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Gender and Religion

laod, is a man! was the full-page headline of the ly'ew York Post, a locai tabloid
\fr,"*rpuper, on |une 17, r99r' Apparently, during a Father's Day sermon, John
Cardinal O'Connor, then the archbishop of New York City, had excoriated radical
feminists who had suggested the possibility of a more androgynous' all-embracing
deity.'
The headline was actually a bit of a hyperbolic over-statement, t)?ical of the tab-
loid press. Actually, O'Connor had said that "In the fatherhood of the Almighty God is,
of cou.se, all personhood, the personhood of mother and father simultaneouslyi' And
he went on to quote a Vatican official who said that "We are not authorized to change
the 'Our Father' into an 'Our Motherl " (That Vatican official, incidentally, was |oseph
Cardinal Ratzinger, who became Pope Benedict XVI in zoo5.)
Critical reaction was nonetheless swift. Many felt that again, women were reminded
that they were not equal in the church. One German theologian dismissed it facetiously
by drawing this anJogy: 'A donkey thinks God is a donkey because in the eyes of a
donkey, the donkey is the top of creation. O' Connor seems to rne to be a combination
of a rnan and a theological donkey."'
This little flare up was actually only the latest skirmish in a centuries-long struggle.
In Western societies, religion has long been bound up with questions about gender' Is
God a rnan? Why do most of the world's great religious traditions have male prophets?
What sorts of relationships does God prescribe, and which ones does God proscribe?
Do men and wornen have equal roles in the various religious ministries?
Monotheistic religious traditions-ludaism, Christianity, and Islarn-have been
especially concerned with gender issues. Both in theological doctrine and as a social

zz6
 i:i,irir1 tr ii.n.li,: ar,-l ileiiginr

institution, reiigion has, for many centuries, piayed a dominant role in the idea that
women and men are fundamentally different, and that such difference is part of a
divine plan. From that difference, these religious traditions hold, women and rnen are
to perforrn different tasks, are assigned different roles, and are placed in subordinate
urrd ,,rp.oordinate positions in a hierarchy. Most simply said: religious doctrine has
been a consistent wellspring of ciaims of essential and eternal gender difference, and,
institutionally a foundation justifliing gender inequality'
It needni be this way, of course. One can irnagine religious doctrines and rituals
that celebrate equality. Perhaps a more Buddhist notion of complementarity, of yin and
yang, heaven and earth, masculine and feminine, that values each as necessary and
'rquil.
At perhaps a rrrore pantheistic understanding in which various gods, some gen-
'B16
arcfri t&
'i/.B*ft' dered and sorne not, are responsible for a wide variety of earthly phenomena.
ttt* *tAr*E
r'..*g1.;:J
I

mm TIIE }IISTORICAI, GENDERING OF RELIGION

Indeed, the historical record suggests that it wasnt always this way at all' In pre-
modern societies, goddesses proliferated; as far back as hurnan societies existed there
were goddesses, especiaiiy of fertility, reproduction, and later for plentiful harvests.
tf,tany"otr ttre great historical anthropologists of the nineteenth and early twentieth cen-
turies proposed that primitive matriarchies and polltheistic cultures were gradually
replaced-either by conquest or contact3 And Marija Gimbutas, a professor of archeol-
ogy at UCLA argued that in Neolithic Europe, between 65oo and 35oo BC, a goddess-
oiiented civiiization was characterized by peace, harmony, and a nurturing sensuality,
rloid which was destroyed by weapon-wielding horsemen who swept across Europe from the
lohn Russian stepPe4
lical Historically, the Great Goddess was known by so many names that it is impossible
cing to count them all: Astarte, Anat, Anahita, Asherah, Attoret, Attar, and Au-and that's
just the "As"!5 There are hundreds, if not thousands of goddesses who have occupied the
tab- pantheon of deities throughout world history. In Female Power and Male Dominqnce,
rd is, ior e*ample, anthropologist Peggy Reeves Sanday traces the origins of male domina-
And tion in Europe and the Middle East to the triurnph of sky gods over earth goddesses-
mge that is the triumph of the invisible and ail-powerful over the more visible, immediate,
seph and pragmatic.
yetLany cutrtures today continue to worship goddesses-with significant cross-
rded overs. For example, animist religions like the Yoruba in Africa have influenced religious
,uslI cult traditions in the Western hemisphere such as VooDoo and Santeria, traditions that
ofa rnaintain women s spiritual power.6
tion Greek and Roman m1'thology paired up gods and goddesses, and while Zeus
thundered angrily, goddesses like Athena and Hera proved abie problem solvers'
Mesopotamians worshipped trshtar; trsis and Demeter were goddesses of law and
jus-
\gle.
:r. Is tice in Egypt and Greeie, respectively. Ancient cultures in the Near East and Middle
rets? East rout"inely included fertility goddesses, who controlled life forces such as birth and
ibe? death. Some cultures even developed matriarchal religions in which the Great Mother
was the source of all life.
)een Many conternporary non-industrial cultures that have been less tainted by incor-
rcial poration into Western networks still maintain such fernale deities, which suggests that
seel.rg the fernale as both equal and divine answers sorne irnportant cultural needs
228 f lt,i

"GoddessTours," which
Figure g. Snake Goddess, Crete, seventl'l century BC.This irnage frorn
l.
organizes women-onty tours to ancient goddess sites. Source: Archaeological Museum' Herklion, Crete,

Greece/Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NewYork'

across historical time-needs that are largely unmet in our culture, perhaps to our
detriment.
Among those religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism, which are older than
religions), there is far
|udaism (r.ifrictt is the oldest of the three major rnonotheistic
more spiritual'diversityi'Hinduisrn holds that there are many gods and goddesses
(although the practice of the religion allows for significant gender inequality)' And
Buddhists dont believe in any tituiar'god" who stands above, but rather in the godlike
ootential of all humans.T
Monotheism changed all that. There has never been much of a question that the
single unitary God who first spoke to Abrarram was a male God. God has had
many
per"sonalities-merciful, vengeful, fraternai helper or angly j"9g-., patient and pater-
,ral, o, proud and patriarchal-but ever since Abraham heard that voice, that voice
has been rnale.
Can you imagine what you might have thought if Charlton Heston had gone
up to
the top oithe mountain in Cecil B. DeMilleb epic movie The Ten Commandments andit
 i.::'..pit: i: ljenri:,' ;.rci i::lli3!c:; 729

