I was an opponent of the Patriarchy Movement from almost the beginning, before it (rightly) became the pariah among Bible-believing conservatives it is today. I have justly been identified as one of its leading public antagonists. Here is an example; and another; and yet another. My views on this issue have been well-known for many years. Godly people have disagreed with me, and I respect their disagreement. Last week I posted a succinct Facebook update criticizing “patriarchy” in this precise vein. Pastor Douglas Wilson, after all these years, seemed to take umbrage at my snippet and drafted a long, defensive blog post to express himself. From what I can tell, he agreed with most of my criticisms of “patriarchy.” He agreed so vehemently that he challenged me to a debate.
Conventional wisdom suggests that the underdog in any contest challenges the frontrunner to a debate, but if so, in this case I’m not the upper dog the pastor needs to debate.
In addition, while I hate the distraction of offering another clarification, for friends and supporters I want to correct a couple of factual errors. Pastor Wilson wrote:
“… Andrew Sandlin has (apparently) taken down his earlier posts supporting Natalie’s story.”
This is false. I haven’t supported anyone’s “story,” and I have removed no link. It has been there all along, and it took me a grand total of 4 minutes to find it.
Pastor Wilson writes,
“Christians like —-, —-, and Andrew Sandlin were taken in by Natalie.”
This also is false. This young lady as a child was raped by one of Doug’s college students. The fact that I have made brief FB comments bemoaning the (generic) church’s treatment of child abusers — and the abused — and encouraged and mourned this courageous young woman is not tantamount to being “taken in.”
Pastor Wilson seems constantly to find himself in loud public quarrels with Bible-believing Christians and is under siege just now (again). Having been under siege once or twice before myself, I do understand how one can make factual errors, especially at those pressurized times.
This brief note corrects those factual errors.
Christian Culture 
A very gracious post. Thanks.
Thanks so much, Scott.
Love the image.
Brian, I thought it was pretty cool.
Reserving judgment in the matter is not the same as agreeing with the young lady.
Thank you, Ron.
Good for you. Doug is trying to embarrass anyone with a name/ministry who has spoken at all regarding this issue. He tried (through some pretty desperate reasoning) to say that because you’ve listened to Natalie, you, Boz, and Ryan Sather must all approve of Wesley’s art. Riiiiight. That is totally how that works.
Of course, he has shown, by digging up Wesley’s almost completely forgotten performance art, that he is willing to reach pretty far and use anything he has to try to discredit people. This would be fun to watch on TV; not so much in real life.
Doug hasn’t learned that when he plays in the mud, he’s the one who gets dirty. Hopefully he doesn’t learn until the whole world sees the game he’s playing.
Just call him out when he lies, keep on the straight and narrow, and let him make himself look foolish.
Thank you Sarah. I appreciate your comment.
Why is it that certain evangelical churches (examples I can cite are Baptists) and their leadership hide or cover up or refuse to publicaly speak out against sexual offenses illegal (child predators) or legal (adulterous affairs) of their like faith pastors and leadership? Why do they sit idle and not say a single word against their “breatheren”? I’d like to say it’s apathy. But I know better. When loyalty goes so far that you refuse to call out a person in leadership who gets in the pulpit and preaches who is guilty of such your loyalty has went to far!!! Sick to my stomach over it. Liars. Frauds.
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“This is false. I haven’t supported anyone’s “story,” and I have removed no link.” FYI, the link in the word “link” appears to be broken
Thanks, Sarah. It works fine for me. I think I might have my Facebook settings activated to “friends only,” but if you send me a friend request, I’ll be sure to accept it. Maybe that’s the problem.
Thanks. I’m sure that’s it.