Author Archives
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Redemptive Forgetfulness by Marcia Mount Shoop
Have you forgotten yet? Have you forgotten what it felt like to go about your life pre-pandemic? My brain has switched to a different filter system. If I watch a movie or see an image from the pre-pandemic world, the… Read More ›
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Mis(sing)Understanding: Kobe, Pompeo, and a Paper Towel by Marcia Mount Shoop
Who knows when each of us first learns that sensation—the sensation of being misunderstood. My hunch is that it comes early on in our lives, maybe even before our brains are making narrative memory, maybe even before we have begun… Read More ›
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Blinded by the White by Marcia Mount Shoop
White supremacy culture is on full display day in and day out in America. You don’t have to strain to see it—the President’s recent comparison of the impeachment proceedings to a lynching is the latest example. Of course, even such… Read More ›
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Gentle Moments in a Violent World by Marcia Mount Shoop
“Be gentle with yourself.” It may be some of the most redemptive guidance I have ever received. And I share that invitation daily with people in painful situations. “Be gentle with yourself.” In a world seemingly hell bent on self-destruction,… Read More ›
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The Race-ing of Innocence: Calling All Feminists to Converse by Marcia Mount Shoop
Well over 100,000 people and counting have read a blog post called “Nothing But the Truth: A Word to White America After the Recent Unpleasantness in Washington DC” that I wrote. Going on 400 commenters have weighed in on my website…. Read More ›
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Not Yet the Death Rattle by Marcia Mount Shoop
I have had the honor of sitting vigil with dying people. And I have prayed through the coming of the death rattle. It can be painful to witness, especially for those witnessing death for the first time. Sometimes the person… Read More ›
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To Dread and To Savor: Mothering in Real Time by Marcia Mount Shoop
It happened in the blink of an eye. So much of how we got here is blurry. I try to parse out the moments that came together to add up to this many years. I pause to absorb fragments, moments of… Read More ›
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Just How Rotten Are Things in Denmark? by Marcia Mount Shoop
The Shakespearean quote, “something is rotten in the state of Denmark,” comes from a palace guard. After watching Prince Hamlet walk away with the ghost of Hamlet’s murdered father, the former King, the guard has a sinking feeling about how… Read More ›
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Why Not Me? by Marcia Mount Shoop
My “me too” went out for all to see way before Facebook existed, way before there were hash tags and internet pages for unveiling our secrets to the world. In all the years that have passed since I first spoke… Read More ›
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My Turn: A Femifesto by Marcia Mount Shoop
It’s coming up on a year now that pretty much everything changed in my family’s life. My over twenty years of married life, up until last year around this time, our lives had been built around my husband’s job. John’s… Read More ›
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Do You Know Why We Are Marching? by Marcia Mount Shoop
When we got into the car to go, I asked my twelve-year-old daughter, “Do you know why we are marching today?” “To protest Donald Trump?” she replied. I explained that some people may be going for that reason, but that… Read More ›
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Elegy for An Old Life Gone: A Feminist Says Goodbye to Football by Marcia Mount Shoop
I married into your strange cadence A drumbeat that never felt natural All consuming was your intention But I protected pieces of myself from your designs And more pieces retrieved me As you showed me your true colors You were… Read More ›
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The Power of Love by Marcia Mount Shoop
Love does not create powerful empires or concentrations of wealth or military might. Love is not what fuels the tanks of commerce or political clout or financial success. Many would say that love slows things down, mires us in complication…. Read More ›
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Blindness, Lethargy, and White Supremacy by Marcia Mount Shoop
With Black History Month fast approaching, it is fitting to investigate the latest call to get rid of it. This investigation may seem futile to some feminists/womanists since we know denials of racism are part of life in white supremacy… Read More ›
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The Whence of the Isms of (the) U(nited)S(tates)… by Marcia Mount Shoop
Thus, when enemies or friends Are seen to act improperly, Be calm and call to mind That everything arises from conditions. -Shantideva, Bodhicharyāvatāra The early Indian teacher, Shantideva, calls humanity to a deeper exploration of the people and situations we… Read More ›
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Safety and Vulnerability in a Dangerous and Fertile World: A Meditation on Incarnation
Feeling safe again is often the healing and elusive aspiration of a person like me. I have been living with the deep and cellular residuum of sexual trauma for most of my life—over thirty of my going-on forty-six years. For… Read More ›
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Feminist Questions by Marcia W. Mount Shoop
“Do sports depend on gender stereotypes that prop up particular expressions of masculinity?” This question is just one of the defining quandaries of my new book, Touchdowns for Jesus and Other Signs of Apocalypse: Lifting the Veil on Big-Time Sports,… Read More ›
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The Tyranny of Obliviousness by Marcia Mount Shoop
The Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the Michigan voter-determined ban on Affirmative Action in college admissions decisions is just the latest example of how white obliviousness suppresses America’s collective capacity to heal from the wounds of racism. This obliviousness (a dynamic… Read More ›
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A Sojourn in Antartica by Marcia Mount Shoop
Ok, so it’s not Antarctica, it’s Indiana, but it sure feels like Antarctica lately. At least it’s what I figure Antarctica must feel like: bone chilling wind that can cause hypothermia and frost bite in a matter of minutes; everything… Read More ›
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A Poem About Sister Love by Marcia Mount Shoop
A Poem: Sister Love This post will never be complete it can only house the fragments, the remains of days at my sister’s hospital bed the vortex of medical labels “critically ill” “brain aneurism” the singular attention to fragile body… Read More ›
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Be-pistemology by Marcia Mount Shoop
Epistemology—the study or theory of the nature and the ground of knowledge, particularly with respect to the limits and validity of knowledges and the sources of knowledge. Being—the qualities and characteristics that constitute conscious existence; a living thing. I look… Read More ›
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Feminism and Football By Marcia W. Mount Shoop
“How did race and privilege affect the NCAA investigation of the football program at University of North Carolina?” This was the question a student posed to me recently when I gave a Skype lecture to a Sports Ethics class at… Read More ›
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Truth and Consequences–This Feminist’s Perspective? by Marcia Mount Shoop
In John’s Gospel, Pilate’s response to Jesus’ self-identification as the one who “came into the world to testify to the truth” is a simple question: “What is truth?” His question hangs in the air as he moves from that conversation… Read More ›
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The David Syndrome? By Marcia Mount Shoop
Is it just me, or does anyone else feel like we’re all in Junior High or High School again with the Petraeus scandal? There is drama at every turn with boundaries crossed and accusations slung across every lunch table there… Read More ›
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Living Liminality: Of Thresholds and Dwelling Places by Marcia W. Mount Shoop
Sometimes I think it happened gradually. Other times it feels like sudden change. Either way I find myself in an in-between space that is my life. With apologies to Victor Turner and his cultural anthropological appropriation of liminality as a… Read More ›