was a sweetly feminine voice

that spoke to him from the burning bush? My guess is that
even to suggest such a thing might
;;; wouid never have taken it seriously; indeed,
burned at the stake'
t;;;;.;" so heretical that you might have been
and a normative code that demanded
The monotheistic asseition oia male God,
had practical historicai implications' It meant not
that women be subordinate to men,
out and suppressing all those
elevating men over women, but it meant stamping
^nlv
ffiilh;#r ,r.Ji t""r that posited either-the equality ofwomen' celebrated women's
reproductive power as divine, or envisioned women as goddesses'
'-' over the course of its first two
ind.ud, much of the history of religion in Europe
a history of purificaiion, of a search for finer
and finer expression
-ifi"rrniu tras been all who might deviate from it' Many of
of doctrinal truth througt itr" *pp."ssion of
commandments for the subordination of
the norms concerning gJnd", relations-the
not encoded into the initi.ai scriptures,
women, the deferenc. of *o*",' to men-are
butcamealonglateraScomrrrentariesonit.Thatistosay,theyarenotthewordofGod,
those scriptures within a specific historical
but the words of mortal men, interpreting
context.
have been suppressed
And not ail are scriptures, either. Entire doctrinal traditions
as heresy, including gospels that were c-ontemporaneous
N:* Testament' but
to
lh:
the sexes and the divinity of women'
suggested far more egaliiarian relations between
Thesenotionrsi-m.rjustbelowthesurfacebecausetheyalsosuggesttheeternal
human desire for and the elevation of women to an equal station, Most
"qrruilty Code, the tenth best-
,...,'trn these ideas crept into the pop potboiler, The Da Vinci
,.itirrg book ofall time elUt" is number one). A quasi-feminist text, it turns out
ith.
to use all available methods' includ-
that the entire Vatican hierarchy was determined
ingrnurder,tosuppressthepossibltritythatJesusandMaryMagdaleneweremorethan
"iust friendsl'
were suppressed, they went
some scholars argue that as these goddess traditions
(The word "witch' means "wise onei')
underground und ,"-?-.rged as witclicraft.
and midwives, who were
witchzs were often heaieri rituaily in charge of medicine,
vhich
ruie of men
in lf,urg. of birth. These were powerful *o-"tt, often
independent of the
of patriarchal
(which, of course, made them especially threatening to the consolidation
our power). As Carol Christ writes:

The wise woman was summoned at the crises of the

life cycle before the priestl she
than deliveredthebaby,whilethepriestwascalledlatertoperformthebaptism.Shewas
while the priest was called in
; far the first called upon to cure illness or treat the dying,
:SSCS afterotherremedieshadfailed,toadministerthelastrites...[I]tisnotdifficultto
And see why she was persecuted by an insecure misogynist
church which could not tol-
llike erate rival Power.. .t
also been the other side of patri-
Women's spirituaiity (to which I wiil return later) has
the
archal religions.
rany
!ter- INEQUALITY
oice
THEOLOGIES OF DIFFER'ENCE' THEOI'OGIES OF
but in so many areas the Bible and other
Not only when it cornes to the gender of God,
nto canonicaitextsarenormative,-prescribingtheappropriaterelationshipbetweenmen
r '" and women, husbands and wives, parents and chiidren. It's estimated that four-fifths
rd it
 relations
of the Qur'an is concerne<l with prescribing and proscribing the appropriate
mene The Bit'le, both the New and Old Testaments, are likewise
between women and
preoccupied with regulating and adjudicating dornestic relationships-
' Wtrat is perhaps most interesting is that the sacred texts, and their prophets, are far
more equinanlmous-or at least arnbiguous-than their subsequent male interpreters
have indicated" Those conflicting interpretations have provided the basis
for centuries
of coirfiict and discord. For exarnple, lesus seemed equally concerned with women as
with men and made it a point to single out some women who were scorned by others
to in Romans 16:7 as an apostle.)
for special devotion. (one woman, iunia, is referred
"Jesus neither said nor did an1'thing which
Acco"rding to theologian Leonard Swidler,
wouid injicate that tre advocated treating women as intrinsically inferior to men, but.. .
of women as the
on the contrary, he said and did things which indicated he thought
equals of men."'o
And Moharnmed insisted that womens consent had to be obtained before
marriage-astartling reforrn at the time; women were also entitled to initiate divorce'
to inherit, to maintain their own property, and to exercise certain conjugal rights'
Women were also subject to the same requirements for prayer and fasting during
the

*7
./'- /-
I

et

t/) t

/' - c at ,r#rt<;. ^
s',4/4/W
"We'we been u"tandering in the desertforfort2 lears' But
he\ a wan-zuould he erter ask directians?"

Figure 8.2. @The NewYorker CoNlection 1999, Peten Steiner from cartoonbank.com. All
rights

reserveo.
 Chapir 6:6ender and li,eligicn 23 |

tions holy month of R.amadan. At the same time, men were permitted to have up to four
:wise wives (provided they couid adequately provide for them), and women were subservient
to men because men were be "a degree above" women, because "God has made one to
re far excel over the otherj"'And among ancient Jews, women's rights were protected at the
'eters same time they were believed to be subordinate to men.
uries It is more often in the commentaries on these canonical texts that the religious
en as imperative for gender inequality seems to have been most firmly instituted. It was not
thers inevitable, and one could imagine that such textual ambiguity might have been inter-
stie.) preted to allow for greater gender inequality.
rhich So, for exampie, St. Par.rl's epistle to the Ephesians leaves no doubt about where he
,ut... stood on gender equality (itself a comment that sornething must have been perceived
s the as amiss for him to even cornment on it):

Let the wives be subject to their husbands as to the Lord; because a husband is
efore
head of the wife, just as Christ is head of the Church. . . But just as the Church
orce,
is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everl'thing to their husbands.
ghts.
(Ephesians 5:zz*24)
g the
And in r Corinthians rr:3, again, a sirnilar theme: "the head of every man is Christ, and
the head of a woman is her husbandl' (Of all the apostles, Paul seemed most obsessed
with women's subordination.) just to be sure there was no misunderstanding, in 1998,
in the wake of severatr decades of intense feminist campaigns, the Southern Baptist
Convention arnended its officiai statement of beliefs to insist that a wife should "submit
graciously" to her husband and assume her "God-given responsibility to respect her
husband and to serve as his 'helperl ""
Orthodox ludaism certainly enshrines gender inequality: Women rnay not be
rabbis, rnay not read the Torah during worship, sing in synagogue, or lead a service'3
Indeed, only men count toward a minyan, the quorum of ten |ews that must be present
in order to hold aprayer service. A hundred women and nine men? No service. Jewish
women may not initiate marriage or divorce, may not pray at the Western Wall (they've
been physically attacked by Orthodox men when theyve tried), and there's a sort of
informal morality brigade of Orthodox men who publicly chastise women who are
dressed "immodestly,' or who sit where they like on public buses. This sounds awfully
similar to the roving bands of Muslim purification groups that roamed Afghanistan
under the Taliban, enforcing its gendered code of conduct on Afghanis.
Such conflicts over the interpretations of sacred texts may be, at their heart, doc-
trinal, but they are often expressed as secular policies. Doctrinal conflicts also inform
the framing of political debates. For example, in the nineteenth century, it was the
Protestant clergy that led the charge against wornen's rights, whether the right to vote,
go to college, or enter professions such as medicine or law. It wasnt that women should
have the "right" to these activities, wrote Rev. John Todd, but rather their divinely cre-
ated frail constitutions required that they be "exempted from certain things which men
rnust endure."'a
But on the other side, though, rnany Protestant ministers were among the rnost
fervent supporters of women's suffrage" Rev. Samuel B. Mays 1846 sermon, "The Rights
and Condition of Women' argued that the disenfranchisernent of women "is as unjust
as the disenfranchisement of the males would be; for there is nothinq in their moral,
 R
L5l t.t.,;]. : i. i: r in i] I ;i il Li I i, I l;':- i l' r r F, l' * r,j i, I irli i"\ I t.

mental, or physical nature, that disqualifies them to understand correctly the true inter-
ests, of the community or to act wisely on reference to them.""
Similarly while across Islamic societies today, men are the heads of the household
and women are often relegated to the private sphere, these practices are not at all con-
sistent. In some of the world's largest Muslim countries, like Indonesia, women wear
Western clothing and are engaged in every profession. Girls go to school unimpeded,
and women and men are equaily enfranchised.
In most religions, gender inequality is enshrined and enforced through a politici-
zation of the body. All the monotheistic religions prescribe some bodily practices and
proscribe others. For example, Christian men are not supposed to cover their heads,
but Christian women are-and for similar reasons. (It is probable that Christian men
were prohibited from covering their heads because fews were required to do so, and
this differentiated them from fews.) As Paul explained to the Corinthians:
A man indeed ought not to cover his head, because he is the image and glory of God.
But woman is the glory of man. For man is not from women, but woman from man.
For man was not created for woman, but woman for man. (r Corinthians n:7*9).

