March 14, 2024 • 34 mins
As I sat down with Dr. Emilie Townes, the gravity of her words struck me with the force of a spiritual awakening. Through our conversation, we peeled back the layers of womanist theology, revealing its inception from the unmet needs of Black women in theology and its evolution into a movement that intersects race, gender, and class. Dr. Townes' insights bridged the gaps left by other theologies, guiding us through the importance of a framework that captures the essence of Black women's fight for survival and justice.
The episode traverses more than just academic theology; it's an expedition into the heart of identity, where labels fall short and personal narratives emerge victorious. Our dialogue in Salvador, Brazil, with Dr. Townes unveiled the ever-evolving journey of self-definition beyond conventional boundaries, invigorating the soul with the concept of 'in betweenness' and the re-emergence of Jesus as a personal spiritual figure. The rich tapestry of cultural identity and faith we discussed is a testament to the power of individual stories in shaping our spiritual and cultural landscapes.
Closing our heartfelt exchange, I couldn't help but express profound gratitude for the resilience Dr. Townes instilled in me, reminding us of the sanctity of companionship in our individual and collective quests. As we seek to align our inner circles with our values and beliefs, the episode is a clarion call to build communities that reflect the diversity of our theologies and politics. It's a celebration of the kinship that fuels our journey toward personal and societal transformation. Join us for this enlightening voyage that is sure to embolden your spirit and challenge your heart.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
What's up everybody, welcome back to this episode of
Life After Levin.
I'm your host, denise SpencerHelms, and I'm a little bit
shaking in my boots this week,but I'm interviewing another one
of somebody that I consider ahero for me in my formation, dr
Emily Towns, and we're going tojump into some conversation, and
(00:23):
this week it'll be a little bitinteresting because I've got
burning questions that have beenkind of sticking with me since
my time in Atlanta and we'lltalk a little bit about that.
But, dr Towns, thank you somuch for being on the show,
welcome.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
You're welcome and thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Yes, indeed, thank you for saying yes.
So a little bit about me.
So I grew up in the BlackChurch when I was 17.
As people know, I wrote it inthe book that you know I met
white Jesus in hell.
It was a simulation, a playabout hell.
I got saved at that play at theage of 17 and went into
(01:03):
full-time ministry right when Igot to college.
Had been in full-time ministryup until Trayvon died in 2012.
And in the midst of kind ofgrappling with police brutality
and Black Lives Matter, thefoundations of my faith began to
really unravel.
And so it was around that time2013, 2014, where I was actually
(01:27):
the first time introduced towomanist theology.
I had never heard of it before.
It was obviously one of thosethings that was considered to be
a slippery slope, and so I hadnever been exposed to anything.
And someone handed me Katie'sCanon and just changed my life.
(01:47):
I never felt more seen.
I never felt like someone hadspoken to my experience in that
same way, even though we grew upat very different times.
So the things that she wasdiscussing felt so current for
me, and obviously from there Iwas introduced to you, duffy
(02:09):
Towns, and so you consideryourself to be an ethicist, and
so I'm wondering if you couldkind of talk about what is
womanism for the people who arelistening to my show?
They may not have even beenexposed to womanism or womanist
theology before, so could youtalk to us a little bit about
what is it?
And then what it means for youto be an ethicist within that
(02:31):
frame of thinking about anddoing God talk.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Well, I'll give you the short history version
because it goes on and on.
But basically by the 1970s,with the rise of Black power and
Black theology, feminism andfeminist theology, black women
(03:01):
started coming to seminary inlarge numbers.
They'd not seen that before.
And we looked around and sawwell, we see Black theology
thinking about Black men mostlyand feminist theology thinking
(03:22):
mostly about white women, but noone was speaking to what Black
women were seeing in theirreligious lives.
And so we used the term Blackfeminist to be clear that, yes,
we were worried about sexism andgender concerns, but we were
(03:46):
also worried about race andclass, and those three things
were inseparable for us.
And as time went on and folksbegan to move from a focus on
the Black church and ministry inthe Black church to now going
(04:08):
into PhD programs.
This all culminated at UnionSeminary in New York where, at
that time, in school, working ontheir PhDs after having gotten
their MDivs, were Katie Cannon,jacqueline Grant and Dolores
(04:31):
Williams Imagine that all atonce, at the same time, and a
few other people might add.
And they were all asking thesame questions in their
respective disciplines Cannonwas in ethics, jackie and
(04:52):
Dolores were in theology, butit's like where is the Black
women's work In both thesedisciplines and also in the life
of the church, the Black churchto be specific and the church
universal to be more broad?
Along comes Alice Walker withher book of essays in search of
(05:18):
our mother's gardens, and a lotof people miss the subtitle,
which was Womanist Pros, grants,not grant.
Walker's editor said what'sthat?
