Ripples of Misogyny

The following intimate and insightful post is by Sean-Allen Parfitt and is reposted with his permission. Sean-Allen blogs at Of Pen and Heart, where this article first appeared on August 26,2013.

The reason I despise fundamental Christianity, as revealed to me in a dream

Recently there has been a series over at the Homeschoolers Anonymous blog, called “Voices of Sister-Moms”. I began reading the introductory post, but could not finish. My entire body was having a negative reaction. I mentioned this to some of my fellow LGBT Homeschooled friends, and they wisely suggested that I step away from the article till I could calm down. I was seriously angry, and had beginning symptoms of a minor panic/anxiety attack.

I was surprised at my reaction to the article.

After all, I am a male, the eldest in my family, who, in the patriarchal/quiverfull system, is in a position of privilege. It’s true that I was expected to do a lot of housework and helped homeschool the kids (see last Friday’s post), but I went to college, got a job, and was allowed to live my own life. (And by “my own life” I mean going to work and coming back home and going to church with the family and sometimes hanging out with friends.)

Well, in the last two years, I’ve come out of the closet, left the fundamentalism my family calls Christianity, meet many new kinds of people, and discovered that what I was taught isn’t necessarily the truth. I am in a relationship with another man, which is for me a clear illustration that the traditionally taught family dynamics are not the one true way. I have even begun to question Christianity itself.

But I couldn’t put my finger on either my anxiety when reading about the mistreatment of Christian girls or my strange negative reactions to other generic mentions of Christianity.

Why did I cringe when I saw a post on Twitter recommending a book about God’s love? Why do I skim past the tweets with Bible verses and references to good times at church?

I believe I got my answer in a dream I had Saturday night.

In my dream, I was visiting my father’s childhood church, which my family had begun re-attending. Mom was in a small-group discussion, and brother T was in the main sanctuary. I walked up to T, but he distinctly turned away without acknowledging me. Once Small Groups was over, Mom came back into the sanctuary. I began following her as she straightened the pews, talking to her. She was upset with me for living openly gay, and I was getting more and more angry with her as the conversation continued.

Then I exploded at her. This is very much out of character of me, as I have only raised my voice at her on a few occasions. I almost tremble is reverent fear of my mother, who has power to unleash unheard-of retribution. Or at least, that’s how I feel. So for me to yell at her actually took me by surprise in retrospect. But what I said to her showed me exactly what I had been feeling but had been unable to express before.

It was the very innermost turmoil that I had not been able to understand.

“Do you know what I hate about Christianity?” I shouted at my mother, standing in the very sanctum of the religion I was at that very moment criticizing. “Do you know what it is that makes you unable to accept the fact that ‘I’m gay, and it’s OK’?” My mother just stood there, not replying. And then I said the word. Just one word, a simple 8 letters that encompass the root of my dissatisfaction with the religion in which I was raised, and which has caused irreparable pain to so many people. I opened my mouth, and with conviction, the word thundered through the church:

“Misogyny.”

According to Wikipedia, “Misogyny /mɪˈsɒdʒɪni/ is the hatred or dislike of women or girls.” When used in a religious context, it usually refers to the belief that women are the “weaker sex” (see I Peter 3:7) and are under the authority of men (see I Corintians 11:3and I Timothy 2:12). In practice, this means that women and girls are to be humble servants to men. Girls are groomed to become wives and mothers, and should not aspire to be successful on their own. They are to submit, never questioning their fathers, husbands, or pastors.

When I awoke from my dream, I was surprised at what my mind had expressed while I slept. However, upon reflection, I realized how so very true it is. Misogyny is at the heart of much of the pain I have experienced in my life.

It is the root of the pain that countless other women and gay men have felt.

Wait, sure, you can see how misogyny has caused incredible pain and discrimination for women, but how dare I include myself and other gay men in that category? This is the question I asked myself. But even though I did not express it verbally in my dream, I knew what the answer was.

One major argument used against unions between two men is the call to remember God’s biblical definition of marriage. Thus, marriage is commonly interpreted as a union between one man and one woman. Traditionalists maintain that the proper balance of power places the man in the position of leader and the woman in a submissive position. Women are expected to take care of the home, cleaning, cooking, shopping, teaching, raising children, making life easier for men, and providing sex on demand. Men are expected to go to work, provide money and housing, spiritually lead the family, and lead the family into ministry work.

With this in mind, it’s not hard to extrapolate the effects of misogyny onto gay men. If two men are in a relationship, who has what duty? Men aren’t supposed to do the women’s work. Who leads the family and makes the decision? Which one goes to work and which one cleans the house? In short, which one is the man and which one is the woman?

So many straight fundamentalists can’t grasp the idea that gay men are still men.

A flamboyant gay man is called effeminate and looked down on. When I came out to my mother over the phone, she prayed for me. In that prayer, she cried, saying that she didn’t want me to be her daughter; she wanted me to be her son. I have had several people ask me who is the man in Paul’s and my relationship.

Besides being entirely misguided, such notions and comments are very hurtful. I have been completely cut off from my family. My old friends have told me that we cannot fellowship anymore. They see me as a deviant from the natural order and desires. Because I don’t want to be with a woman. Because I don’t want to exercise headship over my partner. Because I like to engage in “feminine” pursuits such as sewing. Because I care what I look like and plan my outfits to coordinate. Because I wear earrings. Because I am “acting like a woman”, when I am really a man.

I admit I am not sure where I stand on the issue of Christianity. The pain and hurt I have received from the church has made me very wary of the religion of the Bible. When I see others facing the same discrimination I have, I become enraged. It is hard not to be bitter against the very religion that brought me up.

It’s a world of pain, hurt, and rejection, all because of one word: misogyny.

Circling the Christianity Buffet, Part 4

In Which I Return to the Beginning

We had exhausted the church options in our own community; now we crossed county lines heading east, south, and west. We piled into our 12-passenger van and rotated directions each week, laughingly calling ourselves a "circuit-riding congregation".

The Church of Christ had fired their ATI pastor, and he was now leading a small fellowship of mostly homeschooling families who met on Sunday mornings at a public school to the east, near the lake. The school would rent them the library for something like $10 a week, and we could drag in a piano from down the hall to accompany the pastor’s guitar. This band of believers sang a lot of praise songs I remembered from my childhood. The pastor would print out his sermon notes and pass out copies to everyone. Then he would put the same notes on the overhead projector, stand to the side, and proceed to read them to us. But the homemade cubes of communion bread were nearly as delicious as the charismatic kind, and they served it every single week. On Sunday nights, many in the church liked to have bonfires, s’mores, and guitar-led sing-alongs on the beach.

In the opposite direction, we knew an ATI family pastoring an old country church. Their theology was more covenantal than ours and the congregation more blue-collar, but their music was safely conservative and I borrowed interesting books from the minister. Having connections to the Methodist tradition, they took their monthly communion at the altar rail. Until I asked the pastor to officiate at my wedding, I did not realize that Bible Methodists do not endorse jewelry—including wedding rings.

Other weeks, we drove south to join an eclectic "plain" fellowship meeting in a township hall. Some families were ex-Amish, having been forced out of their communities when they were "born again". One couple had been raised Catholic and now vehemently objected to the celebration of Christ-mass. Another had been Episcopalian, turned Amish (exchanging their minivan for a horse and buggy), and were now neither. When they decided to have a baptismal immersion service at a farm pond, no one knew how to do it. The baptismal candidates didn't even get completely moistened, though, as a female observer, I didn't tell them so. 

Everyone homeschooled, the girls all wore dresses, there was little interaction between the sexes, and the women all wore scarves around their hair, with only an inch or two revealed above their foreheads. The a capella singing was painfully slow. The men took turns preaching. I doubt anyone in the group had a college degree; some of the adults had not even finished high school. I cannot recall the fine points of their theology because it was primarily discussed at men’s meetings. As non-members, we would not have been allowed to take communion.

