Female Faith Practices: Qualitative Research Perspectives [1 ed.] 9781003228431, 9781032105772, 9781032132792

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Female Faith Practices

This book explores female faith practices, drawing on qualitative research to consider how women navigate and create spiritual and religious practices. The chapters cover Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist contexts as well as newer spiritual movements. The contributors examine prayer and ritual practices and familial, educational and ritual spaces and relationships in a variety of cultural settings. The volume reflects on the ways in which women subvert traditional or patriarchal religious practices and spaces, both problematising and expanding existing notions of ‘religious practice’. It also touches on research itself as a form of spiritual and academic practice, considering ways in which women challenge androcentric modes of research as well as ways in which the subject of research – in this case, female faith – may challenge the researcher’s convictions and practice. Blending case studies with empirical research, this book will be an outstanding resource to theologians and researchers interested in Practical Theology, Gender Studies, Sociology of Religion and Anthropology. Nicola Slee is Research Professor at the Queen’s Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education in Birmingham, UK, and Professor of Feminist Practical Theology at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Dawn Llewellyn is Associate Professor in Religion and Gender at the University of Chester, UK. Kim Wasey is Principal of Open College at the Luther King Centre for Theology and Ministry in Manchester, UK. Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz is an Honorary Research Fellow of the Centre for Jewish Studies, University of Manchester, UK, and a Research Fellow at the London School of Jewish Studies.

Explorations in Practical, Pastoral and Empirical Theology Series Editors: Leslie J. Francis, Jeff Astley, Martyn Percy and Nicola Slee

Theological reflection on the church’s practice is now recognised as a significant element in theological studies in the academy and seminary. Routledge’s series in practical, pastoral and empirical theology seeks to foster this resurgence of interest and encourage new developments in practical and applied aspects of theology worldwide. This timely series draws together a wide range of disciplinary approaches and empirical studies to embrace contemporary developments including the expansion of research in empirical theology, psychological theology, ministry studies, public theology and Christian education and faith development; key issues of contemporary society such as health, ethics and the environment; and more traditional areas of concern such as pastoral care and counselling. The Sunday Assembly and Theologies of Suffering Katie Cross A Practical Christology for Pastoral Supervision Geoff Broughton Evangelicals Engaging in Practical Theology Theology that Impacts Church and World Edited by Helen Morris and Helen Cameron A Perichoretic Pastoral Theology In Cadence with God Jim Horsthuis Female Faith Practices Qualitative Research Perspectives Edited by Nicola Slee, Dawn Llewellyn, Kim Wasey and Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz For more information and a full list of titles in the series, please visit: https://www.routledge. com/religion/series/APPETHEO

Female Faith Practices Qualitative Research Perspectives

Edited by Nicola Slee, Dawn Llewellyn, Kim Wasey and Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz

First published 2024 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2024 selection and editorial matter, Nicola Slee, Dawn Llewellyn, Kim Wasey, and Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Nicola Slee, Dawn Llewellyn, Kim Wasey, and Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz to be identified as the authors of the editorial material and of the authors for their individual chapters has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-032-10577-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-13279-2 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-22843-1 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431 Typeset in Sabon by codeMantra

Contents

List of contributors Acknowledgements Introduction

vii xi 1

NICOLA SLEE, DAWN LLEWELLYN, LINDSEY TAYLOR-GUTHARTZ, AND KIM WASEY

PART I

Reflexivity and Research15   1 Inhabiting the role: a retrospective reflexive review from a viewpoint of lived experience

17

GRACE THOMAS

  2 Women and the Church: challenges in researching women’s religiosity in Poland

29

ANNA SZWED

  3 Diving in: research as a journey towards transformation

43

CLARE HERBERT

PART II

Space and Identity57   4 Off-roading: How do women navigate the journey towards a healthy sexuality after choosing to leave evangelical purity culture? 59 LINDSAY STEWART

  5 Exploring expressions of femininity through the reported rituals and practices of the Red Tent

74

MADELEINE CASTRO

  6 Autoethnographic perspectives on Muslim women’s lives online RENASHA KHAN

87

vi Contents PART III

Food and Fabric103   7 Transmission, mimesis, and gender: Jewish women’s kashrut practices

105

LINDSEY TAYLOR-GUTHARTZ

  8 Negotiating christening: mothers, family, and ‘folk religion’

123

ALLISON FENTON

  9 Crafting identity: the spiritual formation of women in prayer shawl ministries

136

DONNA BOWMAN

PART IV

Families and Formation149 10 Mothers in Newfrontiers: charismatic spirituality, motherhood, and the Christian tradition

151

CLAIRE WILLIAMS

11 ‘She taught me how to do it properly’: religious practices in Muslim sister relationships

172

SONYA SHARMA

PART V

Women’s Work185 12 Does religious practice increase levels of economic inactivity among British Muslim women? A mixed methods examination

187

ASMA SHAHIN KHAN

13 Apostolic till the very end: the contribution of older Roman Catholic sisters’ experience of ageing to the evolving identity of women’s religious life

205

CATHERINE SEXTON

14 Looking back on a life of faith: qualitative empirical research with Belgian missionary Sisters

220

JANE McBRIDE WITH ANNEMIE DILLEN

Bibliography Index

235 257

Contributors

Donna Bowman is Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies in the Norbert O. Schedler Honors College, University of Central Arkansas, USA. Madeleine Castro is a senior lecturer in interdisciplinary/social psychology at Leeds Beckett University, UK; is a committee member for the Transpersonal Section of the British Psychological Society; and co-directs Exploring the Extraordinary, a  network for researchers interested in extraordinary phenomena. Annemie Dillen is Professor in Pastoral and Empirical Theology and ViceDean for Education at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven, Belgium. Allison Fenton is Anglican Admissions Tutor at The Queen’s Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham, UK, having served as a priest in the Church of England in Durham, Newcastle and Carlisle dioceses. Clare Herbert is a retired priest in the Church of England having taught most recently at St Augustine’s College of Theology, UK, and is a Co-Convener of the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Inclusion group of the Chichester Quaker meeting. Asma Shahin Khan is a Research Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Islam, Cardiff University, Wales, UK, with research interests including labour market inequalities, migration and the everyday lives of British Muslims. Renasha Khan is a PhD candidate at Kings College London, UK, and, as a documentary producer, has produced films for international broadcasters such as the BBC and National Geographic Channel. Dawn Llewelyn is Associate Professor of Religion and Gender in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Chester, UK.

viii Contributors Jane McBride is a doctoral student at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven, Belgium, and moved from Northern Ireland to Belgium 25 years ago where she works as a conference interpreter at the European Commission and Parliament. Catherine Sexton is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Centre for Catholic Studies, University of Durham, UK, and has been researching and writing about theology and other aspects of contemporary religious life for women on several continents for the past ten years. Sonya Sharma is a sociologist of religion at the Social Research Institute, University College London, UK, and has researched on religion and spirituality in healthcare, religion and intimacy between sisters, and gender in the work of women healthcare chaplains. Nicola Slee is Research Professor at The Queen’s Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham, UK; Professor at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Visiting Professor at the University of Chester; Patron of Holy Rood House, Thirsk; Visiting Scholar at Sarum College; and Honorary Vice-President of WATCH (Women and the Church). Lindsay Stewart completed her MA at the Luther King Centre for Theology and Ministry, Manchester, UK, and is a musician and songwriter (performing as Lindsay Munroe) where she expresses her passion for women’s voices, sexuality and the complexities of moving beyond evangelicalism. Anna Szwed is Assistant Professor at the Institute of Sociology, Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, with research interests in gender and religion, lived religion and religion in the public sphere. Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz was a Research Fellow at the Centre for Jewish Studies, University of Manchester, UK, in 2020–2022 and has also been a lecturer at the universities of Cambridge, Oxford, SOAS, King’s College London and Vassar College, New York, as well as teaching at the London School of Jewish Studies since 2005. Grace Thomas is a doctoral candidate in Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Chester, UK; Programme Lead for Postgraduate Chaplaincy Studies at the Luther King Centre for Theology and Ministry, Manchester, UK; and a priest in the Diocese of Manchester and Diocesan Environment Officer.

Contributors  ix Kim Wasey is a Principal of the Open College at the Luther King Centre for Theology and Ministry, Manchester, UK, and her research has ranged from the social impact of Tractarianism in the nineteenth century to young women’s experiences of communion. Claire Williams is associate lecturer at Regents Theological College, UK, with diverse interests in neo-Charismatic practices, autism and female spirituality.

Acknowledgements

A book of this kind does not come to completion without a great deal of effort and support from a variety of quarters. We are grateful to all the contributors to the volume for their willingness to revise original conference ­papers so that they worked well as chapters with a specific focus. More widely, members of the symposium and delegates at the 2019 conference have each played a part in supporting the development and completion of the book. Our commissioning editor at Routledge, Katherine Ong, and Yuga Harini, editorial assistant for the Religion and Anthropology titles at Routledge, have been both patient with the project during various delays and unfailingly helpful in providing advice and information when we have needed it. Dr  Alison ­Woolley, a long-standing member of the symposium, has generously given a huge amount of time and painstaking work to prepare the manuscript for submission to Routledge, ironing out inconsistencies and clarifying the text. Finally, readers of the previous two books have been generous in letting us know how helpful those volumes have been to them in their own studies, which gives us confidence that this book will receive a warm reception. So, we thank our readers, both new and continuing, for your interest in and ­support of our endeavours.

Introduction Nicola Slee, Dawn Llewellyn, Kim Wasey and Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz

The nature, contexts, and aims of the book This is the third collection of essays arising from the Symposium on the Faith Lives of Women and Girls, a gathering of feminist researchers meeting since 2010 who employ largely (though not exclusively) qualitative methods to research female faith.1 The group is based at the Queen’s Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham, and usually meets there but has, on occasion, moved to other locations around the UK. The first book, The Faith Lives of Women and Girls, gathered 19 papers from early Symposium meetings, representing a range of research undertaken by its members. The work of early-career, never-before-published scholars, including those working at Master’s level, sits alongside chapters by more established members. Although many of the pieces in the book represent work that is small in scale, most of the contributions are pioneering, breaking new ground in the empirical study of women’s and girls’ faith. Collectively, they contribute to a fuller, more rounded and nuanced, more rigorous, and critical account of female faith lives than was previously available. At the time of publication in 2013, we were able to claim, rightly: ‘our book represents the first significant gathering of a body of feminist qualitative research on the faith lives of women and girls within the British context’.2 The second book, Researching Female Faith, published in 2018, has a specific focus on qualitative and feminist research methodology and methods. It explores how feminist researchers employ qualitative methodology and methods to study the faith lives of women and girls. In a way that is still rare in methodology texts – though gradually changing – contributors describe in detail what they did and why, the challenges or difficulties they faced in developing their research design and how they overcame them or, sometimes, had to change tack and take a new approach. They discuss the variety of methodological frameworks available to them and, in some cases, the development of new m ­ ethodologies and new variation on well-worn methods.3

DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-1

2  Nicola Slee et al. In March 2019, the Symposium hosted its first, larger conference, entitled ‘The Faith Lives of Women and Girls: Identities, Experiences, Practices, and Beliefs’. This was very different from the normal, small-scale seminar-style meetings of the Symposium: generally, no more than 20 scholars gathered in a room pre-COVID, online during COVID, and, over the past year or more, taking hybrid forms mixing face-to-face presence with online attendance. We had become aware of growing interest in the work of the Symposium and a desire on the part of others who did not meet the criteria for membership to hear about the research of our members and engage with it, as well as to bring their own research and concerns into dialogue with the work of the Symposium. The criteria for membership of the Symposium are specific: it does not exist for feminist theological research more broadly (there are other fora for this), but specifically for qualitative studies into female faith. Seeking to respond to the wider interest, in 2018 we put out a call for papers and opened our doors to anyone who wanted to attend. More than 60 participants gathered in March 2019 for a two-day conference, with four keynote lectures, 28 papers, an open mic session of poetry, a variety of feminist rituals, and, of course, the conversation around meals, drinks, and formal sessions. This book, somewhat delayed due to COVID and other pressures faced by the editors, is a gathering of some of the offerings from the conference. The conference and this book represent a broadening of the parameters of the Symposium in significant ways, which we welcome and intend to pursue in the coming years. Alongside the overwhelming White privilege of the Symposium, for most of its history the group has been broadly Christian; that is, whilst not every individual member would self-identify as Christian, the research represented by the Symposium has mostly focused on the faith lives of women and girls within, or on the edges of, Christian tradition. There has also been a strongly Anglican bias in our meetings and publications to date, which doubtless reflects the ongoing privilege of the Church of England within a UK context. Our 2019 conference invited Black women and global majority scholars whose expertise is in religious or spiritual traditions other than Christianity. Of our four keynote lectures, two focused on women in Islam (Yafa Shanneik spoke on ‘Performing the Sacred: The Female Body as a Form of Resistance in Shia Islam’ and Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor on ‘What Happens when Women “Own” Religious Spaces? Analysing the Experiences of Muslim Women’4), one on female spirituality in contemporary wellbeing culture (Chia Longman on ‘The Art of Sacred Pampering and Radical Self-Care: Complicity, Resilience and Resistance in Contemporary Wellbeing Culture’), and the fourth was Nicola Slee’s reflections on the history and development of the Symposium, which formed the basis for this introduction. Of the large number of papers presented at the conference, many of which could not be included in this volume, traditions and topics ranged across the Red Tent movement, the politics of the veil, religion in the lives of women in asylum centres, Catholic girls and sex, crafting, knitting and female spirituality, atheism and faith, girls’ bodies as religious objects

Introduction  3 in classical Athens, women’s reading and writing practices both ancient and contemporary, same-sex marriage, female clergy wellbeing, women’s faith lives and disability, and much more. Religious traditions examined across the conference included Islam, Buddhism, Judaism, and Christianity, as well as atheism, goddess movements, and inclusive spirituality traditions that do not think in terms of historic religious traditions. Another broadening of perspectives represented by the conference and within this book concerns the movement away from a limited focus on the UK. That focus was always accidental rather than intentional, reflecting the fact that all the women attending the Symposium are rooted in the UK and that their research was UK-facing – although that has never meant a uniformity of perspective, and some of the most interesting papers have been those interrogating Welsh, Scottish, and Irish female faith identities and practices as well as the recognition of the diversity of ethnic and religious identities within contemporary Britain. The 2019 conference broadened our geographical horizons more obviously, with participants attending from across Europe, Africa, the Antipodes, and North America, and papers exploring female faith in Poland, Norway, Nigeria, Kuwait, and Bahrain, as well as London, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Cardiff. This widening of perspectives and participants has only increased since 2019, with online and now hybrid meetings enabling women scholars to attend meetings of the Symposium from around the world. The Symposium has always welcomed and encouraged a range of disciplinary perspectives on female faith, and this book demonstrates the richness of multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary ways of studying faith. Theological, artistic, literary, and historical perspectives sit alongside psychological, sociological, economic, ethnographic, and autoethnographic studies, to mention only a few. This is another aspect of the broadening of perspectives evident in this book, although it has probably been more of an incremental change than a new direction. What has not changed is the strategic commitment to the study of specifically female faith, whilst seeking to be open to new and emerging discourses on gender. The Symposium has never espoused a naively essentialist view of gender. We are well aware of discourses around gender that challenge a straightforward gender binary and invite recognition of gender as something fluid, dynamic, complex, and multi-layered. We are, of course, aware of the intersection of gender with many other dimensions of faith – age, class, social and geographical location, sexuality, gender variance, ethnicity, wealth and its opposite, poverty, the embodiment of faith in unique and different bodily conditions, and so on: in a word, intersectionality. Coined in 1989 by Kimberlé Crenshaw, the concept of intersectionality is variously defined but, at its simplest, refers to the ways that race, class, gender, and other variables ‘intersect’ with one another and overlap in any individual or group identity.5 It is widely used as a framework for understanding and analysing oppression. Many of the most creative papers at the Symposium are those

4  Nicola Slee et al. that bring the feminist commitment of prioritising female faith into dialogue with other liberation perspectives, or perspectives that explicitly challenge the feminist commitment of the Symposium. Thus, we have had papers on the faith of transwomen (one given by a cis male minister of a church with a predominantly LGBTQI+ congregation), as well as papers that challenge and critique the continuing White privilege of Symposium (it is encouraging to note increasing numbers of Black and global majority women working at Master’s and doctoral level and contributing to Symposium gatherings). Whilst most of our meetings have been women only, we have occasionally invited men working on female faith to present papers, and our 2019 conference was open to all, however they identified in terms of gender (and of course, it is important to recognise the growing number of those who do not recognise the gender binary and do not identify as either male or female). It may well be that, in time, the strategic commitment to continuing to privilege the academic study of female faith will need to give way to a more fluid, shifting study of gender, but as long as women and girls are still massively disadvantaged along multiple indices of education, earnings, status, safety, rape, and domestic violence, and as long as women and girls continue to be marginalised and victimised in many religious traditions, the Symposium will continue to hold its commitment to researching female faith, even as it welcomes theoretical and methodological diversity and maintains a space for rigorous, critical, and nuanced conversation. Female faith practices Over the years, it is possible to detect a growing interest in the practice of faith and specific faith/spiritual practices, as a distinct focus of research and academic study. This is something that has always marked the discipline of practical theology, but has taken new impetus from a range of significant publications. In the UK, Elaine Graham’s Transforming Practice6 offered a powerful argument for the rigorous study of practice as a primary form of theological expression, not merely something that followed on from some other primary religious commitment, such as belief or dogma. In the USA, writings by practical theologians such as Dorothy C. Bass, Craig Dykstra, Bonnie Miller-McLemore, Stephanie Paulsell, and others have explored the wide range of faith practices by which religious commitment is embodied and lived. ‘The Practices of Faith’ series, edited by Dorothy C. Bass, includes titles on a wide range of Christian practices, from the offering of hospitality to household economics, from prayer, testimony, singing, and forgiveness to the keeping of Sabbath and dying well.7 In Christian Practical Wisdom: What It Is, Why It Matters,8 chapters are delightfully and imaginatively offered on spooning, swimming, camping, dancing, rocking, eclipsing, disciplining, imagining, unknowing, and collaborating, all perceived as oft-neglected embodied practical wisdom through which Christian discipleship is formed and deepened alongside the more obvious, traditional practices of prayer,

Introduction  5 fasting, keeping Sabbath, and so on. At the same time, Lauren F. Winner, in The Dangers of Christian Practice,9 exposes some of the ways in which Christian sacraments have been deformed and abused to do terrible damage, as feminist liturgists such as Marjorie Procter-Smith, Teresa Berger, and Jan Berry have long known.10 In a series of case studies, Winner shows how the practice of eucharist in 13th-century Europe was used to legitimise anti-Semitism, how prayer was used by female slave-owners in the American South to subdue their slaves, and how affluent American families in our own time use baptism to endorse their own lineage and privilege. From a more sociologically informed tradition, the notion of ‘lived religion’ has taken root in a range of European as well as American texts and contexts and now informs much scholarship worldwide. In Lived Religion: Faith and Practice in Everyday Life, Meredith B. McGuire orients the study of religious commitment away from allegiance to institutions and towards the practices of faith in everyday life.11 Her work, like that of the others we have mentioned, attends to popular faith practices in the home (such as the erection of home altars, meal rituals, and rites of healing), political practices in pursuit of justice that are regarded by those who engage in them as religious commitments, and the centrality of the body to such everyday spirituality. She also shows how lived religion is strongly gendered, often enshrining a gender binary and patterns of dominance and submission which feminists seek to contest. Similarly, a collection of essays gathered by Nancy Ammerman around the same time as McGuire’s book appeared (and including an essay by McGuire) offers sociological accounts of ‘everyday religion’, largely but not exclusively in the USA, which demonstrate that religion is very much alive and kicking and bursting out of the institutional boundaries set by what were formally mainstream religious traditions.12 Vrije Universiteit, in Amsterdam, has a Centre for the Study of Lived Religion within the Faculty of Religion and Theology, and many publications and research projects associated with it.13 Topics include the relationship between lived religion and praxis in practical theology, lived religion and trauma, lived religion and sexuality, and much more besides. Leading researchers include Ruard Ganzevoort, Srdjan Sremac, David J. Bos, Miranda Klaver, and Johan Roeland.14 Circling back to the UK, the work of Clare Watkins, Helen Cameron, James Butler, and others associated with the Theological Action Research approach has popularised the notion of theology that is done via ‘four voices’. Within this approach, ‘espoused theology’ is ­differentiated from ‘enacted theology’ (as well as ‘formal’ and ‘normative’ theologies), helpfully encouraging students to explore the relationship between what is professed and what is practised by religious believers and not to assume a straightforward correspondence or a one-way relation.15 Abby Day’s The Religious Lives of Older Lay Women16 and Caroline Starkey’s Women in British Buddhism17 represent significant ethnographic research on the lives of older Anglican women and ordained Buddhist women in Britain, respectively, whilst Yafa Shanneik’s The Art of Resistance in Islam extends the close study of ­women’s religious lives to the Middle East and beyond.18

6  Nicola Slee et al. Feminist, womanist, LGBTQI+, and body theologies, to mention only a few, have always paid close attention to the lived, experiential, and embodied forms of human faith, celebrating their diversity and refusal to be owned or controlled by religious institutions or spokespersons. These liberation theologies have been critical of too great an emphasis on right belief, noting how orthodoxy has often been employed to control and oppress women, children, nondominant men, and other disenfranchised groups. This is not to say, of course, that religious traditions do not seek to police and control religious practice and that there is not an equal need for scholars to pay close attention to the tendency for conformity of religious behaviour as well as religious belief. Indeed, some might argue that religious practice is more overtly and readily controlled than religious conviction since particular codes of dress, confinement to the home, or exclusion from particular roles can be more readily enforced than the inner sanctum of personal belief or imagination. In a similar vein to Winner’s work on the dangers of Christian practice, feminist accounts of prayer and liturgy have critiqued male appropriation of women’s capacity to give birth in baptismal rites and of women’s nourishing of their offspring from their own bodies in eucharistic practice from which, historically, women themselves were largely excluded.19 Be that as it may, the study of female faith practice has paid particular attention to the practice of faith within the home, in the education of the young, and in the care of the sick and elderly, amongst other locations – spaces that have, perhaps, been less overtly controlled by men and religious institutions than the public space of church, temple, synagogue, or mosque and, at the same time, have often been overlooked in accounts of how faith is nurtured, formed, and developed. There is thus a range of reasons to focus on the study of female faith practices, and a rich range of resources and perspectives to inform such a study. Whilst not absent in our previous two collections, the focus on practice and practices within this third collection of papers from the Symposium on the Faith Lives of Women and Girls offers much to an understanding and awareness of female faith in our contemporary world. A synopsis of the book The third book from the Symposium begins where our second one ended, that is, with the practice of reflexivity in research. Three chapters from widely differing contexts and perspectives offer accounts of the authors’ practices of reflexivity and the challenges they faced in inhabiting their research as feminist practitioners. Grace Thomas, writing as both an Anglican priest and a feminist researcher, as well as a global majority woman and mother, places herself in the frame of her research on female clergy wellbeing, drawing out what self-care and flourishing can mean for female clergy in an institution that frequently places damaging expectations on women (all women, but perhaps especially those who are ordained or in authorised lay ministries) to care for everyone else, without limitation, except themselves.

Introduction  7 Employing a  ‘retrospective reflexive review’ of research she previously ­conducted, Thomas uses her more recent experience as a priest in the Church of England to critique the notion of ‘resilience’ and to press for a flourishing environment within which individual self-care is supported by institutional resources and practices. Anna Szwed’s research context is very different, and her research project focused on the religious agency of Roman Catholic women in Poland. It resonates and connects with Thomas’s reflections through its discussion of resistance and subordination as key tropes within the lives of Roman Catholic Polish women (echoing Thomas’s reflections on resilience). But more pointedly, Szwed reflects in a similarly transparent way on the experience of conducting her research and the difficulties she experienced in doing it. First, she needed to challenge and subvert the dominant use of quantitative methods to examine Polish Catholicism; only by using in-depth one-to-one interviews could she excavate the nuanced meanings of diverse faith practices of the women included in the study. Second, she had to work with the prevailing assumption amongst her interviewees that she was, like them, a woman of Catholic faith when, in fact, she describes herself as ‘non-religious’, whilst having the experience of formation in Catholic faith. Szwed’s feminist identity was frequently challenged by her participants’ strong critique of feminist politics, particularly around abortion. Thus, her own position as a researcher was both highly liminal and costly, something she is at pains to interrogate for its impact on the research process and findings. Thirdly, Szwed seeks to challenge and problematise the notion of ‘agency’ as it is frequently used with regard to religious women, complicating understandings of what might be assumed to be conservative and non-emancipatory but, on closer examination, is revealed to support women in their self-determination. The final chapter in this first section is by Clare Herbert, who offers a powerful account of how her own research on the experience and understanding of women in same-sex relationships transformed her own sense of herself, as a researcher, as an Anglican priest, and as a person in a committed same-sex relationship. She reflects on how undertaking the doctoral project became a process of revealing, to herself and others, and integrating fundamental aspects of her identity: her feminism, queer identity, faith, and priestly vocation. Recognising that her own public commitment to her partner in the rite of civil partnership had been ‘the single action which had most loudly empowered’ her became the motivating force for interviewing other lesbian and gay couples who had similarly undergone such a legal and public commitment. The process of conducting and analysing conversations with couples she knew from her own ministerial context became the crucible for working out her own theology of same-sex marriage and for facing and throwing off the taboos she had implicitly internalised through years of living in and working for a homophobic church. Herbert’s essay is most powerful for the way in which she evokes the dynamic, complex, surprising, and ­iterative nature of the research process, in which the selfhood of

8  Nicola Slee et al. the researcher, with all its accompanying convictions, beliefs, and habits, is continually challenged, expanded, and transformed. Part Two turns to questions of space and identity, exploring how varied religious and spiritual spaces – literal, cultural, psychological, and d ­ igital – are employed by women to express and navigate their shifting cultural, religious, and spiritual identities. Lindsay Stewart explores her own journey out of a restrictive evangelical purity culture into what she calls a ‘post-purity landscape’ and reflects on the experiences of a group of six women she gathered from across the UK who were also navigating that transition. Her chapter charts several spaces: the space of the research group itself, which functioned as a pastoral support space as well as a space for gathering other women’s stories; then the contrasting spaces of purity culture, often assumed to be an American phenomenon but also existing in evangelical churches in the UK; and the post-purity landscape, which, of course, is not one space but many. She names and analyses the harm and damage done by rhetoric, restrictive codes, and taboos; the enforcement of tight emotional boundaries within purity culture; and the work of reclaiming a space on the other side of purity culture, marked by the embrace of complexity and the often-painful processes of relearning and rebuilding. Madeleine Castro’s chapter examines the literal as well as spiritual space of the Red Tent movement: gatherings of women, often around the time of the new moon, for shared ritual, sometimes in red tents.20 Contrasting with Stewart’s account of purity culture, she describes how, for those who attend Red Tents, the space is construed as a safe space of connection, belonging, healing, and even transformation. She examines the claim made by Chia Longman that this movement is forging new forms of femininity, exploring in detail the Red Tent as a ceremonial space, as cultivating agape, and as embodying femininity. She shows how there are counternarratives within the Red Tent movement and how different forms of femininity are prized and embodied, from a supportive, non-judgemental expression to something that is more energetic and symbolic, centred around the concept of a ‘womb-space’ of the tent. Both expressions of femininity are formed through ritual that offers alternatives to dominant neo-liberal discourses as well as traditional religious rites. Renasha Khan interrogates some ways in which millennial Muslim women use Instagram to curate new and creative versions of selfhood. This chapter examines the digital lives of Muslim women from the British Bangladeshi community in Tower Hamlets, London, demonstrating how the women use social media to empower themselves and assert their selfhood, to subvert binaries that define them in rigid confines of stereotypes of ‘Muslimness’. Khan analyses the ways in which the image-making and self-publishing aspects of social media apps like Instagram can both promote traditional patriarchies in idealised images of Muslim women and, at the same time, undercut such images by engendering feminist and post-feminist consciousness. Khan thus argues for the social and spiritual dexterity of millennial

Introduction  9 Muslim women as they negotiate issues around representation, expectation, and aspiration in their everyday digital practices. Women have always been intimately connected with the production and preparation of food and clothes, as well as other kinds of fabric, and their identities and most profound convictions have been embodied in food practices and the crafting and wearing of clothes. Part Three investigates female faith practices connected with food and fabric, in three chapters that interweave but also spin out into diverse settings and theologies. Beginning this section, Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz examines the ritual practices of Orthodox Jewish women observing kashrut (the complex of dietary laws). She contrasts the ways in which women approach ‘kashrut as practice’ with a male ‘kashrut as theory’ approach. In Orthodox Judaism, the kitchen is often still the preserve of women, with men largely excluded, whilst, until recently, men alone had access to the classic texts on kashrut, thus legislating this gender binary. Taylor-Guthartz examines the ways in which women learn about kashrut rules, the resources they use when dealing with kashrut problems, and the specific practices that they develop. The chapter is based on interviews with mainstream Orthodox Jewish women, which established that women learnt about kashrut from their mothers or other female relatives, whilst factors such as work, marriage, and later education often influenced their practices. When encountering problems, the women tended to consult their mothers or invoked common sense rather than turning to books or rabbis. Their solutions to problems often diverged from traditional rabbinic teaching, illustrating the tense relationship between elite, text-based culture and popular practice or lived religion. Chapters by Allison Fenton and Donna Bowman focus on women’s practices, and the meanings associated with them, that employ the materiality of fabric. Allison Fenton examines the meaning-making processes of mothers who come to church to have their babies ‘christened’ (this is the preferred term over ‘baptism’ in the north-east of England where Fenton did her ethnographic research), arguing that ‘as mothers approach the church for christening, they also negotiate a family narrative which reinforces kinship bonds, family identity and continuity’. Listening to voices that are often ‘muted’ in official theology, Fenton offers her research as a way of reclaiming such women’s narratives and lives at the heart of church liturgy and ministry. Amongst other practices and aspects of ‘folk religion’ that she noted in the group of women she surveyed and interviewed, Fenton highlights the significance of the christening robe or shawl in reinforcing family identity and initiating the new baby into the family, preserving threads across generations. This was one of many material elements in the rite that enabled a public performance of family, ‘bringing together elements of official and folk religion through ritual and tradition, whilst at the same time reinforcing and perpetuating family narrative, connecting one generation with both the ­previous generation and the next’. Donna Bowman’s research documents, examines, and analyses ‘the spiritual formation of women in prayer shawl ministries’. Her chapter draws on

10  Nicola Slee et al. interviews with lay women in the USA who are part of prayer shawl ministry groups, which meet regularly to craft together prayerfully and to plan for the presentation of their handcrafted wraps or blankets to sick and grieving persons. She shows how knitting and crocheting are perceived as a spiritual practice for the women involved in this ministry, ritualised through the offering of prayer, the lighting of a candle, or the saying of a blessing, and deemed to be particularly conducive to contemplative prayer and meditation. Whilst some of Bowman’s interviewees expressed shame over their failure to follow such prayer practices consistently, the groups they were part of developed distinctive rituals – such as the playing of quiet music, sitting in silence to knit, and also an opportunity for sharing what had been made and reflecting on the work together, thus creating a powerful group solidarity. Evidently, the practice of making prayer shawls embodied for the participants a meditative practice of being in the present as well as focusing outwards towards others in the intentionality of the act as a gift. Female faith practices focused around food and fabric are very often rooted within the family and the home, and Part Four examines the influence of families and familial relationships on women’s spiritual formation. Claire Williams examines the meanings and challenges associated with young motherhood for women in the conservative, charismatic New Frontiers tradition. Her research ‘sought to understand the lives of women as they adapted to their changed circumstances upon becoming mothers and, in particular, the quotidian spiritual practices undertaken whilst raising young children at home’. Building on the work of Helen Collins,21 Williams identifies the discontent and loss experienced by young mothers in a church community in which their previous identities and daily lives changed dramatically after the birth of their babies. They struggled to find time to encounter God in the ways they had been used to, and they experienced worship services as conflictual spaces in which they found it hard to balance their own needs with their need to care for their children. Williams describes the ways in which women adapted their spiritual practices to work around the new constraints, such as changing their times of prayer and integrating prayer into the work of caring for their babies, although they were suspicious of adopting practices from other Christian traditions, in case these were no more than ‘empty rituals’. Certain hospitality practices, the prioritising of support for their husbands, and church practices such as sharing possessions via the ‘grace table’ are seen as distinctive of New Frontiers’ ecclesiology, whilst other practices are held in common with women across diverse denominations. Sonya Sharma explores faith practices in relationships between Muslim sisters, noting that little sociological or psychological research has been conducted into sibling relationships in religious communities. Parents have tended to be key figures of study and research, regarded as central to religious socialisation. Asserting the significance of sisterhood in Muslim families, Sharma’s research is based on interviews with women who identified as Muslim and as sisters, representing a diverse range of ethnicities and ages.

