Mary Ann, you know that I have tremendous respect for you and that I love you as a sister in Christ.  I must tell you that what you have written here is probably the most compelling reason for me to disagree with what I believe, because I can feel the pain of your experience in your writing. 

Alex (and Scripture) once showed me something that I carry with me to this day - if I have not love, I am nothing.  Though I believe there is differentiation in roles between men and women, though I believe Scripture tells us that women should not teach men or be pastors, I would be nothing if I confronted you on the issue in an unloving way, tore apart your confidence, and threw you by the wayside.  Pam once shared with me that she was once yelled at by someone in leadership at her fellowship in college, and I remember how furious I was when I heard that story, and I'm still furious as I recall it now.  We ragamuffins do such malice to one another and justify it by saying we're doing it in the name of God.  Although I hold to the positions that I do with regards to men & women and male and female role differentiation, I believe it is a doctrinal issue, not a salvation issue, and thus I am comfortable with agreeing to disagree.

Nevertheless, here are some of the thoughts that run through my mind, and just as before, they are not comprehensive since I am drafting them on the fly.

With regards to the interpretation of 1 Timothy that you previously presented, I can't agree with the observation that the main thrust of this passage is to instruct women to learn.  I agree that women are being instructed to learn in the passage, but to render Paul's comments regarding authority and silence invalid due to the cultural context is a difficult justification to swallow.  This may be a poor argument from me, but the problem with the cultural argument is that the culture of Biblical times was very different from the culture that we live in now.  So where would you draw the line?  If you use the cultural environment as a basis for your observations, and culture is constantly changing, you're building your observations on very shaky ground.

Next, if the 1 Timothy passage only refers to women learning as it's main point, then you necessarily have to stretch that theme to the Genesis passage which Paul references as justification for his teaching, and you end up concluding that Adam had to teach Eve the truths that God had relayed to him first.  You mentioned this in your notes, but then proceeded to render the reference to Genesis passage null and void  Paul clearly has intention in referencing the passage, so I think it's important to dig a little further there.

I do not believe that Paul is saying here that women are more easily deceived than men and thus should not teach.  I think we can all agree that there are certain situations where women can be more easily deceived than men, and likewise there are situations where men can be more easily deceived than women.  I also do not believe that the passage is saying that women need to learn more so that they can teach, because men also need to learn proper doctrine in order to teach.  What I do believe is that God created woman out of man to be his helper (not his servant), and that differentiation of roles did exist before the Fall, though both man and woman were entirely equal in standing.  The order of creation does not make man better, but I think it does demonstrate God's design for man to lead (not dominate) woman, and the disruption of this order led to the fall.  This interpretation obviously requires a further discussion of both creation and the meaning of "helper", which I will not go into here.  However, if you read through the 1 Timothy passage, Paul is talking about issues of authority and submission, and I think this readily lends itself to him using the Genesis passage as a basis for his argument.

To address allclear's question, truth is not more valid if delivered from a boy.  Truth must be true regardless of who is delivering it, or all you have is someone telling a good tale.  As far as a message being more receivable if it is given by a man instead of a woman, I cannot say that.  Just as I said before, in certain contexts, a message is probably more receivable if delivered by a man, and in certain contexts a message is probably more receivable if delivered by a woman. 

What I can say, however, is that Scripture must be the authority which dictates our actions, which I know we both agree on.  The difficulty of this conversation is that it is a very emotional and personal issue, just as we've seen in Mary Ann's post.  It is a question that has been argued by good theologians on both sides, so I don't think it is something that can be solved here.  But I think it is important to share our thoughts and the Scriptural basis by which we arrived at those thoughts.  In our modern cultural context, I would say that holding to the complementarian position is highly unpopular and some would even term "sexist".  But I have to emphasize that I hold to this position not because I think less of women, or that they're incapable of teaching, but because I find biblical justification to do so.  And when my feelings come head to head with the Bible, the Bible must win.

I will also tell you that I go to a church that has a woman pastor.  It has caused many people to leave the church, but many have stayed and been encouraged by her.  Our small group seemed to "come alive" when the church was considering hiring a woman pastor, as many of our passive guys who hold to strict, conservative doctrine were enraged, wanting to talk to the pastor and also make sure that people in the church knew this was unbiblical.  It was then that I had spoken to Alex and read 1 Corinthians 13 over and over.  I saw the passion stirred up over this issue in our small group guys, but I also saw how passive they were about everything else in their Christian life - their disinterest in serving, their desire to stay within a comfort zone, their lackluster efforts in spending time in the word.  I saw that the assertion of their "biblical rightness" would cause great harm to the growing body within our church, particularly to young believers who would only see their anger.  So I told them, "If you disagree that strongly, leave the church rather than dragging everyone else.  But if you choose to stay, then do everything you can to build up the body around you, and agree to disagree."

I chose to stay at my church and continue to serve where I was able.  Likewise here, I'll share my view and agree to disagree.  Thank you for sharing your thoughts, Mary Ann.  I do have the utmost respect for you as a sister and have been tremendously encouraged throughout the years in watching God work in and through you.

This post was much longer than I expected it to be...deepest apologies to those who got bored/tired reading it!

Perhaps I wasn't clear with my response since I was posting on the fly, but I wholeheartedly agree that the cultural context needs to be understood to identify the true meaning and intention of the passage.  However, rendering passages null and void because the cultural context of today is different than when the book was written - that I say must be done very carefully.

Regarding the Genesis passage, I have never questioned whether or not God spoke to Eve directly.  I agree that both were taught by God, and your observation that this was to address the fallacies the Artemis cult in Ephesus was teaching I believe is sound as well.  However, this observation does not eliminate the possibility that Paul is talking about role reversal in Genesis either.

Regarding your observation that Biblical evidence for women being able to preach far outweighs the Biblical evidence against it-if that were indeed true, we wouldn't be having this conversation.  This topic has been hotly debated for some time now, and we probably won't know the true "answer" until we're kneeling before the presence of God. 

I will conclude my thoughts on this topic with this - though we have disagreed, I have been encouraged by the exchanges here.  I don't believe any of us are sharing what we believe to cause malice to one another, and I can confidently say that all of us desire to live biblical, God-honoring lives.  Let us continue to pursue Him with all that we are, as the ragamuffins that we are.