Growth and Change

I admire this American Elm tree when I ride past it on one of my favourite bike routes.  It may be three quarters of a century old, perhaps more, and this area of the city has seen many changes since the tree was a seedling. 

Family trees have branches like this elm that multiply with each generation. The tree is rooted deep in the ground but the surrounding environment changes and the view from the tree top broadens as branches grow higher. My parents were born during the great depression and grew up during World War II. They raised a family in the 1950's, 60s and 70s, times of great social change. My generation has lived through unprecendented social and technological change. The view from the top of our tree today is vastly different from the view our ancestors envisioned.

My great-grandparents lived in a time when women could not own property. 

When my grandparents were adults, women were granted the right to vote. About ten years later, women were legally considered to be persons and were able to hold public office for the first time. 

When my mother was an adult, women won the right for equal pay for equal work of equal value. 

Women are now represented in most professions and have risen to power as heads of state in several countries in my life time. I have watched as many men have stepped up to the plate to share household and child-rearing responsibilities. Yet there are those who feel threatened by capable women and want keep them in traditional roles. 

We were raised in a very conservative Christian church denomination, but it was progressive in the way it allowed women to teach and become ordained as leaders. Many Protestant groups now allow women to be pastors. Sadly, there are large denominations that still forbid women to be in leadership over men, as was the custom in the days of Paul the Apostle. Women are kept in subservient roles which has made them vulnerable to blame and abuse in patriarchal and misogynistic heirarchies. Religious systems easily become bastions of cultural tradition parading as truth. Personally, I could not join a church that did not give qualified and gifted women the same leadership opportunities as men.

Our region is home to many Old Order Mennonites. They are family-oriented, industrious people with many admirable qualities, but their church leaders decided that cultural changes that happened after the 19th century were worldly. Many live in homes without electricity or telephones and they still travel by horse and buggy. Change occurs very slowly in their community. Few people would want to live in Victorian times and no woman I know would want to give up legal rights that women fought for in the past.  

I am part of a family tree that has deep roots. I cannot discard the past, but I must adapt to a changing world while holding on to unchanging truths. The challenge is knowing what principles to hold on to, and what secondary opinions and traditions need to evolve with time. We do not want to end up in a time rut!