Dreams and Visions – Fulfilment and Re-thinking

As one of the founding editors of Feminist Theology journal and indeed the one who with Dorothea McEwan made the trip to Sheffield to sell the idea to Sheffield Academic Press, an idea I just gave voice to with little idea what it meant at a meeting at Sr Mary O’Gorman’s convent one Sunday afternoon, I am truly amazed that we are still here! Of course, the most obvious reason for my amazement is that 20 years seemed an impossible amount of time and energy for a small group of people to keep going with a journal that had to be delivered three times a year. Would we find the energy and how would life pan out for us all? Very practical reasons I suppose.

My amazement is not for one minute because I think the feminist theological agenda is fulfilled but rather because the backlash has been growing for the last few years. A curious backlash this time, one that in part is simply hostile and does not acknowledge Feminist Theology as a discipline and little more than the ranting of out of touch women – this we can cope with, we are used to it. The more difficult to deal with backlash is from those who believe that by incorporating some of the insights of Feminist Theology into their theology they can claim that it is being used and has done its job. From where I stand this is more like assimilation to the point of extinction than it is a true revolution in patriarchal theological understandings. What we find are many of the words that have been associated with Feminist Theology over the years such, as radical embodiment, mutuality and many more, but on closer inspection these words are not used in the way Feminist Theology understands them. This is a method used by many male colleagues but sadly is also a stance that some women who claim a feminist standpoint also appear to be using – we understand why, the job market is tight and it is preferred if a mild feminist insight can be introduced through an investigation of Barth, Aquinas and many others who still appear to be more trustworthy theological sources then Schüssler Fiorenza, Radford Ruether, Trible, Keller, Daly and the rest, who if we bother to look to did hold chairs in very prestigious universities. Do we sisters still have to make and justify our case by reference to these men who we cannot claim are feminist, or indeed do we still have to waste energy attempting to find the feminist in them. Yes, they are part of our heritage but so is Sophia and Ruah, can we not find the confidence to speak our own experience and reflect on it? Are we still too young and for many reasons most of which are legitimate, too insecure? I am not suggesting that we make the mistake of not considering where we have come from and as we all know it is a very long history of males defining the world and the divine and, of course, not all of the males were as excluding and exclusive as others. My point is not that we may not or should not reflect on their contribution, I simply urge that we reflect more on and give at least equal standing to our sisters in theology.

I am also concerned that what were once radical theological thoughts and reflections may be ‘dumbed down’ by accepting male redefinitions of them. In conjunction with this I am also wondering where our young radical sisters have gone. I cannot believe that the world has changed so much that radical voices are no longer needed and can be replaced by those that are happy to tweek the edges of systems that are almost there. I am sure there are radical voices from young women in many disciplines and I long to hear them in theology. What does this signal to us, that young women in theology come from a different place, one where they feel able to find a home in the tradition. Or does this signal that even Feminist Theology has stopped being that radical place it once was and so offers no resources or sense of adventure to those coming into theology today? Either situation is one that needs attention and serious consideration. I wonder what the possibility of ordination has done to the voices of women? There were many of us all those years ago who fought for it and believed it would make a radical change – well, sadly that radical change has not come and perhaps we have to think again on the inclusion of women in patriarchal structures. It is a heavy burden for them to bear if they are indeed fuelled with a desire for change. What dreams and visions could we now have, women canons, bishops, Catholic priests or another way entirely in which to be a community of equals?

The Britain and Ireland School of Feminist Theology (BISFT), has come along way in 20 years, we continue with our summer schools in which we gather women from many walks of life to make theology together, we have a series of ‘Introductions’ books which are still used widely in universities and beyond and we for a number of years sponsored the Sophia Fellowship which enabled scholars to take time out at university and think! We for a short time ran distance learning Certificates and Diplomas through the University of Wales enabling those who studied Feminist Theology in their living rooms together to gain a university qualification for their efforts. Some of those students have gone on to get PhDs in Feminist Theology, not a bad achievement and one for which we all have to thank the tutors who gave their time and their passion to this part of our work.

