Emerging Women

As 2007 draws to a close, I’ve been having fun looking at the blog stats from this past year. Compared to last year, we tripled our yearly hits and have guests from all around the world. We continue to grow as a community and I have been blessed by the voices present here.

As we wrap up the year, I would love to hear what sort of things you all would like to see for Emerging Women (on the blog or otherwise) in the upcoming year. Suggestions for activities, blog series, book discussions? What could we do to serve you better?

And to end the year with a bit of fun, I’m including a list of interesting search results that land people on this blog. There are of course typical google searches that land people here, but these stood out to me in their unique, strange, and disturbing ways. For some I can’t quite understand how they brought people here and for others I wonder what possessed someone to google that in the first place. Anyway, I found it amusing. I’ve added my comments on a few in italics.

“negative stay at home dad”
“how to stop seeking approval be honest”
“emerging church medical marijuana”
“pastor likes to watch me breastfeed”
“woman who like being gluttons”
“christian statistics lust bra straps”
“what james dobson thinks of the book eat, pray, love by elizabeth gilbert” because he does my thinking for me…
“ads of strong women seeking sissy males”
“emerging supernatural woman”
“encouraging the feminine side for my sissy son”
“god created men stronger than women heart wise”
“the women who got burned by aliens” ummm…
“why beer is not meant for women”
“emerging women 7 ups for christ”
“god im growing a second butt”
“looking for appreciation poems for pastors wives”
“sermons on why God created women” why, could you not come up with a good reason on your own?
“what god thinks women should act like within a relationship”
“husband wife switch bodies”
“should a christian woman show cleavage for an evening function?” because Google will give you the right answer…
“what makes you think about those things” Because Google can read your mind when you are really vague
“man but not women is made in the image and likeness of god”
“red wine vinegar pimples”
“2007 50 sexist woman” I assume they intended to type “sexiest”, but I had to laugh
“a peaceful meaningful pagan christmas”
“can a hostess throw a person off a airplane” hostess???
“advice expectation from a submissive woman from a master”
“laws prohibiting women from eating chocolate in public” this is just scary
“names of women who have done something great in 2007″

and (Jemila) just so you know, the top three keyword searches that land people here are 1. Emerging Women, 2. Emergent Women, and 3. Butt Sex.

I hope everyone had a blessed Christmas. Although postponed a couple of days, I wanted to post the final post for out discussion of Scot McKnight’s The Real Mary. Most of this I posted on my blog last year after I first read the book, but I wanted to share these ideas here since the theme of how Mary gets portrayed is so prominant in the book.

What really intrigued me was the discussion of how Mary has been portrayed in art and how that has influenced our perceptions of her. Most depictions of Mary present her as emotionless, ageless, and weak in a pale blue dress. She is decorative, humble, and seemingly powerless. I had never been a fan of religious art mostly because of the way it portrays “holy” figures as disconnected from real life. The Marys in art obviously have not just given birth, finished a long journey, or had recently been on a roller-coaster emotional journey. They are not surprised by the appearance of an angel, are not phased by the request from God, and are not upset by a serious life change. And they are not the kind of women who could sing a politically revolutionary song like the Magnificat. Perhaps that is why when I first encountered Ecce Ancilla Domini by Dante Gabriel Rossetti I was drawn to it. Although it makes use of a lot of the traditional symbols associated with Mary, it challenges tradition as well. Of course in expected fashion it was rejected by critics of Rosetti’s day because it was new and different. Contemporary critics howled with outrage at the picture, denouncing it as ‘an example of the perversion of talent which has recently been making so much headway’. I liked it because it depicts a Mary who has emotions – who reacts in some way to the appearance of the angel and his startling request. Here she is scared to death, cowering in the corner, unsure of her fate. Rossetti (using his sister Christine Rossetti as a model) portrays a real person here and I like that.

But I’m not sure the portrayal is accurate. Yes, I believe there was surprise and fright involved in the encounter. But Rosetti’s Mary doesn’t look like she would willingly say “may it be to me as you have said” in response to this angel. This angel with the phallic symbol lily pointed at Mary’s womb seems to represent the worst form of male violence towards women. One is reminded of Yeat’s poem Leda and the Swan retelling the Greek myth of the maiden being raped by the god. But I can’t seem to figure rape into the Christmas story – the God I believe in (the God I want to believe in) is not like that. I have to think that Mary’s “may it be” was a true willingness. I like the description of Mary’s willingness from the poem Annunciation by Denise Levertov – “She was free/to accept or to refuse, choice/integral to humanness.” Mary knew what she faced, she knew the dangers and she still willingly accepted to bear the Messiah. As Scot McKnight mentioned “may it be” might be better translated as “bring it on,” this was a women with fire in her eyes ready to serve and serve big.

I like that vision of Mary. I like finding strong women in the Bible who aren’t afraid to challenge tradition and cultural assumptions in order to work for a greater good. I like that – that’s the Bible I want to share with my daughter. But I have yet to find it in art. What will it take for the concept of a strong and revolutionary Mary to enter the religious consciousness? What will it take for the church to accept a woman with fire in her eyes? Will she (they) just continue to be shoved out of churches or subdued and tamed? What will it take for Mary to be re-imagined by the masses? Given the church’s track record with women, I’m not expecting much. But this is a story I will tell – a picture I will paint differently.

