Bible Shopping

Last night, a Friday, Anna and I found ourselves perusing the local christian book store after dinner. Since one of my favorite things to do is look at the different covers, pages, translations in which God's word appears in our culture (and I've been eying the ESV Study Bible), when we head in there we tend to stay a little while, until we get sick of the self-help titles and discuss Christian culture on the way to one of our domiciles.

Last night, it was kid's Bibles.

Oh my stars.

There were Bibles with glitter, the Precious Princess Bible, the Adventure Bible, the Treasure Chest Bible (complete with plastic clasp.)

At this point, I will discuss a little bit of insight into my brain. I used to be far more militant than I am now about feminism. I would no longer call myself a feminist due to the social implications of such a label. However, I believe that men and women are both made in the image of God, and that they have different roles to play in family and church structure.

Nowhere in the Bible, though, does Paul, or Moses, or Luke, or Jesus talk about glitter. In fact, in multiple places in the Bible (1st Peter 3, 1st Timothy 2, Proverbs 31 all come to mind) women are exhorted not to put their hope in their external beauty. This doesn't make glitter and fashion and the like bad, but the mind and heart are what are emphasized in these passages.

In all of the kids' Bibles I looked at, all the "boys" Bibles had maps in the back, and the "girls" Bibles did not. This is frustrating to me as well because three very important women in my life are really visual. So they like maps.

There is nothing wrong with Bibles having glitter on them. Not my cup of tea, but if that's yours, fantastic. But if the ones with glitter on them, marketed towards girls don't have a map in the back, I take issue. For visual women to not have that aspect of their brain cultivated at an early age really bothers me.

What are some of the reasons that the publishers might leave this information out?