Feminist Theology has come a long way in these 20 years, we have far more people studying for PhDs in Feminist Theology than we had 20 years ago and the field in which they apply feminist method is so much broader. Of course, the exciting border discipline of Queer Theology has also developed in this time and the two working together have introduced a vast arena in which to offer alternative realities for the consideration of patriarchy! I think one thing that often goes unnoticed is the way in which the journal has kept the title Theology and included many religious traditions. In the early days we were often asked if non-Christians could contribute and the reason for this was deep-seated in the UK academic establishment where theology was indeed a word reserved for Christian work while all other traditions fell within Religious Studies. For me, it has been very important that we kept the title and included all, it was perhaps a small protest against the UK system and an acknowledgment that those who reflect on their own traditions are creating theology. We have seen a number of women obtain Chairs in universities in the UK and USA in theology and philosophy and it is gratifying to note the journal or the ‘Introductions’ series on their CVs. Perhaps another small contribution, at least I hope so.

So what do we do now? Well, I am sure the journal will keep going as will the summer schools but is there any other arena that BISFT should be considering? Perhaps we need to pay more attention to the European arena, we do indeed publish articles from Europe taking particular note when they come from Central or Eastern Europe and we have had many visitors from Europe to the summer schools. However, we have not perhaps addressed how we may support Central and Eastern European scholars. This seems to be very important as the gap is widening between us in how we understand Feminist Theology and this, it seems, needs to be addressed as we are all women with a patriarchal weight on our backs, different in our contexts but debilitating none the less. I would welcome more conversations above and beyond the bi-annual ESWTR gatherings. It seems to me that the contextual and intercontextual nature of Feminist Theology could be explored a great deal more within Europe than it has to date been. I think the journal and the summer schools have helped to highlight the differences in context within Europe and beyond and this is a good reminder of not taking the high ground and assuming one’s own context is the voice to be heard.

As many will know the debate between Marcella Althaus Reid and myself centred around how flexible Feminist Theology can actually be. Her argument in a nutshell was that Feminist Theology by its very nature is bound to set back in place the binary opposites of gender and many of the rigid boundaries of sexuality that it actually fights against. For Marcella, Feminist Theology fell into some of the same traps that Liberation Theology has fallen into and it would take a radical theory such as Queer Theory, a form of analysis that pushes all edges and deconstructs all ideas, if we were ever to move on. I say we debated because actually we shared much of this ground in common but for me radical incarnational theology could and can act as the queer hermeneutic in theology without running the danger of falling into the apolitical. It too pushes all the preconceived ideas and restrictive theologies that we have suffered for centuries. I am not suggesting Marcella gave up on the political, such a thing would never have been possible for her and she suggested that Queer Theology with its push at the edges could always remain political in that the categories it wished to deconstruct were precisely those that caused oppression and exclusion. We both found that Queer Theology caused a great deal of unrest in theological circles. Despite this I feel sure that Queer Theology intersecting with Feminist Theology has a great deal to offer us in the future as does the radical notion of incarnation. It is my hope then that Feminist Theology will continue along these lines as well as many others.

Some of the others are the same things which is so sad but not disheartening. We still need to develop theologies that cannot be used as a justification to harm women, the planet and all living creatures. In short, I think we have much more to do in the area of Atonement Theologies, not just in developing it but in working hard to get it disseminated to seminaries and various clerical training institutions. In relation to this, of course, we have much more to do on Christology and its multifaceted reality. I am pleased to see that Cosmology is beginning to have an impact in these areas of Theology and await with some excitement the results of this research. The body, of course, is another area we have not yet examined in relation to contextual theologies and I will continue to work from what I called some 14 years ago, ‘the flesh becoming word’, many bodies have much to say and as feminist theologians I do believe we need to listen for the human/divine to emerge and take us on different paths. As the right seem to take more power we, of course, need to examine economics and the global consequences of the way we value money. Sadly, Feminist Theology and militarization is still on our agenda and perhaps Theology can offer something here more than the just war. Of course, what will we make of the place of men in Feminist Theology as more do begin to genuinely write from that perspective? Does a feminist experience have to be through a female body and what does that say about its flexibility? I think all bar the very few no longer believe that feminism and Feminist Theology are man-hating but some still ask the question of how we work with the experiences of feminist men, always cautious that Feminist Theology remains a contextual liberating theology for women? There are so many ways in which our discipline will continue to flourish and it my hope that BISFT will remain as a platform for some of it.

Here’s to the next 20 years and all it will bring!

Lisa Isherwood

Professor of Feminist Liberation Theologies

University of Winchester