alright...i'm giving myself a chance

today i started p90x...i'm pretty thrilled about this. feel free to follow my journey:

http://dan-p90x.blogspot.com/

sweet...

A feminist reaction to the parable of the Prodigal Son

The story of the prodigal son from the Gospel of Luke is one of many encounters with a male-centered parable told by Christ. This furthers the overall masculist ethos of scripture. Christian scripture was written by men toward a male-dominant society featuring a male incarnation of Christ which presents problems for women who study and encounter the Bible. As Rosemary Radford Ruether points out:

“A Christology that identified the maleness of the historical Jesus with normative humanity and with the maleness of the divine Logos must move in an increasingly misogynist direction that not only excludes woman as representative of Christ in ministry but makes her a second-class citizen in both creation and redemption.”¹

The theme of redemption found in the parable of the prodigal son is directly related to the fact that the story uses three male characters as the primary players. What if the prodigal child was a daughter and not a son? The society around which scripture was built would never have seen a daughter even consider demanding an inheritance because she would not be entitled to one. If the daughter were to leave sans inheritance then return, the interaction between father and daughter would have possibly looked something like this:

“When she had spent what little money she had, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and she began to be in need. No one would hire her because she was a woman from a foreign land, even though she was well versed in the tasks of daily life. So she was forced to sell herself into prostitution because her body was the only thing the men around her saw as having worth. She was beaten, abused, and raped for a poor pittance. And eventually she thought, were she to return home, at the very least she would be welcomed into her father’s house as the lowest of servants.

But as she approached the house, she saw no sign of her father, for he was not waiting daily for her return. When finally she approached the door of her father’s home and knocked, a maidservant answered. The daughter asked to speak to her father, her head hung in shame. Her father appeared and she fell to the ground before him and cried out, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your daughter. I have lived in debauchery and have sold my body to save my life time again.’ Her father stood in silence before her, his eyes narrowed and his arms crossed. ‘Let me be as one of your hired maidservants. I will work your fields and tend your home.’ But her father no longer saw his daughter but a harlot who had given herself up, and he called for her to be stoned immediately in accordance with the law.”

A woman may be able to see the lesson of redemption being presented through the parable today, but the concept of redemption by a father for sins such as those implied of the prodigal son would be unimaginable for a woman during the time of Jesus. There would be no inheritance. There would be no forgiveness.

There is, however, redemption of a different kind. Mary Ann Beavis reminds us of a passage earlier in the Gospel of Luke where a woman of ill repute comes to Jesus and anoints him with oil.² Even if the story was told about a prodigal daughter who was stoned upon her return, I believe Jesus would have been able to reframe that story as one of empowerment for women. When the woman comes to anoint Jesus in the seventh chapter of Luke, he lifts her up before all the men around and anoints her with his words of affirmation. This outpouring of love shows that God is not like the father in my story but rather the father that girl deserved. Whether the prodigal child is male or female, the divine Parent waits with outstretched arms and runs to meet the long lost child.

[1] Rosemary Radford Ruether, Sexism and God-Talk: Toward a Feminist Theology (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993), 134-135.

2 Mary Ann Beavis, “’Making Up Stories’: A Feminist Reading of the Parable of Prodigal Son,” in The Lost Coin: Parables of Women, Work and Wisdom, ed. Mary Ann Beavis (New York: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), 99.

thinking about sam

about once a year i write a blog about my friend sam. he was my best friend in elementary and middle school, and we remained close through high school even though our paths didn't cross as much as either of us would have preferred. sam is a marine. he has been fighting in iraq since december of 2006. i have been lucky enough to maintain, at the very least, occasion contact with sam via facebook. in december when we went to the birmingham airport to pick up my sister and brother-in-law, i was surprised to run into sam coming home on furlough. i was exceptionally awkward in the encounter because i just could not believe he was there.

it is no secret that i do not agree with the wars being fought by the united states in the middle east. i am a bit more of a pacifist than i was just a few years back and grow ever more so each day. i kind of feel like jesus meant turn the other cheek, and, as cliche as it is, when jesus said "love your enemies" he probably meant don't kill them.

but you will NEVER hear or read any words of mine that lambaste the men and women who are fighting in these wars. they are brave, and they are consistently in harm's way. it takes immeasurable courage to go out and fight a war, to volunteer your life so utterly.

my roommate blake and i have been watching an unhealthy amount of band of brothers, one of the most brilliant cinematic masterpieces i think has ever been attempted. it is a gritting, true look at the 101st airborne division (easy company) from world war two. every time we watch an episode, i think about sam. i think about the difficulty of every day life as a soldier. i think about how it must utterly suck to be so far away from home and comfort. i think about the courage it takes to get up some mornings.

i said it last year when i wrote on this, and i'll say it again. sam is a hero. and sam gives me a face to think about in the midst of any criticism i may have about the war. seeing his face in my mind reminds me that war is not an abstract concept. it involves that concrete lives of many people, including people who are very dear to me.

so thank you sam.

i can hear jesus saying...

“I can hear Jesus saying to us:

I was sick with AIDS and you did not visit me. You did not wash my wounds, nor did you give me medicine to manage my opportunistic infections. I was stigmatized, isolated and rejected because of HIV/AIDS and you did not welcome me. I was hungry, thirsty and naked, completely dispossessed by HIV/AIDS and globalization in my house and family and you did not give me food, water or any clothing. I was a powerless woman exposed to the high risk of infection and carrying a huge burden of care, and you did not come to my rescue. I was a dispossessed widow and an orphan and you did not meet my needs.

We, the church of this era, will ask,

When Lord did we see you sick with AIDS, stigmatized, isolated and rejected, and did not visit or welcome you in our homes? When Lord did we see you hungry, naked and thirsty and did not feed you, clothe you and give you water? When were you a powerless woman, a widow and an orphan and we did not come to your rescue?

The Lord will say to us, ‘Truly, I tell you, as long as you did not do it to one of the least of these members of my family, you did not do it to me.’”

-Dr. Musa Dube in "Theological Challenges: Proclaiming the Fullness of Life in the HIV/AIDS & Global Economic Era"-