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CoffeePods
A series exploring Christian healing in a handy coffee-break sized podcast. Plug yourself in, pick up your mug of coffee, and let's go.
CoffeePods
Women Rising: Breaking Through Leadership Barriers
What would our world look like with more women in leadership? Could the answers to many global challenges be found in the voices we've systematically silenced? This thought-provoking exploration dives deep into the paradox of female leadership in a male-dominated world.
The conversation tackles the often-misunderstood concept of "feminizing" institutions like the church. Rather than representing a threat, what if female leadership offers precisely what our world desperately needs? As Kris suggests, "For men to feel threatened by the presence of women, instead of using energy to prohibit women... what we could do is just find a posture where we celebrate women and their gifts."
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Coffee Pods, a podcast of the Acorn Christian Healing Foundation Exploring what's happening in the world through the lens of Christian healing.
Speaker 2:We're back again, Chris, for another episode of Coffee Pods.
Speaker 1:Hello everyone, we're going to talk about women today, and mothers and girls and wives, and something that maybe I should shut up and listen for a change.
Speaker 2:We're not obsessed with women or anything like that. Why not?
Speaker 1:I think the world needs to be more obsessed with women, because I think the answer to many of the world's problems could be found in strong women in leadership. And maybe that makes me kind of going against the flow, but gosh, I do think that women in leadership could really help the world out at the moment. And, uh, um, so I thought, hey, let's, let's have podcasts and you and I talk about why I might think that, why you might think that, how you feel about it as a woman, and, um, maybe talk about the, the kind of ever-evolving roles of women in society yeah, because it's certainly shifted, hasn't it we?
Speaker 2:we've gone from sort of a model of what you would say, um, a female role would be, maybe the, the mum at home, the housewife and that sort of thing, whereas now we're living in a world where it's much more. You can do anything you want, um being a woman. But, like you did mention uh, we were talking earlier, weren't we? And we're just saying that we do live in quite a male dominated leadership of culture and the world.
Speaker 1:Yes, there's a kind of a talking head person from the United States, a guy named Charlie Kirk, who he has been doing a little tour here in Britain and managed to find his way into the teeth of the union societies at Oxford and Cambridge, and I think there's a video going around of him being mauled by a pretty articulate feminist who pretty much had him saying openly that he thought women should be having babies and back in the kitchen and that women were happy in the 60s.
Speaker 3:Feminism is the the glaring thing in front of us, where we have fertility rates down, we have marriage rates down, we have unhappiness up and we did something in the 1960s out of the universities and all these feminists that basically said you're trapped in a home, go get a job, freeze your eggs, take birth control and all of a sudden women are way unhappier than they were 40 years ago.
Speaker 1:And he literally was saying this in an audience which probably had 60% academic women listening. He got booed, she got clapped. It was quite stunning.
Speaker 3:So you're a feminist that actually isn't just fighting for women, you're also fighting for men.
Speaker 4:So, yes, yeah, men also experience harms from uh patriarchy. But I argue we're talking about the same feminism, though just make sure, yeah, sure, go ahead so men also experience harm from the patriarchal domination, but I would argue that those harms come from that system of domination itself in the same way. For example, this isn't a threat, but if I reached across and punched you in the face, then my hand might hurt to actually hear the the bit that's been silent.
Speaker 1:To hear it said out loud in a room.
Speaker 1:Because you're sitting there and I looked at the faces in the background of the debate and people were literally shuddering.
Speaker 1:He would say things which now, sadly, are quite mainstream in some parts of America, of America, in places where there's theocracies that you know men are in charge of, some of the countries in the world where religion is very male-centric and women are under the oppression of men and men's power.
