Feminism and Religion

BOOK REVIEW: Religion is Not Done With You by Esther Nelson

Goodwin, Megan and Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst, Religion Is Not Done With You: Or, The Hidden Power of Religion on Race, Maps, Bodies, and Law. Boston, Massachusetts, Beacon Press, 2024, 165 pages.

If I were still teaching university classes in Religious Studies, I would certainly choose Goodwin and Fuerst’s book as an introduction to this broad, often misunderstood, subject we call religion. Their writing style has a youthful familiarity—probably purposively done—to broaden their reach to all audiences. The theme running throughout their work is religion is what people do.” “Religion isn’t just feelings or beliefs—it’s systems and assumptions…that shape our lives every day.”

Both authors have master’s degrees and doctorates in religion. Goodwin focuses on gender, sexuality, and American religions. Fuerst puts her attention on Islam, race and racialization, and South Asia. Both women claim to be religious people who “care about justice and repairing our broken world.” They understand that “religion is a force for change—not always bad, not inherently good, but always changed and changing.” It’s important, they assert, “to call out bullshit takes on religion: takes that insist religion is always and everywhere good and takes that want to write religion off as irrelevant, irrational, or regressive.”

From the Archives: There Is No Santa-The Antlered Flying Goddess With Gifts by Marie Cartier

Moderator’s note: This marvelous FAR site has been running for 10 years and has had more than 3,600 posts in that time. There are so many treasures that have been posted in this decade that they tend to get lost in the archives. We have created this column so that we can all revisit some of these gems. Today’s blogpost was originally posted December 25, 2015. You can visit it here to see the original comments.

*Marie bringing in Elen of the Ways*
*photo by Tony Mierzwicki*

One of my colleagues at Feminism and Religion recently wrote of Xmas and Feminine Wisdom. My blog, for Christmas Day continues this exploration.

Elen of the Ways is a figure primarily studied by scholar, Carolyn Wise. She wrote two core articles available on the web here and here. Wise writes that in order to “track” and find Elen of the Ways she had to peel back the layers:

…to the earliest track ways, the migratory tracks of the Reindeer and Elk. Elen moves across vast tracts of time, and land, cloaked and masked appropriately for each age.

Movement of Infinite Mind Expands Faith in Humanity by Cheryl Petersen

Daania and I met while outdoors on a walking trail. At first, we crossed paths and echoed to one another “have a great day.” But sometimes we paced our journeys together, engaged in conversation, and got to know one another. Daania does not celebrate Christmas. I do. We both celebrate the forces that move us with love and truth.

One day, Daania and I moved with swift steps because the weather outside was frigid. The frosty air did not keep us from talking. Even though heavy scarves were double wrapped around our mouths and ears, we proved skilled at interpreting our muffled chit-chat.

The Solstice Tree of Life by Judith Shaw

The exact day of the Winter Solstice ushers in what I think of as the Winter Solstice Season — a ten day period when, in the northern hemisphere, the sun barely moves from it’s most southerly position in the sky. The days are very short and the nights are long, long, long.

At this time of year I embrace the worldview of my Celtic ancestors who relished the darkness in a way that is foreign to us today. Every day began at dusk not dawn. The new year began on October 31, as the cold set in and the world turned toward the dark. The harvest was in, thanks were given, and nature was moving into its period of death. I find an inherent wisdom in this counting of time.

In this moment, my connection to trees feels especially profound. I find such beauty in the winter trees, naked of their green and golden finery, etching stark lines in the sky. As we drew near to the solstice, I felt compelled to create a new painting that expresses my love for winter trees and the Winter Solstice.

Reweaving the Great Round: A Winter Solstice Story by Sara Wright

The scent of balsam wafts through the room as I cut the boughs to make my annual wreath to honor all trees, those that still stand, those who are slaughtered. My intention each year is twofold – acknowledge my love for these sentient beings and to participate in the unfolding of the Great Round. Other intentions vary from year to year until recently when a prayer for protection from the dark forces that permeate the psyches of so many peoples of this earth becomes a yearly part of this winter ceremony, even as a multitude of others suffer intolerable losses.

Today’s American culture creates endless non-religious festivals to celebrate the entrance into this winter season that are totally devoid of meaning beyond consumerism – buy more ‘stuff’ – chop down more trees. These devourers can never be satiated because the chasm is too wide and deep.

Legacy of Carol P. Christ: The Kitten Who Came For The Holidays

This post was originally created on Dec. 24th, 2012

This holiday season I have something warm and fuzzy to be thankful for—Goldilocks, the kitten who came for the holidays.

