Good old-fashioned Christianity: Just in case you thought things were going to change

Pope Francis used an offensive slur for gay men during a discussion with bishops, sources say.ope

The Vatican apologized Tuesday “to those who were offended” after the pontiff used the derogatory term during a closed-door discussion with Italian bishops last week, two sources who were in the room told NBC News.

In case any of my readers thought that I was neglecting the Roman Catholic side of things.

And the discussion was about!:

Francis reiterated that gay men should not be allowed to train in seminaries as priests, according to Italian media, which said that his use of the slur left some in the audience surprised given the pope’s track record of a more welcoming approach toward the LGBTQ+ community.

Tangential Issues #4: A "Dismantling Rape Culture" Rating System for articles and books

Rape Culture: The Personal (fighting crocodiles) and the Systemic (clearing the swamp)

I am beginning to wonder about the purpose of many of the books and articles in the area of biblical scholarship that I have been reading over the last eight months. Are these works attempting to achieve anything vis-à-vis sexual violence against the believer in the pew or only within that group of Christians who make up its interpretative and authoritative strata? I have been finding it more and more difficult to understand how much of the biblical scholarship research that I read (or watch) would make a difference in eliminating rape culture in the long run. 

The #MeToo movement has made it possible to bring back into the foreground the problems of sexual violence in the Christian Bible, theology and norms. However, so often, what I am reading seems uninterested in solving the systemic nature of the problem in Christianity. The authors don't appear to be interested in or believe that there is a systemic nature to the problem in Christianity. If they interpret something differently, then that will be enough. 

You could say that they are worried about the crocodiles, and forget and/or rather don't believe that the crocodiles live in a Christian swamp created over the last 2,000 years. Furthermore, it seems to me that many of them are trying to reinvent the wheel. The ground-breaking work that was done in the late 1980s and early 1990s seems to have disappeared into thin air. What we need is a spaceship that is built on previous biblical and theological scholarship on sexual violence; in other words, a fundamental shift in the understanding of the nature of the universe and divinity. The historian in me sometimes wonders whether they even know that the wheel was already invented!!

So, as I start to put up a number of reviews, I will be asking two questions:

1. How useful is this book in the short run in the goal of helping Christian/ex-Christians survivors come to terms with the attempted murder of their souls.

2. How useful is this book in the long run in the goal of dismantling rape culture? 

My concerns in these books will be about addressing the problem of the systematic structure of rape culture in Christianity. This is a long term goal for many of us. However, helping victims in the here and now is also necessary. There aren't enough of us to walk the long path with the victims as they struggle to become survivors. I do accept that there are short term solutions that will help, and I certainly hope that they will change the face of Christianity in the future. 

Yes, I understand that many of you would argue that rape culture is not systemic to Christianity - stay tuned over the next few months or years to read why I believe that it is. 

My bottom line is that one needs to clean up the mess in one's own house before one even attempts to fix the world.

NOTE: The "dismantling rape culture" part of the title of the post comes from a 2021 book by Tracey Nicholls entitled Dismantling Rape Culture: The Peacebuilding Power of "MeToo". It is available FREE on Kindle or from other sources.

If you want to know more about Early Christianity and more, I recommend

LEARN FROM A NEW TESTAMENT SCHOLAR!

ONLINE COURSES BY DR. BART EHRMAN

And NO, I am getting any remuneration for the recommendation. 

They are very accessible even for someone who has no real understanding of Christianity. 

I would also recommend them for Christians who think they know about early Christianity.

I used his introductory textbook when I was teaching early Christianity - the first addition decades ago - these courses are not expensive and worth every penny, as far as I am concerned!!

New Covenant Theology: The continuing dissemination of Christian antisemitism

 Prologue to the review:

Why I ended up reading this book: These are two comments that I received from a reviewer regarding an abstract for a book that I was proposing to write dealing with the issues of the Christian Bible and Rape Culture.  

Sentence from my abstract: This  monograph looks at the structural aspects of for Rape Culture in Christianity from the perspective of children who have been sexually abused within its environments.

Comment 1: What about those who argue the opposite? E.g. Helen Paynter in 'The Bible Doesn't Tell Me So'? [today's response from me: in an abstract??]

Comment 2: How can you adopt this perspective? What is your legitimacy or authority in doing so? [today's response from me: have you not read my dissertation? or some of my published articles? again: in an abstract? and furthermore, Helen Paynter is legitimate and has authority because why????? she's a Baptist pastor???? she has a PhD in biblical studies???]

Since I hadn't read what Helen Paynter says in her 2020 book, The Bible Doesn't Tell Me So: Why you don't have to submit to domestic abuse and coercive control, I decided that I would look at it. It was not available through Interlibrary Loans, so I stuck it in my shopping cart. However, the book that is being reviewed below, God of Violence yesterday, God of love today?, was available through ILL, so I ordered it. I was horrified at its implicit/explicit antisemitism. I have since removed the 2020 book from my shopping cart. If it is available through ILL at some point, I will order and read it and answer the first question, specifically.

