-: Well thank you so much for agreeing to be interviewed.
Toddy, and if you could say your full name.
-: Rebecca Todd Peters.
-: Wonderful, and are you lay or clergy?
-: I'm clergy, ordained Presbyterian Church USA.
-: Thank you very much.
And when and where were you born?
-: I was born in Tallahassee, Florida
on October 13th, 1967.
-: Oh wonderful, and where did you go to school?
Graduate divinity school?
-: I did my undergrad at Rhodes College
in Memphis, Tennessee and then I did all of my
graduate work at Union in New York.
-: Okay, wonderful.
-: So I did an indiv and then a PhD.
-: Great.
What work or ministry where you doing
at the time of re-imagining?
-: I was working at the national headquarters
of the Presbyterian Church USA
in the Women's Ministry Unit,
specifically in the justice for women section.
-: Wonderful, and your title was?
-: Program assistant.
-: Great, okay wonderful.
And what work or ministry did you do after re-imagining?
-: Now hold on, now that you asked me that,
I think I was actually, now I have to think about this.
I might have been in seminary and gone back to re-imagining.
So I was program assistant for two years.
Okay so I wasn't program assistant.
This is good that you asked me this.
I was program assistant for two years
and then I went to seminary at Union for a year,
and then I came back because I got engaged
and my husband was in Louisville.
So I worked full time at the center again
and I got intern credit through seminary
for my indiv program.
And that would've, because I got married
two or three weeks after re-imagining.
-: Oh my goodness. -: So it wouldn't have been
that year that I was back doing that work,
so it wasn't the traditional
internships that were set up in the headquarters
which we had, I think, five of them at the time.
I'm gonna look at my CD again.
So while I was there, one of the projects I worked on
when I was in those first two years as a program assistant,
was to help start the National Network of Presbyterian
College Women. -: Oh yes.
-: And so, I came back and I was staff person for that,
the year that re-imagining happened.
So I'm thinking, I hadn't actually realized that
but I'm thinking that's,
and I don't know if I had a, what my title would've been,
I think it was coordinator, National Network of Presbyterian
College Women.
-: Okay, and you were just setting that up then?
-: No, I set it up so
I was in the program assistant position from 90 to 92.
And I started the network, working closely with
Mary Ann Lundy during those two years.
Then while I was at seminary, I staffed it part-time
and then I went back and staffed at full-time for a year.
And then I think I staffed at part-time
for about two more years, through the end of my indiv,
and then we were moving toward a full-time,
it needed a full-time staff person and so we moved it.
We were able to start build the funding
and build the model to hire someone full-time.
-: Oh okay, great.
And then your current position is?
-: My current position is professor of religious studies
at Elon University.
-: Wonderful.
Great, thank you.
And, when and how did you first learn about
feminist theology Toddy?
-: In college, so I was in college at Rhodes College
from 85 to 89 and while I was in college we had
an initiative to try to get the college to start
a women's study program.
And so I was reading some feminist theory
in various classes in college,
in english classes, in history classes.
But I only had one religion class
and didn't have any feminist theology
or feminist theory of any sort in that class.
But I was reading on my own, and so I think
Rosemary Ruth or I think Mary, the Feminine Face of God,
was probably the first book I picked up and read.
And I probably found it in a used book store,
so there was no rhyme or reason as to why that book.
No one said well
you should read this. (laughing)
I just picked it up and read it
and then began reading more on my own after that.
So that would have been in the late 80s
and graduated in 89 and went and worked in Italy for a year.
And while I was there I found out about,
or right before I left, I found out about these internships
in the headquarters in Louisville and applied for that job.
So you might like this story actually,
I was at Trianium and they have brochures
where they list all the young adult volunteer positions
and I had no idea what I wanted to do.
And so I was reading through this brochure
thinking oh well maybe something here will be of interest.
And there was this paragraph under the justice for women
office that said one person to work for the eradication
of sexism at all levels of the church.
And I was like oh God, I want to do that!
(laughing)
And it was the only year the ad ran that way.
-: Really? Oh my goodness. (laughing)
-: But it was Paul. (laughing)
-: Yes, wow, wow.
I have to ask, what were you doing in Italy?
-: I worked at the Guggenheim,
the Peggy Guggenheim Art Collection.
-: Yes! -: So in undergrad I was
actually an art history and a creative writing major.
So I thought I wanted to go into museum work,
and found out I didn't.
(laughing)
-: I think going to Italy and finding that out
is a good way to do it.