So Walker sat down and, nottrying to be a scholar but being
(05:41):
a writer, and an evocativewriter at that, she came up with
a four part definition ofwomanist.
And the first definition.
The first part, talks about thecommunication of knowledge and
survival skills from older Blackwomen to younger Black girls
(06:03):
and the fact that younger blackgirls have to grow up faster and
sooner.
The second part talks aboutcommunal bonding of all sorts
and this was what got so manyupset, because Walker waited
right in on same sexrelationships, but also the
(06:24):
importance of communal bondingand bringing others along with
you into survival, as well asthe impact of miscegenation on
black communities, because weare a many colored black folk.
The third part had to do withwomen, self-image, it and the
(06:47):
fact that black women andactually most women, no matter
what color, don't fit into thisideal of beauty for women and
she ends that definition withloves herself regardless.
And the fourth part was thecritique on white feminism,
(07:11):
where she says womanist is tofeminist as purple is to
lavender.
And what she was trying to getat is the deepening and
enriching and spreading out ofconcerns that black women have
to live with.
It's not an option.
We have to be concerned aboutour community.
(07:31):
We have to be concerned aboutthe men and children and other
folk in our community.
We can't just be worried aboutgetting a slice of the pie.
Well, that definition caught awhole with Jackie and Dolores
(07:53):
and Katie and they said well,maybe we can work with this in
our own disciplines.
And this is one of the firsttimes, if not the first time in
history where a new term comesout of religion as opposed to
religion finding a term and thenusing it.
(08:16):
And so they began to work atboth scholars and also deeply
committed to the church.
And so we're often running andwhat that, what womanist,
basically means is no matterwhat you're doing and how you
(08:37):
tease through the issues beforeyou, whether you're a scholar or
a pastor or a counselor or ateacher or whatever you are
trying to hold in your view asyou look at the world and try to
respond to God's call to you byanalyzing it through the lenses
(09:00):
of race, gender and class attheir minimum, at their minimum.
And so womanism is about thatjourney, about that journey of
always trying to expand yourworldview, having a communal
(09:21):
emphasis, being unapologeticabout being outraged about any
of the isms and working withothers to try to eradicate them
and understand more and morethat justice is not an act, it's
an ongoing process.
We're constantly seekingjustice.
(09:43):
If we look, we'll see there area lot of people that still have
a long way to go, and so how weparticipate in where they are
and where they want to get to.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Okay, thank you.
I'm grappling with this and Iknow that I asked this question
about ethicists, but I'm goingto ask it a different way,
because I heard you in aninterview talk about seeing
yourself as a person who was anethicist because you always
wanted to figure out why.
You were after this question ofwhy and I feel like that really
(10:24):
speaks to me in a lot of ways,as I've been grappling with what
does it mean to be non binarygender food and also a womanist,
and what does that?
How does a person reconcilethis?
So I'd like to share with youkind of a little bit of a what's
(10:45):
leading me into that question,and I would love to have you
answer that.
What does it mean to be nonbinary womanist?
Doesn't even matter.
Do we need to figure that out?
But the question I'm asking iscoming from a deep place of
feeling like often being toomuch of one thing and not enough
of another, and when I was inAtlanta just recently, I was at
(11:07):
Pride in the Pews, which isessentially a nonprofit that is
seeking to try to help blackchurches go on a journey of
becoming a firming andcelebratory of queer identities,
and other questions was broughtup and the panelist says
brought up Alice Walker and saidyou know when sugar walks, when
(11:29):
sugar is talking in the book,and says you know, I think it
pisses God off to walk by thecolor purple and not notice it.
And something struck me as thethe person on the panel was
bringing that up because it kindof felt like that's where I
live in, this in between, notone or the other, this bothness
or neitherness, and and and.
(11:52):
So for me I was talking with inthis particular, these were
Trans women is they were transwomen who are also women, is
theologians.
And I said, you know, I'mtrying to navigate,
understanding that you, you all,are sourcing safety from
somewhere, but for me, as anon-binary person, feeling like
my safety is actually in beinginvisible and and not being seen
(12:16):
.
And so how are, how are yousourcing safety?
Where is that coming from andhow are you sourcing hope?
So these are the questions thatI think have been Kind of
swirling around in me as I'mcoming into my own queer
identity.
How do I do?
I feel very much Saved bywomanist theology, held up by it
(12:37):
, and at the same time, feel insome ways Elusive, an
elusiveness to it because Idon't feel like I identify in
terms of the gender of woman.
So could you help me navigatethat?
And and I think the reason I'masking you as an ethicist is
because I feel like I'm drivenby that why a lot as well?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
In the early 2000s I Spent a good bit of my summers
in in Brazil, and morespecifically Salvador, in the
state of Bahia, which at thattime was about 98%
(13:22):
Afro-Brazilian, and a group ofwomen's seminarians there had
gotten a hold somehow of awomanist Theology book and I
don't even know who they werereading.
