatsoever, then you time-out your kid as the occasion requires (so do I, far more often than spanking; I've spanked a half a dozen times total in my life as a father).

Secondly, not all kids respond appropriately to spanking, time-outs, whatever, irrespective of frequency, and if they do not, as a parent one is called upon to adjust, sometimes radically. In short, role-based advice, like gender-based advice, is only appropriate and trustworthy in a statistical sense.

That does not make it less important. Without realizing it perhaps, you end up advocating for a unisex world. No thank you.

My love of biology, ethology, and psychology makes me incapable of wanting a sterilized emasculated, de-feminized world. Not to mention the Bible, which says something about "male and female God created them."

We are wonderfully adaptable as human beings. As a male, I can learn to be a Mr. Mom and in some sense I gain from so learning. A single Mom or a single Dad, with God's help, can cover all the bases remarkably well. None of this changes the fact that the best-case scenario is a family with two parents, a mom and a dad, with a strong form of gender complementation modeled to the children, complementation unique to the specific mom and dad in some ways, and in other ways, utterly typical.

Keep at me if you still don't follow me.

[JohnFH]

#John1453,

Can you tell us what comp resources you have been reading? If you haven't already, try Gary Thomas or Emerson Eggerichs. Or try a non-egalitarian like Sarah Sumner or David Tracy. My guess is that you will see that is possible to be a complementarian or a non-egalitarian and have a positively nuanced take on the issues at hand.

I'm an egal, but I bristle inside when I see other egals arguing against hierarchy as if hierarchy and equality were incompatible. The opposite is the case. The terms and the realities they signify derive their creative power from the interplay and tension between them.

A workplace, a home, a marriage, a government, a church, all go adrift without domain-based hierarchies and clear lines of authority.

[JohnO]

Hi John,
Thanks for taking the time to reply and set me straight on what you are getting at.
I suspect we are simply arguing the same thing, just from two different viewpoints, because I agree with you and don't see how it's different from what I've said. :~)
Well, certainly not significantly different to what I think - maybe I simply haven't expressed it well enough on either blog.
I fully agree that there are gender differences and that they are what make life, and individuals, interesting. There are certainly traits that are more dominant in one gender than the other. Sometimes these traits are even complementary.
Where I think I'm headed (and others have expressed better than I have) is that in CMP's argument, gender-based differences have no bearing on whether a woman may fulfil a particular leadership role. They are not to be ignored, of course because they certainly affect how an individual performs in that role, but gender alone does not preclude women from it. I think the root of the error in CMP's argument was in defining leadership as a confrontational role. Essentially he was defining a role to suit a pre-conceived (or maybe real) idea of who should fill it, and thereby excluding others, in this case based on gender. Your issue of contextualisation then becomes highly relevant. It may well have been the case that, in that particular Christian community, it would have been entirely inappropriate for a woman to lead.
Anyway, it's getting late where I am and I've had a busy day, so I'm not sure my brain's functioning well enough to engage effectively with the subtleties of this at the moment.

[#John1453]

I was careful, though not explicitly clear, to argue in a way that wasn't opposed to authority or hierarchy simpliciter. I am, as obvious from my posts on CMP's site, opposed to the notion that sex determines available roles, or that one can derive an "ought" from an "is" (i.e., there are sex differences therefore we should have role differences).

Despite CMP's simplistic and pejorative dismissal of the research I cited, contemporary studies of leadership have demonstrated that women are just as effective leaders as men, and sometimes more so--though the leadership styles or approaches of women and men are different.

In the church, therefore, this means that though authority and hierarchy is appropriate (but relatively flat: Jesus, priests who are teachers / elders, the other priests), either men or women can occupy the role of authority.

Marriage can, and should, function well without a domain based hierarchy or clear line of authority. Except for sin, there is no reason at all that is sufficient to require a "tie-breaker" by a man.

As for subordinationism literature, I did read stuff in college, and since then nearly everything that is on the CBMW web site.

regards,
#John1453

[JohnFH]

#John1453,

CBMW is a movement, the mirror image of CBE. They fund raise based on their mutually opposing antipathies, and express themselves accordingly. Like the Democrat and Republican political parties in the US, they are vast left-wing and right-wing conspiracies which major, not in what matters most to me, what works for the people I minister to and with, but in social planning. There is a place for this. Probably from both directions. But that is not my focus here, except perhaps to insist that there is place for it from both directions.

For the rest, I disagree with many of your statements. They need qualification. For example:

"In the church . . . authority and hierarchy is appropriate . . . either men or women can occupy the role of authority."

But if the tradition in which one lives and moves has habitually allowed men only to occupy some roles and women, others, with the degree and type of authority the roles in question entails, on what grounds does one throw the old habits in the waste basket. How does a "can" become a "should"?