Speaker 1:And in fact, I saw something on the BBC recently about Sharia law and how women have to ask permission for a divorce of a Sharia court and whatever they are tend to oppress women and they diminish the rights of women. So it's a you know, to be a progressive, strong, articulate woman is a you know you're actually a threat to some religions and some religious thinking. And so I guess what I want to do is to embrace Christianity, because Acorn Christian Healing Foundation's mission is about oldness and restoration, and that means really encouraging people to be fully who they are and who God created them to be, and that means, if you're a woman, to be fully a proud, wonderful, creative woman, using everything that God has given you to make the world better and not to say you have to fit into a world that diminishes who you are and who you want to be. So you know, I know roles of women have shifted and that sometimes people even use scripture as a way to justify the oppression.
Speaker 2:Um, but I think that we can actually use the bible as a way to inspire our understanding of a woman's place and in today's world before we go into that, uh, looking at some of the scriptures, I just wondered your thoughts on something, because I was talking to someone the other day and they said that they think we could be in danger of the church becoming feminized and anyone else essentially not being able to connect with it or feel included in it. I wondered what your thoughts are on that.
Speaker 1:For it to be feminized is a way of talking about a fear of women running the church Right. And so there's no one sitting around saying they're afraid it's going to be masculinized, because it always has been masculinized, because it always has been masculinized. And so this idea that the pendulum, which used to be so firmly in the male camp, is swinging towards women, I would say that if you're afraid of women in leadership, then what does that say about your faith in God? And why is it a perceived threat by you the thought of having a woman praying for you standing up front with a collar on? What is it about your faith that doesn't resonate with women in religious authority? And so there's always seems to be this undercurrent in society that tries to keep women out of power. And so to feminize the church is to say women are in power in the religious setting. And is that a bad thing or a good thing? Should we celebrate it or should we listen to it when people sit in circles and say, oh, my goodness, the women are taking over, the women are taking over. Well, basically, what's happening from my perspective?
Speaker 1:Men have been reluctant to engage in church life and women, on the other hand, who typically outlive men, are more engaged in church life, and so when more women are engaged, more women feel drawn into ministry, more women step up because less men are stepping up, and so what happens is, naturally, the culture shifts because of the absence of a male voice.
Speaker 1:The answer to the feminization of the church is for men to get involved, like they always were but aren't at the moment, Instead of feeling threatened by the presence of women, instead of using the energy to prohibit women which some churches are set to you know, we do not want women priests, we don't want women's ministry so they use all that energy to restrict women, and instead of, what we could do is just find a posture where we celebrate women and celebrate their gifts, and celebrate all their talents and all the wonderful things they bring, and join forces, because surely that's where the kingdom of God is going to be at its best, going to be at its best.
Speaker 1:So I think the idea of the feminization of the church, you know, in a way, is something to be celebrated, because I don't find it a threat. I just kind of hope that more men will step up, not because we need to take it back over from the women, but because the world needs balance and God needs men and women to model love and what it means to preach the kingdom of God in the church.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Yeah, that's really helpful, chris. And Galatians 3, I mean we'll look at a few different scriptures through this podcast but it says there's neither Jew nor Greek slave, nor free male nor female. Female for you are all one in Christ, and I think that highlights what you're just saying there, that we need that balance. But there is this I would say there is a consumption, sometimes even an obsession, around sex and gender, particularly in the days that we're in, and we we see that in the church, in the Christian community, don't we?
Speaker 1:Yes, and I think the Apostle Paul was writing to a very diverse society in that first century and everybody was living in their little silos and then he basically was like in their little silos and then he basically was like you know, they were getting mad because the idea that non-Jews could be Christians was radical, the idea that women could suddenly have some status and power in society. That put women down had this radical thinking and he basically was like our unity is in Jesus Christ. You know, in many ways when you come to the Jordan River to be baptized, you come out equal to everybody because we're all children of God. And then we get dried off from the waters of baptism and then we suddenly forget, we forget our unity and we start hating and judging and pointing fingers. And you know it goes right back to Genesis when God said that you know, I created them with equal dignity and equal worth.
