Churchwoman

“ So long as ministers stand up and tell us that as Christ is the head of the church, so is man the head of the woman, how are we to break the chains which have held women down through the ages? You Christian women can look at the Hindoo, the Turkish, the Mormon women, and wonder how they can be held in such bondage. Observe to-day the work women are doing for the churches. The church rests on the shoulders of women. Have we ever yet heard a man preach a sermon from Genesis i:27-28, which declares the full equality of the feminine and masculine element in the Godhead? ”

“ It is good to see honourable women devout, and well affected to religious worship: The less they have to do in the world, the more they should do for their souls, and the more time they should spend in communion with God; but it is sad when, under colour of devotion to God, they conceive an enmity to Christ, as those here mentioned. What! women persecutors! Can they forget the tenderness and compassion of their sex? What! honourable women! Can they thus stain their honour, and disgrace themselves, and do so mean a thing? ”

“ But when we reach the humbler levels of institution and doctrine, the religious genius of womanhood tends to be pushed, so to say, into an oblique relationship. Under organized Christianity, and particularly under Protestantism, has this been so. Amongst the first Christians, it is true, women preached and prophesied. There is, moreover, in the history of the early centuries sound evidence of an ordained and invested female clergy. ”

“ To quote from Good Words, for 1860: “Wherever there has been any purity, any zeal, any activity, any prosperity in the Church of Christ, there woman’s presence and aid, as ‘a help meet for’ the other sex, while they have been bearing the heat and burden of the day, will be found no unimportant element. It is so at this day in an eminent degree. Nor do I at all doubt that in the Church’s further efforts to carry the gospel into all lands, and get for their Lord the sceptre of the world, the spirit and mind of our Galilean women will be more and more seen stamped upon Christian womanhood.” ”

“ Remember that on the day of your baptism you renounced the pomps and vanities of the world, and, if you are allowed to conform to customs not contrary to the maxims of the Gospel, you ought at the same time manifest in your dress, as in the rest, the glorious character that God has stamped in your soul. You should show by your conduct the striking contrast that exists between the Christian woman and the woman who, being incredulous or indifferent, does not draw her rule of life from the precepts of the Gospel. ”

“ I ought to understand them because my grandmother, mother, and all my female relations were women, and I am a woman myself, but I don't. For the most part women are good hearted creatures, but they fail in judgment when you strike them on religion. The true Christian woman believes in the infallibility of her preacher. He defines her sphere and duty and she proceeds to walk therein. Her sphere is silence and subjection, and her duty is to devise catch penny devices to bring in the shekels and lay them on the altar of the Lord. ”

“ Right there is where a woman can exercise the great power God has given unto her. What a blessing it is when the Lord gives to a woman children, boys and girls born heirs to the covenant, heirs to the holy priesthood, that they may grow up with natural rights to the blessings of the priesthood; to become servants of the Most High; to become vessels for the Holy Spirit to dwell in; to become representatives of the Lord upon the earth; to become ministers of salvation for the living and the dead! ”

“ We hear in sermons only of the meekness of Moses the faith of Abraham, the patience of Job, the strength of Samson, the wisdom of Solomon, the godliness of David, and so on through the chapters, but the clergy should proclaim the whole gospel of God as they are commanded to do by sermonizing on all the other peculiarities and propensities of Bible men and women who are held up as models for the human race.
It is taught that woman brought sin into the world and is at the bottom of all wrong doing in the world. ”

“ The fact is the only prop of Christianity today is the subjection of women. The whole system is like unto an elegant chariot, caparisoned, cushioned and curtained, wherein sit the councils, synods, conferences, priests and laymen, who with wise looks and sanctimonious air, hold their conclaves, and interpret to the women the "Word of God." ”

“ Before considering women’s part in the religious life of the country, it has to be remembered that their part in social life has been largely determined by the Church. For centuries the Church was,86 practically, the only civilizing influence, the only restraint upon passion and lawlessness, the only protection of the weak against the strong. ”

“ How much those who talk thus forget the history of the Church if they ever knew it, but also of feminine influence in the world, is very clear from even a short resume of feminine achievements in Christian times. Whenever there has been a great movement in the Church that meant much for the men and women of a time, beside the man who initiated it, if she was not, indeed, the initiator herself, stood a great woman only a little less significant in influence, as a rule, and sometimes even greater than he. ”

“ Two thirds of the Church of Christ are women. By the freer life and richer opportunity which you and I enjoy; by society’s growing tolerance, not to say its kindly appreciation, of our activities; by the heart transformed and the peace imparted through the gospel, the voice of our Redeemer pleads for our consecrated service. I would not undervalue the culture of the intellect, but would exalt the culture of the heart. ”

“ Yes, it is essentially the nature of woman’s religion, to seek to expand itself, pour itself out on some visible object. Hence has sprung the influence which, in every system, the clergy attained over the female world. ”

“ It was one of the cardinal articles of their belief.
“As we dare not encourage any ministry but that which we believe to spring from the influence of the Holy Spirit, so neither dare we to attempt to restrain this ministry to persons of any condition in life, or to the male sex alone; but as male and female are one in Christ, we hold it proper that such of the female sex as we believe to be endued with a right qualification for the ministry should exercise their gifts for the general edification of the Church.” ”

“ Every writer speaks of Christlikeness as the real crown and completeness of all womanly character. I have not space to quote the words of any letter. I may say only that Christ is not merely the ideal, the pattern, for every young woman to model her life upon, but that Christ is to be her Friend as well as her Saviour, her Master, her Helper. Mary, sitting at Christ's feet, is a loving picture which every young girl ought to keep framed in her heart. One letter sums up the ideal womanhood in these elements: "Trustfulness, hopefulness, joyfulness, peacefulness." ”

