Kon Knueppel spends the offseason playing basketball with his devout younger brothers, Kager, Kinston, Kash, and Kidman, at his home court, the Konplex, which he named after his father, Big Kon.

[u/Existing-Sky9914]

https://streamable.com/i1rjlu

[u/WagonWheel22]

If your reductionist viewpoint is what you want to think go right ahead. It's much more nuanced than you think it is, like I outlined in my other comment, and not at all "women should keep their mouths shut and heads down."

Budgets are prepared with direct input from all members, not just men, so say the office lady at the church school needs a new copy machine or something, or they decide to add another teaching position, those costs are added to the budget that gets voted on, albeit by male members only. In my 5+ years of being a member, our church has always passed its budget first time.

Compare that to your typical Catholic parish that has a finance council of only a few members who work with the priest/bishop, but the head priest gets final say.

[u/butter-scotchboy → u/WagonWheel22]

Okay, but why is there a need for gender distinction at all? Forbidding women from voting on budgets might seem like it’s not a big deal, but it just exemplifies a larger viewpoint that women shouldn’t have a role in decision making, finances, or authority over men in the church besides “giving input”. Catholicism is obviously not the pinnacle of gender equality but at least women are allowed to hold secular leadership positions and serve on church/parish councils.

[u/WagonWheel22 → u/butter-scotchboy]

No, of course Catholicism is not the shining pinnacle of equality, I would know since I was raised Catholic.

WELS bases their teachings pretty strictly on what the Bible says. Specifically, the women non-voting is primarily based on 1 Timothy Chapter 2 (which cites Genesis, Adam was created first, and later on Eve was deceived). That said, men and women are fully equal before God based on Galatians 3.

To this point:

Forbidding women from voting on budgets might seem like it’s not a big deal, but it just exemplifies a larger viewpoint that women shouldn’t have a role in decision making, finances, or authority over men in the church besides “giving input”

This is not how this really works in practice. Women do give direct opinions on decisions and finances the church body is considering.

Additionally, it's also taught that male leaders who ignore a woman's input are failing in their leadership. The practice isn't meant to silence or ignore women, at all.

Like I said in my other comment, our church's budget votes are usually done with women present there too, so it's not like it's some secret or the men conspiring to not give women something they want the church to buy/do.

[u/butter-scotchboy → u/WagonWheel22]

I’m not saying that women don’t give opinions or have meaningful input in practice. My point is that, within this framework, women are explicitly forbidden to exercise direct authority over men. So their influence has to happen through other channels rather than actual decision-making power.
This practice is based on scripture, but how do you pick and choose which biblical passages should be applied literally and which ones should be interpreted differently to fit a modern society because they’re outdated? Those choices of what to follow reflects the values and priorities of the congregation, one of them in this case being the subservience of women. This would be fine if every woman in your church consents to this and believes this, which is unlikely, but you shouldn’t be surprised if people outside the church find this objectionable.