In some, more fundarnentalist Islamic societies, women's bodies are to be completely

concealed at all times; even if she must venture out in public in the first place (and
then accompanied by a male relative) she must remain hidden under a chador. They
may show no part of their body nor face in public. Even today, women who defy these
structures in Afghanistan risk having acid thrown on their face to permanently disfig-
ure them, public shaming of themselves and their families, and even ritual stonings.
Men's bodies are also policed. Since the prophet worse a beard, Muslim men, these
moral enforcers believe, are required to wear a beard. Any man caught shaving could be
executed-and barbers who shaved them could have their hands cut off. (Again, this by
no means applies to all Islam; indeed, in those countries with the iargest Muslim popu-
lation, such as Indonesia, such requirements are virtually unheard of.)
One of the hallmarks of woment second-class status among Orthodox Jews has
always been the ritual cleansing. Menstruation makes women ritually unclean; for
twelve days a month-that is, about 4oo/o of every month-women are considered
unclean; anything she touches becomes impure, and she must be physically segregated
from men. Seven days after her menstrual cycle ends, she goes to a ritual bath called a
mikvah where she is purified and thus able to rejoin social life.
You might think that women might chafe at such elaborate and lengthy reminders
of their inequality. But in a fascinating study of young women who convert to Orthodox
|udaism, sociologist Debra Kaufman discovered that what might be seen as 'bppres-
sion' to an outsider might carry alternative meanings to the participants. Women who
had converted to Orthodoxy, or become significantly more orthodox, actually valued
the experience and found it "empowering." Participation, Kaufman writes, "put them in
touch with their own bodies, in control of their own sexuality, and in a position to value
to so-called feminine virtues of nurturance, mutuality, family and motherhood."'u
Another study of Orthodox jewish women in Israel found a wide range of responses
to these ceremonies of ritual purification. One woman chafed at the oppression she
felt, that she had "this feeling that it is the long hands of the rabbis of hundreds of
years literally entering my body to check me." But another woman cherished her sense
 ChaF,fer {i: 6encler arld llcligion

e inter- of "renewal," feeling "that I enter the water as a religious person who is accepted for
who I am, without makeup, without colours: I have an intrinsic net worth, without
rsehold any Props:.
ill con- And itt decidedly sexual power, since the mikvah purifies her for sex, and Jewish
a
In wear law guarantees her rights to pleasure. One woman says
rpeded,
The mikveh gives me a wonderful feeling, when I go I feel like my husband is waiting
for me like an honored guest, like he waits Friday night for the Sabbath angels.. . it
rolitici-
makes me feel like our relationship moves to a higher level.
:es and
heads, While another says:
In men
A woman can also initiate physical things. Itb good to say that I want this or that,
so, and
especiallybecause the woman is supposed to enjoy. In fact, the husband is not fulfill-
ing his commandment of onah if you dont enjoy. So that means that if you want sex.
or whatever, then he has to agree and you have the right to ask for itl"7
tl Actually, so, too, the veii-or hijab-among Musiim women. Some have argued that
wearing the hijab is a political statement, a statement of solidaritywith other immigrant
Lpletely Muslims in more secular Western societies. Despite its denunciation as oppressive by
:e (and feminist women worldwide, many young Muslirn women embrace the hijab as an act
". They of solidarity and community. For example, young Muslim women in France refused to
y these remove their veils in schools, despite a French law that requires all head coverings to be
disfig- rernoved. since education is a secular institution.
ngs' In one study in the United States, Muslim women saw wearing the hijab as an
r,these expression of their opposition to coionialism in the Middle East and an affirmation of
ruld be gender differences as prescribed by their religion. In a fascinating dissertation in my
this by department, one of our PhD students, Etsuko Maruoka, interviewed young Muslim
popu- students at Stony Brook who had decided to begin to wear the veil-much to their par-
ents'discomfortl For them it was an act of rebellion against parents who were too eager
ws has to 'Americanize" them, as well as an act of solidarity with Muslims all over the world
ln; for (figure 8.:). But most important, Maruoka argued, it was an act of self-identification
idered as a minority group, as an outsider, as different. In this act of conformity, these young
egated women sought to differentiate themselves from their classmates, forging an oppositional
alled a identity. (On the other hand, many of these young women's parents had immigrated
from countries like Malaysia and Indonesia, where veils are virtually unheard of. Their
inders view of a global Islamic practice was likely the result of watching AI-Jazeera, the Saudi-
hodox financed global Muslim television channel that promotes such a unified vision, rather
ppres- than any genuine act of solidarity with some mythic Islamic world.)"
n who Perhaps, as psychologist Rosine Perelberg writes, these multiple meanings attached
valued to the same activity suggest how "power can be exercised from a subordinate position'
rem in and that such fluidity "is fundamental to both the way in which gender roles are con-
r-value structed in different societies and the respective positions from which men and women
perceive themselves."'e
)onses Of course, it is the body and its pleasures that especially elicits religious passions.
rn she All religions require the suppression of sex for the glory of God. Yet even here, there are
eds of rnany interpretations. Among Orthodox jews, for example, women and men are both
'sense entitled-indeed encouraged to experience sexual fulfillment in marriage.
 gI" *%

rp6w
',FffiTE
Figure 8.3. Courtesy of Rizwan Saeed/Reuters/Corbis.

One of Christianityt innovations over ]udaism was a strict repression of sexuaiity.