Title: God of violence yesterday, God of love today?: Wrestling honestly with the Old Testament

Author: Helen Paynter

Publication: Eugene OR: WIPF & Stock, 2019

The Rating System: Not really applicable to this book since it does not deal with intimate partner violence, rape culture or with sexual violence of any sort. However, I have serious reservations about this book that will be discussed below, so I thought that I might as well discuss it.

The Review:

First, as the author makes clear "This is a Christian enquiry into the violence of the Old Testament." [p. 16, italics in the original] 

This book reeks of new covenant theology and this was the starting point for Christian anti-semitism beginning in the "New Testament". I doubt that the author would consider herself an anti-Semite but that is the implication when the "God" of the Old Testament (and no, she does not use Hebrew Bible) is the flawed understanding of God that has to be explained and it is only through Jesus that we can clearly see the good God. The heading for this section of her book reads: The Fullest Revelation of God is in Jesus.

To quote: "We begin with the presupposition that we know God is good because we have seen him revealed in Jesus Christ." (p. 16)

To quote: "If we have not formed an opinion of God that is shaped by the biblical testimony that he is altogether good, then such texts do not present a conundrum. But because we have encountered Jesus Christ and studied his words and life and death, they cause a difficulty." (p. 17)

The assumption here is that if you only read the "Old Testament", your view of "God" would be flawed. Does this not imply implicitly, if not explicitly, that anyone who is a practicing religious Jew has a flawed religion or a flawed understanding of the revealed "god"? Of course it does!

There are two sections at the end of the book under the heading, Interpreting these texts today (pp.154-155). The first points out "that when we  attempt to teach them [that is, children] within the fuller context of scripture , where God is clearly not always on Israel's side, and that we do not encourage children to roll in the blood, as it were". (quotes Is. 9:5 at the end of this sentence) The second segment warns "readers not to equate "ancient Israel" with "modern Israel". Now, since she has been proof-texting throughout her book, I will offer only one text in rebuttal: Gen. 15:17, which reads: "... On that day, Yahweh made a covenant with Abram, "To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphra'tes, the land of the Ken'ites, the Ken'izzites, the Kad'monites, the Hittites, the Per'izzites, the Reph'aim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Gir'gashites, and the Jeb'usites. (RSV)" The following is a link to a map with discussion that charts this verse: Greater Israel map. This is what "text-proofing" gets you! If you are a biblical fundamentalist, then the only answer to Gen. 15:17 is that of new covenant theology!

The book is full of texts proving that the violence in the Christian Bible has a purpose in God's plan. As I read it, she must believe that by quoting violent verses/passages from the "New Testament", as well as the "Old Testament", she is showing a balanced view to help questioners realize that the "Bible" must be seen as a whole (because, of course, it is God's revelation to human beings).  

I could match Paynter prooftext for prooftext but I won't. I was partially raised religiously in a fundamentalist Baptist environment (preached a sermon at Galilean Bible camp on hiding your candle under a bushel and played the piano for services, attended  DVBS,  was a member of ISCF, YFC (our team made it to the Ontario championships for a memorization of Scripture competition ("New Testament"). Mind you, this means that, rather ironically, when scriptures come to the forefront of my mind even today, they are first and foremost in the form of the King James Version) and various revival meetings). My parents didn't see the harm in it, I suppose. However, as soon as the United Church opened a summer camp, that's where my sisters went.

Concluding Remarks: This book contains many of the problems that I believe are, at their core, harmful to a healthy Christianity. There are other issues that I could bring up but I am only concerned with antisemitism as the substrata to the whole book. The problem is that what this book brings to the table is a rather skillful intertwining of the Christian Bible, Baptist theology and its form of new covenant theology. And this is how Christian antisemitism continues to be disseminated.

Glossary:

New Covenant Theology: This is Christian theology - direct from the pages of its primary text. It is embedded in most forms of Christianity whether acknowledged any longer or not. It says that all of the previous covenants that Yahweh/God had with the ancient Israelites that one sees in the "Old Testament" (testament being another word for covenant) are superseded by the "new covenant" that Yahweh/God instituted by the death of Jesus (var. his Son, God himself incarnate. etc.) dying for our sins. And the "New Testament" is where we find this! It is not "new" as some of the Internet links suggest but that is neither here nor there. There are various forms of this. However, in none of them do the Jews come out well. [It can get very complicated but this is the gist of the belief.]

DVBS: Daily Vacation Bible School

ISCF: Inter-School Christian Fellowship, an organisation for high school students within the school

YFC: Youth for Christ

Séminaire de Chambly: un autre supérieur oblat dénoncé

 Yet another one!

For those who read French. This is an interview with one of my closest friends in this fight to rid Christianity in all its forms of the scourge of the theologies that allow this type of child abuse to flourish.

Sometimes it feels like a lonely fight; sometimes we get really, really tired of the fight. Nevertheless, we continue to trudge on through the swamp.

Proof-Texting: Everybody Does It!!

 First let's look at two definitions of proof-texting.

