Author Archives
Carol P. Christ is a leading feminist historian of religion and theologian who leads the Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete, a life transforming tour for women. www.goddessariadne.org
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Do All Religions Teach Love and Justice? Or Do Some Religions Teach Domination? by Carol P. Christ
Recently at a discussion of Goddess and God in the World, Judith Plaskow and I were asked if the dialogue across religious difference we embody and advocate in our book is a “liberal thing.” Can it, the questioner wondered, occur… Read More ›
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The Mountain Mother: Reading the Language of the Goddess in the Symbols of Ancient Crete by Carol P. Christ
Before he told the story of how his people received the sacred pipe, Black Elk said: So I know that it is a good thing I am going to do; and because no good thing can be done by any… Read More ›
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Beginning with Death on the Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete by Carol P. Christ
Our first ritual on the Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete is a death ritual in which we honor the memory of those who have gone before us. Like so many things on the pilgrimage, the death ritual evolved. I did not… Read More ›
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Was There a “Golden Age” before Patriarchy and War? by Carol P. Christ
Marija Gimbutas coined the term “Old Europe” c.6500-3500 BCE to describe peaceful, sedentary, artistic, matrifocal, matrilineal and probably matrilocal agricultural societies that worshipped the Goddess as the power of birth, death, and regeneration in all of life. Gimbutas argued that… Read More ›
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“He Owes Us Nothing”: A Very Bad and Very Sad Theology by Carol P. Christ
While waiting to get off a plane last week, I overheard a serious young woman explaining a recent theological insight to her half-asleep and equally young husband. “You see,” she began, “what I just learned is that though He owes… Read More ›
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Omnipotence: The Ultimate Homage to Male Dominance as Control by Carol P. Christ
The concept of divine omnipotence is the ultimate expression of male dominance as control. Divine omnipotence is the view that everything that happens in the world happens according to the will of a divinity, who is in control of everything… Read More ›
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The Social Structures of Religious Identity and the Decision to Leave or Stay by Carol P. Christ
Reflecting on our different choices to “stay or leave” the religions of our upbringings while writing Goddess and God in the World with Judith Plaskow, I was prompted to think again about the social and ethnic structures of denominationalism. One… Read More ›
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It’s a Small Thing in Relation to Everything Else: Or Is It? by Carol P. Christ
Yesterday morning when I learned about the Open Letter to Attorney General Sessions: Join Us In Selma On the Right Side of History, I paused Joy Reid’s interview with William Barber II in order to search for the petition site…. Read More ›
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Reflections on Death, Evil, and Divinity by Carol P. Christ
In our book Goddess and God in the World, Judith Plaskow and I discuss and debate our contrasting and conflicting views of the nature of divinity and the cause of evil. In the passage that follows, I respond to Judith’s… Read More ›
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Authoritarian Followers: What’s Feminism and Religion Got to Do with It? by Carol P. Christ
There are two types of authoritarians: those who jump out in front and say “follow me, only I can solve the problem”; the far greater number of authoritarian personalities are those who want to be told how to think, what… Read More ›
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Feeling the Earth Move by Carol P. Christ
Magnitude 5.2 earthquake Feb 6, 5:51 AM I awake to the sound of the windows and shutters rattling and the bed moving up and down beneath me for a few seconds. Magnitude 5.4 earthquake Feb 6, 12:58 PM This is… Read More ›
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This Is How Liberal Democracy Dies: Will We Let It? by Carol P. Christ
“This is apparently how liberal democracy dies. It vanishes very quickly with an Executive Order.”– Ska Keller In a powerful yet softly-spoken speech to the European Parliament, Green Party Germany Representative Ska Keller explained that rights and liberties we we… Read More ›
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“Girl . . . You’re Gonna Make It” by Carol P. Christ
Why did this song,* this program, this woman mean so much to Oprah and Michelle, to you, to me? Because Mary Tyler Moore was one of our first role models of cheerful independent womanhood. Why does this song still bring tears… Read More ›
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A Serpentine Path: The Dance Is About To Begin by Carol P. Christ
Entering the archaeological site of Kato Zakros, which includes a Sacred Center and part of a town on a small hill above it, I felt too tired to continue with the others. As we passed a stone bench to the… Read More ›
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The Women’s March on Washington: I’ll Be There in Spirit by Carol P. Christ