Introduction  11 The often-invisible relationships and everyday religious practices of sisters are revealed as rich and nuanced. Away from the public gaze, sisters inform and teach each other how to pray, how to comport themselves, how to ‘do Islam’ and ‘do family’ at the micro-level, for instance in an elder sister showing a younger sister how to wear the headscarf ‘properly’, in supporting and encouraging one another to fast during Ramadan, or in learning to share the kinds of ‘mothering work’ that elder Muslim girls, in particular, are expected to do in the family. Sisters could also experience conflict and disagreement over such everyday practices if one sister is perceived as more devout than another. Yet, on the whole, Sharma identifies that religious practices contribute to the closeness of Muslim sisters’ relationships. Finally, in Part Five, three essays offer perspectives on women’s work and, at the same time, raise profound questions about the value of women’s faith lives in economic and vocational terms, especially as women age. Almost the whole of our book could be seen to address women’s domestic, spiritual, religious, and cultural work in a wide variety of forms and ways. The essays in our final section investigate specific aspects of work not touched on, or only lightly touched upon, in the preceding chapters. Asma Shahin Khan offers a mixed methods investigation of the impact of religious practices on economic activity amongst British Muslim women. Beginning from the well-documented fact that British Muslim women are more likely to be economically inactive than active, choosing to look after home and family rather than entering paid employment outside the home, Khan seeks to establish whether religious practice increases the levels of economic activity amongst these women. She finds that ‘individual religious practice is not a significant predictor of LAHF (“looking after home and family”) among Muslim women in statistical analysis, and that Muslim women themselves do not see religious practice as a barrier to economic activity’. Khan’s interviews with 27 economically inactive Muslim women from Manchester elicited rich data concerning hijab (modesty and ‘covering’ practices) and salah (daily prayers), enabling Khan to conclude that ‘hijab is not a static symbol of oppression; covering practices vary between women and over life-stage, and between women within the same family’ and that ‘hijab gave the interviewees greater confidence in their interactions in mixed gender settings, particularly in their interactions with Muslim men’. Not all women who wore the hijab prayed regularly, and there was a wide variation in levels of religious practice amongst interviewees. Nevertheless, none of the interviewees regarded religious practice as a barrier to economic activity. Accepted practices of making up missed prayers are employed by the women, and most women expressed the view that workplaces were or would be accommodating of their religious needs. The final two chapters of the book offer fascinating insights into the lives and ministries of older women in religious congregations and how they perceive their work now that they are no longer active in former ways. In the chapter by Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen, interviews conducted with

12  Nicola Slee et al. religious sisters in their old age provided an opportunity for them to look back on their long years of living in community and of missionary service. McBride’s interviews with sisters from the Zusters van de Jacht provide an oral history of one of the oldest female Flemish missionary congregations, expanding recent accounts of Protestant missionary women by including a Roman Catholic perspective. Employing voice-centred analysis, the chapter examines the sisters’ experiences and understanding of their missionary vocation and gives vivid accounts of the ways in which this missionary vocation was lived out through various experiences of inculturation, solidarity with the women and children they were living with and serving, prison reform work, and empowerment through education. In each of these contexts and ways, the sisters formed close relationships in the communities to which they were sent, ‘where their long-term presence and commitment to individuals, families, and communities built faith in the lives of those they served’ and also expressed a sense of familial loyalty and intimacy which were often unexpected fruits of their lives. In retirement, most of them have continued to have involvement in the communities in which they served. Finally, Catherine Sexton holds up for scrutiny and affirmation the spiritual work of elderly Roman Catholic sisters who perceive themselves to be ‘ministering Christ’ even as they experience diminishment of their capacity to be actively engaged in the kinds of ministries that formerly constituted their religious practice. Sexton’s chapter, like McBride and Dillen’s account of their research with elderly Belgian missionary sisters, adds to the literature on the lives of religious sisters, but also examines and challenges the theological meanings of ‘work’ from the perspective of faithfully lived old age. Where women’s lives are no longer productive in the kinds of ways that are measurable and valuable in contemporary society, they may nevertheless be generative in ways that critique and challenge those prevailing norms. Here, then, is another example of how feminist-inspired research can decentre norms in both religion and academia and bring to visibility forms of faith and practice that would otherwise remain hidden. Notes 1 For a fuller account of the Symposium, see Anne Phillips, ‘The Faith Lives of Women and Girls: An Expanding Story’, in From the Shores of Silence: Conversations in Feminist Practical Theology, ed. Ashley Cocksworth, Rachel Starr, and Stephen Burns (London: SCM Press, 2023): 76–94. 2 Nicola Slee, Fran Porter, and Anne Phillips, eds., The Faith Lives of Women and Girls (Farnham: Ashgate, 2013), 2. 3 Nicola Slee, Fran Porter, and Anne Phillips, eds., Researching Female Faith: Qualitative Research Methods (Abingdon: Routledge, 2018), 1, 2. 4 Although these two lectures do not form part of this book, one has been published elsewhere, and the other one is in preparation. They represent something significant about the breadth of this collection. See Yafa Shanneik, The Art of Resistance in Islam: The Performance of Politics among Shi’i Women in the Middle East and Beyond (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022), 96–127. Sariya ­Cheruvallil-Contractor’s lecture is in preparation for publication.

Introduction  13 5 The original paper in which Crenshaw introduced the concept of ­intersectionality is Kimberlé Crenshaw, ‘Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics’, University of Chicago Legal Forum 1 (1989): 139–167, accessed 10 January 2023, https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article= 1052&context=uclf. 6 Elaine Graham, Transforming Practice: Pastoral Theology in an Age of Uncertainty (London: Mowbray, 1996). 7 Dorothy C. Bass, ed., Practicing Our Faith: A Way of Life for a Searching People, 2nd ed. (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010); Dorothy C. Bass, Receiving the Day: Christian Practices for Opening the Gift of Time, 2nd ed. (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2019); Douglas A. Hicks, Money Enough: Everyday Practices for Living Faithfully in the Global Economy (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2010); Thomas G. Long, Testimony: Talking Ourselves into Being Christian (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2004); Bonnie Miller-McLemore, In the Midst of Chaos: Caring for Children as Spiritual Practice (San Francisco, CA: ­Jossey-Bass, 2006); Stephanie Paulsell, Honoring the Body: Meditations on Christian Practice (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2002); Donald Saliers and Emily Saliers, A Song to Sing, A Life to Live: Reflections on Music as Spiritual Practice (­Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2004); Claire E. Wolfteich, Lord, Have Mercy: Praying for Justice with Conviction and Humility (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2006). 8 Dorothy C. Bass, et al., Christian Practical Wisdom: What It Is, Why It Matters (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 2016). 9 Lauren F. Winner, The Dangers of Christian Practice: On Wayward Gifts, ­Characteristic Damage, and Sin (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 2018). 10 Marjorie Procter-Smith, In Her Own Rite (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1990) and Praying with Eyes Open (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995); Teresa Berger, Women’s Ways of Worship: Gender Analysis and Liturgical History  (­Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1999), and ed., Dissident Daughters: Feminist Liturgies in Global Context  (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001); Fragments of Real Presence: Liturgical Traditions in the Hands of Women (New York, NY: Crossroad Publishing Co., 2005); Jan Berry, Ritual Making Women: Shaping Lives for Changing Lives (Sheffield: Equinox, 2009). 11 Meredith B. McGuire, Lived Religion: Faith and Practice in Everyday Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). 12 Nancy T. Ammerman, ed., Everyday Religion: Observing Modern Religious Lives (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). See also Nancy T. Ammerman, ‘Lived Religion as an Emerging Field: An Assessment of its Contours and Frontiers’, Nordic Journal of Religion and Society 29, no. 2 (2016): 83–99, and Nancy T. Ammerman, Studying Lived Religion: Contexts and Practices (New York, NY: New York University, 2021). 13 See ‘Amsterdam Centre for the Study of Lived Religion’, accessed 10 January 2023, https:/vu-nl.academia.edu. 14 See, for instance, the series ‘Palgrave Studies in Lived Religion and Societal Challenges’, edited by R. Ruard Ganzevoort, Nancy Ammerman and Srdjan Sremac (Palgrave Macmillan), and R. Ruard Ganzevoort and Johan H. Roeland, ‘Lived Religion: The Praxis of Practical Theology’, International Journal of Practical Theology 18, no. 1 (2014): 91–101. 15 See Helen Cameron, et al., Talking about God in Practice: Theological Action Research and Practical Theology (London:  SCM, 2010); Helen Cameron and Catherine Duce, Researching Practice in Mission and Ministry: A Companion (London: SCM, 2013); Clare Watkins, Disclosing Church: An Ecclesiology Learned from Conversations in Practice (Abingdon: Routledge, 2020).

14  Nicola Slee et al. 16 Abby Day, The Religious Lives of Older Lay Women: The Last Active Anglican Generation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). 17 Caroline Starkey, Women in British Buddhism: Commitment, Connection, Community (Abingdon: Routledge, 2020). 18 See note 4. 19 See references in note 10 for examples. 20 See https://redtentdirectory.com, accessed 10 January 2023, and Niki Rathmell, ‘The Red Tent’, accessed 10 January 2023, https://www.craftcourses.com/blog/ the-red-tent. 21 Helen Collins, ‘Weaving Worship and Womb: A Feminist Practical Theology of Charismatic Worship from the Perspective of Early Motherhood’ (PhD diss., ­University of Bristol, 2016).

Part I

Reflexivity and Research

1 Inhabiting the role A retrospective reflexive review from a viewpoint of lived experience Grace Thomas Introduction Practical theology foregrounds the human experience and is directed towards transformative action. However, as Steven Pattison argues ‘any theological reflection undertaken by an individual may reveal more about that person and their particular perspective than it does about a secular situation or the Christian theological tradition’.1 This is an important epistemological observation as it recognises that no researcher is neutral in the process of gaining insight and understanding. A discipline of reflexivity is essential for the practical theological researcher and integral to discussions of qualitative methodology. Such situatedness enables the researcher to interrogate their own position, assumptions, and responsibilities in relation to the phenomena being studied. Reflexivity has been described as exercising an ‘immediate, continuing, dynamic and subjective self-awareness’.2 Thus, it is both ­immediate (an exercise done initially to position the researcher within the project) and continuing (intended to be maintained throughout the research process and, possibly, even beyond). Breda Gray, for example, describes the discipline of reflexivity as ‘a turning back of inquiry on the formative conditions of its production by variously addressing questions of the researcher’s biographical relationship to the topic’.3 Despite this recognition of the ongoing nature of reflexivity, researchers often undergo a reflexive process at the beginning of their project as an attempt to locate themselves and identify their relationship to the research, before journeying through it. In ‘When my Work is Found Wanting’, Dawn Llewellyn undertakes a ‘turning back’ on her previous work, reflecting on how offering a list of biographical data at the start sometimes meant that she missed out on evaluating more deeply her position within the research.4 Llewellyn’s discussion of reflexivity and practice, and her own personal journey as described in her chapter, illustrates an important and often overlooked aspect of reflexivity – its retrospective potential. The retrospective tool has been employed in practical theology as a method of reflecting upon how personal perceptions of God, or the emergence of qualitative research trends and concepts, have evolved through time and with experience.5 While reflexivity is often framed as an activity DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-3

18  Grace Thomas that occurs within the research process itself, I suggest that a ‘retrospective ­reflexive review’ can also be a transformative learning experience. In this chapter, I employ a ‘retrospective reflexive review’. This extends the reflexive approach to include new perspectives gained following the original focus for the reflection – in this case on research that I conducted into clergy wellbeing while training for ordination into the Church of England (CofE). I explore what my position was in this initial research and, now as a vicar with four years of experience in ministry, I revisit my initial conclusions and interrogate them alongside my lived experience, so that I may be further transformed in my own understanding of clergy wellbeing. My initial research Due to family commitments, I decided against training for ordination in a residential college, choosing the option of training locally, with evening classes and frequent weekends away. This meant that I continued to work alongside my training – as a full-time family support officer in a local authority. At the time I was working, social care practice was moving away from problem-solving approaches and towards enabling and resourcing families. A new asset-based assessment tool was introduced locally, the Family Assessment, to support families at risk of breaking down or experiencing issues that would detrimentally impact their wellbeing. This tool invited family members to consider what their strengths were in a wide range of categories and identify needs that required further resourcing. It was founded on a principle of self-care, with the primary locus of wellbeing being the individual themselves, before broadening it out to identify what additional resources were needed from beyond the individual’s own capabilities. I postulated that such a tool may be beneficial for clergy, who, in balancing a number of varied demands, are known to be at risk of burnout.6 I developed the Clergy Resilience Individual Scoring Plan (CRISP) tool, based on the tool used in social care, for clergy to promote their wellbeing.7 It was designed to enable ordained and lay ministers to review their strengths and resources in a wide range of categories of life, from housing to emotional health to finance. This, I argued, allowed for a comprehensive and holistic view of wellbeing, which is particularly pertinent for clergy where the boundaries between work and home are significantly blurred and the role is perceived as a ‘whole life’ endeavour. Through the research process, however, the responses from the participants, all of whom were clergy self-identifying as female, revealed that while the tool helped to promote wellbeing, there were significant impacting factors that clergy had little ability to influence. My analysis revealed the presence of some dominant social ideologies. ­Participants consistently mentioned their role as household managers  –  arranging childcare, caring responsibilities, and house ­maintenance – and how this impacted the time they had to undertake their priestly roles sufficiently. While health, relationships, financial, and housing

Inhabiting the role  19 issues did impact wellbeing, what was more significant were the expectations that participants felt were placed upon them to balance their multiple ‘ways of being’ and meet various competing demands. I concluded that, for wellbeing to flourish, a tripartite approach that not only encompassed self-care but also included community and institutional support as essential elements was required. Four years on from this study, I now have lived experience of being a clergy person, and therefore, my perspective on clergy wellbeing is viewed from a different angle. As a woman, a mother, a person of Indian heritage, and now a priest, I am treading in a different territory than when I undertook my original research. The influence of this upon my wellbeing can now be brought alongside this research, therefore, in reflexive conversation. My position as a researcher and my position now I embody multiple ‘ways of being’, which shape my outlook and perspective: some I have inhabited since birth, such as being a girl and then a woman,8 of global majority heritage. Some I have gained during my life, such as becoming a mother. I entered into ordination from a background in nursing and social care, and much of my articulated sense of vocation was rooted in a calling to serve and care for people pastorally and spiritually. When I started training, my husband had been a priest for eight years. My father-in-law and brother-in-law were also priests, and, with this, I assumed that I held a level of knowledge about priestly life that maybe my peers did not. Having lived in a vicarage for a considerable time, bearing daily witness to the challenges of ordained ministry, I was aware of the ‘whole life’ aspect of ministry – the way in which, unlike most other jobs, ministry is inextricably linked with all areas of life and, indeed, with who one is as a person. Prior to my ordination, my working contexts were such that I experienced negligible issues related to my identity as a woman. I occasionally encountered language in the staff room that demonstrated levels of racial bias, including, for example, the use of a derogatory label that I had been subjected to as a child being used to describe the owners of a local corner shop. In my approach to the initial research, therefore, my experience as a member of a clergy family enabled me to view wellbeing through the lens of ‘whole life’ ministry, but the impact on my wellbeing of the relationship between certain embodied ‘ways of being’, and aspects of the narrative and self-understanding of the CofE institution, was not fully realised until I became ordained myself. Some understand the point of ordination as a moment of ‘ontological change’, where the person’s very being is altered. One of the most influential Anglican priests and theologians, Richard Hooker, looked upon the order of priesthood as a ‘mark of separation’ and a ‘distinct order’ derived from God alone, with ordination being ‘indelible’.9 While I resist the imagery of ‘separation’, with the assumptions that such language may engender, I accept that when I was ordained priest, my identity was changed in a manner that would remain with me until my death. From the point of ordination onwards,

20  Grace Thomas I inhabited a new ‘way of being’ – a priestly way of being – which became an intrinsic part of my self-expression. My ordination also marked a new chapter in my position within the CofE – as an ordained leader – and it became apparent very quickly that my new way of being within this institution generated new questions and challenges for me and for the wider organisation. I am a brown woman of Indian heritage, ministering within an institution steeped in white, patriarchal influence. For centuries, only men could be ordained in the CofE. In the mid-1990s, women were, for the first time, ordained as priests, and, in 2015, the year I started training for ministry, the first female bishop was appointed. However, women still occupy a tenuous place or are greeted with an ‘ambiguous welcome’ in the CofE, where in some traditions, women’s leadership and their right to hold office in the Church is affirmed, but their ‘priestliness’ is denied.10 In other traditions, a complementarian view is held, whereby women are understood to be equal but have different roles and therefore are not accepted as leaders of a church. In practice, this means that churches in the CofE can legally refuse to appoint a woman on the basis of gender alone. While the number of women being ordained is increasing, with the latest figures suggesting one-third of all clergy in the CofE are now women, only 3.8% of clergy identify as Black Asian Minority Ethnic (BAME),11 with 1.3% identifying as Asian: statistics pertaining to how many of these are women are difficult to locate.12 Navigating my way of being as a priest, alongside my ways of being as a woman, mother, and person of Indian heritage, in an institution where I am a rarity, can sometimes bring me to places of exclusion, othering, and non-belonging, and this has a profound impact upon my wellbeing. In what follows, I present a series of narratives to illustrate the times when my ‘ways of being’ have been in conflict with what is perceived to be the institutional ‘norm’. Using my retrospective reflexive review approach, I will bring these stories together in conversation with the conclusions I drew from my original research, drawing in concepts of institutional self-understanding and identity, to furnish a deeper reflection on how clergy wellbeing within the CofE can be enabled to flourish. My ministerial experiences My first parishes bordered, or were very close to, three CofE churches where my priestly ministry or leadership was not recognised. While I was generally treated with warmth and respect by colleagues who come from these traditions, it did not escape me that one of my ‘ways of being’ was, in effect, denied by the stance that they took. I began to recognise, quite early in my ministry, the impact that this ‘ambiguous welcome’ had on my sense of belonging and, therefore, wellbeing. I felt that I needed to prove myself to colleagues – to demonstrate that I was called to ministry and capable of fulfilling such a calling. I felt a responsibility to prove that someone like me had a meaningful and justified place within the institution.

Inhabiting the role  21 Within weeks of my ordination, I was asked whether I was planning to have any babies during my curacy. I was told by a member of the clergy that it was ‘traditional’ for male clergy to officiate at weddings and by another that it was the case that men are more ambitious than women, which was why more men hold higher positions in the church. During the course of a training event, the lead speaker made the statement that ‘we are all white, middle-class people here’, prompting nearly everyone to look at me. To give credit to the speaker, when I pointed out what they had said, and its effect on me, they were deeply apologetic and expressed gratitude that I had raised this with them. In another place, when working with a group looking at figures who were influential in our childhood, I mentioned Gandhi, which was summarily dismissed due to the reasoning that ‘he’s not of our culture’. In one church meeting, comments were made about the ‘corrupt’ nature of Asians. When I mentioned that this had made me feel uncomfortable, I was told by a church leader, ‘but I don’t see you as Asian’. My way of being, as a woman of Indian descent, was dismissed or disregarded because of the negative connotations attached to such an identity. Of course, alongside these, I have had many joyful and affirming experiences in ministry. My ‘difference’ has been lauded and celebrated by my colleagues who identify my ‘otherness’ as a good thing within the CofE, and my presence within the institution is seen as an indication of the steps it is taking towards diversity. I have also been told by lay global majority heritage women how my presence in the pulpit and at the altar affirms them and gives them hope. At a church event recently, a young woman rushed over, eager to meet me, as she had never met a female priest before. This is very encouraging, but it serves to illustrate a broader point about the lack of diversity within the institution. I occupy a space that is both ambiguous and hopeful. Yet, many times in my ministry, it has been a space that has not felt like a place of safety or full welcome for me. The consequences of this have meant that this section of this chapter has been the hardest to write and the one I feel most vulnerable over. While there are enough women within the CofE to share these experiences in a safe way, there are very few who embody the intersectionality of being a global majority heritage woman. Institutional identity Prior to my ordination, while I was aware that the CofE was an institution that was predominantly white, where the ordination of women was recent history, the extent to which I appreciated the effect this would have upon clergy who did not fit within the ‘normal’ institutional parameters was limited. Thus, in my initial analysis, though I recognised how some of the dominant social ideologies around the role of women in society were manifested in clergy life and wellbeing, I did not question whether there were dominant, or significant, ideologies within the institution that would have a similar impact. Recognising that my position and experience have changed, where I now

22  Grace Thomas inhabit the role that the participants of my original study held, as part of my retrospective reflexive review, I want to further critically interrogate the tripartite model of clergy wellbeing that I conceived. This model drew together the three elements which I concluded were essential for clergy wellbeing to flourish: self-care, care from community, and care from the institution. At the time of my initial conclusions, while I was aware of the relevance of selfcare and the wider societal influences, I was observing the institution from the outside. As articulated in the narratives I presented, once ordained within the institution, I became quickly aware of how my deviation from the ‘norm’ was impacting the self-understanding of the institution and how this, in turn, began to impact my wellbeing. Thus, it is appropriate to consider in more depth how the institutional element of the tripartite model impacts wellbeing. Organisational identity focuses on how organisations and institutions answer two fundamental questions: ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Who are you?’, which are helpful reflexive questions.13 The ‘Who am I?’ question can be used to draw out the overarching sense of who the institution is, and the ‘Who are you?’ question looks to discern who people are within, and outside, the organisation. Vaughan Roberts and David Sims incorporate these questions into an identity story framework when talking about individual church identity, which I suggest is equally effective in considering the identity of the wider church institution – in my case the CofE.14 In their framework, Roberts and Sims highlight three narratives that shape the identity story: historical narrative, organisational narrative, and personal narrative. My personal narrative is threaded throughout this retrospective reflexive review, yet, while I referred to historical and organisational narratives implicitly both here and in my original research, it is worth drawing these out more explicitly to examine how they operate, and therefore influence, the tripartite model. For the majority of the organisation’s history, the leadership of the CofE has been male and continues to be so at the top of the institution at the time of writing. Influences of the CofE’s historical self-understanding are evident and embedded within its framework. Four-fifths of the saints commemorated in the CofE calendar are men, most of European heritage, contributing to a historical foundation of white, male influence.15 Although more attention is now paid to this, male-gendered language in all aspects of church literature – from hymns to liturgy to canon law – remains prevalent.16 While women are now ordained within the CofE and, since 2014, have been permitted to become bishops, the historical and traditional viewpoint of male-only leadership and priesthood led to the development of the Five Guiding Principles, which all candidates training for ministry (including myself) have had to assent to since 2015. Two of these principles are: Since those within the Church of England who, on grounds of theological conviction, are unable to receive the ministry of women bishops or priests continue to be within the spectrum of teaching and tradition of the Anglican Communion, the Church of England remains ­committed

Inhabiting the role  23 to enabling them to flourish within its life and structures; and P ­ astoral and sacramental provision for the minority within the Church of ­England will be made without specifying a limit of time and in a way that maintains the highest possible degree of communion and contributes to mutual flourishing across the whole Church of England.17 Thus, the historical and traditional narrative about ministry within the CofE has led to a present self-understanding that attempts to bring together two different understandings of the nature of ministry. Anyone wishing to enter into ordained service in the institution has to affirm their cooperation with a statute that states that the non-affirming position of the church on women’s leadership and priesthood is a valid position and is to be afforded space to flourish within the CofE. All female ordinands, therefore, must declare that they accept and respect that colleagues within the institution may adhere to a position that does not recognise their priestly way of being. From their point of entry into the organisation, women are reminded that their place at the table is not on an equal footing with their male colleagues. The ‘ambiguous welcome’ that I experience is rooted in this historical narrative that has shaped and embedded institutional thinking and identity for centuries. Reflexively, my position has shifted from observer to insider, yet my position as an ‘insider’, a priest, is shaped by a sense of ‘not quite fully belonging’. Its potential impact upon wellbeing is beyond the scope of any self-care initiative as the cause is firmly embedded within the institution. The values and narratives of an organisation can be found in its mission statements, straplines, and vision documents. The current CofE vision statement ‘Simpler, Humbler, Bolder’ is underpinned by priorities that include being a church that is ‘younger and more diverse’, displaying clear futurefocused aspirations, where the word ‘diverse’ is repeated frequently.18 The CofE has, over many years, sought to address issues of racial diversity through a series of reports and plans; the latest is the Anti-Racism taskforce’s From Lament to Action.19 The most telling aspect of the report is the listing in the appendices of all the previous recommendations to the CofE on the issue of racial inclusion – 161 in total, from 1985 to 2021 – underlining both the need for change and the persistent failure of the organisation to conclusively address this historically embedded institutional problem. Thus, within the institutional element of my tripartite wellbeing model, there is a complex and evolving story, where the historical influence and the organisational aspirations are conflicted and hold opposing ideas in tension. The result of this is a continuing discourse from people who, like me, have experienced a sense of unbelonging and are vocalising the need for change within the organisation.20 I have demonstrated how the identity of the CofE is complex and multifaceted, with a historical narrative that is demonstrably influential, even when it is in conflict with the organisation’s aspirational narrative. From a wellbeing perspective, this creates spaces of uncertainty and confusion for members such as myself. I see the potential and the desire, but my lived reality is often

24  Grace Thomas at odds with this. Therefore, my place within this organisation feels tenuous and open to challenge. I operate from a perspective of hesitant engagement, and my ways of being are not always able to fully flourish. So, the final step in my retrospective reflexive review needs to ask the following: What does wellbeing as a female, global majority clergyperson look like and how can it be realised when working within the CofE? Returning to the concept of clergy wellbeing The move in psychology-related fields towards self-care and asset-based resourcing is mirrored in contemporary clergy wellbeing research, where levels of ‘spiritual resources’, for example, are measured for their impact.21 Wellbeing, understood through this lens, focuses heavily on individual action and the concept of resilience, defined as a ‘conceptual nameplate for a strengthsbased focus on thriving and positive development’.22 Resilience focuses primarily on positive adaptation and growth forged through experience, yet, as a concept, it is not neutral. Resilience is highly personal in nature and is influenced by individual traits, previous experiences, issues of power and discrimination, and variables such as gender, role, class, economic status, ethnicity, age, and life stage. While resilience is perceived as something an individual gains through their own actions and experiences, such actions and experiences operate within a wider context and are therefore influenced by external factors that are often beyond the person’s own control.23 Anglican priest Magdalen Smith argues that clergy must be ‘people of resilience, working and living with a backbone of steel’ so that they can minister to others effectively.24 David Walker, Bishop of Manchester at the time of writing, asserts that the primary responsibility for wellbeing lies with the clergy themselves, rather than their employer, as they are office holders.25 It is undeniable that everyone has a responsibility to care for themselves. Theologically, the call to care for self is apparent in the call to care for creation, of which humans are a part. Furthermore, for ministers in the CofE, the ordinal consistently articulates an image of ministry that is shaped around a Christological hermeneutic of vocation. At several points during my ordination service, I was reminded that my calling was to model my life and service on that of Christ: ‘Will you endeavour to fashion your own life, and that of your household, according to the way of Christ, that you might be a pattern and example to Christ’s people?’26 A Christological hermeneutic of vocation, in terms of wellbeing, is often articulated by reflecting on the way in which Jesus himself attended to his own self-care, by, for example, resting, praying, and taking refreshment. However, as the narratives from my experience have demonstrated, a focus on self-care, and a reliance on individual resilience, without recognition of the non-neutrality of this concept, is problematic. There is a danger that emphasising individual responsibility, and shaping this wholly around a Christological perspective, potentially implies blame and

Inhabiting the role  25 ministerial inadequacy, or inability to live out one’s vocation, when people burn out. It suggests a level of control over one’s own time and experiences that does not take into account wider contextual structures, issues of power, exclusion, and external demand. My understanding of wellbeing in my original research arose from a perspective that viewed developing greater resilience as central. From a retrospective reflexive viewpoint of lived experience, it is clear how external perceptions of gender, ethnicity, and the presence of institutional and societal power and discrimination directly impact a person’s sense of belonging. For wellbeing to flourish, the influences of the contexts within which someone operates – in my case within a local church and parish, and a wider church institution – are critical. Self-care is practised when people feel able and supported. Resilience emerges when people have the resources from the wider context. Structures that inhibit welcome and belonging, and which impose expectations upon a person due to their ‘ways of being’, will inhibit that person’s sense of wellbeing. It is apparent that my wellbeing is affected simply because my ‘ways of being’ as a priest and global majority heritage woman are often subject to dominant social ideologies, scrutiny, expectation, and challenge. My retrospective reflexive review has enabled a deeper critique of the tripartite model that I originally proposed. My appreciation of the institutional influence upon clergy wellbeing, particularly the confused current narrative that is aspirational in vision yet still firmly locked in its historical narrative, has been deepened following my appointment as a clergy person within the CofE. Looking back at my research from the context of my new position enables me to draw deeper on the facets of clergy wellbeing and challenge the emphasis placed on self-care and resilience that can be found within the institution. Clergy wellbeing research, at present, focuses exclusively on the assessment of the clergy themselves. The ability of the institution, for example, not only to provide adequate resources, but also to be sufficiently reflexive itself in realising the way in which its structures may inhibit clergy wellbeing, has not been a prominent area of study. Any discussion of clergy wellbeing needs to examine both what the institution and community elements are currently providing and also how their structures are actively inhibiting flourishing. For clergy wellbeing to thrive, the ability to live out their ‘ways of being’ within a flourishing environment is central and extends beyond concepts of self-care and resilience. Institutional responsibility, accountability, and, therefore, reflexivity must feature significantly, especially when the narrative of the institution directly inhibits or allows for the rejection of some of the ‘ways of being’ held by members. My experiences as a priest within an institution that operates from a historically white, male foundation, where women’s priesthood is not universally recognised and where global majority heritage people continue to be faced with institutional bias and racism, ­suggest to me

26  Grace Thomas that wellbeing is directly and adversely impacted by this f­ oundation and that reliance on a self-care narrative is detrimental. Concluding reflections I began this exploration by highlighting the epistemological position that no researcher is neutral in the process of gaining knowledge. I brought to my original research a level of understanding of ordained life that, in many ways, was reasonably extensive even though, at that point, I was not ordained. Reflecting on my research a few years later, this time from the viewpoint of an ordained priest, enabled me to see new angles and perspectives that were not previously obvious to me. My position had changed, and therefore, my learning changed. Being able to interrogate my own research and re-envision the outcomes has been a transformative journey. Seeing the subject from within, as an ordained minister now, has given me the opportunity to step onto the foundations of my original thinking and see whether they hold. While most of them have, reinforcements have been needed at times. Four years ago, I argued that for wellbeing to truly flourish, self-care had to be placed alongside external factors, such as care of church and community, and care of the institution. My retrospective reflexive review has both confirmed this argument and demonstrated the limits of such external factors, shaped as they are, by structurally embedded advantage which does not fully accommodate, or, at times even welcome, the experiences of all who inhabit the space. The argument that personal reflection may speak more of the perspective of the reflector than it does of wider issues speaks a truth that, I suggest, enhances the rationale for such methods. No researcher holds a bias-free position, and therefore, acknowledging this and incorporating this reality into the research process itself can enable the emergence of embodied truths that speak on a deeper level than observed truths. Furthermore, recognising that the process of reflexivity can be transformative, even years after the original research, allows practical theologians to embrace a journey of learning that is multidirectional – moving forward, gaining new knowledge through experience, and returning to previous understandings to view them in the light of such new experiences. Finally, this process has highlighted the lack of attention paid to the wellbeing of female clergy and clergy from global majority heritages. In inhabiting ways of being that intersect across these identities, I have found myself facing multiple barriers and a deeper sense of unbelonging. More research is needed that pays attention to the voices of global majority women in ministry and takes seriously the added complexities that arise from working within a historically white, patriarchal institution. Most crucially, institutional accountability for the conflicted and confused narratives that serve to perpetuate uncertainty, and therefore negatively impact wellbeing, needs to be urgently addressed through honest reflexivity of historical narrative, ­position, and power.