Speaker 1:However you believe, creation happened. The story of Genesis in the Bible tells us that God created human beings. He created men and women and he created them equal. He didn't actually put one over the other. And you go through the Bible and there's so many different places where women are strong and doing things in the Bible, not sitting on the sideline and saying yes to their husbands, you know, but they're actually exercising leadership. I listed a couple on the notes.
Speaker 2:Go on. Take us through a couple Chris.
Speaker 1:So in Judges, in the fourth chapter of Judges, you have Deborah. And Deborah was a judge, she was a prophetess, she was actually a national leader. Who would have thought that, in the period of the judges, that you would have this incredibly strong woman? So, you know, looking for a name for your next daughter, you know.
Speaker 1:Deborah is a name for a daughter. Mary Magdalene is one of my favorite people because she gets maligned by the early church, who decided that she must have been a harlot or a prostitute, and so they give her this bad rap, even though there's absolutely no evidence that Mary Magdalene was anything of the sort. She is the first witness of the resurrection and I thought to myself if I was going to conquer the grave, if God Almighty raises his son from the dead and he walks out of the tomb, who is the first person he's going to choose to reveal himself to One of the guys? No, you know, he tells Mary Magdalene and then the guys don't believe her. You know she goes back and tells them and of course, men throughout the year, the years, have made jokes about it, because women are gossips and all this stuff, which is demeaning to say.
Speaker 1:That's why god chose mary, because she would go tell everybody. But in fact he told mary because she was strong, she was somebody that was going to speak the truth unwaveringly. She had courage like no one else in the group. So here's one of the first leaders of the christian church, mary magma, or even fast forward to the post-resurrection period. You have another name for your firstborn daughter um you have priscilla oh, what, what a name.
Speaker 1:You know any famous Priscillas in the world? Priscilla Presley, the early Priscilla, is mentioned in Acts 18 by Paul because she was teaching alongside another woman, aquila. So Aquila and Priscilla they even have a celebration feast day in the life of the church on the calendar. They were busy ministering to Apollos in the faith in Acts 18. So here you have the early church with women leadership. Yeah, this goes all the way down through time. So the presence of women in leadership is not a new development. This crazy, radical idea that women are taking over. No, women have been there the whole time. The men have been working real hard to marginalize their voice, and I think the great thing is now's the time for more women to be celebrated and to be lifted up. They have so much to offer. And so, you know, the witness of the Bible shows God consistently calling women into vital roles of leadership, of teaching and even witness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I just think it's amazing because you're right. What just stuck out, what you were saying there towards the end, was that people have worked hard to change the truth of this. The town's called Ramsbury. I went and visited this old church um last summer and in the stained glass windows it's got all these women, all these strong biblical women. I'll find the photos because, if I can, I definitely took photos and we could maybe put them on here. But, um, it was just so cool to see and I was just like these are strong biblical women and they're being represented in this place, but it is still controversial, isn't it? You've got a little quote.
Speaker 1:Who would have thought it would be controversial. I mean, people say, oh, we can't have women, they'll cry, they're too emotional, and I was. I was watching something this week and this thing popped up about crocodiles. I used to live near alligators in Florida and we used to have alligators in our back garden, literally, and so when I saw this little factoid I thought, oh, this will be cool. I think I'll share this because people like interesting facts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so here's, a little fact for you when crocodiles eat their prey, their sinuses get blocked. And so when their sinuses are blocked they cry. So after feeding they cry, and that's because their sinuses are blocked up. And so now you know where the phrase crocodile tears comes from, because people say, don't give me those crocodiles, because the crocodile is not upset. The tears are coming because the sinuses are blocked. And so I would say, you know, a good example of this is when someone you know feels super emotional. But they're not weak.
