Sergeant York was always a favorite film for our family; it even made the Sunday afternoon list of permissible videos to watch on the Lord’s Day, when our family was not involved in other things.

Another favorite was The Andy Griffith Show. Besides watching the videos, we’ve met some of the cast and even traveled to Mount Airy, NC for the town’s annual Mayberry Day.

Recently, I realized that I no doubt shared a love for these shows with some in the patriarchy movement. I also realized, however, that because of what we each believe, we don’t watch the shows the same way. For instance, when our family watched an episode of Andy Griffith, I might ask our children, “What’s Andy doing wrong?” and they’d answer, “He’s lying,” or “He’s not being kind to Opie.” While my patriarchy friends would agree with these, they’d have to have a much longer list, like “Ellie shouldn’t be a druggist,” or “Ernest T. Bass shouldn’t be learning to count in a government school.”

It made me think of those Christian film rating systems which list films, and have columns for numerical rating of violence, language and sex. I wondered if, in the mind of brethren in the patriarchy movement, they think of films with additional columns, as to education, family and church. For instance, if the church scene of a film showed an age-segregated Sunday School class, then it would be rated “10” as pretty bad, but if it showed the congregation worshipping together, it would only be a “1,” and if it showed both, maybe a “7.”

Another thing I realized was that women had to go to work outside the home, and usually with male producers and directors as their bosses for these shows. These were two clear violations of what some patriarchy folk maintain as standards of righteous behavior. Even though Aunt Bea took care of Andy and Opie in the show, it was Francis Bavier working outside the home for my entertainment and for those in the patriarchy camp. The same is true for the two women who played Alvin York’s mother and his girlfriend. In fact, the same is true for all the women who participated in the various Christian history films about Luther, Hus, Wycliffe, Tyndale and others. They all worked outside the home and probably under the direction of a male who was not their husband.

I had to wonder if this made those espousing patriarchy feel guilty that they were receiving entertainment from what they perceived to be women in sin. Did they experience guilt, thinking they were promoting such sinful behavior by buying or renting the videos? I asked, “How could we ever do film differently?”---certainly not by dressing men up as women.

I thought about the Proverbs 31 woman and considered that if the Holy Spirit had inspired such in our day, there may have been a line like, “she occasionally does drama on film”; if the Scriptures said this, we could all sit around and argue whether she went to the studio and was directed by a male director or if she had her own home-based production company and everything was filmed on location at her house and on her property.

Recently, I enjoyed reading a ministry letter by Steve Schissel about actress Patricia Heaton, who stars in, “Everybody Loves Raymond.” She’s written a book, entitled, Motherhood and Hollywood. I haven’t read the book; I have only occasionally watched “Everybody Loves Raymond.” Schissel wrote of her conversion to the Reformed Faith when she had been a part of his congregation in New York, before moving to California. This mother of four children seems to be trying to order her priorities in life in such a way so as to honor the Lord. I’m thankful for talented women with such gifts, and especially for those who are Christian and seek to serve the Lord in this area.

I realize what some are thinking, “What about the Scriptures that deal with women working outside the home?” Well, they are addressed in other articles; but this one is about working out the implications of the positions at which people have arrived, based on their understanding of Scripture.

We each believe our position is correct, and, among other things, I’m glad that with my grandchildren, as with my children, I will hear a shorter list of what’s wrong when we’re watching Andy, and I’m not sitting there thinking about some woman being brought before the elders for her sin of working outside the home, caught on film in the very act.