But they wanted to know moreand so they worked their
(13:42):
connections and I Ended up goingdown After really saying no
several times, because I said Idon't speak Spanish, and the
person asked me said well, theydon't speak Spanish either, they
speak Portuguese.
And I said see, that's evenmore to the point.
I don't know their reality.
(14:04):
Why would I be going down thereto tell them something?
And so we went back and forthand forth and back and finally I
did go and had an interpreterand one of the first things I
recognized right off the bat andSaid it to them until I was
blue in the face, for I think itwas about seven or eight years,
(14:26):
I would go over some everysummer, the part of it if If
womanist doesn't fit, you don'tuse it.
It's not, it's, it's.
It's a confessional term, andsome people use it as a noun and
(14:49):
some people use it as a verb.
Some people do all sorts ofthings with it, but mostly,
where is your heart and where isyour work?
Yeah, and I from one.
I'm not someone who says youhave to use a title.
(15:11):
Mm-hmm and I think that evenmore the more fluid I watch
gender get Every year.
It seems like with eachentering class of students there
is more there than there everwas man.
I was in school in the 70s.
It's just a whole differentworld and over the 10 years I
(15:36):
served as dean at Vanderbilt Iwatched the enormous shift in
how folks present themselves andunderstand themselves, and
hardly anything was static.
So I guess what I say to you isagain if womanist doesn't fit
(15:57):
you, find another term that does, or take what you can from what
womanist thought says and putit in your own laboratory and
make your own way, becausethat's how change happens,
(16:18):
that's how we.
This is the art of conversationwhere I'm not telling you we're
talking together and you get toname yourself for yourself.
I've just never, since I'vebeen a little girl, I've never
liked labels, because theyhardly ever capture the person.
(16:41):
And certainly, growing up,knowing on some level that I
didn't fit the cishet norm, Isaw firsthand and felt firsthand
the not fitting in.
I didn't fit in with my whitefriends, I didn't fit in with my
(17:04):
black friends, I didn't fit inwith the women.
I didn't fit in with the men.
I actually had more friends whowere guys, because I played
sports and ran around all thetime on somebody's field doing
something.
But it was one of my studentswho's now Professor Chitaviya
(17:33):
when calls it in betweenness,yes, right, and having to
embrace that.
So I think womanism is abeginning for folks like you.
It is not your stepping point,nor should it be, because you
(17:58):
are experiencing, seeing,feeling and can talk about a
world some of us don't know.
We will only know if we hearyou talking about it and you
have felt empowered to speak.
So I'm a strong advocate don'tfit into those moles, or ma'am
(18:22):
sir, whatever.
Don't fit into those molesbecause they are not you.
Yeah, define your own mole andinhabit it with all your is-ness
and then some.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Yeah, I think it's.
So hearing that and myresponses, hearing you say, okay
, can womanism be a beginningfor you, there was something
visceral about that to me thatjust felt like that feels
dishonoring.
It feels it feels like Womanism, and I guess you know as I'm
(19:09):
thinking about it.
Womanism, part of it is theproblem solving in the dialogue,
because it felt like to me toclaim something.
It felt like putting on Lineageand power and Source.
You know, in claiming the, inclaiming that, at least
ontologically claiming, and so Ihadn't ever thought about what
(19:34):
it means to start there and goon a journey, and I feel like
there was a Something just kindof unlocks like why wouldn't?
Isn't that the spirit of, ofwhat womanism is?
Is I the?
Finding the way that this textsources freedom and hope for me?
How?
I live it through the world.
(19:54):
You had this, this one.
Okay, so there was oneinterview I wanted to ask you
about.
I'm curious because I'm notsure how I'm identifying.
I say I'm wearing a lightjacket Called Christianity these
days, but there was thisinterview that you did.
It was robust hope in the midstof matrix, and you talked about
(20:17):
how you had always been feelcentury, but of late Jesus
started to creep back in.
Can you say more about that,what that means?
You said, as you've gotten old,as you've gotten older and
lately Jesus has started tocreep back in, but you were
always, from a young age, very,very connected to God and and
(20:38):
the spirit.
Do you remember that by chance?
Speaker 2 (20:43):
Well, I don't remember saying that, but I
suppose I did my real journey.
I don't know what I was talkingabout.
Jesus was a nice Jewish boy, butthat you were connected to God
and the spirit, and thatResonated and and that is true,
(21:05):
still true I am much more toyour century than I am personal
century and I have moved awayfrom.
As a kid, jesus was all that ina bag of chips.
But I Began to realize, I thinkI Began to hear myself when I
(21:36):
was teaching at Yale and I Ialways begin classes in prayer,
mostly for me.
The students think I'm doing itfor them, but I'm doing it for
me, mostly to try and get my acttogether To help us do what the
work we're gonna try to do inthat session.
(21:56):
But I began to hear myselfsaying Jesus who is our Lord.