Speaker 1:Their tears come down as a place of strength, like Bishop Sarah Mullally, who's a fantastic bishop of London who gets a bad rap from some of the anti-women people. She was speaking at General Synod recently and she began talking about what's called micro aggressions. It's a phrase that's more and more popular these days, where men do small things, little passive, aggressive things, to undermine women. Oh okay, and it happens a lot in the church and it has happened a lot. I've seen it. It happen, I saw it in seminary, and these little microaggressions over time are just like pinpricks and they just constantly bug you. And so there was a moment where she was speaking to Synod and she got just a wee bit emotional, kind of looked like she was developing a tear. That tear came from a place of strength, not weakness, and when she expressed her truth, there was this huge ovation in the chamber because everybody there that has seen it, all the women that are there who've experienced it said absolutely right, she speaks the truth in love. Absolutely right, she speaks the truth in love. And it's about time for us to wake up to the fact that we don't treat everybody like the Lord commands us to. And so it was a wonderful thing.
Speaker 1:It wasn't just crocodile tears, because I know some of the commentators after she gave that speech, you know they said, oh, the crocodile tears of Bishop Sarah Brown. I said, come on. You know. They said, oh, the crocodile tears of bishops. I said, come on, give me a break. She's strong. This is not emotionless and it's not fabricated and it's not made up. She's passionate about serving God in the church and she's gifted and articulate and everywhere she turns there, you know there are these folks who deny the her ministry, they deny her legitimacy and I just think, gosh, on theological grounds. So I just think, come on, that surely the world needs us to focus on things other than uh, it's things like this yeah, yeah, sorry, I've got a dog that is barking a lot for anyone in the in the background.
Speaker 2:Oh Boise, we have a Boise appearance today. He really found his point.
Speaker 1:Maybe he'll climb up on your lap before the end of the podcast so the world can see, boise, I became a grandfather. You did yes, not to a human, but something far more important. We have a dog in the family and her name is Dottie. Dottie is a beautiful dog and she lives in New York City now and our whole family is gaga over Dottie and everything, like her first trip to the coffee shop and everything. It's just magnificent and she is just gorgeous, kind of like Boyce. Um, just a wonderful dog. Yeah, it's, dogs are great and uh, there's there's something about taking care of an animal that brings you joy. I walked my two dogs yesterday in the park and, yeah, watching them be curious and energetic. And and then my old dog, sol, he was dragging by the time we got home he desperately just wanted a nap.
Speaker 2:They are absolutely brilliant, I have to say. He certainly found his voice in the last week. He's starting to be more vocal, nice.
Speaker 1:Let's go through. I was thinking maybe we could look at some examples of really cool women, like maybe surprising examples, and then I thought I was going to hit you with another bit of trivia. A little surprise Perfect.
Speaker 2:That sounds good.
Speaker 1:So I wrote down a few things on my list of amazing women who've done amazing things and I thought let's, let's rattle off a couple of these.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, let's hear some of these then. So Florence Nightingale we've got her on the list.
Speaker 1:Sure, the Lady with the Lamp, but I bet people don't realize that she also was a statistician and she revolutionized hospital sanitation. So her role is more than just being this person you often see in pictures and art. She was strong and confident and she made a huge difference. What about Pandita Ramabai? I don't know her until this week and my wife last year was trying to learn Sanskrit and I bumped into this name. She is a Sanskrit scholar who became a Christian and she was one of the principal movers to educate young Indian women. At the turn of the century so I think Victorian times in India. This Pandita was one of the main movers and shakers in getting women educated. So it's kind of a cool. I think that's fantastic.
Speaker 2:It is fantastic We've got Josephine Butler she sounds very. English Josephine Butler she actually again, victorian times.
Speaker 1:There were strong women in the Victorian times. They were fighting for the vote. There were a lot of things going on with suffrage. She campaigned against human trafficking, exploitation of women. And then, if you go way, way back, I've been doing some deep dives on Constantine. I don't know, I'm a bit of a nerd.
