Musings for the Soul
VOICES OF SOPHIA REFLECTIONS
June 2007
“Thinking About the Relevance of VOS in My Everyday Context”
by Beth Beall
I recently moved to El Paso, TX, where my partner, who usually serves local churches as a PCUSA clergyperson, is carrying out orders as a mobilized Army Reserve chaplain for a year. We have been worshiping on Sunday mornings with a PCUSA congregation in our neighborhood. The congregation deals with challenges that resonate on some level with those of other congregations: it is a small (approximately 30 in worship) body comprised overwhelmingly of very elderly people in a rapidly changing community (in this case, a border city)—a body that is trying to be hopeful rather than despairing, trying to be transformational rather than survivalist.
Participation in this particular congregation in this particular community at this particular time is prompting me to think anew—and again!—about the ministry of Voices of Sophia. Does VOS have relevance for this congregation, where the urgent concerns of many congregants are the lived realities of aging and even dis-abling bodies, and where the urgent concerns of the wider community are immigration and the local economy? Should VOS have relevance for this congregation? While I struggle with such questions, I find that I can affirm this much for now: that VOS can have relevance for me as one body in that congregation, to the extent that VOS can resource and empower within/through me vital, transformative, and boldly christian feminist ways of seeing, speaking and living in this particular place at this particular time.
- How, for instance, might VOS resource and empower me to see on Sunday mornings many aging bodies that are loved by their Maker, while also helping me to see through christian feminist eyes how the health and well-being of those bodies have been impacted in complex ways by matters of class, race and gender? And how might Sophia then use my new ways of seeing and thinking?
- Or, how might VOS resource and empower me to look through christian feminist eyes at the communion bread being broken in worship, so that I cannot help but participate in re-membering the missing and/or murdered bodies of women who are my immediate neighbors in Juarez, Mexico?
How do you imagine that Voices of Sophia might resource and empower vital, transformative and boldly feminist christian ways of seeing, speaking, and living in the contextualized ministries of your life? Maybe those around you, to include those who are around you in worship, have never heard of Voices of Sophia. And to be honest, maybe they do not care one way or the other about Voices of Sophia. Still, how might this body called Voices of Sophia resource and empower you as you walk and dance and wrestle with Sophia, wherever you are at this time and in this place of your life? And, importantly, how might all of us who come to be empowered and resourced in our diverse life-ministries by the christian feminist community of VOS offer a re-formed vitality, relevance and prophetic witness within the larger church and world?
Take a moment and share your thoughts about any of this by sending an email to voicesofsophia2@yahoo.com. And feel free to disagree! I speak as just one of the many voices who together form Voices of Sophia. In early August, 2007, the VOS Central Team will gather in Denver, Colorado for a planning retreat. We will be looking ahead to such events as the General Assembly and PW Gathering breakfasts. We will also be thinking about how to make the VOS website not only more user-friendly, but also how to make it a rich resource for those who seek and/or want to share liturgical, sociopolitical, artistic-creative and other contributions. We want to create possibilities and resources that resonate with your own particular efforts and desires born of your life with/in Sophia-God, as together we seek to transform the Body of Sophia-Christ into a justice-loving and joy-full community of equals. We would very much like to hear from you.
May Sophia grant you new eyes to see and new boldness to live, wherever you are right now…and may VOS somehow play a part in that.
***
Voices of Sophia Reflections May 2007
SOPHIA SPOTTED IN.....BARRANQUILLA
by Anne Barstow
I work with the Presbyterian Church of Colombia to provide volunteer Accompaniers for its members who receive threats. These good people are threatened because they insist on working and speaking out for the 3 1/2 million Colombians displaced by violence. Many of the displaced live in wretched refugee camps, including many around Barranquilla. In Colombia, believe it or not, working for human rights can put you on a death list.
Sophia had not manifested herself on my first three trips to Colombia: the sheer urgency of survival in the groups I visited had pushed feminist issues aside. When I asked groups, even feminist groups, about sexual violence, they replied, "It is hard to talk about such things here," or even denied that there was a problem. Having edited a book about rape used as a weapon of war (War's Dirty Secret), I found this hard to believe. So when Alice Winters (the only long-time PCUSA mission worker in Colombia) asked me recently to speak to a group of women in Barranquilla about violence during armed conflict, I readily agreed. I would challenge their denial.
I arrived, however, unfit to speak about anything, having fractured my shoulder two days before. I tried to beg off, but Alice said, "The women are already invited," and what could I do? She generously offered to let me sit down as I spoke and to help out if the pain-killers I was taking addled my brain. The audience consisted of women from local Presbyterian churches and secular women's groups. I arrived, sat down, and hoped that Alice as translator would have the energy to carry the lecture. I surely did not.
