Everyone (ok, Kayla) keeps asking about my opinion and thoughts on Tim's faith crisis, or if I'm having my own, etc. I would not say that I'm having the same existential crisis as Tim, but I have decided to take a bit of a break. Years of frustration with inequality and inconsistencies of both doctrine and practice have built up until I had a breaking point and could not take it anymore. I clung to the bits and pieces that the feminist Mormon online community could throw me about how the Church is actually progressive and good for women and here's a, b, and c reasons why you should stay LDS, but ultimately it seems like grasping at threads. Elusive spider webs that are almost non-existent.
I'm over the rhetoric that women are sooooo righteous and Mormon women especially are sooooo liberated/powerful/strong/self-confident. But actually, they just do whatever a bunch of white, upper-middle-class, heterosexual white males tell them to do without questioning. They don't hold positions of power and they don't make decisions for the Church (and according to some, they should not make the decisions in their own families as well) -- but they don't want to, right? Why would we want our overly-spiritual and sensitive women to fret over the mundane workings of the Church? Leave the dirty work to the men, right? Why would I as a woman want to take on these masculine qualities of power and betray my feminine qualities of nurturing?
Well, I don't buy it anymore, and part of me feels misled and slightly brainwashed. You've told me my whole life one thing but in reality it does not play out in the least. The Relief Society budget is still allocated by males. Men have to approve women's activities. Young women's budgets are a pittance of the young men's (Boy Scouts does not equal the lame-o YW program). We claim to believe in Heavenly Mother, yet we aren't allowed to talk about her or pray to her. All the answers people give me to my questions feel like dry, empty rhetoric.
Women are invisible. They don't sit on the stand, they don't speak (often) in general conference, and then when they do, their messages have to be approved by men. I'm sick of being relegated to a lesser position, of being a second sex. I will not put my daughter on the back-burner.
I'm over the rhetoric that women are sooooo righteous and Mormon women especially are sooooo liberated/powerful/strong/self-confident. But actually, they just do whatever a bunch of white, upper-middle-class, heterosexual white males tell them to do without questioning. They don't hold positions of power and they don't make decisions for the Church (and according to some, they should not make the decisions in their own families as well) -- but they don't want to, right? Why would we want our overly-spiritual and sensitive women to fret over the mundane workings of the Church? Leave the dirty work to the men, right? Why would I as a woman want to take on these masculine qualities of power and betray my feminine qualities of nurturing?
Well, I don't buy it anymore, and part of me feels misled and slightly brainwashed. You've told me my whole life one thing but in reality it does not play out in the least. The Relief Society budget is still allocated by males. Men have to approve women's activities. Young women's budgets are a pittance of the young men's (Boy Scouts does not equal the lame-o YW program). We claim to believe in Heavenly Mother, yet we aren't allowed to talk about her or pray to her. All the answers people give me to my questions feel like dry, empty rhetoric.
Women are invisible. They don't sit on the stand, they don't speak (often) in general conference, and then when they do, their messages have to be approved by men. I'm sick of being relegated to a lesser position, of being a second sex. I will not put my daughter on the back-burner.
More!
ReplyDeleteAmen, more!
DeleteOne sheep follows the other sheep right over the cliff?
ReplyDeleteOr maybe one sheep leads the other away from the cliff.
DeleteI see the errors of my ways! Yikes, I don't want to fall off a cliff, how scary-sounding! Back to Church it is!
DeleteI've been meaning to ask you about all of this. I'm in a bit of a faith crisis myself. Have been for a few years, but I feel like I'm in the worst of it right now. If we didn't live so close to family that is traditionally very conservative and "strong" in the church, I think it would be pretty easy to pull away for a while. I'm not feeling fulfilled, but fear is holding me back from really making any of my own decisions.
ReplyDeleteFor now I'm just silently suffering, pretending to be the good member I'm "supposed" to be. Although I did just ask to be released from my calling, and I don't do my VTing. Ha. So I'm sort of failing at even pretending, but at least my in laws don't know that part. ;)
ReplyDeleteAnyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts. I'd love to hear more, both from you and Tim!
Sometimes I wonder if we don't hear about HM because there are multiple and they don't want to open that can of worms.
