Smiling Wives. Strong Handshakes. Toxic Church.
It's In the Code Ep. 112 - By Dan Miller and Tiffany Wicks
Recently, one of our Straight White American Jesus podcast listeners sent us an image that came as an insert inside of a church bulletin. The insert was slightly larger than a business card, nearly the size of an old baseball card. If you've ever been to church, usually there's a greeter that hands you that kind of program or bulletin of what's going to happen in the service, and it has some information about the church. It looks like the kind of thing that could be inserted in there. This also might be what shows up in church promotional materials. Maybe there's a resource table or section in the church with a pile of these. It could be what goes out with church holiday cards or church mailers. Or it could simply be put on the church’s website. Regardless, it was given to the congregation.
This insert did not have the church’s name on the top, but there was a symbol that may have been the church’s logo. On the card was a list of eight statements, which could be assumed as what those who come to the church will see and experience. The list reads like this:
Smiling Wives
Obedient Children
Loud Singing
Strong Handshakes
Young Marriages
Good Manners
Biblical Preaching
Reverent Worship
That’s it. That was the whole card. And with only eight statements, so much was said.
When I was a pastor, part of my job during the service was to stand in front of the congregation, make announcements, and banter a bit during the welcome to guests. Then the welcome would conclude with a statement about church interest. I’d say something like, “If you're interested in who we are, we invite you to take a look at our bulletin that you should have received when you walked into church this morning. Or you can go take a look at our website as there’s a lot of information there. We'd love to hear from you.” And as visitors look through the bulletin for information, that card would be in there.
What does the order of the topics mean? Was there an emphasis on importance? Was it the list of the priorities of the church or the congregation? I’m not sure, but there must have been a rhyme and reason why they were listed in this way. With this card, there’s a lot to unpack. Each of these eight topics deserves to be discussed individually. We will deep dive into each one over this series. So let’s start with “Smiling Wives”.
What does “smiling wives” mean? If you read that or hear that, do you feel a cringe?
First, the subject that is smiling is wives. This implies a heteronormative context. It also implies a traditional theology that is supported in point number seven, Biblical teaching. If we know it's a theologically conservative or traditionalist church, which we can very safely assume, this is a church situated within a context that says that the only valid expression of human sexuality occurs within a lifelong monogamous marriage. And I think all of that, then insinuates purity culture and everything that comes with it. As soon as you position the narrative of marriage within only a monogamous heterosexual relationship, you're in purity culture. That's the first thing it tells us.
The second thing I've already hinted at is that it affirms and presupposes straight marriage. I think it's safe to say that the term smiling wives does not imply the happy, smiling, lesbian couple. Wives are married to men, and men and women are all there are. It loudly implies a gender binary. It also tells us that men and women have distinct gender roles and expressions and presumably distinct needs, which are met at the church.
But why do the wives need to be smiling?
Many words could have been used to describe wives. Valued, fulfilled, and contributing are all words that could have been used to complement the word wife. But the use of smiling strengthens the narrative of the patriarchy. It intertwines with the implication of heteronormativity as well as monogamy. And it paints a picture within the church of the presentation of a wife within the congregation.
I cannot help but have the image of a married couple standing around, maybe talking with others after the service, sipping their coffee, and the wife smiling on her husband's arm. In my imagination she's not talking, she's not contributing, she's just smiling. And what I hear or what I feel when I read this image is that she is there to accompany her husband. She is there to play her role, and to be content playing that role. She is just there as an accessory.
Within this broad, heteronormative, marriage-focused context, this also implies that a wife's source of satisfaction and happiness should be her domestic relationships. It should be her husband or her kids. And subsequently, the next topic in the list of eight is “obedient children”. This description renders this kind of woman as a passive accompaniment to her husband. I think that this communicates well-worn Christian and cultural stereotypes about women. Paul's injunction in 1 Corinthians 14 comes to mind.
In the New Testament, there's a letter to the church at Corinth, and we call it 1 Corinthians. It's the first discovered and recorded letter that we have that Paul wrote to the church there. In chapter 14, he says that women should be silent and subordinate in churches. I think most people, most interpreters would say that Paul is not literally saying women shouldn't ever make a noise in church. This usually has to do with teaching or holding authority over men. The issue is submission, and submission is the key. This church already states it’s focused on Biblical teaching, evidenced in point seven. So, what is a smiling wife? It’s a submissive one.
Another big piece of this puzzle is the misogynistic trope that is prominent in the church and society. If you are female-identified, you certainly have heard and encountered this. I cannot help but think of all the times when someone, typically male, says to a woman that she should smile more. Or even more cringy, I think of when men say something like, “you're really pretty when you smile, you should do it more often.” This is carried out in the media and males with a platform. Harrison Butker talks about the woman's highest calling. JD Vance emphasizes having children and being a mother and the devaluation of women who don’t have families of their own. All of these narratives are wrapped up in the trope of the smiling wife.
Let’s connect all the dots. When you attend a church that creates a targeted insert such as this, there’s an expectation of what you’re going to get when you enter. You're going to come into a church that values and affirms “traditional marriage”, and you're going to come to a place where the women in those marriages know their role. They are happy and fulfilled being the wife of a loving husband. They find joy in raising their kids and raising them in a heterosexual, domestic relationship. They know that their calling is to be a wife and mother. They know their place, they will fill their role, and they will smile because they know how to submit and find joy in submission. And you're going to like them because they smile, are friendly, and are seemingly happy and positive.
This is everything that this church values. This is what it tells us about so much of who they are, who they're drawing in, who they want to be a part of their community. My experiences with churches like these and the amount of political and religious discourse I watch shape many of my thoughts on this subject. If you're an organization, you make a deliberate decision to put a card like this out with like eight little statements. It’s a deeply descriptive statement about what women ought to be and to what they should aspire. From my purview, it’s pretty self-evident.
I also think that this is the way we should read this. The way that these little cards work is by what they don't have to say and the people who can read between the lines. They chose this card for their church members because it resonates with them and continues to influence them. And it does not resonate despite the misogyny and heteronormativity, it resonates because of it.
This is just the first point on this card, too. There’s more to come and more to discuss. But I encourage you to think about why they chose to start with smiling wives. Consider the message it sends to the congregation and the message that reflects a social and political climate that silences women, especially at a time when a woman is running for President.
Dan Miller is a co-host of the podcast Straight White American Jesus and professor of religion and social thought at Landmark College. Dan produces “It’s in the Code” series every Wednesday on the podcast.