I laid out my research on how the presence of the military increases sexual violence against women and emphasized the U. N.'s investigations into how the sex industry preys on desperately poor women in refugee camps the world over. As Alice and I found an urgent rhythm with which to talk about painful things, I sensed the audience "leaning in." Far from needing to be prodded, they "got it" immediately. Indeed, when I finished, they were on their feet, woman after woman telling of the work their groups do: opposing the sexual slavery practised by the armed groups, running rape hot-lines, counseling for rape victims, documenting sexual crimes, and more. The head of the Presbyterian Women's groups asked: "In this struggle, what role are the world's churches playing?" In honesty I had to admit that, except for isolated cases, the churches were doing little, that given their enormous potential for influencing public opinion and for shaping morality, their efforts amounted to little; mostly they are silent, or else they actually blame the victims. One woman summed it up: "In Colombia today there is endless violence - and we women are its chief victims. To be a woman is to be a target for violence. We are the only ones who can change this."
At that, I was so moved that I struggled to my feet and said, "I am standing in order to honor your work. Yes, we are the only ones who will change the situation of our sex, and you are doing it." As the audience broke up there was high energy, networking, people meeting new allies. I realized that Sophia was here, speaking two languages but evoking the common understandings that all women have about being victimized for our gender. There is no mistaking Sophia's presence: she releases in us determination, cooperation, and - joy.
***
“HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!”
Voices of Sophia Reflections, April 2007
by Mary Ann Lundy
I write this just before Holy Week and the journey toward Easter. Signs of Spring are emerging from the lifeless brown earth. Spring...the time of change, of new life, of transformation. Every year we experience Spring as a kind of miracle of transformed life..
All of this has prompted me to think about change, how we strive to bring it about, how it sometimes happens despite our efforts, how it sometimes doesn’t happen when we have worked hardest and what our response to it is in our lives as well as in the groups and institutions in which we live our daily lives. How much is brought about by hard work, effective analysis, strategies for use of power, and how much do timing and readiness to listen and move affect the outcome? And how important is it to be within the system rather than outside, on the margins?
I have most often felt that it is important to work from within institutions to bring about change. Thus, it was at the point of Reunion and the bringing about of the PC(USA) that we rejoiced at the forming of the Women’s Ministry Unit, one of nine programmatic entities of the General Assembly Council. We were four constituency groups–Women of Color, Women Employed by the Church, Justice for Women and Presbyterian Women–all with goals and programs for particular groups of women within the church and yet together supporting and enriching each other. Yes, and at times competing with one another! But we were sure we could change the face of the Presbyterian Church(USA). Together we felt we could change the church by being at the decision-making table!
We took on all the important issues -- fair representation in the structures and in society, we published booklets and guidelines on non-sexist and inclusive language, on electing women as ministers and elders and advocating for them, on dealing with racism and the intersection of racism and sexism in church and society, we wrote tracts and study materials on women in the Bible and on womanist and feminist theologies. We ran conferences on economic justice on the Mexican border and in mid-America on reproductive choice for women and advocated effectively on overtures and resolutions. Not by ourselves, of course, but with partners who were also a part of the structures at national, synod, and presbytery levels. We saw changes and we experienced setbacks, but we never doubted that we could change the church. It would be a different place for women in 20 years–in 2007…
So it is now 2007 and the Women’s Unit, its constituency groups and large staff is long gone. What do you think has been the real impact of its work in your life and in the church? To be sure, there are more clergywomen now, but do they have any easier time finding positions suited to their abilities? Has the language of worship and liturgy changed? Is God still “He” on most Sunday mornings? Are we still fighting at every General Assembly to keep our pro-choice stance? We do have more women in leadership roles, but are our structures more open to advocacy for women and their gifts? Is the church more involved in ministries of justice for the marginalized? Are the salaries for men and women equal for positions of comparable worth? Do women support women in positions of leadership more than formerly? Well, you know the questions and there are many more.
There are changes and there are losses.
And we find ourselves in 2007 in Voices of Sophia fighting many of the old battles. Only this time we are on the outside, marginalized to the edges of power. What are we to think about this? Does it mean we give up trying to bring about change to a system that has again marginalized women? Do we believe that it is impossible to bring about change from outside the system, that bringing about change is only effective when working from within the institution?
We learned many things from the Re-Imagining event in 1993, an experience that was so life-changing to individuals and so threatening to the churches. In the aftermath of the institutional responses to Re-Imagining, the Re-Imagining Community that formed made the decision to be free and independent of all church affiliation or support and we watched amazed as the movement grew and became more creative. We learned there is an integrity and focus possible when being independent of religious institutions, of making decisions that were not dependent on budget and priorities imposed by churches.