The Women’s March on Washington has released its statement of vision and principles, and what a stunning testimony to intersectional feminism and collaboration it is! The statement is woman-centered, while at the same time addressing a multitude of issues that… Read More ›
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As It Might Have Been: Ancestor Stories in the Dreamtime by Carol P. Christ
In the middle of the night in waking sleep, I asked my great-great grandmother Annie Corliss to tell me the story of how she met and married James Inglis. This story came through me in a place I have come… Read More ›
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Life in the Tenements by Carol P. Christ
During my ancestor research, I have seen the word “tenement”—with the implication of poverty, filth, and disease–handwritten onto more than one death certificate. Last month, I visited the Lower East Side where my Irish 2x great-grandmother Annie Corliss lived in… Read More ›
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FAR Press Publishes A Serpentine Path: Mysteries of the Goddess by Carol P. Christ
This is a great day for me as I announce the publication of A Serpentine Path: Mysteries of the Goddess. It is the first —but certainly not the last—book from the new FAR Press, directed by Gina Messina and Xochitl… Read More ›
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Ancestor Connection in Williamsburg, Brooklyn by Carol P. Christ
In early December 2016 I visited central Williamsburg in Brooklyn, New York, where my 2x great-grandparents Thomas and Anna Maria Christ and their son George and his family, including my father’s father Irving John, lived for over fifty years. I… Read More ›
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The Refugee Crisis: Through the Eyes of the Children: Review by Carol P. Christ
The Refugee Crisis: Through the Eyes of the Children by Robert and Robin Jones. Santa Barbara, CA: Blue Point Books, 2016. $19.95. Website: http://www.throughtheeyesofthechildren.com Arriving in Molivos, Lesbos for a summer break, Robert and Robin Jones quickly became caught up… Read More ›
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Down on the Farm by Carol P. Christ
In the past week I visited Cherry Ridge, Honesdale, Wayne, Pennsylvania in the Pokonos, where I was welcomed by my third cousin Marcia Perry Gager whose family never left the place where our ancestors settled. Marcia and I have been… Read More ›
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Black Sheep by Carol P. Christ
At Thanksgiving and the solstice holidays many of us are reminded that we are the “black sheep” of our families. In my case this means that I am too “assertive,” too “aggressive,” too “demanding,” too “political,” too “willing to upset… Read More ›
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The Reason for Hope Is the Creative Process of Life by Carol P. Christ
In these these days when many of us are gripped by paralyzing despair as we come to terms with the election as President of a racist, sexist bigot who has created a climate of fear and promises to undo much… Read More ›
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Keepin’ On Keepin’ On by Carol P. Christ
It is now Monday morning, five days after the new President was elected, despite losing the popular vote. For many of us, and for me too, losing this election feels like losing everything we have worked to achieve during our… Read More ›
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Sacred Marriage or Unholy Cover-up? by Carol P. Christ
Many women are drawn to the image of the Sacred Marriage—perhaps especially those raised in Roman Catholic or Protestant traditions where sex is viewed as necessary for procreation but nothing more, and who learn that the naked female body as… Read More ›
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Are White Women Voters (As a Group) Waking Up? by Carol P. Christ
I have been following the statistics on the gender gap in voting patterns for many years, often patting myself on the back for belonging to a group that on the whole votes Democratic or breathing a sigh of relief that… Read More ›
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Weaving and Spinning Women: Witches and Pagans by Max Dashu: Reviewed by Carol P. Christ
Max Dashu’s Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion 700-1000 challenges the assumption that Europe was fully Christianized within a few short centuries as traditional historians tell us. Most of us were taught not only that Europe became Christian… Read More ›
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“And God Said It Was So”: Donald Trump Is the Spittin’ Image of Bad Theology by Carol P. Christ
I try very hard this election season to avoid reading about, watching, or listening to Donald Trump: the man is a liar, a cheat, a bully, a narcissist, a racist, a sexist, the list goes on. Yet even progressive commentators… Read More ›
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Can Good Theology Change the World? Part 3: Embodied Theology by Carol P. Christ
In an earlier blog I asserted that one of the hallmarks of good theology is understanding that the only valid source of authority is to be found in individuals and communities that continually interpret and reinterpret texts and traditions in… Read More ›
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Can Good Theology Change the World? Part 2 by Carol P. Christ
In the first blog in this series, I argued that one of the hallmarks of a good theology is recognizing that the source of authority must be located in individuals and communities who interpret texts and traditions as they encounter… Read More ›