Sex was to be avoided, and engaged in only for procreation" According to St. Augustine,
sex was the vehicle by which original sin was transmitted from one generation to the
next. Celibacy was promoted as a higher moral and spiritual position. Lust is listed as
among the seven deadly sins, and women (of course) are the repositories of lust. As the
infamous Malleus Maleficarum put it (this was the church manual for witch hunting):
'All witchcraft comes from carnal lust, which is in women insatiable"""
At the same time, Christian writers have penned best-seliing Christian sex manu-
als, that basically say that God wants you to have great sex-as long as you are married,
heterosexual, and faithful to your spouse. This has naturally led to a certain amount
of confusion among contemporary Christians. As one young man in Lubbock, Texas,
put it,

Life in Lubbock, Texas taught nle two things:

One is that God loves you and you are going to hell;
The other is that sex is the most at{ul, fiithy ttr'ing on Earth and you
should save it for someone you love.21

Generally, that "sorneone you love" has to be sofileone of a gender different from yours.
Another of religions hallmark elements of maintaining gender difference is to require
us to love only those of a different gender. Many religions either discourage or prohibit
homosexuality-and this is particutrarly true of monotheistic religions. Whiie half of all
Americans believe that homosexuality should be accepted by society, three-quarters of
 i.lhrFrar4r l' #ei? 1ar :i:i.l !i;i:G;a 235

fehovaht Witnesses (76 percent), about six-in-ten Muslims (6r percent) and roughly
two-thirds of Mormons (68 percent) and members of evangelical churches (64 percent)
say homosexuality ought to be discouraged.
The majority of most other religious groups sayhomosexuaiity should be accepted
by society. This includes Catholics (58 percent), members of mainline churches
(56 percent), Jews (zg percent), Buddhists (82 percent), and the unaffiliated (7tper'
cent). By contrast, members of historically black churches, Orthodox Christians, and
Hindus are more divided over the issue of homosexuality. For example, four-in-ten
members of historically black churches say homosexuality should be accepted, while
46 percent say should be discouraged."
Religiosity also tends to be associated with more negative views on gay marriage.
According to an August 2ao7 survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life
and the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, 55 percent of Americans
oppose gay marriage, with 36 percent favoring it. But those with a high frequency of
church attendance oppose it by a substantially wider rnargin (73 percent in opposition
vs. 21 percent in favor). Opposition among white evangelicals, regardless of frequency
of church attendance, is even higher-at 8r percent. A majority of black Protestants
(64 percent) and Latino Catholics (52 percent) also oppose gay marriage, as do plu-
ralities of white, non-Hispanic Catholics (+l percent) and white mainline Protestants
(+z percent). Only among Arnericans without a religious affiliation does a majority
(6o percent) express suPPort.
However, a zoo6 Pew survey found that sizable majorities of white mainline
Protestants (66 percent), Catholics (63 percent) and those without a religious affiliation
ality. (78 percent) favor allowing homosexual coupies to enter into civil unions that grant
rtine, most of the legal rights of marriage without the title. The general public also supports
r the civil unions (54 percent in favor vs. 42 percent in opposition). As with gay marriage,
:d as white evangelicals (66 percent), black Protestants (62 percent) and frequent church
s the attendees (6o percent) stand out for their opposition to civil unions.
ing):
THE GENDER OF RELIGIOSITY
anu- Both in doctrine and in practice, most mainstrearn monotheistic religions prociaim
ried, divinely inspired gender difference and thus legitimate gender inequality. Every morn-
ount ing, the Orthodox |ew thanks God he was not born a woman. The Catholic declares
3XaS, obedience to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Muslims read in the Qur'an "Men
are in charge of women because God has made one to excel over the otherl'The Hindu
Code of Manu, V declares that "a woman must never be free of subjugationl"' Where,
you might ask, are the women?
In the pews. One of the great paradoxes of religion is that deities, doctrines, and
institutional practices promote the naturalness of both gender difference and male
domination, and yet the majority of the faithful are female.
Logically, you might imagine that it would be otherwise: that God is imagined
)urs. as male, the word of God has historicalXy been the touchstone for assertions of gen-
luire der difference, and, perhaps even more importantly, the basic justification for gen-
hibit der inequality; that religion would be a man's domain; that far more men would be
rf all religious-since it reaffirrns natural differences and props up men's domination of
rs of women. Right?
736 ?#"*"1 7z 65f;t:I:i,,rD {ti$tri"it"!LE, a;LiF:t,nF.Eg Jr.iSt"t?r., l.iritig
Not so fast. In fact, women are far more religious than rnen. Here in the
United
States, which is the rnost religious nation in the lndustrial world,
virtually everyone
professes some religious belief. (The United States is the fifth
most religious nation in
the world, faliing behind only Nigeria, poland, India, and Turkey.)
ove", 95 percent of
Americans say they believe in God, or some universal spirit. More
than three-fourths
of women (zz percent) and just over three-fifths men
lo3 percent) say their faith is
"very important" to them. Seventy-seven percent
of women. Women believe in life
after death by a 6o-4o margin as well.,o
Muyb" so, but when it cornes to walking one's talk, women seem to do a far
better
job of it' According a zo-os survey of the American Religious Landscape,
19 women are
more likely to identifu with a particular religion and mor! hkely to p.uiti."
it. Earlier
research found that more women than men consider religion as "important"
in their
lives' More women than_ men pray, read the Bible, and attJnd reiigious
services. Of all
those who attend church services once a week, 6o percent are
6mile; of those who
attend more than once a week, 7o percent are female (figure g.4).,5
on the other side of theledger, the. zoo8 survey found that men are significantly
more likely than women to claim no religious affiliation. Nearly one
out of"every five
(19'6 percent) men say they have no formal religious
affiliation, compared with roughly

The Spiritual Gender Gap

% of women and men who..
Are affiliated
90
with a relieion
certain belief
in God or a
universal spirit

Say religion is

in their lives Have absolutely

certain belief
God

30

q;, Women
a) Men
ffi
U Gap between women and men
t':.
6,;. THE PEW FORUM oN RELIGION & PUBLIC LIFE
PEWFORUM. ORG

Figure 8.4. The spiritual Gender Gap. courtesy of pew Forum on

Rerigion and pubric Life
 ,: l,r,i:!ii l:'. :r'i:Jl:' all: i.1-ii1,1;1

Jnited 13 percent of women. Men are twice as likely to say they are agnostic or atheist
(l.l per-
lryone cent compared with 2'6 Percent of women)'
"ion in Arnong Protestants and Catholics, the gender gap is about 8 percent, 54 percent-
:ent of 4o percentlBut that gap balloons
to zo percent (6o percent-4o percent) in historically
ourths blaik churches and among Jehovah's Witnesses. In historically black churches, women
'aith women
is often rnake up from 7o to 9o percent of the congregation. Turns out that biack
in life are the most ieligious of all. (Among Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, and
Hindu Americans
the gender gup go.r the other way, ranging from a modest 4 percent lSz-+8 percent]
better u-o."trg J.r"s top u significantly larger zzpercent lerZg percent] among Hindus')'6
en are Tlere is some evidence in recent years that the gender gap in religion is narrowing
iarlier somewhat. This does not appear to be because rnen's religious participation is increas-
r their ing, but rather because women's is declining. Perhaps the demands of full-time work
Of all ou"tside the home and performing virtually altr the second shift tasks of housework and
e who child care leaves women iittle time to attend to the spiritual side of things.
However, we should not mistake small swells in the ocean for massive changes in
cantly the natures of the tides. The level of enf,orcement of gender inequatrity varies histori-
ry five cally. During periods of prosperity, religious structures may relax: women may make
rughly great strides in public arena without religious interference, and they also may success-
iully challenge doctrinal proscriptions on their religious participation. Periods of sec-
ular crisis, though, are often accompanied by fundamentalist calls to return to basic
texts, to repurifthe religion frorn contamination by secularizing forces. That is, during
periods of prosperity, religions can turn outward and embrace ottrers; during crises,
ihey turn inward and dernand increasing illustrations of faithful adherence.
The fundamentalist impulse is a sort of back to basics, a return to the tried and
true. It redraws boundaries between in-group and out-group more firrniy. One hardly
"needs" ftindamentalism when the old doctrines are firmly in place and unchailenged.
During those moments, fundamentalists seek to return wornen to their "rightfui"
place as one method of solving rnassive confusion caused by social and economic
upheavals. Just as women and men are becoming more and more equai throughout the
world-in education, family iife, the professions, or the workplace-fundamentalists
seek to remind us that the differences between women and rnen, which are everl.where
disappearing, are in fact indelible and fixed."