I was annoyed with the extreme patriarchy and made a point of wearing lipstick (gasp!) and my boldest pale pink dress (short sleeves, print of scattered full-blown roses, dainty lace collar, decorative brooch-like button, and wide belt). Though I enjoyed hats, I did not wear one there. I was accustomed to being the most conservatively dressed in any social group, so feeling like the "harlot" was a new experience! I suddenly realized how most normal women must have felt when they visited our family. 

After months of riding our little circuit on Sunday mornings, we settled at the fellowship that met at the school. The pastor was soft-spoken and kind, there were lots of other children, and the families were the most like us. In many ways, that church was a spiritual rehab center or halfway house, attracting the hurt, the lonely, the ones who didn’t fit elsewhere. It was, for the most part, a safe and quiet place for us to park while our emotional wounds healed.

I moved to Oklahoma (to work for Bill Gothard's cult) and fell in love with a Christian & Missionary Alliance Church there. For the first time since childhood, I looked forward to going to church. The people were friendly and the service combined all the elements I most enjoyed. Even though I couldn't remember the CMA church of my infancy, I had a feeling of returning to the beginning, of coming home to where I belonged, and for a year I participated to the fullest extent my cult involvement would permit.

Theologically, I liked the CMA teaching on the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts; after all I'd seen, it felt centered. One week the pastor prayed for a sick man to be healed. The man was anointed with oil and we all prayed. I went home for a visit and when I got back, the man was dead. I tried to understand. I wrote a poem for his widow, imagining the man in heaven and trying to put a hopeful spin on his passing. Faith was so mysterious.

One of my coworkers at Gothard's training center was confident she heard God’s spirit communicating with her. We talked about faith and what we wanted it to mean. During the lunch hour one day, we went up to my room and she prayed for me to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit. That afternoon I spoke in tongues for the first time. After decades of stories, curiosity, contradictory advice, and yearning to "experience God" in a physical way, this strange and awkward exploratory event felt like losing my spiritual virginity. I basked in a sense of fulfillment for a while.

But my job moved out of Oklahoma and CMA church in my new city wasn’t as inviting. The charismatics weren't down-to-earth enough; the Lutherans were too old or too certain; the Baptists far too stuffy. I kept exploring, learning from each church I was part of, but never able to put down roots. I married, and we eventually settled at a Christian church in our neighborhood that both my husband and I could appreciate. The music leader played with skill and gusto, though some of the more suggestive songs about Jesus made me giggle now that I had sexual experience.

Since Christian churches share a common ancestor with the Church of Christ, communion was a weekly ritual. Unfortunately, this particular congregation used tasteless minuscule crackers that got stuck in my teeth. I tried to think reverent thoughts, picturing the tiny cup of grape juice "blood" as an oral vaccine, passing Christ's immunity on to me and strengthening my resistance to various temptations. It helped for a while, but eventually I started taking two crackers at a time, to get a morsel big enough to chew. Then I switched to selecting the darkest bit on the plate, because at least Burnt Bleached Flour is a flavor.

Once in a while, I would pray in tongues again, sometimes because I felt overwhelmed by life, other times just to see if it still worked. This went on for years until one week, sitting in the sound booth in the back of an evangelical church in the middle of Kansas, my husband and I knew we didn’t belong anymore.

In an attempt to preserve what faith we had left in the God of the Bible, we found a Methodist church with a beautiful pipe organ and a heart of compassion. But even singing anthems with the robed choir, attending the pastor’s Bible class, and dipping bread in grape juice in his study didn’t help. One Easter Sunday, we helped the children’s department with the resurrection-themed crafts, then quietly slipped away. Even as an atheist, I found I could still speak in tongues.

Friends sometimes suppose that if I had ever met their Christ, I would have to love him. But I was presented to the Lord at two weeks old and have seen more of the Body of Christ than most. I found that we simply weren't compatible. For thirty-odd years, I thought we had a relationship; I even thought we were close. But after years of thinking the problems were all mine, his behavior at last began to trouble me.  Could he be trusted? Could he be schizophrenic? Was he cruel? Was he real? And I finally had to conclude: eternity would be far too long to spend with anyone so enigmatic.

Circling the Christianity Buffet, Part 1

An abridged version of this article appeared as a guest post on the blog Ramblings of Sheldon.

In Which God and I Are Introduced

By age 23 I had made a full circuit of the American Christianity buffet table and if I hadn't tasted everything, I had at least gotten near enough to smell it.

I was dedicated to the Protestant God by my parents and a Pastor Dibble at a Christian & Missionary Alliance church in a college town in Pennsylvania. My parents, raised Lutheran from infancy, had been rebaptized there by immersion. They were enthusiastic about Bible study and campus evangelism.

I was wearing toddler sizes when I invited Jesus into my heart before bed one night. There wasn't a CMA church in our new town; my parents fellowshipped with a small, casual group that met in an old building named the "Sunshine Inn". I remember watching the adults perform skits for one another, sharing potlucks, everyone dancing to "Father Abraham", and a small printing operation in a back room. When the group decided to construct their own multipurpose church building, my dad was among the volunteers helping to lay block or hang drywall.

The church was young and charismatic, its members idealistic. Instead of hiring a single pastor, they attempted to follow the pattern of the book of Acts: a group of elders shared the responsibilities of leadership, sitting in front of the assembly together and taking turns teaching from the Bible. Our dentist was one of the elders--until his daughter returned home pregnant from Oral Roberts University and he resigned. Once when I was sick, a group of men from the church (some of the elders?) came to our house to anoint my forehead with oil.

During church services, people prayed out loud, prophesied in tongues, and danced or raised their hands in worship. Song lyrics were shown on the wall via overhead projectors and the song-leader was usually playing a guitar along with a handful of instrumentalists in the "orchestra". Against the wall were inconspicuous wooden boxes with mail slots in the top. Dad often let me slide his tithes and offerings envelope in—a treat I enjoyed and helped him remember. The envelopes were printed with a large Roman-style coin, cut into pie wedges to illustrate the ten percent that belonged to God.

There was a warm water baptistery off to the side of the sanctuary/gymnasium at the church, but my dad baptized me in the Great Lakes in a small ceremony with one other family. They sang “Our God Reigns”—my favorite. My friend’s mom wrapped me in my bath towel with the elephant on it, and I was excited because now Mom and Dad would let me share communion. Elders would stand in the aisles at church holding bottles of grape juice, ready to refill the the common cup as it passed down the rows. The cubes of homemade unleavened bread were fragrant with coriander and star thistle honey. I always tried to nonchalantly pick the biggest piece when the plate made its way to me. I still have the recipe for that bread; it’s one of my family’s favorite snacks.

I remember the men of the church being kind, and I was very aware of their contributions to the community. One was a Vietnam vet who became a veterinarian; he was renowned for his gentleness and good humor. My friends’ dad was an auto mechanic; his father served as principal for the church school and supplied bottled honey to local stores.  A craftsman builder with huge hands did the remodeling on my mom’s kitchen, and helped me ride a bike. When pipes in our house froze one winter, we called the plumber from our church; my brothers and I watched him work. Another dad built cabins from logs he cut himself, and showed my brothers how his bear trap worked. One couple collaborated on art and publishing.

Women and men seemed to participate freely and equally in everything but direct preaching. Except for the elders being an all-male group, I was never aware of restrictions based on my gender. Many adults, including my parents, took turns teaching Bible lessons to the kids in the school classrooms that doubled as Sunday school rooms. I can still quote many of the Bible verses I first memorized there, amid the alphabet posters, stacks of math workbooks, and cabinets of craft supplies. My teachers gave me The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe as a prize, but Mom made me exchange it at the religious bookstore. By then, all fantasy, not just witches, was banned from our home. If my parents had heard of C. S. Lewis, they had certainly never read him.