That was, that was first, andthen over time it became Jesus
who is our brother as much asour Lord and Savior, and then it
(22:21):
became Jesus who is our brother.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
And I haven't.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
I haven't taught in a bit, so God knows what I'll say
when I start teaching.
Nick, bring it I.
I Am persuaded by the power ofthe Holy Spirit much more Than I
am by the power of Jesus.
(22:48):
Which does not mean I don'tbelieve in the power of Jesus.
I mean this is through to whathave been that crucified for me,
so I better give him his cross.
But you, what moves me, whatholds me, what rocks me?
What do I feel?
To where do I feel rested?
(23:09):
Who do I pray?
To?
it's mountains out of town don'tbe the Holy Spirit, and a lot
of that has to do with thejourney I've been on to try and
move away from making God maleor female or both.
(23:30):
I don't even do well with theMother, father, god stuff.
The Holy Spirit is where it is.
For me it's kind of ineffable,but it is so concrete, it is so
tangible and that's where I amnow.
(23:53):
So what I said in thatinterview I don't know what I
was talking about that day, soyou can hit the delete button on
that one Because really, truly,you know I'm on a research lead
this year and we have a houseon Martha's Vineyard where I've
(24:18):
been living all year and we havea coastal pond out the front
door and a marsh out the sidedoor and every day I look at
nature and just am amazed andwhat I see there is the work of
(24:41):
the Holy Spirit.
And what I try to be a part ofis not messing up the beauty.
Even when it's, when we have alot of gray days here, even when
it's a gray day in rainy,there's a beauty to that as well
.
So that's where I am now.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
So as we kind of go towards, we're getting towards
our mark, I think, another.
The last question I have iskind of about some of the spaces
that I occupy, where leavingevangelicalism, leaving white
Christianity, but being a leaderin those spaces and in lots of
(25:26):
institutions in those spaces hasme kind of straddling both
worlds, and so something Iconsider a gift is kind of
introducing white progressivesto this kind of theology,
because a lot of times theyleave the whole game without
ever hearing from anybody.
That doesn't look one.
So I guess what I would love isfor white progressives to have
(25:53):
an opportunity to hear from theyare not probably aware of how
legendary you are, but I amaware, at least in my own
experience of theology if youcould say something to the white
progressive community and atthe same time to queer black
(26:18):
ex-vangelicals who are trying tofigure God out.
You could hold those two peopleand maybe speak to them.
Just words to live by, words ofwisdom, wisdom, words that can
carry us and bring us into thework that we should be doing in
our generation.
I would love if you could dothat before we go.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Well, I can try One of the things that strikes me
and I identify as a progressiveangelical.
The Bible still means a lot tome, even though I'm like roll my
eyes and suck my teethsometimes at it, but it does.
(27:07):
And the power of you starttelling me about the power of
the Holy Spirit, my goodness,yes, mm-hmm.
But one of the things that hasstruck me about all of us,
including the two groups thatyou've asked me to think about
(27:31):
who do we have at ourcelebrations?
Fierals, weddings, birthdayparties, what not?
What does the room look like?
And if that room doesn't looklike the theology you espouse or
(27:56):
the politics you hold, thenyou've got work to do, because
so often I will look at.
I was just doing it the otherday.
A colleague of mine sent me alink to a group that she had
(28:16):
just discovered and said wouldyou look at these people?
I thought, oh Lord.
But now it was a progressivewhite evangelical group and
maybe there were two people ofcolor and I thought I don't know
(28:39):
how far they're gonna go andthey don't even have the people
at the table that, even though,live into the richness of God's
good creation.
So where do we, where are ourpersonal politics and theology.
Wow, and that's gonna be a lifejourney of discovery.
(29:05):
It's not gonna be an event youget to and go got it, check that
off the list.
No, this is a journey.
This is not a destination, andpart of what is so necessary is
in that journey is curiosity,being humble and doing the best
(29:32):
you can not to be swallowed upby guilt and loathing, because
guilt and loathing is a strategyto keep us all oppressed, but
very effective in stopping usfrom moving forward or finding
our best self.
What have you?
So I think it's a good fight.
(29:58):
I think it's a joyous fight.
It's worth working this hard tobring ourselves to a better
place and to bring others alongwith us.
But and this is probably my mostimportant thing, do not try to
do this by yourself.
You gotta find a community.
(30:19):
Even if that community is oneperson, make sure they're sane.
That's all I ask.
They don't need to be saved,they just need to be sane,
because it is too easy, whenfolks try to do the work of
(30:39):
transformation, both in turn tothemselves and to society in
general, to try and be a loneranger.
And I'm telling you, the forcesof domination, evil and hell
and suffering will pick you upwith your lone self.
But you gotta work harder ifthere's more than one and it's
(31:00):
always more helpful to have morethan one, because at some point
we're gonna leave this side ofthe Jordan and we have to have
people who will pick up the bookand carry it on.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
That's Shay.
