March 17, 2000 p.m.

    Kidd seems to have found the liberation of her inner self.  Found her soul. The crisis followed by a reintegration. Positive male image to complement positive female image.  This I can understand. The men's movement seems to be searching for the same.  Denigration of the savior outside the self in exchange for the release of the creative inner self.

    But isn't this part of the message? Saved not by what you do… conforming to the image imposed from the outside but by the transformation of the mind. No need for works for justification.

    Picture patriarchy as the enemy so as to energize the liberating movement.  But the fear is an actual fear. The oppressed once they are liberated often become the oppressor.  Esp. when they maintain that this is the exclusive path of liberation.

Moving beyond the church to find the Christ. There is power and challenge in that. Perhaps that is what makes looking for the perfect church so futile.  It must be found in the temple of the Spirit. Otherwise, in the name of religion it can become the most powerful means of suppression. I suppose this is what all heretics and honest people have found.  Then the decision comes from within. As we compromise a little each day we move back away from liberation into slavery.  Or at least continue to wander in the wilderness.

    The God of Eve, of Hagar and Sarah, of Tamar and Bathsheba, dictates a different calling -- to rise above the constricting norms - to assert even in the face of evil (and our complicity in it) the creative force that He has stored within

even when the one with whom we have to wrestle is the God we have always imagined - a wild hairy man at that, no tame god

but the very image of the One in whose image we were created.

And the complement - it is as male & female that we are in the image of God. Finding ourselves reborn we must reconnect with the image all about us.

    The trouble with friendship - of finding the complement with those who are just like us. No challenge, just status quo. But we are meant for better than that.

Danger, even of those who have reintegrated, is of recreating God in our own image, of simply building a box of our own to hold Him in.

    'tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.  Part of faith is trust enough to take the risk. Like holding on in the face of the questions we cannot answer until we have passed along enough until they no longer seem to be questions.

March 19, 2000

Yesterday I bought and started reading a copy of Sue Monk Kidd’s Dance of the Dissident Daughter.  I wanted to see why someone with the reputation she had had moved from the christian tradition to a feminist spirituality. After reading about 100 pages, am asking some questions. Uneasiness aside, I am confused at the direction she took. It doesn’t seem (just to me) that she had to come to a total rejection of traditional christian faith. True enough, I understand a reaction against the baptist faith of her youth. True enough, even the most progressive christian traditions have strong regressive elements, indicative of the culture in which they were formed and in which they largely continue. I am also uneasy with being sympathetic to her understanding that because she was having difficulty with patriarchical religion, she expects that everyone else must automatically adjust. They have the option to reject the change. That she is “awake” does not mean that everyone else must become awake. Of course, that is their option, especially that of her husband who must have felt some special pressure to adapt to the changes he perceived in his wife.

And what of a religion that excludes rather than includes? Seems that is what she was reacting against. Yet she seems, at least to this point in her book, to be affirming. Seems like she would have taken the option of a religion that allows differences within an inclusive tradition.

At any rate, Galatians 3:28---one of the verses that I continue to meditate upon.

Neither jew nor greek: the core of the argument in the new testament period. The aim certainly was to include the greek. Yet, at the same time, despite the principles laid down by Paul in the greek communities, some jewish restrictions were included (abstaining from blood, as in Acts).

Neither slave nor free: this doesn’t seem to have been much of a problem in the NT world. Paul doesn’t seem to have challenged this in fact, but in relationship, as in Philemon. I believe that he certainly makes slavery untenable as a proposition. Of course, in the US, this principle, advocated by the northern evangelicals, was only ratified by the Civil War. (and to some extent by the history of African americans since then).

Neither male nor female: this is the bone of contention for the present day. What type of equality is it mandating? What challenge to privilege? What cultural norms inculcated into the NT world and viewpoint does it now challenge? Equality as such is a theoretical ideal. Certainly, it is difficult on a practical level, unless one is talking about something like equality of opportunity, access. Equality before God is not a new idea: the idea of the royal priesthood of all before God is one that has its roots in the OT (with the modification and inclusion of females, of course). At the time, the inclusion of females hardly seemed a question. Jesus, however, seems to have put them on a quite different level, even if one assumes that the gospels reflect a patriarchal viewpoint. Like even men calling God “Abba” seems to be quite a revolutionary proposition, although certainly carried within the tradition of the Old testament.

So, is kidd’s argument with culture, cultural christianity, religion, or just with the principles of christianity? If with the first two, how does one separate the husks from the grain?

Good point of not affirming feminism against men but within one’s self. But this in practice has to be exerted over against. Nature of power: Jesus and nonviolence. How does one affirm this against the pagan roman state without resorting to violence? To affirm a violent path to self-affirmation is to become what one is fighting against.

The affirmation of the feminine divine. Some of the church fathers did warn against the extension of the idea of fatherhood into maleness in regard to God. The attribute to God of masculine and feminine qualities seems an indirect affirmation of cultural stereotypes.

Do little boys need to get a masculine spirituality from the men in their lives as little girls get a feminine from the females? A reseparation of society into sexual classes. Of course, some of this is too obviously needed, as both the men’s and women’s movements affirm. But how much of this is cultural, how much biological, how much is at the heart of spirituality?

Maybe I will understand better when I finish the book. Certainly I sympathize with her desire to affirm her femininity in spiritual terms. But is this like giftedness? The failure would be to recognize the being female is a gift just as being male is a gift.

Paul—the idea of mutual submission overcomes some of the hierarchical theme. The idea of calling of persons rather than just males certainly does (what a powerful condemnation of excluding females from the feeding of the soul!!! And what truth!!! In a stereotypical sense) Problem: my reading of Kidd’s reaction to the idea of submission, self-surrender and sacrifice ). Isn’t this the nature of parenthood? To deliberately change one’s life in order to be gifted in this way? This is one reason too many seemed to have problems with not being prepared for the gift. They aren’t ready to give to nurture the gift. Mutual submission seems to be an affirmation that in order to be free for the gift of marriage, each party must accept the limitations of not being God in the situation, of not being totally free. Of being bound by the gift. The oft quoted point is that in that passage Paul is really rougher on the men than the women. How many times is he reminded to love his wife as christ loved the church?