Matriarchy! The Feminization of Churches by Radical Mainstream Culture

By Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya

On the fiftieth anniversary of women's suffrage in New York, before tens of thousands of women, Betty Friedan, the godmother of the second wave of feminism, pontificated that, owing to the inescapable nature of the feminist revolution, the politics of America would never be the same again. Indeed, the gender politics of the U.S. – and the world – would never be the same again. Half a century later, with the feminist movement gone full circle and got a lion's share in the public square, with a radical fourth wave premised on intersectionality perfecting conflict theory, it is imperative to assess the achievements and legacy of the movement.

Yet since maleness and femaleness are not social constructs, it becomes inconceivable to address feminism without addressing the feminist's viewpoint of God. As the girl-power of secular feminism took center stage, religious feminism was steadfastly rising on the horizon. Prioritizing standpoint epistemology and revisionist hermeneutics, the rallying cry of church feminists now is the deconstruction of Christian patriarchy which must be evinced by egalitarian ordination of women and intersectional ordination in respect of the LGBTQ+ community.

One question begs for an answer within all this myriad: if feminism is empowering, why are many educated women voluntarily leaving the workplace to be homemakers?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya
• Release date: Jul 5, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201239640

Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya

Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya is a Christian apologist, pastor, and theologian. The evangelical affirms Biblical inerrancy, Biblical perspicuity, and Biblical sufficiency. Hence his undying passion is to see a Biblically sound Christianity. The author of The Cult of Mammon was born and bred in Zimbabwe. He is married.

Book preview

MATRIARCHY!

The Feminization of Churches

By Radical Mainstream Culture

SYLVESTER TONDERAI FARAVADYA

Dedication

To my son

Ariel Sly II Faravadya

I pray that you grow to be

a Christlike man

in this feminized world

Appraisals

MATRIARCHY is precise, bold, and compelling synopsis of how the feminist movement has hijacked and hindered the Gospel mission worldwide. Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya captures the true intent and history of how radical feminists successfully targeted not only the Church but the institution of marriage and Christian families. A refreshing truth, detailed with sources and documentation, backed up with biblical sufficiency—a fantastic resource for Christian parents, pastors, seminary students, and professors.

Pastor Scott Patton

Founder of the Go Bold Network and Army Colonel (Retired)

Former Dwight D. Eisenhower Fellow at the U.S. Army War College

Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya has skillfully accomplished a much-needed, well-written, extensively-researched antidote for the modern drift from the biblical worldview. This multifaceted issue is both helpfully explained, historically verified, and biblically refuted. Tonderai is not merely pointing out the problem, he points the reader to the solution, which boils down to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and glorifying God through a biblical understanding and application of the family unit. I'm thankful for his clarion call to fidelity to Christ that echoes above the crowded room of competing sinful worldviews.

Mike McCrumb

Pastor, Delton Community Church

Delton, Michigan

Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya has done a great work in addressing the important issue of the negative impact of feminism and the far-reaching consequences it has had on modern society. Feminist zealots have an intense hatred for the nuclear family. This fact alone reminds us of the devastating influence feminism has wrought. Feminists have relentlessly attacked homemakers and motherhood, devalued the significance of the woman in the home, and pressed women to enter the workplace to compete with their male counterparts for dominance. The feminist movement has attempted to subvert and destroy God’s design for women and her place as a helpmate to her husband in the home. They have ruthlessly worked to minimize the value of men, their leadership, and their importance in the home/society. Certainly, fatherless and motherless homes are epidemic in our culture have contributed to many problematic issues with children and youth. The writer has thoroughly and cogently discussed the issue with extensive sourcing. He has also presented the grim picture of what happens when feminism is rampant within a society, and when the pattern for men and women, and the family begins to fracture. Highly recommend reading this well-laid-out work, and the arguments presented and detailed on why feminism is so problematic and destructive.

Mrs. Carole Kaetz

Formerly professional before leaving the workplace

Homemaker, Wife, Mother (of four), and Grandmother (of eleven)

The wealth of knowledge contained in these pages is very timely. The careful foundation laid from front to back, from the secular and godless teaching of decades to its impact upon the Body of Christ, Christian marriages, and Christian homes, is straightforward and clear in its content. This book will be an invaluable addition to your library if you have a genuine interest in understanding the cruel and destructive consequences of embracing the feminist ideological movement. Brother Tonderai doesn’t spare men in his evaluation either. Though patriarchy is ordained by God for the church, family, and civilization, the perversion of it by men who fail to lead and protect has made the corruption that feminism brings into our homes that much easier to instill. Well done on this writing!