"Proof texting is the method by which a person appeals to a biblical text to prove or justify a theological position without regard for the context of the passage they are citing. ... Yet, while the method of proof texting can be problematic, nevertheless theology must still maintain a thoroughly biblical character." (Theopedia) [Missing text is an example of the worst of proof-texting according to the author of this post] Emphasis mine. This post leads to a myriad of explanations about the different problems - there seems to be an agenda behind all of the links, but it still has a lot of useful information about the problems of proof-texting.

"A proof text is a passage of scripture presented as proof for a theological doctrine, belief, or principle. Prooftexting (sometimes "proof-texting" or "proof texting") is the practice of using quotations from a document, either for the purpose of exegesis, or to establish a proposition in eisegesis (introducing one's own presuppositions, agendas, or biases). Such quotes may not accurately reflect the original intent of the author, and a document quoted in such a manner, when read as a whole, may not support the proposition for which it was cited. The term has currency primarily in theological and exegetical circles." (Wikipedia) I would add the exegesis is far from "value free". 

This is a predominantly Christian issue at this point in time, although in the future, I can see it being applicable to the scholars from other religions who are parsing their own religious texts. From the ultra-conservative to the ultra-liberal, Christian theologians, pastoral counsellors, biblical scholars of all genres, as well as pastors can be accused of proof-texting. It is the nature of the primary text - The Christian Bible (which includes The Hebrew Bible and The Jesus (et al) Bible, as well as the Apocrypha in some forms of Christianity) that causes the problem, of course. It contains myriads of contradictory statements because the texts are from different genres, different time periods, different theological points of view, all of which can create very different understandings of the texts themselves and allow for radically different understandings of the core message of Christianity (if there can even be a core message).

These contradictions have been a problem from the beginning of Christianity. The church fathers were wrestling with this problem. They truly believed that all of the texts were divinely inspired and ultimately determinative for understanding "god's will" for believers. And that all the Scriptures could be harmonized. This was the assumption of Saint Augustine of Hippo, and moving forward to the Reformation period, Jean (John) Calvin to name two theologians who gave it a try. From a humanistic point of view, some of their solutions are dreadfully awful. Just saying!

The problem as I see it is that any "proof from the text", whether regarding "domestic violence" or whether Jesus was "a prophet, an apocalyptic, a fundamentalist, socially progressive or prosperity gospel supporter (see Matt. 25:14-30)" can all be proved and disproved by scriptural texts. Hence the dilemma that Christians find themselves in, particularly those who are trying to change things in the realm of violence - sexual or physical, systemic (war) or individual (gender issues). As long as The Christian Bible is considered to be "the revealed word of god" and it just has to be interpreted correctly, proof-texting will remain the bug-a-boo of Christian theology.  

Here are three of my posts that address this issue in one way or another.

Tangential Issues #3: Five Essential Questions from "Christianity, Patriarchy & Abuse"

 I have decided to focus on book reviews for the next little while. Yes, I am back writing the blog with more consistency. I have created a "dismantling rape culture" rating system to use as I analyse these books. More about that in the next post. 

Some questions that will be in the back of my mind as I write my reviews come from the book where my first ever published article appeared. That article is still close to the most downloaded and quoted work that I have published over the years. It vies with "Remember the Good, Forget the Bad".

In 1989, five essential questions were put to readers of Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse: A Feminist Critique (p. xv) that are still relevant. They are as follows with my comments as of the day that I publish this blog post:

1.        1.  Is patriarchy inherent in Christian theology? My Comment: Can we replace patriarchy with "rape culture", which is what I am primarily concerned with? The latter term is even more of a red flag. Whatever you call it, my answer would be yes - even today. [This was published three years before Elisabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza coined the term, "kyriarchy" in 1992.]

2.        2.  Can we call our “corrected” Christianity Christianity? My Comment: Many of the articles in the original book offered alternatives to the prevailing theologies on whichever issue about which they were writing. Today we can read “queer theology”, “feminist theology”, "biblical feminist scholarship", and “liberation theology” to look for examples of  "corrected Christianity". The question is still relevant and as of my readings to date, it is hard to find anyone who really deals with that question. The problem implies questions of definition, essential beliefs, foundational texts, etc. or "who owns Christianity?".

3.       3.  Is there an essential message of liberation in Christianity that runs counter to patriarchal oppression? My Comments: This is the question that was and still is addressed by liberation theology. If this question left out the word, essential, then I would probably answer, yes. Certainly, this is a debatable issue. My question is: "What happens to the dispossessed when they become the possessors of the power that oppressed them?" The problem hasn't been, and I would argue, won't be solved by giving women positions of power in any of its institutions, although that is a start. The patriarchal structure of the texts is so embedded in Christianity that even the liberation theology message is bounded by the will of its god who "giveth and taketh away(KJV)" (adapted from Job 1:20-22 NRSVUE).