My daughter performed in a production of “The Children’s Nutcracker” with her ballet studio this weekend. She was in her element. Take one girly girl and combine her with pink chiffon, sequins, lipstick and a chance to be on stage (and backstage) with her friends and you have all the makings for an ecstatic experience (at least in my daughter’s eyes.) She was not nervous and by the second performance was running around like she owned the place. (Not that I’m proud or anything but to see a picture link to the original posting on my blog here.)

As I sat and watched all four performances I became aware of an upwelling of emotion at various points. This was not an emotional response to seeing “my baby” growing up as I might have thought but something different and it took me some time to understand what I was feeling. Sitting in the darkened theater I felt myself immersed in beauty and abundance. As I watched these beautiful young people I was aware of just how privileged and fortunate they are. They are healthy. They have parents (or someone) who is committed enough to get them to rehearsals and make sure they have the equipment they need to participate. They are Americans so they enjoy a standard of living that is only a distant dream for many around the globe. They get a chance to learn to dance and to be surrounded by beauty. As I experienced Tchaivosky’s “Waltz of the Flowers,” enchanted by the music and the young dancers who looked very much like beautiful flowers, I found myself saying a prayer of thanks to God for the gift of beauty and music and the abundance that makes it possible for me to partake in such a feast for the senses.

The sweetness of the experience was tempered only by the knowledge that so many of our fellow humans will never know abundance but will spend much of their lives struggling just to have enough. The contrast of these dual realities brings to mind the story of the nativity in which the jubilant proclamation of the Angels to the shepherds regarding the birth of Jesus is contrasted with the humble stable which housed him and the violence that followed his life. We live in the paradox of “already and not yet.” God has already provided for the redemption and reconciliation of all creation and yet that work is not yet complete. Living with such abundance it is easy to stop with what we “already” have (most everything we need and much of what we want) and forget that so many do “not yet” have even the basic necessities of life.

I pray that the sweetness of our celebrations this holiday season will be tinged with the awareness of and compassion for those who do not live with the abundance we will experience in the next couple of weeks. I pray that their need will be before us, not to spoil our celebrations, but to remind us to be thankful and to motivate us to generosity and compassion as we seek to follow the one whose birth we celebrate.

Lord hear our prayer.

Oh my God.
I have just seen the most REAL and BEAUTIFUL telling of the birth of Christ.
Wow.
I’ve grown up hearing the Christmas story.
And that can be a drawback, because when I hear “and this shall be a sign to you, you shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger” I don’t visualize an actual Middle-Eastern manger, I visualize a 4th grade girl wearing a white sheet and a silver tinsel halo.
Nothing wrong with sweet 4th grade girls, but that image misses the beautiful reality of what really happened the night of Jesus’ birth. This movie brings it all back and makes it real.
Rent this movie this Christmas!
For me, The Nativity Story was a great way to gently push aside the evangelical traditional pageanty renditions of the story and see it again for the first time.-SW

“Oh my God, I’ve lost the Messiah!!!”

Can you imagine it? I can only begin to. The terror and the panic that come when a child is missing for even two seconds are overwhelming (and really, she wasn’t missing; you just couldn’t see her) …. but Mary, the mother of God, in full knowledge that her son was the promised Messiah – couldn’t find him. He’d been missing for almost a day before she realized He was gone. Can you imagine the questions and the worries that swirled through her head for the three days it took to find Him?

“What kind of a mother am I?” “How could He do this to me?” “What if something happened to Him?” “What will God say?” And then His answer… “Didn’t you know I would be in my Father’s house?” It seemed perfectly logical to Him… and it stopped Mary in her tracks.

Should she have known?

What has struck me as I’ve read McKnight’s book is the way that Mary’s understanding of Jesus shifted as He grew up and began to live into His destiny. Jesus knew the road He needed to take, but His mom didn’t always understand it. McKnight says, “We can understand Mary’s struggle. No one, including Mary, anticipated the kind of Messiah Jesus would become. Following Jesus proved as difficult for Mary as for Peter and for John the Baptist…and for the siblings of Jesus. Mary’s special challenge was to trust that the God who spoke to her in and through the Magnificat was at work in Jesus in his ministry and his mission. While the two visions of the Messiah – the one in the Magnificat and the one guiding Jesus’ public ministry – didn’t seem to fit, it was hers to trust that Jesus really was the Messiah.” (p. 85)

“Embracing a Messiah who would make death on a cross central to his role challenged Mary’s faithfulness more than anything she would face.” (p. 94) But she remained faithful, from the day Gabriel first spoke to her until the day she died…. “The Magnificat’s dream of a society governed by justice with peace streaming through the streets would come through the paradox of the Cross, the power of the Resurrection, and the life-giving creativity of the gift of the Spirit of God. The society Mary anticipated…would come to pass in the Church.” (p. 96-97) And Mary was right there in the middle of it. She remained faithful to what God had spoken to her, even when she didn’t understand what He was doing. That challenges me to question my own willingness to do that.

Just a couple of questions for discussion this week:

How has re-visiting Mary’s story in this book changed your perspective on Mary?

How has it challenged or encouraged you in your own walk with God?

And just for fun: how does McKnight’s portrait of Mary as a woman of faith, justice, danger, witness, sorrow, wonder, surrender, ambivalence, faithfulness, influence, and controversy measure up against the societal portrait we’ve been given by artists and musicians over the years? do you have a favorite painting or a favorite song about Mary that’s been either completely ruined for you or become more special, as result of what you’ve learned about Mary?

Is anyone else here preparing for a Christmas which will not be spent with your family?

This will be my third Christmas (in a row) away from my parents and siblings, and I’m a little homesick.