Friday, September 30, 2011

Ungodly Rage: The Hidden Face of Catholic Feminism

By Cathy of Alex

I’m re-reading Donna Steichen’s book Ungodly Rage: The Hidden Face of Catholic Feminism. I realized, recently, that this book was originally published in 1991 – right when I was an undergrad in a Catholic women’s college and focusing on Feminist Theology as part of my Theology minor. I’m not kidding.

It also recently occurred to me that it is too bad that I did not read Steichen’s book at the time it was published. Instead, I was reading Starhawk, Fiorenza and Ruether (the “trinity”) along with the latest from Timmerman (who was one of my profs, btw), Daly, Kyung, Hellwig. I read them because their books were required or optional reading for courses. In other words; they were the theology textbooks.

I never had the Catechism as a required text in any Theology courses. I had the Catholic Bible (NAB) as a required text in one Theology class. I recall doing a lot of exercises in the hermaneutic of suspicion against Biblical texts and encouraged to find evidence in Scripture that the Church put women down. Did I mention this was (still is) a nominally Catholic college?... (continued...)

No comments: