Say Goodbye to the holy-whore

 

Claude Monet: Sunrise Impression

A recent leaked paper in the US capitol suggests that Roe v. Wade will be overturned by the Supreme Court sitting in judgment over some states’ wish for the legalization of a ban on abortion. Given that Canada suffers a cold any time the US sneezes, it looks like any such reversal on abortion rights there will reopen the conversation here. Knowing the past history of the debate before abortion was de-criminalized here (remember Henry Morgentaler?), it’s bound to be nasty … again! (See Why Canada's Roe v. Wade didn't enshrine abortion as a right | CBC News for a commentary on the legal situation regarding abortion in Canada.)

               Arguing the points for and against legal abortion will be futile as it’s always been. A demonstrator for the anti-abortion side gave as her reason the belief that abortion was murder, and she was only trying to save lives. A pro-Roe v. Wade demonstrator carried a sign saying, “You value lives before they’re born, but not after,” or words to that effect. Thoughtful, logical, courteous discussion on which approach governance should take on this issue is not to be expected; these trains ride on rails of outrage.

               What shouldn’t be forgotten is that anti-abortion pressure is driven much less by a passion for the life of the unborn than by an obsession with restoring men’s dominance over women. All through the 90s and into this century, the evangelical right in the US has waged a campaign to draw a clear line between what God wants men to be, and what God wants women to be. Reflected in the gun culture is the militant, powerful, head-of-the-house, head-of-the-nation vision of what constitutes God-ordained manhood. To say that women exist to be on call at all times to service men’s nutritional, sexual, emotional needs is no exaggeration of some of the rhetoric thrown around in circles calling themselves Christian. A good wife is destined by God to be maid, cook, au pair and 24-hour, on call holy-whore to her husband. (Numerous websites featuring testimonials of women leaving the Southern Baptist Convention style of “evangelical church,” can be found,  See one such at Beth Moore Says She Is 'No Longer A Southern Baptist' : NPR)

               And if his seed has started a pregnancy in her, she’d better suck up whatever pain, inconvenience, indeed any personal contingencies it entails, and bear and care for his child. Nothing can change; that’s the way God planned it. Obscure verses can be found in scripture to support every contention of the binary, male-dominant view of human gender and sexuality. That scribes of old put into God’s mouth “I have known you (Jeremiah) before you were born; I knit you together in the womb,” is, to one Texas preacher, irrefutable proof that a human life begins at conception. Ironically, the book of Joshua putting into God’s mouth the order to massacre all the already-born of Ai is not touted as proof that a genocidal massacre of one’s enemies is the right way to go. (Read about it at BATTLE of AI | Joshua 8; Achan's sin; Stealing the plunder; Tithing (godswarplan.com))

               Let’s be brutally honest: the so called “evangelical church” as we see it operating in the USA  doesn’t follow Jesus; it has put a leash around Jesus’ neck so that he shall follow them wherever their self-righteous rages take them.

               Were I to recite all the Biblical passages that do not support the binary gender spectrum, that don’t celebrate male gender superiority and militancy, I’d fill many pages. I might start with Second Chronicles 7:14: “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land,” and go on to “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matt. 11:29).

               It may surprise you to hear me say that I am anti-abortion and pro-choice. Abortions are painful, distasteful medical procedures with multiple overtones of shame and guilt attached. I know no woman who would ever say, “I think I’ll get myself impregnated so I can have a delightful abortion, maybe blog about it!” The challenge for societies that can land a person on the moon and split the atom is to offer a science that gives any woman a way to prevent pregnancy until giving birth is her … oh, wait, we already have that.

               A CBC news story on this subject today cited a study saying that the reversal of the Roe v. Wade ruling would reduce the number of abortions in the US by 12%, +/- 2%. Legislating abortion and advocacy for abortions as crimes will not achieve what proponents are hoping for, anymore than murder laws eliminated killings or highway rules eliminated road accidents.

               Given the current climate of culture wars and political militancy, leaving pregnancy decisions up to the persons directly affected strikes me as the choice with the most integrity. Call it “the best of a bad lot,” if you must, it holds the best promise of children being started, birthed and raised in a nourishing, welcoming atmosphere … and avoids the folly of men who never face the physical, mental or emotional rigours of pregnancy haughtily deciding from their high towers what others shall and shall not do and think.

               I apologize to all those men who have done their thought and reading homework and have arrived at the conclusion that “lord of the manor simply because you have a penis” doesn’t reflect the suffering servant model your fellowship claims to follow. If y’all find yourself in a church that makes of women second class children of God by, for instance, banning them from the pulpit from which leadership is practiced, understandings dispensed, I strongly advise you to leave, find a church whose men have discarded illusions of their god-ordained superiority.

               I also apologize to you women who have done your thought and reading homework and concluded rightly that forced abandoning of self-esteem and personal integrity is not God’s will for you. Perhaps you’re one of those confident women who have been cajoled into the role of sycophants to the rantings of male militancy and have begun to take the road back to personal integrity. If you’re torn between uncomfortable acquiescence to men you love and the right to exercise freely the talents and understandings creation gave you, I empathize totally with your dilemma. Think of your sons and daughters; refuse to be silent when you’re pressured to make of them stereotypes of what others think they ought to be.

               That is, after all, the only thing that so many of us find ourselves able to do.