I'm deeply, deeply grateful foryour time and I'm just just
thank you so much for saying yesto coming on the show and thank
you for the ways that you have.
Really, I think your work haskept me from drowning in some
ways, and in other ways it'sjust kind of taught me how to
(31:40):
breathe underwater, so it hasbeen extremely helpful through
so many seasons of my life andI'm incredibly grateful to you
oh you're welcome, you'rewelcome.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
I really do believe in this that Zany back and help
somebody along the way, Becausesomebody helped me and I know
what the difference it has made.
Thank you for listening To pickyour money and your heart is
donate to Subquatcher Inc.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
And clear the path for black students today.
What's up everybody, welcome back to this episode of
Life After Levin.
I'm your host, denise SpencerHelms, and I'm a little bit
shaking in my boots this week,but I'm interviewing another one
of somebody that I consider ahero for me in my formation, dr
Emily Towns, and we're going tojump into some conversation, and
(00:23):
this week it'll be a little bitinteresting because I've got
burning questions that have beenkind of sticking with me since
my time in Atlanta and we'lltalk a little bit about that.
But, dr Towns, thank you somuch for being on the show,
welcome.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
You're welcome and thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Yes, indeed, thank you for saying yes.
So a little bit about me.
So I grew up in the BlackChurch when I was 17.
As people know, I wrote it inthe book that you know I met
white Jesus in hell.
It was a simulation, a playabout hell.
I got saved at that play at theage of 17 and went into
(01:03):
full-time ministry right when Igot to college.
Had been in full-time ministryup until Trayvon died in 2012.
And in the midst of kind ofgrappling with police brutality
and Black Lives Matter, thefoundations of my faith began to
really unravel.
And so it was around that time2013, 2014, where I was actually
(01:27):
the first time introduced towomanist theology.
I had never heard of it before.
It was obviously one of thosethings that was considered to be
a slippery slope, and so I hadnever been exposed to anything.
And someone handed me Katie'sCanon and just changed my life.
(01:47):
I never felt more seen.
I never felt like someone hadspoken to my experience in that
same way, even though we grew upat very different times.
So the things that she wasdiscussing felt so current for
me, and obviously from there Iwas introduced to you, duffy
(02:09):
Towns, and so you consideryourself to be an ethicist, and
so I'm wondering if you couldkind of talk about what is
womanism for the people who arelistening to my show?
They may not have even beenexposed to womanism or womanist
theology before, so could youtalk to us a little bit about
what is it?
And then what it means for youto be an ethicist within that
(02:31):
frame of thinking about anddoing God talk.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Well, I'll give you the short history version
because it goes on and on.
But basically by the 1970s,with the rise of Black power and
Black theology, feminism andfeminist theology, black women
(03:01):
started coming to seminary inlarge numbers.
They'd not seen that before.
And we looked around and sawwell, we see Black theology
thinking about Black men mostlyand feminist theology thinking
(03:22):
mostly about white women, but noone was speaking to what Black
women were seeing in theirreligious lives.
And so we used the term Blackfeminist to be clear that, yes,
we were worried about sexism andgender concerns, but we were
(03:46):
also worried about race andclass, and those three things
were inseparable for us.
And as time went on and folksbegan to move from a focus on
the Black church and ministry inthe Black church to now going
(04:08):
into PhD programs.
This all culminated at UnionSeminary in New York where, at
that time, in school, working ontheir PhDs after having gotten
their MDivs, were Katie Cannon,jacqueline Grant and Dolores
(04:31):
Williams Imagine that all atonce, at the same time, and a
few other people might add.
And they were all asking thesame questions in their
respective disciplines Cannonwas in ethics, jackie and
(04:52):
Dolores were in theology, butit's like where is the Black
women's work In both thesedisciplines and also in the life
of the church, the Black churchto be specific and the church
universal to be more broad?
Along comes Alice Walker withher book of essays in search of
(05:18):
our mother's gardens, and a lotof people miss the subtitle,
which was Womanist Pros, grants,not grant.
Walker's editor said what'sthat?
So Walker sat down and, nottrying to be a scholar but being
(05:41):
a writer, and an evocativewriter at that, she came up with
a four part definition ofwomanist.
And the first definition.
The first part, talks about thecommunication of knowledge and
survival skills from older Blackwomen to younger Black girls
(06:03):
and the fact that younger blackgirls have to grow up faster and
sooner.
The second part talks aboutcommunal bonding of all sorts
and this was what got so manyupset, because Walker waited
right in on same sexrelationships, but also the
(06:24):
importance of communal bondingand bringing others along with
you into survival, as well asthe impact of miscegenation on
black communities, because weare a many colored black folk.
The third part had to do withwomen, self-image, it and the
(06:47):
fact that black women andactually most women, no matter
what color, don't fit into thisideal of beauty for women and
she ends that definition withloves herself regardless.