Soli Deo Gloria,

Rev. Charles Johnson

First Baptist Church of Sandy Hook, KY

Copyrights

Matriarchy: The Feminization of Churches by Radical Mainstream Culture

Copyright © 2022 by Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other – without the prior permission of the copyright holder.

All Scripture quotations marked NASB 1995 are taken from The Holy Bible, New American Standard Bible, New King James Version. Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. A Corporation Not for Profit, La Habra, California. All Rights Reserved. http://www.lockman.org

Scripture quotations marked (ESV) are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. http://www.crossway.org

Every effort has been made to credit sources and comply with the fairness doctrine on quotation and use of research material. If any copyrighted material has been inadvertently used in this work without proper credit being given in one manner or another, please notify the publisher in writing so that future printings of this work may be corrected accordingly.

All websites listed herein are accurate at the time of publication, but they may change in the future or cease to exist. The listing of website references and resources does not imply the author’s endorsement of the site’s entire contents. Sources are cited and quoted essentially owing to their relevance to the subject at hand and quoting does not necessarily imply the author’s endorsement of the quotee.

Contents

Dedication

Appraisals

Copyrights

Contents

Preface

Foreword

1 Peter Panism

2 Amazons

3 A Brief History Of Feminism

4 Antifeminism

5 Toxic Masculinity

6 Weaponized Victimhood

7 Comfortable Concentration Camps

8 Girls Run The World

9 Sexual Devolution

10 Androgynous Utopia

11 Church Feminism

12 Patriarchy

13 Marriage Mystique

14 Biblical Manliness

15 Homemakers

Recommended Books

Acknowledgments

Bibliography

References

Preface

I grew up with an understanding that the public square is shaped by truth, objectivity, common sense as well as academic integrity which values honesty and facts in place of intellectual dishonesty, biased censorship, pseudoscience, propaganda, and politically correct pop psychology. Therefore, it was a very rude, if not crude awakening, to realize that the postmodern public sphere can be run either by dangerous zealots or intellectual morons. When did we start quantifying lies as progressive since even noble lies are still lies at the end of the day! Fallacies remain fallacies even when they are fashionable. It was further disheartening to learn that such ideologues use terms such as mean, backward, intolerant, bigotry, arrogant, retro, judgmental, hateful, dangerous, and sexist as a stratagem to silence the truth or any attempts to critique their utopian theories. Being truthful is not being mean. Is it not spectacular irony that champions of relativism are the very ones intolerant of views differing from theirs? Schools should educate, not indoctrinate, and news should be balanced and informative rather than pushing a fancied narrative.

It is virtually impossible to find a person who has not been affected or impacted by feminist groupthink, either directly or indirectly. In fact, it is next to impossible to theorize a subject that has gone mainstream. Hence the main thesis of this book is to critique the effects of feminism in families, churches, and the public square. Encountering the radical nature of feminism was a rude awakening, especially considering that dear mom upheld biblical femininity. It is misplaced to claim that opposing feminism is anti-women since the most lethal venom of feminism was reserved for the women who are homemakers. Hence distinct critiques of feminism have come from antifeminist women, some of whom I have been glad to quote constantly in this book. I pray for a world where women and girls are secure, fulfilled, and flourishing. Not a toxic society that pits one gender against another.

I write with the full knowledge that the feminist ideology is deeply entrenched in academia, the media, as well as governments — and there is potentially a price to pay for whoever opposes it. The central motif of my theology is the glory of God. I have no self to preserve – only Christ to exalt. In The Manliness of Christ (1880), Thomas Hughes wrote, In this life-long fight, to be waged by every one of us singlehanded against a host of foes, the last requisite for a good fight, the last proof and test of our courage and manfulness, must be loyalty to truth—the most rare and difficult of all human qualities. Since the fourth wave of feminism has a sharp concentration on Third World women, I hope lessons from the U.S., which has been central to the feminist revolution, will enable informed decisions.

Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya

Soli Deo Gloria

Foreword

Political turmoil. Economic uncertainty and distress. Rampant homosexuality, gender confusion, and sexual immorality are celebrated in all areas of the public sphere. Disempowered or disinterested men. Weak churches and the collapse of the biblical family.

These, among others, are some of the very serious current issues we must face.