(laughing)
-: It was pretty good, it was a pretty good way to
figure that out.
-: That is wonderful.
Well if we could talk about how your initial involvement
with re-imagining happened.
-: So I was working in the office
from 90 to 92 and it was
an initiative that the Women's Ministry staff
was working on at the time.
So Mary Ann Lundy was the director of Women's Ministry.
And so I don't remember when in particular,
I just remembered it was one of the things that people
were working on at the time, in a sense that
I don't think staff time wasn't going toward planning it
but it was an event that was coming and we were
telling our constituencies about it.
We were building interest, we were trying to encourage
people to go attend and be part of it.
-: Yeah, and do you remember anything about what you were
hearing about it at that point?
-: They said it was really exciting.
Everybody in the Women's Ministry Unit
was very excited to have this international,
mostly national, but this big gathering where
many theologians and biblical scholars,
feminist would be brought together
really for the first time in any sort of
large scale way.
And so there was a lot of excitement about it.
People were really looking forward to it.
-: And so you went in 93.
-: I did, and I encouraged the college women to go.
So I can't remember, I could find out for you
if it was important but we got scholarships
for some of them.
I know Leticia Campbell was one of them.
If you're looking for someone to interview,
she would be a good person.
-: Good. -: She's in a PhD program at
Emory now.
-: Great, I'll get that later.
-: So there were a handful of us who were
in our 20s who were part of the college women's network
who went and participated in the event.
-: And what was it like?
What do you remember about that event?
-: Well it's funny because I remember,
there wasn't anything that was said in a lecture
or a workshop that was new, because I had
read a lot of feminist theology.
So it wasn't, it was new to many people.
But for me, I was well read in feminist theology.
So it was exciting to meet the theologians
that I hadn't met and that part was fun.
But it wasn't sort of walking away feeling
like my life had changed.
The worship was very, very powerful,
and that was probably the most meaningful aspect
of the event for me because it was,
I had been part of feminist liturgy for many,
well for a number of years.
But not with a thousand women.
And so the scale of it was very, very powerful.
And just the care and attention that had been put
in creating the liturgy was so evident.
Everything about the conference was very, very carefully
and meticulously planned and thought about
and oriented toward feminist values and principles.
And so those pieces of it were what I really,
what really struck me more than the theology, the content,
was sort of the lived experience of sitting
in round tables and having art being created
while we were talking together and listening
and engaging in this sort of theological discourse
together and having so many sensory aspects
incorporated into that atmosphere.
I remember feeling like it was those aspect were
very different from your traditional conference.
-: Yes, yeah, that's great.
Are there specific, you already mentioned several things,
are there any other specific moments that you remember?
-: I remember the milk and honey ritual, and remember,
there's always this sort of
feeling of lost and sadness of not being able
to share communion, in a acumental space like that
and feeling empowered by the
liturgical team finding an alternative way
for us to share in a ritual that had meaning and value.
And particularly in feminist ways
in terms of thinking about the elements
and what was being shared and how they wove
that together into the worship service.
-: Wonderful.
You know that there was a backlash after that.
First of all, were you personally affected by it?
-: I think I was called out on one of the laymen articles.
I would have to go back and look, but I,
it was either there, I was called out in several
of the laymen during that time period
but I could have in the GA.
So I don't remember specifically.
And the way most of us,
it was sort of a vagabound or to be called out by the laymen
because they were so awful and it was sort of a sense of
well if they're worried about what you're doing
then you're probably doing something right.
Because my theological understanding of justice
and their understanding of what theology is period
is so amiss, that there is a sense of
everything about radical justice, about equality,
egalitarianism, you know, anti-racist, anything
that I would be supportive and be a part of,
challenges the status quo and challenges
the power that they have and how they want
the church to be and continue to be.
So I don't remember specifically if it was anything,
probably not, now that I think about it
because I had no role in the planning
or the leadership of it, so I think it would be surprising.
There were probably GA things I was called out for
and certainly the College Women's Network
was something that got called out
and I got criticized on that.
-: What don't you say something about this?
-: Sure! -: Because it seems to be
of a piece.
-: Yes it is, absolutely of a piece.
So, and they were both funded by bicentennial money
which is also part of the origins of this so,
I remember when I started, this is a very clear memory.
In the first weeks or months I was there,
there was this great big old binder,
three ring binder that just was four inches thick
and just full and I just was looking through it
and there were all of these interesting projects
and it said bicentennial fund.