ReplyDeleteI struggle with this rhetoric, and the situations within the church that you mentioned every single day. I honestly have no idea what to do about it except cling to my feminist ideas, and find solace in the fact that there are others out there (like you) who think similarly. Thanks for this.
ReplyDeleteHa! Thanks for posting a response just because I've been bugging you about it!
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to see other people validate your feelings. Thank you for sharing!
I'm sorry to hear that, because we really need women like you! I don't buy the "rhetoric" you describe either, I've never believed or been taught that from either of my parents. I get sick of men or women trying to explain the "why"of how things are- I think the fact is some of it is just the way things are organized to be functional (the same as when just the Levites had the priesthood in the OT) and some things are totally just cultural ( and clung to a little too long) the fact of the matter is we don't know all the whys, and we shouldn't try to explain to others that "women are this or men are that innately and so... blah blah blah". In my understanding of God and the gospel, all the inequalities are definitely not eternal in principle. Like many parts of mortality, the way things are now is not the way they will be eternally. Now that doesn't mean we just are passive and wait for eternity to come and "make everything right" any more than we would ignore starvation, crime, sin, or other results of mortality. We cling to all the good, wonderful, uplifting and enlightening parts of the gospel. We struggle, pray and plead with God for understanding and patience with the things we struggle with, whatever they may be (for each individual, male or female, it is different) and we try to make our own families as close to the celestial, eternal, equal, and divine as we possibly can, inviting others in the church and out to come with us and live that way too by our examples and our teaching. The way you live in your own home will be the loudest message of truth your daughter hears. I am grateful to my parents for that- it is what I cling to when the "rhetoric" gets mighty sluggish sometimes. You're awesome Cait! I think no matter what course you take, you and Tim will raise wonderful, thinking, kind and empowered kids.
ReplyDeleteOn a different, but related note, have you seen the new YM/YW manuals? Hallelujah! No more 1950's housewives lesson! We are, at least, making some progress...
I agree 100% with Margrethe's comment.
ReplyDeleteEverything you say has been on my mind for ages. Ever since I was in YW as a twelve year old and realized what the "curriculum" was.
ReplyDeleteThe fact is that the Church is not perfect. It just isn't. The face of the church is a bunch of white men in business suits, and to be honest no talk ever given by a woman in GC has ever inspired me as they all seem to be rather insipid. Over the years the church has changed INCREDIBLY slowly and has never really caught up with society. Black men have only held the priesthood for how long? I believe we as a church are just slow and imperfect.
In my personal relationship with God I am not a second class citizen and I have never felt anything less than 100% entitled to be an equal partner with my husband. Anyone who suggests different is met with maniacal laughter. My mother and grandmother taught me that. In a family where the women outnumber then men 10:1 there has never been a question of the power of women.
What does bother me (and I've spoken out about several times in the middle of meetings) is the patronizing "ah, but you sisters are important, too!" but that's not God speaking. That's just an idiot who thinks he's being sensitive.
As far as Heavenly Mother goes, I think we just don't know anything. I've never been aware of a ban on speaking about her/to her.
I'm not quite the feminist that you are, but I completely know what you mean. I have a strong personality and have often been "on the outs" with people in the church because of it. I still am. It's hard. I don't have the answers. I, myself, am currently in a battle to try and figure out what I truly believe. My husband and I talk often about how we will teach are kids. I think the hardest thing, and most important, is at the end of the day figuring out IF the "church" is true or if it is not. It's not an easy answer. If it's true, i can suffer through the way it is, and just teach my boys (no girls yet) how to truly teach a woman. And their dad is a good example. And if I ever get a girl, i can teach her to have an opinion and do what is right for her. Good luck with finding things out. I totally know how hard it is and confusing. I go back and forth every day on what i believe. Hopefully you (and Tim) will be able to slowly figure it out--either way. I'm not sure there is one "right" answer
ReplyDeleteKnow you aren't alone in your frustration or struggle. Love you.
ReplyDeleteOnly going to make one comment on a fact that is wrong. I have now been in 3 wards were there is no scouting program due to lack of scouts in the ward. Husband and I were both in YM and YW in these wards. The budgets were the exact same for the year. There was no difference.
ReplyDelete