My parents came to object to sensuality in the church. The church orchestra became more of a band, and this made my parents uncomfortable. They were more concerned about several of their friends’ marriages falling apart and about two divorcees from the church marrying each other. This upset my mom so much that we left that church and started attending a Friends meeting.


Part 2: In Which God and I Are Friends

Voiceless Women: Lives of the Wesley Sisters (Part 2)

The following are the stories of the lives of Susanna Wesley's seven daughters. For further reading, see Part 1, Voiceless Women: Susanna Wesley's Daughters.

Emilia, "Emily"

Emilia Wesley was a good scholar, talented and smart, well-read and capable. John, who became a university professor, said she was the best expert on Milton he ever heard.

Emilia was five or six when the family moved to Epworth. As the oldest sister, she was typically responsible and her parents depended on her; she lived at home well into her twenties. Emilia cared for her mother and baby Kezzy after the Fire, managed the parsonage when her mother was ill (with meager resources), tended the clock and locked up the house at night, took leave from her teaching job to nurse her married sister Sukey through an illness. She was fond of her mother, and had strong maternal feelings for John, who arrived when she was eleven. Though she was a dutiful daughter, she was also the most critical of her father, especially of his financial irresponsibility, describing the family’s circumstances as those of “intolerable want and affliction”.

She fell in love with one of John’s friends from his student days at Oxford. The romance lasted three years before her brother Sam apparently interfered, insisting that they break up. Emily was heartbroken. She coped by concluding that Leybourne had not really loved her and they would not have been happy together; however, she never really got over her disappointment.

Emily was nearing forty when she felt compelled to support herself and took a teaching job in London. However, her employer did not treat her well or compensate her properly. After corresponding with her brothers and receiving some encouragement and a loan, she gave her employer notice and started her own school in Gainsborough, which she operated until at least 1735. Back home, her mother missed her dependable companion considerably.

There was another romance in Emilia’s life, but her brother John meddled this time. His disapproval was partly because the man in question was a Quaker, though Emilia described him as “a faithful friend, a unique companion, and a keen lover”.

Emily was 44 when she eventually married Robert Harper, the Epworth apothecary, but she was even poorer with him than she had been with her father. Emilia even had to sell some of her clothes to buy food. Politically, they were strong opposites, which only added to the friction between them. They had a daughter, Tetty, but she apparently died in childhood.

Harper disappeared, leaving his wife penniless, after which Emilia (and her favorite maid, to whom she was much attached) was supported by her brothers, residing in London at the Preachers’ house adjoining a Methodist chapel. Towards the end of her life, dementia softened her memory and sweetened her temper.

Susanna “Sukey”

A good girl, a bit romantic, and very pretty. She and Hetty were very close. Disappointed regarding the prospect of financial aid from an uncle, Sukey impulsively married Richard Ellison, Esq. a local landowner who farmed his own estate. But though she bore him several children, their union was far from happy.

Richard was too “uncultivated” and “morose” for his strong, smart, and vivacious wife. He was also physically abusive, reportedly even when they lived with her parents while she was pregnant. Her mother described him as “little inferior to the apostate angels in wickedness” and blamed Uncle Matthew for Sukey’s throwing herself away on this man who was only a “plague” to her and an “affliction to the family”.

When the Ellison’s home was destroyed in a fire, Sukey called it quits. It must have stirred traumatic flashbacks from her childhood. Like her own family years before, the Ellisons separated to live with relations for a time. Sukey never lived with her husband again, but hid in London with her children, refusing to see Ellison or answer his letters. A master manipulator, he tried to flush her out of hiding by publishing a report of his death in the paper. She immediately went down to Lincolnshire to pay her last respects to the dead, but turned around when she encountered her living husband and realized the ruse.

The two were never reconciled; Sukey lived with her children, and accepted financial aid from her brother John. Ellison later found himself in financial straits after his land flooded, drowning his animals and ruining his crops, and cast himself on the mercy of his brothers-in-law, whom he found more inclined to generosity than was his wife.

Mary "Molly"

Molly was crippled by a childhood injury, thought to be due to her nurse’s carelessness. She was good-tempered, in spite of her disability. Hetty adored her. During the Rectory Fire, someone broke out the parlor window and threw her and Hetty out to safety.

One of Rev. Samuel Wesley’s former students, a John Romley, was given supervision of a charity pupil, John Whitelamb. Romley introduced Whitelamb to his former instructor, who then taught the studious boy Greek in a matter of months. Wesley warmed to Johnny Whitelamb, taking him into his home as his amanuensis and putting him to work designing and engraving plates for Dissertations on the Book of Job. Wesley then sponsored Johnny’s education at university, where John Wesley was by now a Fellow. Susanna called him “poor starveling Johnny”; he could not even afford a gown for his ordination. After his ordination, Rev. Sam Wesley made Johnny his curate in Wroote.

Molly and John Whitelamb were married in December, 1733. Molly died in childbirth within a year. The family rather forgot Johnny after that. Years later, after hearing John Wesley preach in his town, Whitelamb wrote to him and expressed how deeply he felt his debt to the entire Wesley family, how highly he esteemed them, and how he had felt ignored by

The cold shoulder may have been due in part to the Wesleys not knowing how to accept changes in Whitelamb’s religious views. Sometime after his ordination, and probably after the loss of his wife, Whitelamb’s faith was undermined by doubts and he became a deist. When John heard of Whitelamb’s passing in 1769, he said “O, why did he not die forty years ago, while he knew in whom he had believed!”

Mehetabel "Hetty" 

Smart, a poetic genius, educated in language, witty, funny, pretty, and popular with suitors. She was a favorite of her Uncle Matthew, neither of them being as religious as the rest of the Wesley family. It was she who roused the family the night of the Rectory Fire, a piece of the roof falling onto her bed and burning her feet. (Samuel Wesley had actually heard cries of “Fire” coming from the street, but ignored them, not realizing they meant his house!)

Her superior education suiting her well for teaching, Hetty went away to work as a governess. From there, her story reads like a Jane Austen novel. Through her employer, she met a young lawyer to whom she developed a strong attachment. Her father interfered, strongly opposing the match based on information which caused him to believe the gentleman was “unprincipled”. This did not dissuade Hetty, or her boyfriend.

At 27, Hetty attempted to elope, twice, apparently with the lawyer. The latter adventure involved her spending a night with her boyfriend, only to discover that he was not serious about marrying her. When she returned to her parents’ home several months pregnant, she was disgraced and her father forbid her to set foot in the house. He quickly married her off to a journeyman plumber, William Wright, in October of 1725. Only her sister Mary took her side and attempted to dissuade their father from forcing the match. Her sisters were not allowed to attend the wedding, two weeks after being bridesmaids at Nancy’s wedding.

Unwelcome at the rectory, Hetty stayed with her sisters when she visited from out of town and remained estranged her from her father for many years. When Susanna went to visit the Wrights at Anne’s place in Wroote a year later, she requested to speak to Hetty in private. Hetty was unenthusiastic and reserved. Susanna told her daughter she forgave Hetty’s offenses against her; Hetty failed to see how she was in need in her mother’s pardon, but kept her thoughts to herself. Her mother proposed a reconciliatory meeting with her father, but Hetty was not optimistic, foreseeing only more unbearable reproach (her mother thought a father’s rebuke ought not be called reproach, especially since he was a pastor and had a duty to call people out). Hetty repeated that she had no wish for reconciliation with her father and had no interest in ever seeing him again.