4.      4. Why do we struggle so hard to remain within the tradition? My Comments: This is so easy to answer. The existence of the Christian God is embedded in children from the day that they are born. The monotheistic Christian god, no matter what denomination or interpretation has one quality above all else that makes it hard to leave the tradition: that god is personally involved in their lives. Furthermore, if the first twenty years within the system was not blighted by abuse, then  one's community was critically important to shaping your life. Thus, challenging your community is like challenging your whole life. As those who read my blog know, this is a struggle that I have had to work through all my life (still working on that one!). I can only say that being raised is the United Church of Canada was a godsend, whether I knew that at the time or not.

5.   5. Is there anything worth saving in the Christian tradition? My Comments: I am sure there is. Which parts are worth saving is a debate that has been ongoing since Christianity's beginnings. The problem is the Christian Bible itself. If there is no Christian Bible, does Christianity even exist? Well, of course not. The problem is that these texts are foundational - but are they revealed by the deity? And what does "being revealed" even mean? Few of the answers to the latter two questions are as clear as the 1992 statement from the United Church of Canada: "The Word of God, in every case, is larger than the text of the Bible." There is also this from the 2023 UCC website. Their statement of faith with respect to the Bible says: “The Bible is the shared standard for our faith, but members are not required to adhere to any particular creed or formulation of doctrine.” It's a beginning.

So, parsing Pope Francis on sin and homosexuality.

 I seem to have missed putting this on the blog. Pope Francis says that homosexuality is not a crime but it is still a sin.

Then he needed to clarify what he meant by that: he meant sin as in "any sexual act outside of marriage is a sin". Pope Francis clarifies comments on homosexuality: One must consider the circumstances. 

What does this really mean? That if homosexuals get married with the church's blessing (holy sacrament of marriage), then homosexual acts are not a sin?

There are problems with the questions from Outreach, in the first place. Question 2 is problematic and I quote: ""Being gay is a sin," which, of course, is not part of church teaching." Say what? Has Humanae Vitae been struck down? Has the longstanding position that marriage is "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve" disappeared? I think not.

An interesting blog post comes from New Waves Ministry (Building bridges between the LGBTQ ministry and the Catholic Church since 1977). I just add it here because it shows just how difficult this issue is within Christianity, much less the RCC. "50 Years Later, Lessons from "Humanae Vitae" Debate readily Applicable to LGBT Issues". And this also highlights just how divided the Roman Catholic Church is on this issue.

Pope Francis is doing his best, I think, to change the channel on LGBTIQ issues but he needs to do a lot more and he doesn't have much time. The next Pope could well reinstitute reactionary thinking on this subject. If fact, if history tells us anything, then that is what will happen.

Like all good stories, this one has a twist!

It is now time to tell the story of why it took me so long (the full 7 years) to finish my PhD. It is not every jot and tittle about my journey researching, analysing and writing the dissertation - that was never the problem as we shall see. 

In 1985, I finished my Master's on a high - Joachim Jeremias prize for best student article coming out of the MA (published in Second Century a few years later). For reasons unrelated to this story, I couldn't leave Ottawa. There was no possibility of doing a PhD in Intertestamental in either university in Ottawa, so I switched gears.

For the PhD, I was going to look at physical child abuse and Christianity. As I started the research, Phillip Greven's book, Spare the Child: The Religious Roots of Punishment and the Psychological Impact of Physical Abuse came out. While I was unimpressed with his Freudianism, the book said everything that I was going to argue in my dissertation. Switch gears!

I decided to focus on the sexual abuse children in Christian environments. "A blessing and a curse!" The kindest thing anyone said was "Go ahead but I don't think there is anything there!" This was the chair of our department at the time (Dr. Roger Lapointe), who was gracious enough to say, "Well I guess you're on to something." when the Mount Cashel scandal broke.

A couple of years in, I had finished course work and needed to do a colloquium about my topic, my hypothesis, etc. The room was packed. One of my professors (New Testament from my MA - a different horror story for another blog) stood up and gave a diatribe about how there was nothing there and I couldn't prove anything, and how did I every think there was a dissertation here. My flippant reply was "Well, if there isn't a dissertation, there'll be a damn good book!" My dissertation supervisor was not very happy with that reply, of course. Other than that, there were positive responses and questions.

Note: everyone including my dissertation supervisor had been trying to get me to do something else, something more palatable, I suppose.

Note: I had already delivered a paper at the AAR and it was published in Patriarchy, Christianity and Abuse: A feminist critique in 1989 prior to the next step. I had also published papers in Second Century and Women at Worship.

The next step was my comprehensive exam. This is where the real problem began. First, you need to understand that I had no say in the composition of my PhD committee, nor would they be readers of my dissertation. It was composed of  a Roman Catholic priest, Rev. (Dr.) Norman Pagé (the chair), an ex-nun, Dr. Elisabeth Lacelle (a Roman Catholic theologian), and Dr. Robert Choquette (ex- RC military chaplain and Canadian religious historian). I submitted the first proposal, then a second one, then a third one. All were rejected by the committee with various unhelpful comments which I followed as best I could. After the third rejection, on the advice of my supervisor, I tried to have a meeting with the chair of my committee. He wouldn't answer emails, phone, etc. I went to see Elisabeth (who was now Chair of the Department). Her response was that she didn't know but Dr. Pagé said it wasn't good enough (and basically that was good enough for her). So I went to see Dr. Choquette. His first response when I asked what was wrong with my proposal, was "Don't know, looked good to me". Then he sort of backtracked and said maybe I didn't show that I knew the difference between Protestants and Roman Catholics well enough. My response was, if I didn't know that, I shouldn't be in this program. He laughed. So no satisfaction.