At the root of so much contemporary wickedness, we find the almost complete overthrow of God’s commands for women. That is a bold statement to be sure, and some may find it hyperbolic. But when one considers the kind of eisegetical gymnastics required to arrive at our current state of immersion in the feminist worldview, such a claim begins to make more sense.

God’s Word is wonderfully and astonishingly clear on His heart for His sons and daughters. One does not need advanced degrees to understand for the husband is the head of the wife and let the woman learn in silence with all subjection.

Despite our LORD’s perspicuity, societal institutions (and many churches) seem to be trying to outdo one another in undermining, mocking, and legally restraining God’s commands with divesting results!

At the time of this writing, I have been a pastor for 25 years. I have watched, even in the church, the speed of encroaching feminism. I have seen the change in many dear sisters as the matriarchal mindset took hold. The hatred of God’s commands concerning them. The growing immodesty. The rebellion towards husbands. The unwillingness to raise their own children. The needless divorces. I have also seen the change in men: passivity, fear, confusion, and loss of trust in the local church.

This rebellious state of affairs is why I’m excited to give a full-throated endorsement to this thoroughly biblical book.

Sylvester Tonderai Faravadya has written a very well-researched, clear, and timely work that both exposes the work of the devil in history to bring about our culture’s matriarchal mindset AND points us, with love, back to the Scriptures to chart a godly path forward.

But as one reads, be warned. Sylvester leaves no stone unturned. Like a surgeon, he cuts through the outer flesh of feminist mantra to get to the problem. Like a prophet, he exposes the deep work of the enemy’s lies and distortions. Like a loving pastor, he shakes the reader out of lethargy and carnality and stirs the heart for change.

In one volume, both the academic and the layperson will find refutations to feminist dogma as well as the encouragement needed to take on, and by God’s grace, defeat the Jezebelic domination in their spheres of influence.

As the enemy’s evil plan is unveiled, the reader will likely wonder how we have been taken so easily, shake his head in disappointment and sadness, bow in repentance, and prayerfully, be motivated to declare God’s Word to confront such devastation. Sylvester pulls no punches. This is good! Jezebel cannot be reasoned with. She must be dealt with. This requires courage. On that front, this book delivers.

Dear reader, from abortion to divorce rates, the need for homemaking to the godly education of our children, and the raising up of fearless daughters for the glory of Christ...so much is at stake! The Christian response to feminism is one of the defining issues of our time. We must confront the lies with the truth. We must move from fear to faith. We must remember that God’s plans for His daughters are pleasant, and all His paths are peace.

This work is a sharp tool. Let us use it!

Solus Christus!

Dr. Carlton C. McLeod

Author of The Biblically Healthy Household

Senior Pastor, Calvary Reformation Church

Chesapeake, Virginia

1 Peter Panism

Abusive male headship exists. As men, we should also admit that not all men are good leaders. There is a world of difference between ethical patriarchy and misogyny. Or, from a Scriptural standpoint, between Biblical patriarchy and abusive headship. Hence Lord Jesus declared, You are of [your] father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own [nature], for he is a liar and the father of lies.[i] Abusive male leadership hates the truth. It does not respect the fact that women are fellow heirs of grace, created also in the image of God and, therefore, should be treated with dignity. Such unrepentant abusers are degenerates whose passion is to emulate their father, Satan. A man usually manifests the traits of his father. Fallen men constantly wrestle with a Godless version of patriarchy inherited from Satan and fostered daily by humanist and heathen cultures.

Indeed some women are simply impossible. Some are shrews. Even the Bible, especially in the Book of Proverbs, acknowledges that some women are simply difficult. But a man’s conscience should trouble him if he is driven to the point where he wants to raise his hand against a woman. Whereas Proverbs is well known for its appraisals of virtuous and godly women, it also rebukes godless women by using terms such as immoral woman (Proverbs 2:16), evil woman (Proverbs 6:24), foolish woman (Proverbs 9:13), contentious woman (Proverbs 21:9), angry woman (Proverbs 21:19) and hateful woman (Proverbs 30:23).

Misogyny

Women feel vulnerable in the presence of misogynists because they are constantly objectified. Misogynists pride themselves in sexual harassment initially expressed through catcalls, whistles as well as lewd comments on women. They are enabled by a society that cheers them on instead of dressing them down for such impropriety. Little does such a society realize that femicide can be the ultimate horror birthed by the normalization of such ‘mild’ forms of misogyny. The misogynists’ deluded minds feel entitled when they see women wearing tight or revealing clothes. Yet all is well when such men pee in public or strut about showing off their pubic hair and potbellies exposed by unbuttoned shirts. In such a misogynistic culture, some women have to carry pepper sprays in their handbags whenever they go out because male chauvinist pigs consider them easy targets to rob or rape!