Susanna wrote to Hetty’s little brother John after the interview and said if Hetty were truly penitent, she would submit herself to her father. She pointed out to John that Sam did not “restrain” the other girls from spending time with Hetty as they pleased. John later wrote to their brother Sam that their parents and some of the sisters believed Hetty had faked penitence earlier. With this family scenario in mind, John had written a sermon for his parents’ benefit, attempting to explain that even if this were the case, Hetty still deserved to be treated with “some tenderness”.

Hetty tried running a school the next year, but after that failed, the mismatched couple moved to London. Hetty was extremely unhappy in her marriage, in her words “a living death”, and wished she could have given one of her eyes to her father to avoid being compelled to marry Wright. The pair were not equals in any way; he was uneducated, ill-tempered and inconsiderate while she was both brilliant and depressed. He was considered an honest workman in the town, but he spent his evenings away carousing, which wounded his wife. Their several children died young; Hetty believed this was due to her husband’s lead works, which also harmed his own health and probably Hetty’s, as well.

A brilliant, bitter and sometimes biting poet, Hetty had some of her work published in magazines. Other pieces she burned. She and her father eventually resumed correspondence. She also nursed her Uncle Matthew at the end of his life and he left her a generous bequest in his will.

Later in life, Hetty looked for solace in religion and told a neighbor she looked forward to death because “we, the Methodists, always die in transports of joy!”

In 1903, an English literature professor at Cambridge turned Hetty’s story into a historical novel.

Anne "Nancy"

Comparatively little is known about Anne. She was born around the time of the first rectory fire.

She married John Lambert, a land surveyor, shortly after Hetty’s abrupt marriage in 1725. They rented a red house not far from her family and made it “very pretty and comfortable”. Later, they moved to London. Despite John’s slight drinking problem and some financial challenges at times, Anne is thought to have had the happiest marriage of the Wesley sisters. No record remains of any Lambert children.

Martha "Patty", "Pat"

Her sisters and Charles believed she was Susanna’s favorite. Patty enjoyed her mother’s company and listening to her teach. She was calm and serious like her brother John, less playful and mischievous than the rest of her siblings, less inclined to the sharp satire on which they thrived. Patty was sensitive, compassionate, and shared her brother’s strong tendency toward self-denial.

Patty was living with her Uncle Matthew in London when she met Wesley Hall, an Anglican minister like her father and one of her brother’s students at Oxford, and they were secretly engaged. When he later visited Epworth with her brothers and met Kezzia, he was smitten and began openly courting her with the family’s blessing. They were engaged and nearly married before his conscience drove him to break up with Kezzy and return to Martha. Too embarrassed to confess the truth, he told the family God had given him a revelation that he was to marry Martha, not Kezzia. Loyal to their baby sister Kezzy, the Wesley brothers took Hall’s change of plans very badly and Charles even sent Patty a lengthy and nasty poem accusing her of incest (by taking her sister’s husband).

Patty eventually sent her mother a full account of the business, Susanna understood and said it was all fine if Uncle Matthew had given his permission, and Kezzy relinquished any claim on Mr. Hall. The Wesley brothers did not hear the whole story and nursed a grudge on Kezzy’s behalf for years afterward. When the tale was told, however, even Charles had to acknowledge that Patty was completely justified.

After the marriage, Kezzy moved in with Patty and Mr. Hall. It was there she met and was courted by a gentleman, but he died before they could be wed. Kezzy’s health was delicate, and she passed away, still living in her sister’s home, in 1741.

The Rev. Hall turned out to be, no surprise, fickle and shallow, a man of impulse rather than intellect, “one of the worst and most unkind of husbands”. He was inconsiderate, deceitful, violent and abusive. He had an affair with Patty’s seamstress, which Patty only discovered when the girl went into labor in their home. Patty ordered the servants to call a doctor, but they refused, under the circumstances. Patty ended up going herself for a midwife and paying for the girl’s care, before traveling to London to calmly confront her husband. Another time, Hall brought home an infant he had sired elsewhere and ordered Patty to care for it until he could arrange for another situation.

Patty bore Hall ten children, nine of which were buried as infants. Their only surviving child, his father’s namesake, died of smallpox at 14 years of age. By then, his uncles John and Charles were sponsoring his education and he was living away from home. His illness may have been exacerbated by the neglect of those at the house where he boarded. His mother was called, but did not arrive in time to say goodbye to her last son.

Many affairs later, Mr. Hall abandoned his wife and moved to Ireland “with one of his mistresses” and Patty never saw him again, though their marriage officially lasted forty years, until Hall’s death. Deserted by her husband, Patty was financially dependent on her brothers’ generosity. In later years, the talented and Patty was a favorite of Dr. Samuel Johnson and kept company with other literary figures in his circle.

It excited her surprise that women should dispute the authority which God gave the husband over the wife. "It is," said she, "so clearly expressed in Scripture, that one would suppose such wives had never read their Bible." But she allowed that this authority was only given after the fall, not before : but " the woman," said she, "who contests this authority should not marry."  

                                                                (Adam Clarke's Memoirs of the Wesley Family)

Kezzia "Kezzy"

Born a month after the Rectory Fire. Kezzy went with her eldest sister to work at Mrs. Taylor's school for a while. Her health was always fragile, however, and stress made her ill. She longed for more education, but was frustrated by lack of time (when she was working) or money (when living at home).

After her short-lived love affair with Wesley Hall, she forgave him and relinquished all claim on him to her sister Patty. Kezzy lived with Patty and Mr. Hall for five or six years until her death. Charles blamed Hall for her early death (he suspected a broken heart). Kezzia did have a boyfriend later on, but he died before they could marry.

Obsessive Confusion

I am reading through a journal I kept when I was fourteen. Some entries make me smile; others just make me shake my head. I have posted here about how isolated I was as a homeschooled adolescent, but some memories shock me even now. I'm glad my daughter will never be able to relate to my teenage self:

"You know, I’m kinda strange. It’s been over a year since I've talked directly and individually with a teenage guy, excepting the time I found out Greg S----’s name."

The result, of course, was that I obsessed for weeks anytime a boy at church smiled a greeting in the hall or said "good night" before heading to the parking lot.

I would go home and study passages about "holiness" and make lists of things I thought God wanted me to do to remain "pure", such as:

• keep my knees covered
• wear only necklaces with short chains
• wear sleeves to my elbows
• "use lace sparingly"

Then I would weep the next week because I saw a guy from the youth group wearing an earring. 

I was so lonely.

So confused.

And so obsessed with not acknowledging my sexuality, even to myself.

His Quiver Full of Them

Decades ago, I cross-stitched a scripture motto for my parents from Psalm 127, the favorite psalm of large families.

"Lo, children are a heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward."

The psalmist goes on to say: "As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them..."

The term "quiverfull" is now used as both a noun and an adjective to describe a theology and lifestyle that glorifies human fertility while maintaining that God will provide the resources to raise as many children as he allows a couple to conceive. Contraception is held to be "playing God" and a violation of the command to "Be fruitful and multiply". The ideal Quiverfull couple are always open to "more blessings", regardless of financial situation, health concerns, housing limitations, or needs of existing children. 

I'm not certain when my parents decided that contraception was immoral. As a high schooler, Mom was an advocate of zero population growth and intended to adopt rather than bear children. A few years later, she graduated from a strict Catholic nursing school and married my dad. I was born a year later, my brother two years after that, and so on for the next 20 years.

Mail would arrive periodically from the Couple to Couple League and my parents had a couple of books by Catholic authors John & Sheila Kippley explaining the practice of abstinence and/or breastfeeding as a means of birth control. Of course, even "natural family planning" sounded too much like the evil "Planned Parenthood" so it was usually referred to as "child spacing". Somewhere along the line my parents abandoned NFP (turns out it's not all that effective at preventing pregnancy!) and the babies began to come even closer together.

