Gimmicks for God

Valerie Prado, a student in my class this fall (RS 304 Women & the Bible), sent me the link to an NPR report last September about a woman's experiment with trying to live strictly by the various statements about women in the Bible.

I'd heard the report then but let the woman's antics slip by without any comment.  They do, however, deserve a rebuttal because she is turning them into a book that claims to be about "biblical womanhood."

Taking statements out of context without any consideration of the purpose for which each one was written, Rachel Held Evans lived for a year by passages ranging from Proverbs 31 to Ephesians 5:22.

Because Proverbs 31:23 says, "Her husband is known in the city gates," she stood at the "Welcome to Dayton" (Ohio) sign and held a poster saying "Dan is awesome."


Doing that and other things like letting her husband choose which Netflix movie they would watch clearly had nothing to do with what God wants from us humans. It was just a publicity stunt for her book. 

Rachel chose to ignore Ephesians 5:20, "Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ," so she could act out the next verse, "wives to your husbands as to the Lord."  She also chose to ignore the last 37 years of biblical scholarship by women who care about this issue, starting with All We're Meant To Be by Letha Dawson Scanzoni and Nancy Hardesty in 1974. 

But hey, maybe her gimmicks and her book will cause people to think about what "biblical womanhood" really is... to move beyond the simple imitation of various random references to good/bad women and reflect on how the genders should relate and what it means to be a person who serves and praises God. 

Micah 6:8 clearly answers the second question for both genders:
"What does YHWH require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"


http://www.npr.org/2011/09/25/140761994/biblical-womanhood-a-year-of-living-by-the-book

A Feminist Warning from Chaucer

“Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire,” wrote Catherine of Siena.

Bishop Richard Chartres spoke her words as the first line of his homily at the royal wedding today of Prince William Arthur Phillip etc. and Katherine Elizabeth Middleton.

Later he quoted Chaucer:

Love wol nat been constreyned by maistrye.
Whan maistrye comth, the God of Love anon
Beteth his wynges, and farewel, he is gon!

Chaucer's Franklin speaks these words at the beginning of his tale in The Canterbury Tales (FT 764-66).

I accidentally stayed up late trying to untangle a huge mess of yarn caused by our puppy running around the house with a ball of yarn unsupervised. It looked like a massive spider web around the chairs and tables.

Talking and untangling at almost 3 am, my daughter and I realized the wedding was about to begin and decided to watch it.

How exciting that Catherine of Siena's words began the homily, and what a priceless admonition! I had just been telling my students about her earlier in the day (I teach Women & Religion).

She was born the 25th of 26 children in 1347. She died at age 33 from illness contracted by caring for the sick and needy.

In between she had visions, experienced a mystical wedding to Jesus, became a Third Order Dominican, traveled, preached, and wielded tremendous influence in church politics. It was the century of the papal schism, and she convinced Pope Gregory IX to move back to Rome from the luxury of Avignon, France.

An uppity young woman, for sure!

The bishop's next genius move was to speak against male domination in marriage, using the humorous words of Chaucer (buried nearby in Westminster Abbey).

Of course, the sad marriage of Prince Charles and Diana hovered in the background of this wedding day thirty years later.

There was "maistrye" (domination, oppression) in that marriage for sure.

Did Cupid beat his wings and fly away? Yes, indeed.

Given that history, does William need to be reminded not to lord it over Kate?

Yes, it is well for that warning from the 14th century to hover over this day.

After all, kings have nearly always exercised the unspoken royal right of sexual access to whomever they might choose--though their wives have to remain chaste in order to insure proper paternity of continuing royal line.

If William can manage faithfulness in marriage and also strive for relative equality in the relationship, as in Paul's words "submit yourselves one to another" (Eph. 5:21), the story that begins today may have a happier ending than that of his parents.