Art – Page 31 – Feminism and Religion

Why are We Troubled by a Homeless Jesus? by Michele Stopera Freyhauf

There are standard depictions of Jesus that show a Caucasian male with blue eyes (some pictures have the occasional brown eyes), shoulder length brown hair, and usually wearing a tunic with sandals. Jesus’ demeanor is usually victorious, prayerful, inviting, and even reflects humility. Our culture creates an unrealistic depiction of Jesus so that in the United States (at least), we see a savior as a white male representative of the power structures that permeate every facet of life.

There are some variations of this image. The most common is this same image with dark skin. A depiction that makes Jesus more tangible to people of color. If we can accept this variation of Jesus, then why would we be upset when images become more culturally tangible, send a message that encapsulates Jesus’ ministry, or make us stop and think – challenging us to take our rose colored glasses off. When an artist creates an image of Jesus that is different than the standard described above, controversy occurs at varying levels. The artwork is removed or de-commissioned, protests occur, and in extreme cases, the artist will even receive death threats. Here is a small sampling of images:

Jesus in Jeans (Peter Royle) picture courtesy of Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jesus-in-Jeans-by-Peter-Royle.

chocolatejesus — Sweet Jesus (Cosimo Cavallar) picture from Cavallaro’s website (http://www.cosimocavallaro.com/html/chocolate_page.html

T Edwina Sandys: http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2008/mar/06/my-life-so-far-edwina-sandys-69-artist/

Continue reading “Why are We Troubled by a Homeless Jesus? by Michele Stopera Freyhauf”

Painting Jarena Lee By Angela Yarber

When we gender the pulpit in the direction of justice, we ordain her spirit with gratitude for the many miles she walked and the countless sermons she preached.

This month I celebrate the release of my second book, The Gendered Pulpit: Sex, Body, and Desire in Preaching and Worship. As I celebrate the privilege I have as queer feminist to stand behind the pulpit each Sunday—to gender the space in the direction of justice—I must also recall the myriad holy women who have gone before me. I think of many of my Holy Women Icons with a folk feminist twist: Virginia Woolf , the Shulamite, Mary Daly, Baby Suggs, Pachamama and Gaia, Frida Kahlo, Salome, Guadalupe and Mary, Fatima, Sojourner Truth, Saraswati, and so many others. And this month I think specifically of my sister preachers, those who raised their voices in bold proclamations when the road was long and unimaginably difficult. I think of preachers like Jarena Lee.

Lee spent thirty years as an itinerant preacher and was the first black woman to be licensed to preach through the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church. Despite the fact that the AME issued a definitive ruling that women were not permitted to preach in 1852, Lee spent the bulk of her adult life preaching. Jarena Lee’s struggle to preach is a familiar story in nineteenth-century American Protestantism, even though the Second Awakening ushered in a period of intense religious revival; with camp meetings around every corner, there was an unprecedented opportunity for women to preach. Like Jarena Lee, though, they weren’t paid, ordained, or protected. Continue reading “Painting Jarena Lee By Angela Yarber”

The Flesh Made Word: Colm Toibin’s “The Testament of Mary” on stage and in print By Joyce Zonana

Before the play begins, the audience is invited on stage; we walk around, not quite knowing what to do, gazing at the props, uncertain. A few chairs, scattered jars of honey, jugs of water beside a free-standing waist-high faucet, a tall ladder, a long table, a stripped tree trunk with a wooden wheel at the top suspended from the rafters, a menacing roll of barbed wire, and a live turkey vulture occasionally spreading wide its iridescent blue-black wings: such is the set for Deborah Warner’s searing production of Colm Toibin’s The Testament of Mary, a one-woman show currently in previews at the Walter Kerr Theater in New York. In a large open-sided box, stage left, the actress Fiona Shaw, draped in blue from head to toe, arranges herself, then sits perfectly still, holding a lily and an apple. We know this woman. The Virgin Mary. The Icon. Incarnate.

