Author Archives
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Identity and Marriage: Which Christian Conception? by Stephanie Arel
This post explores issues I present in an essay which will be published in the Journal of Theology and Sexuality. In that piece, I consider the term “identity.” I claim that identity and the categories it delineates often present dilemmas… Read More ›
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Beginning Conversations about the Body at Ease by Stephanie Arel
A topic that continually perplexes me, both personally and professionally, concerns the connection, or harmonization if you will, between our cognitive capacities and our physical expression and comfort, between thinking and feeling. Yoga, dance, working out, meditating, and other modalities… Read More ›
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Resisting Shame and Choosing to Live through the Loving Eye by Stephanie N. Arel
This week, I finished reading The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory by Marilyn Frye, a text I had not encountered in my studies of feminism (in literary theory, psychology, philosophy, or theology) until now. In some ways, I… Read More ›
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Sexuality and Spirituality: Convergence or Alienation? by Stephanie Arel
I just finished reading for review The Bloomsbury Reader in Religion, Gender, and Sexuality, edited by Donald L. Boisvert and Carly Daniel-Hughes. Targeting an undergraduate audience, the text explores ways that religion, gender, and sexuality intersect and interact in a variety… Read More ›
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Encountering and Countering Self-Disgust by Stephanie N. Arel
In my last post, Trump’s Misogyny – A Case for the Contempt-Oriented Personality, I wrote about disgust, claiming that media diagnosticians failed to identify disgust- contempt as part of Donald Trump’s psychological profile. At the end of the piece, I… Read More ›
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Trump’s Misogyny – A Case for the Contempt-Oriented Personality by Stephanie Arel
In the quotes below, you will briefly encounter the words of Donald Trump throughout the years as he has commented on women. You might have read or heard many of these, as I have. Reading them still brings a chill… Read More ›
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The Death Penalty and Human Dignity: Where Do We Stand? by Stephanie N. Arel
On Wednesday, March 22, I had the pleasure to speak at a conference on law, economics, and religion hosted jointly by Georgetown University Law Center and the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies. Entitled “The Moral Economy,” the conference provided rich… Read More ›
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Reflections on Trauma, Part II: YOLOCAUST by Stephanie N. Arel
In light of the recent attacks on Jewish cemeteries —the desecration of Mount Carmel Jewish Cemetery in Philadelphia and the toppling of more than 150 gravestones at Chesed Shel Emeth Cemetery in Missouri — along with my reminiscing that a year… Read More ›
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Reflections on Trauma, Part I: Pink Pussyhats by Stephanie N. Arel
I have been thinking frequently about trauma, about what perpetuates suffering and what supports the arduous journey of transforming traumatic experiences, especially in the aftermath of traumas of human design. The violation of bodies lies at the heart of such… Read More ›
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Trump: Shock, Awe, and Response by Stephanie Arel
In the frenzied wave of responses to Trump’s most recent, and horrifying, decisions – reinstating the Mexico City Policy and the newly instated Immigration Ban – I have experienced surges of anger, frustration, despair, concern, and hopelessness. My adrenaline has… Read More ›
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In Memoriam: Katelyn Nicole Davis by Stephanie Arel
On December 30, 2016, Katelyn Nicole Davis, a 12-year-old girl from Cedartown, Georgia filmed her suicide by hanging from a tree in her front yard. Recorded live, the video has gone viral. Alarmingly, a young girl’s succumbing to death logged… Read More ›
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Facing the Shame that Lingers: A. Denise Starkey and Michelle Obama Lead the Way by Stephanie Arel
In March of 2011, at a symposium on trauma, healing, and spirituality in Belfast, Ireland, I spoke about shame in the context of war, addressing the experiences of women survivors of rape during the Rwandan genocide, US soldiers returning from… Read More ›
