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The Religion Report: 9 March 2005 - Carol Christ
[This is the print version of story
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]
Dr Patricia Brennan on the banning of Feminist theologian Carol Christ
David Rutledge: Welcome to the program.
This week we're talking with two distinguished
international guests, one of whom is the American
author and Kabbalah scholar, Rabbi David Cooper,
and we'll be hearing from him a little later in
the program.
The other guest is a pioneer in the study of
women and religion. Her name is Dr Carol Christ;
she's originally from the US, having taught at
Harvard Divinity School and Columbia University.
But these days she lives in Greece, where she's
Director of the Ariadne Institute for Myth and
Ritual. Carol Christ's first book Womanspirit
Rising , was a key text in the emerging field of
feminist theology in the late 1970s, and since
then she's been a leading writer and teacher on
ancient traditions of goddess religion.
And if you thought that feminist theology in the
21st century had lost its power to confront, then
you'd be sadly mistaken. Carol Christ was
scheduled to give a lecture this Saturday evening
in Sydney, at Santa Sabina College in
Strathfield, that's run by the Dominican Sisters.
But it turns out that she was too hot to handle.
Early this week, the College was contacted by the
Catholic Auxiliary Bishop of Sydney, Julian
Porteous. He'd been asked by Cardinal George Pell
to inquire into the nature of the lecture being
given at Santa Sabina. A statement released by
the Bishop said that 'following an enquiry from
myself on behalf of the Archdiocese, the
Dominican Sisters decided it would be
inappropriate for a talking promoting Goddess
worship and Pagan spiritualities ... to be held
in a Catholic venue.' The Dominican Sisters were
unavailable for comment, and Cardinal Pell is
currently in Rome.
The organisers of the event then approached
Meriden School, an Anglican girls' school, also
in Strathfield. Meriden were afraid that the
school might be seen to be endorsing the
unorthodox views of Dr Christ, and so they
declined. Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Dr Peter
Jensen, has reportedly said that he stands by the
school's decision.
And Carol Christ will now be speaking at the
Uniting Church in Strathfield on Saturday evening.
We'll be talking with Carol Christ in a few
moments, but first, Dr Patricia Brennan is
National Convenor of the Australian Feminist
Theology Foundation, one of the bodies that
invited Carol Christ to Australia. And Patricia
Brennan is talking with Noel Debien.
Patricia Brennan: To our great surprise at the
eleventh hour, we've had a venue denied us
because it's Catholic property, and Christian
ideas are not Catholic property, and we were
rather hoping that they'd be able to get out from
that venue.
Noel Debien: Can I ask what is at stake here?
Patricia Brennan: I guess the question is whether
it's control of property or whether it's control
of ideas, and the church has a mechanism for
controlling ideas when it actually doesn't let
you speak.
So the silencing of women is nothing new; the
silencing of any creative theologian isn't new,
but we're a bit surprised because this was not a
matter of wide interest in 2005, the days of
creative interest by a groundswell of feminism
are really over, like all prophetic movements,
they come, they go.
Noel Debien: Yet there is precedent for the
Dominican Sisters sponsoring this type of event,
isn't there?
Patricia Brennan: Elizabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza
who's probably a noted feminist theologian, I
think she'll go down in history as having made a
difference to orthodox theology in the end, she
spoke at Santa Sabina in
1989 to a very large meeting, and that launched
the Australian Feminist Theology Foundation,
which is really a combination of all the reform
groups: Catholics, Anglicans, Uniting Church and
women who are outside the church.
Noel Debien: Well I'm interested that you talk in
that interdenominational way too, because in a
sense, Carol Christ herself is beyond
denomination now.
Patricia Brennan: Yes, but theologians are
usually beyond something, aren't they? I mean
their job is to think; there's always a cutting
edge to every traditional form of knowledge, and
theologians are the ones who have a job to do.
They're supposed to re-think things. They always
have, they've always been controversial. If
they're not controversial, I don't mean for the
sake of being controversial, if they're not
pushing boundaries of how people understand God,
but most of all of how that understanding affects
the way they treat each other, then they're not a
lot of use.
Noel Debien: I'm interested to ask though, there
is a real sense of surprise among some of the
women I've spoken to; where is that surprise
coming from, given that we know the Cardinal's
views on theology and church order?
Patricia Brennan: I didn't think that it would
matter enough to stop that. After all, it wasn't
going to be to thousands of people. It certainly
is critical of orthodoxy, but surely every bishop
throughout history knows that you to have
theologians is to invite them to criticise
orthodoxy. I think it's because it's a woman, I
think that probably the greatest challenge to
orthodoxy in the last few decades I have no
doubt, has been women coming to an understanding
that their experience of God is profoundly
affected if their concept of God is male. And I
think women, and men too, who think about it,
connect what God is like to what people are like,
and what they think they can do to each other.
And I think nobody would deny that there's a
horrible lot of abuse going on in terms of the
bodies of women, and I think they relate that to
hierarchy and power over other people. So I think
it will go down that feminist theology genuinely
impacted orthodoxy in the 20th century.
