Tag: Activism
Blue on Blue: A Music Video by Mary Ann Vorasky
CFT Member Mary Ann Vorasky shared a music video she made in response to American racism. "I got the idea for this music video during the pandemic after the news of George Floyd’s murder by a police officer."
The Temptation of Apologetics
Apologetic tactics encourage the reader or listener to engage with their own beliefs and understandings in ways that (hopefully) inspire them to reevaluate those beliefs and understandings.
The Christian Narcissist and the Misunderstanding of Belief
"How this must devastate the God of truth, such abuse being carried out by the cruel hands of those who claim to love, honor, worship, and represent an all-loving Supreme Being..."
On Love and Mercy: A Social Justice Devotional
"Mattson calls us to expand our definition of neighbor to include all humanity regardless of income, education, background, religious affiliation, race, gender, and sexual orientation or expression."
Moxie
"May we all join with Vivian and say, “I hate that we are shoved aside. That we are dismissed, ranked, assaulted, and I mean nobody does anything about it. Nobody listens to us. And that is why I walked out today. That’s why I’m standing up here, yelling at all of you.”
To The Survivors: One Man’s Journey as a Rape Crisis Counselor with True Stories...
"Though Uttaro’s treatment of Christianity is gentle, he explores his own faith and the ways in which his beliefs have helped him persevere and serve, without being heavy-handed or pushy—a method that may very well come from years of practice in listening without judgment and guiding without usurping agency and autonomy from the survivors he works with. "
We Need to Talk about David Haas
August 24, 2020
The sexual abuse allegations that have recently come to light against composer David Haas have left many progressive Catholics reeling. Some Catholic...
Jesus Was Divisive: A Black Pastor’s Message To White Christians
"While many church communities have been closed since the height of the coronavirus pandemic, some evangelical congregations have fought against their governors orders despite the very real health and safety concerns for many minority communities."
A Year of Anti-Racism Work
"We lose our zeal for justice as (our) lives return to normal, and we get busy with jobs, families, and our own (real) problems. But anti-racism work needs to be ongoing if it is to be effective. We must be in this for the long haul, even when the issues don’t dominate our newsfeeds, and for that, we must pace ourselves, educate ourselves, work on ourselves, and take concrete action."
The Mrs. Files
May 21, 2020
How does the honorific "Mrs." impact how women view themselves and how they are viewed by others? Take a look at The...
May Cause Love: An Unexpected Journey of Enlightenment after Abortion
"Although she felt relieved, she also found herself feeling regretful. Anti-abortionists said women like her were murderers and would go to Hell, but her community of friends could not comprehend her having depression after abortion."
Saint Ursula and the Holy Bones: Divinity and the Body
"Have you ever seen a grown woman cry with movement over the skull of one of the 11,000 maids of Saint Ursula? I have. She was wearing a sweater with a Labrador retriever on it, and she talked a lot about Satan. "
Abortion and the Christian Tradition: A Pro-Choice Theological Ethic
"This is a very important book for anyone who is pro-choice on the abortion question. Someone has to stop the nonsense parading as Christian truth, and Kamitsuka has deflated many of the balloons being brandished."
Making Peace with the Body
"Let’s celebrate the body, embrace it for all its humanity, and allow the body to transform our pain and carry us home to the larger wonder that connects us all."
Reframing the Coronavirus Outbreak: The Spiritual Practice of Social Distancing and Quarantine
"This time is unprecedented in our lifetime. It is a beginning and an ending, the beginning of a shift and the end of an old way of living in the way we once knew. We can use this time to unlearn, let go, and reset our thoughts, behaviors, and patterns."
Blessed are You
"Blessed are you when you are treated unfairly on the basis of race or gender or sexuality or any other thing that makes you, you. Blessed are you when you make less and get less, and have to fight all that much harder to thrive."
Respecting Rachel—At Last
"I need to make amends to Rachel for being so contemptuous of her books without even having read them and not considering them worth my time when I first heard about them. Now my attitude is altogether different. I respect her as a feminist, a journalist, a good writer, and an evangelist for biblical feminism."
