Category: Women’s Power

St. Brigid: Reproductive Justice and the Realms of the Miraculous by Elanur Williams

St Brigid being carried away by angels, in a painting by John
Duncan (1913)

One of my favorite saints is St. Brigid of Kildare, the patroness of poetry, learning, healing and protection. She is frequently called upon during childbirth. Brigid’s hagiographies are noteworthy for her remarkable abilities to heal and perform miracles—including her ability to make pregnancies vanish, for those who ask. In Vita Prima and Vita Brigitae (Life of Saint Brigit) published around 650 C.E. by Cogitosus, an Irish monk from Kildare, it is claimed that “Saint Brigid, by the very powerful strength of her faith, blessed a woman who had fallen [pregnant]…and the conception in the woman’s womb decreased and she restored her to health…without childbirth and its pangs.” The pregnant people in Brigid’s tales turned to Brigid to help them reclaim and restore their dignity. Consequently, their abortions served as catalysts for change. “Abortion miracles” have narrative and theological functions: they expose constructs of sexuality, chastity, purity, and sin. In addition, they test our understandings of healing—physical and spiritual—by revealing the intersectionality between medicine, pregnant people, power, and personal agency. Scholars have theorized the presence of “abortion miracles” in hagiographies, and whether they are to be read as a kind of defiance towards early Christian morality, or as a demonstration of chastity’s role and value in early medieval Irish Christianity. Some Irish penitentials view medieval abortions as malefic acts or as a kind of malevolent magic; however, according to Arica Roberts (2020), it can be argued the abortion miracles found in Irish hagiography can instead be read as “medicines of penance” and as contributing to healing.

Continue reading “St. Brigid: Reproductive Justice and the Realms of the Miraculous by Elanur Williams”

From the Archives: A Chorus of Need: I Need an Abortion by Marie Cartier

This was originally posted June, 2022

I need an abortion and I can’t get one

Because I don’t have the money to fly somewhere else other than …here

Where I can’t get one

I need an abortion and I can’t get one

Because the kid, or the cells of a maybe kid, were put in here by the guy that raped me and if I have to have it, I will kill myself

I need an abortion and I can’t get one

Because I have four kids already and I can’t feed another one

I need an abortion and I can’t get one

Because it’s my dad’s…did you hear me say that? I have never said that. I have never said what he does to me…and now I have to show everyone… if I can’t get this out of me I will…

I have to get this thing out of me

I need an abortion and I can’t get one

Continue reading “From the Archives: A Chorus of Need: I Need an Abortion by Marie Cartier”

The Awakened Woman: Remembering and Reigniting Our Sacred Dreams by Woman Writer Dr. Tererai Trent by Maria Dintino

Moderator’s Note: This piece is in co-operation with The Nasty Women Writers Project, a site dedicated to highlighting and amplifying the voices and visions of powerful women. The site was founded by sisters Theresa and Maria Dintino. To quote Theresa, “by doing this work we are expanding our own writer’s web for nourishment and support.” This was originally posted on their site on January 14, 2020. You can see more of their posts here. 

Breaking the Bronze Ceiling – Statues of Real Women in Public Spaces

I cannot imagine a woman more deserving than Dr. Tererai Trent, her likeness one of ten life-size bronze statues unveiled in New York City on Women’s Equality Day on August 26, 2019.

Australian global public artists and activists, Gillie and Marc Schattner, revealed the statues of these inspirational women on 6th Avenue (Avenue of the Americas) that glorious summer day! Their organization, Statues for Equality, is on a mission to achieve gender balance in public statues worldwide. In NYC prior to their unveiling, only 3% of the statues depicted females; this climbed to 10% on August 26.

Continue reading “The Awakened Woman: Remembering and Reigniting Our Sacred Dreams by Woman Writer Dr. Tererai Trent by Maria Dintino”

Fight, Fight, Fight? by Caryn MacGrandle

I have two divorces under my belt. I’m not proud. I made bad choices. I didn’t have the support network nor the mental ability to thrive in the situations. But I had gumption. And I didn’t stay.


So here I am. 54. And starting over. 


It can be rather terrifying as motherhood and family has always been my focus.


After my recent second divorce, part of my stability plan was Land. The Blue Ridge mountains in North Carolina called me. The Appalachians. I spent a year looking. I had a list: unrestricted land, at least five acres, a water feature. 
I had several adventures on my own looking, but I will never forget the day I found it. I was with my son James, and I knew it right away.


Ten acres. A third of it a bog along a creek. Away from it all, but not ‘too away’ as it has a road running through it that leads to a partly developed mountain subdivision. 


Home. 


I can breathe.