ylces
RELIGION AS A GENDERED INSTITUTION
To a sociologist, religion is more than the codification of an ethical way of iife, a set of
beliefs about the meaning of life, its purpose and its creator, or a set of spiritual prac-
tices designed to express those beliefs. It's also a social institution, an institution that
employs people, in which people have careers, earn livings, and make a most secular
life for themielves. While there may be much rnystery in the actuai ideas of a religion,
in a social sense, religions institutions may look like virtually any other institution.
There is significant syrnmetry between religious doctrine institutional practices.
Since monotheistic religions post intractable divinely ordained gender differences,
and thus justify gender inequality, their institutional arrangements often reflect these
beliefs. (d".".ti"1h. United States accords religioi.rs institutions the freedom to profess
their beiiefs and institutionalize practices based on them-within limits, of course-
our government aliows religious institutions to develop their own hiring and firing
 :"i

policies and to deterrnine their own criteria for selection, hiring, and mernbership.
Thus, even though the law prohibits gender as a criterion for hiring or promotion,
we permit religious institutions to use gender as a criterion. However, this is not carte
blanche to practice your religion in whatever way you might want. For example, even if
your religious beliefs require that you stone adulterers or money-lenders to death, the
U.S. penal code prohibits such behavior. (So bankers can breathe a sigh of relief, not to
mention those who might be tempted to cheat on their spouse!)
Given the doctrinal beliefs of the three rnajor monotheistic religions, ttren, it is not
surprising to see dramatic sex segregation in the institutional positions that women
and men occupy. (In chapter 9 on the workplace, we will discuss that sex segregation is
the primary mechanism by which gender inequality is rendered to appear as "natural"
when it is anl.thing but.) Sex segregation is both an expression of gender inequality and
one of its chief props.
Historicaliy, wornen were simply prohibited from serving as ministers, imams, rab-
tris, or priests. The first female rninister ordained in the United States was Antoinette
Brown, a Congregationaiist in 1853. (Antoinette Brown soon married Samuel Blackwell,
whose sister, Elizabeth, was the first wofiran to graduate from medical schootr in the
United States. Quite a family!)
Yet in recent decades, there has been significant progress in enabling women to
assunre a position of greater equality. The Association of Theological Schools reports
that the percentage of women seeking master of divinity degrees in member seminaries
has increased by more than 7oo percent in 3o years, and that female seminarians con-
stituted 3z percent in zooz. For example, whiie Reform iudaisrn perrnits both women
and gays and lesbians to be rabtris, Conservative ]udaism prohibits gays and lesbians
and permits wornen, and Orthodox ]udaism prohibits both. Reforrn |udaism began
ordaining rabbis in ry72, and there are currently oyer 4oo female rabbis. Different
Protestant denominations permit women to minister, and some permit gays and les-
bians, other denominations proscribe either women or gays and lesbians, or both. The
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Arnerica says the percentage of its ordained clergy
who are women doubled from r99r to 2oo3, to 16 percent. The Episcopal Church began
ordaining worlen in t 973; today, women constitute nearly 14 pelcent of all priests. And
among Lutherans, nearly one in five rninisters is a woman.'8
Within the black church in Arnerica, only about 5 percent have female pastors, and
these are often in small, remote, or troubled congregations. And only 5 percent of all
seminary students are black women. (Two percent of all seminarians are Asian women,
and r percent ane Hispanic women.)
By contrast, the Cathoiic Church has remained steadfasttry opposed to the ordi-
nation of women and of gay men and iesbians. Since priests are believed to act in
the name of Jesus, they must resemble him physically: that is, they must be male. In
the mid-r99os, then Cardinal Ratzinger (now Fope Benedict XVI) claimed that the
pope's prohibition of women's ordination was to be considered "infallible" teach-
ing, which means that it rnust be upheld without any debate or question, as the
word of God.
The Southern Baptist Convention reversed its long-standing position in zooo
and refused to ordain female rninisters, despite the hundreds who had aiready been
ordained since the practice was permittedtnry64,
 dh&.ili.rr : Ge:rcicr arrd flcligi*n 239

ership. Catholic clergy must also remain celibate, a vow that is not required of other mono-
rotion, theistic clergy. Ceiibacy extends traditional Catholic teachings that sex is the route by
t carte which original sin is transmitted from one generation to the next, so that those who
even if seek to represent God's will on earth must themselves renounce not their own orig-
th, the inal sin (for all who are born are brorn with it), but rnust not transmit it to the next
not to generation.
Intransigent resistance to the movements for gender equality and the recognition
I is not of a diversity of sexuality puts the Catholic Church increasingly at odds with many of
vomen its parishioners. A commission of biblical scholars appointed by the pope in the r97os
rtion is found no scriptural foundation for the prohibition of women from the priesthood, and
atural" a 2oo5 Associated Press poll found that nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of all American
ity and Catholics believed that women should be ordained.'n
Despite this, when Father Roy Bourgeois participated in the ordination of Janice
rs, rab- Sevre-Duszynska in Lexington, Kentucky, in August, zoo8, he was threatened with
rinette excommunication. "Deeper than the hurt, the sadness, there's a peace that comes from
:kwell, knowing I followed my conscience in addressing this great injusticej'he said.s"
in the Despite the proscriptions against women's ordination, those who work in religious
institutions almost exactly parallel church mernbership. At the turn of the twenty-first
nen to century, more than three out of every five people (62 percent) who work in religious
'eports settings-everyone from ciergy to managerial and secretarial and even janitorial
inaries positions-were women. Women also compose more than half of all students studying
rs con- for the clergy, and more than a quarter of all students studying for advanced degrees
vomen in theology.3'
:sbians What's more, in practice, even the Catholic Church's ban on female clerics breaks
began down. Given the worldwide crisis in recruitment of Catholic clergy-there are cur-
fferent rently half the number of priests in the United States than there were in the r96os,
nd les- and there are more Catholic priests over ninety years old than under thirty-has
h. The meant that lay people have begun to take over ministerial functions out of expedi-
clergy ence or necessity. There are more than 3o,ooo lay ministers who are serving as sub-
began stitutes in parishes that do not have regular priests-and more than four out of five
s. And of these lay church people (82 percent) are women.3' (There are some things that the
women are not permitted to do, like administer last rites, but they can and do per-
rs, aird form other rituals, like communion, baptism, confirmation, and marriage.) If present
t of all trends continue, women will probably eventually be ordained in the Catholic Church
/omen, not because of a sudden change of heart from the Vatican, but because the church
will simply have run out of men who are willing to embrace life-long celibacy in the
e ordi- priesthood.33
act ln Finally, religious institutions in the United States serve many civic functions as well
Lale. In as spiritual ones. on any given weekday, a tourist in a European church might encoun-
rat the ter a few dozen other tourists and one or two parishioners. But the church is largely
teach- empty. Not so in the United States, where there is constant secular activity-day care
as the programs, after-schooi events, maternity classes, men's groups, woment groups, gyms
and swimming pools and other recreational activities, Little Leagues, meal service for
I 2000 the, homeless, administration of charities, various twelve step and other recovery pro-
y been grams, in addition to Bible study classes. And dont forget Sunday schooll Indeed, in the
United States, the local church has assumed the institutional role of community center
244 f.i i,t'' ?; GInJ*Hh{:l i{:It1-r-:i ]q$, {:E}:L't:F Lf i'j5't'l TLjl-1^::ii