Does Q Prove Jesus Was the First to Teach Women Are as Valuable as...
March 2, 2020
Does Q prove that Jesus Was the First to Teach Women Are as Valuable as Men? Interested in finding out more about...
My Faith Doesn’t Discriminate Campaign
January 13, 2020
Religious Freedom Day is this Thursday, January 16th! In preparation for the plenary, to be held during our upcoming 2020 Gathering, with...
Saying No in the Community
"Churches rely heavily on volunteering women to take on childcare responsibilities, cooking, fund raising, and administrative duties, usually without pay. In fact, women who are already conditioned to take on nurturing tasks may find it more difficult to say no, and perpetrators of abuse take advantage of that."
UnUnited: LGBTQ Inclusion in the United Methodist Church
"The United Methodist Church’s legislative body, the General Conference, voted in 1972 to prohibit qualified LGBTQ individuals from being ordained pastors and prohibit United Methodist pastors from performing same-sex wedding ceremonies. Since 1972, these prohibitions have been subject to a contentious debate and efforts have been made to repeal them."
Kol Isha from a Whisper to a Song: The Voice of a Jewish Woman
Our tradition encourages, even requires, us to examine things from different angles, to question, and to make sense of ideas in the context of our own time and place.
Help Puerto Rico Now!
September 26, 2017
Hurricane Maria has caused unbelievable devastation in Puerto Rico.
"Puerto Rico in particular is facing what local officials have described as a full-blown...
The Church of Social Justice
August 7, 2017
Frances Lee, a Seattle based genderqueer scholar and artist, begins their post on Autostraddle with these words:
"There is a particularly aggressive strand...
McKenzie Brown’s Reflection on Protest— How We Prevail
I don’t want to have to protest again. I don’t want to be in a position where I must exercise my civic responsibility to stand and defend other human beings from a political leadership who would oppress them. That said, as an individual who has inherited the freedoms and privileges of American citizenship, it is a responsibility I cannot choose to ignore right now.
2017 #GCNConf Rev. Janet Edwards Interview, Part 3
There are lots of reasons for women to leave parish ministry, I’d say. Complicated family circumstances and fewer openings because of the implosion of the American church experienced first in the mainline but followed now by the evangelical church, as well, to name two. The bias that blights women’s service is one among them, in my experience.
2017 #GCNConf Rev. Janet Edwards Interview, Part 2
... the PC(USA) cannot confess sin against LGBTQ people with any integrity. First, this action would not include those Presbyterians who do not feel that they are sinning when they judge the LGBTQ person. Second, people with these judgments are still hurting LGBTQ people in the PC(USA). We are not of one mind in the PC(USA).
2017 #GCNConf Rev. Janet Edwards Interview, Part 1
My tradition is Reformed, always being Reformed (which is why we tend to protest what is traditional). Coming to a more expansive understanding of marriage is our generation’s experience of reforming our grasp of God and God’s will for us.
Ferguson & Faith: Sparking Leadership & Awakening Community
As a theology professor, Gunning Francis approaches this subject through the framework of faith in action. That spoke strongly to me. I also saw, however, that what she wrote could be helpful to those who approach the work from a more secular stance.
A Report from the “Jobs, Justice, and the Climate” March in Toronto
For me, honoring First Nation people and ensuring environmental justice is essential, especially if we claim to truly love this "blue dot" (what astronauts have called the earth from space, depicted in my poster above) we all call home.
Shades of Gray: Toward Real-Life Christian Sexual Ethics
From a Christian perspective, sexual ethics can be extremely difficult to discuss in any kind of nuanced manner, particularly in the Catholic setting with which I am most familiar, because the Church’s sexual teachings are so rigid and narrow. They offer no shades of gray to accommodate the many and varied situations that real life presents. Church teachings are seen as obsolete, irrelevant to the 21st century, and seldom factor in to sexual decision-making by people of any age. Thus movies and other media messages readily fill the void.