And the fourth part was thecritique on white feminism,
(07:11):
where she says womanist is tofeminist as purple is to
lavender.
And what she was trying to getat is the deepening and
enriching and spreading out ofconcerns that black women have
to live with.
It's not an option.
We have to be concerned aboutour community.
(07:31):
We have to be concerned aboutthe men and children and other
folk in our community.
We can't just be worried aboutgetting a slice of the pie.
Well, that definition caught awhole with Jackie and Dolores
(07:53):
and Katie and they said well,maybe we can work with this in
our own disciplines.
And this is one of the firsttimes, if not the first time in
history where a new term comesout of religion as opposed to
religion finding a term and thenusing it.
(08:16):
And so they began to work atboth scholars and also deeply
committed to the church.
And so we're often running andwhat that, what womanist,
basically means is no matterwhat you're doing and how you
(08:37):
tease through the issues beforeyou, whether you're a scholar or
a pastor or a counselor or ateacher or whatever you are
trying to hold in your view asyou look at the world and try to
respond to God's call to you byanalyzing it through the lenses
(09:00):
of race, gender and class attheir minimum, at their minimum.
And so womanism is about thatjourney, about that journey of
always trying to expand yourworldview, having a communal
(09:21):
emphasis, being unapologeticabout being outraged about any
of the isms and working withothers to try to eradicate them
and understand more and morethat justice is not an act, it's
an ongoing process.
We're constantly seekingjustice.
(09:43):
If we look, we'll see there area lot of people that still have
a long way to go, and so how weparticipate in where they are
and where they want to get to.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Okay, thank you.
I'm grappling with this and Iknow that I asked this question
about ethicists, but I'm goingto ask it a different way,
because I heard you in aninterview talk about seeing
yourself as a person who was anethicist because you always
wanted to figure out why.
You were after this question ofwhy and I feel like that really
(10:24):
speaks to me in a lot of ways,as I've been grappling with what
does it mean to be non binarygender food and also a womanist,
and what does that?
How does a person reconcilethis?
So I'd like to share with youkind of a little bit of a what's
(10:45):
leading me into that question,and I would love to have you
answer that.
What does it mean to be nonbinary womanist?
Doesn't even matter.
Do we need to figure that out?
But the question I'm asking iscoming from a deep place of
feeling like often being toomuch of one thing and not enough
of another, and when I was inAtlanta just recently, I was at
(11:07):
Pride in the Pews, which isessentially a nonprofit that is
seeking to try to help blackchurches go on a journey of
becoming a firming andcelebratory of queer identities,
and other questions was broughtup and the panelist says
brought up Alice Walker and saidyou know when sugar walks, when
(11:29):
sugar is talking in the book,and says you know, I think it
pisses God off to walk by thecolor purple and not notice it.
And something struck me as thethe person on the panel was
bringing that up because it kindof felt like that's where I
live in, this in between, notone or the other, this bothness
or neitherness, and and and.
(11:52):
So for me I was talking with inthis particular, these were
Trans women is they were transwomen who are also women, is
theologians.
And I said, you know, I'mtrying to navigate,
understanding that you, you all,are sourcing safety from
somewhere, but for me, as anon-binary person, feeling like
my safety is actually in beinginvisible and and not being seen
(12:16):
.
And so how are, how are yousourcing safety?
Where is that coming from andhow are you sourcing hope?
So these are the questions thatI think have been Kind of
swirling around in me as I'mcoming into my own queer
identity.
How do I do?
I feel very much Saved bywomanist theology, held up by it
(12:37):
, and at the same time, feel insome ways Elusive, an
elusiveness to it because Idon't feel like I identify in
terms of the gender of woman.
So could you help me navigatethat?
And and I think the reason I'masking you as an ethicist is
because I feel like I'm drivenby that why a lot as well?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
In the early 2000s I Spent a good bit of my summers
in in Brazil, and morespecifically Salvador, in the
state of Bahia, which at thattime was about 98%
(13:22):
Afro-Brazilian, and a group ofwomen's seminarians there had
gotten a hold somehow of awomanist Theology book and I
don't even know who they werereading.
But they wanted to know moreand so they worked their
(13:42):
connections and I Ended up goingdown After really saying no
several times, because I said Idon't speak Spanish, and the
person asked me said well, theydon't speak Spanish either, they
speak Portuguese.
And I said see, that's evenmore to the point.
I don't know their reality.
(14:04):
Why would I be going down thereto tell them something?
And so we went back and forthand forth and back and finally I
did go and had an interpreterand one of the first things I
recognized right off the bat andSaid it to them until I was
blue in the face, for I think itwas about seven or eight years,
(14:26):
I would go over some everysummer, the part of it if If
womanist doesn't fit, you don'tuse it.
It's not, it's, it's.
