Losing My Religion for Equality - Jimmy Carter
President Jimmy Carter has an article in Australiaās The Age newspaper on why he left the Southern Baptist Convention.
To be clear, Mr. Carter has not abandoned his faith. He, along with a number of influential people in many of the worldās major religions, are banding together to call for the end of religious teaching encouraging misogyny.
The article begins (the rest at The Age):
Women and girls have been discriminated against for too long in a twisted interpretation of the word of God.
I HAVE been a practising Christian all my life and a deacon and Bible teacher for many years. My faith is a source of strength and comfort to me, as religious beliefs are to hundreds of millions of people around the world. So my decision to sever my ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, after six decades, was painful and difficult. It was, however, an unavoidable decision when the conventionās leaders, quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be āsubservientā to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service.