Reflections on African Women's Theology - On Religion and Health 2

Some reflections on readings for seminary class: Global Theologies of Women of Color 

African Women, Religion, and Health Ch. 9-13

Ch. 9 – “Women Poverty, and HIV in Zimbabwe: An Exploration of Inequalities in Health Care” by Sophia Chirongoma

Chirongoma introduces the reader to the reality of living in Zimbabwe as the health of its citizens is threatened by poverty, insufficient health services, malnourishment, and the continuous spread of HIV/AIDS. She calls upon the church to provide the presence of God and Jesus in the lives of those suffering. She suggests they emphasize sharing one another’s burdens and “seeking corporately to correct injustices that deny access to health care or food security for the poor” (184). My favorite part of her theological reflection was her Christology for women. “Women and all those who suffer from deprivation should find encouragement and consolation in Jesus as the caring compassionate healer who is outraged by the injustices of poverty, violence, inequality, and sickness” (183). Having read Carroll Watkins Ali’s Survival and Liberation this week, I see similar themes of survival and liberation within the stories of these African women. , I’m thinking about the Christology Watkins Ali lifts up from Jacquelyn Grant’s work. The Christ who saves souls is inadequate for people in the midst of suffering. Jesus must be made real through not only being a compassionate healer, but also a co-sufferer. Chirongoma calls the church in Zimbabwe to represent such Christology. Just as in Watkins Ali and Grant’s work, pastoral care and church care in such settings is not only to ease the physical suffering, but to accompany and walk with those who suffer

Ch. 10 “Women and Peacemaking: The Challenge of a Non-Violent Life” by Susan Rakoczy, IHM

Evelyn Underhill became an inspiration to me during my own time in the wilderness, rediscovering what my faith and God looked outside of my fundamentalist and harmful upbringing. She intrigued me on many levels, but mostly the pursuit of spiritual and theological understanding on her own terms. The way Rackczy summarizes Underhill’s transformation into pacificism exemplifies what I continue to admire about her. Seeing faith life as a journey, a process that is ever unfolding as our own self-realization develops was transformative to me and helped me return to Christianity. Without her influence, one that wasn’t only cognitive nor only affective, but both, I probably would have never entered seminary. Pacifism is a concept that I struggle with and cannot claim as my own, despite, admiring so much of its goals. I struggle with it because pacifism would not participate in the culture and society, the capitalistic systems within which I live. I cannot claim to be a pacifist if I participate in the structural destruction of others.

Ch.  13 "Navigating Experiences of Healing: A Narrative Theology of Eschatological Hope as Healing" by Fulata Lusungu Moyo

Such a beautiful piece, one with depth of expression combined with theological thinking. Moyo and I disagree upon some fundamental metaphysics, about the nature of God and creation, but the conclusion we get to is similar… healing takes on multiple forms and we may or may not have control over the form of healing that takes place. I would love to hear more of her musings about prayer and  faith healing vs. miracles. She summarized the premise of chaplaincy and chaplain training in pastoral care when she speculated what kind of healing, what kind of prayer would Solomon have requested if they had only thought to ask. Death is a communal event in some ways, but it is also a personal journey, one that is taken alone, or at least, between God and person. As a hospice chaplain, I’ve helped many people who believe in faith healing and miracles process what it means when death still comes. It is not easy and definitely shakes up faith in God, but mostly faith in oneself. I see myself giving this article to people who struggle in similar ways, to see how one woman processes such a journey.

