Penis Envy

Good morning God,
I have never wanted equality with a man - why settle for less than you already have has been my motto. But now I find I have a peculiar case of Penis Envy It's a little late in developing I know, but previously I have never had a real problem with being a woman in a man's world. Whether in Information Technology or Lecturing, it was always easy to deal with sexism simply by being better at my job than the other 'guy'.

It took the Church to make a sort of feminist of me!
I confess that I have tended to play down feminist theology as a 'red herring' theology - one of those side-avenues that 'real theology' can dally around in whilst it muses over the real questions of who YOU really are and why You have any interest in us, and who on earth Christ was, and what in heaven's name has happened to the trinity as a result.. you know the sort of things I mean.
Feminism always seemed so stamp-the-foot angry, and, if I am honest - too one-sided for me. What's the point in making women into men? What's the point in being so aggressive that we lose who we are? I can't be a man hater - I love too many of them! From my experience training and working with male ministers, I just can't believe women are any more caring or creative, loving or flowingly liturgical(?) than any male minister fulfilling their calling to love Christ's flock.

Moreover, feminism has always seemed keen to categorise and define women as a group of people I didn't belong too. I am highly creative, but wouldn't know how to wear a scarf around my neck properly or apply a modern mascara. I enjoy a soak in the bath, but can't be bothered with make-overs or make-up (the very expression says it all for me!) I prefer mixed company where possible - but to be honest I don't care what the gender or sexuality of the person is - as long as they can laugh and converse,  preferably about theology, but I'll settle for anything cultural, political or scientific as a substitute!

I hate the very notion of Network or as it is now renamed 'Women in British Methodism' and the assumption built into it that just because I wear knickers I belong to a special group which the Church must pander to by allocating a place at Conference to a women who dares to claim she speaks in my name (as though I lack the ability to speak for myself!!!)

I am a woman not a wimp - I can speak for myself thank you - and I hate the very notion that such women's groups are based on -  that women are so waspish and wimpish that in order to succeed they have to have special consideration of their needs.

So that's my prejudices nailed to the mast - but what then of my anger and righteous indignation of the state of the Church? Of the disgusting male exclusivity built into every element - from the liturgy with its conditional offering, to the priesthood!

I could of course, take the attitude suggested by the David Hallam in a comment on my last post and simply thank God that I am a Methodist and a product of the Reformation..
Except, of course, as most women in Methodism know - the problem of exclusivity is as much a Methodist problem as a Catholic one.
Do the figures..
what percentage of an average congregation is male, what percentage is female.
Now.. what percentage of our Connxional Team is Male? What percentage of our District Chairs is Male? what percentage of our Circuit Superintendents is Male? And of our ministers.. our district officers, or our new  Pioneer Leaders?

The only place where the ratio of male to female  even begin to match the Congregation is in terms of local preachers... but even here I still hear complaints from women about women local preachers with their high pitched screachy voices!
I am incensed at how delighted everyone is that we have a female president and vice president - why so delighted? this should be NORMAL - we don't experience the same joy when we have the usual twosome - or when (increasingly more common) we have a male president and a female Vice president
Our very delight in the elections of Alison and Eunice show how much this is OUR problem as well as the catholic Church's problem.

What - did we think having women ministers was enough?
we have prided ourselves on the idea that no office in our Church is barred to women - but we have our own glass ceilings, they may not be in CPD - but the figures make it clear that they do exist in the hearts and heads of those who appoint and select our ministers, officers and pioneer leaders (albeit, I grant, perhaps subconsciously).

BUT Gender justice is a gospel issue - not just a Church structure issue.
Our structures are but a reflection of our underlying theology and liturgy (we are what we pray as a Church) 
So for me this cannot aford to be about helping the little woman out - I demand gender justice, and although, yes, I am little(!) I am not wanting special privileges or special consideration.  I dont want a different job, I don't even want women to want access to the sort of jobs men in Methodism currently hold - I want a more radical change. I want the underlying theology exposed so that we see how we got into this mess and are more able to use the gospel light to find a way out of it.

I want for myself and for other women in our Church what you God, have given to all - full and unconditional access to your grace, to your love and to your power to change what is wrong, to transform the world and assist in the building of a kingdom of justice and peace. I want everyone to have what my male colleagues have, the theological and biblical freedom and confidence to be who they are, and to grow fully in grace and holiness in a Church which follows Christ's example and celebrates both genders.  I want for everyone to have the same access to authority, the same rights within our Church, the same respect and the same consideration as every man is granted naturally - and I want it without anyone having to stamp a foot to get it.