Inhabiting the role  27 Notes 1 Stephen Pattison, ‘Some Straw for the Bricks: A Basic Introduction to Theological Reflection’, Contact 99, no. 1 (1989): 8. 2 Linda Finlay, ‘“Outing” the Researcher: The Provenance, Process, and Practice of Reflexivity’, Qualitative Health Research 12, no. 4 (2002): 533. 3 Breda Gray, ‘Putting Emotion and Reflexivity to Work in Researching Migration’, Sociology 42, no. 5 (2008): 936. 4 Dawn Llewellyn, ‘When my Work is Found Wanting: Power, Intersectionality, Postcolonialism and the Reflexive Feminist Researcher’, in The Routledge Handbook of Religion, Gender and Society, ed. Caroline Starkey and Emma Tomalin (London: Routledge, 2021), 179. 5 For example, Oliver uses it as a method of reflecting upon how personal perceptions of God have evolved through experience in Gordon Oliver, ‘Speaking Christian: A Retrospective Journey in Practical Theology’, Practical Theology 14, no. 5 (2021): 454–466; Miller-McLemore uses it to trace the development and trends of her living human web in Bonnie Miller-McLemore, ‘The Living Human Web: A Twenty-five Year Retrospective’, Pastoral Psychology 67, no. 3 (2018): 305–321; and Graham uses it as an autobiographical method of tracing practical theology practice and reflecting on future directions in Elaine Graham, ‘On Becoming a Practical Theologian: Past, Present and Future Tenses’, HTS Teologiese Studies 73, no. 4 (2017): 1–9. 6 For a few examples of literature discussing clergy burnout, see Benjamin Doolittle, ‘Burnout and Coping Among Parish-based Clergy’, Mental Health, Religion & Culture 10, no. 1 (2007): 31–38; Barry Fallon, Simon Rice and Howie J. Wright, ‘Factors that Precipitate and Mitigate Crises in Ministry’, Pastoral Psychology 62, no. 1 (2013): 27–40; Leslie Francis, Stephen Louden and Christopher Rutledge, ‘Burnout Among Roman Catholic Parochial Clergy in England and Wales: Myth or Reality’, Review of Religious Research 46, no. 1 (2004): 5–19; Maureen H. Miner, Martin Dawson and Sam Sterland, ‘Ministry Orientation and Ministry Outcomes: Evaluation of a New Multidimensional Model of Clergy Burnout and Job Satisfaction’, Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 83, no. 1 (2010): 167–188. 7 Grace Thomas, ‘An Exploration of the Practical and Theological Implications of Utilising an Asset Based, Self-care Tool to Promote Clergy Wellbeing’ (MA diss., University of Chester, 2018). 8 I identify with the gender I was assigned at birth, which was girl/woman. I recognise that this particular way of being is not a fixed one and may change as people’s gender self-identity emerges and/or changes. 9 Richard Hooker, The Works of Richard Hooker, Volume 2 (London: Clarendon Press, 1888), 10. 10 This ‘ambiguous welcome’ was articulated by Percy in Emma Percy, ‘Women, Ordination and the Church of England: An Ambiguous Welcome’, Feminist ­Theology 26 no. 1 (2017): 90–100. 11 While I prefer the term global majority heritage, BAME – Black, Asian Minority Ethnic – is the term used in the report cited. 12 Church of England Research and Statistics, Ministry Statistics 2020, accessed 11  July 2022, https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2021–07/­ Ministry%20Statistics%202020%20report%20FINAL.pdf. 13 Paul Tracey, Nelson Phillips and Michael Lounsbury, Religion and Organization Theory (Bingley: Emerald Publishing, 2014), 13. 14 Vaughan Roberts and David Sims, Leading by Story (London: SCM Press, 2017). 15 St. Chrysostom’s, ‘Oh When the (80% male?) Saints …’, in St. Chrysostom’s Church News and Views, accessed 11 July, 2022, https://stchrysostoms.­wordpress. com/2016/10/28/oh-when-the-80-male-saints/.

28  Grace Thomas 16 See, for example, https://www.churchofengland.org/about/leadership-and governance/legal-services/canons-church-england/section-c. 17 Sally Fearns, The Five Guiding Principles: Guidance for Candidates for O ­ rdination in the Church of England, accessed 11 July 2022, https://www.churchofengland. org/sites/default/files/2017-10/the_five_guiding_principles.pdf, 2014). 18 General Synod of the Church of England, Simpler, Humbler, Bolder: A Church for the Whole Nation which is Christ Centred and Shaped by the Five Marks of ­Mission, GS 2223, accessed 14 May 2022, https://www.churchofengland.org/ sites/default/files/2021–06/GS%202223%20Vision%20and%20Strategy.pdf. 19 From Lament to Action: The Report of the Church of England’s Anti Racism Taskforce, accessed 11 July 2022, https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/ files/2021–04/FromLamentToAction-report.pdf. 20 See, for example, Azariah D. A. France-Williams, Ghost Ship: Institutional ­Racism and the Church of England (London: SCM Press, 2020); Jarel RobinsonBrown, Black, Gay, British, Christian, Queer: The Church and the Famine of Grace ­(London: SCM Press, 2021); Victoria Turner, ed., Young, Woke and ­Christian: Words from a Missing Generation (London: SCM Press, 2022). 21 A good example of this is found in Grant R. Bickerton et al., ‘Spiritual Resources as Antecedents of Clergy Well-Being: The Importance of Occupationally Specific Variables’, Journal of Vocational Behavior 87 (2015): 123–133. 22 Michael Ungar, ‘What Is Resilience Across Cultures and Contexts?: Advances to the Theory of Positive Development Among Individuals and Families Under Stress’, Journal of Family Psychotherapy 21, no. 1 (2010): 3. 23 My critique of resilience is influenced by Froma Walsh, ‘Applying a Family Resilience Framework in Training, Practice and Research: Mastering the Art of the Possible’, Family Process 5, no. 4 (2016): 616–632. 24 Magdalene Smith, Steel Angels: The Personal Qualities of a Priest (London: SPCK, 2014), 7. 25 David Walker, ‘Keeping Well’, in Clergy in a Complex Age, ed. Jamie Harrison and Robert Innes (London: SPCK, 2016), 105. 26 Church of England, Common Worship: Ordination Services, accessed 22 August 2022, https://www.churchofengland.org/prayer-and-worship/worship-texts-andresources/common-worship/ministry/common-worship-ordination-0.

2 Women and the Church Challenges in researching women’s religiosity in Poland1 Anna Szwed

Introduction For a sociologist with an interest in researching women and religions, Poland certainly offers fruitful opportunities for analysis: a post-communist country with high indicators of religiosity compared to the rest of Europe and where the Roman Catholic Church occupies a strong, historically ­determined position in the public sphere. Moreover, in recent years, it has been an arena of mass mobilisation of women against a ruling party with links to the Church, mainly against attempts to tighten the abortion law. This tangible  tension between the Church’s position and women’s resistance has led to an ­abundance of commentaries suggesting that the Church will ‘lose women’ and that especially educated Catholic women living in big cities will start to ­abandon it. The idea for the research project, ‘Resistance and Subordination: Religious Agency of Roman Catholic Women in Poland’, emerged in the context described above and resulted from the conviction that apart from quantitative data, a qualitative examination of what is happening with women’s religiosity is also needed. Unlike the Polish media, I was not interested in the causes and trajectories of becoming irreligious, but rather the practices of those women who remain within the Roman Catholic Church. Since in my earlier projects, I focused mainly on the institution, studying the discourse of the Church and attitudes of priests,2 on this occasion I decided to concentrate on women’s perspectives. The result was a project in which, together with two colleagues, I conducted 48 in-depth interviews with Catholic women educated to university level, living in large Polish cities, and involved in various religious groups.3 We also carried out ethnographic research in three religious communities for women. Depending on the community, the ethnography encompassed participant observation during group meetings, taking part in the conferences and training of leaders, analysis of the communities’ communication, and online ethnography in social media. Although the data we gathered provide extremely interesting material on faith practices among Catholic women in Poland, and the role that religion plays in their everyday family and professional lives, in this article I will only DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-4

30  Anna Szwed refer to some of these findings fragmentarily. My main subject of interest is the challenges I encountered at various stages of the research. These result mainly from the tension between the institutional context I operate in and my identity as a researcher – a person raised in the Catholic tradition but now irreligious and with feminist views. As a contribution to the discourse of reflexivity and researcher position,4 I would emphasise the need for broader problematisation of the institutional context in which we operate during research.5 Based on my own experiences, I show how this context – shaped by the dominance of one religion (Roman Catholicism) – can affect the way in which research is conducted and results are obtained. I see this influence on the one hand as restrictive, and on the other, when it is subjected to critical reflection, as potentially inspiring further, original research. The article is divided into three parts. First, I identify the challenges associated with the influence of the dominant religion on the way religiosity is studied, but also on the understanding of religious practices. Second, I focus on the positioning of the researcher vis-à-vis the object of the research and relations with the women being studied, who are followers of the dominant religion. Third, I refer to the challenges of researching the agency of women in so-called conservative spaces. Challenging Catholic frames in research methodology In Poland, the dominant method of studying religiosity is quantitative research conducted on the basis of parameters of religiosity,6 a modified version of Stark and Glock’s dimensions of religious commitment.7 These studies show that the religiosity of Polish society has remained relatively stable over the last 30 years. Since the 1990s, more than 90% of Poles have declared as believers, and around 8% as strong believers. The level of church attendance remains relatively high in Poland, although in recent years it has also been changing – from 47.5% in 2000 to 38% in 2018.8 Increasing numbers of people also declare that they are religious in their ‘own way’ (see below).9 In Poland, there is a long-standing gender gap in religiosity. Quantitative research shows that women are more likely than men to define themselves as ‘strong believers’, have better religious knowledge, and are more orthodox and Church-oriented in their faith. Women are dominant among the participants of Sunday Mass and take Communion and pray more often. They also declare a greater attachment to the religious community, including their own parish, and are more engaged in religious organisations and communities. Women are more likely to point to an emotional experience and feeling of proximity to God and to assign more importance in life to faith, although quantitative research does not allow precise definition of how they understand it.10 The results of the quantitative research cited above provide a general ­picture of religiosity in Poland. This emerges from aggregating easily measurable aspects of individuals’ religiosity,11 with gender treated simply as one of

Women and the Church  31 the variables.12 Yet such studies do not say much about the meaning women attach to religion in their lives. Meredith McGuire suggests that efficient research on individual religiosity requires different research methods than quantitative ones.13 Nancy Ammerman, meanwhile, shows that typical survey questions can constitute an obstacle in acquiring more in-depth data, especially when researching minority groups and women.14 These remarks can certainly apply to the research trends present in Polish sociology of religion. However, there is also one more type of restriction visible in studies on religiosity in Poland, related to the status of Roman Catholicism as the dominant religion. Perhaps ironically, one could state that quantitative research not only shows that Catholicism is dominant in Polish society, but also that the Catholic perspective is dominant in methods and techniques of research on religiosity in Poland. Kinga Sekerdej and Agnieszka Pasieka call this phenomenon ‘methodological Catholicism’ and attribute it to the imposition of Catholic standards in research on religiosity.15 Indeed, if we look at the dominant ways of formulating survey questions in Poland, it is clear that they refer to the official model of religiosity recommended by the Roman Catholic Church.16 In this sense, research on religiosity resembles measuring ‘deviations from the norm’ in the guise of Catholic doctrine. This applies especially to the contents of religious beliefs and knowledge, but ‘methodological Catholicism’ is also visible in other aspects, however, as when religious experience is tested by asking questions about feeling the proximity of God (a premise of theism) or with references to the Eucharist, which is unambiguously Christian. Catholic templates are also visible when discussing religious practices, defined as participation in Mass, taking Communion, confession, and so on. Roman Catholicism in Polish society is often treated as normative. In research, this is reflected not only in the way survey questions are formulated, but also in the interpretation of data, for example when declining indicators of religiosity are regarded as a problem and secularisation is viewed as a negative process.17 These tendencies in research can certainly be linked to the history of sociology of religion in Poland, which in the communist period developed in two main trends – Marxist and Church-based.18 The democratic transformations of the 1990s and the political rejection of Marxism led to a rise in the importance of the confessional narrative and to the perception of religion in Durkheimian categories of a functional institution for society.19 It is easy to imagine that ‘methodological Catholicism’ is an obstacle in researching other religious groups by imposing Catholic standards and ideas on religiosity. I am also convinced, however, that it limits research on religiosity of people self-defining as Catholics. If 46% of respondents declare that they are religious in their own way, it would be useful to know what is behind this declaration. How do our respondents construct ‘believing in their own way’, and moreover, how do those who declare belonging to the institution of the Church construct their religiosity? Do their faith practices fit within those foreseen in the official model and reflected in survey questions?

32  Anna Szwed When designing the research among Catholic women in Poland, the aim of gaining an in-depth insight on individual religiosity was easier to achieve owing to the use of qualitative research methodology from the outset. Interestingly, this did not safeguard me from attempts to return to the aforementioned religiosity research blueprints, illustrating how strongly certain conventions are present in my researcher’s habitus.20 Our project was helped enormously in overcoming ‘methodological Catholicism’ by including the perspective of lived religion,21 which allows a wide range of religious practices in women’s everyday lives to be investigated.22 Focusing on such elements of lived religion as embodiment, materiality, emotions, aesthetics, and narratives expands our understanding of religious practices and also incorporates aspects that go beyond the institutional model of religiosity. At the same time, the lived religion perspective does not mean an exclusively individualistic approach to religiosity or rejection of institutional aspects (e.g. conventional faith practices). As McGuire states, ‘people construct their religious worlds together, often sharing vivid experiences of that intersubjective reality’.23 In this construction, meanings, imaginaries, and practices provided by religious institutions are not obligatory but are nevertheless often used as building blocks. Our interlocutors, as declared Catholics, of course regularly participated in Sunday Mass, went to confession, prayed, and so on. Yet our research also showed that religion is present in their lives not only in designated spatiotemporal fields and rigid forms, but also permeates their everyday lives, and religious practices intersect with practices characteristic of the family or professional sphere. For instance, our informants told us that they prayed while feeding their babies or ironing, or recited the Rosary on the way to work, but also that the very act of ironing becomes prayer, and their religiosity is embodied through their work activities. The religious practices of the women we studied were temporally discontinuous, fragmented, and interrupted by other activities (e.g. care of children). Agata, a 35-year-old lawyer and mother of three children, reflexively referred to the problem: Because I don’t think you can just almost grab hold of that time (…), just say I want to have half an hour twice a day, ideally before the Blessed Sacrament (…) I think that with time, you learn that whether I will have time for contemplation or not depends on what is happening inside my head, and not what’s going on beneath my knees. It’s possible to recite the Rosary on a walk (...) We sometimes have beautiful marital Rosaries, which I very much value, while out driving. For many of our informants, spatiotemporal organisation of these practices demanded additional effort, for example, managing their free time, or finding a suitable place, as with Maria, a 40-year-old working mother, who said that she read the Bible while sitting on a stool in the hallway early in the morning when her husband and four children were still asleep.

Women and the Church  33 New technologies and media, such as religious applications, social media sites, and YouTube preaching, also played an important role in the women’s practices. For example, women from the religious community that I researched found that online courses offered by group leaders were wellsuited to their needs. The courses were divided into smaller parts that could be accessed independently of time and space (e.g. by mobile app), which enabled women to be more flexible in managing the time devoted to religious life and family or professional work. We were also able to grasp the processual nature of women’s religiosity. Some of our interlocutors said directly that their religiosity changed according to the role they were playing. It is evident that experiences of motherhood and family life modify religious practices – they temporarily weaken or suspend some and allow others to develop. In activities related to social roles, such as in resolving dilemmas concerning how many children to have, the choice between employment or staying at home, and forming relations with their husbands, many women found religion a source of support but also a cause of tensions (as in the case of conflicts between religious convictions and work). This intentionally brief overview of examples from our project shows that a critical, reflexive approach to widely applied methodology can open us up to other ways of researching women’s religiosity and deliver more indepth data on the role of religion in their lives. Researching Catholic women as a non-religious feminist and mother As researchers, we carry all the baggage of our personal characteristics, which affect the research process – from gaining access to informants, to forming relations with them, obtaining data, analysing it, and describing the results of studies. This baggage, which may sometimes facilitate and sometimes excessively hinder the process, consists of attributes ranging from our gender, race, age, sexual orientation, social class, ethnicity, and linguistic tradition, to our beliefs and attitudes.24 When commencing the research among Catholic women, I entered the field as a 40-year-old, cis, heterosexual ethnic Polish woman with children, academically educated, working at one of Poland’s top universities, as well as an irreligious person with feminist views. Some of the characteristics positioning me as a researcher were immediately visible to the participants in the study: my name and appearance suggest my gender, my appearance gives an approximate idea of my age, the information about the project denotes my professional status and education. Though I occasionally mentioned the fact I am married with children during the interviews, I did not disclose my personal approach to religion and feminist worldview. I will now focus on these three aspects – my being irreligious, a feminist, and a mother. One of the consequences of the domination of Catholicism in Poland, and a manifestation of its naturalisation, is something I would call ‘researcher’s

34  Anna Szwed default Catholicism’ – the assumption that a person studying religiosity is a Catholic. Sekerdej and Pasieka,25 who describe their ethnographic experiences, interpret this as a manifestation of Catholic hegemony. Like them, I too was never directly asked during my research whether I am religious or a Catholic. However, my interlocutors’ statements and gestures suggested that they assumed I was a Catholic, for example when I was given images of saints or invited to meetings of religious communities, or when one of the women asserted that a non-religious person would not understand her story at all. When conducting ethnographic research in a community of Catholic women, at almost every meeting in the local group I reminded them of my status as researcher, as I wanted it to be clear to people joining. Yet this did not stop the members of the group from regarding me as simply one of them, i.e. a Catholic. This can also be interpreted as a sign of trust and acceptance of my presence in the group, but for me it was an emotionally burdensome factor.26 The conditions in which I conducted the research generally prevented me from correcting ‘researcher’s default Catholicism’. As a tacit assumption, it was never stated directly. I did not consider making a kind of ‘coming out’ at the beginning of each interview or meeting in which I reported all my identities. Only when it came to working on this article did I realise that in a country in which the majority of people are Catholics, perhaps this time it was me – a white, heterosexual, ethnic Pole but irreligious person – who was part of the minority, and I found revealing my minority status harder than I had imagined. Declaring my irreligion also seemed problematic in terms of successfully conducting research and concerns about participants rejecting or withdrawing their consent.27 In a country like Poland, with one dominant religion, the category of religiosity de facto functions as a dichotomy: either you are religious, meaning Catholic, or you are an atheist, which connotes a negative attitude to religion, and especially to the Catholic Church. Although my interlocutors sometimes voiced criticism of the Church as an institution – for example, its approach to women – they all remained within it and felt connected to it. When writing about a researcher’s identities, which are intrinsically involved in the research processes and relations with participants, we often assume that they are relatively constant and set in stone, and thus that the researcher knows who she is. In fact, though, our identities might be fluid, liminal, and are often formed or reflected upon in relations with others. I grew up in a family which could certainly be called Catholic.28 I underwent the entire cycle of Catholic religious socialisation, participating in sacraments, culminating with a church wedding and the baptism of my first child. My process of becoming an irreligious person took some time and was more of a distancing, first from the Church, and then more fundamentally, from the faith, than a pursuit of anything. Even now I prefer to describe myself as an irreligious person, which seems to be more fluid and open to interpretation, than as an atheist, which entails the conviction that God does not exist. At  the same time, I find the world of Catholics understandable as well as

Women and the Church  35 culturally and personally close, through my own experiences and those of my family members. Years of academic research in this field have also expanded my knowledge of Catholicism, especially its institutional dimension. Neitz points out that both a researcher’s positioning towards the tradition in question (adherents, non-adherents) and its status (dominant, minority) is extremely important for the research questions we ask as well as ways of interpreting data.29 My own experiences, however, situate me in a liminal position in the location matrix Neitz proposes – neither an outsider nor an insider, but a kind of ‘familiar stranger’ in relation to Roman Catholicism as the dominant religion.30 This positioning has certain virtues – it made it easier for me to enter, move in, and understand the religious worlds of the women I was researching. On the other hand, the status of ‘familiar stranger’ can reinforce beliefs concerning my ‘default religiosity’. Its liminality is also connected with the constant process of reflexive monitoring of my position and care for how I interpret data. This also entails constantly working on my identity – on its construction (who am I in the religious field?) but also managing it (disclosing/concealing identity). This is part of the general tendency described by Coffey towards objective treatment of a researcher’s identity as something ‘to be “managed”, amended, and constructed in order to facilitate the research process’.31 The tensions I experienced, however, resulted not only from my positioning as an irreligious person researching Catholics, but also as a feminist operating in so-called conservative social spaces.32 On the one hand, my feminist habitus generated a critical perspective on the patriarchal relations within the Church and family appearing in my interlocutors’ narratives, while on the other, my sociological eye attempted to focus on how the women function within these structures, and reproduce, negotiate with, or resist them. It was a major challenge for me to take part in a community meeting during which we read and commented on the writings of a Polish cardinal together. From my point of view, the very act of reading a text from the 1960s on ‘purity’, and reproducing stereotypical notions on femininity and sexuality (women as guardians of virtue, responsible for how they are treated by men) was problematic. It became even more so when it turned out that the participants treated this model as exemplary. This example shows that when studying conservative spaces, as feminist researchers we face up, not only to attitudes and views we do not agree with, but also with those we see as unfair and harmful. Although Catholicism, as the dominant religion in Poland, seems to particularly interfere with my identity as an irreligious researcher, I also discern its influence in generating tensions associated with feminist identity. In this aspect, however, I understand domination not so much as Catholics’ statistical prevalence or the aforementioned treatment of Catholic standards as taken for granted, but as the political consolidation of religion and the ­significant role of the Church in the public sphere in Poland.33 We conducted the research during a period of intensive public debates on reproductive

36  Anna Szwed rights, the rights of LGBT+ people, and attitudes towards human ­sexuality, against the backdrop of mass public protests against the tightening of the anti-abortion law34 and amid heightened ideological polarisation of ­Polish society, successfully compounded by political forces. Representatives of the Roman Catholic Church played an important role in these conflicts by publicly supporting anti-choice bills, contributing to a discourse about the threats of gender and LGBT ideologies that was deftly harnessed by the Churchallied ruling party. This context was significant for my fieldwork, as it lent an additional resonance to my interlocutors’ critical statements on abortion, rights of nonheteronormative people, sex education, and so on, as the voices of the political ‘majority’ supporting the conservative status quo. In the community of Catholic women I studied, for long weeks there was a focus on criticism of feminists and participants in the so-called black protests, condemnation of supporters of the right to abortion, and anti-abortion mobilisations. This was a particular challenge to me, as I was one of the very same feminist participants in protests against the tightening of the Polish abortion law that they were criticising. In this sometimes emotionally costly balancing act between my identities and empathy with my research subjects,35 the status of a woman studying women and mother talking to other mothers was very helpful.36 Among the aspects that interested us in the project was the way that religion is present in the women’s family lives, and the extent to which it can be a source of women’s agency in this field. While as an irreligious researcher I did not share my religious experiences with my informants, I had a certain insight and understanding of some of their experiences as wives and mothers.37 At times, I  revealed this part of my identity in my contacts with my interlocutors. Unlike in the case of being an irreligious person and a feminist, this identification was safe for me and served as a kind of legitimisation in the conservative circles I was researching. I am also certain that this gave my interlocutors a sense of security in situations when they were talking about their experiences of pregnancy, miscarriages, childbirth, or during an interview when they had to divide their attention between me – the researcher – and a young child expecting attention. These examples of the positive function of my identity as a woman and mother show that in reflection on the researcher’s positioning, potential links are just as important as factors distancing or differentiating us from the people we research. Acknowledging religious women’s agency The third type of challenge I wish to discuss mainly concerns the process of data analysis, although it is also related to the theoretical setting of the research. One of the key categories in our project is agency. In studies on gender and religion, the question of agency has been widely discussed since the beginning of the 1990s.38 The recognition that religious women also have

Women and the Church  37 agency forced researchers to stop thinking about their religious engagement, especially in conservative religions, as a manifestation of ‘false consciousness’.39 The next challenge was to expand the category of agency and go beyond its Western, feminist implications. Scholars pointed out that the agency of religious women should not be identified solely with resistance to religious rules but can also be expressed in acts of subordination and piety.40 Understanding that the agency of religious women is multidimensional and takes place in diverse practices by no means negates the tensions that we experience when attempting to interpret the collected research materials: can what I describe be regarded as a manifestation of agency; is what I perceive a form of resistance or subordination; where are the limits of agency? In their article on the feminist ethnographer’s dilemma, Avishai, Gerber, and Randles show that the data we collect in the field can complicate our understanding of what we regard as conservative and non-emancipatory and challenge the feminist agendas with which we enter this field.41 I would like to refer to this complexity by describing two cases from our project. The first is the story of Lena, who underwent a major transformation of her ­ religiosity  –  from religious indifference to being highly religious Catholic. This experience reorganised Lena’s thinking about the role of religion in her life and the social roles she plays. Just before her conversion, as she named the transformation in the interview, Lena was close to divorce with her husband, who used psychological and physical violence towards her. The conversion made Lena decide against these plans. At first glance, Lena’s story could be interpreted as an example of the negative impact of religion, which causes a woman to stay in a violent relationship. Her case is more complex, however. Although Lena stayed with her husband, the conversion led her to undergo an internal transformation – her sense of self-worth was strengthened. The awareness that she is a daughter of God, loved, and accepted, resulted in Lena gaining the courage to express her own opinion. Based on religion, she started to set boundaries for her husband and to force him to change his violent behaviours. Lena became the co-ordinator of a religious group and also underwent intensive professional development. At the same time, she currently declares that family life is her priority. In Lena’s story, religion becomes a source of resistance to her violent husband. On the other hand, the religious conversion means that she submits to religious rules concerning the indissolubility of marriage and the idea of the woman as mother and carer. Lena became psychologically independent of her husband and autonomous as a person, although she declares that after conversion she is more relational, associating this with her femininity. Lena’s story emphatically demonstrates the antinomies inherent in female agency. It also shows that certain actions can simultaneously represent acting with agency to follow certain rules as well as pursuing resistance to others, and that actions might not in fact be non-emancipatory, even if they seem to be. The second case I would like to refer to is a community of Catholic women in which I spent more than a year conducting ethnographic research, in both