Reflections on African Women's Theology - On Religion and Health 1

Some reflections on readings for seminary class: Global Theologies of Women of Color 

African Women, Religion, and Health Ch. 4-6

From the beginning of this reading, I was reminded of our class discussion last week and previous weeks as well. Sarojini Nadar quotes Teresa Okure in the beginning of her essay, describing the unique style of theological study for African women, whose “primary consciousness in doing theology is not method, but life and life concerns- their own and those of their own peoples” (78). These readings are striking contrasts to the political philosophy I’m reading in Cosmopolitan Theology and the history of Pastoral Theology in another class. In fact, after discussing last night Homer Ashby’s Our Home Is Over Jordan: A Black Pastoral Theology (2003), I Nadar’s concern that scholars are just not GETTING it when it comes to truly liberating the texts of the bible. Ashby tries to reimagine the exodus story in new ways for African American Christians to rally together in solidarity. While an admirable exercise and a compelling book in other ways, his deconstruction of the biblical text lacks depth when addressing the displacement and genocide of the Canaanite people. The stark honesty that the African women theologians are demonstrating needs to be heard by more academics, by people who influence the ministers and churches that live out the interpreted example of these texts. Women who experience, witness, and anticipate misogyny, sexual violence, abuse of body and of mind, NEED to have the troubling texts of the bible addressed. Women NEED teachers demonstrating that the Bible is not just for the oppressor. The stories of the bible relate to their lives and speak to each of them in their experience.

I loved how each chapter begins with a re-telling/re-imagining of a biblical text. My initial reaction to Chapter 5’s opening poem surprised me. I realized that my Americanized (and patriarchal) image of Psalm 23 always implies Jesus as the representative of God, the Shepherd. To see the entire psalm retold, lifting up the incarnation of God’s love and care within another, within a woman scholar, took me off guard. But once I got over that reaction, and the bits of shame that my fundamentalist upbringing still influences my perspective, I LOVED it. Now I want to use that psalm to lift up so many other women (and men) who have shepherded me as representatives of God’s love and care.

Related to Chapter 6, I contemplated my role as healer of souls. As a chaplain, I greatly appreciate the concept of a ritual of cleansing and healing after traumatic violence and violation of rape. I wonder how US culture receives such ideas. I am concerned, though not surprised, that men who act so violently are allowed to participate in the regular life of the church, village, and country without any need for cleansing or healing. While women need ways to process and heal from violence and domination out of their control, the dis-ease of the people continues to fester and grow if society does not see the  need for men to heal and reconcile this within themselves.

Reflections on African Women's Theology - On Passionate Compassion

Some reflections on readings for seminary class: Global Theologies of Women of Color

With Passion and Compassion

I loved this reading. To hear so many different voices whose passion shines through is inspiring. The power of the words of these women scholars derives from the wisdom acquired through marginalization, suffering, even abuse. To hear one proclaim hope in a future free from suffering when she, herself, is suffocating within a reality of oppression, is to hear the Christ-event incarnated, to hear the prophets of God call us to solidarity.

So many quotes stand out, but the opening page of the first essay, “Church Women of Africa: A Theological Community”, describes the situation of the church so succinctly. “The Christian church has suffered and is suffering from a growing cultural alienation because evangelization has not been that of cultural exchange but of cultural domination or assimilation” (3). I knew from that quote, these women, speaking from their own unique worldview, are prophets to the entire Christian world and that I would learn much from their wisdom. At first, the premise of the book to base a Woman’s theology of the church upon the Bible made me uncomfortable. I grew up in a fundamentalist misogynistic church that “claimed”, as so many evangelical churches do, to be directly inspired by the bible. But later, the authors explain that the source of theologizing is not only the Bible, but that “revelation has to be interpreted and applied to our contemporary situations and experiences,” including the particular experience of women (8).

In the second essay, by Dorothy Ramodibe, she posits that women and men cannot work together to build a church based upon the examples of the past and the structures that keep women suffering inequality and injustice. Ramodibe asks “Which church are we building?...Women want to change the church and not simply “improve” it. Women want liberation of the church from men” (15). And, “men also need liberation from their prejudices of masculinity” (20).

Therese Souga, in the third essay on the view of African women on Christ, writes “Christ is the true Human, the one who makes it possible for all persons to reach fulfillment and to overcome the historic alienations weighing them down” (22). This Christology describes a limitless hope for not only personal transformation, but also community transformation. “False images of women persist in the church in Africa and in turn produce certain negative kinds of behavior. Should not Christology question these images in order to question the real situation of African women and subject it to a critical examination in the light of Jesus Christ?” (25). Christology should not just be about confession of faith and forgiveness of sins, it must use the model Jesus provides as a lens through which to look at our everyday lives, to witness, name, and act upon injustice.