I want an end to theological Penis envy..

Ironically God, the Vatican is full of male statues, each with the penis chopped off... there's got to be a feminist sermon in there somewhere!

Clerical Errors: Child abuse and Women's Ordination

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Good afternoon God,
I've been needing to talk to you about the fuss caused by the Roman Catholic Church's recently published

MODIFICATIONS MADE IN THE NORMAE DE GRAVIORIBUS DELICTIS


The part that has caused several of my fellow bloggers to get all excited is:

Art. 5


 The more grave delict of the attempted sacred ordination of a woman is also reserved to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:


1° With due regard for can. 1378 of the Code of Canon Law, both the one who attempts to confer sacred ordination on a woman, and she who attempts to receive sacred ordination, incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.


2° If the one attempting to confer sacred ordination, or the woman who attempts to receive sacred ordination, is a member of the Christian faithful subject to the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, with due regard for can. 1443 of that Code, he or she is to be punished by major excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.


3° If the guilty party is a cleric he may be punished by dismissal or deposition[31].

Put in English this means that both the woman and anyone daft enough to try and ordain her is automatically and instantly excommunicated.

Now there is nothing new in this - this is NOT what has upset people - it is the fact that the next item in the document is:

Art. 6
§

1. The more grave delicts against morals which are reserved to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith are:
1° the delict against the sixth commandment of the Decalogue committed by a cleric with a minor below the age of eighteen years; in this case, a person who habitually lacks the use of reason is to be considered equivalent to a minor.
2° the acquisition, possession, or distribution by a cleric of pornographic images of minors under the age of fourteen, for purposes of sexual gratification, by whatever means or using whatever technology;
§ 2. A cleric who commits the delicts mentioned above in § 1 is to be punished according to the gravity of his crime, not excluding dismissal or deposition.

Again - to translate this into English - a cleric who has sex with a minor (or vulnerable adult) or who acquires, produces, uses or distributes pornographic images of minors will be punished 'according to the gravity of his crime - which could mean that they get dismissed or removed from office.

People (including some newspapers) have therefore assumed that the Catholic Church is equating women's ordination with child abuse. Not so. They are simply recording in one document all the changes that have been made to the document which details delicts against the faith.


Ok.. so the Catholic Church has shot itself in the foot maybe by putting both things in the same document - but the document collects a number of changes together - including the prohibition against con-celebration, and; 'the taking or retaining for a sacrile­gious purpose or the throwing away of the consecrated species'


There ARE things that I would want to take the Roman Catholic Church to task over - but sorting out their clerical errors, their admin and documentation is not one of them.  Putting these things in the same document was bad PR maybe, but there was no intent on the part of the Catholic Church to equate the items in the document in any other way than as willful acts or crimes against the faith and its moral and sacramental standards

I'm more upset that the attempt to ordain women results in automatic excommunication for both parties whereas abusing a minor may result in dismissal - now that IS something to get upset about.


Why.. because it says that the Church is more afraid of the influence of women on faith than it is concerned about the lives of children. It says it really still hasn't got the message that abuse is NEVER acceptable in Church - that it destroys not just the individual's life of faith, but the Church itself.
I abhor the hypocrisy of a Church that can preach suffer little children to come unto me - but which will not take steps to ensure that those same Children are as safe as they can be in the Church's hands.


I really don't mind that the Catholic Church is scared of my influence on the life of the Church - it should be - that's why You call women to Holy Orders - to challenge any human attempt to limit Your action in the world - or in Your Church. I don't mind because if the Church really is of You God then your will, will be done in the end - whereas if it is not - then the Church will simply die.

BUT
When the Church sends out signals that effectively says the Church is more at risk from women than from abuse - I am afraid for us all - we really have lost the plot.


As a Methodist, I don't believe in excommunication anyway - it is a denial of your grace God - (as though WE can decide who is and who is not a part of your body!)  But I do understand that for Catholics and Orthodox, excommunication is a serious matter - a matter of life and death for all eternity as there is no salvation outside of the Church according to this way of thinking.


SO - it time to end the abuse - to work on the text

But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. (Matt 18:6)

No, I can't get excited about the Catholic Church's attitude to women - I just don't need the catholic Church to approve my ordination - and as I am not and never have been a Catholic - the threat of excommunication doesn't bother me. I have Salvation by faith, not by belonging.


I do however need their clerics to stop abusing Children and making a mockery of the good news of Jesus Christ's invitation to 'let the Children come' - and I suspect the threat of automatic excommunication might have more of an effect than the threat of deposition.

I think God, that there are some clerical errors  still in need of correction in that document.