It's a confessional term, andsome people use it as a noun and
(14:49):
some people use it as a verb.
Some people do all sorts ofthings with it, but mostly,
where is your heart and where isyour work?
Yeah, and I from one.
I'm not someone who says youhave to use a title.
(15:11):
Mm-hmm and I think that evenmore the more fluid I watch
gender get Every year.
It seems like with eachentering class of students there
is more there than there everwas man.
I was in school in the 70s.
It's just a whole differentworld and over the 10 years I
(15:36):
served as dean at Vanderbilt Iwatched the enormous shift in
how folks present themselves andunderstand themselves, and
hardly anything was static.
So I guess what I say to you isagain if womanist doesn't fit
(15:57):
you, find another term that does, or take what you can from what
womanist thought says and putit in your own laboratory and
make your own way, becausethat's how change happens,
(16:18):
that's how we.
This is the art of conversationwhere I'm not telling you we're
talking together and you get toname yourself for yourself.
I've just never, since I'vebeen a little girl, I've never
liked labels, because theyhardly ever capture the person.
(16:41):
And certainly, growing up,knowing on some level that I
didn't fit the cishet norm, Isaw firsthand and felt firsthand
the not fitting in.
I didn't fit in with my whitefriends, I didn't fit in with my
(17:04):
black friends, I didn't fit inwith the women.
I didn't fit in with the men.
I actually had more friends whowere guys, because I played
sports and ran around all thetime on somebody's field doing
something.
But it was one of my studentswho's now Professor Chitaviya
(17:33):
when calls it in betweenness,yes, right, and having to
embrace that.
So I think womanism is abeginning for folks like you.
It is not your stepping point,nor should it be, because you
(17:58):
are experiencing, seeing,feeling and can talk about a
world some of us don't know.
We will only know if we hearyou talking about it and you
have felt empowered to speak.
So I'm a strong advocate don'tfit into those moles, or ma'am
(18:22):
sir, whatever.
Don't fit into those molesbecause they are not you.
Yeah, define your own mole andinhabit it with all your is-ness
and then some.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Yeah, I think it's.
So hearing that and myresponses, hearing you say, okay
, can womanism be a beginningfor you, there was something
visceral about that to me thatjust felt like that feels
dishonoring.
It feels it feels like Womanism, and I guess you know as I'm
(19:09):
thinking about it.
Womanism, part of it is theproblem solving in the dialogue,
because it felt like to me toclaim something.
It felt like putting on Lineageand power and Source.
You know, in claiming the, inclaiming that, at least
ontologically claiming, and so Ihadn't ever thought about what
(19:34):
it means to start there and goon a journey, and I feel like
there was a Something just kindof unlocks like why wouldn't?
Isn't that the spirit of, ofwhat womanism is?
Is I the?
Finding the way that this textsources freedom and hope for me?
How?
I live it through the world.
(19:54):
You had this, this one.
Okay, so there was oneinterview I wanted to ask you
about.
I'm curious because I'm notsure how I'm identifying.
I say I'm wearing a lightjacket Called Christianity these
days, but there was thisinterview that you did.
It was robust hope in the midstof matrix, and you talked about
(20:17):
how you had always been feelcentury, but of late Jesus
started to creep back in.
Can you say more about that,what that means?
You said, as you've gotten old,as you've gotten older and
lately Jesus has started tocreep back in, but you were
always, from a young age, very,very connected to God and and
(20:38):
the spirit.
Do you remember that by chance?
Speaker 2 (20:43):
Well, I don't remember saying that, but I
suppose I did my real journey.
I don't know what I was talkingabout.
Jesus was a nice Jewish boy, butthat you were connected to God
and the spirit, and thatResonated and and that is true,
(21:05):
still true I am much more toyour century than I am personal
century and I have moved awayfrom.
As a kid, jesus was all that ina bag of chips.
But I Began to realize, I thinkI Began to hear myself when I
(21:36):
was teaching at Yale and I Ialways begin classes in prayer,
mostly for me.
The students think I'm doing itfor them, but I'm doing it for
me, mostly to try and get my acttogether To help us do what the
work we're gonna try to do inthat session.
(21:56):
But I began to hear myselfsaying Jesus who is our Lord.
That was, that was first, andthen over time it became Jesus
who is our brother as much asour Lord and Savior, and then it
(22:21):
became Jesus who is our brother.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
And I haven't.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
I haven't taught in a bit, so God knows what I'll say
when I start teaching.
Nick, bring it I.
I Am persuaded by the power ofthe Holy Spirit much more Than I
am by the power of Jesus.
(22:48):
Which does not mean I don'tbelieve in the power of Jesus.
I mean this is through to whathave been that crucified for me,
so I better give him his cross.
But you, what moves me, whatholds me, what rocks me?
What do I feel?
To where do I feel rested?
(23:09):
Who do I pray?
