| WASHINGTON
- March 2 - This
weekend the Christian Coalition is convening its first-ever national
conference aimed at women. Titled "Women Changing America,"
the event takes place in Arlington, Va., March 3-4.
In
promotional materials sent out in advance of the conference, Christian
Coalition Executive Vice President Roberta Combs writes that the event
"will attract speakers and guest [sic] from across the nation who
are concerned about America's moral climate and are ready to become
involved in making a difference in America's future."
Although
men are not barred from attending the conference, all of the listed
speakers are women, and session titles include "The Role of the
Retired Woman in Politics," "Women in the 20th Century
Conservative Movement" and "A Woman's Voice in Local
Politics."
Observes
Combs, "While the last decade gave way to immoral leadership and
open sin throughout much of America's society, a mobilized effort from
Christians at the polls could create a positive change in this new
decade for a return to righteousness across the country. I am sure you
can share my concern for young families struggling to fight the evil
pervading our society. This conference is the tool many women seek to
learn how to protect their families, schools and neighborhoods from
the violence, immorality and spiritual dangers that lurk in many
American communities. As women unite in one purpose at this
conference, an army of dedicated workers, impassioned and prepared for
battle, will be formed to lift up their voices in government
again."
The
Christian Coalition seems to be undertaking a deliberate outreach to
women. At the same time, there are signs that some other Religious
Right groups are doing the same. What is behind this effort, and why
is it happening now? Do American women agree with the Religious Right,
and are their interests best served by organizations like the
Christian Coalition?
This
special report prepared by Americans United for Separation of Church
and State examines these and other questions.
Wooing
Women: What's Behind The Coalition's New Drive
Despite
its claims to be "non-partisan," the Christian Coalition is
in fact a far-right organization that works to elect the most
conservative candidates possible to public office. Through
distribution of biased voter guides and other forms of partisan
activity, the Coalition seeks to influence the political system, stack
national, state and local offices with its followers and change U.S.
laws on many issues.
Given
this, nearly every activity the Coalition undertakes has a political
dimension. In the case of the "Women Changing America"
conference, the political angle is easy to understand: Polling data
shows that women are generally more liberal than men. In fact, women
voters helped propel President Bill Clinton to victory in 1992 and
1996, opening up a so-called "gender gap" that conservatives
have been trying to close ever since. Additionally, many of the drives
to keep abortion legal, make access to contraceptives convenient and
win a place for sex education in the public schools have been led by
women.
But
Religious Right strategists believe the political winds may be
shifting and seem eager to seize the opportunity. Last year the
liberal Center for Gender Equality issued a poll indicating that a
slight majority of American women favor greatly restricting access to
abortion or outlawing it entirely and that 36 percent agree that
"wives should submit graciously to their husbands." The poll
also found that twice as many women believe the Christian Coalition
works "in the interest of women" than think it is a threat.
The
survey's startling findings have been questioned. Other polls have not
shown a majority of women adopting anti-choice views on abortion or
taking positions in sympathy with the Religious Right. A survey of
women by the website www.iVillage.com taken last November, for
example, found that only 4 percent of the respondents said they
consider themselves part of the Religious Right.
Nevertheless,
Religious Right leaders were quick to trumpet the results of the
Center for Gender Equality poll. Randy Tate, then executive director
of the Coalition, said the findings prove his group is mainstream.
Other Religious Right activists made the results into large,
poster-sized charts that they displayed at national meetings.
It's
also worth noting that in working to mobilize more women, the
Coalition is merely taking advantage of an untapped resource. A survey
undertaken by the organization six years ago showed that 48 percent of
the group's membership is female. Although throughout most of its
11-year existence the Coalition was led by men, in recent months the
groups has undergone a leadership crisis, and most of the top staff
has departed. Robertson's chief Coalition lieutenant is now Combs, a
South Carolina activist who serves as executive vice president.