Thus I come to Voices of Sophia. Though we may often wish that we were part of the power system and decision-making processes within the GAC, we do have the benefit of being an independent voice that is not controlled by the institution or co-opted by those in power. We are free to continue the work for those changes that were begun 20 years ago. We are able to speak clearly with the voice of wisdom and in so doing, we may be able to do more than we can imagine to bring about real and lasting change in the church. May it be so!
***
VOS Reflection for March 2007
“Retirement: Answering the Invitation”
by Janet L. Bohren
Last month Beth Beall wrote a very thought-provoking reflection in which she challenged each of us and Voices of Sophia to tell a different story - a story of how we follow the Sacred into the unknown “where transformation is the only reality and where the only rule is Love.” She asked what invitation has drawn us into the story of Sophia-Jesus, and what invitation “are you and Sophia working on together to share with others these days?”
All of these questions are helping me begin to make sense of how I will spend my time of “retirement.” A bit of my recent story: Because of a bothersome eye problem affecting my reading ability, I had planned to retire in August of 2007, but last June 2006 my College Dean offered to buy out faculty who wanted to retire in Sept. 2006 or Jan. 2007. I accepted for the Jan.2, 2007 retirement date, so that I could help some of my doctoral students finish before I left. This worked out fine.
Four years ago, thinking ahead to retirement, I began a Master of Theological Studies at a local Methodist seminary, United Theological Seminary in Dayton. My classes have been exciting and I have met so many wonderful people from many different denominations. But the question still remains, what am I going to do with this degree? I am specializing in studying about women: feminist theology, history of women in the church, the stories of women in the Bible, feminist biblical interpretation, etc. My dream has been to put online what I have learned for others to learn and share or to help others do this (since my professional educational work is in instructional/ multimedia design). I don’t know if this will work out. But there is so much wonderful material to be known at the lay level and so few know it or really have access to good teaching and resources.
And so as I read Beth’s February reflection, I asked myself, how can I help Voices of Sophia tell a different story? How do we make this organization a meaningful voice for all of us, all of us in our great diversity of interests, works, and passions? Perhaps we should ask, how can VOS reframe all our stories into a new, powerful one for today’s church?
In retirement I am looking to tell a new story, one that will ring clearly with the love and wisdom of Sophia-Jesus. My story should be linked to your stories. Our stories should tell a wider story, one that will bring new ways of seeing how the love of God is working in the world through women.
Why should people join our group? What is our particular frame or lens for looking at the church and the world and all the many issues that plague humankind? How can we help VOS reflect with its new stories the transforming love of a resurrected Christ and an ever-so human Sophia-Jesus?
***
Voices of Sophia “Reflections,” February 2007
by Beth Beall,
interim convener of VOS Central Team
The Source of Life birthed Voices of Sophia at a time of crisis in the Presbyterian Church (USA). Our website (www.voicesofsophia.org/WhoWeAre.html) points to a couple of the times since that birthing when God/ess has again given VOS opportunities in the midst of denominational crises to speak of, stand for and prayerfully witness to the same Holy Spirit who lived in and compelled the ministry of Jesus. This Holy Spirit, who calls all of creation into the holiness, i.e., the wholeness, of partnership has called VOS to resist dehumanizing denominational practices of patriarchy—practices whose pulse and reward are God-defying domination.
Given the persistence of patriarchal impulses and practices, it is likely that VOS will have continued opportunities to mobilize and advocate in the midst of denominational crises for a long time to come. Indeed, such mobilization and advocacy in the face of crisis seem to be two of Sophia’s gifts to us in relation to the larger church. And yet, when the tide of a particular denominational crisis has receded, who are we then as Voices of Sophia? I have been a part of Voices of Sophia since 1998, and what I have observed is that, even when denominational crises are at a lower tide, this body continues to be one that gives voice to an array of critically important issues. Voices of Sophia, rooted organizationally in the Presbyterian Church (USA), cares about so many things in the world as a body living in partnership with God/ess! I did not attend the October VOS Gathering in Santa Fe, but notes shared from a brainstorming session at that gathering reflect the dazzling array of issues to which VOS members bring commitment and care: women’s global health issues, including reproductive health; issues regarding the power of language; issues of racism; legal issues; domestic violence; poverty issues; and more.
Sometimes, the range of this body’s care and passion for the world (expressed in such issues as those noted above) can feel unruly and counterproductive, at least to this member of the body (me). So many issues, so little time, not enough people! How do we focus…how do we prioritize…how do we get more folks involved in working on these important issues…??! Peter Sawtell, Executive Director of Eco-Justice Ministries (www.eco-justice.org), recently shared with me some words from Bill Moyers. (For the full text of Moyers’ piece, see www.tompaine.com/print/the_narrative_imperative.php.) Moyers notes that, in light of the recent changes in Congress, “progressives and liberals of every stripe” are working to get their lists of priorities on the table. “But,” says Moyers, “America needs something more right now than a ‘must-do’ list from liberals and progressives. America needs a different story” (emphasis mine).