And I didn't know what a bicentennial fund was
and there were just all these really interesting things
and they were very diverse around all sorts of different
themes but the re-imagining was in there
and that's where I think
66,000 came from. -: Right, you got it.
-: And there were sort of a grouping of things that were
part of Women's Ministry that I, and I don't know how
process worked but I'm assuming each ministry unit
was asked to forward suggestions for fundraising
for the bicentennial fund.
And so one of them was this idea to do something
with college women specifically.
That Women's Ministry wanted to reach out
and do some sort of intentional ministry with college women,
and I had just graduated from college.
And I remember pulling the sheet out
and going into Mary Ann's office and saying
wait a minute this has been funded and no one is doing this?
(laughing) Why is no one doing this?
(laughing)
And Mary Ann was like, you know, she was an administrator
and she was up to her ears in work, and she was like
oh well you should do that (laughs) if you're interested.
-: Wow!
-: So that really wasn't part of what my job was
in terms of I was brought in to work with Justice for Women,
which was the advocacy unit but everyone that I worked with
in my experience in that workspace,
was that it was a very feminist workspace
and people were very supportive and encouraging.
I'm sure there was politics that I wasn't privy to
as a 23 year old but my experience of it
was a very positive place.
My supervisor, who was Mary Kuehne's,
even though that took me away from the work
that I needed to be doing,
recognized that doing that, that I was a good person
to do that and that doing that was a value for me
in learning and supported me working with Mary Ann
on developing that project.
And so she and I worked together really for,
you know, ended up being probably five or six years
over the course of my participation with that.
Although Mary had probably gone by then.
But in building the groundwork and she had worked in
campus ministry in previous iterations of her career.
And so she had just wonder contacts
with campus ministry programs across the country.
And I could just remember sitting down with her
and we came up with a target list of chaplains
and asked them to send students to a conference.
It was all about networking, it was all about
how do you figure out who your allies are
and try to pitch something and see who comes
and then figure out what to do.
And so there was no agenda going into it
other than Women's Ministry wants to reach out
to college women.
And so we pulled together a group initially
and just brainstormed and talked about what do you want,
and what would be meaningful?
And really built it from there and
worked on laying out what the values were
that undiverted the development of the program
and feminism was at the top of the list.
The two I remember are feminism and evangelism
because those were the two we had the most discussion about.
And we didn't just put the values,
we defined what we meant by them.
Because what we meant by each of them
were very important to the women who are involved.
So all of that. -: Do you remember you defined,
I know it's been a long time.
-: I haven't, I could get it to you.
-: Yes, that would be great, sure.
-: But again, I remember the evangelism piece
was very controversial because there were a number
of women who didn't want to include evangelism
and a number who did and we talked a lot about
what we meant by evangelism and what does it mean to
share God's word and does that mean you're
trying to convert people or does that mean
that you're trying to witness through your life and actions.
So I just remember that every conversation we had
was in that sort of level of depth.
And these were not students who were
religious studies majors or had training.
They were just college women who were
interested in their faith and interested in justice,
and came together to talk about what does this mean for us.
And they were majors across the spectrum,
from biologists to socialogists to english and--
-: That is great.
-: Yeah, it was phenomenal. -: About how large
a group was this?
-: So started out with a coordinating committee
I think of 12 people.
I think we had three years with four people each.
And we were trying to, in the very early stages,
we were very intentional about racial ethnic diversity
and making sure we had broad representation
on the coordinating committee.
And then we held events.
We held summer leadership events for college women
and sure anyone could come and we tried to recruit
through the, we had campuses who,
I forget if they signed on or if they were just part
of our networking, I can't remember how we organized it,
but we would have 30 to 40 in those early years
at the summer events.
I remember one of the first ones we went down to,
this was right around NAFTA, we went down to the border
and worked with Rick Everchase and the work they were
doing with Border Links, was one of our first summer events.
And they were always oriented around different
social justice issues and educating and participating in
advocacy as well as feminist theology and ethonist liturgy
and those sorts of things.
-: Wonderful. -: Yeah, so it really was
all of a piece. -: It was.
-: I mean it was very much what was going on.
And the attack on the College Women's Network was
oriented in everyway from the same basis of
threat and fear that the reaction to
re-imagining was for sure.
-: I know about the backlash against re-imagining.
I know a little bit but could you say more about
what the backlash was toward the College Women's Network?
-: Yeah, some in fact, the are others who can give you
more detail on that.
Do you know Iylee Marloe?
-: Yeah, actually I just interviewed her.
So yeah.
-: We're having dinner together tonight.