At the very least, caution is in order.

On the other hand, I agree completely that "there is no reason at all that it is sufficient to require a tie-breaker by a man."

To require tie-breaking by a man (or a woman) outside of the context of the golden rule, better yet, the new commandment (love one another *as I have loved you*) is a recipe for oppression.

[JohnFH]

JohnO,

Thanks for the conversation. I bet we can learn from each other.

[Marilyn]

John1453, I see the Bible as saying much more about how husband and wife are to relate than the activities they are to engage in. This is the emphasis of Emerson Eggerichs’ book, Love And Respect. It is also the emphasis of Covenant Theological Seminary President Bryan Chappell’s book, Each For The Other. Both are to be productive. Both play important roles in their children’s lives.

JohnFH, are you willing to say more?

Gender studies by folks like Michael Gurian or Carol Gilligan immediately come to mind. To grossly simplify nuanced arguments, men emphasize rules over relationship while women focus on the relationship over the rules. This is not unrelated to Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen’s male dominion degenerating into domination and female sociability degenerating into social enmeshment as a result of the Fall. (Mary SVL then asserts egalitarianism should result, but – at least in my opinion – doesn’t do the math to support that conclusion.)

Perhaps two possible positions are implied? One view would suggest that the rules establish the boundaries within which relationship occurs? A second position would envision an a more dynamic relationship between the rules and relationship folks?

Just rambling - is this at all where you’re headed?

BTW, thanks for fessing up to a wee bit of spanking. Like many new parents, we initially resolved never to spank. That commitment fell by the wayside one night when our then-toddler son refused to sit in the time-out chair. Ten minutes turned into twenty minutes, which turned into thirty minutes. We (correctly, I believe) perceived that this was a defining moment and that we needed to establish our authority. We spanked, and our son complied.

The next day at work, I approached a colleague who committed to never spanking his triplets, who were about a year older than my son. I shared my story, and asked him what he and has wife did in situations like this. He explained that they had successfully dealt with exactly our situation. They forcibly restrained their son in a car seat until he expressed a verbal willingness to stay in the time-out chair. My colleague also confessed that at least as much force was required to confine a resistant child to a car seat as to spank that child. But, the “no spanking”principle had been upheld.

[JohnFH]

Thoughtful questions, Marilyn, which I will have to think about more.

It would be a worthwhile project to put together in a single synthesis the insights of Gurian, Gilligan, and Mary SVL, to which one might add John Gottman.

Spanking is a controversial subject, and rightfully so. But I think the question deserves to be re-examined (without imagining that everyone can or should follow the exact same rules).

Based on observation and experience, the first thing that comes to mind is that fathers should never raise their voice with small children. I think mothers need to be careful about this as well. A firm spanking done with a gentle voice is probably more constructive than a verbal whipping without a spank.

With teenagers, a good tongue lashing is sometimes appropriate, but even then, what I notice is that I do it so infrequently that I leave my teenage son (momentarily) speechless and my teenage daughter (momentarily) in tears.

From there, the exit strategy has to match the entrance strategy. With my son I wait in silence but with full attention. With my daughter I myself go into tears.

[Ahavah-Shimeon]

"Gender differences, I’m convinced, matter very much."

Thank you so much for posting this! You are one of the brightest stars amongst the myriads of dullness that exist in the blogging world.

As a driving school teacher of both sexes and all ages, I understand completely where you coming from. As a 'teacher' I knew the goal we had to achieve but the route for each individual was entirely unique but understanding the basic male/female learning capabilities was the key to a successful outcome.

I came to the conclusion a very long time ago that the 'church' (generic term for all denominations/faiths/belief systems) was a much, much sadder and emptier place without the counsel and ministrations of women amongst their leaders, elders and pastors.

[#John1453]

RE: Posted by: JohnFH | February 19, 2010 at 05:18 PM

I suggest that one moves from male only pastors to including female pastors the way that Paul the apostle suggests adn the way that the Anglican and other church organizations have: by using the existing authority structures. The wrong way is to do what some women Catholics have done, which is to ignore the existing structure and to hold their own ceremonies and declare themselves priests.

Being christlike is more important than being a head pastor, or allowing female head pastors. However, as Paul says, if one can obtain freedom and female head pastors then by all means.

regards,
#John

[scott gray]

john--

cmp, in asking his questions with no context whatsoever, is getting ready to move the goalposts all over the field and then change the game entirely. the questions are always asked within the context of a heritage and world view, such as 'how do you raise your children to be christian, american, global citizens, or whatever. my suspicions are that he will restore heritage standards and markers when it suits him.

there's also a lot of 'as if' going on here. (http://thepietythatliesbetween.blogspot.com/2010/01/belief-in-search-of-evidence.html) each of us uses 'as if' as reitan describes it here, the comments are full of it. i suspect cmp will fuss with the 'as ifs' of others, then present his own 'as ifs' as if his held a higher authority of some sort (historical validation, reason, scripture, or whatever).

we'll see.

the questions he asks can't seriously be played with fairly or honestly outside of a heritage or context.

scott

[JohnFH]

Ahava-Shimeon,

I make an effort to formulate my thoughts in such a way that Jews and Christians across a wide spectrum can follow along without feeling marginalized. I don't always succeed. You are a gifted reader if you can read this conversation among Christians and relate it so seamlessly to your own context.

