\u00a0<\/p>\n
That doesn\u2019t make it easy to explain, though Lord knows I\u2019ll try.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
It\u2019s no secret that I\u2019m feeling a little disenfranchised from Capital-E Evangelicalism (heretofore to be known as The Big E). As a progressive Christian, I\u2019ve always felt a little like a triangle trying to force herself into a nice, softly-rounded circle anyway \u2014 all my sharp, pointy edges poking at the sides of propriety, bursting bubbles, crossing boundaries, eliciting behind-my-back eye rolls (yeah, I saw you).<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve finally acknowledged that I hold a deep, painful hurt in my soul, and it is borne of my womanhood. It started with a small story in Judges 19. There, in those lines, a group of men come to a house and want to have sex with a male guest. The host, horrified by all that homosexuality, instead offered his own daughter and the concubine of the guest he was protecting. (For the record, I hate the word \u201cconcubine\u201d.\u00a0She was a person<\/em>.) Eventually, they push the concubine outside and slam the door, leaving her defenseless against the gang of hell raisers.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n They raped her to death.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n For days after I read that tiny little scripture \u2014 one that, understandably, is not often preached from a pulpit \u2014 I couldn\u2019t get that unnamed woman out of my head. She haunted me. She haunts me still. According to the scripture, the men raped her all night long, letting her go just before dawn. She went back to the house, collapsing on the threshold. Judges 19:27 says, \u201cIt was morning. Her master got up and opened the door to continue his journey. There she was, his concubine, crumpled in a heap at the door, her hands on the threshold.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The image of her hands reaching for a door that remained closed to her is one that haunts me still. In a sick and twisted sense of false righteousness \u2014 and my guess is it had more to do with destruction of property than with actual humanitarian compassion or even a fear of God \u2014 the man chops her up into a bunch of tiny pieces and sends them to all the tribes of Israel, to demonstrate their<\/em> wretchedness. In a striking sense of irony that scarily resembles today\u2019s infuriating headlines, this guy has the nerve to act offended. Classic.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n But all I can see is her hands, reaching for a door that\u2019s been shut to her. In many ways, this unnamed woman represents women in Big E Christianity everywhere \u2014 those of us who have been pushed out, kept out, shut out of the safe spaces, the places where we can be fully human, and something other than someone else\u2019s belonging.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Don\u2019t be confused. I don\u2019t blame God for this disgusting betrayal. I blame patriarchy. \u00a0And regardless of what many complementarians may say, patriarchy is a wholly human construct.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s been going on, in one form or another, for ages. Our stories are barely told in the Bible, because someone considered them unimportant. We often go unnamed. When we are named, and bold enough to make an impact, our names have been changed to the masculine form, or a translation has altered the original meaning to make our impact less important. Take Junia, a woman called out as a noted apostle by Paul, whose name was changed to make it seem as if she was a man. It\u2019s important to note that this was only corrected in the NIV as recently as 2011<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n We are still fighting this battle.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Recently, I had the incredible pleasure of meeting Sarah Bessey<\/a>, author of Jesus Feminist<\/em>, and hearing her speak. She said that men (and some women) will\u00a0still<\/em> walk out when she speaks in church. They see this, I assume, as some sort of strange obedience to some patriarchal doctrine of supremacy. I see it as Pharisaical pride.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n My friend Jory Micah<\/a>, whose mission is \u201cBreaking The Glass Steeple\u201d, fights for the right as a woman to teach and preach the Gospel, and the absolutely hateful and vile things that so-called Christians heap upon her are so incredibly offensive, I don\u2019t know how she stands it. She is a strong woman. Truly a woman of valor. Eshet Chayil!<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Women are still blamed for their own rapes, and the Big-E was complicit in helping get a sexual abuser\u00a0in the White House. \u00a0In churches, women clearly doing pastoral work are called \u201cdirectors\u201d \u2014 because of ill-applied scriptural interpretation. In a blatant display of othering, 52 percent of men<\/a> in a recent study claimed that they don\u2019t benefit from women having access to birth control.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Because it\u2019s all about the guys. It\u2019s always all about the guys.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n We won\u2019t even get into the fact that maybe you don\u2019t have some kids you didn\u2019t want because a woman in your life had access to birth control. We\u2019ll just focus on the fact that the insane question was even included in a survey. Because women\u2019s health care \u2014 and this may shock you \u2014 is actually about\u00a0women.\u00a0<\/em> Which may be why so many of us women are in such a tizzy over the fact that none of us were invited to the party where the bros\u00a0decided how our healthcare will be managed here in this great democracy-of-the-penis we\u2019ve got here.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Anyway.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Despite the obvious attempts to wipe us out of the story as if we were just marker on a white board, we\u2019re still in there \u2014 right there, from the very beginning, starting with God. We are in<\/em> God. God says, Let\u00a0us<\/em> make humans in our<\/em> image \u2014 male and female<\/em>. We are the unnamed concubines and the Deborahs and the Esthers, the Eves and the Ruths, the Junias and the Phoebes. We are there, doing God\u2019s work, living out imperfect stories, chasing down our perfect God. We are the many Marys, who hear God call our name, and respond.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Which brings me to Glennon.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n When I was a newbie in Christian world, I towed the Big E line that Catholics were practically heathens, but we should love them anyway. I was judgmental and felt very superior to all their worshipping of idols and deification of Mary. I was so smart. And such a jerk. Because the thing is, Marys make wonderful introductions to God. Marys make wonderful prophets. Marys tell the truth about God\u2019s love, because they have been among the first to respond to God\u2019s love for them. Glennon found God through Mary, and so did I. I just forgot.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In\u00a0Love Warrior,\u00a0<\/em>Glennon talks about her turning point: she walked into a church a hot mess, and found, under a statue\u2019s stare, only peace and acceptance. That statue of Mary holding her baby spoke to Glennon in a way no authoritative patriarch could. And Mary paved the way for Glennon to live a different kind of life. In a way, on that day, Mary told Glennon, God knows your name. We\u2019re all waiting for you.\u00a0<\/em>And Glennon said yes.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I was young \u2014 in my early teens, long before Jesus and I would have our moment. I was in Ireland, standing in a field in the rain with a bunch of Irish Catholics praying the rosary. I was brought up Methodist, so I had no idea what we were doing. I tried to cross myself at appropriate times, just to fit. (See? I\u2019ve always had pointy edges that don\u2019t fit the circles I\u2019m given.)<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n
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