I then decided that I was handing in no more comprehensive proposals until someone could tell me what was wrong with the preceding three. My supervisor was not happy but I stood my ground. So I continued to write the dissertation, pay my fees, raise my children, interact with my husband and my friends, work in the AIDS hospice, teach part-time, in other words, live my life.

In the 7th year (1993), I let it be known around the office that I was considering suing the department. Lo and behold, I received a letter from the Chair (still Elisabeth) with the date for my comprehensive exam, the names of my interrogators (LOL) and could I please send them in a proposal, which I did. The exam went off without a hitch, I handed in my dissertation with the required 5 copies in August 1993. Then my mother took me on a trip to Israel. When I got back, it seemed that my dissertation had got "lost in the mail" (of course, I had handed it in to the department in person). Never mind, they sorted it out, I got feedback from a couple of readers before the defense. At my defense, I had a psychologist, an anthropologist, a sociologist and a feminist theologian. Highlights were when the psychologist said that she had never thought of it like that but when she started to look at her childhood, she found other examples, like St. Agnes. The anthropologist and the sociologist got into an argument about my analysis of Leviticus on incest prohibitions and blood rights. The feminist theologian was the hardest on me. She said that my theology was all over the place - what could I say, I was raised in the United Church of Canada noted jokingly by all my colleagues as the home of the "bouncing ball of theology". And any specific form of Christian theology was not the point. It was more complicated than that, of course, and my defense of my position was obviously satisfactory.

The decision was that I had to expand my conclusion (which had been deliberately perfunctory for reasons too long to put in this blog) and the PhD was mine. I expanded the conclusion and I received my PhD in 1994. Burnt out was the only way to describe my state of mind. I wanted little to do with formal academia ever after.

Then 11 years later almost to the day of my defense....

THE TWIST:

Priest charged with sexual assault [1976-2002 Page] - RCC. Boys.
CANADA - The Ottawa Citizen by Dave Rogers Saturday, April 09, 2005
A former high-ranking official in Ottawa's Roman Catholic archdiocese charged with sexually assaulting boys has been sent for a psychiatric examination after he grinned and giggled in Gatineau court yesterday.
Police arrested Rev. Norman Page, 73, at his Chelsea home on Thursday. He faces two charges of gross indecency, two counts of sexual assault and two counts of attempted sexual assault on juveniles between 1976 and 2002.
Sgt. Manuel Bandeira, of the Municipalite Regionale de Conte des Collines police, said yesterday the alleged sexual assaults involved boys between the ages of 14 and 18, and took place in Chelsea, where the priest lives, and in the Laurentians.
Before his retirement, Father Page was director of the Office of Liturgy for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Ottawa.
He also taught religious studies at the University of Ottawa, lecturing on the history of religious architecture and sacred art, from 1965 until his retirement in 1997.

Yes, it's true. The Chair of my PhD committee was a child (juveniles) sexually abusing priest. My best friend notified me of the arrest. My supervisor emailed that it must be nice to be vindicated. Really! Too little, too late! She hadn't been overly supportive of my work (again, another story - won't make it onto a blog though).

I will leave the reader to come to their own conclusions. For me, I had my explanation.

Wrong is Wrong : A few comments re the Dalai Lama

Dalai Lama apologizes after video shows him kissing boy, asking him to 'suck my tongue'

 I can't make this an "I told you so" post because this blog has been focused on the religious culture that that I was raised in. I come from the belief that you clean up your own house (Christianity) first before you try to change other people's houses (every other religious system in the world). Divine sanctions and such!

Just a few things to say: 

1. No religious system is devoid of the abuse of children - physical, emotional and sexual. Power makes a person think that they are above the norms of the general populace - that they are exceptional. 

2. Religious systems are set up to make "worldly abuse" something that people have to accept - it will be better in the next life - or worse. 

3. Remember "Don't buy Thai". (this Wikipage is in desperate need of amplification but I don't have time to do it at this point) You probably don't. But I do because I was a voracious reader and fan of the writings and activism of Andrew Vacchss. Here is a link to his official website, The Zero. Thailand, a devout Buddhist country was (is?) the accepted hub of child sex tourism.

Oh no, my class on the History of Religion is going to be so much fun in the fall (irony, sarcasm and all that).

Tangential Issues 1: Groundhog Day anyone!

 Backgrounder to this label. A few months ago, I was asked if I wanted to put together a book proposal and I said yes very quickly. My response rather surprised me because I had, to a large extent, decided that I really had little more to say that I hadn't already said - either academically or in this blog. When people ask why I wasn't still writing, presenting or at least researching in the area of Christianity and child sexual abuse and all the issues surrounding that focus, I said "why bother", nothing has changed, not really. And I don't need the grief! However, I said "yes" to creating a book proposal. I have begun to do my reading  (there is a lot to catch up on) - classes are done, only marking which is not as consuming as teaching. What I have found so far is that, in the end, I was right, nothing much has changed where the big issues are concerned. Things are more informed about "sexual abuse" and "domestic abuse" issues (we can thank #MeToo for that), but I feel like I am Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. Been there, done that and it is once more into the breach.