Noel Debien: What would Carol Christ have raised
with the women and the men who would have
attended the lectures in Santa Sabina?
Patricia Brennan: I like to think that would
be... much. But at least it will be in connection
with Mary Daley, who was a foundation feminist
theologian, where she will say 'If male is God,
God is male', and I think that George Pell has
just shown that that is still a good thesis.
If you have power over thinking, and you're male,
then that's acceptable, especially if it's over
the thinking of dissident women. She talks about
the unrelatedness of the orthodox God to human
experience.
She talks of the immortality as a career after
death as problematic. So she tackles a lot of
things that are accepted thinking about God.
Noel Debien: This whole area of goddess
exploration is not mainstream, not net anyway.
It's not widely known in the streets; when you
begin to talk about the whole idea of the goddess
and its place within religion.
Patricia Brennan: Yes, but one would have to say
that religion isn't widely known in the streets
at the moment. There's a terrible disenchantment
in a secular society that says Only those who are
part of the flock. I think the tradition that's
worshipped Mary as the Mother of God, and where
there are whole orders, that absolutely obsess
over this wholly-removed woman who was virginal
and perfect, there's a lot going on about
gendering God in that. And so I think that's
where it's more offensive. I think that the
Catholic tradition thinks it's looked after
femininity, but actually what relevance has a
virginal mother to the average woman struggling
to survive at the moment? Not much, I'd say.
David Rutledge: Patricia Brennan of the
Australian Feminist Theology Foundation, talking
there with Noel Debien.
So why has Carol Christ been deemed theologically
inappropriate to appear on Catholic or Anglican
property? Well her work stems from the conviction
that the world's great religions have relied on
the subordination of women, and so for 30 years
she's been exploring ancient goddess traditions,
and looking for ways in which to re-imagine
divine power in ways that redress the age-old
gender imbalance.
Carol Christ's recent work has been influenced by
what's called process philosophy , which concerns
itself with change in the world, creation in
constant transformation, rather than fixed
eternal laws.
The 20th century's most influence process
philosopher was the American Charles Hartshorne,
who died in 2000, and he was famous for his list
of six theological mistakes that he felt had been
made by classical theology. These mistakes
included the idea of God as perfect and
unchangeable; and the possibility that there
could ever be an infallible revelation. These
ideas are all developed at length in Carol
Christ's latest book 'She Who Changes', and so
maybe it's not particularly surprising that
certain elements in the established churches
would rather she took her business elsewhere.
Anyway, let's hear from Carol Christ; she's on the line from Brisbane.
Carol Christ: Some people think that when we
begin to imagine God as "she" simple sex-change
operation on the divine power, or as Rita Gross
once put it, "Yaweh in a skirt". But in my book I
talk about the fact that I believe the divine
power in the larger sense is inclusive of all of
male, female, and any genders in between, of
animals, plants, cells, atoms, particles of
atoms. So in the larger sense the divine power
can be imaged in many, many different ways. The
importance of imaging the divine as "she" is
really a western problem. At this point in time
where we have several thousand years of
exclusively or predominantly male imagery for
God, and I think the picture that almost everyone
in our culture has in their minds when they hear
the word 'God', is an old man with a long white
beard. Now they may quickly said "I didn't really
think God is like that", but I think that image
comes to mind for almost all of us, and it's very
important to shatter that image, and the only way
we can shatter that image I believe, is by
affirming images of the divine as female.
David Rutledge: Doesn't that bring a particular
set of problems for women though? You often hear
it argued that goddess theology establishes a
whole new set of fundamental characteristics for
women that could be as oppressive as the old
patriarchal stereotype. So what does goddess
theology have to offer to women for example, who
say "Well I'm not particularly nurturing", or
"I'm not a very earth-centred person, I'm
actually very rational and abstract".
Carol Christ: I don't think that goddess
spirituality has ever denied the rational
capacities of women. If you like at ancient
goddess traditions, it's always been understood
that goddesses in the past have been attributed
with inventing writing, poetry, music and so on,
so it's not simply a body thing, but it is a
holistic spirituality. Now if anyone - female or
male - says I'm not particularly earth-centred,
what goddess spirituality has to offer them I
think is a way of becoming more earth-centred. I
think that we are creatures of this earth, and if
we're not earth-centred I believe that we're
alienated from our true place in the world. And
one of the reasons that I found process
philosophy to be useful in this matter is that
it's a philosophy that's addressed both men and
women, stating that the highest power in the
universe is the power of sympathy. You could call
that nurturing if you wanted to, but this is not
a capacity that's only for women, it's for both
women and men.
David Rutledge: Well tell me more about process
philosophy, because as you've said, this is
fundamental to your new book, particularly the
work of Charles Hartshorne. How do the ideas of
this philosopher inform your own work?
