I came across a new concept in fundamentalism recently: the feminization of worship. Being a woman, my first thought upon seeing the phrase was, What on earth could this possibly refer to? In my mind, saying there are masculine and feminine ways of worshiping God is like saying there are masculine and feminine ways of building a doghouse. All worship is the same. Isn’t it?

Well, I thought so. So I decided to look into it. Here’s what I found:

Your worship service and church community might be effeminate if . . .

– Your music and sermons almost never contain references to judgment, wrath, battles, enemies, Hell, the devil, or apostasy.

– Your music minister is more concerned that the choir trills their r’s correctly than that they fill the sanctuary with loud sounds of battle.

– One of the ministerial staff has taken to wearing a clerical collar and a powder pink shirt, and no one on the session has the courage to tell him that he looks like a thirteen-year-old boy with rosy cheeks, as painted by Norman Rockwell.

– The worship team gravitates toward “Jesus is my girlfriend” songs, and their facial expressions while up front are those of guys in the backseats of their cars, having just gotten to second base with their actual girlfriends.

– The sermons rarely deal with sin or, if they do, they deal with sins found outside the sanctuary, preferably those of secularists in Hollywood somewhere.

– The church does not practice church discipline, and not because everybody in the church is behaving. They won’t practice it because the elders are misbehaving. Continue reading →