Fiona Shaw rehearses for her role as the Virgin Mary in The Testament of Mary. Irish novelist Colm Toibin's one-woman play opens April 22 at Broadway's Walter Kerr Theater. — Shaw in rehearsal. Photo by Hugo Glendinning

But when we are all back in our seats, Mary casts off her robe to stand before us in a simple black shift, flowing easily over narrow brown pants. Her hair is cropped, her face haunted; wearing short leather boots, she fumbles as she searches for a hand-rolled cigarette to steady herself. “I remember everything. Memory fills my body as much as blood and bones.” No longer an icon, hardly a virgin, this Mary addresses us with the piercing directness of the passion she has suffered: to have seen her only son crucified despite her efforts to save him. Now, interrogated by two unnamed apostles (John and Luke?) who want to fix the story of her son’s life and death and resurrection, Mary insists on reporting only what she knows: “I was there. I fled before it was over but if you want witnesses then I am one and I can tell you now, when you say that he redeemed the world, I will say that it was not worth it. It was not worth it.”

Continue reading “The Flesh Made Word: Colm Toibin’s “The Testament of Mary” on stage and in print By Joyce Zonana”

What Is Love? by Jassy Watson

I asked this question at the family dinner table, on facebook, and by e-mail. Many heartfelt responses were offered, all insightful. Some spoke of romantic love, sexual love (eros), self-love, spiritual love, the love a parent has for a child, unconditional love (agape), primal love, authentic love, universal love, divine love, the source of love, friendship (philia), love of nature, and love of a pet, while others considered the destructive nature of love. What was demonstrated by these conversations was that not only are the possibilities of love’s expressions endless, but there can ultimately be no right or wrong answer when it comes to the meaning of love. Our cultural, familial, religious and spiritual backgrounds all play a part in the way we think and feel about love.

I was raised in a secular, middle-class, two parent, two children, cat, and sometimes a dog kind of family. Despite the usual ups and downs, our family life was full of love. I remember having feelings of love as a child that were so incredibly overwhelming I would be brought to tears. I loved everything and everybody. Mum still reminds me that if I could have, I would have brought every elderly person along with every stray animal home to look after. After reading about the process view in Carol Christ’s book She Who Changes: Re-Imagining the Divine in the World, I see now that this love I felt was born out of feelings of deep sympathy.

Because we did not have a religious or spiritual background, I had no idea what divine love meant. My idea of the divine was the male, Christian, biblical God that our family rejected. It is said that Christian love is selfless and is best seen in actions such as compassion and kindness. This may be so. But selflessness, compassion and kindness are not limited to Christian values. They are human values. In his book The Art of Happiness, the Dalai Lama says that “love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive”. All religious, spiritual and philosophical traditions speak of the values of love. They say that love encompass compassion, kindness, selflessness, acceptance, gratitude, sympathy, sharing, grace, justice, charity, and liberation. They also speak of tension, wrath, discomfort, unkindness, loss, and judgement. For me, love is all these things and more.

Ancient myths address these values of love through tales of passion and devotion. Diane Wolkstein celebrates some of these myths in her book The First Love Stories. Each story expresses a distinct aspect of love. For instance: the tale of Isis and Osiris represents love that is stronger than the forces of nature, Innana and Dumuzi expresses the cyclical quality of love; Shiva and Sati reveals the eruption of passion and the taming of the mind; the Song of Songs celebrates love’s yearning; the story of Psyche and Eros portrays the forging of the self. All of these stories emphasize the sacred nature of love.

For me, having children awakened a love so very deep within. When I gazed into the eyes of my first born son at the tender age of 18, I was so overwhelmed by love I thought my heart would burst. I now have four children a husband and a loving extended family and friends who all teach me much about the true nature of love. They teach me above all else that love is patient, non-judgmental, and unconditional. It is through the growing awareness of my spiritual being and my journey with the Goddess that love has become something deeper than I ever thought possible. Love, for me has become a union with something higher than my individual self. My love extends beyond the family to include every living being on this planet and beyond. It is not just all about giving and receiving, but rather it is a state of being. It is personal yet universal and comes from deep within my sub-conscious. Love for me, not unlike the tales woven in ancient myth, is profoundly sacred.

Embodied with love I set out to create my next painting. Out of this portal of love:

Aphrodite, Goddess of love, pleasure and relationships, in all her glory was born. Continue reading “What Is Love? by Jassy Watson”

Painting Saraswati By Angela Yarber

Saraswati reminds me that the divisions between fields are our construction; that academics can be creative, art can be holy, and preaching can engage the mind.

I was precariously perched atop a file cabinet tacking a giant cloth to the wall when another staff member entered my office. “What’s that?” she asked, puzzled, and pointing to the massive cloth now covering my wall. “Saraswati,” I responded, hopping off the file cabinet, “the Hindu goddess of arts, creativity, and learning.” She raised her eyebrows. “Our previous Baptist preacher didn’t have any Hindu goddesses hanging on the wall,” she said with a wry smile. “I guess I’m not your average Baptist preacher,” I chuckled.

