Feminism and Religion

Archives from the FAR Founders: The Courage to be a Self and a Part by Xochitl Alvizo

This post was originally published on November 1, 2o23. It is about a chapter I was working on at the time. That piece was recently published in Catholicism: End or Beginning? by Mary Daly, and edited by Meg Stapleton Smith.

A blurb about the talk can be found on WATER’s homepage: https://www.waterwomensalliance.org//. And if you would like to join as well, please register here: https://www.waterwomensalliance.org/watertalk-registration/.

I thought it a good time to repost since the first public discussion of our volume will take place next Wednesday, March 11, 2026 at 1PM (EST) on Zoom. Mary E. Hunt will be hosting Meg Stapleton Smith for a WATERtalk. I and other contributors will also join the conversation.

~~~~~~

I just submitted to the editor the final draft of a chapter I’ve been working on for about two years (no joke). Sometimes when I really care about a subject, it can take me a long time to process, reflect, and write on the subject (I shared a bit about this project on FAR early this year)—but this one might have taken the cake in terms of how slow a process it ended up being. Still, it is now submitted and in the hands of the publishing company, Oxford University Press, for the next step in the process.

White Pine Wonder by Sara Wright

Yesterday was mild (mid 40’s in January) so Coalie and I went to our favorite forest to walk. The roads were icy, but the seeps were brimming and ringed with footprints. Over one of my favorites (because declining wood frogs still lay eggs there in the spring), an elderberry bush arced over rippling water like some sort of plant protectoress.

Seeps fascinate me because they defy freezing weather bubbling up through deep in the earth. Water seeps in the forest are small wetland areas where groundwater naturally emerges at the surface, often at the bases of slopes. They create moist spots with lush plants in season (like elderberries) and serve as important habitats for wildlife by providing clean water sources all year-round. They form from underground layers of rock that force water to flow horizontally until it surfaces. Seeps care for their animal and bird neighbors by providing clear waters at any time of year. There were so many fox and partridge tracks leading to and from these pools that I was surprised we didn’t startle one of the latter. (At home I have a pair that are feasting on the last of the crabapple berries). A couple of chickadees were chirping from nearby maples probably annoyed because we were taking our time. Coalie was nosing every blade of grass in the area.

Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Celibacy Is the Lynch-Pin of Male Dominance according to Matilda Joslyn Gage

This blog was originally posted on Dec 2, 2019

Matilda Joslyn Gage was an activist in the nineteenth century struggle for women’s rights equal to Susan B. Anthony, and a writer and theorist equal to Elizabeth Cady Stanton. That she is not remembered is due in large part to Susan B. Anthony’s efforts to write her out of history.

Matilda Joslyn Gage was also a scholar of women’s history unrivaled in her time. In Woman Church, and State, Gage argued that “the most grievous wrong ever inflicted upon women was in the Christian teaching that she was not created equal with man.” (page 1) From this it follows that feminists must never lose sight of the role Christian teachings have played and continue to play in the unequal treatment of women.

According to Gage, women’s position in church and state did not improve in the Christian era. To the contrary it declined! Gage proved this thesis in chapters titled: The Matriarchate, Celibacy, Canon Law, Marquette, Witchcraft, Wives, Polygamy, Woman and Work, and The Church of Today.

The Epstein Files Prove Just How Right Carol Christ Had Been, part 1 by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

We here at FAR are so honored and grateful to be the custodian of so many of Carol’s writings. Her 3-part seminal piece Patriarchy as a System of Male Dominance Created at the Intersection of the Control of Women, Private Property, and War first appeared on our site in 2013. We have committed to re-running it each year on the anniversary of her death in July. It is a piece that needs to be read over and over again until the understanding of what she writes seeps into our very bones. And even for those who already know this in our bones, it is important to articulate. We shouldn’t have needed the Epstein files to provide proof of Carol’s work. But alas . .. it does provide it in slews. And the fact that we needed the Epstein files for society at large to even begin discussing this proves Carol’s points of how insidious patriarchy is. It is so ingrained into our world that it is invisible unless there is a stimulus to bring it to the forefront. Will that be enough to make change?

For this two part post, I quote Carol from Part I of her essay (linked above – her words in italics). My commentary is based on recent events as well as the Epstein revelations. Really this is just scratching the surface and I plan to write more posts highlighting the work that Carol did on patriarchy. Here is her definition of patriarchy.

From the Archives Herstory Profiles: The Queen of Gospel Music, Mahalia Jackson by Anjeanette LeBoeuf