To?
it's mountains out of town don'tbe the Holy Spirit, and a lot
of that has to do with thejourney I've been on to try and
move away from making God maleor female or both.
(23:30):
I don't even do well with theMother, father, god stuff.
The Holy Spirit is where it is.
For me it's kind of ineffable,but it is so concrete, it is so
tangible and that's where I amnow.
(23:53):
So what I said in thatinterview I don't know what I
was talking about that day, soyou can hit the delete button on
that one Because really, truly,you know I'm on a research lead
this year and we have a houseon Martha's Vineyard where I've
(24:18):
been living all year and we havea coastal pond out the front
door and a marsh out the sidedoor and every day I look at
nature and just am amazed andwhat I see there is the work of
(24:41):
the Holy Spirit.
And what I try to be a part ofis not messing up the beauty.
Even when it's, when we have alot of gray days here, even when
it's a gray day in rainy,there's a beauty to that as well
.
So that's where I am now.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
So as we kind of go towards, we're getting towards
our mark, I think, another.
The last question I have iskind of about some of the spaces
that I occupy, where leavingevangelicalism, leaving white
Christianity, but being a leaderin those spaces and in lots of
(25:26):
institutions in those spaces hasme kind of straddling both
worlds, and so something Iconsider a gift is kind of
introducing white progressivesto this kind of theology,
because a lot of times theyleave the whole game without
ever hearing from anybody.
That doesn't look one.
So I guess what I would love isfor white progressives to have
(25:53):
an opportunity to hear from theyare not probably aware of how
legendary you are, but I amaware, at least in my own
experience of theology if youcould say something to the white
progressive community and atthe same time to queer black
(26:18):
ex-vangelicals who are trying tofigure God out.
You could hold those two peopleand maybe speak to them.
Just words to live by, words ofwisdom, wisdom, words that can
carry us and bring us into thework that we should be doing in
our generation.
I would love if you could dothat before we go.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Well, I can try One of the things that strikes me
and I identify as a progressiveangelical.
The Bible still means a lot tome, even though I'm like roll my
eyes and suck my teethsometimes at it, but it does.
(27:07):
And the power of you starttelling me about the power of
the Holy Spirit, my goodness,yes, mm-hmm.
But one of the things that hasstruck me about all of us,
including the two groups thatyou've asked me to think about
(27:31):
who do we have at ourcelebrations?
Fierals, weddings, birthdayparties, what not?
What does the room look like?
And if that room doesn't looklike the theology you espouse or
(27:56):
the politics you hold, thenyou've got work to do, because
so often I will look at.
I was just doing it the otherday.
A colleague of mine sent me alink to a group that she had
(28:16):
just discovered and said wouldyou look at these people?
I thought, oh Lord.
But now it was a progressivewhite evangelical group and
maybe there were two people ofcolor and I thought I don't know
(28:39):
how far they're gonna go andthey don't even have the people
at the table that, even though,live into the richness of God's
good creation.
So where do we, where are ourpersonal politics and theology.
Wow, and that's gonna be a lifejourney of discovery.
(29:05):
It's not gonna be an event youget to and go got it, check that
off the list.
No, this is a journey.
This is not a destination, andpart of what is so necessary is
in that journey is curiosity,being humble and doing the best
(29:32):
you can not to be swallowed upby guilt and loathing, because
guilt and loathing is a strategyto keep us all oppressed, but
very effective in stopping usfrom moving forward or finding
our best self.
What have you?
So I think it's a good fight.
(29:58):
I think it's a joyous fight.
It's worth working this hard tobring ourselves to a better
place and to bring others alongwith us.
But and this is probably my mostimportant thing, do not try to
do this by yourself.
You gotta find a community.
(30:19):
Even if that community is oneperson, make sure they're sane.
That's all I ask.
They don't need to be saved,they just need to be sane,
because it is too easy, whenfolks try to do the work of
(30:39):
transformation, both in turn tothemselves and to society in
general, to try and be a loneranger.
And I'm telling you, the forcesof domination, evil and hell
and suffering will pick you upwith your lone self.
But you gotta work harder ifthere's more than one and it's
(31:00):
always more helpful to have morethan one, because at some point
we're gonna leave this side ofthe Jordan and we have to have
people who will pick up the bookand carry it on.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
That's Shay.
I'm deeply, deeply grateful foryour time and I'm just just
thank you so much for saying yesto coming on the show and thank
you for the ways that you have.
Really, I think your work haskept me from drowning in some
ways, and in other ways it'sjust kind of taught me how to
(31:40):
breathe underwater, so it hasbeen extremely helpful through
so many seasons of my life andI'm incredibly grateful to you
oh you're welcome, you'rewelcome.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
I really do believe in this that Zany back and help
somebody along the way, Becausesomebody helped me and I know
what the difference it has made.
Thank you for listening To pickyour money and your heart is
donate to Subquatcher Inc.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
And clear the path for black students today.
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