Speaker 1:But Constantine's mother, helena. She became a Christian and a lot of people argue that's the reason why Constantine became a Christian. But Constantine, the emperor in Rome, sent his mother to Jerusalem. Constantine, the emperor in Rome, sent his mother to Jerusalem. So you've got to think first century she goes to Rome sorry, from Rome to Jerusalem, with the purpose of identifying all the sacred Christian sites from the Bible. And so when you're in the Holy Lands, helena is the reason why there was the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. So the church that was built on the site of the cross of the crucifixion was identified by Constantine's mother. And then you can go all around and there are little places where Helena identified. This is the place where Lazarus rose from the dead, this is the place where he fed the 5,000 at Tabgha, and these are all places which have been preserved from the first century to this day as having the significance of being the place where Jesus did what he did.
Speaker 1:So how cool is it to think that Constantine's mom, was the reason we still have this connection to the church and the nativity in Bethlehem, all these amazing things, was because of the emperor of Rome's mother. I found that really cool. This is my favorite one, because I always like to find something that's really interesting, and so the people listening, I want them to go. Oh wow, but there's someone named Judith Love Cohen. I bet you don't know who Judith Love Cohen is. She was an electrical engineer. She was the electrical engineer behind like Hubble Space Telescope and Minutemen missiles and things like that, and she was very involved in the Apollo space program.
Speaker 1:Ok, so you remember Apollo 13? They made it into a movie with. Who was in that movie? Tom, was it? It wasn't Tom Cruise, it was anyway Tom Hanks. Tom Hanks was in that movie. Tom, it wasn't Tom Cruise, it was anyway Tom Hanks. Tom Hanks was in that movie.
Speaker 1:And so it's about the disaster that almost ended, and so they had to get mathematicians to do the computations for the abort guidance system. So you would think that would be enough for Judith Love Cohen to be on my little list of superstars. You would think that would be enough for Judith Love Cohen to be on my little list of superstars. She's the one that calculated when to bring Apollo 13 back out of orbit so that they saved the lives of the astronauts. But my favorite part was that she was in labor, about to give birth when the Apollo 13 was coming back and she was doing the computations for the return. And she gave birth to her son and then evidently contacted NASA to say that she had solved the problem, gave them the information and then went back to being the mother of her son. Now that is, forgive me, but that is just badass. I mean, that really is. And do you know who her son is? Go on the amazing Jack Black From Monkey King Kong, nacho Libre, cumberland and School of Rock.
Speaker 2:Oh, he is such a good boy, jack Black is the son of Judith Love Cohen.
Speaker 1:I just think that that is wonderful, to think that she is this really cool woman who brought Jack Black into the world, who is crazy and wonderful stories. And there are women whose stories we don't know, but we simply know the impact of, of their goodness and their contribution to the world. And so I, I guess the you know, the purpose of this podcast is to say you know, let's celebrate women, let's don't denigrate women, let's find a way to lift everybody up.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah equality, leadership gaps, societal expectations, all these things. That seems to me the important thing for any missionary charity organization that's all about wholeness is to lift up women and call them to be fully who God has called them to be, and healing is needed where women's voices have historically been silenced. There really needs to be an intentionality about praying for healing in those places.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we do need to do that, and I mean we have people we pray for where they've experienced that. You know women have experienced being silenced in the workplace, in their heart, you know, family relationships, church, um, and it is really damaging but there are opportunities for hope. Um, you know, we do see that there are there's increasing leadership in churches with women. Um, we see them in health care, in peace building and and this is where I think also films, books and getting on the internet are really helpful because you can find these people where you may not otherwise know that they're there, and I think that's really encouraging and even matthew henry in the in the late 1600s he was.
Speaker 1:He was a theologian. He wrote when God made woman, he didn't take her from man's head to rule over him. Lord over a woman and to keep her in her place. You know, barefoot in the kitchen. Hemingway said there's nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man or to your fellow woman. True nobility lies in being superior to your former self.