Certainly Mom was influenced by Mary Pride's 1985 book The Way Home, a story of the author's journey from feminism to what she calls "reality". Mary had just three young children when she wrote the book, in which she blasted away at contraception, lingerie, Marabel Morgan's The Total Woman, and even Christian schools. 

"All forms of sex that shy away from marital fruitfulness are perverted. Masturbation, homosexuality, lesbianism, bestiality, prostitution, adultery, and even deliberate marital barrenness--all are perverted."

"Since the word used for female is connected so strongly with the idea of nursing babies, whereas it has no connection at all with the idea of sexual activity, I believe that God is saying here that when women exchange their natural function of childbearing and motherliness for that which is 'against nature' [that is, trying to behave sexually like a man], the men tend to abandon the natural sexual use of the women and turn to homosexuality. When men stop seeing women as mothers, sex loses its sacredness. Sex becomes 'recreational', and therefore the drive begins to find new kicks."    (Mary Pride, The Way Home, 1985)

(Pride's position against family planning was more extreme than even the Catholic Couple-to-Couple League's, prompting a correspondence between her and John Kippley, president of CCLI, and leading Pride to grudgingly endorse NFP in some situations in her sequel to The Way Home.)

Pride went on to birth six more babies and became a powerful force in the new homeschooling movement. My mom used to share The Way Home with all her friends and donated it to church libraries when she could. (When she encouraged me to read it, I was confused. Especially by the story about the lady wearing saran-wrap. Sexually naive young women raised in patriarchal, homeschooling isolation were definitely not Pride's target audience.)

Mary Pride's views fit rather well with the teachings of Bill Gothard--a middle-aged bachelor who handed out plenty of sexual and parenting advice at his seminars and encouraged couples to have surgeries to reverse previous vasectomies and tubal ligations. One of Gothard's books informs us, "Labor in childbirth... was given to the woman for her spiritual benefit..." and points out that the God of the Old Testament "cursed several women by closing their wombs." Attendees of Gothard's conferences learned to associate infertility with God's judgement. A full quiver, on the other hand, was a sign of God's favor, a spiritual status symbol.

In 1990, a Nebraska couple published A Full Quiver: Family Planning and the Lordship of Christ. In this book, Rick and Jan Hess (homeschooling parents of ten) invite the reader to imagine a world where no one has ever had more than two or three siblings, effectively eliminating many historical figures. This exercise concludes with visualization of a future where enormous families are normal and God provides spacesuits for a missionary family moving their brood to evangelize a colony on the moon. My parents had this book, probably purchased at an IBLP seminar and still available on Gothard's website.

Then there was Nancy Campbell's occasional magazine for moms, Above Rubies. Nancy is a fierce promoter of anti-feminism from her compound in Tennessee. Her website includes multiple articles by women who felt guilt and regret over "the biggest mistake" of their life. After they repented, they went on to expand their families by four, five, six more babies. What mistake is reversed by more pregnancies? An abortion, perhaps? No, as it turns out, the biggest mistake of these women's lives was a tubal ligation. Nancy also sells a book, A Change of Heart, encouraging couples to have surgeries to reverse both vasectomies and tubal ligations.

Vickie Farris, whose husband Mike is president of the Home School Legal Defense Association, homeschooled their ten children and lived to write a book about it. She encourages other women to reject birth control methods and embrace motherhood. Quiverfull women like Farris, and Michelle Duggar of "Nineteen Kids and Counting", have built their lives on the mantra "God won't give anyone more than they can handle", sometimes phrased as "What God orders, he pays for".

My parents were opponents of both birth control and sterilization. They even encouraged some of their friends to have reversal surgeries, resulting in many more babies. My mom had eleven children over 24 years, including ten [unassisted home]births. Pregnancy was not easy for her--she often referred to herself with the phrase from St. Paul, "a living sacrifice". She spent most of my childhood breastfeeding, diapering, potty-training, and homeschooling on top of that. I understood that this was not culturally normal, but sought to convince myself that God was pleased with this self-sacrifice. I spent my teen years watching my mom's body swell and deflate, and changing thousands of diapers.

In my twenties, as I waited for my turn to become a wife and mother, I quietly ticked off how many children I could have in x years. I may have been ideologically persuaded that contraception was wrong, but I didn't want to spend twenty years lactating either. When I got impatient for God to bring me a husband (no boyfriends on the horizon), I consoled myself by guessing how many fewer children I would bear in a shorter window of fertile sexual activity.

Fortunately, when I did get married, my husband and I quickly began to realize that many aspects of Quiverfull thought and practice were contradictory to our values. Not before taking NFP classes from a Catholic certified trainer, though. When we got pregnant anyway, we were told the method worked fine--we'd just had sex when [it turned out!] we were actually fertile. Well, what do you know?

I think my relationship with the Quiverfull movement finally ended a few years ago as I was perched on the end of an exam table in my doctor's office. Looking up from my chart, she compassionately observed, "You've been raising kids for a long time," and I burst into unexpected tears.

These days, stories of ex-Quiverfull moms and their "quivering daughters" are multiplying on the Internet like rabbits in the spring. The fruit of the movement has not turned out to be sweet; we deal with health problems, poverty, anxiety, depression, PTSD, eating disorders, cutting, sexual abuse, emotional incest, and divorce. (You can read far more than you want to know at the Homeschoolers Anonymous blog.)

In spite of these firsthand horror stories, Quiverfull continues to enjoy wide support in America and is gaining traction in other nations. Earlier this year, the BBC reported on the movement's growth in the United Kingdom. You can listen to more, including scary-sounding clips from Nancy Campbell, here.

Meanwhile here in the States, Hobby Lobby and Catholic hospitals gnash their teeth over their employees' rights to use birth control. Texan teenagers are taught that contraceptives don't work. (The result? Texas has more than 10% of America's teen births.) And TLC continues to profit from shows like "Nineteen Kids and Counting", promoting Quiverfull ideology to some unsuspecting viewers. The show should include a disclaimer: For your own safety, don't try this at home.

Strange Stories of the Bible: Jephthah's Daughter

     And Jephthah vowed a vow unto the Lord, and said, If thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into mine hands,
     Then it shall be, that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.
     So Jephthah passed over unto the children of Ammon to fight against them; and the Lord delivered them into his hands.
     And he smote them from Aroer, even till thou come to Minnith, even twenty cities, and unto the plain of the vineyards, with a very great slaughter. Thus the children of Ammon were subdued before the children of Israel.
     And Jephthah came to Mizpeh unto his house, and, behold, his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances: and she was his only child; beside her he had neither son nor daughter.
     And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent his clothes, and said, Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of them that trouble me: for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and I cannot go back.
     And she said unto him, My father, if thou hast opened thy mouth unto the Lord, do to me according to that which hath proceeded out of thy mouth; forasmuch as the Lord hath taken vengeance for thee of thine enemies, even of the children of Ammon.
     And she said unto her father, Let this thing be done for me: let me alone two months, that I may go up and down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity, I and my fellows.
     And he said, Go. And he sent her away for two months: and she went with her companions, and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains.
     And it came to pass at the end of two months, that she returned unto her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed...

Judges 11:30-39

Engraving by John Opie, 1790

"The Bible and the church have been the greatest stumbling block in the way of women's emancipation." --Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Strange Stories of the Bible: Lot's Daughters

Before they had gone to bed, all the men from every part of the city of Sodom—both young and old—surrounded the house. They called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them.”

Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him and said, “No, my friends. Don’t do this wicked thing. Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don’t do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.”

*****

Lot and his two daughters left Zoar and settled in the mountains, for he was afraid to stay in Zoar. He and his two daughters lived in a cave. One day the older daughter said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is no man around here to give us children—as is the custom all over the earth. Let’s get our father to drink wine and then sleep with him and preserve our family line through our father.”