38  Anna Szwed the physical space (local groups) and the virtual one (social media). At first glance, the community could have been described as a conservative project. Being a mother and a wife is both an ideal promoted in the group and the actual status of many of the women involved. The community promotes an essential vision of femininity based on the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church, mainly Pope John Paul II’s so-called ‘new feminism’. Women are also encouraged to follow this ideal by taking care of their appearance and physical attractiveness. Important aspects of the community’s activity are support for anti-abortion movements, promotion of large families, and criticism of feminism. This brief description is sufficient to produce an impression that this is a group of Catholic women who in a simple way reproduce the conservative, religious status quo. Partly at least, this is no doubt the case. However, a closer look at their activity shows that the community also supports women in their self-determination efforts and in building a sense of agency. In the activities and materials generated by the community, its members are encouraged to be strong, determined, and independent of the opinions of others, including men. The key is meant to be recognising their needs and submitting only to God, not other people. For many women, the ‘daughter of the King of Kings’ metaphor promoted in the community becomes a motivation and legitimisation of the changes they make. A good example is this statement by Liliana, a 28-year-old single woman who is a doctor: I began to […] really feel I was the Daughter of the King. […] That I was really learning that I am wanted as I am. That generally my whole life had been about fitting in and making other people happy. I didn’t think about what I really like. […] What interests me, and not my friends or family. For people like Liliana, religion becomes a resource used in actions to bring about change, and submission to God is often a ‘precondition for their own agency’.42 As I mentioned above, the message targeted at the members of the community has a strong focus on questions of external appearance, beauty, and body care, which can easily be interpreted as a reproduction of cultural models of femininity based on physical attractiveness. It is worth, however, placing this message in the context of the models of feminine religiosity popular in the environment in which these women move. They emphasise the spiritual and emotional aspect, fundamentally ignoring bodily concerns. We could therefore say that the community members on the one hand reproduce the cultural templates of feminine attractiveness, but on the other use them to negotiate the model of the Catholic woman, which they perceive as limiting. By wearing feminine dresses, using makeup, taking care of their bodies, and so on, they distance themselves from the figure of the unattractive traditionalist concentrating solely on prayer. For some of the women, the

Women and the Church  39 body-related practices promoted in the community, including its acceptance, also give them a chance to reflect on their own needs and help them to manage the space to accomplish them. The research I conducted in the Catholic women’s community was, for me, an important experience developing my reflexivity as a researcher. My data show that religious women can realise their agency in activities that, from feminist positions, we regard as non-emancipatory. The results of our research demonstrate that the same practices that reproduce religious and gender orders can also strengthen women at the individual level and support their resistance to the restrictions or inequalities they experience. Finally, it bolstered me in the conviction that in giving a voice to religious women and deeming them to be subjects with full agency, we must also be aware that this agency can reproduce the patriarchal order, and that we will not necessarily ‘like’ the voice of women that we hear during our research. This type of approach simultaneously positions me as a researcher in two fields I am close to – sociology of religion and gender studies. In Poland, research on women and religion is a relatively undeveloped field and marginal in both areas. Leaving aside the issues of methodological and ideological attitudes I  discussed earlier, in general sociology of religion in Poland can still be viewed as not sensitive to gender. Gender researchers, meanwhile, are either not interested in religion, or concentrate on criticism of religious institutions.43 The strong position of the Roman Catholic Church in the public sphere, and its numerous interventions in women’s rights, mean that anything religious is often equated with the Church as an institution, and as such criticised from feminist positions, including in academia. The political entanglement of Catholicism and the Roman Catholic Church’s interventions in women’s rights in Poland make it difficult for many feminist researchers to acknowledge the agency of religious women. Conclusions By describing my experiences of studying religious women in a country like Poland, I wanted to show how the institutional context is enmeshed in our methodological choices and research activities. At a very basic level, the religious context of the society in which we carry out research positions us as members or non-members of a majority or minority religion,44 or as people with liminal identities, as I tried to show using my own example. The case of a society with one dominant religion generates questions about what this domination really means in the religious, social, and political context, and how it influences us as researchers of religion. What is significant for the research process and its results is not only who we are as researchers, who our subjects are, and who we become for each other in this relationship and with regard to the research problem, but also the near and distant historical, social, and political context in which we operate. I find this aspect important since the context often has an unplanned influence on what and how we research – it

40  Anna Szwed can focus our attention on specific topics, guide our i­nterpretations, resonate in our relationship with the participants in the study, emphasise certain parts of our identities, tone down others, and so on. Reflexivity, which we can understand as ‘the process of a continual internal dialogue and critical selfevaluation of researcher’s positionality’,45 also means casting doubt on one’s assumptions, working on one’s own limitations and prejudices, and accepting the dissonance that appears when the data gathered contradicts our ideological agendas.46 The processes of being reflexive on my position as researcher that I describe are not only intellectual, but also connected to emotional costs. Providing the participants in our research with comfort, a sense of security and participation in the process, avoiding exploitation, and bringing attention to the power imbalance (researcher over subject) are today regarded as ethical foundations for conducting research. Increasingly, however, it is noted that it is not just the participants in research but we researchers who bear the potential costs of participation. Continual reflexivity and work on our own identity in the research field can be emotionally exhausting.47 Fortunately, fieldwork is not only related to tensions, which can be hard to relieve, and contradictions that we must deal with. In the reflexive approach to our work, it is also worth considering what makes our fieldwork easier and what reduces tensions and allows us to develop productive contact with our informants. Notes 1 This chapter is a result of the research project ‘Resistance and Subordination: Religious Agency of Roman Catholic Women in Poland’ (no. 2017/26/D/HS6/00125), funded by the National Science Centre, Poland. 2 Anna Szwed, Ta Druga. Obraz Kobiety w Nauczaniu Kościoła Rzymskokatolickiego i w Świadomości Księży [The Other One: The Image of Women in the Teaching of the Roman Catholic Church and the Awareness of Priests] (Kraków: Zakład Wydawniczy Nomos, 2015); Anna Szwed and Katarzyna Zielińska, ‘A War on Gender? The Roman Catholic Church’s Discourse on Gender in Poland’, in Religion, Politics, and Values in Poland, ed. Sabrina Ramet and Irena Borowik (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 113–136. 3 All individual interviews were conducted by me or by my colleagues Katarzyna Leszczynska and Agata Rejowska. Interviews were conducted and transcribed in Polish. Quotes included in the text are translations of excerpts from the transcriptions into English. 4 Carol Warren and Jennifer Hackney, Gender Issues in Ethnography (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2012); Amanda Coffey, The Ethnographic Self (London: Sage Publications, 1999); Marta Trzebiatowska, ‘When Reflexivity is Not Enough: Doing Research with Polish Catholics’, Fieldwork in Religion 5, no. 1 (2010): 78–96; Kelly H. Chong, ‘Coping with Conflict, Confronting Resistance: Fieldwork Emotions and Identity Management in a South Korean Evangelical Community’, Qualitative Sociology 31, no. 4 (2008): 369–390. 5 Mary Jo Neitz, ‘Insiders, Outsiders, Advocates and Apostates and the Religions they Study: Location and the Sociology of Religion’, Critical Research on Religion  1, no. 2 (2013): 129–140; Dorota Hall, ‘Autorefleksja i Usytuowanie

Women and the Church  41 ­ adawcze w Socjologicznych Studiach nad Religią’ [‘Self-reflexion and Research B Positioning in Sociological Studies of Religion’], Studia Socjologiczne 3 (2020): 161–186. 6 Władysław Piwowarski, ‘Operacjonalizacja Pojęcia “Religijność”’ [‘Operationalisation of the Concept of “Religiosity”’], Studia Socjologiczne 4 (1975): 151–174. 7 Rodney Stark and Charles Y. Glock, American Piety: Patterns of Religious Commitment (London and Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968). 8 Instytut Statystyki Kościoła Katolickiego, Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae in Polonia (Warsaw, 2020). 9 Centrum Badania Opinii Społecznej (CBOS) [Centre for Public Opinion Research], Religijność Polaków i Ocena Sytuacji Kościoła Katolickiego [Religiosity of Poles and Assessment of the Situation of the Catholic Church] (Warsaw: CBOS, 2018). 10 Instytut Statystyki Kościoła Katolickiego, Religijność i Aktywność Kobiet w Kościele Katolickim w Polsce [Religiosity and Activity of Women in the Catholic Church in Poland] (Warsaw, 2015). 11 Nancy T. Ammerman, ‘Finding Religion in Everyday Life’, Sociology of Religion 75, no. 2 (2014): 189–207. 12 Cf. Mary Jo Neitz, ‘Dis/Location: Engaging Feminist Inquiry in the Sociology of Religion’, in Handbook of the Sociology of Religion, ed. Michele Dillon (­Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003): 276–293. 13 Meredith B. McGuire, Religion: The Social Context (Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, 2008), 107–109. 14 Ammerman, ‘Finding Religion in Everyday Life’, 192. 15 Kinga Sekerdej and Agnieszka Pasieka, ‘Researching the Dominant Religion: Anthropology at Home and Methodological Catholicism’, Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 25, no. 1 (2013): 53–77. 16 McGuire, Religion, 107–113. 17 Sekerdej and Pasieka, ‘Researching the Dominant Religion’, 71. 18 Irena Borowik, Odbudowywanie Pamięci: Przemiany Religijne w ŚrodkowoWschodniej Europie Po Upadku Komunizmu [Rebuilding Memory: Religious Changes in Central and Eastern Europe After the Fall of Communism] (Kraków: Nomos, 2000), 212–213. 19 Hall, ‘Autorefleksja i Usytuowanie Badawcze’. 20 Cf. Orit Avishai, Lynne Gerber and Jennifer Randles, ‘The Feminist Ethnographer’s Dilemma: Reconciling Progressive Research Agendas with Fieldwork ­Realities’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 42, no. 4 (2013): 394–426. 21 Meredith B. McGuire, Lived Religion: Faith and Practice in Everyday Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008); Nancy T. Ammerman, ed. Everyday Religion: Observing Modern Religious Lives (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2007). 22 Nancy T. Ammerman, ‘Constructing Religion in Context: Contributions from a Lived Religion Approach’, Presentation at the International Society for Sociology of Religion Conference, The Politics of Religion and Spirituality, 9–12 July 2019, Barcelona. 23 McGuire, Lived Religion, 12–13. 24 Cf. Roni Berger, ‘Now I See It, Now I Don’t: Researcher’s Position and Reflexivity in Qualitative Research’, Qualitative Research 15, no. 2 (2015): 219–234. 25 Sekerdej and Pasieka, ‘Researching the Dominant Religion’, 56. 26 Cf. Chong, ‘Coping with Conflict’. 27 Trzebiatowska, ‘When Reflexivity is Not Enough’; Chong, ‘Coping with Conflict’. 28 Cf. Trzebiatowska, ‘When Reflexivity is Not Enough’. 29 Neitz, ‘Insiders, Outsiders, Advocates and Apostates’, 131. 30 Trzebiatowska, ‘When Reflexivity is Not Enough’.

42  Anna Szwed 31 Coffey, The Ethnographic Self, 5. 32 Avishai, Gerber and Randles, ‘The Feminist Ethnographer’s Dilemma’, 396. 33 Jose Casanova, Public Religions in the Modern World (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1994). 34 The first wave of mass protests against attempts to tighten the anti-abortion law took place in autumn 2016, when the ‘Stop abortion’ citizens’ bill was referred to parliamentary commissions. The bill, which demanded an absolute prohibition of abortion and punishment for women who had terminated pregnancies, was ultimately rejected. Further waves of protests took place in the subsequent years. The culmination came with the ruling of the Constitutional Tribunal of 22 October 2020, which deemed abortion for embryopathological reasons to be a violation of the Polish Constitution, thereby de facto limiting the right to legal abortion in Poland to situations when the pregnancy is the result of a prohibited act or when the mother’s life or health is at risk. The Tribunal’s ruling led to weeks of street protests on an unprecedented scale, despite rising COVID-19 infection rates and increased restrictions (including a ban on gatherings). 35 Chong, ‘Coping with Conflict, 382. 36 Ann Oakley, ‘Interviewing Women: A Contradiction in Terms’, in Doing Feminist Research, ed. Helen Roberts (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1981), 30–61. 37 Cf. Berger, ‘Now I See It, Now I Don’t’. 38 Orit Avishai, ‘Theorizing Gender from Religion Cases: Agency, Feminist Activism, and Masculinity’, Sociology of Religion 77, no. 3 (2016): 265–268. 39 Orit Avishai, ‘“Doing religion” in a Secular World: Women in Conservative Religions and the Question of Agency’, Gender and Society 22, no. 4 (2008): 411; Sarah Bracke, ‘Author(iz)ing Agency: Feminist Scholars Making Sense of Women’s Involvement in Religious “Fundamentalist” Movements’, European ­ Journal of Women’s Studies 10, no. 3 (2003): 337. 40 Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject 2nd ed. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011); Sarah Bracke, ‘Conjugating the Modern/ Religious, Conceptualizing Female Religious Agency: Contours of a “Post-secular” Conjuncture’, Theory, Culture & Society 25, no. 6 (2008): 51–67; Avishai, ‘“Doing religion” in a Secular World’. 41 Avishai, Gerber and Randles, ‘The Feminist Ethnographer’s Dilemma’. 42 Bracke, ‘Conjugating the Modern/ Religious’, 63. 43 Orit Avishai and Courtney Ann Irby, ‘Bifurcated Conversations in Sociological Studies of Religion and Gender’, Gender & Society 31, no. 5 (2017): 647–676; Dawn Llewellyn and Marta Trzebiatowska, ‘Secular and Religious Feminisms: A Future of Disconnection?’, Feminist Theology 21, no. 3 (2013): 244–258. 44 Neitz, ‘Insiders, Outsiders, Advocates and Apostates’. 45 Berger, ‘Now I See it, Now I Don’t’, 2. 46 Avishai, Gerber and Randles, ‘The Feminist Ethnographer’s Dilemma’. 47 See Trzebiatowska, ‘When Reflexivity is Not Enough’; Chong, ‘Coping with Conflict’; Katarzyna Wojnicka, ‘Sex and the Fieldwork: Gender, Sexuality, ­ Nationality, and Social Class in Research on European (Heterosexual) Men’, International Journal of Qualitative Methods 19 (2020): 1–10.

3 Diving in Research as a journey towards transformation Clare Herbert

Introduction In his poem, ‘Anatomy of a Perfect Dive’, Michael Symmons Roberts describes someone compelled to go diving into the sea on a hot day.1 Expressed in the poem is an urgency to leave the house, to make the preparations necessary before diving, to be aware of sensations involved in the steep drop down, to enjoy hitting the water, to be aware of self-loss in the sea’s shadowy depths, to swim up to break the surface, and to realise that, on returning home, the self may be changed beyond all recognition. In this chapter, I use themes developed in the poem to highlight transformations I experienced through engagement in the process of doctoral research. The research resulted in my gaining a professional doctorate which was published as my first book, Towards a Theology of Same Sex Marriage: Squaring the Circle.2 I am proud to have gained a doctorate. I am excited to have written a book. Yet it is by immersing myself in the process of research in practical theology that I have been transformed as a person. Leaving the house I began my doctoral studies knowing that, as the diver needed to make a dive, it was time for me to change. I had been profoundly unsettled for many years by the widening gap between the apparently increased tolerance of homosexuality in secular society, and the resistance to that increased acceptance voiced by the Church, particularly by the Roman Catholic Church, and the Church of England of which I am a priest. What propelled me, like the diver, to change? Church and faith had been part of my formation from a young age. I had an early call to ministry and adored reading theology at Durham and ­Edinburgh universities before training to be a parish worker and deaconess in the early 1980s. There is a photograph of me in my middle twenties, wearing a long blue deaconess robe and white pearl earrings, acting as the then Bishop of Bristol’s occasional chaplain – the absolute defining image of a good girl! And though I laugh at that photograph now, my early identity was DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-5

44  Clare Herbert constructed around being such a good girl, a candidate deemed promising for ministry in the Church of England. So, it came as a shock in my late twenties to find myself falling in love with and then in relationship with women. And an even more profound shock when I realised the depth, seriousness and commitment involved in my relationship with the woman with whom I was to live for the rest of my life, whom I met in my middle thirties. Suddenly there was nowhere to hide, not least from myself. Nevertheless, by various artful dodges and lucky breaks, and with the help of a brilliant spiritual director and an even more skilled psychotherapist, both of whom helped me to accept myself, I ended up living with my partner and working as the first woman incumbent in the central area of the London Diocese – as the Rector of Soho and Dean of Women’s Ministry – by my early forties. However, all was far from well beneath the outwardly successful façade of my life. I suffered panic attacks trying to hold myself together and make a successful career. Once, speaking out for gay and lesbian people at a conference held at my Church, I was so nerve-wracked that my hands and whole upper body became rigidly attached to the lectern, so that at the end of the talk it was difficult to prise my muscles free and let go. The question haunted me from then: how do gay and lesbian Christians become less afraid to reconcile the love they know in partnership, with the love of God, as married heterosexual people are fully encouraged to do, not least in the marriage service itself, which enjoins them to know God in the love they know for each other? This question was so compelling for me that I stepped aside from the accustomed Church of England career structures, to become National Programme Co-ordinator for the charity Inclusive Church,3 Assistant Priest and Lecturer in Inclusive Theology at St Martin in the Fields, and Tutor in Pastoral Care at St Augustine’s College of Theology. During these years, my question became a research question. Our research question shapes us. If we are extremely fortunate, it possesses, like the dive in the poem, a fascinating draw of its own. Taking off our clothes Rather like the diver, in preparation I had clothes to shed. Like many practitioners, l found choosing a research methodology difficult, akin to painfully refining a few vague ideas into a clearly defined understanding of the world. Its difficulty lay in the habit of many long-term practitioners who do not consider the philosophical assumptions underlying their work in favour of ‘just getting on with it’. In compulsive busyness, I had lost the art of asking, ‘How do I know what I know?’ My initial interest lay in finding out what theological, ecclesiastical and social structures silence gay and lesbian Christians in the context of their ordinary lives and in the context of Church. I imagined conducting a piece

Diving in  45 of quantitative research, using a nationwide questionnaire, to unearth the silencing mechanisms I had noticed during a so-called ‘listening process’ ­conducted across the Church of England in the years preceding the last ­Lambeth ­Conference of Bishops in 2008, and described in the report, The Anglican Communion and Homosexuality.4 I expected the results of my intended survey to raise issues of just speech, of mental health, and of theology within the community of the Church of England. I imagined that a doctoral programme, whether by instruction or magic, was there to teach me exactly how to do this. The challenge of writing an early paper revealed that I had not understood the nature of research, whether quantitative or qualitative, and thus imagined that individuals’ experiences in written response form could be simply and arbitrarily used to support hypotheses gained from reading. I entered then my first messy, confused period of thinking. What was I trying to do and what resources did I have to do it? While concerned by the mental health issues presented by some lesbian and gay Christians then in my pastoral care, I was not trained in mental health nor in mental health research methods. I did not have the resources to create a nationwide research questionnaire and doubted that it would gain useful levels of response. Far worse was handling my own deeply entrenched suspicion that ‘real’ research collects hard, measurable facts, by randomised controlled trials, conducted as part of large quantitative research programmes. I had been a church minister for 30 years of my life, and had preached and taught knowledge gained as mystery, imaginative insight, and relationship. Yet there was part of me seemingly utterly beguiled by positivist views of reality. John Swinton and Harriet Mowat write that such assumptions are commonplace: ‘The idea of the “scientific fact” as definitive of rigorous truth is so “natural” to us that we rarely think beyond it’.5 It was time to rethink the whole enterprise. I am a priest, a pastor, and an activist and facilitator of conversations around issues of lesbian and gay life in the Church of England. These roles suggest a research methodology consonant with practical theology, for which Swinton and Mowat provide this useful definition: Practical theology is critical, theological reflection on the practices of the Church as they interact with the practices of the world, with a view to ensuring and enabling faithful participation in God’s redemptive practices in, to and for the world.6 Moving from an impossibly wide research focus, my own context and skills provided the discipline of practical theology within which to work. H ­ aving defined the theological context of my study, a research question began to emerge. Where did the lesbian and gay Christians to whom I was pastor experience silencing and how have they dealt with it? Have their faith and theology helped them break through to a new speech, even new theology, and

46  Clare Herbert how might I investigate that? How have I done that in my own life? It became important to think about silence, and its breaking, not as an abstract principle but as a lived reality. As I thought about my own life, I reflected that entering the publicly ­recognised commitment of civil partnership was the single action which had most clearly empowered me to speech as a lesbian, within family, society, friendship groups and Church. What had possessed me to do that with such conviction and joy, when the Church of England was less than supportive, and when future employment opportunities as a clergyperson might be jeopardised? If I could understand what theological and social taboos I and other Christians had broken through to realise civil partnership, I might understand both silence and a new theology being not merely ‘heard’ but ‘lived into speech’ in the rites and relationships of civil partnership.7 A new piece in the jigsaw fell into place. I had been struggling to organise research interviews by arranging meetings with other priests across the ­Diocese of London who knew congregation members in civil partnerships. The meetings were certainly fun, but I was left with the sense of being adrift. Interviews in so many different churches would result, after considerable work, in an arbitrary set of results. One night, in a vivid nightmare, I discovered an appropriate context for the interviews. I found myself drifting in a turbulent sea away from my place of work and belonging. Waking suddenly, and with a jolt of insight, I realised that I must conduct my research at St. Martin-in-the-Fields where I worked and belonged, no matter how difficult that task might prove to be. My fearful dream indicated how much I wanted to understand the church context of my research participants, and for the church itself to engage with the research process as part of my ongoing work. I had taken another step. A research question, sufficiently specific to complete, yet sufficiently wide to investigate theological motivation in breaking through taboo, had formed, not least through listening to my dreams: ‘What meanings do gay and lesbian Christians who are Anglicans attending St. Martin-in-the-Fields give to their relationships of civil partnership?’. This research question also indicated a type of research, namely qualitative research, which was then new to me. Norman Denzin and Yvonna Lincoln offer a helpful initial generic definition of qualitative research: ‘Qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense of, or interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them’.8 My research question suggested that I work in this way, with the group of 13 self-identifying gay and lesbian Christians who worshipped at St Martin’s at that time and who were known by the ministry team to be in civil partnership. My preparation to dive was over. I decided to pursue research in hermeneutical practical theology, which understands the exchange of meaning involved in pastoral care,9 using the qualitative research methods of ­interview and thematic analysis.10

Diving in  47 Breaking the surface As the diver drops, she sees the universe expanding all around her. Much is written about the process of theological reflection and ­particularly about that moment when a penny drops and the Christian disciple or theological student steps from one world of understanding to another.11 I want to describe three such moments and their effect on me. The first moment of understanding came with comprehending the nature and power of taboo. I have already described how my interest in investigating stories about a sensed presence of God in same-sex relationships came to a head with the experience of finding myself rigid with terror when I presented my first conference paper as an ‘out’ lesbian priest, questioning in public the official teaching of the Church of England regarding sexual relationships for clergy. The event was small and friendly, welcoming only a hundred gay and lesbian Christians. It was held in my own home church, where I held tenure as the Rector. No press reporter was present. Yet I experienced catastrophic feelings about losing my job, being ridiculed, attracting punishment in some way. Seeking to understand this overwhelming sense of terror, I read the work of Marilyn McCord Adams,12 and of James Alison.13 This was transformative, because it introduced me for the first time to the concept of taboo ­surrounding sexual behaviour and identities deemed disruptive by society or church. I began to understand why I felt so afraid, and had done so for much of my life. In her work considering the apparent lack of justice towards gays and lesbians in the Church, Adams begins with the concept of ‘taboo’ as explored by the anthropologist Mary Douglas. In her book, Purity and Danger, Douglas suggests that words like ‘purity’ and ‘defilement’ act as social metaphors.14 They are used to build evaluative systems which protect social definitions and boundaries. Douglas’ hypothesis was that societies under threat tend to develop elaborate rules surrounding purity and pollution. Because sexual behaviour is so charged with energy, and lies at the heart of self-and-other definition, and because sexual relationships will carry the family, tribe, and race into a strong or weak future, it is an easy target for the strongest of these rules – the rule of taboo. Taboo gains strength by rendering absolutely unthinkable any behaviour that threatens to undermine social foundations and further power by being understood to be the will of a family, tribal or national god. Adams understands the continuing power of the taboo against homosexual behaviour, despite it being weakened considerably in modern secular society, to lie in three areas.15 Firstly, because a text is considered sacred, anything it says about same-sex relationships may threaten to undermine the mental health and identity formation of the gay or lesbian person, especially if they are isolated by their youth or lack of supportive social contacts. Taboo resists rational thought and excludes an individual not through any

48  Clare Herbert willed behaviour of their own but simply by their very being. Secondly, the ­insistence on the irrational, whereby taboos maintain power, also permits irrationally cruel and abusive behaviour to be perpetrated against the perceived taboo bearers. Thirdly, while there are signs of a decreased institutionalisation of homophobic attitudes and taboos, stubborn resistance to change also persists, with accompanying outbursts of homophobic bullying and violence, such as I had known take place in the community in Soho. The theologian James Alison, resonating with Douglas’ analysis, understands how this sense of terror fuelled the silence of his boyhood as a gay child: Sheer panic engulfed me … My awareness, as a nine-year-old, that I was completely lost and alone in a dangerous and hostile world, in which the thing that I most wanted – the love of another boy and to be with him forever – was not only impossible but utterly reprobate and an abomination.16 What is particularly significant for practical theology in Alison’s work is that he understands the overturning of taboo to be part of the essential Christ event, and that he considers himself to be writing from ‘within the story’.17 He is a gay theologian who writes for all people who find themselves in a place of annihilating taboo. His mentor is the French ethnologist René Girard. In the views of both Girard and Alison, Jesus attempted to convert Israel away from a social and religious ethic, which rested on taboo and the punishment of the scapegoat, towards a love ethic.18 When he fails in this task of persuasion, he offers himself as an innocent victim to stem the violence he has caused and to help his followers see through the lie behind the device – it is innocent victims who are killed when the scapegoat mechanism is used to create social and political harmony. As Girard suggested, in the cultural upheaval we are experiencing around gender and sexuality, people who are outside the power of conservative religious institutions step freely into places of taboo and show them to be utterly survivable.19 They begin to destabilise the taboo. By engagement in the research processes of reading and listening to my research participants, within this context of the disease involved in living under taboo, I realised that the external validation and public celebration of long-term committed same-sex relationships is particularly significant for society and for the Church. The second moment of understanding came with my reconsidering the meaning of marriage. A clear finding of my research was that 11 of the 13 interviewees longed for their relationships of civil partnership to be recognised and blessed as marriage.20 At first, I was highly resistant to writing about this, finding myself perhaps bored – doesn’t everyone write about marriage and the ways it has changed and is changing? Then I fell ill with sickness and nausea after a mysterious fall. It was as if I was unable to digest the fact that my research

Diving in  49 participants were now contemplating something – civil marriage – which as a priest in the Church of England I was forbidden to pursue. I was rescued from this painful writing block by further research which showed me how, in a certain theological light, I may consider myself to be already married. When I looked in detail at the ‘Introduction to the Marriage Service’ on the Church of England’s online version of Common Worship,21 I found that the gay and lesbian Christians who were my research interviewees know and grapple with difference between each other as great and as vital to them as traditional gender difference. They also struggle with equality, finding it a dynamic movement of continual adjustment between them, rather than a static arrival point decided according to gender. They enjoy a sexual union which unfolds over a lifetime in security and knowledge of the other, which creates a convincing ascetic of faithfulness and openness, as does heterosexual marriage. They create rich family lives, caring for relatives, parents and in some cases children. They sense that their relationships are made holy by God, many of them regarding themselves as living in covenant with God and with each other. In terms of a sense of holiness in the relationship, I came across three new ideas in my reading which resonated with the interviewees’ experiences. In the Reformed theology of theologian David Jensen, the marriage promises taken in front of the supporting community and before God are the start of a journey towards God that is taken together.22 The couple and the relationship will be flawed and broken, as is all human living seen in the light of God’s perfection. It is the promises made and the journey taken with the support of the community and under the protection of God’s mercy which matters. In this sense, gay and lesbian people who make such a vow are in Jensen’s mind married in everything except ecclesial law. I find this an immensely affirming and freeing theology. It is what I believe of my own relationship, and I work to change that ecclesial law simply because it suggests so strongly which relationships are deemed holy, and which are not, in culture and Church. In the queer theology of David Matzo McCarthy, I found another liberating idea which freed me to understand my sexual orientation as a gift from God for my becoming in relationship.23 McCarthy writes of the sexual orientation of the other in our lives being that place where God offers us growth into our full being. People of opposite sex attraction become their fuller selves and unfold in the company of the other. Gay and lesbian people become who God wants them to be in all their fullness and unfold fully in the loving regard of someone of the same sex. That is why it is so ruinous to us to suggest, let alone counsel or manipulate us, into heterosexuality. Under such manipulation, God’s gift of our full becoming is ignored. If counselling kills the reflex to love another human being, awareness of divine love may also be dimmed. In the theology of Eugene Rogers, I came across this wonderful phrase: ‘marriage, including same sex marriage, is a small theatre of God’s glory – a place

50  Clare Herbert where God is evidently engaged in an act of creation’.24 I have always felt this to be clear beyond dispute in the relationship between myself and my ­partner – our relationship as a stage for God’s ongoing work with us, together and apart, assisting us with our inner lives and our outer life in work, community and friendship. The pressing down of God upon us goes on, but it has a secure, loving, forgiving and creative place to start. One interviewee, Matthew, has his own phrase for this: ‘being gradually transformed in the direction of God’s self-giving in Christ’. I am not married legally or linguistically in the eyes of the state or the Church of England. This denial is what the Church of England continues to ask of me and its priests who live under episcopal authority. Yet I no longer live with their denial within myself, and this confirmation of the status of my relationship is liberating, providing within me a deep source of confidence, joy and growth in faith. A third moment of understanding came in my embrace of queer theology. Imagine for a moment this scene. I am sitting in a luxurious room about to go out to dinner. I have conducted over half my research interviews by now, so the questions to my interviewee Stephen come easily, even routinely. It is warm, we are both tired after a day’s work, and I drop the question, ‘Have you ever known violence or bullying as a result of being gay?’ ‘Oh yes’, comes a muttered reply, and the room and I still to a point of such concentrated silence, that I feel as if I am praying. Stephen said: Oh yes, beaten up, I am trying to remember … I was cornered and threatened with violence. At school I was bullied very heavily. I was bullied when I was a young child by other children. I was bullied again as a teenager by the sort of popular guy at school when his mates decided to corner me at the back of the corridor and threatened to tell my father that I was a poofter. I had people calling me names, doing kind of mincing sounds.25 Violence had been mentioned before during interviews, though I never became used to hearing about it. Among the 13 well-heeled, successful, seemingly confident people whom I interviewed at St Martin’s, three had been violently assaulted, two sexually abused, three bullied at work, and three had experienced a threat of violence linked with their appearance. Hearing their pain catapulted me into fresh discoveries. I experienced such listening in research interviews to be akin to prayer or contemplation. I was forcibly reminded of Heather Walton’s insight that ‘This is how theology is done’,26 as the relationships between myself as researcher and my interviewees deepened. Walton writes of creating living theology, where the experience of suffering comes to be shared in the process of constructing theology: I have brought you to a place in which you may recognise God and know yourself. When you understand this, you can smile at the small

