Still the WOMAN

Still the WOMAN....

“Two things everybody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin' fuh theyselves.”
                                              ― Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God

I grew up Catholic, and I never thought very much about the very distinct ways that gender roles were ‘acted’ out until I was about seven years old.  Every Saturday I attended Catechism classes, and every teacher I had was a woman, if not a nun. I questioned why the only time I saw the sisters was on Saturdays, but other than that they were virtually invisible.  The only time we ever saw our parish priest was if we were required to go to confession, but I noticed just like many traditional households, the women seemed to do all the work, but the men got the ‘special’ treatment.  They (the priests) received substantial monetary gifts from the more affluent parish members during the holidays, people cooked meals for them, and there often invited into the homes of those in our church community, but our sisters, the nuns, never received such treatment.  I can remember Sundays where collections were taken up for the abbesses three times because people would not give.  Such occurrences were commonplace back then; as a child, I was unable to deduce what these things meant.  Surely, these things could not be a reflection of the character of the nuns I knew.  For the most part, they were kind gracious women who worked very hard to make sure that the over 100 plus children in our parish had what we needed week in and week out.  I didn’t get my first male teacher for catechism until I was about to make my confirmation.

Much like  my church community’s implied gender roles, my grandmother was the one who kept our house running smoothly; she worked all day as a domestic and came home and cooked, cleaned and took care of her family. No matter how late my grandfather came home, she would get out of bed, heat his food, fix his plate, and place it before him, yet I had never seen my grandmother given the same treatment ever.  More importantly, even as a child, I knew there was something that did not seem right about the expectation that my grandmother should have to get up no matter what time it was to fix dinner when her husband missed dinner with the family because he did not come home after work.  Perhaps this was part of what Daniel Moynihan  would justify as “ just making Black men the Lords of their castles, so everything would be all right.”[1]

The last few weeks of class have dealt specifically with the issues that have persisted in the African American community for over one hundred years, if not more, but there are two things that people never seem to talk about without placing blame or listening objectively, and that is matters dealing with gender-oppression in the African American church and the break down in relationships between Black men and women.  Gender-oppression in African American churches is so prevalent and such a customary practice that no one seems to notice it or see it as problematic at all in fact, in many instances the Bible has been used in order to justify the woman’s role or lack thereof in the church.  What is imperative for us to realize is that gender oppression is no different than the racial oppression or “othering” that bell hooks talks about in her essays.  Oppression-whether it be racially motivated or dictated by gender, is a threat to one’s humanity. Gender and racial oppression are birthed of the same system of white patriarchal domination.

When I moved away from home for my undergraduate studies, I visited several Black churches in the city. I can recall having many talks with my roommate about the importance of aesthetics as part of the ritual for the Black church on Sundays, particularly on holidays such as Easter, Christmas, and Mother’s Day.  I understood that for many Black folks, Sundays were a transformative time where African Americans were actually seen; the imago dei was recognized within them and in that sacred space they became people who mattered and were not judged based on skin color or their profession.  It was also a place where African American men were able to secure patriarchal privilege denied to them elsewhere.[2]

But, the church also became a place where they were given dominance over women that some felt they had been denied in society and in their own homes.[3] It was amazing to me how sermons were preached that stated that the man was emphatically the “head of the household” and many pastors suggested that the reason many of the women in the congregation were not married was because they would not let men be men.  Such attitudes feed into the notion that all women are cookie cutter carbon copies of one another who share all the same ideals and values because all women value the same things.  The women who do not fall into this ‘norm’ are labeled antimen and antifamily if they choose lifestyles that do not include marriage and children.[4]  Are such views and beliefs fair and do they foster spiritual growth of women and men in faith communities when such attitudes are perpetuated? In many of these same communities, “the call” is something that is considered off limits to women;  “the call” is seen as something reserved strictly for men, black women preachers are sharply and persistently questioned.  Sometimes it is implied that a sincere “call” has by definition, a detrimental effect on the black woman preacher’s sexuality. [5]  Essentially what is viewed as a gift or blessing from God when received by a man, is questioned as being authentic in regards to women.  Are we not all made in the image of God?  So, as an extension of His personhood, why wouldn’t women be called to preach?  Essentially such beliefs that women have no place in the pulpit, in essence says that God only delivers His word through men and only calls men to be His vessels.