It is infuriating to see men beating their wives, in some cases, to a pulp. Though I was just a Grade One pupil back in the countryside in Murewa, I vividly remember one neighbor who, to ward off anyone from intervening or the docile wife from fighting back, would have axes and knobkerries handy. When the gathered members of Kwindima village failed to intervene, my dear grandma would go down on her knees from a distance, clapping and chanting the man’s clan names to forgive his wife – since he claimed that he was wronged. When he finally felt appeased by my grandma’s lamentations, he would get up from his wife’s chest, where he had been sitting whilst pounding her with heavy fists. If I would ask grandma later what the wife had done wrong to incense him like that, the charges would range from she did not warm his bathwater in time or he felt that his meat was a bit burnt. Control freaks treat women as if they are pieces of property they own. Yet, owing to the interconnectedness and interdependence of humanity and society, misogynists should know that a man cannot be free when a woman is enslaved. Vice versa.

Be it domestic, physical, economic, emotional, or sexual, there is simply no justification for violence in relationships. Whereas men are not spared from gender-based violence, women and children are the primary victims. It is a fallacy of elementary logic for a man to think that masculinity should be expressed as misogynistic superiority. The mind of a real man, whenever he looks at women and children, must remind him that masculinity means that he is their protector. Respect her decision if you court her and she says No. If a relationship is not working, part ways in peace. If a marriage is on the rocks, seek counseling.

Some misogynists maintain that there should be no right to education for the girl-child. Even if she is to be a homemaker, shouldn’t she be able to, at least, read, write and count? Education can help even a homemaker with home-oriented courses such as fashion designing, tailoring, baking, financial management, teaching, driving, and interior designing. Can you believe that in the twenty-first century, women in some countries in the Middle East are still lobbying to be given the right to drive a car! With the right to education for the girl-child gone, it then comes as no surprise when child marriages and arranged marriages with a wealthy person who is as old as the girl’s grandfather are practiced in some misogynistic cultures. One of the reasons given for such marriages is that the family wants to survive a famine! The dignity, rights, and health of the girl are not considered.

Allegations of witchcraft, especially in the rural areas of Africa, are essentially targeted toward women. Furthermore, the inquisition based on a system of guilty till you prove yourself innocent is certified only by the word of the traditional healer even though in most, if not all cases, there is no proof of the allegation. Painfully the accused woman will bear the resounding brunt of humiliation in the society which may even result in ostracizing based solely on allegations. Furthermore, these are the same misogynistic elements within traditions that offered the girl-child as appeasement to what they considered to be avenging spirits. Much of this tradition is practiced as well in some of my Shona communities in Zimbabwe.

The Department of Political Science Faculty of Humanities, Management, and Social Sciences, Federal University in Wukari, Nigeria reported that discriminatory practices against women take place in the eastern part of the country where the funeral rites include coercing the widowed women to drink water used in bathing the dead husband, shave their heads, wear black clothes then stay in isolation for a period ranging between three months to a year. As if they are part of the inheritance property, at times they are handed over as a wife to one of the brothers of the deceased. Ironically, such traditions are not practiced when it’s a man whose wife has passed on.[ii]

The tradition of dowry, roora in the Shona-speaking part of Zimbabwe, and lobola in the Ndebele-speaking part of Zimbabwe as well as in South Africa, should value building good relations between the two families. If it becomes or is perceived to be a money-making scheme then women suffer at the hands of unfortunate social constructions of misogynistic hegemony where women are viewed as bought properties. Oppression gains a stronghold the very moment women are considered properties insomuch as properties have no say in the way they are kept. Such women simply have to endure the abuse, especially in cases where their families commercialized the lobola process and now cannot pay back the money.

Besides arranged marriages, it is heartbreaking to note that in some African cultures, notably in rural areas, the tradition of kidnapping, abducting girls and the young women with the intent of having sex with them without their consent and consequently marrying them is considered normal and acceptable. This practice, called ukuthwala in South Africa, is carried out by some cultures, especially in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal provinces, provided the girl complies with the legal age of consent and her parents’ consent as well. Nevertheless, the government criminalizes it under the Sexual Offences Amendment Act of 2007. Misogynistic cultures psychologically torture a woman in cases of infertility. Yet it is common knowledge that infertility affects both men and women. And even when women give birth, they are not fully embraced by the misogynistic in-laws till they give birth to a son – as if women are determinants of X and Y chromosomes. Even inheritance in misogynistic cultures excludes the girl-child. 

