Oh, Holy Sophia, did I hear that right?

Paraphrasing, but apparently the purpose of tracking a woman's menstrual cycle is to know when she's "in heat."

Yes, heard by yours truly today. Followed by yours truly shouting out, "Did you just say that?"

Then there was much awkward laughter in the room.

Makeup Mystique

As I was brushing my teeth last night, my gaze fell over my roomie's make-up and the description of one of the shades in a set she had gotten. i.d. BareMinerals, in case you were wondering.

"Glee captures the look of pure joy on a women's faces when describing their most joyous time in their life, such as their wedding day or the arrival of their first baby." Not to knock such occasions, but seriously -- those are the only two examples of joyous women of which they could think. Futhermore, such makeup can "provide a natural luminosity that is similar to the dewiness of a child's skin." Because, yes, the patriarchy demands that you look like a small child. While entering into lawful matrimony for the production of small children. But you'll be happy -- gleeful -- while doing so!

Umm, feminine mystique much?

Mary Winkler: Comments from an ex-CofC Feminist

So, a lot of my friends and a couple of my family members have asked about my take on Mary Winkler’s trial and the verdict. And because they know, I’m a theology geek and a feminist, they also expect my take on the interaction of CofC doctrine and practice with spousal abuse. A caveat: Trying to apply the term doctrine to CofCs is artificial at best.

So, here’s Metra on the subject:

1) I don’t think Church of Christ doctrine on the relationships between men and women produces spousal abuse, or abusers.

2) I do think that the doctrines held by the CofC on the place of women within the church family and world can exacerbate pre-existing conditions wherein spousal abuse occurs. In other words, if you hand an already sick man the type of power that CofC doctrine can be interpreted to give him, yeah – location within the CofC can make that situation worse than it might be otherwise.

The stigma attached to divorce is also a factor, as it makes it harder for abused women to leave a bad situation. It’s not an intentional effect, but it is an effect. I’m very confident that the majority of CofC elders and ministers, if they knew a woman was in an abusive situation would not condone the actions of the husband, or try to shift blame to her, and would do everything they could to help out. The system is flawed. The majority of the people aren’t.

My main concern, as a feminist, is the mindset that I have found to be pushed on young girls and young women in the CofCs. Girls and young women are indoctrinated to focus on seeing themselves in roles of wife and mother – defined through others. I spent a good number of years in classes intended for teenaged girls; we rarely talked about anything other than dating and marriage. My little sister was once in a class with the theme: How to be the perfect woman for your future husband. CofC Colleges, particularly Freed-Hardeman, Harding, and Lipscomb advertise themselves as places where “you meet your mate.” The encouragement is to see yourself as attached to a man – there simply isn’t another model for female life and wholeness available to most young women in this context. (Paul might as well have never written that it was best to remain unmarried. Thank whatever god loves me that I had a close spinster great-aunt!) This conditioning, when applied to a person who may already have, for whatever reason, a weakened sense of self and you have a complete lack of an independent self that can contribute to unhealthy, or even abusive, relationships. Not the intention, but a sad effect – illustrated in this tragedy – at which the CofC needs to take a long, hard look.

Of course, the same is true for a number of Christian denominations that promote a hierarchal family structure where the man rules, marriage is overly-idealized, and divorce is heavily suspect. It’s not just a CofC problem. And, to be honest, the CofC isn’t the big fish in the game. It’s Dobson and company and their ilk that you need to be concerned about.

And, yes, I think voluntary manslaughter was a just sentence. It wasn't murder.

So you don't want to hear about my good day . . .

. . . that's okay, I have a blog for rhetorical ranting. And today it's happy thoughts! (Not the least of which is short meditations on why the existence of the Dresden Dolls makes the world a better place.)

I have job this summer! It pays in the decent range and hopefully won't be as "must kill" inducing as BK. Furthermore, my place of work is across the road from where I will be living. And the hours look like they'll be evening, not night. Works with summer classes. Works with something akin to a normal sleep schedule. Overrated, but whatcha gonna do?

I talked my way into an intro oil painting class without taking any prerequisites! (I have no formal training in art, other than iconography and egg tempera, but I'm a decent sketch artist and refuse to take general introduction to art. Self-teaching works remarkably well with a few online guides and a LOT of free time.)

*Happy dance! Happy dance!*

Misquoting Jesus

I've read two books for fun this semester. The Last Temptation of Christ and Misquoting Jesus. I realized the other day that this makes me a geek par excellence, but hey, if that shoe fits, I can deal with wearing it.

I basically finished up Misquoting Jesus this morning. I say basically because I would up skipping a few sections that were things I already knew from classes and so on and so on. Anyhow, this book was written by Bart Ehrman, a well-respected Biblical scholar. I had read some of his more scholarly works for other classes, and given that I never know when a family member is going to corner me with, "well, why don't you believe X" (where X = belief that is supposed as clear as crystal from a certain Biblical passage), or that I'm going to give in to the temptation to once again pick internet fights with fundamentalist, evangelical Christians, I thought it might be interesting to see if I can toss an easily availiable and accessible book out as a suggestion for further reading.

Misquoting Jesus is certainly accessible. The reader doesn't need much, if any background in textual criticism, historical criticism, or even Christian history. Ehrman doesn't assume that anyone is familar with the various controversies that were floating around early Christianity, so he neatly sums up things like Arianism or Gnosticism in one or two paragraphs. My thought, as a geek and lover of Gnostics was -- wow, what an oversimplification! Then I remember that not everyone has the time or the desire to slug through various non-canonical texts or Kurt Rudolph's Gnosis: The Nature and History of Gnosticism, and that in all reality a complex understanding of Gnosticism was not necessary to understand Ehrman's point. So, my second thought was he does a very nice job at summing up these controversies.

Ehrman also introduces the reader to the principles of textual criticism, with which I'm not all that familiar. I found his explanations of textual criticism to be clear, concise, and imminently understandable.

I was struck at some points by the humor in the writing -- recognizable to me as religious studies geek humor. In scholarly articles, this humor is sometimes present, but it's normally limited to titles or footnotes. I suspect that Ehrman enjoyed writing in a more relaxed genre. I enjoyed reading in a more relaxed genre. To me, the process of reading this book was more like attending a class taught by a professor with whom I'm familiar than it did anything else. (Having never attended a lecture by Ehrman, I can't guess whether his writing style reflects his lecture style or not.)

The most interesting parts of the book, for me, are the autobiographical bits in the introduction and the supplementary material in the back of the book. Ehrman outlines his personal journey from mainstream protestant, to evangelical, to happy agnostic. It's an interesting story, and it functions nicely to pull the reader into the importance of the matter. The personal touch of the book also keeps it from becoming a "dry" scholarly read.

Could it be . . . is it really . . .

. . . a music video that's overtly critical of the sexualization of the female image?



Why yes and think it might be? And the band, Paramore, is from Franklin, TN -- just a county above my home stomping grounds. Ah, it makes me feel a bit better about my state.

This isn't about Elaine Pagels

So, Elaine Pagels was on the Colbert Report the other night. Incidentally, Irenaeus wasn't writing 2000 ago more like 1850, but over-simplifications aside it was an interesting interview. Colbert's impersonation of a fundamentalist, evangelical Christian was -- quite eerily -- dead on.