menstruation – Feminism and Religion

Life-Giving Blood by Michelle Bodle

“What did you think?” This question was posed to me by a young woman I am mentoring in ministry. After receiving The Book of Womanhood by Amy Davis Abdallah as a gift, she asked me to walk through the book and discuss it with her, as suggested in the introduction.

I inhaled deeply before replying that I thought Davis Abdallah was writing from a posture of privilege that she was completely unaware of – and that deeply troubled me.

Davis Abdallah’s premise is that Christian women need a rite of passage accompanying the journey of getting to know themselves. Piloted at the former Nyack College where Davis Abdallah taught, Woman was a program that sought to develop a Christian right of passage for women focused on relationships with God, self, others, and creation.

Let’s Talk About Shame by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Disclaimer/Trigger Warning: This post includes content about rape, sexual assault, domestic abuse, violence.

The recent, meaningful discussions on this forum about how so many of us feel broken due to our own personal histories have fortified and inspired me. I’ve marveled as women have spoken up so honestly and even brutally about the effects of trauma, rape, cold and dismissive mothers, abusing fathers and so on.

Some of you know my own story. I am a survivor of my father’s childhood abuse and then a rape at knifepoint in my early twenties. I carry a deep and abiding sense of shame. This feeling has always flummoxed me. Why should I feel shame when I didn’t do anything to create my own abuse? Shouldn’t my father have felt the shame? The rapist? Why did I get saddled with it? I was the victim (and survivor), not the perpetrator. But shame is indeed the feeling I carry and I’m not alone. Why is this feeling so pervasive? I don’t have all the answers, but I do have some clues about where to look.

Continue reading “Let’s Talk About Shame by Janet Maika’i Rudolph”

Vayeitzei: Rachel and the Practice of Niddah by Ivy Helman

29662350_10155723099993089_8391051315166448776_o This parshah contains the account of Jacob’s marriages to Leah and Rachel, (who happen to be his cousins) as well as the birth of his 11 sons and one daughter. It describes the long amounts of time Jacob worked for Laban in order to marry Laban’s daughters, and recounts the trickery of Laban giving first Leah, the older daughter to Jacob, before allowing Jacob to marry who he wanted to, Rachel.

Like the relationship between Hagar and Sarah, there is animosity between Leah and Rachel over Jacob’s love as well as the ability to bear children. This animosity spreads to the maids of Leah and Rachel, Zilpah and Bilhah respectively, as they are used by the sisters to conceive children on their behalf. One can see also this animosity in how Leah and Rachel name their sons. Yet, the parshah also contains two aspects that seem at odds with such a patriarchal perspective. First, there are five named women who play key roles in the goings-on. Second, Rachel is an active agent. Continue reading “Vayeitzei: Rachel and the Practice of Niddah by Ivy Helman”

A Sacred Urban Menstruation Ritual by Elisabeth Schilling

Beach If I had such an opportunity, I would not hesitate to bleed free in a moonlit forest with other women during the flow of blood from our wombs in sacred ritual. This said, I currently take on a nurturing and maternal role for myself, the earth and humanity through the creation and use of my reusable menstruation cloths.

According to Nina Rastogi of slate.com and Elissa Stein and Susan Kim of Flow, the average American menstruating person could accrue about 62,415 pounds of waste in a lifetime. Continue reading “A Sacred Urban Menstruation Ritual by Elisabeth Schilling”

The Fringe is Our Stronghold by Oxana Poberejnaia

oxana Recently I have come across several stories of women’s fringe spiritual movements or practices. This made me think about the role of outsiders’ or minority views in religions and society.

Patriarchy pushes women and their issues to the margins of society and religion. It seems that there women sometimes invent their own spiritual practices. These allow women to stand their own ground in religious matters, to preserve self-respect and to keep the hope of the highest spiritual attainment.

Quite often these beliefs and practices seem shocking in their bizarreness and their stubbornness not to accept orthodox norms.

