Women who don't submit to husbands are to blame for domestic violence, says Baptist scholar

One reason that men abuse their wives is because women rebel against their husband's God-given authority, a Southern Baptist scholar said in a Texas church recently.

Bruce Ware, professor of Christian theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, said women desire to have their own way instead of submitting to their husbands because of sin.

"And husbands on their parts, because they're sinners, now respond to that threat to their authority either by being abusive, which is of course one of the ways men can respond when their authority is challenged--or, more commonly, to become passive, acquiescent, and simply not asserting the leadership they ought to as men in their homes and in churches," Ware said from the pulpit of Denton Bible Church in Denton, Texas.

Ware said God created men and women equally in God's image but for different roles.

"He has primary responsibility for the work and the labor and the toil that will provide for the family, that will sustain their family," he said. "He's the one in charge of leadership in the family, and that will become difficult, because of sin."

"...A woman will demonstrate that she is in fact a Christian, that she has submitted to God's ways by affirming and embracing her God-designed identity as--for the most part, generally this is true--as wife and mother, rather than chafing against it, rather than bucking against it, rather than wanting to be a man, wanting to be in a man's position, wanting to teach and exercise authority over men,"

Oh. My. God. (Or not, as the case may be). Like we needed any more reasons to scorn and revile southern American right-wing religious types. Why doesn't this stuff make the headlines more often? How can Christians tell Muslims (and they do, often) that some elements of Islam treat women unfairly? Are enough loons out there taking this crap seriously for it to be a serious social and political issue?