#John,

That's a fine point. As soon as the question of traditionalism vs. complementarianism vs. egalitarianism is made first and foremost a justice issue - this applies also to the question of women in the pastorate - the debate is impoverished and, at least in my experience, becomes a "law" debate rather than a "gospel" debate. A "gospel" debate is more helpful and more instructive, it seems to me.

Scott,

You are right to emphasize the importance of heritage and context. And CMP is welcome to stand on tradition via scripture as much as he wants. But he can also be encouraged to be more than a Bible deist or a Church History deist, if you understand these terms. I think he already has moved beyond those crotchedy and mildewed schema. Peter Kirk has an old post up on the topic:

http://www.gentlewisdom.org.uk/?p=60

[C. Michael Patton]

I really like your stuff John. We may not come to the same conclusions, but I think, unlike so many other when it comes to these issues, we are both arguing from outsite our respective tradtional boxes. This, I appreciate much. (Always have about you!)

[C. Michael Patton]

(Although, I am wondering if we are getting ready to come to the same conclusions! Hair's breadth.)

[Susan]

Sometimes my main frustration with these discussions is that it seems that the majority of it centers around whether a woman is as capable of leading as a man....and we can agree that they are....so then the conclusion is that women should be permitted to take on any and all pastoral and home headship roles. I really think that the essence of the conversation should always be focused on trying to bow to God's authority and how He has established lines of authority, as laid out in His word. Why is it that generally speaking God's word isn't given the priority trump in all arguments? And, the truth remains that traditionally, through the centuries, this issue wasn't debated, but rather both genders accepted the straight-forward reading of the text. As there has been a cultural shift in the past century...everything has changed, so we are then to try to see God's word differently to fit what seems right to us now? I don't think that it is oppressive to women to have male headship in the home/ nor to be excluded for top pastoral positions. Just because some stupid husbands use their 'God given position' to sinfully domineer their wives is not a reason to throw our the God ordained order. I'm sure their are plenty of men who claim to be egalitarians who are equally guilty of this sort of behavior....because they are sinners too. Some men are just naturally bossy and controlling (as are some women).

I realize that there are plenty of Bible scholars who have (in the past 40 years or so) worked hard to demonstrate from scripture that saying women are excluded from any and all headship is not scriptural. Dan Wallace, being one of the top five Greek grammarians in the word says that one has to do an awful lot of 'exegetical gymnastics' to come to the egalitarian position....although I think I know his thought on the subject enough to call him a 'soft complementarian'. To me, the MOST IMPORTANT issue is that we seek to know GOD'S intent, and that we humbly bow to that even if it doesn't always fit how we would arrange things if we we God. I fail to see this as an issue of oppression, and it bothers me that some always make it out to be that. I don't feel oppressed by my husbands headship...unless he abuses that position (which is sin)...not God's intent. I've been asked (in my complementarian church, to teach a mixed gender adult class....but I will never be asked to be a pastor. I'm totally OK with that. I don't see any oppression in women being excluded from that role. God has reasons, and I might not understand them 100%, but I know that He is a loving creator.

Furthermore, I do wonder what you and your wife do when you totally disagree and a decision has to be made. This situation does sometimes arise in our home... How do you decide who makes the final call?

[Marilyn]

Agreed. The synthesis would be very helpful. Oh, for the time to take on that project . . .

[JohnFH]

Michael,

I think we are close on this one, and a lot of other things. I trust we can continue to model conversation that is not afraid to find common ground where it effectively exists, not afraid to differ on non-essentials, and therefore not afraid to make judgment calls about what is essential and what isn't.

Susan,

It's nice to have a complementarian woman with gifts of teaching in a context that allows her to use them on this thread.