(especially given the paucity of local municipal funding for such activities.) And in the
United States, it is women who maintain the non-doctrinai components of religious
institutions, running these programs, organizing ail the secular functions, and arrang-
ing for the institution's upkeep and maintenance'

PUMPING {.]P THE PROPHETS: R.E-ENGAGTNG MEN IN REI,IGION

The gender of religiosity poses two parallel problems. One is how to increase men's reli-
giosi"ty and the other might be characterized as how to decrease women's. Weil, if not
Io decr.ase it, at least to transfer it to a domain in which women are at least the equals
of men.
One of the reasons that women are more religious than men has to do with the fact
that being observant itself is gender-coded. Stated most simply: Real men dont pray.
They donl need to. They can take care of things on their own. There is an implied con-
tradiction between masculinity-being in control, powerful, and king of the hiil-with
religiosity, which implies service, subservience, and acknowledging that you ate not in
control. Indeed, ministers have long been plagued by the question of how to reconnect
men to religious institutions. What will attract men back to the pews?
This isnt a new question, In the middle of the last century, one observer com-
mented he had never seen a country "where religion had so strong a hold upon the
women or a slighter hold upon the men' than the United States. By the turn of the last
century, Protestant rninisters worried that religion had become a women's domain, that
the sentimental piety and sanctimonious moralism-churches were the springboards
for prohibition, after all-were well-suited for female churchgoers, but hardly entic-
ing io men, who needed to steel themselves for the rigors of competition in the urban
jungle. The tipical Protestant minister "moved in a world of women." Henry ]ames Sr.,
fath-er of the great novelist, lamented that the old "virile" religion had disappeared and
been "replaced by a feeble Unitarian sentimentality.34
Images of lesus, himself, reinforced this perceived feminization of religion. In
paintings and drawings of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Jesus was
i-ug"d ur a thin, reedy man, with long bony fingers, and soft doelike eyes, a man who
could easily counsel you to turn the other cheek and love your enemies. Such an image
was actually thought to be transformative to American men; one Methodist minister
described that transformation:

It is wonderful tosee a great burly man, rnostly animai, who has lived under the
dominion of his lower nature and given rein to his natural tendencies, when he is
born of God and begins to grow in an upward and better direction. His affections
begin to tap over his passion. . . The strong man becomes patient as a lamb, gentle as

the mother, artless as the little child.

That is, he ceases to be a "real manl' "Have we a Reiigion for men?" asked one disgrun-
tled guy.35
His prayers were quickly answered. A new movement was born: Muscular
Christianity, a rnovement "to bring rnanliness in its various rnanifestations to church
and to keep it awake when it got there." It's goal was to revirilize the image of ]esus
and thus to masculinize the church. ]esus was "no doughfaced, lick-spittle proposi-
tion" proclaimed evangeiist. Billy Sunday, but "the greatest scrapper who ever livedi'
 ChaFrer 8:6e:rder rnci Ftaiigiln 241

lin the Books such as The Manhood of the Master (rSr:), The Manliness of Christ (r9oo), and
ligious The Manly christ (rgoq) all sought to refashion fesus as more Hans and Frans than
!rrang- girly man.
Billy Sunday was perhaps the most celebrated of these Muscular Christians. Sunday
abandoned his lucrative career as a professional baseball player to become an evangeli-
N cal preacher (he was the model for Elmer Gantry) who organized tent revivals all across
n's reli- the Midwest and South (figure 8.5). These tent meetings were for men only, and they
, if not drew effusive praise from journalists and new followers:
equals
He stands up like a man in the pulpit and out of it. He speaks like a man. He works
likea man. . . He is manly with God and with everyone who comes to hear him. No
he fact
matter how much you disagree with him, he treats you after a manly fashion. He is
it pray.
not an imitation, but a manly man giving all a square deal.36
:d con-
These all-male revivals celebrated Jesus as he-man with colorful language and spir-
-with ited services. Sunday prociaimed that mainstream ministers had become "preten-
:not in
onnect tious, pliable mental perverts" who were egged on by their cronies, inteilectuals, who
were "fudge eating mollycoddles," and big-city fat cat capitalists ("big. fat, hog-jowled,
r com- weasel-eyed, pussy-lobsters"). "Lord save us from off-handed, flabby cheeked, brittle
,on the boned, weak-kneed, thin-skinned, pliable, piastic, spineless, effeminate, ossified three-
the last karat Christianity!" he thundered in "The Fighting Saintj' his rnost famous sermon.
in, that "Dont tell me about the peaceful gentle Jesus! Jesus Christ could go like a six cylinder
;boards engine . . . i d like to put my fist on the nose of the man who hasn t got grit enough to be
' entic- a Christian."37
: urban Such gendered evangelical fervor $'as part of the birth of modern society at the
nes Sr., turn ofthe last century, true, but it is revived every so often as the gender differences
:ed and in religiosity become an organizing vehicle for renewed religiosity among men. In the
r99os, seYeral evangelical preachers made the manhood of )esus a central element in
ion. In
ius was
an who
r image
rinis{er

the
els
)ns
3as

lsgrun-

uscular
church
rf |esus
roposi-
Figure 8.5. Billy Sunday preaching to an all-male audience. From the archives of the Billy Graham
r livedl' Center,Wheaton. I llinois.
r 242 fA.F,1'?: i1[i{l:gntfi !*':f"lT!Ti!:S, fir:t'{i}SF'e n !t{$'tlTrJT:til'!s
"The man who lived
their ministry. "Christ wasnt effeminatel' grumPed Jerry Falw-ell'
on this earth was a man with muscles " ' Christ was a he-manl"38
The most visible of these renewed revirilization efforts has been the
PromiseKeepers, who held massive 5o,ooo-7'ooo men-only
rallies in sports sta-
(called
diums (because it was where men felt comfortable gathering) and ministers
coaches) and their assistants (dressed in zebra striPed shirts as ifthey were football
."f"r".rj who sought to return men to the church. Founded in r99o by Bill Mccartney'
are an evan-
forrner football coach at the University of Colorado, the PromiseKeepers
gelical Christian movement that seeks to bring men back to f-esus' They
heralded a
irore "feminine" notion of evangelical Christianity-ideals of service' healing, and
racial reconciliation-with a renewed assertion of mens God-ordained position
as