Whereas misogynists within the Jewish community thank God each day that He has not created them as females, in the case of adultery under Sharia law, only the woman culprit is punished while the man is set free. Sharia law also allows a man to be polygamous. The Roman author Cato the Censor (234-149 BC) wrote, If you were to catch your wife in an act of infidelity, you can kill her with impunity without a trial; but, if she were to catch you, she would not venture to touch you with her finger, and, indeed, she has no right.[iii] Yet in such an oppressive pagan Roman culture, the Bible commanded Christian men to treat women with dignity (I Peter 3:1-7). There are no ontological differences between men and women.

Sexual Abuses

Whereas khafz is the genital mutilation practice carried out by some Shia Muslims whereby the clitoral hood of little girls is removed, female circumcision in young girls in Egypt, for instance, goes as far as the full excision of the clitoris, the labia minora as well as the labia majora. Such traumatic female circumcision practices are based on the pseudoscientific belief that they lessen sexual desire in women – as if such desire lies in the reproductive organs. If sexual desires in women have to be curbed, what about sexual desires in men, especially given the high testosterone in men? One is reminded of those misogynists who brought a woman caught in adultery before the Lord (John 8:1-11). If she was committing adultery, where was the man she was committing adultery with? As if clitoridectomy is not heartbreaking enough, the north-eastern region of Africa practices the heinous tradition of infibulation whereby the clitoris and labia of a girl or a woman are either cut out or stitched together at the edges of the vulva as a way of preventing women and girls from having sexual intercourse. Dear LORD!

Despite the African Union’s Maputo Protocol of 2003 illegalizing female genital mutilation (FGM), the International Development Select Committee (UK), for instance, published a report on Violence Against Women and Girls (HC paper107 of session 2013–14, 13 June 2013) which showed that female genital mutilation is prevalent, especially in the Horn of Africa. The report also stated: Although there is no comprehensive data on the extent of sexual violence in conflict, it is estimated that between 20,000 and 50,000 women were raped during the Bosnian War and that 200,000 Congolese women have been raped since 1998. Around 400,000 women were raped during the 100-day Rwandan genocide in 1994. Although there is international legal recognition of rape as a war crime now and a crime against humanity, including in the statute of the International Criminal Court, prosecutions remain low. For example, there have only been 30 convictions for the up to 50,000 rapes perpetrated during the Bosnian war.[iv]

Then there are Neo-Malthusian policies particularly in India and China intended to limit family sizes but in essence have resulted in forced sterilization, female infanticide, and sex-selective abortions. In 2015 Aljazeera reported that while sex-selective abortions are enforced in some cultures, there were over thirty million males than females in China alone because of abortions that terminate the girl child.[v] Although China has now softened from a one-child policy to a two-child policy, the policy is still coercive. Millions of Indian women were forced to be sterilized under the Emergency Decree. This is the same India where, despite rising economic power, tens of thousands of women are killed annually over dowry disputes, some even burned alive, and some are coerced into arranged marriages as child brides. There are some cultures, even in India, that practice honor killings. These are perpetrated against women accused of having brought dishonor to the family or clan name by being raped, or found, or suspected of having committed adultery or fornication.

In her recommendable book A Return to Modesty, Wendy Shalit wrote, Then there is the large number of boys who report that they are ‘revolted’ by girls whose privates do not resemble those of the porn stars they view online, and in 2013, a student body president at the University of Texas–Austin even felt free to share his views about how to judge a woman’s private parts, and whether they will prove to be ‘gross,’ based on her general appearance. Is encountering such negative judgments directed against a young woman’s body and most private areas empowering? Is such an attitude enlightened for either party? Or is it more empowering to praise a young woman for her internal qualities of character? I personally feel that it is the latter.[vi] Some of these misogynists will grow to become promiscuous men who still demand the consummation of their marriage without protection as if STIs are harmless. Ironically the same players take off their wedding rings in public to give the impression that they are still available on the market.

Stupid fools deflower girls but demand the so-called virginity tests when they want to marry! Notable times I have had boys talk with some Christian young men who declare that one of the characteristics in their future spouse is that she should be a virgin. When I ask if