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III. Rethinking Feminist Theologies of Sin in Light of White Women's Racist Violence
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 June 2023
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In 1960, Valerie Saiving published a groundbreaking essay, “The Human Situation: a Feminine View,” in which she pointed to the failures of classical sin-talk to account for the ways that women sin. As an early work of feminist theology, the article pointed to the androcentrism of theology: classical notions of sin were rooted in the failures and temptations of men. It also set the stage for feminist treatment of sin going forward. For Saiving, it was theologically inaccurate to identify women's experience of sinfulness with pride and will-to-power. Instead, she argues, the “feminine forms of sin … are better suggested by such items as triviality, distractibility, and diffuseness … in short, underdevelopment or negation of the self.”
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References
74 Saiving, Valerie, “The Human Situation: A Feminine View,” in Womanspirit Rising (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1979), 37Google Scholar.
75 See Serene Jones, Feminist Theory and Christian Theology (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2000); Mary Potter Engel, “Evil, Sin, and Violation of the Vulnerable,” in Lift Every Voice: Constructing Christian Theologies from the Underside (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1998), 152–64; Rosemary R. Ruether, Sexism and God-Talk: Toward a Feminist Theology (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1993); Mary Daly, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women's Liberation, Revised (Beacon Press, 1993); Barbara Hilkert Andolsen, “Moral Deafness and Social Sin: Moral Theology and the Bishops from a US Perspective,” in The Catholic Ethicist in the Local Church, ed. Antonio Autiero and Laurenti Magesa (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018), 259–69. This emphasis remains even in the work of feminist theologians who seek to develop the theology of sin in other ways. See, for example, Mary McClintock Fulkerson, “Sexism as Original Sin: Developing a Theacentric Discourse,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 59, no. 4 (December 1991): 653–75; Margaret D. Kamitsuka, “Toward a Feminist Postmodern and Postcolonial Interpretation of Sin,” Journal of Religion 84, no. 2 (April 2004): 179–211; Marjorie Suchocki, “Sin in Feminist and Process Thought,” Word & World Supplement Series 4 (2000): 143–53.
76 Johnson, She Who Is, 28.
77 Ruether, Sexism and God-Talk, 181.
78 Jones, Feminist Theory and Christian Theology, 94.
79 Sarah Mislin Nir, “How 2 Lives Collided in Central Park, Rattling the Nation” New York Times, June 14, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/14/nyregion/central-park-amy-cooper-christian-racism.html.
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91 Copeland, Enfleshing Freedom; Emilie M. Townes, Womanist Ethics and the Cultural Production of Evil (Basinstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). For other Black theological engagement on this question, for example, see also Massingale, Racial Justice and the Catholic Church; Bryan N. Massingale, “Conscience Formation and the Challenge of Unconscious Racial Bias,” in Conscience & Catholicism: Rights, Responsibilities, & Institutional Responses, ed. Kristin E. Heyer and David E. DeCosse (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2015), 53–68; Bryan N. Massingale, “The Erotic Life of Anti-Blackness: Police Sexual Violation of Black Bodies,” in Anti-Blackness and Christian Ethics, ed. Andrew Prevot and Vincent W. Lloyd (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2017), 173–94; Bryan N. Massingale, “Vox Victimarum Vox Dei: Malcom X as Neglected ‘Classic’ for Catholic Theological Reflection,” CTSA Proceedings 65 (2010): 63–88.
92 Traci C. West, Disruptive Christian Ethics: When Racism and Women's Lives Matter (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006), 23.
93 West, Disruptive Christian Ethics, 23.
94 For a recent reflection on and assessment of the contribution of Saiving see Elizabeth Hinson-Hasty et al., “Roundtable: Fifty Years of Reflection on Valerie Saiving's ‘The Human Situation: A Feminine View.’” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 28, no. 1 (2012): 75–133.
95 White feminists have certainly begun to address the topics of racism and white supremacy from the perspective of theological reflection on sin and evil. See, for example, Fletcher, The Sin of White Supremacy; Andolsen, Barbara Hilkert, Daughters of Jefferson, Daughters of Bootblacks: Racism and American Feminism (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1986)Google Scholar; Vasko, Beyond Apathy; and Teel, Karen, Racism and the Image of God (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Here, however, I am primarily concerned with the specific feminist work seeking to develop a feminist theology of sin.
96 Niebuhr, Reinhold, The Nature and Destiny of Man: A Christian Interpretation (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996)Google Scholar.
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