“With his Stripes”— The Messiah Resonates in 2014
Whipping, pulling out hair, and spitting brought to mind the “enhanced” techniques authorized by Attorney General John Ashcroft on July 24, 2002, and the waterboarding he approved two days later. (What was I doing that summer? For sure, I was not keeping track of my government’s use of torture.)
She Lives! — A New Book by Jann Aldredge-Clanton
"She Lives!" (the exclamation point is part of the title), helps us move beyond the limited gender binary to see God as both male and female, yet strictly speaking, neither male nor female, and at the same time inclusive of all gender identities.”
Climate Change and Neighbor Love
"What is neighbor love in an era of climate change? That ancient question, 'Who is my neighbor?' remains pertinent. I suggest that two shifts may help focus our ecological lenses for neighbor love— how we understand neighbor love, and who we understand our neighbors to be."
The Risk of Returning: A Novel
One rarely encounters a suspense novel in which the protagonist reminisces about insights from C. S. Lewis and the Bible and gets intimately involved with the mysterious woman who is helping him relearn his Spanish, but it's all here.
Remembering EEWC-CFT Member Marillia Hinds
Marillia Hinds was a woman ahead of her time. I remember her telling about injustices she became aware of through her reading, which prompted her to write to the CEO of the company or organization to share her opinion of the unfairness.
What She Did Here – Marillia Hinds
And this is why Marillia Hinds is important. Because she believed that it made a difference when an ordinary person wrote a letter to a person of privilege, and asked them to be more just— more inclusive. Let me say that again, she believed it made a difference.
Wild Goose Festival 2013 – Introduction
I've never been to Wild Goose before but am looking forward to the experience. You'll be able to read about and see what I experience here on Where She Is (and on the Christian Feminism Today social media outlets) as I'll be posting frequent updates leading up to, during, and directly after the conclusion of the festival (August 8-11, 2013).
What Does Family Therapy Have to Do with the XL Pipeline, Climate Change, and...
The question facing all of us is whether the unbridled dependence on oil and gas that marks our North American economies and lifestyles, or the creation-care vision articulated by environmental and Aboriginal groups, will determine our future.
A Christian Feminist Speaks Out on the Drone War in Pakistan
"The notorious instability of many Middle Eastern countries means a seemingly innocuous walk to a market, across the street, through a park might be disrupted by a suicide bombing. A decade-long U.S. military presence has done little to provide safety for women and children in Afghanistan, Iraq, or elsewhere. "
Confessions of a Christian Humanist
For Christianity to be Christian it cannot by-pass St. Paul’s confession of Christ crucified as “the wisdom of God,” for it would have nothing distinctive to contribute to the humanist project. But for it to be humanist it cannot ignore the truth wherever it is to be found, for all truth ultimately reflects the beauty and goodness of God.
Broken We Kneel: Reflections on Faith & Citizenship
In these hard days, in these dangerous times, we need witnesses and prophets like Diana Butler Bass. Bruised and broken, we can abandon our vision. Bruised and broken, we can flee our faith. Or bruised and broken, we can kneel, dreaming of love, striving for peace, pleading for grace.
Justice, Love, and Compassion on Trial
--Why I Took Part in the Jimmy Creech Protest Demonstration
by L. Victoria Peterson
Why did more than 100 persons leave their homes and jobs and...
Women Called to Witness: Evangelical Feminism in the Nineteenth Century
Women Called to Witness suggests that the American women who led the battles over temperance, female ordination, abolition, and woman suffrage in the 1800s were motivated by their evangelical Christian faith. In the Second Great Awakening revivals, which touched the lives of each of these female crusaders,
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New Noah
May 2023 Poetry Selection
We travel the waters;
the waters travel us, trace us,
turn us dark and dank. The
trip from pupil to lip: traversed
We travel the waters;
the waters travel us, trace us,
turn us dark and dank. The
trip from pupil to lip: traversed