That night they got their father to drink wine, and the older daughter went in and slept with him. He was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.

The next day the older daughter said to the younger, “Last night I slept with my father. Let’s get him to drink wine again tonight, and you go in and sleep with him so we can preserve our family line through our father.” So they got their father to drink wine that night also, and the younger daughter went in and slept with him. Again he was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.

So both of Lot’s daughters became pregnant by their father. The older daughter had a son, and she named him Moab; he is the father of the Moabites of today. The younger daughter also had a son, and she named him Ben-Ammi; he is the father of the Ammonites* of today.

Genesis 19:4-8, 30-38 (New International Version)

The same Lot character shows up as a hero in the New Testament. One wonders what led the author to regard Lot as "righteous":

...[God] rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)...

2 Peter 2:7-8

7th-century Byzantine Christians built St. Lot's church and monastery at Lot's Cave, a site in modern Jordan.

"When women understand that governments and religions are human inventions; that Bibles, prayer-books, catechisms, and encyclical letters are all emanations from the brains of man, they will no longer be oppressed by the injunctions that come to them with the divine authority of 'Thus sayeth the Lord.'"
― Elizabeth Cady Stanton

*More on the Ammonites later.

Knives

KNIVES

by Jeri Lofland

One morning in the middle of my childhood, Mom sat my brother and me down in the living room and presented us with heirlooms from her parents, who had divorced when she was a teenager. For me, an orange topaz ring my grandfather had once given my grandmother. To me, it was the brownish birthstone for the month after my birthday, sized for an adult finger and rejected by its original owner. My brother got a pocketknife. 

In exchange, we promised our mother to pray for her birth parents every day, according to their specific needs. I diligently kept my promise. Every night for years and years I beseeched God to “please help Gramma stop smoking”. My brother prayed for Grand-Dad “to become a Christian”.

Though Grand-Dad had given my mom a New Testament when she was in high school, he also drank, which I suppose was evidence against the salvation of his soul. A worn and troubled woman, Gramma had been a smoker most of her life, though she quit for a year when I was born, and for various periods after that when she would gain weight instead. Grand-Dad died of brain cancer the same week I got my diamond engagement ring.  Gramma died of heart failure a few years later. When Mom told me the news, my first thought was: “Well, God finally answered. Gramma’s stopped smoking.”

I was never very attached to Gramma’s ring. Mom rarely wore any jewelry beyond her plain wedding band. She had a heart locket pendant that appeared on special occasions, but owned no other rings as far as I knew. Also, I had somehow picked up the idea that earth tones like browns and oranges were ugly: Mom dressed me more in pastel pinks and blues.  Besides, the topaz seemed tainted with uncomfortable memories of failed relationships.

The pocketknife, on the other hand, was useful. It even had tiny scissors. And of course, since it belonged to my brother, I could only use it with his permission. Some years later, both my brothers received knives as gifts from our paternal grandfather. Once again, the knife became a symbol of an imbalance of power.

In a burst of youthful resourcefulness as well as asceticism, I sold the topaz ring for a few dollars at a gold & silver store in town. I was disappointed it wasn’t worth more. Mom had stayed home with the babies that day and she said little about the transaction.

I traveled to Indianapolis to stay for a few weeks at a “training center” run by the religious cult our family was part of. I was there to study music but was also making new friends, and listening to my stomach growl between the two meals we were served each day. One of the girls I met was a petite yet spunky Alaskan extrovert with a knack for discovering people’s inner cravings. On my next birthday, I was surprised to receive a package from Alaska, containing an ivory-handled pocketknife on which my friend had engraved my name.  And so my knife collection began.

Having a knife tucked away in my pocket, my purse, or my desk gave me a feeling of strength and assertiveness. As forceful as my mom’s personality appeared in some settings, she absolutely hated strangers at her front door. Heck, she didn’t like having any male knock on our door: solicitors, deliverymen, proselytizers, police officers, or homeschooling friends. Even the UPS man made her nervous. So when a young salesman rapped on the screen door (the main door was open) one hot summer afternoon while she was slicing peaches, her response was unusually bold.

Striding down the humid hallway without putting down the fruit, she greeted the youth through the screen, paring knife in one hand, the dripping remains of a peach in the other. As he tripped over his tongue attempting to explain what it was he was selling, Mom relaxed, curiosity about his wares eventually overcoming caution. When she went back to the kitchen to put down the blade and wash her hands so she could examine the books, I remained at the door, sizing up the self-conscious salesman.  “I didn’t know what to think when she came to the door with a knife”, he admitted with a nervous laugh. She ended up buying a whole trio of reference books from the guy. The story became legendary in our family and I had a new respect for the lowly paring knife.

After delivering her tenth baby, my mother had a breakdown. She was likely suffering from post-partum depression, but I’d never heard of that. I only knew that I’d never seen her throw a water glass at Dad before. Ever distrustful of medical professionals and convinced that mental health issues had spiritual causes, she and Dad decided to seek counseling help at the Gothard cult’s (Institute in Basic Life Principles) campus in Indianapolis. I recall Mom sitting on her bed, rocking back and forth, while I packed a suitcase with clothes for her and things for the baby. I was a few months shy of twenty-one. My seventeen-year-old brother and I were left responsible for six siblings (aged 2-14) with no definite word when our parents would be back.

While my parents were praying with an elderly pastor in an old hotel building in Indiana, we had as much fun at home as possible. We borrowed old movies from the library—Friendly Persuasion; Mary, Queen of Scots; How Green Was My Valley; and Bambi—and entertained ourselves as best we could. Neighbors we didn’t know left boxes of ripe peaches on our porch and we turned them into pies and cobbler and ate them with ice cream. We had grown up with Laura Ingalls Wilder’s stories, so this was our chance to live the week in Farmer Boy when Almanzo’s parents leave the kids alone on the farm for a week. In addition to caring for all the children and keeping the household running, I studied for an upcoming exam.

We were quietly relieved when our parents returned after a week, externally calmer. But we were observant, watchful. Weeks later, several of us were in the kitchen when something triggered Mom again. She grabbed the largest kitchen knife, a long serrated blade, and shouted at my brother, “Why don’t you just stick this in my chest and twist it?!”

I froze. My memory has buried the details of that day, but I do remember that my brother and I were traumatized. The next time Mom delegated the chore of sharpening the knives, we were triggered, and frightened. Were the children in danger? Were we?

I was haunted by the most chilling story in the entire Little House on the Prairie series: a chapter called “Knife in the Dark”. Wilder describes boarding with a severely depressed woman who waves a knife at her husband during a nocturnal argument, scaring the daylights out of teenage Laura peeking through a gap in the curtain partition. If the story gave me goosebumps before, now it knotted my stomach.

Time passed. I kept stories about my great-grandparents. I discovered that I looked good in browns and earthy greens. I wished I still had Gramma’s ring.

I married and moved a thousand miles away. In the middle of an August night, a tiny baby girl surged her way out of my body in a powerful gush of water. For all my experience with newborns, I’d never held one so small. My husband stayed home with us for the first week as we adjusted to parenthood together. Then my mom spent a week helping out.

After Momma flew back to start a new school year with her own brood of little ones, I was consumed with anxiety. This helpless infant depended on me completely. I was her lifeline, the umbilical cord connecting her to her own future. I would be all alone with her now, every day. What if something happened to me? What if I choked on my lunch? What if I tripped on the stairs?

The kitchen knives worried me most. Every time I diced an onion or chopped a tomato, the knife seemed to threaten me, reminding me how vulnerable I was, how mortal. I was cautious, gripping the handle firmly, curling my fingertips carefully away from the blade. I always carried the knives to the sink slowly, point to the ground. I wondered how long I could go on this way. But as the weeks went by and my daughter grew and my hormones regulated, the anxiety diminished.

