Christian culture and politics, UncategorizedLeave a comment

A Day with Rachel Held Evans

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This week the world lost arguably one of the most important Christian feminists of the twenty-first century. Rachel Held Evans, 37, author of a Year of Biblical Womanhood, Inspired: Slaying Giants and Living on Water and Loving the Bible Again and Searching for Sunday, passed away from complications relating to the flu. In 2012, Christianity Today named her on the top 50 Women to Watch, and they were right. Evans was a force, never settling for trite Christian messages, pushing evangelical culture to change and become inclusive not only to women and the LGTQI community and ultimately having to leave Evangelical culture to … Continue reading A Day with Rachel Held Evans

Christian culture and politics, Christian Patriarchy, Feminism and Christianity, Gender Norms in Christian Co-CulturesLeave a comment

The Hypocrite & The Believer: Televised Courtship and Marital Dramas

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Part Two 8.17.18 Dr. Christy Mesaros-Winckles –The Duggar family, like most patriarchy families, believes in courtship instead of dating. This means both adult male and female children do not casually date but are paired with a potential spouse who their parents believe might be a good match for them based on personality, religious beliefs, and other interests. Often times the children do express attraction towards their potential partner, as the Duggar children did, but it is then up to the father to approve the match and the families to meet and decide if courtship is suitable. At this point, the … Continue reading The Hypocrite & The Believer: Televised Courtship and Marital Dramas

Christian culture and politics, Christian Patriarchy, Gender Norms in Christian Co-Cultures, UncategorizedLeave a comment

The Hypocrite & The Believer: Passing on Patriarchy Culture Through Pop Culture

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Part One 8.16.18 Dr. Christy Mesaros-Winckles – In the summer of 2015 the seemingly blissful, perfect conservative lives of the Duggar family, stars of TLC’s now defunct hit reality show 19 Kids and Counting, fell apart as over a series of months their oldest child Joshua Duggar’s history of sexual misconduct came to light. This began when the American tabloid In Touch uncovered evidence, later confirmed by the family, that during his teen years the Joshua had molested five underage girls, four of whom were his sisters. As if this was not troublesome enough, in August 2015 Joshua Duggar’s name … Continue reading The Hypocrite & The Believer: Passing on Patriarchy Culture Through Pop Culture

Christian culture and politics, Christian Patriarchy, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Grappling with Purity Culture Regrets

freemethodistfeminist

I’m now 34, and like so many former evangelicals who grew up at the height of the purity movement all of my romantic choices were influenced by the guidelines of books such as I Kissed Dating Goodbye. I now realize I am damn lucky my romantic narrative didn’t turn into a horror show. Continue reading Grappling with Purity Culture Regrets