Question:
Is secular feminism the same thing as the call for gender equality in
the church?
The
World Health Organisation defines gender as referring to socially
constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a
given society considers appropriate for men and women. Gender role
characteristics are defined in relation to one another and through
the relationships between women and men, girls and boys. These gender
roles, and the power relations they reflect, thus vary across
cultures and through time, and are amenable to change. Gender
equality refers to the equal rights, responsibilities and
opportunities, of women and men, girls and boys, and is both a human
rights principle and a pre-condition for sustainable, people-centred
development.
Secular
feminism recognises that the Abrahamic religions of Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam, are patriarchal and promote binary gender
roles in which women are 'second-class citizens'. Secular feminists
also promote the separation of church and state, and consider
religion to have had a detrimental effect on how women have been
viewed and treated throughout much of history. Although it can be
seen that in some areas women are becoming better represented, for
example there are increasing numbers of women politicians, the gender
equality promoted by secular feminists does not mean settling for
incremental improvement: 'When half of the people in
your country still do not inhabit half of the leadership positions in
your country, then the work of feminism is not done.'
Secular
feminism tries to avoid the creation of 'enemies', including
patriarchy, since that assumes an us/them mentality, rather than the
recognition of social pressures which affect both women and men.
Patriarchy is seen as one of the foundations that supports existing
economic, religious, and cultural structures, all of which need to be
made inclusive. It is rather the binary concept of masculine/feminine
that is addressed. Feminism itself is seen as activism, rather than
culture, such that, when gender equality is achieved, the label of
feminist can be relinquished in favour of humanist.
Feminist
theology/thealogy begins with both the experience and the rejection
of patriarchy, and the desire and work for the retrieval of the
'hidden history' of women in the Scriptures and in Christianity to
date. Beginning in the 19th century as an off-shoot of the feminist
movement, feminist theologians have sought reformation and the
establishment of gender equality within the Church. It should be
noted that this does not in any way negate the celebration of the
'God-given differences' between the sexes.
There
are, of course, many different groupings of feminist theologians:
there are those who are 'evangelical feminists', affirming the
authority of the Bible and the truth of the historic creeds, while
arguing for gender-neutral language and the abolition of hierarchical
relationships between men and women; there are those (Biblical
feminists) who deny the unquestionable authority of the Bible, while
recognising it as a source; and there are those who are
'post-Biblical feminists' who reject the authority of the Bible. As
well there are 'Goddess feminists' and 'Wicca feminists'.
Some
feminist theologians have left the church. Mary Daly, a leading
former Catholic feminist theologian, became disillusioned with
institutional Christianity and eventually rejected it, along with the
concept of 'Father God': "If God is male, then the male is God".
She subsequently expressed the view that female spirituality is best
expressed in eco-feminist witchcraft/paganism.
Dr. Daphne Hampson is
also a 'post-Christian' feminist, regarding Christianity as
"irretrievably sexist... highly dangerous... calculated to
legitimise a patriarchal world".
Rosemary Radford Ruether
initially chose not to reject Christianity but to reform it from
within the church - but in the end she too called women to leave and
form 'Women-Church' incorporating goddess worship in the liturgy.
Some,
however, have stayed within the church. Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza,
Professor of Divinity at Harvard, argues that Biblical interpretation
is a tool for becoming aware of structures of domination, which must
then be abolished, and advises that feminist biblical scholars are
not mere academics, but are part of a social movement for
emancipation, and must learn how to ‘discern the spirits’, and to
judge any interpretation according to 'whether it is empowering to
wo/men in their struggles for survival and transformation’.
Other
feminist theologians who have stayed within Christianity include
Phyllis Trible, who traces out the ‘womb/compassion’ metaphor for
God, which she claims points to Biblical female imagery for God, as
well as highlighting those heroines in Scripture who challenge
patriarchal culture...
… and Sallie McFague, who argues that the
Scriptural metaphors for God (King, Ruler, Lord, Father) must be
discarded because they are hierarchical and ‘death-dealing’. She
suggests the monist/panentheist metaphor of ‘the world as God’s
body’, and the use of the terms mother, lover and friend for God.
Feminist
theologians and secular feminists have in common a commitment to
feminism, the rejection of patriarchy, and the establishment of
gender equality. They are working to achieve a similar thing, but
starting from different places, and, I think, the results would be
qualitatively different: secular feminists, by definition, aim to
achieve a humanist society; feminist theologians aim for people to
achieve not 'salvation' but self-realisation/wholeness of life, the
honouring of experience as well as tradition and scripture, and, I
believe, 'heaven on earth', where all is recognised and honoured as
part of the Divine.
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