-: That's wonderful, she mentioned that in fact.
-: So she would have been part of that.
Did she talk about it at all?
-: She did talk about it, yeah.
And that's mostly where I know it from.
-: I wasn't staff anymore and I feel very strongly,
I used to tell the women this when we were working together
that a good leader is not missed when she's gone.
It doesn't mean you don't miss her personally
but nothing changes in the flow of the organization
if you've built a good organization.
And I didn't want the new staff person to feel like
everybody was running back to me to solve the problems.
So I really stayed out of all that
but it was the GA a year or two after
I was not the staff person anymore,
that there were, I think it must have been a floor move
to try to cut the funding and eliminate the program.
And I've only heard, you know, second hand reports
from people who were there about that.
It would be good to find out from people.
-: She did talk about that.
It was very powerful.
-: It was apparently very ugly and very, very mean spirited.
In much the same way that the re-imagining was.
It was all of a piece.
-: Were you at the 94 GA where they talked about
re-imagining and had the report,
does any of that sound familiar?
-: I think I was, I don't remember it in particular.
I went to lots of GAs at that time.
-: I betcha did, I bet you did.
-: But I don't remember that in particular.
But did you want me to talk again about being in the center
in the days after? -: Yes please, please.
-: So the reports started to come out in
the laymen and then the Methodist, the Good News
and at first I think, my memory of this is that
people at the center just sort of took it with
a grain of salt because this is what they do.
I think it was when the lay committee started,
I forget what the details were,
but I remember that there were letters that were sent
related to funding and it took a different tone
than much of their other just sort of general nastiness.
And I think that was when people started to get worried
about what the impact of this was going to be.
And I think, part of my memory was that
the staff women that I worked with,
and so there were staff women in Women's Ministry who went
but there were staff women from many other areas
who went just because they were feminist
and they wanted to be part of this.
And we all began to meet together weekly.
I sort of think we met over lunch.
Does anybody else talked about this?
-: I remember meeting.
I don't know if it was over lunch or not.
-: Okay, I can't remember but we were meeting regularly
and it was really as a support group than anything else.
As a young woman in her 20s, this wasn't my livelihood
in the same way it was for the women
who were in their 50s and 60s.
And I remember being just very aware
of how vulnerable they felt and how threatened,
and how deeply unsettling it was.
It was no fun for me but I wasn't
vulnerable in the same way they were
and that was very evident to me.
So we met regularly as a support group
and I think I also remember that many of the staff people
were deeply concerned about what was happening to
the woman participants from across the country
who had gone and had this amazing experience
and were now being told by people
that what they experienced was bad and heretical
and evil even.
Whereas when they were there in the moment
it was invigorating and liberating and exciting
and challenging in all these sorts of ways.
And I don't know if there's any way to ever know
the impact on that group of women
and how they navigated that.
My hope is that, and I know many of them did
because there were reports from Presbyteries,
from women who stood up and said I was there,
this is not what happened.
It was not God as worshiped.
But I do wonder how many of them were
able to reconcile that and to recognize and honor
the validity of their experience.
Given that the whole history of the patriarchal control
of the church is controlling how women
think about God and their faith.
And so that's always bothered me.
-: Yeah, yeah.
You mentioned the tone changed was different.
How would you describe the different in tone?
Was it threatening to withdraw funds, what was different?
-: Well you know, I mean,
the laymen was always full of attacks
of everything that was going on in the national church.
But never before had they followed that up
with issues of funding, and cutting funding
and really calling for people to be fired.
Calling for the kind of accountability
that they were asking for.
And I think because, and I don't know,
this is just speculation, but the sense is
because it was an independent organization
that had sponsored this outside of the authority
of the denomination.
I mean it wasn't outside because it was a collaboration
but it wasn't the National Council of Churches for instance.
There was no sort of authoritative body that was gonna
stand up and counter or correct or challenge
these interpretations.
There was no countervailing patriarchal presence.
There was just an organizing committee of a conference.
And I think, it would be interesting to interview
the people who were working at the lake maybe at the time,
find out their thinking was.
Maybe someone will do that someday but you know
it just sort of felt like they saw
a vulnerability and were able to exploit it.
Because they've been attacking Mary Ann for years
and they've been attacking other people and programs.
And certainly the Women's Ministry unit had already
been under attack but there was an elevation of that.
What year did Kuehne give her talk at the World Council?
-: It was right before that, it was 91 or 92.
-: So that was hugely controversial.