I have found a few things that give me some hope that there will be a shift a-coming but I doubt that I will see it. I figure that I have about 20 years left - give or take - and as long as "the Alzheimer's" doesn't get me, I will still be doing this and hopefully, die with "my boots on".

 I am not talking about what I will propose because it is very specific; so the purpose of this label is to write about things that come up that are related to the topic but are really tangential because, if I don't, they will drive me crazy. 

This morning I woke up to a wonderful email from a student in my class who thanked for me everything that they had learned over the term. It was quite lengthy and brought tears to my eyes. The course was on the history of women in the pre-industrial world and focused on the "creation of patriarchy". Emails like this are one of the things that keep me going and make me realize that yes, what I am teaching does have an impact that changes things, even if in very small ways for one person. That is all I can ask for. 

1. Tangential issues are not triggers. They are issues that are coming up as I read these academic tomes (books, articles, blogs, podcasts, etc.) that are not clearly germane to the topic that I want to address in my book proposal. They just make me angry or sad.

2. Need for external support systems. I have found a therapist to replace Neville who died a few years ago. He will now be my "on-call" support system should I run across triggers related to my childhood sexual abuse as I am doing this work.

In future posts, there are already topics that have come up that I want to write about. "Vicarious trauma" and "Witnesses" the latest buzz words for avoiding pain (I'm such a cynic!); "Triggers" and "Trigger Warnings" - I have a draft post that needs to be finished and will come under this label - for example, I will write about how I deal with those in my classroom; "Theory" - how that box is a real problem; and finally "Stigmas", which will be a re-visitation of my very first post. Maybe I will start another "label" called "They mean well, but..." 

Once more, into the breach!

Because It's 2016: Part 2

From my blog on the Cologne attacks. It has some relevance to the societal constructions that allow the blame-shifting to victims to be the predominant construction of western society (I won't discuss other societies - "clean up the mess in our own house first, I say").

Sometimes the legal system is just an excuse to avoid dealing with the larger social presuppositions of our society. It is the legacy of our western history - scapegoating has been the answer for so long (bah, humbug to René Girard), it is time we really tried to get rid of the larger social construction that enable it.

If we don't then we are all enablers of these travesties of justice.

Comments to my Facebook post:

Male Friend 1: Ok, ok...but it's interesting - and significant - that both the defence attorney AND the law professor that CBC had on as commentators for the decision agreed that it would have been nearly impossible to obtain a conviction on the basis of the evidence as presented and cross-examined! So is this the court's fault or the crown's?

Like · Reply · 38 mins

Sheila A. Redmond The Crown Prosecutor's Office did not represent the women in the best way possible. And no I still do not think that it was predominantly the prosecutor's fault - there is a flaw in the system that has a hard time in a patriarchal society to avoid "blame-shifting" to women (or to male victims) in cases of sexual assault. It is the most blatant example of a society that is still stuck in its Christian past (almost 2,000 years to get it right - enough time already) with respect to women, and over issues of sexuality. Western society - whether we like it or not - is still embued with the fundamental constructions of Christianity as the foundation of its legal systems & we know what Christianity has thought about women over the centuries.

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Male Friend 2: All the judge stated was that there is reasonable doubt as to his guilt based on the conduct evidence and inaccuracies of the accusers. When witnesses/victim testimony are the only evidence, and that evidence is deemed to be less than credible, there is no other choice -in law- than to find not guilty.

It is a fundamental principal of justice that you cannot lock a person away without certainty of guilt.

Agree or disagree with the judge on a personal level, but in legal terms he made the only available decision. This is a justice system dispute, not the makeup of the bench.

Like · Reply · 7 mins · Edited

Sheila A. Redmond We'll get to that shortly - the great gender divide on this issue is becoming clearer

Comments on the Attacks in Cologne 2016

I am not a fan of this particular podcaster, but this one is sort of on point - whether or not anyone likes it. I could make some minor complaints about the podcast, but why bother?

These attacks in Cologne took me back to 1976, when I was sexually assaulted in a Paris by 5 young Algerian men. While I didn't know it then, now I can only call it the precipitous cause of the breakup of my first marriage. The nightmares, the PTSD (although we didn't have a word for it then), caused a chain of events that made us a statistic that society didn't have back then either.

What horrifies me most is that people don't want to acknowledge that beliefs have real world consequences. The excuses that believers come up with for the negative attitudes towards women are sometimes beyond the pale. Unless religious systems change - and Christianity is not exempt - religious systems that make women second-class beings subject to men will always implicitly - if not explicitly - condone the actions of these sexual predators - because in the end, women are supposed to somehow change their behaviours, their demeanors, their clothes, their jobs, where they go, so that they won't be attacked.