It's
also worth noting that women have long been active in Religious Right
groups. Singer Anita Bryant ushered in the modern era of Religious
Right gay bashing in the 1970s, and about the same time Phyllis
Schlafly's Eagle Forum shifted from rabid anti-Communism to an effort
to beat back the Equal Rights Amendment. In the 1980s, Beverly LaHaye
founded Concerned Women for America, a Washington, D.C.-based
Religious Right group that likes to call itself the largest women's
organization in the country.
More
recently, when Gary Bauer stepped down from the Family Research
Council last year to run for president, he named right-wing radio talk
show host Janet Parshall as the FRC's chief spokesperson. Janet Folger,
an anti-abortion activist from Ohio, now runs TV preacher D. James
Kennedy's Center for Reclaiming America in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. Even
TV preacher Pat Robertson's wife, Adelia, has been getting in on the
act lately. Adelia Robertson, who usually goes by the name "Dede,"
spoke at last year's Christian Coalition "Road to Victory"
Conference and is slated to address this month's "Women Changing
America Conference."
In
His Own Words: Robertson's View Of Women
Some
might consider Robertson's outreach to women ironic, given his long
track record of anti-women rhetoric. Robertson, a Southern Baptist who
practices a Pentecostal theology, has long advocated the
fundamentalist view that women are required by the Bible to submit to
men. He believes that in a marriage, the husband is to rule and has
stated that women have no right to take a leadership role in churches.
In addition, Robertson has endorsed the Promise Keepers, an
evangelical men's group known for its promotion of wifely submission.
Over
the years Robertson has unleashed a string of attacks on women's
rights and feminism. He has also argued that wives must submit to
their husbands. A sampling of Robertson's comments on women follows:
*
On his nationally televised "700 Club" television program,
Robertson has repeatedly stressed the theme of wifely submission. On
Jan. 8, 1982, he said, "I know that this is painful for you
ladies to hear, but if you get married, you accept the headship of a
man, your husband. Christ if the head of the household, and the
husband is the head of the wife. And that's just the way it is. This
is the way the Bible set it up."
*
Speaking on the "700 Club" Nov. 28, 1989, Robertson
dismissed feminism, strongly implying that women just aren't as smart
as men. He cited chess as the proof for this idea, saying,
"There's never been a woman grand master chess player. And if,
you know, once you get one, then I'll buy into some of the feminism,
but until that point...." (In fact, there were two women chess
grand masters when Robertson made that comment; since then, at least
three others have joined their ranks.)
*
In his 1984 book Answers to 200 of Life's Most Probing Questions,
Robertson writes that the Bible mandates that women refrain from
becoming religious leaders. He asserts that women can work in other
occupations but insists, "in the government of the family and the
church, men are to be the leaders. These two institutions are a type
of God's universal fatherhood that must be adhered to."
*
In his 1993 book The Turning Tide Robertson writes, "[T]he
ultimate spiritual direction for the family is to come from God
through the husband. The wife is to recognize her husband's role and
submit to his wisdom in matters where there may be disagreement."
He goes on to write, "[T]he radical women's movement of the 1960s
and 1970s has not been geared for reform, but destruction. It has
turned fanatical and ugly. These women launched programs that were
anti-God, anti-capitalism, anti-family, anti-birth and
anti-heterosexual....This movement was not about women's rights, it
was about virulent hatred against anything having to do with
males."
*
On July 6, 1995, Robertson, speaking on the "700 Club,"
argued that husbands do their wives a favor by keeping them in
submission. "[T]he woman should be in submission to the man as
under the Lord...," he said. "People who speak the biblical
truth are reviled and ridiculed.... What woman wouldn't want a man who
was willing to die for her? What woman wouldn't want a man who puts
her interests ahead of his? What woman wouldn't want a man who was
willing to do anything possible to bless her and cherish her and
nurture her and look after her? In those circumstances, wouldn't the
woman be delighted to say, 'I acknowledge your headship because God is
head of you and together we are one flesh?'"
*
Robertson's most bizarre -- and perhaps most offensive -- comment
about women's rights occurred in 1992, when his Christian Coalition
was busy trying to defeat a state Equal Rights Amendment in Iowa. In a
fund-raising letter, Robertson wrote, "The feminist agenda is not
about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family
political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill
their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become
lesbians."