            As we continue to reflect upon the influence of women theologians in church and academia, I am inspired to approach each reflection, each project, with the zeal and love for God and God’s vision for the world that these faithful scholars demonstrate.

Reflections on African Women's Theology - On Mercy Amba Oduyoye

Daughters of Anowa: African Women and Patriarchy

by Mercy Amba Oduyoye   Second Half

In chapter 6 of Daughters of Anowa, Mercy Oduyoye says “The framework of patriarchy is constructed on many pillars. Each requires scrutiny, but patriarchy itself is defective and must be torn down” (153). Within the second half of her book, Oduyoye looks at several of those pillars, including the impact of Western ideology’s influence upon patriarchy. She says “ Traditional norms are enforced whenever they serve to silence women, reduce or eliminate their voices. My observation is that these traditional systems have been strengthened by Western patriarchal structures as national governments and institutions have been formed” (151). The horrific irony of this is exasperated by the prevalence of customary law and ambivalence to civil law. Civil law, constructed from Western models, is limited by lack of provision for important existing structures in Akan society, such as polygyny. Marriage and inheritance for children are often adversely affected by interference of misaligned civil law (161-162). Another angle of patriarchy are the oppressive expectations on African women. Oduyoye says “To expect women to uphold all that is humanizing in African culture and yet deny their participation in the politics of family and nation is like asking them to make bricks without straw (171).

The essay "A Coming Home to Myself: The Childless Woman in teh West Africa Space" which is in the tribute to Letty Russell, is another example of the rich prose with which Oduyoye writes. She shares her personal experience of internalized oppression and shame of the familial and cultural expectations for childbearing and most importantly her journey to acceptance and affirmation of God’s love and call for her life, a call without biological children, but with great potential for creative generation of life. Our reading of this article stems from a question I asked in class about how to care pastorally for women within such a communally driven identity. Dr. Mombo responded graciously, replying that the individual’s experience of pain and suffering is always there and suggested this article as an example. I’m looking forward to discussion in class about this essay. Oduyoye describes thoroughly the despair and grief she lived with during her reproductive years and shares her testimony of grace and healing coming from God, from a specific experience as well as from her theological construction. I wonder, then, what her advice to African ministers and women elders who counsel women would be.

The ambiguity of reproductive potential and reality of infertility are at odds within a woman’s experience. Female autonomy means that we are told we choose whether we want to have children or not. But, in a society that views the choice of childlessness as abnormal, how much choice do we really have in our desires? I envy my friends who have come to the decision to be childfree due to a genuine desire to not have kids. My soul longs for that level of confirmation. But, instead, I am left with fibroids, in a similar way as Mercy, and thanks to access to more testing ability than the actual medical understanding of what’s going on, I am aware of multiple chronic conditions contributing to infertility and access to only vaguely understood interventions that did not work. My passion for reproductive concerns stems from my own experience… one that includes walking down state-assisted hallways with limited access to care as well as walking down privatized hallways with access limited only to your checkbook and your privileges in society. Both were hallways of shame, fear, and grief. 

1980s Transitions in Pastoral Care: Smith and the Relational Self

Reflections upon 

The Relational Self: Ethics & therapy from a Black church perspective by Archie Smith (1982)

Dr. Smith is a retired professor of pastoral psychology and counseling from PSR. While his training began in theology and ministry, his studies and work expanded to include psychology. He shares much of his context in Chapter 1. The way he shares shows signs of the self-reflexive exercises of his clinical training. He focuses on parental relationships and experiences within his ministry and work. But he also treads into interesting territory as he shares just a glimpse of the social and historical context of his experiences, which is the point of the book, but I imagine is also breaking into new territory in 1982. Smith identifies himself as neorothodox theology and pastoral care in 1966, but also informed of psychological perspectives that enhanced such a view (35).

