There is a conference call set with Mike Foster this afternoon. Please be in prayer.
I’m trying not to let all of this Deadly Viper stuff emotionally hijack me. Writing helps. Talking with “Kathy Khang husband” helps (btw, that is exactly the search engine term someone used). Praying helps.
I’m trying to muster up the courage to say something else about a situation that is already heated and complex without blind-siding anyone else, without derailing what could be a conversation in the making about the racial, ethnic and faith issues at hand, without sounding too angry, bitter, or in need of inner healing.
But can someone please tell me why pink frosted cupcakes, salads, Richard Simmons and pink Smart cars are girly which is code for “not manly” or akin to being wimps and wussies, which clearly are not adjectives any real man would want used to describe men?
Deadly Viper is NOT the first, last or only leadership development that uses what some would call a hyper-masculinity to appeal to men and their leadership. There are several male pastors who are calling out for men to be warriors, man-up, go to battle, etc. There is a shift in some circles arguing that the feminization of the Church is why men are failing to lead. Jesus as manly man.
But I make the connection here in the middle of all of this talk about culture, race, ethnicity and pain because it is in these conversations I often feel like I’m choosing first to be Christian Asian American and put the “Woman” on hold. It feels too complicated to simultaneously engage people across the divide in a conversation about racial stereotypes AND gender stereotypes. I don’t want my Asian American experience to be defined by ninja warriors, but the message here is so much more nuanced because there are parts of my Christian and Asian and American culture that try to silence my leadership.
Women and men are different. Yes! How can we speak respectfully of those differences, learn from one another and affirm one another without resorting to one of the worst insults a boy can throw at another boy at the playground: “You throw/hit/punch/run/laugh/cry like a girl”?
Just last week I heard a few men at the bowling alley ask me if I had a french maid costume for Halloween. Was that a man being a man in his public man-cave? If those men were just being stupid, isn’t it possible that all of this talk and imagery about real men versus chickified church boys could add unnecessary fuel to the fire?
I’m struggling here. I am the mother of an amazing daughter and two amazing sons. This isn’t me ranting. I am feeling deeply the brokenness of our world as my kids sleep soundly tonight. How will the church lead in teaching both my daughter and my sons to be strong, effective, compassionate, gracious, courageous leaders? Can we do it without making fun of one another, without Kung Fu warriors fighting off pink cupcakes or salads?
Is anyone else bothered by this hyper-masculinity? Am I being too sensitive?
When the idea of a group of Asian American women writing a book about faith, gender and culture started out with a snowball’s chance in hell, I had one fleeting thought that unnerved and annoyed me: What if this book actually gets published? Will my husband be OK with my success?
Somewhere in quiet, indirect messages I grew up to understand that boys were preferred over girls and smart, successful girls are scary or, even worse, undesireable.
It’s not that I thought two chapters in a book would launch my New York Times Bestseller literary career. But I understood that in the ministry world I’m in being a published author opens up opportunities that may have taken a lot more to open in the past. This is no time for false humility. After spending five years in the marketplace and then nearly a decade in ministry part-time, loving and learning from college students while raising a young family, my star was rising.
It is no small feat to be able to write a statement like that. Culturally there is no place for self-promotion – self-effacing comments, maybe. And by culturally I mean having grown up with a certain brand of Korean-American spirituality/fundamentalist/evangelicalism that let me know that under no circumstances was I to take credit for anything that I happened to achieve or fail.
Good grades? I was lucky, or God pulled through. A promotion at work? I was lucky, or God had a plan. A big project flops? Bummer, or it wasn’t God’s will. Oversimplified? Without a doubt.
I will say here that my husband has been very supportive, but even then the kind of comments he would field while I traveled hinted at the audacity of what I was doing – pursuing a rising career. Men and women would gush over his willingness to babysit the kids while I was away writing or speaking, as if he had granted me a favor. Men at church would joke about “letting” me have so much time away from him and the kids. Women would ask how I could spend so much time away from my family.
It was as if my rising star needed to be explained away as an anomaly or excused as a luxury.
I’m not sure if it’s the sudden change in weather that is making me a bit cranky these days. I’m pretty sure it’s because over the past few weeks I’ve talked with a few other women who have wrestled with being a supportive wife and present mother who has an opportunity to stretch her wings and fly a bit. And maybe my fuse for this internal conversation is growing short…I want to respond graciously when I’m asked about the toll of my travel schedule on my family (because I really do agonize over it). I want to respond confidently when I’m asked about my ability to speak to a large audience about matters of faith and life. But I know I’m cranky.
Anyone else cranky out there?
So, I’m sitting there with my supervisor having just spent quite a bit of time talking about my anxiety over moving into a new job, confusion over past conflicts, frustration over not being able to influence change and growth the way I had envisioned it.
As we are winding down our supervisory meeting, I open my fortune cookie.
“Your leadership qualities will shine soon.”
We laughed. I still have the fortune because it gave me hope in a funny, fortune cookie, God’s timing kind of way. (I also still have the fortune my husband opened 16 years ago when he came over for dinner while we were just getting to know each other. It read: “You or a close friend will be married within a year.” YES!)
Have you ever kept a fortune? What did it say and why did you keep it? My youngest collects them. At last count he had 60+. That’s a lot of fortune cookies.
Kathy VOICE
Kathy KEYS
Kathy FLUTE
My dear friend Emily took my magnets off of the soundboard at our “old church” when she and her family left.
We left months before Emily’s family, and only after much hand-wringing and praying and waiting and discerning. When God gave us the green light to leave there was no turning back – kind of like a fire alarm. You don’t go back to grab your belongings. So, my magnets sat on the soundboard.
When Emily left she took her magnets and mine, and then on a bench at the local mall she gave me her magnets for safe-keeping and she kept mine. We agreed that when the other person landed in a church and was worshipping God in the context of a church community – whether or not it was on the worship team – we would return the magnets.
Emily is still waiting and healing.
I thought I was still waiting. I’m definitely still healing. But as Emily put it, “You’re leading worship, Kath. I think that’s landing.”
Kathy FLUTE
Kathy KEYS
Kathy VOICE