The secular world is trying to change this - not very successfully, at times. Nothing excuses sexual assault on anyone - but women are the primary victims. The fact that most religions see women as appendages to men is something that is so embedded in worldwide cultural structures that people don't even see where it comes from - or they don't want to see - they just find "secular" justifications for what were originally god(s)-driven justifications.

There are times when I truly wonder whether anything will change. Then I tell myself that at least it is better than it was in 1976. It is no longer just an individual problem - although there is still resistance to the idea - there is acceptance that this is a societal issue that has to be dealt with at that level. Can I applaud the Ontario government for its ads on sexual harassment and violence against women - I can. Will it change things? In the long run, I think that it will. Social marketing can work - the justice system just has to follow up.

Now that that is out of my system, I will go to sleep.

https://youtu.be/WJCLSZm4-LA

"Suspension of Belief": Just Because It's Difficult, Doesn't Mean You Shouldn't Try, Post-Modernism Be Damned!

There are things that I often ponder.

1. Why do I bother getting into these discussions with believers? I understand getting into these discussions with other academic biblical scholars, but believers? Where is my head? I suppose that old habits die hard; I miss the academic arguments of my Master's and PhD - there is no one where I am now that has any academic biblical historical critical (or for that matter, broad philosophical) training, much less the old style training in the importance to attempt "epoché" in all that one does:

1. Epoché (ἐποχή epokhē, "suspension") is an ancient Greek term which, in its philosophical usage, describes the theoretical moment where all judgments about the existence of the external world, and consequently all action in the world, are suspended.

We used this term to describe what we try to do when we anaylse biblical texts. We divest ourselves as much as possible of our ingrained belief systems and view the texts as if we had never seen them before or heard them interpreted. It comes out of the phenomenological philosophy of Edmund Husserl, described sometimes as phenomenological reductionism.

Why do people think that everyone else's belief affects their translations, but not their own analyses - even when they don't go to the primary sources? Not that there is one definitive ancient Greek, Aramaic, ancient Hebrew text of the different books of the "Christian" Bible. There is no "original". Even if we could lay our hands on the actual original handwritten text of, for example, the Gospel of John, and the written documents of the historical narrative within it (the basis around which many of us agree that the Gospel of John was built) and where it was written, what would, and would not, this tell us:

• for me, the biggest would be the ur-text - what a goldmine that would be (just saying)
• we could follow the changes in the text throughout the western historical tradition more clearly (I can always dream)
• we would have more definitive answers (maybe) about the mindset of the original author
• we would have a greater understanding of the community out of which it came
• we would have greater understanding of the development of the belief system that became Christianity, and it's move away from the Judaisms of the first two centuries
• however, it would tell us nothing about "truth"
• it would not explain whether or not Jesus was divine; it would only tell us that a group of people had ventured further down that murky slope of integrating Greek and Roman mindsets with Jewish mindsets, and then started to argue (rather cautiously, I would suggest) that Jesus was divine

What does it matter, actually, whether the translation is "Jesus (the Word) is "a" god or Jesus (the Word) is god? On such things, heresy is always born. (Gospel of John 1:1-18)

Of course, the caveat is that I don't believe that Jesus was in any way shape or form "god". He was an (Israeli, Jewish, Palestinian, Galilean - take your pick) prophet in a long line of prophets (the Isaiah school/tradition?) . That he spoke "truth to power", I have no doubt. That is, after all, what a prophet did. His tradition led him in a certain way, in much the same way as the Buddha's tradition formed the structure of his dissent with the faith. The one was Jewish, the other Hindu - but they were both men.

Then again, if we're "proof-texting" this, one only has to go to the Gospel of Matthew (at least the ur-text one could say). Matthew 1:1-17 makes it clear that there are 42 generations between Abraham and Jesus. including David and Solomon. So, apparently, Jesus was descended from the kingly line of David biologically. This means that Jesus can only be the biological offspring of Joseph, but wait ....... Of course, shortly thereafter (v. 18 ff) we get the Holy Spirit story of Mary's pregnancy. I don't have time (nor the inclination) to go into the wherefores and whys of biblical criticism on the subject. Suffice it to say that there are plenty of commentaries, articles, and books dealing with the issue, if one were so inclined to follow up on this topic

Then there is the difference between exegesis and eisegesis - I'm not going down that rabbit hole right now - probably later - stay tuned.

Why this post?

1. Triggered by a conversation that I had last night.

2. Avoidance of writing the review of Sacred Witness that has been burning a guilt hole in my mind. It deals with all of these issues.

3. Avoidance of writing the reviews of Ray Donovan that are also burning a hole - but a different kind of hole, more emotional than anything else. The third season has started. I began my post yesterday morning and it sat there all day. It is call "Disconsolate". I wrote a few things, then it kept rolling around in my head - all the things that should go into the post. I just couldn't get around to writing them down - avoidance, emotional pain. Needless to say, but it was a difficult first two episodes. The next two have been easier. It will be up soon.