Question 2: Pastoral Identity within the Text

Smith argues for several identities for the Black Church, and thus the Black pastor, arguing these identities are relevant to all forms of church and ministers. As he names them, I imagine these are the ideals to which he aspires and desires for his students.

One way he organizes his thoughts about pastoral identity is through the idea of Paradigms I, II, and III. Paradigm I encourages the individualized, privatized, personal salvation of most of contemporary American Christian groups (41). This leads pastors and churches to focus on internal sins, struggles, without complex analysis of social systems. (Smith quotes Ruether on page 49). Paradigm II makes ministry politically aware, socially active, and oriented to changing the systems; it is often expressed by rescuing the victims of social oppression (43). The role of church and pastor becomes one of a mediating structure between society and personal experience. Paradigm III ministry emphasizes the interconnectedness of the web of life, recognizes the social-intentional character of the agent, all aiming toward justice in relation to one another (53). Within the discussion of the three paradigms, Smith names multiple identities for Black churches. Some highlights are:

Mediating structure between individual and society (44)

Psychic support to people while advocating social change

Prophetic voice to injustice (46)

Supporting moral vision of people

Empowering them to transform social structures

Source for transcendent values.

In Chapter 2, Smith lists the historical role of the Black preacher as “bringer of glad tidings, a spiritual and psychological healer, the interpreter of the Unknown, the comforter in times of sorrow, the one who gives voice and picturesquely expresses the longings, disappointments, and resentments of a stolen and oppressed people” (76).

In Chapter 4, Smith posits that Black therapists must be intentional to include social and historical context within their reflexive practice. “The context is operative whether the black therapist or client chooses to recognize it or not” (98). The combined effect of race, gender, class, and other oppressions within social experience should be acknowledged. He also suggests that therapy of “black consciousness selfhood includes acceptance of one’s self and others, respect and self-determination, self-initiation, and responsibility for one’s own life. This implies affirmation, integration, and transformation of the symbol “blackness” (105). While not directly stating so, Smith’s description can be applied as a goal for Black churches, as they continue to fulfill the role of a therapeutic institution. A minister’s role, therefore, as trained in both theology and therapy, would be to empower and foster identity development that challenges and transcends societal norms.

I feel the book would benefit from further extrapolation about Smith’s view of a Christian Black liberation ethic. I found myself left with lots of questions about the practical application of such an ethic. While I skimmed Chapter 8 to see if he applied it in the Jonestown case study, I wonder if more could have been done. It seems that a model of care based on therapy and ethics should describe more clearly how the moral objective of freedom is enacted. I also am struggling to pinpoint the places of departure between his theology and my own. I sense that Smith is or similar to an Open Theist or Free Will Theist, which shares many aspects of process thought, but maintains an all-powerful supernatural (or perhaps 19th century natural) God. This thought of God is often used within neoorthodox liberation theologies and helps many connect their modern scientific understanding and postmodern relativism with more traditional theological language. It is not convincing for my own theological ponderings, as I feel there is still a layer of false consciousness, or perhaps cognitive dissonance, within such a model. But the science education most people obtain within dominant structural systems does not encourage expansion beyond a modernist perspective. I find it interesting that liberation theologies use Marx, or in this case, Mead, who were raised theists, but whose philosophies were not. It seems inserting assumptions about God’s nature into a philosophy without God can produce many points of tension. Those tensions, however, do provoke intriguing questions and do disrupt/disturb/push the oppressive structural systems.

Upon further digging, George Herbert Mead, his primary source for the development of the relational self, is a contemporary of Whitehead and they influenced each other’s thoughts and language in compelling ways. What is interesting to me about Mead and Smith’s use of him is the focus on psychological and social behavior. I’m also curious about how the development of thought in the 1930s contributed to the social/academic atmosphere of later decades. Did the work of these philosophers reflect the work within society’s thought process that eventually led to the civil rights movement and feminist activism of the 60s/70s… or perhaps did their contributions pave the way for more serious reflection and openness to include silenced voices at the table? I’m not claiming that the path to today’s academia was premeditated or that there wasn’t open hostility towards those who pushed us towards it. However, these minds were poking holes all over modernity… before World War Two, before the Holocaust. If time travel ever becomes possible, I’d love to listen to the conversations brewing. 