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Four Days of Bliss (or How I used The System to beat The System) by Vibha Shetiya

Vidha S I’m not particularly fond of my periods – they’re painful, full of cramps. But they are a part of who I am, and I’m not going to apologize for them. We women, especially those of us belonging to the sub-continent, have been shamed or embarrassed into silence, while being reminded that motherhood is the most exalted position a woman could ever hope for. I mean, isn’t that paradoxical – if it weren’t for the bloody nemesis (pardon the pun), we would never get to experience motherhood.

I grew up in a Western environment (in southern Africa) where “period” wasn’t necessarily synonymous with repulsion. But when I moved to India, the land of my birth, soon after my “life-altering” experience, things began to look different. I came to realize that I ought not to be like the neighbour girl who was so besharam, or shameless, that she insisted on announcing her monthly ignominy to the world by refusing to conceal the fact that she had indeed been at the pharmacist’s to buy sanitary pads. Why, the pack of pads, sealed in newspaper and carried in a little black plastic bag was right there for the entire world to see on her ten minute walk back home! I gradually came to understand that “those four days” were taboo – do not speak of “it,” do not make it obvious even if you are writhing in unbearable pain, do not contaminate sacred space with your womanly profanity. Continue reading “Four Days of Bliss (or How I used The System to beat The System) by Vibha Shetiya”

When Baby Girls and Old Crones Ruled by Jeri Studebaker

Jeri Studebaker

The data came as somewhat of a shock to me. I stumbled across it one day in The Civilization of the Goddess, a mammoth book by the late Lithuanian-American archaeologist Marija Gimbutas about what Gimbutas dubbed “Old Europe” – a culture area in southeastern Neolithic Europe that she maintains was centered around female deity.

Until she had the temerity to suggest that people at some point in the past might have worshipped goddesses rather than gods, Gimbutas had a sterling reputation among academics, even being hired to teach at two of the most prestigious of all American archaeology departments, Harvard’s and UCLA’s. After presenting her goddess theory of Old Europe, however, Gimbutas came under attack by a few powerful male archaeologists, after which her reputation among academics began to plummet (see Spretnak 2011 for a good accounting of Gimbutas’ fall from grace).

Before I get to the data that so startled me, I need to tell you a bit about archaeologists. Like the members of many academic disciplines, they disagree with each other – sometimes vehemently (and perhaps even somewhat more vehemently than scholars in other disciplines). One thing however they all agree on is this: the higher the quality and quantity of grave goods buried with an individual, the higher that individual’s status in her or his society. Continue reading “When Baby Girls and Old Crones Ruled by Jeri Studebaker”

Menstruation for Buddhist Women by Oxana Poberejnaia

Not all, but many women menstruate. The menstrual cycle is a contentious areas for feminists. Even men who aspire to be a feminist tend to find it difficult to deal with it. Inappropriate jokes ensue, and completely ignoring the issue is also a popular option.

My journey along a feminist path and toward the Sacred Feminine necessarily included working with my menstrual cycle. In this, Women’s Wisdom and the Menstrual Cycles articles and Womb Blessings by Miranda Gray have been most helpful.

Continue reading “Menstruation for Buddhist Women by Oxana Poberejnaia”

Through Body and Space: A Glimpse into Women Worshippers of Aadhi Parashakthi by Amy Levin

Once what happened was after people started believing someone around also started believing in this temple and one person kept a statue on their steps. Her Aunty she believed and she is very much interested in small things. So she started decorating it up. And what happened was the statue starting getting bleeding, like monthly monthly. And the dress which the statue wore during those periods was stained with red bleeding. So they asked Guruji about what is this and he said that the shakti has come into the statue. So if you keep this in the home it will turn into a temple so go and leave it outside. This was followed by entry of snakes, king cobras, so what they did was they went and left it in the sea, after which her grandmother had a dream that you have left me in the water but still I am with you. I am the temple opposite here, put a lamp everyday at that place. So they started putting it out there, and now there is an earthen Kali which as come up in that place by nature. –Interview with Premila, March 18, 2008 Continue reading “Through Body and Space: A Glimpse into Women Worshippers of Aadhi Parashakthi by Amy Levin”