And again I think it's all part of something that was
happening there in the early 90s
as feminist theology was gaining a voice
of a more public presence.
In a sense they were right,
feminist theology is very threatening
to the traditional church but that doesn't make it
unchristian and it doesn't make it heretical.
But it was definitely threatening their,
their authority.
-: Mm hmm, mm hmm.
That is really helpful.
You also spoke at the 2009 meeting
and could you say something about that?
-: Sure, so that would have been,
was that the 15 year, let's see.
I feel like it was an anniversary year.
Let's see 93.
Six, seven, eight, nine.
-: Well I would have been. -: Not quite, 16 years.
-: Yeah, yeah.
-: Well Mary Ann called and asked me
if I would do this and indicated that,
and I didn't really follow much of what happened
with the re-imagining community after the fact.
I was in graduate school and newly married and young
and not anywhere near the Twin Cities.
But she said that the planning committee really wanted
to have sort of a younger theologian talk about
what's the future of feminism.
I think there were,
my sense from Mary Ann and the planning committee was
there're a lot of older women, middle-aged and older women,
who were very concerned about the future of feminism
and about young women and how much young women
are interested and or care about feminism.
And so they wanted me to come and talk about that.
And I did, it was a good experience.
It was very much like by experience
speaking to a lot of churches which is,
there aren't very many young women ever.
No matter where I go or where I speak, there aren't many.
Then I'm increasingly less be-agra-ful.
(laughing)
You know and it's funny because one of my best friends
was on the World Council of Churches' Central Committee
when she was a youth.
And so again, very, very committed and involved
and she and I talk about how hard it is to get up
on Sunday morning and take our kids to church and go
and how different life is.
And so I don't necessarily think,
well I certainly don't think
young women aren't interested in feminism,
that's a different issue but I think it relates
to this issue about where are young people,
20 somethings, Millennials in church, 30 somethings even,
and why are they not in church?
Or what does that mean?
Or what is faith and life look like in the 21st century?
Certainly doesn't look like what it did mid-20th century,
which is what I think our model is, right?
This is 1950s church and this is post-war,
this is what we should be.
This is the idyllic community and it's a mirage.
It's not, and I'm not even sure,
maybe for some short, brief period there that was true,
but we still hold up, hold ourselves accountable to that
or maybe not accountable but intention with that
as if that's our aspirant model of the church.
-: Now I know this is a huge question, I'll throw it at you.
You could say whatever you want, or not,
but why do you think young people aren't
attending church these days?
-: (exhales sharply) I mean I think it's a lot of things.
I read a study recently, just last week even,
that was talking about how
when they ask people, people who actually consider
themselves active in a church,
how often they go to church, it's like once every six weeks.
I mean that's part of what I mean about,
but they themselves consider themselves
to be active members of that church.
Although those who are in my mom's generation.
(laughing)
But I just think life is so,
I mean, I have two kids.
I have a 16 year old and a 10 year old
and my husband and I work full-time
in professionally demanding jobs,
and we're just exhausted.
And I think that's true for any parents
who are working full-time.
You don't have to be in, you know,
a physician and a PhD for your life to be demanding,
psychologically and physically.
I just think it's a different
era in terms of the kind of
work that people are doing.
Women, but men also, I think part of
the neoliberalization of our economy has meant
that people work more hours now than they did.
And so everybody's working more
and there's just less time, period.
And there's, especially with the middle class
or upper-middle class, this sort of
attention to making sure that you're giving your kids
all these benefits and doing all these things
and I don't so that, I've rejected that,
but I see lots of my friends who are overwhelmed by that.
So I think that's part of it, I think our lifestyle
is part of it.
But I think the other pieces are cultural shift.
There are two wings to a cultural shift,
I think one of them is this sort of
cocooning that we're involved in,
where we really only want to be around people
who think like we do.
And so I'll admit to this too,
I have a hard time going to a church
where they don't use inclusive language.
I just don't want to be there, period.
But to find those churches in Greensboro, North Carolina
there, it's hard.
And even the churches where the ministers don't use it,
they don't make sure that the hems are inclusive, right?
So it's a step to have the ministers
not using exclusive language but if they don't
really believe that it's important enough
to make sure that your music doesn't also,
I don't want my kids being shaped by that.
Or I have to figure out ways of mediating that.
So I think that's a piece of it, the sort of cocooning
and where do go even, how find places.
But then I also just think that our,
yeah, I don't know, worship is,
I'm not sure it meets people's spiritual needs.