February, the month designated as Black History Month, will see us focus on the voice, the faith, and the heartbeat of one of the greatest singers in all of US History. Many have stated that the voice and songs of Mahalia Jackson can be considered one of the most influential voices of the 20^th Century. She not only became one of the most modern voices to bridge popular music, blues, and religious hymns but she also is intrinsically linked to the Civil Rights Movement. She is one of the first commercially successful Black musicians of the modern era.

Mahalia (1911-1972) was born Mahala in New Orleans, Louisiana. Both sets of her grandparents were born into slavery. Mahala’s childhood was filled with hardship, yet a persistent faith emerged. Mahala was raised in a very charismatic Baptist church, Mount Moriah Baptist Church. It is at church that Mahala would start to sing, find her voice, and start to uplift the souls around her.

Renee Nicole Good—An Acrostic Poem by Marie Cartier

Say Her Name So We Remember Her

R—Remember– that is what I think we need to do
E– Everything that she did, like poetry, like raising kids
N– Not just the horror of what happened… Bam! Bam! Bam!
E— Everything she did …like win the Academy of American Poetry Prize
E— Everything she did …like be a lesbian, be so beloved, be.

***

N- Not just that video on an endless loop- Bam! Bam! Bam! “Fuckin’ bitch.”
I–I want to see her, more of her, before that day, all of her
C- Colors. All of the crayons in the coloring box she represented.
O- -Oh! I wish I had known her. I wish it hadn’t happened. I wish we weren’t here right now in these United States
L– Let me say I wish we were not here.
E– Everything feels dystopian. I forget all the crayons in the coloring box, except gray.

My God Bleeds With Me by Jsabél Bilqís

My god bleeds with me
Her feet right beside mine for morning gratitudes
Soles to soils, we touch skin to skin
She’s vast like me
And I love her

My god grieves when I do
My sorrows meet Hers at the ocean shore
Vial for vial, our tears make our medicine
She can transmute anything, just like me
And I love Her

She courts me
leaves me love notes in the shapes of flower petals
winks at me in amber sunsets
morning serenades and juicy fruits
She loves me! She lifes me!
And I love and I life Her too

Decolonizing Liberal Feminism – Questioning Choices & Freedom in the Rhetoric of Saving by Huma Iqbal

In the wake of the attack on a Muslim imam, with his veiled wife in Melbourne on January 12, 2026, we are reminded of the Islamophobic violence targeting hijab-wearing women around the world. Concerns persist about ongoing Islamophobic attacks, from the murder of a German Muslim woman for wearing a hijab in July 2025, to the Bihar Chief Minister pulling down a Muslim woman’s hijab in December 2025. According to Reuters, data from various rights organizations indicate that Muslim women, particularly those who wear hijabs, face disproportionate levels of discrimination and hate crimes in parts of the EU.

These recent incidents remind me of Abu Lughod’s work, ‘Do Muslim Women Need Saving?’ 2013). Lila Abu-Lughod is a Palestinian American anthropologist and feminist scholar. She is known for her work on gender, Islam, media, and power in the Middle East. In her work, she critiques colonial and imperial feminism and advocates for culturally sensitive and context-based analysis of the lives of Muslim women.

Indigenous Peoples in Greenland May Lose Their Way of Life to a Madman by Sara Wright

The Inuit make up about 88 percent of the people in Greenland, and most speak the Inuit language with the remainder speaking Danish.

Up until the present the greatest challenge the Inuit peoples have faced besides the threats to their culture/and massive environmental collapse due to climate change has centered around uranium mining and the ubiquitous Military presence.

Now an American Madman demands that the entire country be taken over to secure homeland security against the ‘enemy’ (himself?) What is rarely mentioned is that Greenland is also so rich in resources (so useful to ‘resource’ hungry America). This lunatic threatens to make everyone that refuses to support the takeover ‘pay’.

What never seems to make it into the news is that should this takeover happen the Inuit people who have subsisted in this harsh but magnificent peace of earth (peace used deliberately) for thousands of years will be destroyed. How is it possible that no one mentions that this is yet ONE MORE Indigenous culture that will go down under the tyranny of the colonizers? I repeat this truth for emphasis because Indigenous peoples are invisible in this culture, regardless of what is said. 500 hundreds year of oppression by foreigners isn’t enough?

The Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Losing My Skin

This was originally posted on June 29, 2020

I arrived to Crete on June 6. Movers were in my house in Lesbos on the 4^th and 5^th. I put myself, my car, and my cat on an overnight ferry from Lesbos to Athens on June 5, and, after a day, took a second overnight ferry from Athens to Heraklion. Then another day moving my furniture and belongings up to my 5^th floor apartment using a crane. The agreement was that the moving company would put all of the furniture in its place, while I would unpack over the next few days.

This was the end of a very long journey. I bought the apartment at the end of September and expected to be in Crete by Christmas. Paperwork problems delayed the contract of sale until the end of February. My architect was ready to begin renovations. I hoped to be in Crete by the end of March. Then the Covid quarantine hit Greece. Luckily work on the apartment was allowed to continue during the quarantine. And my architect sent copious photographs and asked my opinion about everything.