Embracing my difference and celebrating yours

In the early 1990s, when I was 16, I participated in a youth leadership training to be a part of a “Multicultural Panel”. From what I can remember, the training was developed by Friends University and included a day or two long workshop that assisted youth to contemplate, describe, and learn about their own cultural experience. Say what?! Learn about your own culture first? Yep. Our job was to be able to ad-lib a 2-3 minute talk on our culture and respond to questions by the audience about the various cultural experiences of the panel. At each presentation, the panel would represent about 5-6 types of cultural diversity including race, gender, class, and physical abilities.

My expectation of the class was to learn about everybody else’s culture, because what did I, a white girl from Kansas, have to contribute? My culture was The Andy Griffith Show mixed with Full House sitcoms. I entered with the assumption that my culture was so overexposed to be non-existent. I felt guilt and shame for being part of the privileged masses. It took quite a while and some petulant teenage angst to acknowledge that my cultural experience had complexity and value. Instead of asking the privileged white kids how they are scared of or adapt to differences, the facilitators taught us how to name our own value in a way that did not de-value someone else. Not only did I learn positive and enriching language and conversation skills, I also learned listening and interrelational skills with those different than me. I discovered solidarity in a group not because of race, gender, class, but because of a common openness and ideal. I learned more about stereotypes and assumptions within myself, groups, and society than I had in any other context. I also shed much of the shame of my own differences, whether as a representative of the majority, of geeky science girls, or of children living with poverty. Before, I saw the community I grew up in as boring and my identity in it as a freckled Irish/German American Kansas girl with glasses as being a dime a dozen. I valued any difference from my normative experience as more valid, interesting, and meaningful. I felt invisible.

What I discovered is that my peers had never had bierocks and had no idea what a Volga German was. I learned that my family history mattered and that I knew very little of it. And as I worked on reforming my family and cultural narrative, I discovered my family history had experiences of marginalization and oppression, some not so long ago. I realized that I had embraced the caricatures created by St. Patrick’s Day and Oktoberfest without truly understanding my own heritage. My family was no longer an assimilated melting pot with no cultural identity but what the media promotes. I no longer fell for the biggest lie our society and media feeds us.

In 1881, Irish caricature:

from: http://irishmemory.blogspot.com/2013/01/irish-industries-cartoon-1881.html

 

2012, t-shirt:

from: http://irishamericanheritagemonth.com/why-we-need-irish-american-heritage-month-the-2012-winner-of-the-know-nothing-award/

 

 

 

found on: http://imgur.com/gallery/FXugjVI

 

The experience with that Multicultural Panel revealed I was connected to and a part of a universal, global, human story expressed in unique communities and individuals. By embracing my own difference, I realized that my neighbor’s difference was valuable as well. I cannot claim that I embraced my value as a female so young. In fact, I kind of ignored it as long as possible. However, a first step to understanding occurred there.

This reflection bubbled up while preparing for my re-entry into academia. As I read essays that repeatedly stereotype European American and Western thought, I felt the resurgence of guilt and shame for being lumped into such a category. There is more discomfort while reading these pages than I thought there would be. Who am I supposed to identify with if I am a complex unique individual who exists with both privilege and marginalization?  Perhaps if we even have one area we feel tossed aside, not important, or directly attacked, we should be able to recognize a similar struggle in someone else. Even if our struggles do not match in content or even degree of oppression, perhaps there is still a way for us to relate to, sympathize with, and value each other.  

I have many other thoughts related to this, including pre and post modernity and caricatures of scientific thought, gender value, and how can this white woman learn about her heritage and history of women and pastoral care in the church and society.

350 for climate change

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