head of the family and master of women. In return for men keeping their
promises
devoted fathers, and general all-around good men, the move-
to be faithful husbands,
..biblel' The seven Promises of a PromiseKeeper, suggests that men deal with
ment,s
women this waY:
"Honey I've made a terrible mistake' I ve given you
[s]it down with your wife and say
to take my place' Now I must reciaim
-y rot. in leading this family and I forced you you to take it
that rolel' . . . tr'm not suggesting that you ask for role back. . . .I'm urging
back . . . . There can be no compromise here. If you're going to lead you must lead.'e
"The Power Teaml' a group
Others have followed suit. Bodybuilder John facobs founded
of massively muscled zealots who used a pumped-up theology asthe basis for motiva-
tional speaking, "Jesus christ was no skinny little mani' |acobs claimed. "Jesus christ
*u, u *urrt manl' He and his acolytes performed circus feats of masculine strength'
like b,reaking stacks of bricks or large blocks of ice with their bare hands' to illustrate
Christ's power.4o
"shock and awe"
And then there are the "JBC Men," who promise to deliver the
pro-
gospel to manly rnen. JBC stands for "|esus-Beer-Chips"-and the organization
iides ttre beer and chipsl With film clips from Gladiator, Braveheart, and Matrix,
these
religious Rambos expound a "manly gospel]' saturated with images of redemptive
vioi-ence. They promise a "shock and awe" gospel, and sermons.lbout
how "fesus is no
Mr. Rogersi' (bven their website, www.letsrollmen.com links military masculinity, 9-u,
an d evangelical Ch ristian irY.)
And"currently, Seattle evangelical minister Mark Driscoll rehearses Billy Sundays
"a
fulminations almost verbatim. The mainstream church has transformed |esus into
Richard simmons, hippie, queer christl' a "neutered and limp-wristed
popular sky
Fairy of pop culture thai . . . would never talk about sin or send anyone to helll'*' And to
Driscoll, reasserting traditional gender roles-women as utterly subservient to men-is
part of God's divine Plan.
mas-
Of course, these efforts to remasculinize fesus are only partly about men and
culinity. They suggest just how malleable arc partayals of religious prophets. Dont
a carpen-
forget ihat Jesus hai also been portrayed as a socialist (the working class man,
ter,"who organizes the working masses to rise up against their ruling class oppressors),
a capitalistlJesus was a "turniround specialist" who motivated workers
to be a "lean,
mean, marketing machine" according to a book lesus, CEO). Het been
imagined as a
white racist (theresurgent Ku Klux Klan invokes a "red blooded and virild' man who
 .."
1:,,r,"r.r, 'r: : I - I "," ..:a i.-'il"ji.tr, 243

o lived "purged the temple with a whip" and wrestled "the continent from savages") and a pas-
sionate advocate of civil rights and racial equality (as in the black church).0'
n the And while Jesus's gender identity has long been a major theme arnong American
'ts sta- Protestants, it is interesting that while the gender gap in religiosity is greater in Europe,
(called there have been no cornparable movements to "masculinize" religion there.
rotball Most of all, these movements and groups are responses to women-or, more accu-
artney, rately, to women's increased equality. Katie Ladd, a liberal Methodist offered a bit of
I evan- a historial perspective when she observed that "it's oniy since women have been in
rlded a church leadership that this backlash has come."
Lg, and A revirilized ]esus seen'ls necessary to re-establish the divinely ordained hierarchy
tion as of men over women, but oniy by those who feel threatened by women's equality.a: One
omises might even say, the rnore equal women get, the more masculine God becomes in the
move- eyes of His earthly stewards"
al with
A WOMAN-CENTERED SPIRITUA,I,ITY
There has also been significant opposition to these efforts to masculinize ]esus. Parallei
/ou
to this movernent has been a feminist-inspired effort to challenge the in-rplicit or explicit
Im
subordination of,women by citing alternative contemporaneous texts or by reinterpret-
eit
39
ing texts or images in different ways. Throughout American history, female-dominated
Protestant sects have emerged, such as the Shakers and Christian Science. For example,
a group in the early r97os, theologian Leonard swidler argued that ]esus was a "feminist-who
notiva- "vigorously prornoted the dignity and equality of wornen in the midst of a very male-
r Christ dominated society."+e
rength, Back in the era of Biily Sunday, feminist sociologist Charlotte Perkins Gilman
lustrate turned Muscular Christianity on its head. In an indictment of mainstrearn
Protestantism, His Religion and Hers OSzi, Giiman asks a simple question: Why is
rd awe" it that "neither religion, moraiity, nor ethics has made us 'good''?45 Typicaily, theo-
0n pro- logians would point to human faliibility: No matter how the clergy had tried to steer
x, these us toward the path of God, we humans always seemed to manage to fall off the path.
:mptive That is, it's our fault for being so imperfect.
us is no Gilman stands this on its head. It's not that we are imperfect, but that the religion
v,9-r , that has been foisted upon us has led us astray. Religion has focused on the wrong
thing-life after death instead of life before death-because, stated most sirnply, men
unday's have been in charge ofit. "Reiigion, our greatest heip in corrscious progress, has been
, into "a injured by coming through the rninds of men alonel' This is, she is quick to point out,
rlar Sky "not in any essential fault of the matre of our races . . :'46 lt's not that men have done this
And to deliberately, but this distortion of what religion could be, should be, is the inevitable
nen-is by-product of the great tragedy of our species-the subjugation of the female,"r'Much
of the book is spent detailing the calarnitous consequences of what she believes is our
rd mas- original sin: "making a private servant of the mother of the race.a8
s. Dont ]ust as the sociologist |essie Bernard had argued that there were two rnarriages,
carpen- "his" and "hers," so, too, did Gilman argue that there were two religions. "His" reii,
:essors/, gion is preoccupied with death. Because men in prehistory were concerned with war
a "lean, and hunting, and competition among men, they developed a religion that revolves
ned as a around the question; "What is going to happen to me after I arn dead?"ae Heaven, in
ran who this scheme, is a hypermascuiine paradise. "Never a feminine paradise among them.
744 j,i:.'l' '.:.i :l-i.:''..!ri tr:-1 li: iir:-: r"i-;ii'i, ;:"')ti:ii::i"i";t: ::'i1: :':':"i"1':i;:f rs