And I think that the sort of
contemporary worship service with the band
isn't that much better. (laughs)
I don't think that's the solution either.
And again, I think we have,
we inherited these models of worship
from centuries of Christian tradition.
But they haven't changed much in hundreds of years,
they've shifted some here and there.
There's openness and there's certainly more
contemporary hymns and music.
But don't think it's just sort of updating the same liturgy.
So I think most people that I know,
like some sense of tradition on occasion.
I think wonder maybe that's why they're only
going once every six weeks, you know.
There are lots of different worship forms
that appeal to different people
but I think what people are searching for,
and I see this some in the data that I read about.
What does it mean when you say you're spiritual
but not religious?
Is it people are rejecting institutions?
And institutions they perceive to be hypocritical?
For social reason, right around homosexuality
and abortion and other things,
but even more than that, around what they're doing
with their money.
And how much of the money is going into replicating
themselves rather than the community in which
the building is which is falling apart.
-: Right, right, yes.
-: So I think there's a crisis in that piece,
in the disconnect in around that hypocrisy, right,
so I think it's two fold.
I think it's economic but I think it's social,
in terms of the rejection of the institution.
But I think this is one of the biggest opportunities
of the 21st century is to try to figure out
what does this mean to be spiritual but not religious?
I think the increase in our country in particular
but it's happening in a lot of cities
in the countries around the world
of increased immigration and interfaith realities
means that many people are asking,
it's not necessarily that they're asking the questions
but they're asking, they're thinking differently
about old question.
Alright so there's always been encounter between
Christians and Jews and Muslims and Buddhist
and Sikhs and Hindus but I think there's less
of this sort of modernist sense of Christianity
as the truth with a capital T.
Certainly for evangelicals that's still the case.
But I think what we're seeing with these Millennials
and these folks who are spiritual but not religious,
even if they grew up evangelical is a rejection of that
truth with a capital T and in openness to thinking about
I don't know what it means to be spiritual.
But I know that I think there's something more than me
but I don't know how to name it and how you've named it,
doesn't work for me anymore.
And so I think there needs to be some new way of,
this is probably not even what you want me to be talking.
(laughing) -: Actually well one of
the questions is what is re-imagining mean today?
You're answering that question.
Thank you, beautifully. -: I'm sorry, I didn't
want to take you off. -: No, no, no.
This is exactly, you're answering that question,
that's perfect.
-: I do, I think,
yeah, I think there is a crisis in the 21st century
and you know, it's not the crisis of the church.
I have said since I was first working at the church
in my early 20s that my generation is,
I sort of feel like the ones who are
mid-wives to something new.
We were not enough a part of the church
when it had all the resources and power
to know what that feels like.
The church has been falling apart
since I was old enough to know what the church was.
In terms of loosing members in crisis
and sort of it's been that Chicken Little
my whole adult life.
To such an extent that I don't care.
I don't care, I mean it makes me sad.
I'm not against tradition, I think tradition
has a lot of meaning and value.
I don't mean it in a flip way.
I sit on the Faith and Order Commission
of the World Council of Churches
and representing the Presbyterian Church
and when my Ecumenical Officer called,
I should think about whether I want this to be public.
(laughing) -: Yeah, yeah don't put it on
if you don't, let's maybe we don't want to do that.
-: So like I would just say that I'm deeply committed to
Ecumenism and to tradition.
But I'm also, I'm mean I think this is
what feminist theology has taught me is that
even though I'm deeply formed and committed to them
I'm not beholden to them.
And I'm informed by them and I value them
but I'm more interested in the world in crisis before me
and trying to figure out how to address
whatever those crisis are.
For me it's the economic and climate crisis
and what does it mean to be the church in the midst of that?
And what does it mean to be Christian in the midst of that?
And I think that there is very little that I find
in traditional theology that helps me
answer those questions in all that I find that gives me
hope and inspiration and vision for what that looks like,
comes from the margins.
Comes from theologians in the developing world,
the global south.
It comes from feminism, womanist
and other critical woman's theologies
that are asking these questions in context
that are very different from the first world.
And doing that as faithfully as the church fathers did
and yet with very little recognition of that faithfulness
and I think that's what bothers me the most about feminist,
about the backlash against feminist theology
and about what happened with re-imagining
is the way in which something that I feel like
was gaining some public status and exposure.
Was again, just sort of squashed by the powers
of the patriarchy and misogyny.
-: And you've mentioned in Greensboro you can't find
much inclusive language, what is your sense of
the introduction of inclusive language
and feminist theology into churches in general?