“ I think that many of our earnest, eloquent, high-minded, religious women should make for the pulpit. I have always felt that there was great point in the doctrine of the orthodox Church on the birth of Christ. We have a greater share in Him than men can have, as He received His humanity—His sweet, tender, suffering humanity—wholly from woman. ”

“ While the clergy, secular and regular, went among the adults, preaching, instructing, and baptizing, holy women were near at hand to pray for the success of their efforts, and to show, by their gentle charities and meek demeanor, the loveliness and beneficence of the Christian religion.
One of the greatest glories of the Catholic Church is that she, and she alone, freed woman from the grossest slavery, and placed her in her proper sphere of usefulness and influence. By the sacrament of marriage, woman was made the honored equal of man ”

“ It seems to me that the one thing we need is more consecrated women in our churches, women that have more love for their Master and for his cause, women that do not do this work from a sense of duty, but because they love their Lord and Saviour. ”

“ Here were these heathen women, who had never heard the name of Jesus, and knew no more about the creed and the theology of the Christian Church than they did about the differential calculus, fighting for their virtue and their sacred rights of womanhood, while there was that English Christian gentleman who probably had been taught to pray at his mother’s knee, and often rattled off the services in church, as I had seen him do, waiting in his tent, with his thoughts bent on lust. ”

“ The work of the missionary's wife and the unmarried woman, as teacher, not only of the Bible, but ever-thing that comes in the line of woman's work, makes woman's presence in all heathen lands, as a missionary, as indispensable as that of the minister of the Gospel. ”

“ Suppose a Catholic lady wishes to go to Mass, to confession, to devote a part of her time to meditation or charitable works? Does that necessarily interfere with the perfect fulfilment of all her duties toward her family and society? Is it any greater liberty than that which women generally expect to be conceded to them, and which they take at any rate, whether it is granted with a good or a bad grace? ”

“ Then, while we are pursuing our investigation, seeking light as to whether the work of God among His people is making progress, let us ask further as to our women. Are the leading women of our churches dead to the fashions of this world, separated from the world, not conformed to the world’s maxims and customs? Are they in behaviour as becometh holiness, teaching the young women by word and life the lessons of soberness, obedience, and home-keeping? Are our women noted for their praying habits? Are they patterns of prayer? ”

“ In the early days of the Church when its ministers were illiterate and humble, and her struggles with poverty and proscription were long and severe, and it required perseverance, and patience, and fortitude, and foresight, and labor, the women were ready, with their time, their talent, their influence and their money, to dedicate all to the upbuilding of the Church. No class of persons did more to solicit and bring in the people than they. ”

“ Independently of the disinterestedness, simplicity, and humility of woman's character, in all matters relating to religion, they naturally reverence and cling to those who show them respect and deference. The clergy, from understanding this point in their nature, possess great and deserved influence over them; and they have only to interest their feelings, to insure success to any clerical or charitable purpose. Look at a woman's zeal in foreign or domestic missions, not only devoting her time at home, but leaving her friends and her comforts, to assist in establishing them in a distant land. ”

“ From the beginning the Church was quick to recognize the value of women’s adherence, and the importance of the services which they could render. By raising women, the Church created a power for its own uses. And women were as quick to respond. They gave themselves freely. Whatever the Church has done for women has been repaid by them tenfold. Their labour, their property, their lives were placed at the disposal of the Church. They gave something more—their freedom of thought, their independence of action. Their minds, as well as their consciences, were in the keeping of the priest. ”

“ And since there are exalted women in the world who do not consecrate themselves to the church, I shall pray that you may find one of these to walk by your side through life. I shall pray that she may be worthy of you; and perhaps you will teach her sometimes to pray for one who will always need her prayers. ”

“ IT is one of the glittering fictions of the Church that to her civilization is due,* and that it is to her benign influence and direction alone that woman has been advanced to her present position in the social scale; that without the Bible and the Church the status of woman in Christian countries would be lower and her lot harder. ”

“ What a blessing was this! Better the sympathy of one noble soul, than the hosannas of thoughtless millions. It is clear from the New Testament, that in the Apostolic Church there was an order of women known as deaconesses, whose work was to minister to the necessities of the saints and to teach other women. We see no reason for the discontinuance of these officers. Those who think they are not needed now, see with very different eyes from us.
During the entire Christian era, the piety of woman has shone conspicuous. ”

“ But it was not only this desultory, unrecognised service, however frequent, however great, that women rendered to the spread of the Gospel in its earliest days. The Apostolic Church had its organised ministrations of women, its order of deaconesses, its order of widows. Women had their definite place in the ecclesiastical system of those early times, and in our own age and country again the awakened activity of the Church is once more demanding the recognition of the female ministry. ”

“ Instead of any further efforts in behalf of a pin-cushion ministry, I conjure my countrywomen to devote themselves from this hour to the education, elevation, and enfranchisement of their own sex. If the same amount of devotion and self-sacrifice could be given in this direction now poured out on the churches, another generation would give us a nobler type of womanhood than any yet molded by any Bishop, Priest, or Pope. ”

“ The eighteenth century, in its latter half, gave to the world two remarkable examples of the female apostle; and though but few vital memories of either survive, yet these women are worthy of place in this record for their singular, though limited and temporary, influence, and for the resemblance in certain ways, at least of one of them, to one of the most prominent feminine leaders in our own day. ”

“ Women have done everything from getting up a swell dinner to scrubbing the floor of the "meetin house," from singing an oratorio to dancing the Kan-Kan for the church, all for the blessed privilege of being instructed to take Bible women as their example and "remain in silence and obedience," when Bible women did nothing of the sort. ”