Diving in  51 stories of human freedom and divine judgement which are told for ­children. They are charms recited to protect against the passion and the pain. There are darker, deeper tales to tell.27 The awareness of darkness prompted me to dive into reading queer theology. Unlike gay and lesbian theology, which had previously satisfied me in its attempt to squeeze gay and lesbian experience into the stories of the Gospel and Church Tradition, queer theology challenges heteronormative readings of those traditions to ask what queer experience adds to our understanding of life, of God, and of faith. What rescued Stephen was a relationship of steadfast transgressive love with another Christian man, which he understood to be a sort of liberation: It means a sense of security, safety, a sense of completion, and a sort of, almost like a closure of the previous chapter of my life, which was much more a sort of chapter of uncertainty, a sense of the wilderness.28 I shared this sense of pain and liberation in my own life, and was helped by the writings of queer theologian Marcella Althaus-Reid to understand the usefulness of my experience to research.29 Althaus-Reid brings to ecclesiology a hermeneutic of suspicion that resonates with my learning from the work of philosopher Jurgen Habermas,30 and feminist psychologist Carol Gilligan, about the use of power in language construction.31 Althaus-Reid does not require that queer theology disregard church traditions, but suggests a process of queering which may turn them upside-down, or submit them to collage-style processes, which search for and add experiences that may have been excluded and ignored. This process of queering un-shapes and reshapes traditional theology by always questioning its heterosexual hermeneutic. How does it do this? By a queer theologian deemed alien or villain within church systems inserting into theology stories of transgressive life and culture: ‘The powerful theological praxis of transformation usually comes from the direction of aliens working within the system’.32 This is what I tried to do in my research as a practising priest and queer practical theologian. But to what end? What does queer theology add to the quest to seek God’s face? Seeing underwater In conducting this research, I discovered a queer God. By that, I don’t mean that God is queer – none of us knows, or can describe, the being of God. To talk of a queer God is to talk of a human description of God which I find exciting, enlivening and just. I found this God appearing in the ways in which research participants created and then talked about their ceremonies of civil partnership, in which they inserted poems, music, silence and myths which recalled the God known to them in Christ and revealed by the Spirit. It is liturgy which helps recreate the people of God, the creative space for hearing

52  Clare Herbert the continuing story of the Word of God lived in the contemporary world. It is in the liturgies created by gay and lesbian Christians that a queer God is discovered. What was clear from my research was that where the Church of England planned for there to be no liturgy, in civil partnership ceremonies held in town halls, registry offices and hotels, the gay and lesbian Christians I interviewed had created it. In church services, which, according to the official statements of the Church of England, could be neither blessings nor marriages, they recreated themselves as the people of God. The research findings show that God is neither silenced, nor displaced, nor un-named, where God chooses to be. In these research participants’ voices, there is evidence of a God who chooses to be known and addressed outside heteronormative patterns of living in relationship. Queer theology reminds us how wide and ‘scandalous’ is this God’s desire: ‘Our search is for theological interchanges of intimacy, sexual identities and politics in the dark alleys behind our churches; the search for God in dark alleys’.33 A conclusion of this research is that God liberates outside the forms and hierarchies of official church structures and statements, and that gay and lesbian Christians must take responsibility to know and possess their own experience of God. This experience of God does not require – although it may – the leaving behind of Church community and belonging. On the contrary, Althaus-Reid suggests that, as ‘resident aliens within the system’, by telling our stories and living our lives we may queer the institutions to which we belong. A queer theology of adult relating in marriage suggests the presence and pattern of a God who in relating is beyond binary gender identifications and beyond paternal and maternal imagery, yet who takes up home with us, chooses to be identified with us, God’s queer people, and remains faithful to us in providing an abundance of love for us to share. Returning home ‘Anatomy of a Perfect Dive’ ends with the sense of a home deserted and visitors standing unsure where the diver has gone, or what he or she may have become. You may be asking the same about me. What have I done with the Bible and Church Tradition? I seek to understand and live by overarching themes within the Bible, but add the question as I read, ‘Where do lesbian and gay Christians challenge heteronormativity?’ One such interpretative method is suggested by Samuel Wells in How Then Shall We Live?34 In a chapter concerning LGBT identity, Wells asks how lesbian and gay people may be considered as a gift and blessing to the Church, rather than a burden, a ‘problem to be solved’. He attempts to change the terms of the debate so that we concentrate not on individual texts, but on the whole story which we join when we become Christian. The story of Creation, Covenant, Christ, Church and Consummation he stands on its head. Rather than beginning with ‘how we were made’, he asks ‘for what we were made?’,

Diving in  53 and therefore what kind of living will reflect the heavenly destiny of us all in the consummation of God’s time? He understands LGBT people to be different from, but not less than, heterosexual people, and called in the same way to display the fruits of the Holy Spirit in the ways we integrate our sexuality with our Christian discipleship. Perhaps most encouragingly, in terms of an inclusive reading of the Bible, Wells suggests that we are all called to bear in our bodies the truth of God sharing our life in the incarnate Christ, the goodness of Christ’s laying down his life for our sake, and the beauty of the Holy Spirit’s raising Christ to life for evermore. The Church needs everyone to do this, not least those LGBT people who have already been persecuted for their faith, yet who remain faithful Christians. Similarly, I judge three areas of human experience to be neglected in the arguments of those who oppose the blessing of same-sex love out of respect for Church tradition. First, surely pain of body and spirit forces us to think in new ways about sexual orientation and gender roles. What was assumed to be based in nature, in the givenness of anatomy and physiology, and what was unquestioned, considered benign, in gendered divisions of labour, has been challenged by feminists, womanists, gay and lesbian people suffering a painful lack of self-determining freedom to grow, to exert influence, even to protect the self from violence.35 Second, just as every secular discipline requires careful examination and interpretation, so do texts of the Bible and the writings of Church tradition. The cultures represented in the Bible and the traditions of the Church were neither stable nor monolithic. Third, at the heart of Christianity lies the awareness of God’s justice and God’s love, revealed in the person, words and work of Jesus. Since Jesus’ summary of the religious tradition which he inherited stressed love of God, love of self, and love of neighbour, God’s righteousness appears to call us to an inward wholeness of love, which extends to neighbours near and far. This orientation towards God involves the recognition that our judgements have the capacity for harm as well as healing of our neighbour, and that in the creation of theology and sexual ethics it is important not to neglect justice. Searching Church tradition for ways forward in sexual ethics that recognise recent cultural shifts in the understanding of personal relationships, gender and sexual orientation, the Catholic theologian Margaret Farley suggests that we move away from a framework for sexual ethics based on the fear of taboo and an ethics of defilement and guilt, towards an ethic for both heterosexual and homosexual relationships based on justice.36 This is something which I have tried to do in my research. Transformation How have I been reconstituted – as the poem suggests its diver has been – by leaning into my dive, by involving myself in this research? More than I ever conceived, it has healed the split in my mind and soul between good Christian girl and bad protesting lesbian. What has caused such transformation? Five

54  Clare Herbert steps in the research process described above stand out: resonances with my own experience; naming those experiences; voicing my truth; creating a space to speak; and arranging firm but permeable boundaries around that space. Resonance: The research process gave me other Christians of courage to meet, who denied neither their love for God nor their love for their partner, no matter what such faithful loves may cost them. I include here writers who helped me embrace with excitement queer theology. Naming: I have had the time to reflect over and read about taboo, its destructive effects and persistent hold on the religious imagination. I have had the opportunity to discuss with others on similar journeys what I now understand my relationship to be: a marriage, a ‘small theatre of God’s glory’, a place of journeying towards God in brokenness and hope. Of course, I am not married in the language or law of the state or of the Church of England. This denial is what the Church of England continues to ask of me and all its priests – but at least I do not live with their denial within myself. Claiming the space: I discovered that I may use the pain I have known to interrogate heteronormative readings of Church tradition and Bible. My eyes are open to what and who heteronormativity protects and why. I have rediscovered the experience of being surprised and delighted by God  –  ­finding new faces of God, fresh, unexpected, colourful places of God’s blessing and presence. Setting boundaries: I am resolved that the pain I have known can keep me alert and alive to the vivaciousness of the Creator. I do not need to hide that pain by oppressing others in an angry way. Nor do I need to manipulate others into compassion by adopting a victim role. I can debate with those who want to do so, but without fear or favour. I am free. Voicing my truth: I had imagined doctoral research to lie along the same trajectory of knowledge gaining and collating as earlier learning experiences. Only near the very end of the process did I realise that the expectation was that I would make my own contribution to theological knowledge. I don’t know how this dreadful challenge eluded me through five years of study, but I suspect that, just as I could not find the good in me in relation to God, so I did not believe that I had anything to say worth hearing about the search for God. As I stepped from theology to feminist theology, to queer theology, and to naming which strands of queer theology invite and excite me (and politely putting aside the rest), I found my own theological voice. Conditioned by years of study in patriarchal theology, with its insistent theme of maintaining unity within the Church, I had underestimated the degree to which our theological voice rests on ‘no’ as much as ‘yes’. To gain a doctoral degree, I needed to ‘come out’ as a theologian and handle the conflict which would necessarily arise both within and outside myself. Along the process of conducting my research interviews, I found such faith in God expressed by Christians in civil partnership rites and celebrations, that I named these rites ‘Coming Out Ceremonies for God’.37 No wonder the diver’s guests are unsure where she has gone, and whether she will be

Diving in  55 recognisable to them when she returns! For there is a sense in which, once we have discovered the joy of diving, we may never again emerge fully from the water. If I learned in research that God and I are both involved fully in a continuous process of ‘coming out’ which never ends but goes on creating new and different shapes from the constituents of life, then the effects of immersing myself in research may never end, either. Notes 1 Michael Symmons Roberts, Corpus (London: Jonathan Cape, 2004), 67–71. When I first read ‘Anatomy of a Perfect Dive’ I imagined the diver to be Christ, and the poem to describe his incarnation, death, and resurrection. As I lived with the poem, I began to internalise its meaning. The process of taking a deep dive then represented my struggle to combat homophobia in myself and the Church, and my deep desire to understand this struggle theologically. As I learned to recognise reflexivity as a useful tool in qualitative research the poem continued to inspire my imagination. 2 Clare Herbert, Towards a Theology of Same-Sex Marriage: Squaring the Circle (London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2020). 3 Inclusive Church is found at https://www.inclusive-church.org. The charity’s mission statement is this: ‘We believe in inclusive church – a church which celebrates and affirms every person and does not discriminate. We will continue to challenge the church where it continues to discriminate against people on grounds of disability, economic power, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, learning disability, mental health, neurodiversity,  or  sexuality. We believe in a Church which  welcomes and serves all people in the name of Jesus Christ; which is scripturally faithful; which seeks to proclaim the Gospel afresh for each generation; and which, in the power of the Holy Spirit, allows all people to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Jesus Christ’. See accessed 9 June 2022, https://www. inclusive-church.org/the-ic-statement/. 4 Phillip Groves, ed. The Anglican Communion and Homosexuality: A Resource to Enable Listening and Dialogue (London: SPCK, 2008). 5 John Swinton and Harriet Mowat, Practical Theology and Qualitative Research (London: SCM Press, 2006), 39. 6 Ibid., 26. 7 Nelle Morton, The Journey Is Home (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1985), 86–101. 8 Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, ‘The Discipline and Practice of Qualitative Research’, in The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research, 3rd ed., ed. Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna. S. Lincoln (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2005), 3. 9 Swinton and Mowat, Practical Theology, 26. 10 Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke, Successful Qualitative Research (London: Sage Publications, 2013). 11 Heather Walton, Writing Methods in Theological Reflection (London: SCM Press, 2014). 12 Marilyn McCord Adams, ‘Hurricane Spirit, Toppling Taboos’, in Our Selves, Our Souls and Bodies: Sexuality and the Household of God, ed. Charles Heflingh (Boston, MA: Cowley Publications, 1996), 129–141; Marilyn McCord Adams, ‘Sexuality Without Taboos’, in The Bible, the Church and Homosexuality, ed. Nicholas Coulton (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2005), 36–48. 13 James Alison, Faith beyond Resentment: Fragments Catholic and Gay (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2001); James Alison, ‘Theology amidst the Stones and Dust’, in Theology and Sexuality: Classic and Contemporary Readings, ed. Eugene F. Rogers (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002), 387–408; James Alison, Undergoing

56  Clare Herbert God: Dispatches from the Scene of a Break-In (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2006); James Alison, Broken Hearts and New Creations: Intimations of a Great Reversal (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2010). 14 Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Purity and Taboo (London: Routledge, 1966). 15 McCord Adams, ‘Hurricane Spirit, Toppling Taboos’, 130–132. 16 Alison, Broken Hearts, 188. 17 Ibid. 186–208. 18 See James Alison’s discussion of René Girard, The Scapegoat (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University, 1989) in Raising Abel: The Recovery of Eschatological Imagination, 2nd ed. (London: SPCK, 2010), 15–33. 19 René Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning (Leominster: Gracewing, 2001). 20 Herbert, Towards a Theology of Same-Sex Marriage, 115–141. 21 Church of England, Common Worship: Introduction to the Marriage Service, accessed 9 June 2022, https://www.churchofengland.org/prayer-and-worship/ worship-texts-and-resources/common-worship/marriage. 22 David H. Jensen, ‘God’s Desire for Us: Reformed Theology and the Question of Same-Sex Marriage’, Theology 109, no. 847 (2006): 12–20. 23 David Matzko McCarthy, ‘The Relationship of Bodies: A Nuptial Hermeneutics of Same-Sex Unions’, in Theology and Sexuality: Classic and Contemporary Readings, ed. Eugene F. Rogers Jr. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002), 200–216. 24 Eugene F. Rogers Jr., Sexuality and the Christian Body: The Way into the Triune God (Oxford: Blackwell, 1999), 214. 25 Herbert, Towards a Theology of Same-Sex Marriage, 68–69. 26 Heather Walton, ‘Passion and Pain: Conceiving Theology out of Infertility’, in Spiritual Dimensions of Pastoral Care: Practical Theology in a Multidisciplinary Context, ed. David Willows and John Swinton (London: Jessica Kingsley Publications, 2000), 201. 27 Ibid., 201. 28 Herbert, Towards a Theology of Same-Sex Marriage, 63. 29 Marcella Althaus-Reid, The Queer God (London: Routledge, 2003). 30 Jurgen Habermas, On the Pragmatics of Communication, ed. Maeve Cooke (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999), 287–289. 31 Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982). 32 Althaus-Reid, The Queer God, 30. 33 Ibid., 34. 34 Samuel Wells, How Then Shall We Live?: Christian Engagement with Contemporary Issues (Norwich: Canterbury Press, 2016). 35 A useful overview of this theme is found in Gerard Loughlin, ed., Queer Theology: Rethinking the Western Body (Oxford: Blackwell, 2007), 1–34. Authors I found helpful were: Alison, Broken Hearts and New Creations; Marcella Althaus-Reid, ‘Demythologising Liberation Theology’, in Cambridge Companion to Liberation Theology, 2nd ed., ed. Christopher Rowland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 123–136; Margaret Farley, Just Love: A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics (London: Continuum, 2010); Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, ‘Feminist Theory in Pastoral Theology’, in Feminist and Womanist Pastoral Theology, ed. Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore and Brita L. Gill-Austern (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1999), 77–94; Patricia Mullins, Becoming Married: Towards a Theology of Marriage from a Woman’s Perspective (Strathfield, NSW: St Paul’s Publications, 2000); Alison Webster, Found Out: Transgressive Faith and Sexuality (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2017). 36 Farley, Just Love, 185, 186. 37 Herbert, Towards a Theology of Same-Sex Marriage, 61.

Part II

Space and Identity

4 Off-roading How do women navigate the journey towards a healthy sexuality after choosing to leave evangelical purity culture? Lindsay Stewart Introduction My journey towards researching women’s experiences of sexuality after purity culture began several years ago with an honest conversation. A close friend and I were discussing our experiences of life after being involved in evangelical purity culture, having recently chosen to leave that environment. My friend compared this journey to off-roading; we both had found freedom by leaving the evangelical world, filled with rules and stop signs, but felt daunted by how to navigate the wilderness in front of us. The post-purity landscape appeared uninhabited, without signposts or guides to help journey towards a different understanding of sexuality, yet I knew from my social group alone that there were many other women with very similar experiences. Throughout my MA in Contextual Theology, I kept returning to the question of how women built healthy sexualities after evangelicalism. I was convinced that if I could gather a group of women who had chosen to leave evangelical purity culture, they would each have wisdom to share from their individual journeys. I decided to pursue this through my MA dissertation after taking inspiration from Musa Wenkosi Dube’s discussion of ‘circle transformative acts’: women sitting together, sharing their experiences and collectively building theology through their conversations.1 I gathered a group of six women from across the UK, and identified them using pseudonyms in this chapter. These women ranged from 25 to 34 years of age and had chosen to leave evangelical purity culture at some point between the ages of 18 and 26. Due to the intensely personal and vulnerable nature of the conversations, and the consequent need for safety, I sourced participants from friends and acquaintances I met in church environments. This created a sense of safety and camaraderie in our group discussions, but limited the demographics: everyone involved was white, university-educated, and no one openly identified as queer. We spent four evenings together over Zoom in March and April 2021, discussing our journeys away from evangelical purity teaching and the ideas and values we had developed since leaving that environment. I used the pastoral cycle to give these sessions structure, drawing mainly on Patricia O’Connell Killen and John De Beer’s model, with influence from DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-7

60  Lindsay Stewart Laurie Green’s cycle, too.2 As a tool for theological reflection, with roots in the Latin American liberation theology movement, the pastoral cycle is often used to facilitate group discussions.3 It was important to choose a methodology that held central the validity of women’s embodied, lived, and felt experiences because these sources are often undermined in favour of ‘reason’ in evangelical churches and wider society. I therefore chose Killen and De Beer’s model of the pastoral cycle because it holds the importance of emotions and embodiment at its core. I also drew on Laurie Green’s pastoral cycle as in it he advocates for a wider approach that includes consideration of social structures and imbalances alongside personal expression, which I felt was missing from Killen and De Beer’s approach.4 Our first session focussed on experience, and we spent the majority of our time sharing our stories of being involved in and leaving evangelical purity culture. We moved on to analysis, drawing together common threads from our experiences. In our second session, we continued analysing these experiences, placing them in a wider social context and sharing resources that had guided us in our journeys. We also reflected on insights via a series of questions inspired by the Ignatian Daily Examen,5 which encouraged the group to identify what they wanted to take forwards and leave behind from their experiences. As following through the stages of the pastoral cycle always leads to action, my participants chose a collective action of planning one final session where we thought creatively together about what a healthy sexuality after purity culture might look like. Before starting to work through the pastoral cycle, we had an introductory session, laying the groundwork for our discussions by providing an overview of the research and agreeing on a code of conduct which ensured respect.6 The introductory session also ensured that all the participants were giving full informed consent; I encouraged them to reflect upon their stories and whether their mental health might be impacted by discussing these topics. Each participant was provided with a list of helpful resources, support in accessing these resources, and encouraged to disengage from the sessions at any point if they were finding it too challenging. However, this highlights an issue that still remains in feminist research: how to engage in embodied and experience-based research whilst safeguarding the many women whose stories and bodies hold trauma of sexual assault and abuse.7 Purity culture: the context Purity culture is widely known as an American phenomenon, and the type of purity teaching discussed in this chapter has its roots in white American evangelicalism. The intricacies of purity culture will be fleshed out as we explore my participants’ experiences, but young people are generally taught to wait until heterosexual marriage for penetrative sex,8 alongside messages such as ‘the [gendered] sexual double standard, women as sexual gatekeepers,

Off-roading  61 men as unable to control their sexual desire, extreme modesty, virginity as a gift, benevolent sexism, and an “all or nothing” mentality as it relates to sexual activity’.9 Young people are encouraged to enforce strict boundaries around sexual expression upon themselves and each other. They are warned that penetrative sex before marriage can lead to physical, psychological, and spiritual harm.10 All of these messages are delivered in ways which rely on gendered stereotypes and are linked to wider teaching in conservative evangelicalism around male authority in the home and church.11 In the USA, purity culture is more widely experienced due to abstinenceonly education in schools, which continues to receive large sums of government funding.12 National organisations such as True Love Waits rose to fame in the nineties for running stadium-size events where they encouraged teenagers to sign purity pledges stating their commitment to wait until marriage.13 Purity culture has never reached such a wide audience in the UK, but it still has a significant foothold. A clear example of this is the Soul Survivor festival, which ran for two weeks each summer from 1993 to 2019. At its height, Soul Survivor attracted 30,000 young people annually, and several of my group participants mentioned being influenced by an anecdote given by Soul Survivor leader Mike Pilavachi. In the anecdote, which was later recorded in his 2018 book ‘Lifelines’, Pilavachi narrates a conversation between himself and an animate chocolate cake. The cake is defrosting for a party the next day, so he knows he shouldn’t eat it, but it convinces him to take it out of the fridge so they can talk. One thing leads to another, and he ends up eating the whole cake and feeling shame.14 The story is an uncomfortable read, using clumsy metaphors for arousal, quotes such as ‘you need to run your finger along my cream and have a lick’, and a fatalistic final warning: ‘don’t open the fridge door’.15 Pilavachi's anecdote portrays sexual activity as a sinful act, in which one party is a ‘temptor’, which leaves a person either irrevocably consumed or wracked with guilt. Importantly, it demonstrates purity teaching on a sizeable stage in the UK and highlights the issue of appropriate safeguarding and boundaries between (male) leaders and the young people they teach. In 2018, the first publications addressing post-purity discourse emerged in the United States: Linda Kay Klein’s Pure empathetically and thoroughly deconstructed purity teaching, whilst Elizabeth Gish’s ‘Are You a “Trashable” Styrofoam Cup?’ deftly demonstrated the impact of purity messaging on young women.16 In 2019, Nadia Bolz-Weber famously had purity rings melted into a vulva statue, shortly before releasing her book ­Shameless – a multi-dimensional work that calls for a widespread reimagining of sexuality within Christianity.17 The UK’s academic dialogue around the post-purity movement began in 2020 with the publication of Katie Cross’ essay ‘“I Have the Power in My Body to Make People Sin”’, in which she presents purity teaching as a traumatising theology. This subject is now an area of inquiry for British researchers at both PhD and MA levels.18 As I read these

62  Lindsay Stewart brilliant, challenging works, I became aware that they tend to either focus on trauma, ­deconstruction, and critique, or present ‘reconstructed’ alternative sexual ethics or frameworks. Yet, the conversations I was having with friends tended to focus on the difficulty and uncertainty of navigating the journey from deconstruction to reconstruction, the messy and non-linear part of the process of moving from trauma towards greater wholeness. Whilst it is important to hold space for the realities of women’s trauma to be acknowledged, so far there has been little discourse around the realities of living with and healing from the trauma of purity culture, including how we journey towards reclaiming our sexualities. Even since this research was begun in late 2020, the conversation around ‘post-purity culture’ has grown exponentially. Whilst criticism of purity culture began in the ­ex-evangelical movement, the conversation has expanded to the point where even some conservative churches are asking ‘What comes after the purity culture reckoning?’19 I was convinced that women who have traversed this ground would have wisdom to share from their journeys. The conversations we had were at different moments touching, challenging, hilarious, and inspiring, and no chapter could encompass the wide range of the experiences they named. During the process of transcribing and analysing our conversations, I drew together common themes from each session, and these have informed the structure of this chapter. I will first explore my participants’ experiences of purity culture, before looking at their stories of reclaiming their lives and sexualities, and finally I will examine the core conclusions from our ‘action’ session. Deconstruction: experiences of purity culture My participants shared many damning stories of their time in purity culture and how the teachings affected their lives. After discussing our experiences, we pulled together three areas of particular concern: harm and damage rhetoric, restriction, and emotional boundaries. Harm and damage rhetoric

Purity teaching commonly employs a rhetoric of harm and damage, using anecdotes to convey the message that pre-marital sexual encounters will do irrevocable injury to young women. Whilst sharing her story, Frances explained ‘I remember growing up believing that when you had sex you inherited the brokenness of someone else and I remember believing in that way sex was dangerous’. Other anecdotes included comparing the impact of sex to Sellotape that gathers dirt and loses its sticking power the more times it is used. Gish notes that this imagery is harmful to women: these metaphors encourage women to disengage from their agency and from their bodies by comparing them to inanimate objects that irreversibly lose value with use.20 Purity teachings are delivered in evangelical church youth groups between

Off-roading  63 the ages of 11 and 18, a period of intense sexual curiosity and a time when trusted authority figures have profound influence over the beliefs and values of young people. As one participant, Anna, noted, these binary messages of purity and impurity came from adults who viewed their own teenage sexual choices as mistakes or sinful. The impact of harm and damage rhetoric can be seen in my participants’ stories. Frances had her first sexual encounter at university and, after feeling unable to clearly express her boundaries to her partner, described feeling as though ‘I’d lost every part of myself that had once made me so good’. Joan had a positive consensual experience with her first boyfriend, but was left asking ‘Am I numb or in shock? I know I’ve sinned but how do I feel nothing?’ In both of these stories, the harm and damage script left these participants questioning their goodness, rather than evaluating their experiences on the basis of respect, consent, pleasure, or comfort. When reflecting on purity teaching, Frances noted that: There were sexist undertones about what they teach you about your body as a woman and how it’s objectified and glorified as something that should be pure and holy. Whereas a man’s isn’t held as highly to that standard. And I feel hurt by that teaching. Young women are taught that their purity is to be fiercely protected, but also that the control of men’s desire is their responsibility. It is their obligation to ensure they do not present a ‘stumbling block’ to their brothers in Christ, by dressing modestly and considering their actions around men. These stereotypes are also found in rape culture: there is a ‘pervasiveness [to] victimblaming, the idea that women are, and should be, responsible for navigating their own safety, for managing men’s sexual attention and aggression, and also for accurately assessing and avoiding risk’.21 The message of purity culture is clear: ‘men’s thoughts and actions are said to be either pure or impure, whilst women themselves are said to be either pure or impure’.22 Restriction

Purity teaching encourages restrictive boundaries as the means to ‘successfully’ wait until marriage. Young people are warned against masturbation, discouraged from moving their physical relationships beyond kissing, and admonished for having sexual or ‘lustful’ thoughts. Teaching adolescents to be careful with sexual exploration is positive; younger engagement with sex generally results in higher incidences of STIs and unplanned pregnancies.23 Yet, evangelical purity teaching does not simply encourage care, and it sets up extreme moral binaries around sex, masturbation, and sexual thoughts. Adolescence is the primary stage of human development for exploration of sexuality, which is completely natural from a biological, sociological, and

64  Lindsay Stewart psychological standpoint.24 Purity teaching tells teenagers that even sexual fantasies are sinful, thereby encouraging young women to disengage from their sexuality at a key developmental stage. Some women are successful with this dissociation, others are not, but for both groups, one of the outcomes is shame. One of my participants, Anna, described how her attempts to date after purity culture left her with severe anxiety; a kiss on a night out caused her to shake and feel a visceral sense of terror. Anna eventually chose to go to therapy, where a therapist with a faith background gave her the message she needed to hear: that her body is good, and she can enjoy her physicality, and that she has every right to believe in her own worth. The restrictive behaviours in our group were not confined to sexuality. Several group members experienced eating disorders (EDs) in their adolescence or early 20s. Within the scope of this essay, I cannot explore the link between EDs and conservative religion in depth, and it would not be appropriate to claim insight into the complex causes of my participants’ relationships with food and their bodies. However, it takes minimal imagination to draw a link between extreme control of the body through sexuality and control of the body through eating, exercise, or purging. Joanne Grenfell explains that EDs can ‘feed on the heightened sense of bodily shame in relation to sexual relationships which occurs when religious purity laws are superimposed upon existing adolescent anxieties about the process of physical and sexual maturation’.25 Grenfell’s work comes from a pastoral care standpoint, but her observations fit within contemporary feminist discourse on EDs. Janelle Kwee and Hillary McBride assert that EDs are societally situated illnesses, stemming from the dualisms in contemporary Western culture which continue to paint women as ‘Madonna or Whore’, ‘Anorexic or Pornographic’.26 For young women in purity culture, where sexual expression is harshly limited, these dualisms are even narrower. Kwee and McBride advocate for treating EDs holistically, focussing on restoring women’s ‘sense of agency, their ability to “take up space” physically and relationally, and experience of “voice”’.27 This closely mirrors the ideas that my participants chose as central to their journey towards a healthy sexuality. Emotional boundaries

Over the course of our conversations, several participants identified that despite being taught strict physical boundaries, there was a complete lack of emotional boundaries in purity culture. They were taught to be open about sexual choices as an evangelism technique or so they could be ‘held accountable’ by other Christians. Yet, they often barely knew these people, leading to intrusive questions and judgements from acquaintances. Cora commented: The lack of privacy that you’re allowed in that culture is really bizarre when you think about it … it’s all anyone wants to talk about because

Off-roading  65 it’s spicy … but looking back it’s a very unboundaried and unsafe way of practising and exploring that. We wondered whether the obsession with talking about sex stemmed from a natural desire to explore sexuality as an adolescent without the opportunity to do so safely. Yet, this culture where acquaintances and adults assumed access to intimate areas of young women’s lives was not a safe place either. Purity culture communicated to my participants that their intimate lives were open to critique and judgement from peers and leaders, which meant that they were not able to learn appropriate and safe vulnerability. This is especially troubling given the high prevalence of sexual harassment and assault experienced by women. Cora shared her story of intimate partner violence in a conservative church environment, explaining Boundaries were a constant topic in conversations with Christian friends and I would try to be honest and say that we were ‘struggling’. People would offer to pray for me or to help keep me accountable. I would never tell them about the times I drank too much and he took advantage, because then I would be stoned for being drunk as well as being sexually unclean - double sinning. Cora explained that when this relationship ended, she felt incredibly angry that Christians had such a hyper-focus on sex, with close friends constantly sharing their ‘purity struggles’ despite not being sexually active. She now has compassion for the way those people were trying to navigate their sexuality, but the constant focus on sex was deeply triggering for a survivor of sexual abuse and led her to withdraw from support systems.28 Post-purity culture: reclaiming Purity culture claims to protect women from a host of dangers: emotional pain, spiritual brokenness, unwanted pregnancy, STIs, and ultimately being ‘unfit’ for their future spouse. Yet, the stories of my participants are a damning indictment of this claim. The dualism of purity culture left them feeling disconnected from their bodies, desires, and sexuality. They still all experienced heartbreak, often heightened by shame that came from not following the path of purity teaching. Half of my participants never received the HPV vaccine as it was assumed by adults that they wouldn’t need it. The lack of emotional boundaries communicated that their sexual ‘purity’ was the most valuable thing about them, not their privacy, desires, or self. Damningly, several group members were either not equipped to assert their physical boundaries, not able to identify abuse, or not able to share it with their support systems. Each participant was aged between 11 and 18 when they first received these teachings, highlighting that this is a safeguarding issue relating to the physical and emotional health of young people. Discussing this

