It seems to me that God was always trying to bring equality to people in the Bible. It sometimes doesn't look like it to us as moderns, but a lot of the laws in the Old Testament about women were actually groundbreaking laws protecting women's rights. The problem is, people were so backward and violent back in those days that God was forced to make changes a little at a time.
It's not until Jesus comes on the scene that we learn God's true heart. Jesus loves everyone. Lots of Jesus' original followers were women, and they traveled with Him and supported Him. (Luke 8)
Paul also thought Jesus was teaching equality.
Ga; 3:28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
I think all the stuff about women being in leadership and separated etc. is nothing more than people taking Paul's letters as prescription for all Christianity and not pastoral letters addressing specific communities dealing with real issues in their lives. If you think about Paul's letters as responses to issues the churches were having, then you can leave some room for things going on in the background we don't know about. It also allows you to consider that there were cultural considerations that would have had an impact on Paul's prescriptions that just aren't applicable to us today.
Thanks for the addition information @garthfreeman , but interestingly to say about what you mentioned in your statement: