One of the interesting aspects of early Christianity is that the woman of the household was once the spiritual head of the family.
"They" are extremely large, diverse groupings of over a billion people. It's absurd to make sweeping claims about the entirety of them. Christians and Muslims, people with religious motivations and allegiances, are responsible for some terrible things. But they're responsible for great things too. And as far as manipulating people towards conflict with no empathy--you don't need religion for that. In fact, you don't need very much at all.
Just saying. Before churches appeared on the scene, women dominated the spiritual aspect of Christianity within the household.
Women played a more equitable role in Early Christianity. Its status as a revolutionary, politicised, quasi-mystery-cult lent it towards rather more fringe ideas for the time. Some of which are similar to mystery religion of the Hellenistic east. And a placement of women as important to households and religious services were part of that, perhaps an attempt to consciously reflect the importance of Mary in Christian mythology. That changed, starting with Paul of Tarsus, but really took hold after the Christians absorbed conventional Roman social customs in an effort to appear "normal" and avoid persecution. Bowser's not entirely wrong about that point. The supremacy of men in Christianity was certainly solidified well before it found political patronage in the dynasty of Constantine.