I’ve been thinking a lot about Story lately, and so Moyers’ words spoke strongly to me. I work in the area of children and family ministries at a Presbyterian Church. In worship each week we have a segment during which I invite people to come forward and hear a Bible story. And each week, I close that segment with the words, “Hear this story, and let this story change you.” The longer I do children/family ministries, the more I learn that families with young children who enter a church community are rarely looking for an extra activity in their already-busy lives. Rather, I sense and am learning to trust that what their/our hearts are quietly and persistently calling out for is a different story by which to shape and live their/our lives. Learning to trust this is difficult work for me, indeed, as it’s easier for me to plan a snappy, consumer-pleasing program than it is to ask, “How can I create spaces and opportunities where families with children can hear and touch and sing and be transformed by the story that compelled the life of Sophia-Jesus?”
As I noted above, I look at Voices of Sophia and see that God/ess has gifted this body with the passion and ability to mobilize and advocate when patriarchy lashes out in our denomination. And I look at Voices of Sophia and see that the Source of Life has gifted this body with the passion and ability to care for and work on a wide array of critically important issues, in season and out of season. While it can sometimes seem, at least to me, that we lack sufficient focus, prioritization, effectiveness, etc., when we do not have an obvious crisis to deal with, Moyers’ words about Story reminded me that perhaps our immense breadth of passion and interest and ability is not something to bemoan and try to “narrow” in the name of effectiveness. That is, could it be that our array of concerns ought not to be seen primarily as discrete issues that require prioritization—a prioritization that in turn feeds an anxiety over the need to find more people to carry out all of the important tasks for each item of priority? Could it be that our “deep and wide” care for so many important issues is a Sophia-inspired manifestation of the hunger and thirst for a different Story in our church and in our larger world?
I offer no answers, but my head and heart are full of questions, and I invite your conversation. How can we as Voices of Sophia create spaces and opportunities within our churches where people can hear and touch and be transformed by a contemporary and relevant incarnation of the Story that was incarnated in the life of Sophia-Jesus? How can our God-inspired passions for shalom (for well-being and wholeness in all areas, including health issues, environmental issues legal issues, economic issues, educational issues, liturgical issues, and so on) not feel like yet another “must-do” list for ourselves and for others who are already weary and heavy-laden? Instead, how can the passions and interests and issues of our body, i.e., of Voices of Sophia, be transformed in Sophia’s hands into exquisite invitations to live another Story—a Story where water is turned into wine, where fishermen leave the economic security of the greatest catch of their lives (Luke 5) to follow the Sacred into the unknown, where transformation is the lived reality and where the only rule is Love? What does the invitation look like that has drawn you into the Story? What kind of invitation are you and Sophia working on together to share with others these days? What might the invitation that Voices of Sophia creates for the Presbyterian Church in 2007 look like?
***
Dear Friends of Sophia,
Beginning in May 2006, Voices of Sophia will produce a monthly publication called Reflections that will be available both on the VOS website and as an email distribution.
Our hope is that Reflections will be as varied in form as the expressions of Sophia’s wisdom. At the same time, Reflections will be unified by the common thread of writers bearing witness to what it means for them to live faith-fully in this world as co-creators with Sophia-God. A Reflections writer might, for example:
- Offer a book review that includes womanist-informed questions and insights.
- Analyze a current event at the local or global level through christian-and-feminist lenses.
- Share a piece of poetry, indicating how that poem spoke to her as a faith-full mujerista.
- Present feminist insights on a biblical text or liturgical practices.
- Consider the everyday struggles the writer experiences between the theory and the practice of dismantling oppression.
Each reflection piece should be no longer than one single-spaced typed page.
IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO WRITE FOR REFLECTIONS, please send a note to voicesofsophia2@yahoo.com and indicate in the body of the email the month(s) for which you would like to write, beginning with June 2006 (as May is already covered). You will be contacted shortly regarding your designated month and submission details.
IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO RECEIVE REFLECTIONS VIA EMAIL, please send a note to voicesofsophia2@yahoo.com and indicate in the body of the email your interest in subscribing (free of charge, of course!) to this distribution list. Be sure to let us know if we ought to send Reflections to an email address other than that which you use to reply to this message.
Thank you for joining us in this adventure! Peace, joy, and more joy to you,
Beth Beall, VOS member and Reflections coordinator
Judy Strausz-Clement, for the leadership team of VOS