66  Lindsay Stewart topic as adults, it became clear that the ability to criticise, reclaim parts of our lives from harm, and re-learn lessons we were taught was central to our post-purity culture journeys. Criticism

In Shameless, Nadia Bolz-Webber compares purity culture to American 1920s prohibition and argues that both forms of abstinence create ‘a culture of secrecy, hypocrisy, and double standards’.29 Each of my participants reflected that identifying and critiquing this shadow side to purity culture was important to their journey. Fern told the story of her first sleepover with a boyfriend, where his insistence on sleeping outside the bedroom door (to make clear to his housemates that they weren’t having sex) led to her walking home alone late at night. She was catcalled, followed, and didn’t even receive a text from her partner to check on her safety. Later, their pastor used the story of her boyfriend sleeping in the corridor as an example of how far the men in their church would go to ‘protect’ the women. Frances shared that a family member referred to her consensual sexual experiences as assaults because they couldn’t accept her choice to be sexually active. These stories reveal the double standards of purity culture: claiming to protect women yet valuing ‘purity’ so highly that it is more acceptable for a woman to be put in danger or be assaulted than to engage in consensual sexual activity. As this discussion progressed, my participants realised that they had never been taught about consent in their church youth groups. Boundaries were discussed widely, but always in the context of avoiding penetrative sex before heterosexual marriage. This message was paired with the teaching that you must find your identity in God alone. My participants noted that the combination of these teachings linked their sense of worth to their sexual experiences. These teachings create an approach to sex which is highly boundaried but gives young people no skills or criteria to judge if a sexual relationship is safe, enjoyable, or consensual. My participants felt real anger at the lack of consent teaching they received. I believe this anger is an important part of moving forwards or, as Connie Baker terms it, ‘exercising the “Me” muscle’.30 Regaining a sense of self-­definition and agency after being involved in conservative religion is important, and Marlene Winnell advocates for exploring sex and sexuality as a part of this rebuilding.31 Anger about the lack of protective education communicates a belief that you are worth respect, deserve bodily autonomy, and the agency to navigate your own sexuality. These beliefs are life-changing for those who have been raised in purity culture. Friction between my participants’ lived experiences and the narrow path of purity teaching caused them to re-evaluate. Whether it was discontent over education around consent, anger at hypocrisy, or finding that there were other well-articulated viewpoints on the Bible and sexuality, this friction

Off-roading  67 opened the door for them to step away from evangelical teaching and widen their perspectives. Embracing complexity

All of my participants expressed complex feelings towards their involvement in purity culture. Assigning responsibility after leaving a controlling environment can be confusing and can lead to self-blaming or to avoidance of acknowledging personal involvement. It is important to be clear at this point that in the aforementioned instances of intimate partner violence and abuse, the responsibility and blame lie entirely with the perpetrators. Yet, one participant, Cora, reflected that: There were messages coming from above, but a lot of how the culture is perpetrated is amongst us ourselves. In dorm discussions it’s all anybody wants to talk about … there is this self-perpetuating thing. It is a truth to be acknowledged that each of the women in the group was, at the time these experiences occurred, too young to meaningfully question the teachings given to us by older people in positions of power. Yet, at the time of our Zoom discussions, participants expressed feeling empowered by acknowledging that they, too, had advocated for purity teaching to non-Christian friends and partners. Additionally, they recognised that their unmet emotional needs led them to be more responsive to purity teaching. Much has been written in feminist discourse about the importance of acknowledging internalised oppression, which can be defined as the experience of ‘taking in messages about the inferiority of women, believing them, and enacting them on oneself and others of the same gender’.32 Acknowledging the internalised oppression of gendered purity teachings, and taking account of their own behaviours and motivations, was a key part of reclaiming their autonomy and the harmed parts of their lives. Part of my participants’ process of reclaiming was moving away from binary thinking and towards ambiguity. This was reflected in their opinion of purity culture itself. Rather than simply labelling their experience as bad, the group unanimously expressed gratitude for the extended, unpressured adolescence that youth group provided them. The freedom to abstain from sexual activity until they were older was viewed positively, but they also agreed that purity teaching left them unprepared for sexual relationships when they did occur. This complex thinking reflects Baker’s claim that moving beyond black and white thinking is an integral step in leaving harmful religious environments.33 As Frances shared: I still judge myself sometimes but it’s like removing yourself and looking in from a perspective of love and understanding and then if it’s really wrong and unkind then picking that apart and being like ‘OK, lesson to learn, how can we improve in the future’.

68  Lindsay Stewart Frances demonstrates a profound departure from shame-based binaries towards a healthy ambiguity, something that was later identified as a key part of our group’s ideal approach to sexuality. Re-learning

As the participants’ discussion turned to reconstruction and the rebuilding of a healthier sense of sexuality, the conversation flowed less freely. Critique of purity culture came much easier than putting words to our experiences of navigating the post-purity landscape. Neither purity culture, nor wider ­Western culture, give women empowering language to discuss their sexualities. Yet what struck me was how often women in my research group would provide in-depth and insightful reflections, then brush them off as unclear or unformed. They shared that therapy, online resources like OMGYes, and media such as Netflix’s Sex Education had empowered and educated them.34 Whilst most of their conversations were centred around partnered sex or masturbation (sex acts), a wider understanding of sexuality arose as we spoke. Several group members shared that they had stopped using the term ‘­virgin’, finding it reductive and unhelpful.35 Many participants had years of non-penetrative sexual experience, sharing intimacy and climaxes with partners before they had penetrative sex. For others, there was a sense that ‘virginity loss’ was established by purity teaching as a life-changing moment, when in reality, they felt it was the first step towards exploring how penetrative sex worked for them. This rejection of virginity was part of a wider journey of moving beyond patriarchal definitions of sexuality. When discussing their growth, the group shared a desire to define ‘good sex’ by connection. Whether due to trauma, self-criticism, or learned disembodiment, each participant had stories of feeling disconnected from their bodies. The causes of this disconnection were twofold: purity teaching created difficult experiences with shame and a dichotomy between mind and body, whilst the prevalence of porn in popular culture created unrealistic body standards and expectations of sex. The group expressed a desire for embodied, non-critical connection with themselves and their partners. As Joan shared, ‘I’ve always kind of thought the best sex I’ve ever had with somebody has been the most authentic … Not the most orgasms or the longest, but the most authentic’. As the group reflected on Joan’s statement, they found that they all considered eye contact with sexual partners to be an important point of connection. Each participant shared examples of their experiences of eye contact with their partners, noting that they found it grounding, communicative, and vulnerable: a very different way of describing sexual experience than our prevailing cultural narrative. As I listened to this, I found myself viewing their shared reflection on eye contact as the beginning of a new approach to sexuality for these women, one that centres embodiment, connection, confidence, vulnerability, respect, and pleasure.

Off-roading  69 Rebuilding: navigating a healthy sexuality after purity culture The final stage of the pastoral cycle is always ‘action’. This mirrors the ­feminist adage, ‘the personal is political’, by bringing experience into conversation with wider societal issues, reflecting, and deciding on an action. My participants asked me to organise a final session where we could think creatively together about what a healthy sexuality after purity culture might look like. This session began with me leading the group through a guided visualisation, where we imagined a young woman (11–14) towards whom we felt compassion (a younger self, cousin, future daughter). We used this visualisation to ground the conversation, coming back to the question of what we would want to teach her about sexuality as she grew up. The result was a series of values that, whilst influenced by a shared background in purity culture, expanded beyond critique of evangelical teaching into a reconstruction of sexuality that would serve this imaginary young woman and, ultimately, the group members themselves. The eight points that we built together encompassed embodiment, moving from a sense of inherent sin to inherent goodness, affirmation of the body and pleasure as good, the importance of self-expression, positive consent (not only affirming the agency to say ‘no’, but the agency to say ‘yes’), and a fluid approach to sexuality and belief as lifelong journeys to approach with curiosity. Throughout this research, my participants expressed a feeling of double transgression: by leaving purity teaching they were no longer acceptable in the evangelical environment, yet their history in this restrictive subculture during their sexual development left them sometimes feeling ‘other’ to the prevailing norms of secular culture. Anna commented that ‘already it’s been so helpful just to hear that we’re not alone in this, because these things that we’ve learned and dealt with can feel really isolating so, thank you for making me feel a bit more normal’. It remains a radical act to create space for conversations which affirm that women are worthy and have the right to reclaim their voices and define sexuality for themselves. Given that my research was rooted in feminist theory, it does not surprise me that the most impactful element was the women’s group itself. Feminist consciousness-raising groups were a central part of second wave feminism and their methodology loosely mirrored the pastoral cycle; where the pastoral cycle starts with experience, ends with action and then restarts with the experience of this new action, feminist consciousness raising groups believed that ‘action comes when our experience is finally verified and clarified … learning the truth can lead to all kinds of action and this action will lead to further truths’.36 Evangelical purity culture is an environment where women’s voices are often devalued, and women’s experiences in their own bodies side-lined. In the light of this, the act of collaboratively building a philosophy that centres women’s stories, desires, and embodied experience was a healing practice in itself. Second wave feminist consciousness raising groups ‘were not intended primarily as self-help, therapy, or “venting”, but rather as a form of political

70  Lindsay Stewart transformation’.37 Now that there is a wider conversation happening in the evangelical church around ‘What comes after the purity culture reckoning?’38 I believe that the women impacted by these teachings are uniquely positioned to inform our responses to that question. Throughout these sessions, my participants made clear their belief that purity teaching fails to protect young people of any gender, causing the spiritual, physical, and psychological harm that it claims to protect them from. These teachings cross safeguarding boundaries not only due to the harm they cause to young women, but also to LGBTQ+ youth and young men. It is critical that churches who teach purity culture listen to the voices of people who have been harmed by their teachings, re-evaluate the messages they are sending to young people, and take seriously their duty of care. Yet, I also believe it is important that, as we navigate a post-purity landscape, the priority must be the people who have been harmed by those teachings, exploring how they can lovingly guide each other towards a healthier, life-giving understanding of sexuality. Unless we can continue to build and develop the post-purity culture discourse in this direction, then we aren’t providing a meaningful alternative to the limiting and patriarchal views of sexuality presented by purity teaching and Western culture. I started this research by asking how women build a healthy sexuality after choosing to leave evangelical purity culture. As I reflected on the group conversations, I was drawn back to the off-roading metaphor referenced in the introduction. At the time of that conversation, off-roading communicated a sense of loneliness and lack of direction in an uncertain landscape. As we worked through the pastoral cycle, it became clear that these women did not need another narrow path to follow. Instead, they worked together to populate this landscape with empathy, solidarity, education, authenticity, vulnerability, mistakes, and pleasure. As our group imagined a more embodied, compassionate, and inclusive sexuality, I felt as though we were building our own ideological off-roading vehicles. This time, we were in the driver’s seat. To navigate this new terrain, we needed to build a sturdy vehicle, as capable of cruising on smooth ground as it is in tackling a mountainside. This is because it is important that we feel safe in navigating difficult territory. Yet, it is also because it is important that we have fun and take pleasure from the journey. When off-roading, we know that we will get bogged down, stuck in the mud, or find some parts of the experience difficult. However, we also know that our vehicle can withstand this terrain and if it is too challenging then we can reverse, take a different path or stop.39 Throughout this research, the conversations I had with my focus group confirmed to me that women do not need a new ethic of sexuality to be laid down by someone else. We need resources, education, self-compassion, embodiment, authenticity, and community. These are the things we populate the post-purity landscape with, helping us claim an understanding of sexuality and our bodies that is truly ours. Each of these ideas and values is a reserve

Off-roading  71 that we will keep returning to throughout our lives, rather than signposts to a final destination of marriage, monogamy, or an ultimate ‘healthy sexuality’. Notes 1 Musa W. Dube, ‘Introduction: “Little Girl, Get Up!”’, in Talitha Cum!: ­Theologies of African Women, ed. Nyambura J. Njoroge and Musa W. Dube (Pietermaritzburg: Cluster Publications, 2001), 11. 2 Patricia O’Connell Killen and John De Beer, The Art of Theological Reflection (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1994); Laurie Green, Let’s Do Theology (London: Mowbray, 2009). 3 Green, Let’s Do Theology, 18. 4 Ibid., 21. 5 The Ignatian Daily Examen is an approach to daily prayer and self-reflection practiced by Saint Ignatius Loyola. It follows a sequence of becoming aware of God’s presence, reviewing the day with gratitude, paying attention to your e­ motions, choosing one feature of the day and praying from it, and finally looking toward tomorrow. 6 The code of conduct can be summarised as an agreement to maintain full confidentiality (with exceptions for any safeguarding or health and safety risks), to strive to be non-judgemental and approach differences with curiosity, not to make assumptions about other participants, to maintain good Zoom conduct, including not interrupting and muting when not speaking, and to provide trigger/content warnings. 7 For example, see the discussions in Sharlene Nagy Hesse-Biber and Patricia Lina Leavy, Feminist Research Practice: A Primer (London: Sage Publications, 2006); Michal G. Griffin, Patricia A. Resick, Angela E. Waldrop and Mindy B. Mechanic, ‘Participation in Trauma Research: Is there Evidence of Harm?’, Journal of Traumatic Stress 16, no. 3 (2003): 221–227; Amanda Burgess-Proctor, ‘Methodological and Ethical Issues in Feminist Research with Abused Women: Reflections on Participants’ Vulnerability and Empowerment’, Women’s Studies International Forum 48 (2015): 124–134; Keerty Nakray, ‘Vicarious Trauma and Safety Protocols for Sensitive Feminist Research’, in Social Science Research Ethics for a Globalising World, ed. Keerty Nakray, Margaret Alston and Kerri Whittenbury (London: Routledge, 2015), 304–317. 8 Elizabeth Gish, ‘Are you a “Trashable” Styrofoam Cup?’, Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 34, no. 2 (2018): 10. 9 Amanda M. Ortiz, ‘Developing a Measure of Purity Culture: Sexual Messages in Evangelical Christian Culture’ (PhD diss., Biola University, 2019), iii. 10 Gish, ‘Are you a “Trashable” Styrofoam Cup?’, 7. 11 Bretlyn Owens, ‘Purity Culture: Measurement and Relationship to Domestic Violence Myth Acceptance’ (PhD diss., Biola University, 2021), 10. 12 Klein states that federal funding increased again in 2016, bringing the total figure for 2017 to $90 million. Linda Kay Klein, Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free (New York, NY: Atria, 2018), 37. 13 Ibid., 34. 14 Mike Pilavachi and Andy Croft, Lifelines: Sound Advice from the Heroes of Faith (Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2018), 185. 15 Ibid., 186. 16 Klein, Pure; Gish, ‘Are you a “Trashable” Styrofoam Cup?’. 17 Nadia Bolz-Weber, Shameless: A Sexual Revolution (London: Canterbury Press, 2019).

72  Lindsay Stewart 18 Katie Cross, ‘“I Have the Power in my Body to Make People Sin”: The Trauma of Purity Culture and the Concept of “Body Theodicy”’, in Feminist Trauma Theologies: Body, Scripture and Church in Critical Perspective, ed. Karen O’Donnell and Katie Cross (London: SCM Press, 2020), 21–43. 19 Rachel Joy Welcher, ‘What Comes After the Purity Culture Reckoning’, Christianity Today, 14 October 2021, accessed 26 January 2022, www.christianitytoday. com/ct/2021/october-web-only/purity-culture-reckoning-rules-sex-spiritual-formation.html. 20 Gish, ‘Are you a “Trashable” Styrofoam Cup?’, 14, 15. 21 Melanie Randall, ‘Sexual Assault Law, Credibility, and “Ideal Victims”: Consent, Resistance, and Victim Blaming’, Canadian Journal of Women and the Law 22, no. 2 (2010): 409. 22 Linda Kay Klein, ‘What is Purity Culture?’, accessed 17 July 2021, https://­ lindakayklein.com/what-is-purity-culture/. 23 Sujita Kumar Kar, Ananya Choudhury and Abhishek Pratap Singh, ‘Understanding Normal Development of Adolescent Sexuality: A Bumpy Ride’, Journal of Human Reproductive Sciences 8, no. 2 (2015): 73. 24 Ibid., 71. 25 Joanne Woolway Grenfell, ‘Religion and Eating Disorders: Towards Understanding a Neglected Perspective’, Feminist Theology 14, no. 3 (2006): 375. 26 Janelle L. Kwee and Hillary L. McBride, ‘Embodiment and Eating Disorders: An  Emergent Vision for Theory, Research and Practice’, in Embodiment and Eating Disorders: Theory, Research, Prevention, and Treatment, ed. Hillary L. McBride and Janelle L. Kwee (New York, NY: Routledge, 2019), 359–368. 27 Ibid. 28 Further reading on purity culture and abuse: Caroline Blyth, Rape Culture, Purity Culture and Coercive Control in Teen Bibles (London: Routledge, 2021); ­Bretlyn C. Owens, Elizabeth Lewis Hall and Tamara L. Anderson, ‘The Relationship Between Purity Culture and Rape Myth Acceptance’, Journal of Psychology and Theology 49, no. 4 (2020): 405–418; Emily Joy Allison, #ChurchToo: How Purity Culture Upholds Abuse and How to Find Healing (Minneapolis, MN: Broadleaf Books, 2021). 29 Bolz-Weber, Shameless, 25. 30 Connie Baker, Traumatized by Religious Abuse: Discover the Cultures and ­Systems of Religious Abuse and Reclaim your Personal Power (Eugene, OR: Luminare, 2019), 219–226. 31 Marlene Winnell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving their Religion (Berkley, CA: Apocryphile Press, 2006), 225. 32 Christina M. Capodilupo, ‘Internalized Sexism’, The Sage Encyclopedia of Psychology and Gender, ed. Kevin L. Nadal (London: Sage Publications, 2017), 950. 33 Baker, Traumatized by Religious Abuse, 50. 34 OMGYes is an online subscription service based on widespread studies of women’s pleasure by the Kinsey Institute and the University of Indiana. It has video tutorials of different techniques, demonstrated by a diverse array of women. Each technique is given a different name, providing useful language for communication. Sex Education (2019–present) is a Netflix drama series. 35 For more information on this topic see Bonnie MacLachlan and Judith Fletcher, eds., Virginity Revisited: Configurations of the Unpossessed Body (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 2007). 36 Kathie Sarachild, ‘Consciousness-Raising: A Radical Weapon’, in Feminist Revolution, ed. Kathie Sarachild (New York, NY: Random House, 1978), 144–150, 149. 37 Rhiannon Firth, ‘For a Revival of Feminist Consciousness Raising: Horizontal Transformation of Epistemologies and Transgression of Neoliberal TimeSpace’, Gender and Education 28, no. 3 (2016): 347.

Off-roading  73 8 Welcher, ‘What Comes after the Purity Culture Reckoning?’. 3 39 This ‘off-roading’ metaphor is clearly limited, as it brings to mind masculine stereotypes. However, it is the metaphor that came naturally from our discussions and signifies the participants’ shift in thinking from ‘off-roading’ being a bewildering, lonely experience to an empowered, autonomous journey.

5 Exploring expressions of femininity through the reported rituals and practices of the Red Tent Madeleine Castro Introduction In this chapter, I consider the effects of the practice of ‘sharing’ in UK Red Tent (RT) circles. Rituals have been demonstrated to have transformative effects on participants in various contexts, and the ritual of sharing has well-established benefits, such as healing, in Indigenous talking circles. Three analytic themes are reviewed regarding sharing rituals and emerging new forms of femininity, in RT circles. After a brief and selective history of the RT movement, the chapter considers the post-feminist, neo-liberal, and post-Christian context in which RTs operate, before going on to demonstrate the effects that such rituals might be having on expressions of femininity in RTs. What are Red Tents and how did they emerge? Women’s circles are spaces where women gather regularly – often around the lunar calendar – to be with other women. These meetings are special moments, set aside from ordinary existence, in which women can share experiences, participate in activities, and feel supported.1 The RT movement is a banner under which circles are loosely connected which has emerged fairly recently in the West, initially spearheaded by the publication of The Red Tent.2 This novel retells ‘The Rape of Dinah’ from Genesis 34, in the Hebrew Bible. In Diamant’s version, Dinah is an active, voiced participant who chooses a lover, rather than the silent victim of sexual violence from the original. In the RT, the women gather to menstruate, give birth, practise polytheistic worship (particularly of ‘the Great Mother’), perform rituals, and pass on ‘feminine’ knowledge.3 Another influence is imagined prehistoric matriarchal myths.4 These motifs centre on a past reconstructed through ancient archaeological findings of the female form. Some artefacts (e.g. clay figurines with prominent breasts and hips or birthing women) are sometimes portrayed as evidence of the elevation of the feminine in societies or even as indicating that these societies were matriarchal or matrifocal and revered female divinities. Sister or DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-8

Exploring expressions of femininity  75 moon circles and women’s temples more generally are influenced by the feminist spirituality movement of the 1970s, including the Goddess movement and Paganism.5 RTs provide distinctive spaces for women, which are often decorated in soft fabrics and furnishings of a crimson or scarlet hue, emblematic of a womb-like space.6 Held in homes, community centres, or even in yurts,7 RTs offer somewhere women can talk, rest, and participate in activities. They perpetuate positive messages about menstruation and women’s bodies, including providing space for marking menarche and menopause. Research depicts women’s circles as communal sources of healing and transformation for individual women,8 as spaces where ‘sisterhood’ and solidarity materialise9 and where women are able to share unacceptable ‘negative’ emotions or experiences and seek refuge from neo-liberalism.10 Apart from these limited explorations (which include research into RTs in the USA, the UK, and women’s circles in Europe), academic research is negligible. These claims are not without complexity. The context in which RTs operate is fraught with various tensions. The probable contentions are numerous, including cultural appropriation, overwhelming privilege, and Whiteness, but this chapter focuses on expressions of femininity, which connects in part to issues of perceived gender essentialism. Discussing this, we can locate RTs within ‘the holistic milieu’, neo-liberalism, and post-Christian contemporary spiritualities that frequently meld sacred and secular forms.11 I will consider issues of gender, neo-liberalism, and the holistic milieu before highlighting pertinent aspects which frame the analysis. The holistic milieu, neo-liberalism, and gender RTs are inescapably embedded in the ‘holistic milieu’. This describes the assortment of practices, services, and events which appear to blend spirituality, health, and wellbeing culture. It incorporates aspects that have been considered ‘New Age’,12 (Neo-)Pagan phenomena, complementary health and holistic wellbeing practices, the self-help genre, and a bricolage of spiritual practices from mindfulness meditation to Tantric Yoga. Critics assert that the holistic milieu is well aligned with the central tenets of neo-liberalism. In emphasising aspects of autonomy, choice, and individual empowerment, it is argued that holistic practices prop up consumer capitalism.13 Gill’s conception of post-feminism echoes this critique, observing what she calls ‘intensified and extensified’ microscopic levels of surveillance, including in increasingly psychologised terms.14 The promise of self-transformation through cultivating ‘confidence or resilience’ is neo-liberally compliant and ‘patriarchy-friendly’.15 One notable aspect is the re-emergence of normative, polarised expressions of gender linked to femininities

76  Madeleine Castro that offer ‘more individual agency, freedom and pleasure’ that emphasise ‘consumerism and self-labouring, and often reproduce dominant forms of (hetero)sexual attractiveness’.16 Here, individuals are physical and emotional projects for consistent improvement, which encourages the perception of the neo-liberal subject as a discrete component. A climate of self-preferentialism that is encouraged and sustained by neoliberal ideology in governmental institutions, economic structures, and wider socio-cultural systems has arguably contributed to dominant forms of femininity under late capitalism. These femininities involve not only self-surveillance but also that of others’ conduct and appearance through a kind of ‘post-feminist gaze’.17 This describes how women govern and police each other’s perceived adherence to sanctioned forms of femininity through judgemental looking. If post-feminism casts femininity as a property of the body (arguably, a psychic one too) that demands unending attention, aimed at ‘improvement’, for example through ‘makeover’ or reinvention, then ‘women’s looking’ contributes to this monitoring process.18 The post-feminist gaze thus shapes women’s subjectivities whilst simultaneously preserving neo-liberal arrangements. It has been asserted that women’s circles are ‘sites of sisterhood and solidarity, and dissent, cultivating a new type of femininity grounded in both affirmative and more oppositional forms of emerging feminist consciousness’.19 This does not deny the body, but instead fosters connection with ‘the feminine’, emphasising ‘feminine embodiment, rather than female biology’, and a more abstract conception anchored in ‘the experiential, ritual and symbolic’.20 Chia Longman’s research was conducted in Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands, so it is worth exploring the extent to which these differing forms of femininity might be present in UK circles. Drawing together these threads provides a focal question for this chapter: to what extent are RTs’ rituals and practices ‘forging new forms of femininity’? Methodology and analysis The data come from the second phase of research into RTs. The first phase explored the presence and depiction of the RT movement online. Reviewing websites, blogs, and online media, this part of the research gathered, collated, and analysed materials to assess the reach of the movement and how it imagined and presented itself in the digital sphere.21 The second phase was an online survey sent to all UK-based RT organisers. There were 182 UK RTs listed at the time of the survey,22 but this was always an ­approximation of ­circle numbers as groups begin, merge, change, and become obsolete over time. A total of 78 RT organisers completed the online survey. Data from both phases are qualitative and quantitative, though the analysis here includes only qualitative data.

Exploring expressions of femininity  77 Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis (TA).23 This upholds a constructionist epistemology to critically consider the presence of broader cultural narratives and seeks to understand their impact and contextualisation. Any discursive focus is concerned with underlying intimations; these offer analytic insight into other aspects suggested by the responses. Themes are ‘created’ by in-depth engagement with the data and an active process of interpretation and analysis.24 This chapter showcases three themes to explore the question above. The RT as a ‘Ceremonial Space’ This theme captures the special, even ‘sacred’ nature of the RT. Sometimes this connects to religio-cultural phenomena such as the Divine Feminine, Goddesses, or (Neo-)Pagan and Wiccan practices (one respondent notes that their ‘ritual activities depend on the Pagan Wheel of the Year’),25 but more generally reflects the practices that occur within RTs. One respondent proffered that RTs are an opportunity to ‘share a quiet, sacred space away from the role of “mother”’. This recognition, of the partition between the revered circle and that of ordinary existence, hints at the transformative nature of a sacrosanct space achieved through specific practices. It is informative to consider how practices might become rituals. Whilst many rituals emerge through custom or tradition, Bird suggests that the act of repetition and collective will can be enough to cement a practice as a ritual: Rituals gain authority in part through the very process of their being repeated. However, rituals may gain authority by other means than tradition. The innovative ritual codes of experimental religious associations, group therapies, or even established denominations may achieve an authoritative status by being collectively authorized by participants themselves …26 Respondents draw attention to various circle practices which are habitually enacted and have a ritual quality to them. These include routine openings and closings, storytelling or sharing, guided meditations, smoke-cleansing/­clearing, divination, readings of poetry or prose, music, singing, and m ­ ovement or dance. Several respondents detail a ‘typical’ gathering, which is instructive for considering these practices further: There is music as the women come in and get a tea. We gather in circle and a guided meditation is held to connect us all and open safe and sacred space. Then each woman has opportunity to share using the womb, girl doll or plushy uterus!27 We then go into an activity held by the host or invited activity leader. There is food and we either eat at the

78  Madeleine Castro end or during the activity. We come together in guided meditation to close the circle. Initiating the circle is marked with specific rituals. The act of taking one’s place in the circle (a deliberate repositioning of the body) and participation in the meditation (a shift in consciousness) are clear signifiers to switch focus and enter into a ‘special’ state. The opportunity for attendees to ‘share’, followed by an organised ‘activity’ and eating together, comes before the event is concluded with another ritual meditation to signify completion and a return to ordinary life. Whilst different emphases are placed on these practices, all respondents report women sharing their stories as a fundamental component of circle gatherings, so this ceremonial ritual is our focus. In the example above, an object – plainly connected to normative biological female embodiment – is passed between women, indicating the opportunity to speak in an uninterrupted fashion until finished. Participation is not obligatory (women do not have to share unless they wish to); the object might instead be a ‘stick’ or cushion, a dedicated seat, or just an upheld principle. One respondent suggests this principle is a ‘very basic one of listening without response or intervention, allowing each to speak when she feels ready and for as long as she needs to’. This undoubtedly has therapeutic consequences – an active form of deep listening, without interruption, advice, or judgement that aims to allow women time to share without pressure, fear of intrusions, and the subjective experience of, as one respondent suggests, ‘being listened to, and heard’. This sharing/listening activity bears a striking resemblance to talking circles, peace-making circles, or healing circles which originated in North American Indigenous cultures.28 In these spaces, The circle starts with a prayer, usually by the person convening the circle, or by an elder, when an elder is involved. A talking stick is held by the person who speaks (other sacred objects may also be used, including eagle feathers and fans). When that person is finished speaking, the talking stick is passed to the left (clockwise around the circle). Only the person holding the stick may speak. All others remain quiet. The circle is complete when the stick passes around the circle one complete time without anyone speaking out of turn. The talking circle prevents reactive communication and directly responsive communication, and it fosters deeper listening and reflection in conversation.29 Native American traditions have influenced the feminist spirituality movement, but the lineage is often misrepresented or ignored.30 It is important to recognise the origins of talking sticks and circles, found in many

Exploring expressions of femininity  79 Indigenous cultures, especially Native American and First Nation peoples.31 Whilst the specifics surrounding its use are diverse, the purpose is often similar – to respectfully and peacefully encourage communication ‘for the purposes of teaching, listening, and learning’.32 Patently there are issues that predominantly White Western forms of spirituality invoke vis-à-vis cultural appropriation, particularly with regard to Native American rituals and practices.33 However, there are multiple applications of the talking circle in various secular (e.g. educational circles) and sacred contexts (e.g. prayer circles and Quaker circles), including more recently a primary care context.34 These rituals are putatively powerful, as many responses intimate. Transformation is arguably a key part of the ritual but should not be assumed. Bruce Kapferer notes that a transformation of ‘context and component elements’, such as identities and interrelationships, indicate how any changes to the participants may occur in the ceremonial space, but can also transfer outside into other domains, such as everyday life.35 This is hinted at in the data. Here one respondent identifies the powerful, empowering effects of sharing and listening in the circle. The RT connect[s] women and give[s] them a safe space to witness each other and be witnessed. It is a place to be emotionally held and supported to claim your truth and power as a woman, which in itself empowers the other women of the circle. Together we dismantle the stigma and stereotypes of sisterhood and rediscover intimate human connection. She claims that sharing can help change the way in which women see themselves and others, facilitating shifts in perspective and (self-)belief whilst promoting deep bonds between women. This has therapeutic echoes but simultaneously has educative and political resonance. Either way, potential transformation through ritual is evident, and for the majority of respondents, this power is directly located in sharing practices. RTs as ‘Cultivating agapē’ Respectful listening and non-judgemental acceptance are at the heart of this theme. Cultivating agapē indicates an atmospheric embrace that is actively encouraged in RTs. The term agapē is an early Greco-Christian word referring to love of God. Paul uses the term to articulate the bonds of the early Christian communities.36 This love is socially adhesive, unconditional, and all-accepting. Sociologist Gennaro Iorio has adopted the term agapē to epitomise forms of deep-rooted social and communal care which might be exemplified by the ideal relationship between parent and child.37 Considered more a state than a sentiment, it involves aspects such as suspending judgement of

80  Madeleine Castro others and practical action in service of others’ needs without expectations of reciprocity. In RTs, this ambience is fostered to welcome the women in an unqualified way, as one respondent indicates: ‘total acceptance’. The subjective sense of being noticed, listened to, and not judged is noted by respondents. For many, this is the express purpose of the circle. All activities pivot around this opportunity for women to be valued, accepted, loved, and cared for by others during these occasions. Numerous responses suggest the quality of agapē: The red tent is an invitation, an initiation, into radical self-acceptance and healing through the mutual exchange of unconditional, non-judgmental support … To provide an unconditional loving space for anyone that may feel they need it … A safe space to share and connect at a deep level which brings [the women] peace as they are understood without the need to explain themselves or their feelings … Intentionally nurturing, this tone within the circle also reputedly has profound effects. As it is clear from the subsequent extracts, the power of sitting in a circle without judgement or interruption is readily relayed, where personal problems are not perceived as exclusively individual failings and there are ripples of change/action beyond the tent. We all benefit from hearing it when our negative experiences with struggles in life are reflected back to us as accurate responses rather than somehow indicative of our own failings ([e.g.] self-doubt) … [Women] usually have significant personal insights which inspire them to take positive action in their lives outside of the red tent. This affirmative non-judgement and acceptance appear to promote a different type of femininity. In contrast to dominant femininities suggested by the ‘post-feminist gaze’ mentioned earlier (a specific form of judgemental looking conducted online and offline amongst women),38 the agapē-imbued care encouraged in RTs seems to enable alternative ways of being and behaving with other women. Via the sharing ritual, difficult experiences are somewhat alleviated as women reveal stories about coping with stressful life situations and loss or share traumatic experiences of abuse. This has ­resonance with group therapy settings.39 In turn, this nourishes knockon effects such as developing strength and agency, challenging dominant pernicious ideals of feminine beauty and ‘acceptable’ bodies, having positively directed ­conversations about sex, sexuality, fertility, birthing, menstruation, and so on. Some aspects are commonly connected to normative female embodiment. However, there are differing ways in which femininity ­manifests in RTs.