Speaker 1:Wow, society is not about beating out the people that we see around us, but that the real battle is an interior battle with ourself, that we really want to try and find a way to live into the person that God is calling us to be. And that means challenging those presuppositions that we grew up with, those household things that we were taught around the kitchen table when we were children about how the world is supposed to be ordered and things that really lead to racist thinking, xenophobic thinking, sexist thinking. And to challenge those things within ourselves, to say I can be better and my battle is with self. It's not with this crazy world around me. I'm not jousting windmills, you know. I think I told you behind me is my Don Quixote painting. Yes, and it's not about jousting the windmills, it's about learning to fight the things inside us which hold us back and make the world ugly.
Speaker 2:I saw a challenge on facebook today about having a cup of tea with somebody who you might not necessarily agree with, um, so you don't have to try and um win them over.
Speaker 2:You just listen to your brother, and I thought that was quite a an interesting thing to do, because even like in our churches and our friendship groups and families, there's people we won't completely agree with.
Speaker 2:But it's good to sit and listen and learn from one another and be challenged ourselves, rather than just thinking I know it all what I think is correct. But I suppose, to summarize this, we've got from Deborah which again we like that name to florence, 19 gail to women today, and I actually think go and find who these women are, look them up, go and see who these women are, um, they might be sitting next to you, they might be in your church, um, but god continues to call women into his mission of healing and restoration, um, so anything, chris, you want to encourage the listeners with before we come to a close, um, I really just want to encourage people to honor and support the women who are around them in ministry, the women who are around you in your family and the women who are just around you in society in general, that we really, you know, we want to be as Proverbs 31 says.
Speaker 1:We want to be clothed with strength and dignity that we can laugh at the days to come. We want to be given strength and be to say do I laugh at that? That's a little bit sexist and in my, you know, I have three daughters and so I find myself sitting sometimes and I think what would my kids think about this? Or, if somebody respond to it, am I participating in it If I don't challenge things which are undermining? You know, if I hear the fellas talking about going to a strip club or participating in something which I just find completely immoral and really objectifies women, what does that say about me? If I don't, you know, if I don't challenge that?
Speaker 1:You know, I think St Thomas Aquinas said it best when he said when God made woman, he finished his masterpiece. You know what a beautiful thing to think about. You know, women are to be celebrated. We haven't really talked much about our own wives and our own children and things like that. But I think it's important to just kind of generically throw that out there that we celebrate women today.
Speaker 2:I love that. Yeah, I was just looking through our notes to see if there's any other how about the quotes for women?
Speaker 1:that at the bottom, I think the? Uh, there's a really there's a good one from Eleanor Roosevelt. The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. Eleanor Roosevelt a strong, passionate woman who was the strength behind her husband, you know, she in many ways was the reason he was successful. And Maya Angelou I met her when she came to Duke years ago. Oh wow, she's an incredibly great speaker and some of her poems are just remarkable Great speaker and some of her poems are just remarkable.
Speaker 1:You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them. She said Very good, and the last one was Mother Teresa of Calcutta Do not wait for leaders, do it alone, person to person. She was all about loving people, one person at at a time, feeding one person at a time, and I think we can learn a lot from uh, from that and yeah and I think you know, go, go into the world and find strong women, you'll.
Speaker 1:you'll see them everywhere, and when you do like you said, ask questions and then listen.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And see, you'll be amazed at what you discover. You know, I'll finish with this. When we first moved to England back in the 90s, I became friends with a lady named Doris Some of those great names you don't hear much anymore and I would go over to Doris's house once or twice a week. She lived in a terrace house in Oxford and she was 96. And this was in 91. So I don't know what that would make her now, but well into her hundreds she was middle-aged during the Second World War. She was middle-aged and a schoolteacher and so her experience of the war was very vivid and fresh because she remembered the Blitz, she remembered the barrage balloon, she remembered all the stories of the war because she was what, 40 or so when the war was raging. And I just was amazed at her courage, at her strength. She was helping with her younger sister. The two of them lived together and her younger sister, who was like 92, was very disabled and Doris looked after her little sister and she was 96. And these two women were just remarkable women with both of them had these incredible stories steeped in Oxford lore. I mean they could make a movie out of the White Sisters Just incredible.
