wombs and wells

weekend updates

Employee is just a gentler way of saying slave,

I think in Bible Study, where God works within the culture,

but transcends the page of Genesis,

where God walks in wombs and wells,

springs of life he meets a woman by.

Wells and wombs, where you expect to find a woman.

Sometimes I feel it deep inside:

Sarah’s laugh

Hagar’s angel.

Don’t we all?

It’s our story, too, I think.

But who has eyes to read it?

Sweet Unrest in the Streets

Spiritual Criminals Review - National Catholic Reporter

I had so much fun reading and reviewing Michelle Nickerson’s Spiritual Criminals, the story of an anti-Vietnam War action in Camden, New Jersey in 1971. 28 co-conspirators vandalized a draft office for two hours: but the real drama was the year and a half leading up to their three-month-long trial, which the judge (a Notre Dame alum, representtt) allowed to go on so long because he took an unusual tack of admitting all sorts of moral and spiritual arguments in defense of their actions into the courtroom. It’s a fascinating story—and deeply dissatisfying, which is why it is such a thought-provoking read.

At the root of so many social movements is this toxic idea of domination and coercive power, which is best described as patriarchy. We see it underlying the epidemic of child abuse, intimate partner violence, and flaring up in sickening trials like Gisèle Pelicot’s in France, and undergirding the ecological destruction of the earth: at their root is their same lie: ownership gives you the right to destroy what you own. Power means you can crush and control and dominate what is in your power.

I think many people imagine patriarchy means fatherhood, but that is not what fatherhood means at all—that is not what parenthood or motherhood means either. It is also certainly not what Christianity or theocracy means, no, not when our Saviour told his disciples: the pagans lord over one another, but it shall not be so among you.

I’m not opposed to destroying draft cards—especially since they are taxpayers’ property, and often the most vulnerable and underprivileged of Americans were more likely to be drafted in the Vietnam War—but what Nickerson paints so well is the other destruction—the destruction of humans—that some members of this group wreaked on others. To speak more clearly: the cost of the terrible behavior of the men on some of the women in the group.

I could not help but think of what has become a core text for me—Chapter Two of Jenny Odell’s “How to Do Nothing,” in which she writes of the failure of many counter-cultural communes to rid themselves of the mindset of domination that they have been formed in by our patriarchal-capitalist society. One has only to spend a small time in any counter-cultural commune (Catholic Worker houses included) to see the truth of what she writes. I thought also of Alexander Stille’s The Sullivanians (see below), which unveils how a free love cult was, in fact, a sort of sexual abuse pyramid scheme.

At the end of the day, it is really hard for most humans—women and men alike—to truly believe that women are really, fully persons, on equal personhood footing with men. For a long time, most people would give lip service to men’s and women’s equality, but did not want to change the underlying legal or social structures. Now, the ugly new reality of our society is that it’s become acceptable to no longer even give lip service to the equality of all: it’s become a new norm to say that ugly truth out loud: our society has always been structured around the belief that white Americans are more persons than Black Americans and we have always thought that a person is really a man and a woman is only something like one. Our systems reflect those truths.

It’s amazing the labyrinth of misogyny that we are all trapped in: it’s hard to disentangle ourselves from its logic. But unless we do, any alternative society will just replicate the home of the master (hat tip to Audre Lorde).

Anyhow, it’s a good book that raises good questions. Read my full review at NCR here.

Religion and Tech - Iowa Catholic Radio

Delighted to announce that I’ll be joining my friend Bo Bonner every third Friday on his Catholic Morning Show to talk Religion and Tech (easily each of ours second or third most favorite topic to chew over).

You can watch our conversation from this past Friday below!