As I was preparing for Thanksgiving, I opened my front door to the sound of really loud really pitiful crying. A tiny grey kitten with a large golden spot on nape of her neck was howling in the middle of the street just a few feet from my door. Living as I do in a town where there are many homeless cats and kittens, I do not usually respond to such cries. My dogs maintain “cat patrol” in my back garden and quickly chase strays away.

However, the cries of this little kitten were so insistent that I picked her up. She was smaller than my hand. My neighbor who was sweeping his porch offered to take her in. A few hours later he returned her. She was still mewing loudly, and, he said, she had not stopped crying all day long. I found a syringe and fed her some milk. Soon the crying stopped and she began purring in my lap. Continue reading “Legacy of Carol P. Christ: The Kitten Who Came For The Holidays”

From the Archives: I Sing Asherah Exalted! by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

This was originally posted Dec. 16th, 2021

With this season of the festivals of light upon us (Hanukkah, Christmas, Solstice, Kwanzaa), I wanted to focus on the more joyful aspects of our lives. For that, I have been diving into passages about joy and singing in the bible.

Sometimes when I write these posts, they take me in directions I never thought to go. This post is one of them. The surprise direction I found is in the Psalm below:

Sing unto him, sing psalms unto him: talk ye of all his wondrous works.
Glory ye in his holy name: let the heart of them rejoice that seek the LORD.
Psalm 105:2-3 KJV

Into the Light by Beth Bartlett

I looked for my friend, Pamela’s email the morning after she died. Every morning I have looked forward to her email from the day before — the last one sent at 4:37 on the Tuesday afternoon before Thanksgiving. Did she ever see my response sent at 6 AM the next morning – my wish for her to know joy this Thanksgiving, my sending much love? The bulk of it was full of mundanities. How differently might I have written it had I known it would be the last she would see? Our ongoing call and response email conversation — now without response, forever without response.

Ours was a friendship of words — words in the cards she has given me over the years, in her detailed responses to my blog posts, in the thousands of emails passed between us over several years. I’ve saved them all. They were too precious ever to delete. How we both loved words — their poetry, their capacity to communicate, convey, confound, console, comfort. I eagerly anticipated her words every day. For years I have entrusted my daily thoughts, worries, joys, activities, hopes, and the occasional dream to her tender care, always knowing her response would be a mirror, reflecting me back to myself, she reflecting on all I had written – giving witness and testimony, always with the deepest of care and affirmation. As Adrienne Rich wrote in the poem we both loved — “Phantasia for Elvira Shatayev” – I have never seen/my own forces so taken up and shared/and given back. Yes, this – the immensity, the intensity, the profound reciprocity of our sharing.

From the Archives: Tree of Life: The Festival of the Trees in an Age of Treefall by Jill Hammer

This was originally posted on January 22, 2019

Almost every day, I walk in Central Park. There are certain trees there I’ve come to know: the gnarled cherry trees by the reservoir, the bending willows and tall bald cypress by the pond, the sycamores that drop their bark each summer, the hawthorn not far from Central Park West. Lately I’ve been taking photos of the trees to try to capture their essence, their posture in the world. The trees around me feel like friends, which is what an ancient midrash (interpretation/legend) called Genesis Rabbah says about trees: that they are friends to humankind. To me, they’ve always been a central manifestation of Mother Earth.

Currently, the national parks in the United States have no staff because of the government shutdown. Some people have taken the opportunity to cut down the rare and endangered Joshua trees in the Joshua Tree National Park—just for fun, I guess, or as a trophy of some kind. Meanwhile, President Bolsonaro of Brazil recently has indicted that he wants to remove protection for the rainforest, in order to allow development. It appears that my friends the trees have enemies. Sometimes the enmity is for personal/corporate gain, and sometimes the enmity seems to have no reason at all.

“Now I Will Have Respect”; “Now I Will Be Looked Up To” – Women Assert Their Worth in the Christmas Story by Liz Cooledge Jenkins

“The Giver of Breath has looked upon me with kindness and has taken away my shame. Now I will have respect in the eyes of my people.” -Elizabeth (Luke 1:25, First Nations Version [FNV])

“From deep in my heart I dance with joy to honor the Great Spirit. Even though I am small and weak, he noticed me. Now I will be looked up to by all. The Mighty One has lifted me up!” -Mary (Luke 1:46-49a, FNV)

Two women, one older, one younger. Both unexpectedly pregnant. Both key players in the Christian Advent story. Both living in a world, not unlike ours today, where women were not fully acknowledged as complete human beings, with all the strength and agency this entails. And both, for this reason, starving for the respect of their loved ones and communities.