This document discusses issues around gender roles and feminism within Orthodox Christianity from the perspective of Fr Timothy Curtis. Some key points: - Orthodox theology holds that both men and women are equally created in God's image based on passages like Genesis and Galatians. However, women cannot be priests as the priesthood models the relationship between God and Jesus which was male. - Many prominent women in Orthodox history played active spiritual roles equivalent to apostles through missionary work, teaching, writings, and martyrdom, showing leadership was not restricted only to the priesthood. - Quotes from scholars argue the Orthodox perspective transcends gender through eschatological completeness and monasticism, rather than viewing roles through secular soci

1. Dealing with Dilemmas Being a male ‘feminist’ in a ‘patriarchal’ faith community Fr Timothy Curtis A personal perspective- not speaking on behalf of the University of Northampton or the Orthodox Church

2. What am I going to say about sexism? Write a few notes about your expectations of this session.

3. OK, Christianity is sexist, right? I’m a male, that’s limiting I’m Christian, and that’s a faith full of male priests I believe in a male God, or do I? I certainly live in a feminist world Am I even sure of that?

4. Starting point “Do not be conformed to this world, but continually be transformed by the renewing of your minds so that you may be able to determine what God's will is-what is proper, pleasing, and perfect.” Romans 12:2 I (as a Christian) stand as a challenge to the norms of ‘the world’ I (as a Christian) stand not to ‘be natural’ but to be called to ‘be perfect’, knowing that I also fail at that Raise up the ‘image and likeness of God’ in us This is a complex area- I’m just looking at the principles

5. The Orthodox Church

7. The accusation of misogyny comes from, above all, Western feminists referring to the Latin traditions from Augustine to Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure Focussed on visible power Sociologists looking from outside (Weber, Durkheim, Marx)

8. An old, old question Genesis 1:27-28 and Galatians 3:27-28 are found at the heart of the Fathers’ anthropological meditation: "The woman possesses, just as the man, the privilege of having been created in the image of God. Both their natures are equally honourable," is Basil the Great (4th century) reply to a woman whose own doubts led her to question him on this topic.

9. Genesis 1:27-28 So God created man in his own image,in the image of God he created him;male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

10. Galatians 3:27-28 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. Does that mean we ignore ‘female’ in preference for a male ‘normality’?

11. Gregory of Nazianzus (also 4th Century) proclaims, "The same creator for man and for woman, for both the same clay, the same image, the same death, the same resurrection."

12. Why can’t women be priests? This is a very narrow concept of the Christian life It assumes that the only valid form of ministry (cf life) is priest. Actually, the bishop is the primary celebrant, not a priest A priest exists only to administer some sacraments All Christians participate in all sacraments (more than 7) Pastoral care is different from sacerdotal function The priest models the relationship between God and Jesus, as Jesus, in place of Jesus- a male relationship The model of the relationship between Mary and Jesus (mother and son/deity) or Mary and God (woman to deity) have different characters and functions

13. I am not relying on these for my argument: Jesus chose male disciples That Jesus had to be a man in patriarchal Jerusalem society That the bible does not exclude women from ordained ministry Jesus was male, therefore priests have to be male- why not also Jewish? it's because ancient people were dumb. We're wiser now.

14. Society at the time was not misogynist It is unhistorical and simply false to say that in Jesus' day priestesses would have been unacceptable to people at large. Jesus never hesitated to violate cultural taboos (John 5:1-18). He spoke to women in public (John 4:4-42; 8:3-11). The first witnesses of his Resurrection were women (passim). Furthermore, the lands around the Mediterranean teemed with religions with priestesses. The famed Vestal Virgins of Rome were priestesses. There was a priestess functioning at Delphi. The Sybil was a priestess and the many temple prostitutes were priestesses Existence of priestesses in nearby religions was not exceptional

15. St Paul understood… There have always been queens and princesses, and now there are female prime ministers and presidents. BUT In terms of human functions, a woman can no more be a priest than a man can be a mother (biological function).

16. Bad St Paul, the misogynist Women be submissive and silent in church (1 Timothy 2:11-15 and 1 Corinthians 14:34-35). Yet Paul honours many women in active ministry, like the deaconess Phoebe (Romans 16:1). And he hails Euodia, Synteche (1 Corinthians 4:2-3) and Prisca (Romans 16:3) as synergoi (fellow-workers) in the gospel. Vocal prophetesses are found everywhere in the Bible, from Moses' sister Miriam (Exodus 15:20) to the four daughters of St. Philip (Acts 21:9). The prophetess Anna spoke out in the temple, telling everyone about the child Christ (Luke 2:36-38). Silence = hesychia

17. It’s a question of scale… We have some semantic confusion here, because many things people think are restricted to clergy are done by Orthodox laity. We have women saints who were missionary evangelists, church-planters, teachers, healers, preachers, apologists, spiritual mothers, counselors, miracle-workers, martyrs, iconographers, hymnographers, and theologians. Holy women do virtually everything men do, except stand at the altar (and men are excluded from adult female baptism preparation- deaconesses). That leaves the rest of the world—which is where most of God's work gets done.

18. St. Theodora the Empress Actress, sex worker and empress Joannes Laurentius Lydus, remarked that she was "superior in intelligence to any man". Justinian clearly recognized this as well, allowing her to share his throne and take active part in decision making. exercised authority over both men and women, brought a triumphant end to the destruction of icons.

19. St. Nina, a 14-year-old slave, evangelized the entire nation of Georgia.

20. St. Mary Magdalene, St. Helen, and others are called "Equal to the Apostles." A common title in the Orthodox church, never used in the west

21. St. Catherine and St. Perpetua were brilliant debaters. put to the sword. "But Perpetua, that she might have some taste of pain, was pierced between the bones and shrieked out; and when the swordsman's hand wandered still (for he was a novice), herself set it upon her own neck.

22. It’s all about sex......... The Fathers of the Church’s egalitarianism is “situated in the eschatological perspective of the completeness of the end of time, when genital sexuality will be transcended”. Monasticism anticipates this completeness: transcending genital sexuality Even married life is expected to ultimately transcend genital sexuality

23. Fr Alexander Schmemann “This priesthood is Christ's, not ours. None of us, man or woman, has any "right" to it; it is emphatically not one of human vocations, analogous, even if superior, to all others.” The late Rt. Rev. Dr. Schmemann, S.T.D., LL.D, D.D., was Dean of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary in Crestweed, N.Y., where he also occupied the chair of Liturgical and Pastoral Theology.

24. Tatiana Goricheva: "Here I had to exert all my efforts in trying to explain how our Russian "feminism" became religious and why it is that only in the Church can today's Russian woman find freedom and consolation; only there does she receive strength for life and spiritual struggle. Even now it is the Church alone which takes on problems unique to women. “We saw that social changes would not liberate either men or women unless they were connected with the main thing, with the spiritual revolution which was taking place in every soul and throughout society. We said that women could only be free in the Church. http://www.roca.org/OA/37/37k.htm doctoral student of philosophy at the University of Leningrad, exiled to Vienna 1980

25. Implications for social work Do we follow our own interpretation of a faith community’s beliefs? (i.e. our beliefs are superior & universal) Or do we follow their own account of those beliefs? Is sexism an intrinsic part of the belief of Christianity, or are Christians, in practice, about as sexist as everyone else? How do you balance belief and practice?

26. Other ‘faith’ perspectives Exorcisms, possession and witchcraft (Climbie) Race and sectarianism (race majority churches, Protestant/Catholic in Belfast Discuss other ‘boundaries’