KATE Forbes does not believe that women should become church ministers, her campaign team has confirmed.
In a letter published online in 2014 and unearthed by the Daily Record, Forbes wrote that “God’s plan for women” did not “permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man.”
Although published anonymously on a blog called The Wee Flea many years ago, Forbes’s team confirmed both that she wrote the blog and continued to hold the same views.
The letter was in response to calls from former Church of Scotland moderators Lorna Hood and David Lacy calling for an end to sexist views within the church.
Since 1968 women have been able to become Church of Scotland ministers.
However, Forbes’s church – the Free Church of Scotland – has no female elders or ministers.
The letter stated: “I have been a woman for 24 years, most of them spent in the Church of Scotland. But this week I was bemused to be accused of sexism in the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. My sin? Believing that I am preciously unique, with a specific design and an awesome calling in the Church.
"Lorna Hood, David Lacy and those that applaud their statements argue that God’s calling for me and my sisters in the Church is restrictive.
"It is a great injustice when we ignore God’s plan for women, as Mrs Hood suggests we do in the Church. His plan clearly states that, specifically within the Church, “I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man.” (1 Tim 2 v 12).
"Now, I admit that often I don’t understand the ‘whys’ of God’s plans. Maybe it’s because I don’t know myself as well as he does. He knows the exact number of hairs on my head. I don’t. Or, maybe it’s because I’m not God and never will be, and so I don’t quite grasp his reasoning.
"Maybe it’s because I am ambitious, young and female. I have a degree from Cambridge University, worked in politics and I’m now employed on one of the best fast-track schemes in the business world. Education, hard work, and stewarding our talents within the parameters of Scripture are commended in God’s Word.
"You can give me your culturally sensitive, historically contextualised and feminist-power arguments. But you’ll forgive me, I hope, if I choose to believe the One who loves me with an everlasting love, who made me and who died for me before I believe you."
It concluded: “Aged 24, I am arguably closer to the beginning of life than the end. The opportunities I enjoy in society were won for me by brave women, to whom I am incredibly thankful.
"Every day and every breath and every gift is given by God, to whom I am forever indebted. He provides clear guidelines for how women and men are to relate to one another – a Godsend really, because we still can’t seem to get it right. Those guidelines are for His glory and our good.
"Mrs Hood and Mr Lacy have the freedom to call me a shame and a disgrace to the Church. But I quite enjoy being fully the woman that God made me.”