It stands to reason that Christians will differ on whether women should be in the pastorate. On the one hand, the evidence is clear that women were not allowed to be presbyters (pastors, roughly) in NT times. In fact it is hard to see how that would have worked in that cultural context. The exclusion of women from that role in the NT will always be for a part of the church reason enough to keep the exclusion in place. The burden of proof is on that part of the church that thinks that it can work in our context. I think the pastoral ministry of a female versus a male has or can have a different chemistry about it. There are unique opportunities and dangers in both. How often I have seen a nun in a parish be the counterpart of a priest in this sense. In a Protestant congregation, it may be the church secretary or it may be a lay leader who complements the pastoral ministry of a male. Even more often, it has been the pastor's wife (it works the same way in a synagogue; the rabbi's wife has been a crucial figure). It used to be (much has changed now, some for the good, some for the bad) that a smart Pastor-Parish relations committee would lay out its pastoral needs to the District Superintendent more in terms of the pastor's wife than of the pastor himself! Now that's thinking! In my wife's congregation, she works side by side with a very strong group of predominantly male (but also female) lay leaders and yes, they practice mutual submission. These are the things that matter most. That is, neither of us is interested in monarchical model of pastoral leadership though both of us know when the buck stops here.

A friend of mine who is a Roman Catholic chaplain on a university campus was allowed to preach for years during Mass, even thought she is of course not a priest and therefore could not do so, strictly speaking. But she did, and she blessed audiences of several hundred students on a regular basis with strongly scriptural preaching.

With a change of bishops, however, the anomaly was corrected. This was hard on her, but her parish creatively expanded the ways she carried out her teaching ministry outside of Mass, without creating confusion in the sense of supplanting what needs to be the task of a presbyter in the Roman Catholic tradition. Her own commitment to evangelical Catholicism is expressed here:

http://www.evangelicalcatholic.com/college-conversion-project/campus-ministry-stories/harvard-catholic-student-center

The first rule, in a marriage, in a congregation: do not quench the Spirit. At the same time: let everything be done in good order. Whether a marriage or the configuration of a congregation is traditional, neo-traditional, or egalitarian - let's be honest and recognize that every marriage and every congregational configuration, unless it is dead as a doornail, contains elements of all three in 21st century North America - is not a deal-breaker in the Gospel sense. At least I don't think so. I'm more interested in deal-makers: the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit.

[ScottL]

Thanks for the thoughts. This is such a topic of debate. It used to be Calvinism-Arminiasm. In today's culture, it's complementarian-egalitarian. I don't like the term egalitarian, as it has so much baggage and can usually be connected to feminism in people's minds. I know terms can help us understand things more, but, while I have egalitarian leanings, I generally try and stay away from that word.

I also believe that we must recognise the innate differences between male and female. There's nothing wrong with it. This is why I have liked books by John Eldredge. Some think he is over the top (even theologically). But I believe he has some good insights into the male life (and his wife into the female life).

I think CMP gets it wrong to believe that if we are willing to recognise such differences between male and female, then this shuts the door to allowing women leading roles over men. I am glad that I am different than my wife (and most every other female). It allows me to complement her and her to complement me.

Ok, enough from me. Thanks again.

[Gary Simmons]

This topic truly does turn into a veritable crusade. Sometimes, I wonder if people become such crusader-martyrs for no greater purpose than to have some sense of direction in life. Ouch -- I wonder if that applies to my push for pacifism...?

About this particular debate, I wonder if the fact that there is a debate is itself indicative of the "thorns and thistles."

@Scott: When I hear/read a female self-identify as egalitarian, feminism comes to mind. Not so much when males use the word, although it still comes to my mind as an associated train of thought. You are wise to use a different term.

[JohnFH]

I am happy to self-identify as an egalitarian, but I am not a caped crusader for egalitarianism. Like any cultural framework, egalism has strengths and weaknesses.

The notion that egalism and compism are not cultures of repression in the positive sense (Freud noted that culture is, in the first instance, a system of repression of natural instincts) is ludicrous.

Nature is an alternative to culture, something the Bloodhouse Gang understands well: "Do it now. You and me baby we ain't nothin' but mammals. So let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel. Do it again now."

If I obeyed my "nature," I would be a sexual omnivore, committed to copulation outside the bounds of the slavery of an exclusive relationship and with no necessary commitment to nurturing the fruits of copulation.

It is also important for there to be movements that break out of the usual ideological boxes. Such as "Feminists for Life," - Sarah Palin is an example.

[Gary Simmons]

I've heard of Feminists for Life. I've also heard that Susan B. Anthony was pro-life, which is rather interesting.

Your points about culture are well said, John. And since you have laid out your view on things, self-identifying as an egalitarian doesn't (or, shouldn't) lead someone to jump to conclusions.

And I'm not saying that all major players on either side are such caped crusaders; I'm just trying to come up with an explanation for why a few of the more outspoken are closed to any constructive dialogue.

[Marilyn]

Although not addressing the comp-egal debate per se, Tim Keller writes convincingly of our tendency to turn ideologies into idols (See, e.g., Counterfeit Gods, pp. 104-106). When we forget that our ideology is only a partial explanation of how the world works, we come to depend on it rather than on God. I think that’s one reason why some folks aren’t willing to talk.