Womanist Theology

Body Talk by Kelly Brown Douglas

The more I reflect upon the complex and multiple ways in which various bodies are put upon and disregarded, the more I am persuaded that we have a body problem.

Our bodies communicate to us in many ways. They are a valuable source of knowledge in terms of our present realities and they are also valuable storehouses for memories. Long after the memories of the mind fade away, memories of the body linger. The mind may not remember, for instance, the details of a particular event, but the body remembers how it felt. The memories of sadness, anxiety, hurt and pain as well as happiness, peace, healing and love are grafted upon our bodies. Feelings, sensations and instinctive reactions—things that are hard to explain—are oftentimes our bodies’ ways of communicating memories. These are embodied memories reminding us of what it means to feel torn apart or to feel whole. It is the body giving feedback at any given moment in time. Embodied memories certainly involve what Audre Lorde identifies as “erotic power.” This, Lorde says, is an “internal sense” and a “depth of feeling” “that is a source of power and information” (Lorde, Sister Outside). Embodied memories are one of the ways in which our bodies speak to us and help us to know the good, right and just thing to do, from within ourselves and through depth of feeling. Continue reading “Body Talk by Kelly Brown Douglas”

Monthly Highlight: Emilie M. Townes

“In my teaching I want to get students excited about that notion of, you know, you’re not just here to get a Yale degree and have it on your diploma and be able to hang it on your wall…You should be here thinking about what kind of contributions can I make to society….What are you doing that helps enhance the lives of all of us, as opposed to (our) own little idiosyncratic research interests.” – – Emilie M. Townes

Emilie Townes is a pivotal person in the field of Womanist and Christian ethics as well as a foremother and pioneer in Womanist theology. Cornel West of Princeton University said:

“Emilie Townes is the towering womanist ethicist of our time….In this ice age of indifference and evasion, her powerful voice and viewpoint summon us. And we thank her for her vision and courage.”

At an opening address at the Convocation in 2005, Townes stated that there is a need to live in a “deep walking hope” that shapes lives “in ways that are not always predictable, not always safe, rarely conventional” and protests “with prophetic fury the sins of a world, and sometimes theological world views, that encourage us to separate our bodies from our spirits, our minds from our hearts, our beliefs from our actions.” Continue reading “Monthly Highlight: Emilie M. Townes”

Exposure by Elise M. Edwards

Before I feared too much disclosure, but now I seek to channel revelations of personal experiences into exercises that inform the moral and intellectual agency of everyone in the classroom, including me.

I have always been a bit nervous when people share personal experiences in non-intimate settings. For the past several years, I’ve been in an academic environment where people routinely discuss and reflect upon significant life events. There were times that I was very uncomfortable listening to classmates discuss abortions, first sexual experiences, and encounters with racism. Even though they did not use graphic or disturbing language, I questioned the appropriateness of sharing intimate details of one’s life in a classroom.

So when I was preparing to teach my own course on Christian Ethics, I was careful to define a course policy that related to sharing and participation. In part, it reads: “While students are encouraged to use the course material to reflect on their own experiences and develop their own theological-ethical perspectives, sharing intensely personal reflections is not required – in fact, it is discouraged to maintain the professional atmosphere of the classroom.“ In class, we discuss conceptions of God and religious faith as they are applied to complex issues like sexuality, racial reconciliation, war, and medicine. The potential for conflict and personal attack is always present in the classroom because we often have deep commitments and personal beliefs on these issues, so I wanted to curb the amount of personal reflection that occurs in the corporate setting.