Carol Christ: Yes, well again getting back to the
title of the book 'She Who Changes', process
philosophy is a philosophy that affirms changing
lives, and for me that often means "life in the
body" and the finitude of life on earth. In
contrast to philosophies rooted in the platonic
tradition, which see change as negative, that is,
the divine power is something that doesn't
change; a consistent human being is someone who
doesn't change, and so on. And I think that in
affirming change is a major departure from much
of Western philosophy and theology, and I think
it has very important consequences for women,
because in Western philosophy, women have been
identified with the changing body and the
changing body in nature have been viewed as less
than the immortal realm of God and the rational
mind of men. As I say in my book, I believe
process philosophy pulls the rug out from under
that whole way of thinking.
David Rutledge: In your book, you quote the six
theological mistakes identified by Charles
Hartshorne, one of which says that it's a
theological mistake to imagine that there can
ever be an infallible revelation. And that cuts
right to the heart of traditional Christian
theology, doesn't it?
Carol Christ: Yes. Again, beginning from change.
Life is always changing. We are also fragments of
a much larger whole, and so that any position we
have on truth is always going to be in a process
open to change, open to correction, so we can
affirm that there has been revelations - and I
think there have been many in human history - all
of those are partial and fragmentary, and none of
them are infallible.
David Rutledge: So the implication there is that
God is constrained by the limited development of
human consciousness and human culture.
Carol Christ: God is constrained?
David Rutledge: Mmm.
Carol Christ: We are constrained.
David Rutledge: We are constrained, or God in the world, God through us.
Carol Christ: God or Goddess is not constrained
by our limitations, but on the other hand from a
process point of view, the divine power is fully
involved in the changing world, and in that sense
it's different from our traditional notion of
omnipotence.
David Rutledge: You also echo Hartshorne's
criticism of the idea of immortality as a "career
after death". What concept of immortality are you
working with, or do you reject it out of hand?
Carol Christ: Hartshorne believed that
immortality was a legacy of dualistic thinking in
which the immortal is viewed as higher and better
than that which is finite and changing, and he
believed that when we focused on life after
death, we were devaluing this life and perhaps
lessening our moral commitments to change things
within the world that we find ourselves. So I
tend to agree with him that immortality as a
focus in religion, removes us from this world
which is our true home, and from our moral
responsibilities within this world. And if we
think of ourselves as being involved in a cosmic
process of birth, death and regeneration, I don't
see a problem with all life being finite,
including my own.
David Rutledge: Carol, if we look at what seems
to be a rising tide of conservatism in the West,
if we look at even the events that have
surrounded your appearance or perhaps
non-appearance in Sydney this week, do you
sometimes feel that a voice such as your own is
maybe more marginalised from the mainstream than
ever right now?
Carol Christ: Well I think we're involved, I
don't know, in America we're involved in -
actually a great divide. I think we have a
growing number of people who are embracing
diversity; who care about the earth; who care
about other people within this life in a way that
I've been talking about here from a process point
of view. And then we have another half of the
population that's looking for some type of
authoritative answers. What I see happening is
actually a sharpening of the divisions rather
than a marginalisation of the other side. So I
mean, in a way, I've never been denied a venue by
the Catholic church before, and on the one hand I
was kind of surprised, on the other hand I was
kind of delighted, because to me it showed that
the Catholic church is afraid of me. But that
doesn't mean I'm marginalised, that means I
actually have something to say that they're
afraid might convince people if they heard it. It
might be attractive.
David Rutledge: Author and theologian, Carol
Christ. And Carol Christ will be appearing at the
Uniting Church in Carrington Street, Strathfield
in Sydney this Saturday evening at 7 o'clock.
She'll also be speaking in Canberra, Melbourne,
Adelaide and Tasmania. Full details on our Web
site.
Guests on this program:
Patricia Brennan
National Convenor, The Australian Feminist Theology Foundation
Carol Christ
Author and Director of the Ariadne Institute for
the Study of Myth and Ritual, Greece
Publications:
She Who Changes: Re-imagining the Divine in the World
Author: Carol Christ
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan (New York 2003)
Further information:
Carol Christ Public Lectures
Saturday 12th March at 7.00 pm (Sydney) Lecture;
Strathfield Uniting Church, 16 Carrington Ave,
Strathfield, Sydney.
Monday 14th March at 7.45 pm (Canberra) Lecture;
St James Church Centre, 40 Gillies Street, Curtin.
Wednesday 16th March at 7.45 pm (Melbourne), Evan
Burge Lecture; Evan Burge Building, Trinity
College, Royal Parade, Parkville, Melbourne
Saturday 19th March, 10.00am - 3.30pm (Adelaide)
Lecture; Table-Talk and Plenary Session;
RitualSophia, 225 Cross Rd, Cumberland Park,
Adelaide
5041
Tuesday 22nd March at 3.30pm (Golden Valley,
Tasmania) Lecture, meal and workshop;
Mountainside, Golden Valley, Tasmania. Details 03
6369 5226
Wednesday 23rd March at 7pm (Launceston,
Tasmania) Public lecture; level 1, 93 York St,
Launceston Tas. Details 03 6327 3997.
© 2005 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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