Cooking shows on PBS became one of my favorite relaxations. Low-key and engaging, they entertained me while I nursed the baby, cuddled a sick child, or put my feet up at naptime. Let others have their superheroes and action films—I love watching men who know their way around a kitchen!

Ever ready to expand my culinary creativity and technical expertise, I soaked up information about ingredients and tools from French, Asian, Cajun, Latin, and Italian chefs. But always when the cutting boards came out—oh, my! Be still, my beating heart! What speed! What finesse! The chopping scene was my favorite in Pixar’s animation Ratatouille. I dreamed of having a superpower: the ability to slice and dice effortlessly, evenly, and safely.

I practiced my technique every time I made dinner. On date nights I would drag my husband through the kitchen stores so I could handle the knives and compare the balanced feel of their handles in my palm. I read up on the advantages of German steel, Japanese blade angles, hollow-ground indentations, and sharpeners. Not only was I proud of my kitchen skills; I was extremely fond of the cutlery that made it all look easy.

After my other grandmother died, I began having panic attacks with chest pains. I found a therapist and started counseling. I regained my balance and made changes to my thinking, my relationships, my parenting. My personal knife collection was forgotten in the back of a closet shelf, but I remembered my girlhood feelings of impotence. When I presented my daughter with her own multi-tool with knife blade for her birthday, I took vicarious delight in her pride.

Then came another triggering experience, an imbalance of power that brought traumatic old memories to the surface. Though I was in no danger, I felt trapped, weak, mousy and afraid. More distressingly, I was in pain and short of breath and my heart was racing, so I sought professional medical help. The anti-depressant my doctor prescribed to relieve my anxiety only made it worse: a dirty spot in the bathtub looked like drops of blood. Even the Pixar titles seemed too scary to watch. Suddenly I couldn’t walk into my kitchen without shivering at the thought of the knife block on the counter. Never mind superpowers, I thought. I just want to function without fear.

The effects of the drug wore off, but I was still anxious. And so began a new journey of courage.

     Of finding my own strength.

     Of allowing my mind to think freely without fear of abuse or shame.

     Of building new relationships based on individuality and mutual acceptance.

     Of challenging the culture of patriarchy and reprogramming my brain about acceptable boundaries.

     Of speaking for my silent self, empowering my helpless self, learning to be kind to my too-often critical self.

My strength does not derive from objects sharp or shiny. I gain nothing when I defend my own pain by pointing daggers at others, or at myself. I find my confidence, as well as my compassion, deep inside, in the recognition that my worth is equal to that of any human being on the planet.

When I am afraid:

                           of disappointing someone,

                                of my inner self being found out and rejected,

                                     of not being strong enough,

…neither the sweetest of blades nor the most cunning miniature scissors are of any use at all. Instead of slashing or separating, I need bonding. I need friends who infuse me with courage when they draw me into their hearts for myself, our connection based not on our achievements, but on our being, right now. Mutual respect is a beautiful thing, with no strings attached.

It turns out the Little House on the Prairie lifestyle holds little appeal for my children. Why would any family want to live independently and reliant solely on their own resources—far from stores and schools, helpful neighbors, and supportive family? All of us learn from and lean on so many others: teachers, counselors, neighbors, friends, other family members. Together this wider community forms our safety net. And as I practice better self-care, I no longer expect to be my children’s lifeline. Instead, I teach them to reach out and speak up when they need help.

But on some shaky days I still gauge my progress by how I feel when I glance at my kitchen knives. 

Are they friend or foe? Am I meat, or maven? 

Strange Stories of the Bible: The Levite's Concubine

    ...So he took [the Levite] into his house and fed his donkeys. After they had washed their feet, they had something to eat and drink.
    While they were enjoying themselves, some of the wicked men of the city surrounded the house. Pounding on the door, they shouted to the old man who owned the house, “Bring out the man who came to your house so we can have sex with him.”
    The owner of the house went outside and said to them, “No, my friends, don’t be so vile. Since this man is my guest, don’t do this outrageous thing. Look, here is my virgin daughter, and his concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But as for this man, don’t do such an outrageous thing.”
    But the men would not listen to him. So the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go. At daybreak the woman went back to the house where her master was staying, fell down at the door and lay there until daylight.
    When her master got up in the morning and opened the door of the house and stepped out to continue on his way, there lay his concubine, fallen in the doorway of the house, with her hands on the threshold. He said to her, “Get up; let’s go.” But there was no answer. Then the man put her on his donkey and set out for home.
    When he reached home, he took a knife and cut up his concubine, limb by limb, into twelve parts and sent them into all the areas of Israel.  

Judges 19:21-29

"Come, come, my conservative friend, wipe the dew off your spectacles, and see that the world is moving. Whatever your views may be...your political and social degradation are but an outgrowth of your status in the Bible...Whatever the Bible may be made to do in Hebrew or Greek, in plain English it does not exalt and dignify woman."    

--Elizabeth Cady Stanton in the introduction to The Woman's Bible (1898)

The Rights of Women

Quick history review:

One hundred years ago, women in America were still marching for the right to vote.

An American suffrage event in 1913

Jeanette Rankin, the lonely female voice in Congress in 1917, was proud to vote for woman's suffrage. Her male colleagues finally approved women's voting rights in 1920, ratifying the Nineteenth Amendment more than forty years after Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton first drafted it. Men in Switzerland did not approve federal female suffrage till 1971.

Much more recently, married women in Wichita still needed their husband's permission to get a library card and women in Memphis could only get a library card in their husband's name.

In the 1980's, I grew up in a religious cult that did not permit women to wear pants (lest they cause a man to lust after them and rape them). Contraception was also considered immoral, so my mother had 15 pregnancies: 4 miscarriages, 11 births. When I realized (just a few years ago!) that women actually have equal rights with men, I was amazed. And then I discovered that those rights are under attack right here in heartland.

For example, our governor and some of our male state legislators are continually eroding, in the name of religion, the rights of Kansas women to not be pregnant. If women were making these rules, that affect only women after all, maybe I would feel differently. But these men were born with the right to never be pregnant. Why would they insist that a woman grow another human inside her body against her will?

My daughters need to know they can be whatever they want to be. That motherhood is their choice--even if they are victims of sexual violence. Even if they are minors. Even if their birth control fails. Even if they are ignorant or irresponsible. Even if they don't discover they are pregnant until 8 weeks later. And if they choose to exercise their constitutional right to an abortion, they should not have to fight a state-mandated obstacle course of shame, fear and lies. 

Men, especially religious men, have a long history of telling women how God intended women's bodies to be used:

For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another...
--St. Paul (Romans 1:26-27)

You really wrote that, Paul? "The natural use of the woman"? Oh, God. Got that straight from Him, did you? You'll be glad to know the church in Rome took it seriously. In fact, they've spread the good news all over the globe--letting it be known that the only morally acceptable place for a male orgasm is inside a woman's vagina. Yep. Thanks, Paul.

Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.
--St. Paul (I Corinthians 11:9)

Of course. What was I thinking?

But others drink potions to ensure sterility and are guilty of murdering a human being not yet conceived.
--St. Jerome (Letter 22, to Eustochium 13)

How the heck? I don't think that word means what you think it means.

Therefore, women do wrong when they seek to have children by means of evil drugs. They sin still more grievously when they kill the children who are already conceived or born, and when by taking impious drugs to prevent conception they condemn in themselves the nature which God wanted to be fruitful. Let them not doubt that they have committed as many murders as the number of the children they might have begotten.
--St. Caesarius of Arles (Sermon 51, 4; CC 103, 229)

Inconceivable!