Interestingly enough, I attended a church where a young man said that he was called to preach and the pastor and community were very supportive during the time that this man was to be ordained.  Never once was it mentioned that this man had been living with his girlfriend for three or more years; however, when one of the women in our congregation who was a part of the leadership team and board of elders was questioned about whether see was practicing abstinence in her relationship with another church member she was dating and she confessed that they had not been, the pastor condemned her in a sermon. While he never uttered her name, the congregants knew whom he was referring to.  What does this say about the moral fiber of the church and how it reflects our everyday lives and beliefs in regards to the sexes?   My intent is not to bastardize the church or condemn it as if it does no good, but until we can look at gender inequality as a problem in the church, particularly, the Black church, there will continue to be a gap in the camaraderie of the men and women and we will all continue to be victims of a system that was designed to divide us.

Part of the healing that needs to take place in the African American community is that men and women need to see that we are victims of the same system of oppression and that if one of is oppressed, it impacts us all.  I think this is what bell hooks communicated very well in her essays.  Othering is not just about gender and race; it is about control.  It is a way of ensuring that those who are in control, stay in control even if that means pitting African American men and women against each other through the patriarchal system constructed by whites for whites; in the, Black men still are not seen as men and Black women are not acknowledged at all.

  As I read about hooks’ encounter with the young white jocks who walked down the sidewalk talking about their plans to fuck as many girls from other racial/ethnic group as they could “catch’ before graduation… with Black girls were high on the list[6] , I realized it was no different than the preacher in the scenario in Dr. Riggs’ book where the pastor who has just asked for deliverance for sexual immorality has a conversation with another man of the cloth who asks, “Who was that woman with those big breast who was sitting on the third aisle to my left?...Damn, she kept shouting and jiggling so much I almost lost my concentration.”[7] In this case, the pastor agrees to try to hook the “Revrun” up with this woman.  Both of these scenarios seek to exploit women, just in different manners, but for virtually the same reasons.  It is this type of patriarchal privilege that has “control of women” as its core value, and this value cannot exist in the same context in which justice is a core value without creating a context that breeds moral corruption.[8]

As a community, we must evaluate the lenses through which we view each other and ask if we see that person first and foremost in the image of God, and acknowledge that each person is unique because they are a creation of God regardless of their sex or race.  Lastly, I would like to pose a scenario that I have talked about with our professor, Dr. Floyd-Thomas.   What would happen if women stopped going to church?  What would happen if they decided not to tithe or requested their husbands not tithe, if they didn’t sing in the choir, conduct Sunday school, preside over the nursery during service, not help with the Lord’s Supper on 1^st Sunday, and refused to spearhead any of the bereavement committees or cook meals for the church?  Imagine…perhaps women should stand in solidarity all over the country one Sunday and boycott their church service.  I think perhaps then gender roles would be viewed a little differently. 

I would like to do much research of the prevalence of existing gender-oppressive attitudes in today’s society within the Divinity School.  I don’t think such attitudes will change until people are willing to see and admit that there is a problem.  More importantly, I would like to see how many women support the gender restrictive roles in the church because many of the women in the scenarios we read about were complicit in the behavior of the men in their respective churches or were accepting of the status quo.   I think the attitudes of women and men need to be transformed in order for any true changes to take place.

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[1] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 41.

[2] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 80.

[3] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 80.

[4] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 53.

[5] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 82.

[6] Bell hooks, Eating the Other, 23.

[7] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 74.

[8] Marcia Y. Riggs, Plenty Good Room, (Eugene:  Wipf &Stock, 2003), 86.