Continue reading “Fight, Fight, Fight? by Caryn MacGrandle”

Sojourner Truth, the photos by Beth Bartlett

Moderator’s Note: We inadvertently left out the photos from Beth’s posts on Sojourner Truth. The photos, all by themselves, pack an emotional punch and so we want to be sure they can be seen. These are Beth’s photos from Sojourner Truth Legacy Plaza in Akron, Ohio

You can see Beth’s posts here. Part 1 and Part 2

close- up of statue

MATILDA JOSLYN GAGE: IN HER NAME, AMERICAN WOMAN WRITER AND ACTIVIST (1826-1898), part 2 by Maria Dintino

part 1 appeared yesterday

Leila Brammer in her book Excluded from Suffrage History: Matilda Joslyn Gage, Nineteenth-Century American Feminist, explains the long-term impact of the dismissal of Gage:

“The loss of Matlida Joslyn Gage from the history of the woman suffrage movement and her ideas from the intellectual history of feminism speaks to the influence of exclusionary processes in social movements as well as their unfortunate consequences…we must remember that Joslyn Gage was intricately involved in the movement, wrote in newspapers and magazines, and published a book, but all these activities and her significant feminist thought had to be re-created and rediscovered nearly a century later”(120).

Continue reading “MATILDA JOSLYN GAGE: IN HER NAME, AMERICAN WOMAN WRITER AND ACTIVIST (1826-1898), part 2 by Maria Dintino”

Why I Wrote Queering the American Dream by Rev. Dr. Angela Yarber

Like most authors, I had grand plans for Queering the American Dream. Heeding the wisdom of the venerable black, queer writer, Pauli Murray—“One person plus one typewriter constitutes a movement”—I committed, not simply to writing and publishing a book, but creating a movement. With my modern-day typewriter (laptop) in hand, I dreamed of readers throwing off the shackles of an ill-suited dream, galvanizing retreats, coaching to help other marginalized creatives queer their own iterations of the so-called American dream.

I tried learning about book marketing and pitching companion essays and creating a launch team and all those things small-time authors without expensive publicists on retainer do. I tried so hard.

Continue reading “Why I Wrote Queering the American Dream by Rev. Dr. Angela Yarber”

A Feminist Reading of Saint Wilgefortis by Sofia Meskhidze

The legend of Saint Wilgefortis tells the story of a Christian woman who was martyred for her faith. While there are numerous women martyrs in the Christian tradition, Wilgefortis is distinguished by her gender non-conformity. She is often referred to as female Christ[1] and is almost always depicted with a beard, in a dress, and nailed to a cross. According to the legend, she was a Christian princess from Portugal whose father had promised her to the pagan king of Sicily. Wilgefortis, refusing to marry, prayed all night for God to make her unmarriable and as a result miraculously grew a beard, causing her father’s rage, after which he had her tortured and crucified[2]. The origin of the legend is thought to be the Volto Santo sculpture in Lucca, Italy, one of the most well-known examples of a clothed crucifix[3]. Misinterpretation or not, it is without doubt that the legend spread wide and Wilgefortis was in medieval times venerated almost as much as the Virgin Mary. In fact, this popularity displeased the Catholic Church, who actively discouraged it and even removed Wilgefortis from the official list of saints in 1969[4]. Here I argue for the importance of Wilgefortis to feminist theology, feminist and queer Christians, and her potential as a non-binary/gender non-conforming icon.

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In Our Right Minds: On the Sacred Feminine, the Right Brain and Restoring Humanity’s Natural Balance by Dale Allen

TODAY •  BOOK LAUNCH ON AMAZON!  Launch Discounts underway now!

There’s something about a book. I make a lot of things: podcasts, videos, a film, a musical production, paintings, lots of articles for publications, but this… this feels huge to me. A book. A book that represents 25 years of my life as a spokesperson and champion of the feminine side of humanity – a part of all us.

Here’s the official Press Release:

Veteran of corporate and commercial communications, host, interviewer, and filmmaker Dale Allen has now released her new book, In Our Right Minds. This new book is an in-depth exploration of the sacred feminine and its power to heal humanity as a whole. Sharing her profound journey of exploring the goddess archetype, the author combines science, art, and history for a transcendent literary journey.

Continue reading “In Our Right Minds: On the Sacred Feminine, the Right Brain and Restoring Humanity’s Natural Balance by Dale Allen”

Miriam Speaks by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Wikimedia Commons: Anselm Feuerbach

Intro:  I have been working on a project inspired by Charlene Spretnak and her book Lost Goddesses of Early Greece. I am writing biblical stories through the eyes and words of the women. The scribes who wrote down the tales of the bible, wrote mostly from men’s point of view. And they had their own which was to destroy evidence of the Goddesses. I tell Noah’s story through Naamah, his wife. Abram and Sarai’s journey to Egypt through the eyes of Sarah. Exodus in Miriam’s voice. In my telling, Miriam went to Midian with Moses and, while there, experienced the Burning Bush and worked with Moses’ wife Zipporah to protect knowledge of the Goddesses. Below is an abridged version of this section of Miriam’s tale.  

I look around at your world today. You, yes you, are my descendants. My beloveds. I mourn for what you’ve lost. No, I am angry, how could things have gotten this bad? I dare you, I dare any of you to challenge my work. We did everything we could. It should not have taken this long to find our clues. But then I see the job the scribes did. It was better and more thorough than even we, who saw so much, could have imagined. I look around at this precious earth we bequeathed to you and see how damaged it is.

Continue reading “Miriam Speaks by Janet Maika’i Rudolph”