Exploring expressions of femininity  81 Embodying femininity This theme considers the way in which femininity appears in RTs.40 The concept of femininity is interwoven with gender in that femininity is often considered to be the socio-culturally normative characteristics or qualities associated with women. The complex process of internalising a sense of gender through routinised repetition of expressions, behaviours, or performative enactments is, for many feminist and queer theorists (e.g. Judith Butler), how we come to ‘belong’ to a particular gender.41 This perspective embraces gender fluidity and trans or non-binary identities. Conversely, self-ascribed ‘gender critical feminists’ (sometimes labelled Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists) insist on fixed notions of biological sex as a determining aspect of womanhood.42 RTs have been criticised for aligning with biologically essentialist and normative female embodiment.43 Longman, however, suggests that the femininities expressed in circles are more creative. This theme explores Longman’s assertions with an eye on the issue of essentialism. In the data, mentions of gender or women often remain unexamined or unexplored. At times, respondents cite the Divine Feminine (or Masculine), and embodiment is referenced in unsexed terms. The lack of specificity around embodiment does not preclude other, albeit minimal, allusions to normative female embodiment. These are predominantly concerned with menarche, menstruation, and menopause, but these matters do not dominate. Equally, however, alternative forms of embodiment are not explicitly mentioned at these moments either.44 There are also activities ostensibly centred around biologically normative depictions that on closer inspection present more fluid possibilities. For example, one respondent reports ‘sometimes [doing] some womb Yoga or Mizan therapy’.45 These incorporate connections with the womb as a grounding practice, … these points in the meeting are marked, usually with a hand on the heart, and the other over the womb and three deep breaths together, or something similar … The idea of a ‘link’ between the heart and the womb surfaces several times and intimates constructions of femininity that are open to diversely embodied expressions of womanhood. Some respondents reference an ethereal, symbolic, and energetic body, resonant with a broader conception of ‘femininity’. Whilst sometimes this involves formulaic depictions of feminine intuition, it also encompasses looser concepts of ‘womb-space wisdom’ and ‘heart-womb spaces’. A safe space to drop into our womb-space wisdom, connect with other like-minded women, access our intuition and healing powers, and create a better world where women are leading from their connected heart-womb space …

82  Madeleine Castro This formulation, redolent of womb yoga, allows for a symbolic conception of feminine power, which is not specifically tied to normative bodies. This form of femininity could be diversely expressed, symbolically felt, engaged with, and experienced as ‘feminine embodiment’ rather than ascribed definitively to conventional ‘female’ bodies. Nevertheless, RTs are subject to the effects of post-feminist discourses concerning the ‘natural sex difference’ view, bolstered by appeals to the disciplines of biology or evolutionary psychology.46 Some RTs are also likely influenced by feminist spirituality and the goddess movement formed in opposition to ‘God as male’, where ‘She’ is the ‘female’ deity, combined with an emphasis on the body and nature.47 Nonetheless, as the data suggest, new forms of femininity might be emerging, including a conceptualisation of the feminine as looser, more energetic, rather than as biologically embedded. New forms of femininity? Longman identifies that women’s circles appear to be fostering new forms of femininity. Quite what these forms are or how they are emerging is not specifically elaborated. My research builds on Longman’s work to provide details about these forms of femininity in UK RTs. There are at least two ways in which these potential new forms might be understood, which I summarise below. Further, these new forms appear to be emerging through the rituals and the atmosphere cultivated in the circle. The two emerging expressions of femininity concern feminine embodiment and the post-feminist gaze. I will deal with each in turn. The notion that femininity reverberates in an energetic sense opens it up to differently embodied women in a symbolic but also experiential sense. These more imaginative forms of feminine embodiment, supported by concepts such as ‘womb-space’, could resonate with diverse expressions (e.g. trans women). As Longman suggests, circles can provide productive spaces of wellbeing to explore these new forms. Expressing femininity becomes unshackled from the objective specifics of a physical body and instead could be rooted in the subjective experience of embodiment, the phenomenology of biology.48 This idea – posited by a trans theorist – of human biology as a subjectively lived experience is compelling and provides another dimension to the articulation of gender. These findings simultaneously recognise the possibilities and the constraints in RTs and women’s circles. As Anna Fedele and Kim Knibbe suggest, we need to take these seriously: For many people, these practices can open up new avenues to come to terms with their everyday lives, contest previous forms of power and create something new. Whether and to what extent they succeed is another question, but they need to be taken seriously and cannot be reduced to passive victims of their social and spiritual milieu.49

Exploring expressions of femininity  83 We can see that RTs align with some neo-liberal tenets, conceivably ­including the drive to ‘improve’ the self. There are also threads of individualised psychotherapeutic discourses around healing and coping. However, there are also counter-narratives, running in opposition to dominant arcs of i­ndividualised subjects and femininity. The second emergent form of femininity was within the theme ‘Cultivating agapē’: an atmosphere of acceptance and non-judgement. This expression of femininity presents a distinct alternative to women’s looking (the ­post-feminist gaze) as a form of policing and judgement. Manifestations of supportive, collective, and non-judgemental femininity in RTs are in direct contrast to judgemental, individualistic, and competitive forms of femininity articulated by complex webs of feminist and antifeminist discourse. These emerging supportive forms appear to both validate and encourage whilst also conceivably sparking empowerment and consciousness-raising. Indeed, through the ceremonial sharing in RTs, there may be similar benefits to those claimed by the ‘healing circles’ of Indigenous contexts, as previously observed in similar Pagan groups.50 My research highlights complexities around expressions of gender and femininity and is hesitant about making bold claims, but i­dentifies the propensity for these forms to work over and against both dominant forms of gender and femininity under neo-liberalism. This emphasises that these forms are not yet ‘forged’ – they are a work in progress. Conclusion In this chapter, I have explored how the ceremonial ritual of sharing in RTs appears to be manifesting emergent forms of femininity. It is significant how they differ from those in broader social contexts (as non-judgemental, loving forms), as they offer opportunities for including diverse embodiment through more symbolic and creative configurations. Further, I have emphasised the elements of this sharing ritual which pivot on a specific kind of active, deep listening, influenced by the healing circles of Native American peoples. Indeed, a practice that ‘allows’ women to speak freely and safely without fear of silencing, reprisal or interruption is still something not consistently extended to women in contemporary settings.51 Feminist scholars note how certain types of women lack representation in public and cultural spheres, associated with an impeded gender revolution and the post-­industrial context, whereby Black women are ineffectively represented, middle-class women are criticised for perceived ‘ambition’ in both/either private and public arenas, and older, ‘ugly’ or ‘fat’ women are all but invisible.52 Also, Longman argues that women’s circles are ‘responding to the perceived failure of (neo-) liberal gender ideology to empower women and transform society within secular modernity’.53 RTs may offer alternative expressions and representations of femininity and gender to some women. RTs may act as a refuge from neo-liberalism for some women.54 This sanctuary is cultivated in part by the sharing ritual and

84  Madeleine Castro agapē evidenced here. This ritual facilitates emerging forms of femininity and highlights RTs as potentially reflexive spaces of healing and acceptance for diverse presentations of womanhood. However, this acceptance will require conscious exposition, sustained, and undeniably difficult conversations. Notes 1 Isadora Gabrielle Leidenfrost, ‘Things We Don’t Talk About: Women’s Stories from the Red Tent’ (PhD diss., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2012). 2 Anita Diamant, The Red Tent (New York: St Martin’s Press, 1997). 3 Alex Clark, ‘Rewriting the Good Book’, The Guardian, 2002, accessed 14 February 2022, https://bit.ly/RTClark. 4 Cynthia Eller, ‘The Feminist Appropriation of Matriarchal Myth in the 19th and 20th Centuries’, History Compass 3, no. 1 (2005): 1–10. 5 Starhawk, The Spiral Dance (San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row, 1979); Åsa Trulsson, ‘Cultivating the Sacred: Gender, Power and Ritualization in Goddess-Oriented Groups’, in Gender and Power in Contemporary Spirituality: ­Ethnographic Approaches, ed. Anna Fedele and Kim Knibbe (London: Routledge, 2013), 28–45. 6 Leidenfrost, ‘Things’. 7 See Madeleine Castro, ‘Introducing the Red Tent: A Discursive and Critically Hopeful Exploration of Women’s Circles in a Neoliberal Postfeminist Context’, Sociological Research Online, 25, no. 3 (2020): 386–404. 8 Leidenfrost, ‘Things’. 9 Chia Longman, ‘Women’s Circles and the Rise of the New Feminine: Reclaiming Sisterhood, Spirituality, and Wellbeing’, Religions 9, no. 1 (2018). 10 Castro, ‘Introducing the Red Tent’. 11 Paul Heelas and Linda Woodhead, The Spiritual Revolution: Why Religion Is Giving Way to Spirituality (Oxford: Blackwell, 2005). 12 This label is often derogatory. See Madeleine Castro, ‘Spontaneous Transcendent and Transformative Experiences in Everyday Life’, in Alternative Salvations: Engaging the Sacred and the Secular, ed. Hannah Bacon, Wendy Dossett and Steve Knowles (London: Bloomsbury, 2015), 52–62. 13 Jeremy Carrette and Richard King, Selling Spirituality: The Silent Takeover of Religion (London and New York: Routledge, 2005). 14 Rosalind Gill, ‘The Affective, Cultural and Psychic Life of Postfeminism: A Postfeminist Sensibility 10 Years On’, European Journal of Cultural Studies 20, no. 6 (2017): 606–626, 616. 15 Ibid., 618. 16 Longman, ‘Women’s Circles’, 7, 8. 17 Sarah Riley, Adrienne Evans and Alison Mackiewicz, ‘It’s Just between Girls: Negotiating the Postfeminist Gaze in Women’s “Looking Talk”’, Feminism & Psychology 26, no. 1 (2016): 94–113. 18 Ibid., 97. 19 Longman, ‘Women’s Circles’, 1, my emphasis. 20 Ibid., 8, 9. 21 Castro, ‘Introducing the Red Tent’. 22 Publicly listed RTs were detailed on the Red Tent Directory, accessed 14 January 2021, https://redtentdirectory.com/. However, because they are unable to ensure that individual RTs are ‘inclusive liberatory spaces’, they are no longer listing them. 23 Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke, ‘Reflecting on Reflexive Thematic Analysis’, Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health 11, no. 4 (2019): 589–597.

Exploring expressions of femininity  85 24 A research assistant initially coded data with NVivo using ‘nodes’ which grouped similar responses. Data were then transferred to Excel for an in-depth manual analysis. I developed themes, informed by knowledge of previous literature and broader research questions regarding representation in RTs. Initially, themes were descriptive. After several analytic immersions, more ‘latent themes’ were teased out, resulting in several key analytic themes – three are discussed here. 25 This references the Pagan ritual calendar which has eight points for festivities including the two solstices, both equinoxes, and four seasonal markers throughout the year. See Ronald Hutton, ‘Modern Pagan Festivals: A Study in the Nature of Tradition’, Folklore 119, no. 3 (2008): 251–273. 26 Frederick Bird, ‘The Nature and Function of Ritual Forms: A Sociological Discussion’, Studies in Religion 9, no. 4 (1980): 387–402, 389. 27 The ‘womb, girl doll or plushy uterus’ are likely soft toys representing normative female anatomy – see for example https://bit.ly/PlushyU, accessed 7 December 2020. 28 Lewis Mehl-Madrona and Barbara Mainguy, ‘Introducing Healing Circles and Talking Circles into Primary Care’, The Permanente Journal 18, no. 2 (2014): 4–9. 29 Ibid., 4. 30 J. Santamaría-Dávila et al., ‘Women’s Ecofeminist Spirituality: Origins and Applications to Psychotherapy’, Explore 15, no. 1 (2019): 55–60. 31 Educators for Peaceful Classrooms and Communities, ‘The Story of the Talking Stick’, accessed 7 December 2020, https://bit.ly/TalkStik. 32 Mehl-Madrona and Mainguy, ‘Introducing Healing Circles’, 4. 33 See for instance, Laura E. Donaldson, ‘On Medicine Women and White ShameAns: New Age Native Americanism and Commodity Fetishism as Pop Culture Feminism’, Signs 24, no. 3 (1999): 677–696. 34 Mehl-Madrona and Mainguy, ‘Introducing Healing Circles’. 35 Bruce Kapferer, ‘Introduction: Ritual Process and the Transformation of Context’, Social Analysis: The International Journal of Anthropology 1 (1979): 3–19, 4. 36 1 Cor 13: 7–13. 37 Gennaro Iorio, Sociology of Love: The Agapic Dimension of Societal Life (­Delaware, US: Vernon Press, 2020). 38 Riley et al., ‘It’s Just between Girls’. 39 Santamaría-Dávila et al., ‘Women’s Ecofeminist Spirituality’. 40 A more in-depth consideration of womanhood, biological essentialism, inclusion, and exclusion than this chapter allows for is still needed. 41 Judith Butler, Gender Trouble (New York & London: Routledge, 1990). 42 Sophie Allen et al., ‘Doing Better in Arguments about Sex, Gender, and Trans Rights’, Medium, 2019, accessed 14 February 2022, https://bit.ly/StocGCF. 43 E.g. Amanda Ure, ‘The Red Tent Movement and Non-Menstruating Womyn’, Transwaffe Blog, 2016, accessed 14 February 2022, https://bit.ly/TWonRT. 44 There are references to trans women, non-binary, and queer identities being ­welcomed by some RTs. 45 Womb yoga is not only for people with wombs. As Dinsmore-Tuli suggests, it ‘is my term for yoga to nourish every aspect of our lives as women, whether we have a womb, or not, whether we menstruate, or not, and whether we are mothers, maidens, enchantresses or crones!’ Uma Dinsmore-Tuli, https://yonishakti.co/, accessed 14 February 2022. Mizan therapy is an abdominal massage technique billed as a form of ‘traditional reproductive healing’ which is thought by practitioners to help balance the body and alleviate certain conditions. Bushra Finch, ‘Mizan Therapy’, accessed 14 February 2022, https://www.mizantherapy.com/. 46 Rosalind Gill, ‘Postfeminist Media Culture: Elements of a Sensibility’, European Journal of Cultural Studies 10, no. 2 (2007): 147–166. 47 Starhawk, The Spiral Dance.

86  Madeleine Castro 48 Oli Stephano, ‘Irreducibility and (Trans) Sexual Difference’, Hypatia 34, no. 1 (2019): 141–154. 49 Fedele and Knibbe, ‘Introduction’, 15. 50 Tanya M. Luhrmann, ‘The Ugly Goddess: Reflections on the Role of Violent Images in Religious Experience’, History of Religion 41, no. 2 (2001): 114–141. 51 Heather Savigny, Cultural Sexism: The Politics of Feminist Rage in the #metoo Era (Bristol: Bristol University Press, 2020). 52 Gill, ‘Postfeminist Media Culture’; Fedele and Knibbe, ‘Introduction’. I acknowledge that this chapter is unable to do justice to intersectionality or issues of race or ethnicity as this warrants an in-depth discussion for which there is no space here. 53 Longman, ‘Women’s Circles’, 2. 54 Ibid., 2.

6 Autoethnographic perspectives on Muslim women’s lives online Renasha Khan

Introduction This chapter highlights the networks and online spaces Muslim women make and use through the production and consumption of digital content on the social media platform Instagram. In this chapter, I investigate the digital lives of Muslim women from the British Bangladeshi community in Tower ­Hamlets, London, while exploring the motivations and methods used during my fieldwork. I draw on autoethnographic-rooted methodologies as well as other feminist perspectives. Presenting data taken from interviews with British Bangladeshi women from Tower Hamlets, I demonstrate how these individual and collective online actions on Instagram represent a form of ‘makeshift creativity’.1 Consciously or unconsciously, social media are used by Muslim women to empower themselves, to assert their selfhood, and to subvert binaries that define them in rigid confines of Muslim h ­ ypervisibility – stereotyped and defined by their ‘Muslimness’.2 Online spaces, made by and for Muslim women on social media, act as a ‘third space’:3 a space in which this group is free to explore and express themselves beyond the limitations presented by their situations. The process of producing, consuming, and curating social media profiles and timelines on Instagram represents a distinct articulation of agentic self-making. This is intimately connected to historical contingencies and imaginings of idealised Muslim women. Representations of Muslim women in mainstream and traditional media are crucial to shaping the context in which Muslim women find and see themselves. The negotiation of these representations, online and offline, and expectations projected from these evocations, are an inherent part of the Muslim woman’s experience.4 This chapter will look at the ways in which the image-making and self-publishing aspects of social media apps like Instagram promote traditional patriarchies in these idealised images of Muslim women, while also engendering feminist and post-feminist consciousness. The choices made by women online also highlight the significant role of Muslim lifestyle influencers, modest fashion stars, and religious figures in shaping and reflecting expressions of contemporary Muslim experience. This chapter will demonstrate the complexity of experience in these women’s lives by surveying the DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-9

88  Renasha Khan manifold constructions of the ideal Muslim woman across traditional media and how these have been developed, rejected, and transformed by Muslim women in their use of social media. I will convey the social and spiritual dexterity millennial Muslim women show in negotiating issues around representation, expectation, and aspiration in their digital lives and in their everyday faith practices. These faith practices include specific acts as in their choice to wear hijab, engage in Islamic learning and engage with religious content and communities online. Methodology I refer to autoethnographic-rooted methodologies in the introduction because the methods I used in my fieldwork were not planned within a rigid autoethnographic scheme; rather, I realised with time that many of my methods drew on aspects of the methodology. Carolyn Ellis and Arthur Bochner describe autoethnography as ‘a form of writing that turns the researcher’s own experience into a topic of investigation in its own right’.5 This is not the case in my research as I am not making explicit autobiographical connections in the presentation of my data. However, I do draw upon the aspects of this methodological stance where my proximity to my contributors, as a millennial British Bangladeshi woman born in Tower Hamlets, has impacted the nature of the main interviews. I was able to establish an initial rapport through our shared identities but also to consolidate trust as relationships developed. The main interviews, despite being conducted over Zoom, were intimate and friendly conversations full of shared experiences and personal disclosures. As a result, I have been given an incredible body of rich and nuanced data because of the closeness I built with my contributors. My gender and my Muslim and Bengali identities were variables that helped broker special kinds of research relationships with the women in my study, most of whom I still speak to on a regular basis via Instagram. Using an autoethnographic lens allows me to be honest about my involvement in the research process and gives a methodological understanding that ethnography is embodied practice. As a researcher, it prompts me to be analytically reflexive and observant of my place in the conversations I have with my contributors. Carolyn Ellis, Tony Adams, and Arthur Bochner argue that ‘autoethnography is one of the approaches that acknowledges and accommodates subjectivity, emotionality, and the researcher’s influence on research, rather than hiding from these matters or assuming they don’t exist’.6 In the case of my research, it is hard for me not to bring my own experience and knowledge of the Bangladeshi community in Tower Hamlets, and I draw on this aspect of autoethnographic methodology.7 The study takes an interdisciplinary approach, located at a convergence of fields ranging from sociology of religion to dimensions of digital cultural studies, gender and media studies, and visual anthropology. I also used mixed methods, such as traditional research techniques including interviews

Autoethnographic perspectives  89 and focus groups and combined them with creative methods like the scroll back method in interviews, detailed later, and collaborative filmmaking techniques to capture secondary interviews and focus groups. These methods integrate perspectives that intersect several other subjects beyond those just mentioned. The primary forms of data collection were one-to-one interviews and focus groups. Collectively, these built into a significant body of data which was analysed to map trends and significant patterns of use. Attempting ethnographic fieldwork during a pandemic was a huge challenge, especially in terms of recruiting contributors. Originally, I had expected to use snowballing sampling techniques through key organisations in the borough of Tower Hamlets, such as women’s groups, welfare centres, and other social spaces where I could recruit a broad spectrum of women aged between 18 and 38 years old. A high proportion of the organisations I expected to use ran on skeletal staff pre-pandemic and with the successive lockdown measures, many were no longer operational or deemed viable by the borough. I was faced with adapting my recruitment. I eventually opted for recruiting through social media on my existing networks online and through my links in the community. I designed a post on Instagram which I posted on four successive days in October 2020. I intentionally used a simple graphic design of a camera icon on a colourful background which resembled a casting call to draw interest as, from my professional experience, I understood the filmmaking aspect of my research was an exciting incentive. The text of the post read: I’m looking for women of Bangladeshi heritage from Tower Hamlets, London to take part in my PhD research exploring how Social Media is changing y/our lives. Be a part of an innovative film and research project. DM or email [address] for more info. Please share widely. With this recruitment post, I engaged in autoethnographic practices to include myself, as a British Bangladeshi female researcher and filmmaker. The graphic reads ‘British Bangladeshi Women, tell (y)our story’, using wordplay and an imperative to indicate my place as a Bangladeshi female researcher in the study. The use of the word ‘story’ also indicates an emphasis on ethnographic narrative and representation, which was central to the motivations and methods used to conduct the interviews. These were shared as permanent posts on my Instagram account grid as well as in my Instagram stories. I was originally hesitant to use social media to recruit contributors as it would skew my sample towards younger and more urbane Muslim women. I had hoped to get a more representative sample including women with a greater variety of educational backgrounds/attainment, as well as those who had chosen to be stay at home mothers. I ended up recruiting 15 women and, thanks to my links in the community, I was able to speak to a few women who were mothers and in the older s­ ection of my sample age group.

90  Renasha Khan Meeting in person was not possible because COVID-19 restrictions did not abate, as I had hoped, by the autumn of 2020. To progress with the fieldwork, I conducted the interviews online as recorded Zoom interviews. The themes initially explored in the interviews were designed with a life history narrative of the participants in mind.8 This meant a focus on areas such as family and schooling, and the participants’ representation of their lives in Tower Hamlets. This allowed for a kind of ‘scene setting’ by the interviewees and, in turn, gave them agency and confidence in speaking about themselves as the interview continued. The later parts of the interview dealt with their faith practices and their use of social media. The questions were designed to delve into the role of digital platforms in their lives. The interviews were semi-structured, which encouraged a natural dialogue to develop between myself and my interviewees. This rapport centred on shared identities and social practices, meaning I was never far out of the conversation. This is a consistent aspect of the autoethnographic style I used in the interviews. Interviews ranged from 80 minutes to over three hours in two cases. I was overwhelmed with the candour of my participants in trusting me with their personal stories. Central to the social media enquiries was the use of the ‘scroll back’ technique, pioneered by Brady Robards and Siân Lincoln in their study of ­Facebook.9 This method involved the interviewee scrolling through their feed on Instagram, while I asked them questions about their posts, who they followed, and why. I asked questions exploring social media as a platform for both the consumption of Islamic content and productions of it (as in posting, reposting Islamic/Islamic lifestyle content) in relation to these young Muslim women’s online presence and practice. I also asked all contributors about which Muslim lifestyle influencers they followed and why, amongst other insights about how these accounts made them feel or reflect about themselves. This allowed for a nuanced conversation which broke down the faceto-face interview style and allowed for a ‘show and tell’ style exploration led by the subjects.10 This generated a fluid style to the conversations and gave interviewees autonomy to lead with their thoughts. Using aspects of the autoethnographic interviewing style and scroll back method, I sought to encourage an authentic and candid conversation between the participants and myself. By allowing them to do the scrolling, the participants were able to control the selection and discussion around their profile and their online presentation of themselves. This mechanism fostered ‘creative authorship’ as remarked on by Sarah Banet-Weiser and Inna Arzumanova in their study of female self-authorship in digital spaces.11 Analysis I made transcripts of the Zoom recordings, which I then recorded in a fieldwork log in Microsoft Excel. During transcription, I felt compelled to adapt the nature of my analysis from digital to analogue analysis. I had planned to use Nvivo to code and thematise the data; however, as I repeatedly watched

Autoethnographic perspectives  91 and listened to the interview recordings, I realised I wanted to spend more time with my contributors’ words. I needed to treat their feelings and thoughts with the same respect and privilege they imparted to me. I opted to use paper coding methods because it felt like an intimate and reflective process which allowed me to physically handle and become familiar with the data. This involved printing copies of transcripts and then colour coding quotes and interesting sections by hand, and labelling with one-word codes. In a method much like that I use in my filmmaking process, I mapped these 121 codes on large A3 pieces of paper. In this way, I was able to visually map the codes written randomly on sheets of paper in different coloured Sharpie markers and observe the different words/codes. This method of observational distillation allowed me to group codes and start drawing out themes. I have used this method on several films, and it has proved a creative way to develop themes and sequences in an organic and highly creative manner. The 121 codes were collected under thematic umbrellas. These included broad themes such as family, Tower Hamlets, school, and relationships, as well as more specific subjects like algorithm, filters, hijab, and dating. Using this thematic coding technique allowed me to understand the areas I could pursue in my subsequent fieldwork and what I wanted to capture in my wider thesis. These were then recorded in an Excel database and colour-coded for reference later. These interviews, along with secondary interviews and focus groups, will comprise the body of data for the entire study. The conversations from the later data collection processes will be analysed in the same manner, using transcripts and paper coding. The secondary interviews and focus groups took place in person and, as planned, were recorded on film. These will create a visual representation of the study in the form of a short documentary film. Together, the research and the films will build on an existing body of work which looks to uncover the lives of Muslim women in Britain. The aim is to capture, in an unobtrusive way, how new forms of identity are created by young British Muslim women, transmitted to new communities, and proliferated or rejected using social media. Muslim women online The women I spoke to present their interests and consumption online under the following subjects: • • • • • • • • •

Islamic knowledge online Community Social activism Modest fashion and make up Self-expression Gender roles – acceptance and defiance Advice, support, and wellbeing Travel Food

92  Renasha Khan This chapter is not an exhaustive survey of my data; rather I will present data that represents the women’s faith practices and how they were articulated online. Halima, a 38-year-old mother of two and primary school administrator, consumes mainly Islamic content on her Instagram. When asked who she followed, she lists the following Islamic teachers: ‘Omar Suleiman, yeah Mufti Menk I like a lot and Yasmin … Mogahed’. These three individuals are some of the most popular and best-known online personalities whose content focuses on Islamic teaching. Mufti Menk is a Zimbabwean Islamic scholar with a doctorate in social guidance who has gained a global following with his personable and down-to-earth style in lectures on Islamic teaching about everyday life. Similarly, Omar Suleiman, an American imam and founder of the Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research, uses online lectures and digital content to inspire and guide Muslims. Suleiman is also Adjunct Professor of Islamic Studies at the Southern Methodist University in Texas, so, like Menk, brings a combination of traditional Islamic scholarly authority with western academic expertise. He is also a vocal civil rights activist. Mogahed is an American motivational speaker and educator and is popular amongst many Muslim women globally for addressing issues around gender in Islam. Much of the content produced by these Islamic teachers represents excerpts of longer video lectures found on their YouTube channels or through online courses, to which viewers subscribe through affiliated institutes and schools. Most of the content on Instagram is consumed in short-form stories or clipped video posts, which work as tasters for lengthier discussions on subjects such as marriage rights, or whole courses on the teaching of the Prophet or aspects of scripture. Halima was enrolled on similar courses which were created and distributed by her local mosques – London Muslim Centre and Dar el Umma Mosque – who use their social media channels on Instagram and Facebook to connect with their congregations. She explained that consuming Islamicoriented content had influenced her outlook on faith and her practice. She cited the example of the story of Ali Banat, an Australian businessman-turnedhumanitarian through his charity ‘Muslims Around the World’. Banat changed his life after being diagnosed with cancer and started a mission of philanthropic work which garnered a large social media following. Halima explains, It was amazing what he did in a short time since he found out about his illness … Yes, we are in this dunya [this life] and we are so busy with it. But we should think about akhira [the afterlife] … he has inspired me, because it made me sit down and think about my life. Halima is a consumer of Islamic content and other more generic content like food-related accounts where she can find tips and recipes, particularly traditional Bengali cuisine which she wants to learn more about. Halima is one of the few contributors who posts infrequently and uses her account to mainly consume Islamic content. She only has three posts on her account grid and since we last spoke, over a year ago, she has not posted at all. The three

Autoethnographic perspectives  93 posts consist of pictures of her two children’s birthdays over the course of two years. Other participants, like Orin, a 26-year-old lawyer, use Instagram daily and consume Islamic content more consistently. Like Halima and many other of my contributors, Orin is a fan of Mufti Menk: ‘the way I distil my knowledge is by listening to Islamic lectures, roughly, Mufti Menk he’s one of my favourites, like he’s amazing’. She goes on to explain that her particular reasons for enjoying Mufti Menk’s lectures are the candidness and breadth of his engagement with day-to-day issues: to find somebody like Mufti Menk, who addresses real situations that are happening to real Muslims in this real world. And he does it in a way that’s so unashamed, like, I don’t feel ashamed to kind of think about those topics’ Those topics include divorce, domestic violence, homosexuality, and other subjects, which are taboo in Muslim communities. She goes on to explain that growing up in a south Asian family means to adhere to conservative rules, which stifle exploration and are rooted in shame. Mufti Menk speaks openly about sexuality and sex in marriage, combining advice with theological understanding, which defies gender stereotypes. Orin explains: I’ve recently learned from him that having sex with your partner in a marriage is a form of worship. Like, ibadah [worship] in itself. Things like that you’re just not taught. And especially as women, we’re taught to be incredibly sexually submissive. It’s so annoying that, we should almost pretend like we don’t want it, or we don’t like it. And that’s ridiculous. So, for me like to have someone like that is important and his lectures have really empowered me so much. Orin also reproduces and shares this content frequently. Since I have started following Orin, in 2019, she re-posts on average six posts on her daily stories from Islamic content creators beyond teachers like Mufti Menk. These consist largely of Islamic reminders or text-based images that include scriptural sayings or advice, which are posted by accounts devoted to content on Islamic guidance or wellbeing. Orin explains that reposting Islamic reminders and wellbeing posts is a part of her personal journey as a Muslim who, she explains, is ‘just someone who’s struggling and trying hard’. The impact of being on Instagram for Orin is clear and highly positive in terms of her faith practice: It’s made me a better Muslim in the sense of, I’m constantly being reminded of my faith and what that means to me. It’s also constantly teaching me and I’m constantly learning. I don’t think I would have that constant learning environment had it not been for social media.