-: I think it's gone.
I think it was a moment in seminaries with
the advent and recognition, maybe recognition,
maybe just pressure, in the 70s and 80s
for seminaries to take this seriously
and for, maybe a little bit into the 90s
but I think already in the 90s it was starting
to get pushed back from students and other faculty.
But I think there was a moment where,
well maybe I shouldn't say that.
It feels like maybe there was a moment where people
thought that this was important
and the changes were made because people believed
this was important theologically.
Maybe that's my
optimism,
because I don't know politically how that happened
in different seminaries.
But I do know the impact on the church was broader.
When seminarians were being taught about
not just you need to use inclusive language
but here's why.
I think that's what when I talk to,
and mostly I talk to young women pastors
who come out of seminary, there's a clergy group of women
in Greensboro that I meet with for a number of years
and they use inclusive language but they're not
gonna make a big deal about it in their churches
and they're not gonna make other people use it
or they're not gonna try to fight their senior pastor
to get him to use it or to get the music director to change.
They understand on some level at least that it's important
but it's not important enough to fight for.
And I think in the 70s and 80s and 90s it was.
And not just women seminarians, I think it was men too,
at least some of them.
So, I think, I forgot what your question was. (laughs)
-: Though you were answering it, about the status
of inclusive language and feminist theology
in churches now.
Well this is a big question but do you think that the,
just to make sure I'm clear about what you're saying here,
how significant was the backlash against re-imagining
in doing that or was it more a symptom of what was
happening more broadly? -: That's an excellent question
and I don't know if I know.
My hunch would be that the backlash
and the success of the backlash gave credibility to people
who didn't want inclusive language already,
and it gave them cover for rejecting it.
So I don't know how that then played out
on seminary campuses, what the politics would've been.
I remember when I was in seminary in the 90s
getting a paperback where I'd use Chi for God intentionally
because I was writing a paper about the feminine
aspects of God and having it all marked up
and the person, the TA at the bottom said,
"I understand everything you're saying and I'm fine
"with you doing this but it's against the policy."
Because the policy is to not use standard language for God.
(laughing) -: Really?
-: Yes.
You only get something like that at Union.
(laughing)
But people were taking it much more seriously, I think.
(chuckling)
But yeah, I don't know if,
I guess I think my hunch is probably it gave cover
to people who were already against it.
And it allowed them to push back
in that sort of politically correct kind of way.
Which is a horrible contested way to think about it.
But it gave them political cover.
-: That's really helpful.
So in the end, how would you define re-imagining?
-: I think re-imagining was an extraordinarily
important event in the life of
particularly the Protestant Christian community in the US
to bring critical women's theologies
to the forefront of the public.
-: Mm hmm, excellent.
-: Yeah, that's how I would define it
and it think the backlash showed. (laughing)
What the response to the public was
to those critical women's voices.
-: Yeah, yeah.
What aspects of re-imagining, you've talked about
something things that are really important to you
but in the end, what aspects of re-imagining
were most significant to you and why?
-: So from however many years later,
20 something years later, I think the answer
would be different than it would've been a month
after the event, right?
So now I would say, I think the most important
aspects of it are the very public nature of the event
and of bringing women's theological voices
empower to the fore of the church.
I know lots of young women leaders in the church who
have been shaped and informed
by the College Women's Network and by experiences,
exposure to feminist theology,
even if they weren't at re-imagining.
It was a cultural event.
So it was important on several levels,
it was important to the people who were there in the moment,
but I think it was important for many others,
sort of the ripple effects of recognizing not only
what happens when, sort of the power of being able
to gather lay women outside of the authority
of their churches and share theology with them
in different ways but also recognizing the power of
the institutions to reign that back in.
Which again I think is part of the problem
with the institutions but the institutions
have changed in the 20 something years since then too.
I not sure how much power most
of those denominations have anymore.
The staffs have been cut extraordinarily.
Any attention to women's issues and feminist theology
has almost been eviscerated.
I think the Methodist still and maybe the Episcopalians
do a little bit better than some of the rest of us but.
What denomination are you?
-: Methodist, and yes I think the women's division
is still doing pretty well, yeah.
-: But for many of the other denominations,
race and gender were just wiped off the slate
when budget cuts came.
And I think again, it's been to the detriment of
the larger church.
-: Yeah. -: Yeah.
That is really helpful.
Did your involvement in re-imagining,
you mentioned that you already knew a lot of this
about feminist theology, it really didn't change
your perspective on that.
