I'm reading Philip Jenkins' The New Faces of Christianity for Theology. And it occured to me, about halfway through his chapter "Women and Men" that the Bible gives few restrictions on women and the types of roles or jobs they should hold. It says that a woman should be submissive to her husband, it says that a wise woman looks well to the ways of her household, and that younger women are to be keepers at home, but it has more to say on a woman's behavior. Nothing about no college, split ends down to the ankles, flowery sack dresses, barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen. The strongest statement on feminine roles is that a woman is not permitted to speak in church--but there are plenty of other places that she can speak!
Motherhood as Surrender
My son is set to turn 2 before the end of the year. He's developed rapidly over the last few months after several slower-paced months of growth since he started walking in February. It really is marvelous that one's body can knit together another human being totally apart from one's own willpower. But amidst the awe, I've only seen one person acknowledge that bearing a child subtly changes a mother. (I don't remember whom, unfortunately.) Not just the physical changes or that a child "made me a mother" (a sentiment I don't embrace). Childbearing is a surrendering. Perhaps that's why so many fight against motherhood and why Shulamith Firestone believed that only surrogacy -- to a machine -- could make the sexes equal. Childbearing is a superpower too, but it is more of a surrendering. Sleep and sleeping positions, range of motion, energy, appetites, activities, perceptions of this or that body part, and time have all been circumscribed by a bein...
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