By that primitive name [Eve], says he, He showed for what labor the woman had been provided; and He said accordingly, "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth." Now, who among ourselves denies that the woman was provided for the work of child-bearing by the Lord God, the beneficent Creator of all good?
--St. Augustine (On Marriage and Concupiscence, Book II, Chapter 12)

 I guess no one else is going to do it...

...We see how weak and sickly barren women are. Those who are fruitful, however, are healthier, cleanlier, and happier. And even if they bear themselves weary—or ultimately bear themselves out—that does not hurt. Let them bear themselves out. This is the purpose for which they exist. It is better to have a brief life with good health than a long life in ill health.
--Martin Luther (The Estate of Marriage, LW 45)

I've seen such women. It is a heartbreaking sight.

Woman is more guilty than man, because she was seduced by Satan, and so diverted her husband from obedience to God that she was an instrument of death leading to all perdition. It is necessary that woman recognize this, and that she learn to what she is subjected; and not only against her husband. This is reason enough why today she is placed below and that she bears within her ignominy and shame.
--John Calvin (author of Institutes of the Christian Religion, cited by Brown in An Apology to Women)

So glad I don't live in Calvin's Geneva.

Woman in her greatest perfection was made to serve and obey man, not to rule and command him. After the fall, she was made subject to man by the irrevocable sentence of God. In which sentence there are two parts.
    (a) A dolor, anguish and pain as oft as ever she shall be a mother.
    (b) A subjection of her self, her appetites and will to her husband and his will.
From the former part of this malediction can neither art, nobility, policy nor law made by man deliver women: but, alas, ignorance of God, ambition and tyranny have studied to abolish and destroy the second part of God's punishment.
--John Knox (First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women)

And so it goes on. From Calvin and Knox to Doug Phillips and Jim Bob Duggar. Let the women kill fleas!

Sisters, we have come far. Occasionally with the support of religious groups, more often without. Our daughters are watching us to determine their own value. For their sake, let's not give up any of our hard-won progress now.

Women's Fashions Responsible for Crime & Hellfire

Today's Christian rape culture is nothing new.

From Clement of Alexandria ("By no means are women to be allowed to uncover and exhibit any part of their bodies, lest both fall – the men by being incited to look, and the women by attracting to themselves the eyes of men") to the infamous Modesty Survey, religious men have always been good at making women anxious about their appearance.

Digging through an old folder last week, I came across this gem of a tract. Years ago, articles like this one were an encouragement to me to keep dressing the way I was told to.

Alas, there is no date on the pamphlet, but I'm figuring the article had to be written about a hundred years ago. I've posted the full text below with my favorite parts highlighted.

Are We Dragging Men to Hell By Our Modern Dress? 

The old sign of the harlot's den was a red light by night, and women sitting in front by day showing their legs. The Bible says to Christians:

"In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with broided hair or gold or pearls or costly array." I Timothy 2:9

A preacher said, "Only yesterday my manhood was insulted. Across from and facing me on a street car sat a 'something' -- a female picking her teeth. Her dress was above her knees with no effort to keep them together. Horrors! What are we coming to when a clean man must cover his face with a paper or turn his head the other way to keep from seeing entirely too much? It seems that many of these she animals have lost all modesty and are out for sale, offering all that is left -- just leg! legs!! legs!!!"

A good lady said, "These knee-length dresses are not modest. The Holy Spirit showed me that at least half of the calf of the leg should be covered."

Hear what Dr. [Perry] Lichtenstein, Physician of Tombs Prison in New York City, who is able to speak authoritatively on the causes of crime, says: (He has seen, in 12 years, 170,000 prisoners pass over the 'Bridge of Sighs', and he ought to know.) "The so called crimes of passion are increasing alarmingly, and will continue to do so in my opinion until the principal cause is eliminated. This, it seems to me, is the present style of dress which, to say the least, is immodest. Rolled stockings and similar styles have a direct bearing on crime incitation no matter how innocent the wearer may be." It is safe to say that there would be much less crime today, far fewer homes whose happiness has been blasted forever by unfaithfulness, fewer divorce trials, less violations of maidenly honor, if everyone of these underworld styles could be thrown into the deepest Hell.

Dr. [Thomas De Witt] Talmadge said, "Thousands of men are in Hell, whose eternal damnation is due to the improper dress of women."

In a neighboring town lives a boy who was graduated from the State University with the highest honors. Later he had a fine position but acquired a venereal disease, went insane, and now is in the insane asylum part of the time--all because of lust. 

Low necks, short dresses scarcely to the knees, bare arms, painted faces--in a word--everything to arouse passion and lust is the order of the day.

"Everybody does it!" I know--but do you belong to the 'everybodies' or are you a pilgrim?
I went to Bible school, and one day the teacher had a special meeting of the girls and told them if they would let the Lord talk to them, they would lengthen their dresses. When the school had a social gathering, one boy left the party when the girls were playing games, etc. He could see too much, he said.

When women come with knee length dresses, and stoop to pick up apples, I think the men can see more that it is the Lord's will for them to see.

I would rather wear my dresses a longer length and please the Lord, than to try to please a hard-to-please fickle world. We surely will never send men to Hell by wearing longer dresses.

D.L. Moody in his book, Prevailing Prayer, said, "Why is it that many of our children are going down to a dishonored grave? Many Godly parents find that their children are going astray. Does it arise from some secret sin clinging around the heart? I sometimes tremble when I hear people quote promises, and say that God is bound to fulfill those promises to them, when all the time there is something in their own lives which they are not willing to give up. It is well to search our hearts and find out why our prayers are not answered."

One saintly woman, who wore rather long dresses, said, when she put on a shorter dress, the Lord would not hear her prayers.

John Wesley said gay and costly apparel tends to influence lust.

During the first hundred years of her ministry, Methodism was the greatest power for righteousness of any movement since Pentecost. In those days of her glory, Methodism always insisted upon plainness of attire.

We may say if we wear our dresses a longer length we will look differently. What does Charles Finney (one of the most God-used evangelists of the all time) say? "I will confess that I was formerly myself in error. I believed the best way for Christians to pursue was to dress so as not to be noticed: to follow the fashions so as not to appear singular. But I have seen my error and now wonder greatly at my former blindness. It is your duty to dress so plain as to show the world that you place no sort of reliance in things of fashion.

If you wear immodest clothing that offers a suggestive appeal to sex, and stimulates those baser impulses which slumber in the human breast, do you think the Lord is so likely to protect your girl and boy in the wave of immorality among youth and others?

Preachers, if you think these knee length dresses are not modest, and it is a sin for women to wear them, will you be faithful to the Lord to warn them? Can you expect the Lord to put a hedge around yours sons and daughters, and keep them moral in this immoral world, if you do not?

I am trusting the Lord to keep my three sons pure. Can the Lord protect young people? I know He can; because He has kept mine moral. I couldn't commit adultery if you would give me the whole world; neither can I get mixed up in an affair with some other woman's husband (which is so common these days). If He can keep me moral, He can keep your son and daughter moral. The power of the Devil is great; but, praise God, the Lord has more power.

I don't want Jesus to say to me some day, "By the exposure of your flesh you have dragged men to Hell." Do you?

--Mrs. Dewitt Smith   (Reprinted by the Pilgrim Tract Society, Randleman, North Carolina)

Inciting crime in Moscow, ID in 1922

It all reminds me of Corrie ten Boom's dour and outspoken aunt: "To Tante Jans, the clothes in fashion when she was young represented God’s final say on human apparel; all change since then came from the stylebook of the devil. Indeed, one of her best-known pamphlets exposed him as the inventor of the mutton sleeve and the bicycle skirt" (from The Hiding Place). 

And I used to long for leg-of-mutton sleeves!