Speaker 1:But I remember one particular conversation we had and I said well, doris, do you remember? Do you remember what happened when they said that the war was over? She's like, oh yeah, we had parties and everybody took their tables out to the street, and so you imagine the stories of the celebrations on the street. And I said well, what did you do? And she said well, I went down to the school. You know, I was a school teacher.
Speaker 1:So I went straight down to the school and I ripped the curtains out of the windows and I found myself sitting there in her living room and I thought she carried on teaching children how to read and write and do arithmetic and all the basic educational things, in the middle of the war, and she put blackout curtains so that the people bombing wouldn't see the lights of the school. I mean so that when the war ended, her first thing was let's rip the curtains out and the education goes on. It's like I'm not missing a beat. Yeah, they're not going to stop me. She was so defiant in her strength, it was kind of like I'm not afraid of anything.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I remember the rest of my time there. I used to go over and mow her grass and she would say let me make you a cup of tea. That meant I need to go to the kitchen, clean the mugs and make the tea, and then she would hand me the milk. I always had to sniff the milk because you just never, knew, but God bless her.
Speaker 1:Doris was wonderful. And when we had our first child, pastor Doris was wonderful. And when we had our first child, we were thinking about godparents and people thought we were crazy, but we actually wanted Doris to be the godmother of our oldest child.
Speaker 1:And they said, well, she's not going to live very long. I said, who cares? Who cares On the day she's baptized, Doris will be there. Who cares On the day she's baptized Doris will be there. And this old lady will come in and she will pray and she will be so proud to be my daughter's godmother. And it was a there's a little peek into our lives and also to my real, true respect for strong women, real, true respect for strong women.
Speaker 1:She didn't go fight in Normandy but, in so many ways she gave the soldiers who were fighting in Normandy a reason to come home.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 1:I just love people's stories like that and they're true. They you know, they're really. It's important to keep telling them. And she's in heaven now and it's a. It's a wonderful thing that her legacy lives on. So people will now know. So they'll know about my friend doris that's incredible.
Speaker 2:That is how to use a push mower with no she had one of those old push back breaker you know when, when we moved into this house five years ago, my granddad tried giving me one of them.
Speaker 1:No, way, no way, good. Well, this has been great and uh I hope that whoever is listening today especially if you're uh, if you're female- that you will.
Speaker 1:You will say, hey, um, this is great. I feel like somebody just gave me a pat on the back and a push to really lean into who you are and into your giftedness. The world needs feminization, the church needs the strength of women, and boy do our political leaders need some female sensibility. I still believe that if we could gather a bunch of women around the table from all these countries that are fighting that, we could soon end hunger and bring relief. I just don't think women are all that keen to bomb each other, so I pray for that, not in a crazy way. I genuinely think that the Lord Jesus was smart when he chose lots of strong women in the early days of the church, and I think we could do a lot better in some of the choices we're making these days.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's right. This has been really helpful. Thank you, and I don't know what we're talking about on our next podcast. Have you had any thoughts for the next one?
Speaker 1:I'm not I haven't really, but I think one of the things I wanted to talk about was the things we carry with us, be it trauma damage I hear the phrase trauma dumping a lot, and I thought let's talk about what we carry in our cup. I think it's important to really think about. You know, we talked this morning about who we are deep inside and and what we're wired to do and how we're programmed to think and that sort of thing. Maybe we could do a podcast on that and explore self and self centeredness and narcissism and things like that. And so let's just say we'll talk about what's in your cup, what's in your cup.
Speaker 2:That's great and for those of you listening maybe start to think what's in your cup and it might come up as one of the things we talk about.
Speaker 1:but I'm going to go put some coffee in my cup, go get some coffee in your cup.
Speaker 2:And also don't forget to like, follow and subscribe.