Over the course of the semester, though, my perceptions have changed due to well-written memoirs and personal statements I have read recently, the profound statements my students have shared, and the teaching philosophy I am developing. Whereas before, I feared too much disclosure, now I seek to channel revelations of personal experiences into exercises that inform the moral and intellectual agency of everyone in the classroom, including me. Continue reading “Exposure by Elise M. Edwards”

The Black Church, the Blues, and Black Bodies by Kelly Brown Douglas

“Ooh, Ohh there’s something going all wrong”, Ma Rainey sang. There is indeed something going all wrong in the black church. This church, which is born out of the commitment to safeguard the life and freedom of all black people, has gained a reputation for repudiating if not demonizing certain black bodies, namely LGBT bodies. While there are certainly significant black church leaders who have vigorously defended LGBTQ person’s struggle for justice and equal treatment under the law, including support of marriage equality, those black church voices against LGBTQ rights have been vociferous and unrelenting. Continue reading “The Black Church, the Blues, and Black Bodies by Kelly Brown Douglas”

Get Your Laws off my Body! by Elise Edwards

After considering Virginia’s Transvaginal Utrasound Bill in light of the womanist critique, I wonder if religiously-motivated lawmakers considered that they alone do not have access to God’s intentions, but that the divine spirit is operative in a pregnant woman as well, would they be so willing to negate her moral agency?

On Tuesday, the senate in Virginia approved a law that would require women to get an external ultrasound before an abortion. This is a scaled-back version of an original bill that mandated transvaginal ultrasounds prior to abortions. According to this Washington Post article, opponents like Sen. Janet D. Howell describe the measure as “state rape,” since it is the state, not the woman and her doctor who decides that she must undergo this procedure requiring the insertion of a probe into the vagina. Although proponents of the bill say that it is designed to give women more information about a fetus’ gestational age and development, most would agree that it is ultimately intended to discourage the women from having an abortion. This is why bloggers like Kendra Hamilton believe that religion is the motivation behind this and the other 5 abortion-related bills introduced in the Virginia General Assembly connected to issues of women’s sovereignty over their bodies. Yet, as I heard about these bills, another religious response came to mind – one that expresses horror and condemnation of coercive practices regarding women’s childbearing. Continue reading “Get Your Laws off my Body! by Elise Edwards”

A Next Wave of Scholarship By Kwok Pui Lan

I came to the United States in 1984 to begin my doctoral studies at Harvard Divinity School. It was an exciting time to do feminist theology and religious studies. Womanist ethics just began to emerge, as Dr. Katie Geneva Cannon has just completed a dissertation on the subject at Union Theological Seminary in 1983. I count it as a blessing that she was teaching at the Episcopal Divinity School, just on the other side of the Cambridge Common.

The mid-1980s saw the paradigm shifts in feminist studies in religion, as womanist, mujerista/Latina, Asian and Asian American women began to articulate their own theological understanding. If Womanspirit Rising (1979) was a reference text for our field, which contained essays by white women, we had the first reader by radical women of color, This Bridge Called Our Back(1981).

We began to discuss multiple oppressions and multiple identities, and the need to integrate race, class, and gender into our analyses. We challenged white women who have universalized their middle-class, white experience as if women were all the same. Continue reading “A Next Wave of Scholarship By Kwok Pui Lan”

KARAI KASANG: Rebirthing the Non-Patriarchal Image of God in Kachin Culture by Zau Sam

This post is written in conjunction with the Feminist Ethics Course Dialogue project sponsored by Claremont School of Theology in the Claremont Lincoln University Consortium, Claremont Graduate University, and directed by Grace Yia-Hei Kao.

Zau Sam is a first year MA student in Feminist Studies with interests in process theology, ecotheology, feminist and ecofeminist theologies. He is ethnically Kachin (Jinghpaw) and from Myanmar (Burma). Zau is a minister at Yangon Kachin Baptist Church (in Myanmar) and Academic Dean of the Church-based Bible School there.

Throughout our Feminist Ethics class, I have been thinking about Mary Daly’s concept of “Goddess” in her Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism. I don’t believe that there is any sound theological argument that the term “God” itself represents patriarchy. Theologically speaking, if we study the Bible systematically, particularly Genesis 1:27, it is unquestionable that God is associated with both feminine and masculine imagery. God is imaged as both mother and father. In contrast to this nature, Mary Daly does not merely seek to erase masculine imagery from the term “God,” but the word “God” itself. However, “Goddess” without the masculine imagery can no longer be the Perfect Goddess, just as “God” without the image of the feminine also remains imperfect.

Continue reading “KARAI KASANG: Rebirthing the Non-Patriarchal Image of God in Kachin Culture by Zau Sam”