For years I have been searching for Saraswati, claiming her as my patron saint, the one who guides my path as I navigate three seemingly disparate callings: artist, scholar, and preacher. In Saraswati, these three callings merge. Naturally, I hang a giant image of her on my office wall and wear a pendant bearing her likeness around my neck. She reminds me that the divisions between fields are our construction; that academics can be creative, art can be holy, and preaching can engage the mind. These three seemingly disparate callings do not have to be mutually exclusive. Saraswati certainly wouldn’t see them this way. Continue reading “Painting Saraswati By Angela Yarber”

A Valentine Towards an Ethics of Loving Women Making Art by Marie Cartier

It is still a radical and generous act to love a woman for who she is apart from, as well as with, others.

My favorite artist is Frida Kahlo because she was a woman who dared to do art about her own self, in fact often about her own physical self. When she did that it was brave; and it still is brave to consider your life as a woman important enough to focus on. Let’s face it– women are not considered a priority in a world which still underpays women for the same jobs that men do. When I entered the work force in 1976 women made 60.2% of what men make. In 1986 they made 64.3%; in 1996 73.8%; in 2006 76.9%; and in 2010 women made 77.4%.

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Painting Sojourner Truth By Angela Yarber

This month, I am reminded of the importance of Jacquelyn Grant’s work on womanist Christology. In White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus, Grant reviews the white feminist discussion of the so-called problem of Jesus’ maleness, while beginning to construct a womanist response to this incarnational conundrum. She states, “It is my claim that there is a direct relationship between our perception of Jesus and our perception of ourselves.”[1]

Beginning with Mary Daly, feminists have responded to Jesus’ maleness in a variety of ways. Daly argues that because the person of Jesus is male, the male is recognized and celebrated as the superior being. Because of this, the male Jesus is to be rejected or exorcised because Jesus’ gender identity contributes to patriarchy and does not hold salvific power for women. Rather than rejecting Jesus altogether, Rosemary Radford Ruether asks the seminal question, “Can a male Jesus save woman?” Continue reading “Painting Sojourner Truth By Angela Yarber”

Brigid, Goddess of Healing, Poetry, and Smithcraft by Judith Shaw

Brigid, the Celtic Goddess of Healing, Poetry, and Smithcraft, begins her reign on Imbolic, February 2, the midpoint between winter solstice and spring equinox. On this day the ancient Celts held their Fire Festival in honor of Brigid and the growing light. In Scotland, as recently as the mid-twentieth century, houses were cleaned and the hearth fires rekindled on February 2, to welcome in Brigid. Remnants of this festival are found in America today on Groundhog Day.

Like the Cailleach, She existed in many places and was known by many names. The Irish called her Brighde; she was Bride in Scotland, Brigantia in Northern Britain, and Brigandu in France. Some called her Brid, Brig or Brighid. Later she was transformed by Christianity into Saint Bridget. Her older name was BREO SAIGHEAD. Her name has various interpretations, many relating to fire – “Power,” “Renown” “Fiery Arrow of Power ” “Bright Arrow”, “The Bright One”, “The Powerful One”, “The High One” and “The Exalted One”.

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Miracles Of The Great Mother by Jassy Watson

I was brought up in a household where attitudes to God and church were quite negative. My Nanna, however, was deeply religious, and I can still remember sitting in her dining room as a very young child staring up in awe at a painting of ‘The Last Supper.’ I was completely mesmerised, there was something haunting about that painting that left a lifelong impression. Art became a passion very early on in life, and whenever I came into contact with images of a religious nature emotions stirred. I was spellbound by divine mystery. The most profound feelings were engendered when I met with images of Mother Mary and the infant Jesus. Continue reading “Miracles Of The Great Mother by Jassy Watson”

Epona, Celtic Horse Goddess by Judith Shaw

Epona, Celtic Horse Goddess was worshipped by the Gauls (the Celtic French). Her worship spread to Britain and Rome from Western Europe. Hundreds of statues and shrines dating from between the first and third centuries CE have been found in France alone.

Today we can understand Epona mainly from her images, as few stories of her have survived. She is often shown either riding a white horse side saddle or standing or sitting between two horses. Many images show her feeding mares and foals from a cornucopia or a basket of fruit.

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