Quote:
Originally Posted by UntoHim
Either leadership is not "official, permanent, or organizational", or it is. Leadership "always depends upon spiritual capacity", or it does not. If leadership is not official, permanent or organizational, then you should have no problem with women/sisters taking leadership in an unofficial, non-permanent, unorganizational way. If leadership always depends upon spiritual capacity, then you should have no problem with a woman/sister who exhibits a superior spiritual capacity (relative to the brothers and sisters in her locality) taking the lead in a certain area of service to the church.
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To be a church elder is clearly "official" in the sense that people (men, not women) were appointed:
Acts 14:23 Paul and Barnabas
appointed elders for them in each church
It is this roles to which have belonged to men exclusively in the history of the church.
But it is not official in the sense of being organizational and permanent as in the Catholic or protestant systems. Those who get appointed as elders must have spiritual capacity to match or be appointed because of their spiritual capacity.
According to ZNP's testimony, there are many women in (unofficial) leadership positions in the LC, 90% of the decisions regarding the church were influenced by the sisters and an office for the training was run with an "Iron fist" by a sister.
For this reason I don't think the local churches have a problem with sisters taking leadership in unofficial, non-permanent, organizational ways. I fail to see exactly what is the problem.
That's why I say that it's important to consider that QOSTA's post and my response were in relation to eldership only as per Acts 14:23. I have never taken issue with women in unofficial leadership roles as ZNP illustrated.