*
Robertson defended the Southern Baptist Convention after it approved a
controversial resolution on women in June of 1998. The SBC statement
reads in part, “A husband is to love his wife as Christ loved the
church. He has the God-given responsibility to provide for, to
protect, and to lead his family. A wife is to submit herself
graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church
willingly submits to the leadership of Christ. She, being in the image
of God as is her husband and thus equal to him, has the God-given
responsibility to respect her husband and to serve as his helper in
managing the household and nurturing the next generation....
Wives...were created to be 'helpers' to their husbands. A wife's
submission to her husband does not decrease her worth but rather
enhances her value to her husband and to the Lord."
Robertson's
Views: Out Of Step With Women's Concerns
Polls
show that most women are concerned about issues like strengthening
public education, improving access to health care and finding
affordable child care. The Christian Coalition constantly bashes
public education and promotes private school voucher schemes.
Reforming the health care system and increasing access to quality,
affordable child care have not been on the Coalition's radar screen,
but given Robertson's well known antipathy toward government programs,
it's a safe bet he would oppose greater government involvement in both
areas.
Many
women are also concerned about keeping abortion safe and legal.
Robertson and the Coalition have worked to undermine this principle in
state after state. Some of Robertson's harshest, most extreme rhetoric
is aimed at legal abortion. He has several times compared legal
abortion to the Nazi Holocaust. Speaking to Coalition activists in
1995 during the annual "Road to Victory" meeting in
Washington, for example, Robertson said that by the year 2000 seven
times as many "innocent people" will have been killed
through abortion in America than perished in the Holocaust. He called
for a constitutional amendment or "whatever it takes" to
stop legal abortion.
In
recent years, Robertson has even stepped up his opposition to birth
control. Addressing attendees of a Christian Coalition meeting in
Atlanta in September of 1997, Robertson blasted Griswold v.
Connecticut, a landmark 1965 ruling by the Supreme Court that
struck down a state law that banned contraceptives for anyone -- even
married couples. The reasoning behind Griswold, Robertson told
the crowd, "was made up out of whole cloth." Said Robertson
of the ruling, "I want to see it abolished."
Robertson
is also a supporter of diverting tax money to religious groups to
provide social services. Many critics believe that the Religious Right
would like to shift social service spending to sectarian agencies for
the short term, with the larger goal of getting government out of the
job of providing these services at all. Robertson, for example, has
derided the various government programs that were created in the 1960s
as "wasteful."
Women
may have a special reason to be concerned about the shift of social
services from the public to the religious sector. Statistically
speaking, most single-parent households are headed by women. Many of
these households live at or below the poverty line. Since these types
of households are the ones most likely to need social services, they
will bear the brunt if problems arise once these services are shifted
from the public sector to religious organizations.
Robertson's
Attacks on Public Education
National
polls show that women voters place a higher premium on the issue of
education than men voters. Two years ago, a poll by the American
Association of University Women found that the vast majority of women
favor more federal involvement in education and oppose diverting tax
dollars to religious schools.
Only
29 percent of the women surveyed favored voucher plans to fund private
education. Sixty-six percent opposed such plans and said that public
money should go only to public schools.
Robertson
has repeatedly blasted federal involvement in education and strongly
promotes voucher plans. In his 1993 book The Turning Tide,
Robertson conceded that voucher plans may spell the end of public
education but went to write, "So what? For all we've been getting
for our tax dollars out of the public schools, they should have
disappeared years ago."
Conclusion:
The Christian Coalition--No Friend of Women
Time
after time, the Christian Coalition's agenda fails to match the needs
and wants of American women. There's no doubt that the Christian
Coalition is trying to bring more women into its fold, but women
should reject the overture.
"The
Religious Right has a basic contempt for the progress women have made
over the past century," says the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive
director of Americans United. "Its policies, if adopted, would
return women to a time when their choices were limited and many of
their personal decisions were made by someone else. There is simply no
way you can call an agenda like that 'pro-woman.'"
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