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This is an abomination in a western democracy

Ottawa considering hate charges against those who boycott Israel

"The government's intention was made clear in a response to inquiries from CBC News about statements by federal ministers of a "zero tolerance" approach to groups participating in a loose coalition called Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS), which was begun in 2006 at the request of Palestinian non-governmental organizations."

I could not believe this when I heard it on the news this morning. I was horrified. I am teaching a course on 20th century German history, and this sends chills down my spine. In my course, I am trying to get my students to understand how good people slowly walked into participating in one of the more horrific events in the history of the world.

First, my positions & I do realize that I live with a certain level of discombobulation on the issue:

1. I would never take part in BDS (Boycott, Divest and Sanction), the boycott of Israel. However, it worked with South Africa and apartheid - but only after supported by western governments. In the final analysis, my position would be "a pox on both their houses".  When I think of what is going on there right now, I weep for all those that are displaced by war and for all the dead. On the other hand, the historian in me selfishly thinks about all the artifacts, and past worlds that are being destroyed. For better and worse, the ancient middle east contains the founding blocks of western and Muslim civilizations.

2. I am in total disagreement with the church that I grew up in (the United Church of Canada) and its one-sided position on this issue. I wish that they could focus more on forcing a solution rather than blaming one side more than the other. There is plenty of blame to go around, believe me. 

3. I do not support the building of Jewish settlements on the West Bank.

4. The situation is so f!@#$ing complicated. All parties need to be held to account, and that includes the west who set up this appalling situation in the first place. I cannot even begin to write about the historical mess that brought us here. I am only teaching one small part of that mess. 

5. Anti-semitism is a construct of Christianity. This is an unpopular position to take, but nevertheless, it is true, and, as such, those societies that are based on the Christian mythologies need to take ownership of the part that they have played in creating this mess. Christian anti-semitism has now morphed into a bizarre form of secular anti-semitism. The Jews are to blame for everything (for god's sake, even the American Indian Movement and some Canadian First Nations peoples jumped on the anti-semitic bandwagon - for example, somewhere on the AIM website is a lecture that smacks of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion - if it has not been pulled down, go look for it. As one of  my students said, "The poor Jews, they can't cut a break!")

6. I support the right of Israel to exist. My personal history does not allow me to do otherwise. I do not support the Fundamentalist/evangelical support of Israel - it is, in its own way, blatantly antisemitic. One day I will write about my trip to Israel with a bunch of fundamentalists (don't ask - just to say, that my mother really didn't know what she was getting us into), and (to keep it simple) its up front - "so sad that the Jews don't really belong on this land because they aren't saved, etc., and won't be there at the rapture" crap.

Books to read (with links to Amazon site):
Robert R. Wistrich's A Lethal Obsession
John G. Gager's The Origins of Anti-Semitism
William Nicholls' Christian Antisemitism: A History of Hate 
William F. Buckley, Jr.'s In Search of Anti-Semitism

HOWEVER:

1. Boycotting the state of Israel is an acceptable method of protest. We live in a democracy and we can choose to boycott who/what/where we will. I joined a general boycott of Thailand over its lack of child sexual abuse legislation. At a personal level, I no longer watch Woody Allen films - I can't stomach them. The  same goes for Michael Jackson's music - no matter how good it is, I just can't stomach it. I don't expect anyone else to think the way that I do; I don't believe that those who think differently are "evil".

2. The state of Israel just voted in Netanyahu with enough seats to create a government with the extreme right. So much for a peace settlement. "Dead to me, they are dead to me" was my immediate response. (As I said, discombobulation)

And the point that takes us right back to the beginning of this post:

3. The Harper government is beginning to do to the Muslims, what the Germans did to the Jews. This government is turning the Muslims in Canada into scapegoats, creating a fear scenario that could easily morph into something far more sinister. Just look at their position on Omar Khadr. It is a slippery slope as history tells us. There is, in all humans it seems, an unease about the "other", that is, those who don't look like us, don't think like us, don't believe like us. The NSDAP tapped into that in Germany; and Harper is certainly trying to tap into that in the Canada. Is it "needless to say", that Europe and the United States is falling into that trap as well. It is a thin line that they are all walking.

4. In part, this is a political move on the part of the Harper government to appeal to its fundamentalist Christian right base. (Although I do believe that there are other personal motivations by members at play) The religious justification for this one-sided extreme support of Israel is based in a particular millennial interpretation of  "the end". Some of them believe that all the Jews will convert - thus heralding the end; some of them believe that the final battle between good and evil will be fought on the fields of Megiddo (as my mother said on that trip to Israel - "you don't really believe that" - out loud, on the bus - I had to shush her with the "yes, Mom, they really do").


As Bonhoeffer told us: “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”  There is also the unattributed adage: The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. Those who are boycotting Israel are doing something in the face of what they see as evil. That I find their position at times extremely simplistic and problematic is true. But people like to take simple black and white positions - demonizing the other is so easy. Something has to give in the Middle East - the backlash against modernity will not go on forever - the violence and cruelty of the medieval period of western European Christian society can be considered somewhat analogous to what is going on in the "middle east". Of course, that is for next semester's history course.