HupPyHuntingGrounds-noHappyNursinggroundsi,soAllofthisjustifieswar:
"No
enabies?eath-based religions to carry out wars with
morai righteousness-
W#i,
she writes. "No war couid ever
peace can ever be rnaintained ii a wholiy male worldl'
for long in a world of equal men and women'"s'
-^--lg"i"rt
..rdrrr"
Gilma" prop"r"t religion. Because experience
ttis, _"her" -women
be life-affirming' Such a
childbirth and nurturing "f lif., so their religion would
;uirirr-uur.a religion' wJuld pose a different fiaming question: "What must be done
mythic creation that
for the child who is born?" trtls the Great Mother-a somewhat
and saints and superordinate males who
stands as a foil to the cavalcade of priests
the real source of life' the origin of
have constructed "his" religious edifice-who is
is, by virtue of her experience, aitruistic:
humanity" And the rnother, Gilman writes,
"She works, not to get but to give." And God? God is
"within us" not "above us"'5'
echoed through the late
And just as the Musculai Christianity of Billy Sunday
anchoring of spirituality
twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, so, too has Gilmans
years of the contem-
in women's concrete ernbodied experience as mother. In
the early
a struggie to emancipate
Dorarv feminist movement, feminlst theologians undertook
*o-.ttt spirituality. This endeavor had several fronts'
First, there were efforts to reinterpret traditional texts
in rnore favorable light'
book, the authors of the
After all, as ferninist theologian Mary Daly argued in her first
Bible were rnen of their tiries, "and it would be naive
to think that they were free of
intentions of various prophets
the preludices of their epochs."r: Extracting the original
by r"ore fallible human interpreters is aiways tricky'
fro- tfr" layers of interpretation
that point to the marked inequality
but so, too, is finding the actual textual references
prophet's words' And those texts often do seem
that has been in-rposed on those sarne
interpretations. For example' Paul makes
more egalitarianihun some of those fallible
cautions that "there is neither Jew nor
u pr",ai radical and egalitarian ca-se when he
male nor female; for ye are all
Greek, there is neithei bond nor free, there is neither
how slave owners also used the
one in christ Jesus" (Galatians ::28). (And you wonder
there can be no inequality' for
Bible to justify slaveryl) If there are no distinctions, then
difference, whether bio-
tn" .tui-s of inequaliry as we've seen, have aiways rested on
logically derived or divinely ordained'5a
females who had been reli-
second, there were efforts to retrieve from obscurity
to retrieve
g-rr, 1"ua"rs-prophetesses and priests, goddesses and theologians-and
doctrines' Important
iost o, ,oppr"rr.d texts and restore them to the central canonical
female prophets- and priests have been restored
texts, such as the Gnostic Gospels, as
move, while important historically, often
to prominence. Yet even this restorative
in part because the teachings of these women:
fails to fully resonate with the faithfui,
power or spiritual depth of the original
while laudable, do not approach the rhetoiical
prophets.
us from the more
And besides, discovering such worthies may actualiy distract
pressing liistorical questionsi (This is analogous to searching for great female art-
i*, o. were the equals of Rembrandt and
?o*por"r, during the Renaissar,.. *h"
Pisan or Hildegard von
Michelangeio, or Bach alnd Mozart. Elevating Christine.de
ni.,g." dJes not solve the problem; indeed it only begs the question: what
were the
from becoming great
historical circumstances that prevented truiy taiented women
composers or artists?)"
 /.t'rtay:!.r:t $: i!:riCl: :rd ileiigicn Z4S

war: Part ofthis tradition has been to look less at official doctrine or at organized reli-
"No gious institutions, and more at the way people actually ase religion, or experience the
ever sacred, in daily life. To take one impressive example, anthropologist Laurel Kendaii has
shown how in small Korean villages, it is women who are the local shamans, blessing
families, offering prayers for propitious events, helping them choose auspicious days
cha for weddings and the like, offering potions for illness, smoothing over family prob-
lone lems, and scaring away evil spirits. "The job of the Korean shaman is to seek out the
that gods, lure them into houses, and bargain with thernl' Shet part nurse-practitioner,
who part family therapist, and part itinerant priest. Thus, despite a patriarchal official cul-
in of ture in which women are relegated to the home, and official religions like Christianity,
istic: Confucianism, and Buddhism that are rnale-dominated, at the daily practical level, sha-
manism is the dominant religion in the country, and it is carried out entirely by women.
: late Here Kendall finds that shamans offer a vision of women's ernpowerment and engage
rality women in a spiritual life from which they are officially barred.56
Ltem- Third have been efforts to revision female spirituality in more experiential ways,
:ipate to anchor a spiritual vision within the lived experience of, women" Like Gilman at
the turn of the twentieth century, it is women's presumed connection to life-as
light. mothers-and to the earth ("Mother Earth') that enables women to have a different,
rf the and presumably superior, spirituality to that of men. Ecoferninisrn is a spiritual branch
:ee of of feminism that celebrates women's intimate connection to life-as mother-as the
phets potential salvation of an earth that seems hellbent on destroying itself. Women are
ricky, closer to the earth, to its natural baiances, its rhlthms and forces, and thus better
uality able to realign Mother Earth with its core principles of harmony. Here is Charlene
seem Spretnak, one of the pioneering ecofeminists, explaining the core of the movement's
nakes beliefs:
/r' nor
Earth is a bountiful female, the ever-giving Mother, who sends forth food on Her
lre all surface in cyclical rhlthms and receives our dead back into Her womb. Rituals in
:d the Her honor took place in womb-like caves, often with r,.ulva-like entrances, and long
ty, for slippery corridors. The elemental power of the female was the cultural focus as far
r bio- back as we can trace. At the moment this awe tr.rrned to en\ry, resentment, and fear,
patriarchy was born. why or how we do not know. . . The objective of patriarchy was
n reli- and is to prevent women from achieving, or even supposing, our potential . . . They
:trieve
Ipatriarchy] almost succeeded.st
ortant
stored It may also involve a more direct and iiteral (or rnythic) retrieval of the past. Mary Daly,
often for example, espouses what she cails "Gyn/Ecology"-an essentially feminine spiritu-
omen, ality that invokes "the Witch within ourSelves, who spins and weaves the tapestries
riginal of Elemental creation"58 The revival of Wicca is one such exarnple. Wicca represents
a retrieval of ancient polytheistic and naturalist theologies by women who proudly
: Inore declare themselves to be witches; they worship a Mother Goddess and focus on the
Ie art- intimate connections among all living creatures.5e
It and Feminist spirituality is more than simply a critique of a male-dominated religion,
:d von or a religious institution that justifies and legitimates male domination. It is also a
:re the powerful testament to the human yearnings for the sacred-a realm in which all are
great equal on earth and in heaven.
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i

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246 :,4'!:i.? :; tiSi

CONCLUSION
IttoneofthegreatlroniesofAmericanreligionthataninstitutionthatisamongthe
-domination-whether in theological doc-
maie
central pillars of gender inequality and to
men abo,r. women and demands that women remain subservient
trine that places
rnen,institutionalarrangementsthatenshrinesexsegregationandgenderdiscrimi- in the
ceiling on women's occupational mobility, or
nation, placing a permarient glass
representatior.,, of coJ ura
"tlt' prophJts themselves-actually finds more adherents
it's so "naturalizedi' so taken for granted, that
arnong women than .;;;; -"". n"rhups
menfeeltheyneedntparticipatetosustaintheirdominance.Perhapsmenarentreli-
giousforthesame..u'o"-*do"tdohousework:Becausetheydonthaveto'
the connection between gendered reli-
Ferninist theologian Mary Daly explained
gion and our gendered societY'
ThesymbolofthefatherGodspawnedinthehumanimaginationandsustainedas
by making
service to this type of society
plausible by patriarchy, has in turn rendered
appear right and.fitting. If God in..his,
its mechanisms for the oppression of women
heaven is a father rmling" hls" people,
then it is in the "nature" of things and accord-
6o

ing to divine plan and ord., of the universe that society be male-dominated
ti.
began their long march for equal-
In the middle of the nineteenth century, as women
ity,thepioneeringwomen,srightsadvocateElizabethCadyStantonremindedwomen
under all systems of religion is to con-
that..[t]he first step in the eleiation of wornen
vincethemthatthegreatSpiritoftheUniverseisinnowayresponsible{or.any1f
insisted, is always political, because it deals
with
these absurditiesl,u, fi;lrgt";, she
and inequality between women and
secular arrangements ,rr".h u, power, obligation,
"absurditiesl' God, the omnipotent and infallible' may have
men, inequalities she called
men ale fraitr, fallible, and easi'ly given to temp-
created the heavens and the earth, but
not God'
tation. Gender inequality is the work of rnen'