Did it change your perspective on the church at all?
-: No, I had seen a lot of,
I had seen enough of, working at the national office
for, by that point, 2 1/2 years, enough of the nastiness
from the right to recognize
their power and mostly their power of misdirection
and misinformation and fear mongering.
And recognizing sort of how bad that was.
I would say that I pretty much knew growing up as a PK
that I really didn't want to pastor a local church.
And after watching that, I knew pretty clearly
I didn't want to work in the national office.
I didn't want my livelihood to be tied up in
the vagaries of power,
that were very clearly dominating
in the 90s in that institutional setting.
Which is one of the reasons that I went into acting, yeah.
I knew from those early days that
I was committed to justice, I was committed to feminism,
I was committed to the church.
But I wasn't gonna be able to pursue those callings
in any institutional setting
where the church had power over me.
And so the academy became a place,
not a safe place but just a place
where I could do those things that I was called to do
in ways that I felt had more freedom
and support to do that.
-: Exactly.
I have one last very specific question,
this has been wonderful.
We're developing a re-imagining website
and I'm wondering if you have ideas.
A lot of it is going to be historical,
putting the conferences on there, that kinda thing.
But also-- -: Oh you're gonna have,
can you click and listen to the speeches.
-: Mm hmm. -: Wow.
-: That's what we're working on.
-: That's amazing. -: Yup, it should be ready
by the end of the summer.
-: Are the Q and As, were they taped?
-: Ah no, they were not. (sighs)
Yeah, which is unfortunate.
-: I remember being in Dolores'.
Were you there?
-: Ah no. -: When that happened?
That's another one of those memories from that event.
Remembering or saying that and thinking,
wow!
-: Say some more, wow meaning?
-: I can remember, I don't remember what the question
she was asked, but I remember she said sort of in an
off hand way, "Ah, we don't need bodies hanging from
"crosses and bloody."
And I was just like, yes!
'Cause that's what I believed in, it was just so great.
I remember just thinking it was so great to have,
a womanist theologian, to have prominent theologians
saying what I believed.
-: And of course you know that was
one of the-- -: I know, I know!
-: Mm hmm, yes exactly. (laughing)
Yes, yeah, yeah.
But what else would be,
I think a lot of it's also gonna be about networking,
providing support resources.
Do you have ideas about who would benefit from it,
what should be included?
Any ideas you have.
-: I think that,
I mean certainly that would be a great research resource.
I think it would also nice if you had some portal
or way for it to also help support
women who wanted to be
active practitioners or,
I mean he whole women church movement
is sort of dead too but
I don't know, books to study together
with study questions, links to water, you know water.
(words drowning out by speaker)
Feminist rituals, suggestions for,
I mean, I think increasingly I'm aware of how
isolated people feel, particularly women
who might not feel exactly the same way
as everybody else they know feels.
And really just simple steps about
what to do to get connected and how you find someone
and how you might start book group or
find like minded souls to talk to.
I just think people need help.
Especially if they're in a church
where their pastor's not gonna be any help.
-: One of the things re-imagining did when it was
in existence was form small groups across the county.
Just help people do that.
So it sounds like that might be one of those.
-: Yeah, I think that's enormously helpful.
-: Yeah, yeah, yeah. -: I do, yeah.
-: That's great.
Is there anything you want to add
that we haven't talked about?
-: Hmm.
I think the other thing that might be interesting
and you may be looking for this,
is what the impact was on women pastors.
-: Please, talk about it.
-: I mean I just know
how much the model of pastor
came out of the same model
that all our profession did, right?
An independent male who had a family to support him.
I see colleagues who take one of two tracks.
One is I really want to be a senior pastor
but then they have to
conform themselves to a model of the male pastor
to be a senior pastor.
Or rejecting.
Women who have wonderful gifts and skills
who simply say I will never do that
because I don't wanna have to do
what it takes to do that, right?
-: Right.
-: I don't know, I just think that's,
I think women pastors are
implicated or
impacted by this in some way that
we haven't articulated yet.
I don't know how many women pastors were there.
That would be interesting if we knew
the breakdown of lay and clergy.
-: We do, it was 1/3 clergy.
-: Okay.
Are you interferencing some of?
-: Yes. -: Yeah.
I would love to know what you find
related to women clergy about how they think
re-imagining impacted
professional ministry.
-: Yes, yeah.
-: In any ways.
Yeah.
That's, I don't know.
I guess that's about it.
-: That's wonderful.
Let me turn off the recording here.