wfn.org | Breaking the silence: Chief of women's ministries program envisions

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Note #6807 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

new global women's theological conference
22-August-2001
01290

Breaking the silence

Chief of women's ministries program envisions 
new global women's theological conference

by Alexa Smith and Jerry L. Van Marter  

MONTREAT, N.C. - Mary Elva Smith, the new director of the Women's Ministries
Program Area of the Presbyterian Church (USA), said here recently that she'd
like to see the denomination push for another global women's conference that
she said will restore the validity of feminist theology in the church.

She said she doesn't want to allow the continuing backlash to the
legendarily controversial Re-Imagining God conference of 1993 to continue
silencing feminist theologians in the denomination.

That conference, which marked the mid-point of the World Council of
Churches' "Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women," generated intense
debate within the church after $30,000 in Bicentennial Fund money was used
to help defray the expenses of women theologians attending it.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was the only Re-Imagining sponsor to fire a
staff person as a result of the controversy.

"Re-Imagining was a turning point for women in the church, a flash point,"
Smith told the Presbyterian News Service in an interview after speaking to
clergywomen at pre-conference event at the annual Montreat Women's
Conference. "My goal is not to create another flash point, but to give women
an opportunity to come together as women theologians around the world  to
(contribute to) the wisdom of the larger church."

Spokespeople from the right - led by The Presbyterian Layman - objected that
a Re-Imagining conference speaker had questioned the historic interpretation
of at least one of the church's fundamental doctrines, the atonement; and
expressed revulsion at liturgies that celebrated the sexuality of women.
Probably the most provocative aspect of the conference was its repeated use
in prayer of the ancient name of "Sophia" to describe the wisdom of God.
Critics alleged that the women had been praying to a pagan goddess - a
charge conference organizers vehemently denied.

Smith, who attended the Re-Imagining conference, said the silence that
ensued in its aftermath was terrible. Although she didn't agree with every
speaker, she said, the sensationalized coverage of it was erroneous:   "I
was there, and what was reported was not what I experienced," she said.
Smith, who was then a member of the General Assembly Council (GAC), recalled
former General Assembly moderator Freda Gardner's comments to the GAC. In
Smith's paraphrase, Gardner said: "I'm sixty-something. I'm a professor at
Princeton Theological Seminary. And you still don't believe I can think for
myself."

That kind of (silencing), Smith said, was a slap in every Presbyterian
woman's face. "And I don't think we deserve that."

What does Smith want now for the Women's Ministries Program Area?

"I want them to be on the map," she told the Presbyterian News Service. "...
I want to make a place (where their) voice carries weight and has influence.
I want their voice to be heard for the good it brings, and as a challenge to
our weaknesses. I want them to be treated with a sense of equity."

Problems have plagued the women's program area at least since the reunion of
the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America and the
Presbyterian Church in the United States in 1983, when some constituent
groups which relate to the women's program area grew uncomfortable with
advocacy work that was built into the unit's structure.

Smith said she intends to be a reconciling agent, for the program area and
for the entire church, which is deeply split on issues running the gamut
from what is appropriate sexual expression for faithful people to unease
with a term like "feminist theology."

"I'd love to build a bridge" between such polarized groups as Voices of
Sophia, a liberal caucus that coalesced in defense of Re-Imagining, and
Voices of Orthodox Women, a conservative group that supports traditional
interpretations of doctrine, Smith said.

But even she admits that dialogue may not be possible between women who
disagree so vehemently simply because it is hard to sit down together and
authentically listen.

After listening to clergy women at the preaching pre-conference talk about
loneliness in rural parishes, the rejection of inclusive language and other
problems of women in ministry, Smith reaffirmed her support for "advocacy
for women in ministry in any form" - lay or clergy.

For now, she said, she is seeking suggestions from clergy and lay women
across the denomination as to how the program area can tackle the racism and
sexism that plague American society and many American churches.

Smith was the final speaker at the recent Horizons' Bible study conference
at Montreat, whose theme was Come to the Festival:  Esther's Message for
Such a Time as This, and her message was informed by her commitment to
feminism. She told about 250 listeners that they - like the Old Testament
women whose lives they had been studying - do have power.

"Vashti stood her ground; she found her voice and the power to stand up to
the king," Smith said. "Esther took power into her own hands to free her
people.  And we, too, have power.
"We often feel we have no voice," she continued. "... But we have to find
the courage to stand and face the acknowledged power of the king."

Smith admits that how and where to make that stand can be a tough call.

Vashti, after all, was the queen who simply told the king, "no," and refused
his invitation to appear at a drunken brawl wearing only her crown, at least
that is how some rabbis interpret the reference. The punishment for her
defiance was banishment, a penalty about which the text is clear.  Another
result was the issuance of a royal order specifying that men were the legal
heads of households in Persia.

Esther, on the other hand, worked quietly, inside the system, to subvert the
evil that was being done in her time - when men were hoarding wealth,
planning a pogrom to eliminate the empire's minority Jewish population, and
working to legalize the suppression of women (partly in response to the
Vashti fiasco).

Smith said the parallels with today are all too real. 

"The result of using your power always carries with it a risk," she pointed
out. "We are called to use our power with wisdom ... and to encourage and
support one another."

She said there is nothing inherently bad in feminist theology, no matter
what its critics might believe.

"Feminist theology is within the Reformed tradition, which is not [set] in
stone," she said.
"We're 'reformed yet always being reformed.' Feminist theology falls within
the Reformed tradition. ... It brings to it another perspective that needs
to be heard."

Smith said she is still formulating a vision for the Women's Program Area. 
"I'm called to be here and be faithful to where God leads," she said. "I
want to be a good listener, to not threaten by my presence either group. Yet
I want to stand firm so that women may have a voice (and an opportunity to
use) our gifted minds.

"The church needs us to be among its leaders as well as its doers."
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