94  Renasha Khan Islamic educational content and the proliferation of online content focused on providing guidance on issues from an Islamic perspective mean that the women I spoke to were able to engage with the practical issues that arose in their everyday lives in a way that is rooted in their religious outlook. In this manner, social media are having a profound impact on the way that Muslim women perceive and practise their faith in daily habits, the way they raise their children, and the way they conceive their own existence. Constructions of the Muslim woman We have taken a brief look at how Islamic practice is impacted by social media, but how do the women I spoke to understand themselves in relation to the world around them? Representations of Muslim women in mainstream and traditional media are crucial to shaping the context in which young ­Muslim women find and see themselves. The negotiation of these representations, online and offline, and expectations projected from these constructions, are an inherent part of the Muslim woman’s experience. These expectations, I  argue, can be embodied in constructions of an ideal or idealised Muslim woman. Many of my participants expressed, explicitly or implicitly, a consciousness of these idealised constructions. In turn, participants spoke keenly about how this consciousness affected their own sense of self and selfhood in relation to these formations, and how these impacted their faith practices. How are Muslim women constructed in the media? Their representations are numerous and multifaceted, and nuanced for effect according to the audience. Despite this, there are recurring and overriding discourses around ­Muslim women that prevail. In the diverse representations of ­Muslim women in the UK and wider Western media culture, three personas tend to be prevalent, repeatedly constructed, and disseminated. The first is the oppressed, undervalued, and imprisoned, and almost always veiled Muslim woman who is captive to her patriarchal and archaic community. Lila ­Abu-Lughod charts the long history of this gendered orientalism in the framing of M ­ uslim women as unfree subjects, confined by their religious shackles.12 In this construction, the Muslim woman has no agency or will and needs white Western saviours to emancipate her. The second construction of the Muslim woman is rooted in the idea of Islam as a political threat to Western culture. This portrays Muslim women as a threat, the terrorist or Islamic extremist amongst us. This version of the militant Muslim woman is often shown in hijab with a gun/ bomb vest and military camouflage gear. However, in more recent times, this imagery has shifted from Middle Eastern suicide bomber imagery to heavily veiled Isis-brides. The most prominent example of this in the UK is Shamima Begum, a British Bangladeshi girl from Tower ­Hamlets who left her home to join the extremist group Isis in Syria at the age of 15 in 2015. The third representation is the moderate and acceptable face of Muslim multiculturalism, usually a media personality like Nadiya Hussain who, though veiled, is pointedly apolitical in her public persona. Since she is a celebrity

Autoethnographic perspectives  95 baker, this may not a problematic construction, but her TV programmes and books emphasise her British identity,13 muting aspects of her ‘Muslimness,’14 which generates additional issues. Hussain’s Great British Bake Off win in 2015 sparked debates online and in the media about how Britishness is understood and consumed by society. With time, Hussain’s religious identity had to be effectively erased to be deemed acceptable to the mainstream and to create the marketable media personality Hussain now is. All these constructions of the Muslim woman are met with criticism, from outside the Muslim community and certainly from amongst the Muslim community in Britain. The moral judgements of Shamima Begum as a traitor and an extremist outlier in the Muslim community were loud and damning. What these commentators crucially ignored was that Begum, who faced trial at the age of 19, had been indoctrinated as a child. Regardless of her alleged crimes, Shamima Begum’s case highlighted the fact that Muslim women are not judged with the same compassion and objectivity as other women because of the choice they make to uphold Islam, in whatever form that might take. These constructions evoke the general Western ‘cultural consensus’ of Islam as a static, archaic, and violent religion.15 As this is upheld in a discussion on Islam analysed in Edward Said’s Orientalism and has been discussed widely by scholars of Islam and diasporic cultures, I will refrain from discussing it at length here. However, it is important to note that in this orientalised conception, Islam and Muslims are usually represented as outsiders and others. My participants broadly had strong views and an understanding of how misrepresentation of Muslims and Muslim women has occurred in the post 9/11 and 7/7 era in the media and, specifically, the impact that has had on the moral judgement Muslims faced in wider society after the terror attacks. Orin explained at length the sense of othering and Islamophobia she was dealt in her university experiences at Oxford, where she read law: I think growing up in the post 7/7 generation, as a brown, visible Muslim … I felt like I had to justify my existence or, I had to justify the fact that I’m a good human being … I’m brown, I’m Muslim, and I’m a good human being, but I’m a good human being despite being brown and Muslim. I felt like that’s what people were trying to get me to say. And I really didn’t want to say that because it’s not what I believed. Influencers In this section, I explore the ways in which Muslim influencers affect the construction of the ideal Muslim woman for women like my participants. Muslim women influencers have used the community building and networking aspects of social media to create a community-focused, authentic sense of community. Largely, these accounts and individuals or groups of individuals have used fashion and lifestyle, which includes home decor, cooking, and

96  Renasha Khan craft,  to focus their sense of Islamic lifestyle. Influencers like Dina Tokio, Ascia, and Habiba Da Silva – to name a few – also helped to construct the changing idealised vision for Muslim women by opening a conversation online in the community about modest fashion. By actively disempowering the male gaze which dominates Islamic discourse about hijab and modesty, such influencers offered a female-centred perspective which highlights progressive fashion while engaging an Islamic and appealing approach. In doing so, they were able to centre female experience of hijab and modesty. Many of the bloggers and influencers I will discuss have also fed into traditional constructions of the idealised Muslim woman as wife, mother, and homemaker, but with the incorporation of successful entrepreneur.16 In many ways, this woman is an aspirational Muslim woman and celebrates what Muslim women can be. However, as with all idealised constructions, there are fault lines and problematics, which exist and affect their audiences in numerous ways. The model of Instagram centres on consumer products and their marketing. Many influencers build their brands around Islamic identity, but also around fashion. For women of Bangladeshi heritage, fast fashion is a difficult subject to negotiate as consumers, due to the co-option of fast fashion labels by Instagram influencers. There is a problem of adopting colonial and corporate models which involve outright exploitation of women from South Asia and the global South, an awareness of which many of my participants demonstrated. The pushing of unrealistic beauty and body standards was also something that came up when thinking about and discussing Muslim influencers. Furthermore, many of the most influential and successful Muslim lifestyle mavens have since removed their hijabs and stepped away from the Muslim community who built them up. For many of my participants and women like them, Muslim lifestyle influencers and bloggers were an important factor in asserting a voice that hitherto had not been heard in any media. The significance of feeling represented by these influencers and therefore seen by the world is emotionally loaded and can be complex. Many of my participants voiced their misgivings regarding developments in the Muslim lifestyle arena online as increasing numbers of well-known Muslim influencers renounced their hijab and publicly stepped away from their Muslim identities. Individuals identify with Muslim influencers because they feel represented and seen in the world through these social stars. When talking about influencers, Fariha, who is 21 years old, mentioned Mishti Rahman, who has come up several times in other interviews. Mishti Rahman is an influencer of Bengali heritage, born and brought up in Australia, who is a model, blogger, and social media influencer. On Instagram she has over 500,000 followers; she posts pictures of herself and makeup-related pictures/videos. Fariha talks about her interest in her: ‘She’s an empowered Bengali woman. She’s doing her own thing. She’s living by herself. I think that’s cool. And kind of aspirational’. In line with her comments about finding connection and community regarding her Bangladeshi heritage, Fariha goes on to express her

Autoethnographic perspectives  97 dismay and disappointment at this influencer’s lack of transparency in terms of ­exploitative garment-making practices in her own brand of clothing, with anger and outrage: Okay, so this girl has completely like used being brown as like a ­selling point yet when it comes to empowering actual brown women from where she comes from … this girl is just so fake, so I unfollowed her Despite expressing a distinct lack of focus in her interest earlier in her interviews about the exploits of Bangladeshi heritage influencers online, she displays a strong emotional investment in these figures upholding principles and values. There are clearly tensions at play when it comes to influencers and their role in women’s lives. There is a sense of betrayal when influencers do not also uphold other values held by community members, especially when this intersects with other identities. Fariha continued to talk about Mishti Rahman: Obviously, she basically partners with a lot of fast fashion brands, and quite clearly uses labour from Bangladesh but she didn’t really seem to care about it. And people have called her out about it, because they’re like, how can you have your USP as being about being a brown Bangladeshi woman, and then not acknowledge the fact that these women are literally making the clothes that you’re paid to promote? And you’re using that as like as leverage for like making your brands pay. It’s slavery. It’s literally your own women who you’re like, you’re kind of saying, Yeah, I’m a feminist, and I’m not doing this, this and this, and this, like, your feminism doesn’t extend to people who lives in Bangladesh, which is weird, because I… just because you’re part of the Diaspora doesn’t mean that your experiences are more valid than, like people who are back at home. Fariha’s passion for environmentalism is demonstrated in her sustainability blogging and separate Instagram account, @easypeasysustainibility, which has acquired a considerable following since we first spoke. This passion and her feminism are expressed in her anger regarding this influencer’s display of self-interest over community or collective gain. An important observation in the discussion about influencers, particularly those who are Muslim women of colour, concerns their perceived exploitation of Muslim identity for their own gain. As Munadiah (22) articulates eloquently, Some people also use their access to the Muslim community to kind of like build themselves up and I’m like let’s build together. And that’s my thing, like, we build together, or we’re not building, you’re not building anything. You’re just literally pushing yourself up. And I don’t believe

98  Renasha Khan in that for a second. You all know about that kind of experiences in the community. This comment was made in reference to arguably the most recognised ­Muslim lifestyle blogger, ‘Dina Tokio’ (her online name). Dina Torkia (her real name) is a Muslim woman of mixed Egyptian and English heritage from Cardiff. Starting her social media career doing fashionable hijab tutorials on Youtube, she was one of the first Muslim women online to create a space focusing on Muslim women, specifically Muslim women’s needs and tastes. As ­Munadiah explains, ‘Dina Tokio, what she did was really profound. She created a space where there was none. And she challenged the status quo. Then, loads of people followed her and did the same thing’. This view was held by many of the women I spoke to. There was a strong connection to what Dina Tokio created online, a space for women, as Munadiah continues: ‘I feel like she created … a culture and opened up a possibility for that to be normalised’, regarding wearing modest clothing and hijab. What Dina and those ­bloggers who followed her did was espouse Muslim ideals in the context of their ­everyday lives as millennial British women, and reflect to their following a sense of being which was validated, normalised, and even lionised. It was a sea change in representation for Muslim women and, I argue, the catalyst for a social change which empowered Muslim women in the UK and globally. The Muslim lifestyle industry online is vast. Central to its dynamics are personalities or ‘influencers’ who shape and reflect the tastes, trends, and consumption of their audience. It is crucial to analyse the role of influencers in the construction of ideal Muslim womanhood. With the growth of youth leading to political Islam in the UK from the 1990s, and the establishment of organisations like Hizb ut Tahrir and the Islamic Society of Britain,17 more and more young women chose to adopt the veil.18 This became something of a cultural change in the Bangladeshi community in the UK, particularly in areas like Tower Hamlets, which saw increasing numbers of young women who started to wear hijab and other forms of Islamic dress (like the jilbab, burqa and niqab) more prominently. This fashionable shift played into the existing patriarchal structures which limited women to domestic roles, with marriage being the goal in a woman’s life. With religiosity growing in the community, being visibly more modest and wearing the hijab became a preferred virtue signal, not only in terms of faith but also culturally, including women seeking good marriage prospects. Suggesting this is not intended to undermine the choice many women made spiritually and politically, especially in the atmosphere of growing anti-Muslim hostility of the post-9/11 period, but to recognise that the growth in the adoption of hijab was primarily a cultural phenomenon and was driven by fashion.19 Influencers like Dina Tokio, Amena Khan, and Ascia espoused the growing interest in M ­ uslim fashion with hijab tutorials and modest fashion hauls, where influencers show and try on the clothes from their latest shopping trip, on Youtube and

Autoethnographic perspectives  99 subsequently Instagram. In doing so, they shifted the conversation towards asking questions about how to wear the scarf in a way that is truthful to the wearer. These influencers modernised the act of veil-wearing by widening the remit to self-expression and authenticity of the women choosing to cover. This was reflected in the developments in hijab fashion, as adopted by women not just in the East End of London but globally, as followings online grew for these bloggers, but also as a part of a growing sense of ‘global Islam’.20 This included changing fashions, from long oblong scarves, to turbans, to Yemeni wrap hijab styles – to name a few. All these trends and evocations of the hijab were potent developments in the vocalisation of young Muslim women. The distinct demonstration of this was in the realm of modest fashion, where catwalk style and high fashion were being reinterpreted by Muslim influencers to cater to the needs of more modest and covering women. These phenomena ultimately saw modest wear being made and marketed, not only by high street brands but also by international high fashion designers. This reflects the sheer demand and lucrative allure the Islamic blogosphere and its followers had co-created. I believe that these developments are a continuation in the construction and deconstruction of what the idealised Muslim woman is. The idea spread that one could still be a model Muslimah, in the traditional sense, but that one’s faith and spirituality are not defined by hijab or other elements of dress. The evolution of the construction of Muslim woman, therefore, took the power away from the veil and clothing in discourse amongst Muslim women. These developments impact the nature of selfhood in respect to putting the religious onus on the individual, away from their dress and appearance. In a way, what Islamic lifestyle influencers and consumers have done is to take the gaze away from women’s bodies and their choices in how they cover and present themselves to a more agentic articulation of selfhood, bound in their own self-expression and faith practice. Whether or not this has happened intentionally, according to participants like Habiba, this shift has ‘alleviated the pressure on hijabis to maintain the “perfect Muslim persona”’. It can be argued that the evocation of a perfect or ideal Muslim woman can be a powerful tool of empowerment and modernity. However, what are the complexities that arise when this is largely conveyed through commercial and consumerist ventures online? This chapter has explored how Muslim lifestyle influencers and modest fashion icons have propelled Muslim visibility into mainstream consumer and popular culture. It is interesting to note that many of my contributors were acutely aware of these complex issues and had a great awareness of their own participation in perpetuating the same systems that also marginalise their experiences. Despite the apparent problematics around social media platforms and their commerce-driven models, social media – and in particular Muslim social media – is challenging and transforming the mainframe by which Muslim women, like my ­participants, shape and regard themselves. This particularly applies to their ­self-understanding in terms of their everyday faith practice.

100  Renasha Khan Notes 1 Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life, trans. Steven Rendall (­Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984), xiv. 2 Nadia Jeldtoft, ‘The Hypervisibility of Islam’, in Everyday Lived Islam in Europe, ed. Nathal M. Dessing, Nadia Jeldtoft, Jørgen S. Nielsen and Linda Woodhead (London: Routledge, 2013), 27. 3 Rosemary Pennington, ‘Social Media as Third Spaces? Exploring Muslim Identity and Connection in Tumblr’, International Communication Gazette 80, no. 7 (2018): 620–636. 4 Faiza Hirji, ‘Claiming our Space: Muslim Women, Activism, and Social Media’, Islamophobia Studies Journal 6, no. 1 (2021): 78–92. 5 Carolyn Ellis and Arthur Bochner, ‘Autoethnography, Personal Narrative, Reflexivity: Researcher as Subject’, in The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research, ed. Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2000), 739. 6 Carolyn Ellis, Tony E. Adams and Arthur P. Bochner, ‘Autoethnography: An Overview’, Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung/Forum: Qualitative Social Research 12, no.1 (2010). 7 Andrew C. Sparkes, ‘Autoethnography and Narratives of Self: Reflections on ­Criteria in Action’, Sociology of Sport 17, no. 1 (2000): 21–43. Sparks writes that autoethnographies ‘are highly personalized accounts that draw upon the experience of the author/researcher for the purposes of extending sociological ­understanding’, 21. 8 Amia Lieblich, Rivka Tuval-Mashiach and Tamar Zilber, Narrative Research: Reading, Analysis, and Interpretation (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1998). 9 Brady Robards and Siân Lincoln, ‘Uncovering Longitudinal Life Narratives: Scrolling Back Facebook’, Qualitative Research 17, no. 6 (2017): 715–730. 10 Nancy T. Ammerman and Roman R. Williams, ‘Speaking of Methods: Eliciting Religious Narratives through Interviews, Photos, and Oral Diaries’, Annual Review of the Sociology of Religion 3 (2012): 117–134. 11 Sarah Banet-Weiser and Inna Arzumanova, ‘Creative Authorship, Self-Actualizing Women, and the Self-Brand’, in Media Authorship, ed. Cynthia Chris and David A. Gerstner (New York, NY: Routledge, 2012), 164. 12 Lila Abu-Lughod, Do Muslim Women Need Saving? (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013. 13 For example, see Nadiya Hussain, Nadiya’s British Food Adventure: Beautiful British Recipes with a Twist (London: Penguin Books, 2017). 14 Jeldtoft, ‘The Hypervisibility of Islam’, 27. 15 Edward William Said, Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World (London: Routledge, 1981), 169; ‘the canonical orthodox coverage of Islam that we find in the academy, in the government, and all the media is interrelated and has been more diffused, has seemed more persuasive and influential, in the West than any other coverage of interpretation’. 16 Brooke Erin Duffy and Emily Hund, ‘“Having it All” on Social Media: Entrepreneurial Femininity and Self-Branding Among Fashion Bloggers’, Social Media + Society, July–December 2015. 17 Philip Lewis, ‘From Seclusion to Inclusion: British ’Ulama and the Politics of Social Visibility’, in Politics of Visibility: Young Muslims in European Public Spaces, ed. Valérie Amiraux and Gerdien Jonker (Bielefield: Transcript Verlag, 2015), 169–190. 18 Claire Dwyer, ‘Veiled Meanings: Young British Muslim Women and the Negotiation of Differences’,  Gender, Place and Culture: A Journal of Feminist ­Geography 6, no. 1 (1999): 17.

Autoethnographic perspectives  101 19 Banu Gökariksel and Anna J. Secor, ‘New Transnational Geographies of Islamism, Capitalism and Subjectivity: The Veiling-Fashion Industry in Turkey’,  Area  41, no. 1 (2009): 6–18. 20 Bruce B. Lawrence, ‘Allah On-Line: The Practice of Global Islam in the Information Age’, in Practicing Religion in the Age of the Media, ed. Stewart M. ­Hoover ad Lynn Schofield Clark (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2002), 237–253.

Part III

Food and Fabric

7 Transmission, mimesis, and gender Jewish women’s kashrut practices Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz

Introduction My ethnographic research with modern Jewish women suggests that women characteristically preserve mimetic transmission of ritual practice as the main mode in which they operate in the field of kashrut (dietary laws). Such transmission is embedded in a network of relationships, particularly with female relations, rather than relying on reference to and compliance with the classical legal texts of Judaism, written and interpreted by male authorities and taught in a formal context. The latter type of transmission has become predominant among men in recent years, but is only now beginning to transform Jewish women’s ritual practice – though only in some spheres and in specific communities.1 This chapter uses my interviews with Jewish women to examine gender-based differences in the transmission and implementation of ritual knowledge and to suggest that this has led to parallel but divergent modes of ‘kashrut as theory’ (male) and ‘kashrut as practice’ (female) in non-haredi (ultra-Orthodox) communities. The issue of changes in the transmission of ritual practice has been raised before, but its gender-related aspects have rarely been considered. In 1994, the prominent American Jewish historian Haym Soloveitchik published a landmark article, ‘Rupture and Reconstruction: The Transformation of Contemporary Orthodoxy’,2 which claimed that a deep-seated change, characterised by greater stringency in ritual practice, took place in Orthodox Judaism in the late 20th century. Soloveitchik attributed this to the loss of a mimetically based, imitative method of transmission of tradition, centred in the home and community, and characteristic of organic, premodern Jewish communities and to the gradual adoption of text-based knowledge and formal study as the major mode of transmission, which now serves as the ultimate ground and authority for correct practice. In his view, this process undercut traditional and multiple sources of authority, such as family members and local community practice, in favour of far more centralised, isolated figures – scholars and heads of religious academies (rashei yeshivah), who have acquired a new charismatic authority that endows them with previously unheard-of levels of power and the ability to impose increasingly strict standards of practice. DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-11

106  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz Many people, in America and elsewhere, who had sensed a fundamental shift in Jewish life felt an immediate sense of recognition when they read the analysis. The article had a profound impact on the academic understanding of contemporary Orthodox communities and practice and continues to be cited as a foundational work. It has been criticised on various grounds, both when originally published and later,3 but rarely from the standpoint of gender or ethnographic research – two factors I explore in this chapter.4 When Soloveitchik wanted to contrast ‘text-based and transmitted’ ­Judaism (i.e. based on the formal study of books) and ‘mimetically transmitted’ Judaism (i.e. based on the imitation of observed behaviour), he used the strongly gendered example of the kosher kitchen. In Orthodox ­Judaism, the kitchen is often the realm of women, with men largely excluded, and until recently, those with access to the classic texts on kashrut, the dietary laws  –  the Talmud, its commentaries, the halakhic (legal) codes, and their commentaries – were exclusively men. Those with the greatest textual knowledge and authority (rabbis and scholars) were the least likely to enter the kitchen and participate in what went on there, trusting their womenfolk to produce kosher food and to come to them with questions, should any arise. Kashrut practices thus offer a particularly interesting sphere in which to examine and evaluate Soloveitchik’s claims. In this chapter, I focus on two aspects of Soloveitchik’s work: his handling of the concept of transmission of ritual practice and the gendered nature of such transmission in the premodern and modern Jewish world, both of which can be tested against my interviews with Orthodox Jewish women. After considering these aspects of transmission, as well as alternative models (such as those of Thomas Williams and Mary Belenky and her colleagues),5 I focus on three aspects of my interviews with Jewish women, most of them from London, to support a fresh evaluation of Soloveitchik’s conclusions in terms of gender: how women learn about kashrut rules, the resources they use when dealing with kashrut problems, and the kashrut practices that they develop themselves. I employ a ‘lived religion’ approach, based on the fact that ‘religious practices and understandings only have meaning in relations to other cultural forms and in relations to the life experiences and actual circumstance of the people using them’.6 I will conclude by reflecting on the rich potential of such a study in revealing nuance and variation both in current practices in different communities, and in processes of change and transformation. Soloveitchik and models of cultural transmission Soloveitchik employs a binary model that envisions two types of transmission. The first he labels ‘mimetic’, noting: A way of life is not learned but rather absorbed. Its transmission is mimetic, imbibed from parents and friends, and patterned on conduct regularly observed in home and street, synagogue and school.7

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  107 He characterises the second mode as ‘book knowledge’, contrasting this with the role that classical religious texts traditionally played in Jewish life as only one component of a way of life that was primarily learnt mimetically: If I were asked to characterise in a phrase the change that religious Jewry has undergone in the past generation, I would say that it was the new and controlling role that texts now play in contemporary religious life.8 Soloveitchik considers how these two modes used to complement each other in traditional Jewish practice, with primacy accorded to the mimetic model. He notes that in daily life, texts and practice sometimes coincided, but sometimes did not. He cites the standard kosher kitchen, with its separate dishes, sinks, dish racks, towels, tablecloths, and even separate cupboards for milk and meat utensils – much of which is actually not necessary according to halakhah ­(Jewish law), in spite of its fundamental prohibition of the cooking, preparation, and consumption of milk products together with meat (including fowl).9 If food is served cold, there is technically no need for separate dishes for meat-based meals and milk-based meals – but it would be an extremely rare kosher ­household in which the same dishes were used for both. As Soloveitchik observes, The simple fact is that the traditional Jewish kitchen, transmitted from mother to daughter over generations, has been immeasurably and unrecognizably amplified beyond all halakhic requirements. Its classic contours are the product not of legal exegesis, but of the housewife’s religious intuition imparted in kitchen apprenticeship.10 This is a fairly basic model of mimetic transmission and would be improved by the addition of complexity and nuance, even if it is somewhat unreasonable to expect Soloveitchik (a historian) to have investigated the models of cultural transmission current when he wrote the article. Thus, for instance, Thomas Williams has suggested that separate processes of cultural transmission (how information is given to others) and cultural acquisition (how information is received from others) should be studied simultaneously: this in turn results in a ‘distinction between how culture is learned and how behaviours are patterned, what effects these behaviours have on the personalities of socialised individuals, and how systems of knowledge give meaning to social forms of learned behaviour’.11 These and similar ideas lie behind much anthropological investigation of cultural transmission. A classic exploration of the ways in which women’s transmission of knowledge differs from that of men is Women’s Ways of Knowing, originally published in 1986.12 The authors found that the ways in which women learn are intimately linked to their self-understanding: for instance, their tendency to see themselves as subordinate to others and as primarily focused on enabling others can lead to a passive role in learning and

108  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz a sense of inadequate mastery of knowledge, whereas women with higher levels of self-confidence and a better self-image trust their own intuition more and are more confident in the knowledge that they possess and its truth, even when confronting external authorities. Those who attain this level of confidence develop relations of trust with others, whom they then feel free to consult and to learn from. Women often develop their knowledge via others in this way, reaching what the authors describe as a state of ‘connected knowing’, in which they develop procedures for gaining access to other people’s knowledge, often by sharing their experiences and collaborating in groups.13 Moral elements and social contexts are important in how they employ and use their knowledge, aspiring to work in ways that contribute to the empowerment and improvement of life for others and that recognise the importance of emotion and care, rather than a ‘banking’ model of knowledge accumulated for an individual’s benefit, and sometimes deployed to leverage power. Many of these elements can be seen in Orthodox Jewish women’s accounts of their education in kashrut practices, as emerged from the interviews. This rich theory of women’s transmission of knowledge leads to a consideration of the gender implications of Soloveitchik’s discussion of transmission. As noted, his first example of mimetic transmission was that of the kosher kitchen. Until recently – and still today in many Orthodox Jewish contexts  –  the kitchen was the realm of Jewish women, with men granted little or no access: I have often been proudly told by older Orthodox women that ‘my husband wouldn’t know how to make a cup of tea’. The anthropologist Susan Sered, who studied elderly women from the Kurdish and Iraqi communities in Jerusalem, noted that they regarded food preparation as a sacred occupation that was their particular domain.14 A recent ethnographic study of ultra-Orthodox (haredi) women’s reproductive authority by Michal Raucher also reveals women’s sense of authority in other areas of life that they regard as their divinely apportioned concern – in this instance, that of birthing and nurturing the next generation of haredi Jews. In the sphere of Jewish law governing marital relations and reproduction, as in maintaining a kosher kitchen as revealed by my interviews, women do not always turn to rabbinic authority, despite strong cultural expectations that they should do so, and instead rely on their personal, embodied experience as a source of authority.15 However, only men – rabbis and scholars – write books and commentaries on kashrut laws. In addition, these works were only read and studied by men until very recently, since traditionally, Jewish women were not given an education in or access to the extensive halakhic literature, which spans two millennia.16 Though basic English-language guides to kashrut observance appeared in the 1950s and more detailed handbooks in English have recently been published,17 only one of my interviewees mentioned these. The primary halakhic sources, including the major legal codes, such as the 16th-century Shulhan Arukh and its commentaries,18 are in Hebrew and have not been translated. Most Orthodox Jewish women outside Israel

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  109 know limited Hebrew (very little in the UK) and would not be able to read these intricate legal texts.19 Historical evidence of different types of transmission of Jewish ritual practice Rather than modern times witnessing a change from mimetic to text-based transmission, in the case of kashrut observance – a central and important area of Jewish life – the two systems have always existed in parallel, divided principally by gender: women learnt from their mothers and other female relations how to run a kosher kitchen in a hands-on, collaborative way (as demonstrated by the interviews described below), while elite men studied texts formulating rules, measures, and correct procedure in study houses (batei midrash) and academies (yeshivot), away from the realities of the kitchen. Non-elite men probably had a smattering of each system (or possibly very little knowledge at all, either textual or practical, beyond the basics). This may have extended to other areas of religious practice, too, though when looking at the past we have very little information on what women actually did, as opposed to what men wrote that they should be doing. Before looking at how the interviews illuminate the way in which the kashrut system is transmitted from one generation to the next, I consider a rare historical example that gives a glimpse into another area of Jewish life showing gendered transmission and practice of this type, in Shaye J. D. Cohen’s article ‘Purity, Piety, and Polemic’.20 Cohen uses four rabbinic responsa, from the early 12th to the early 13th centuries, to explore women’s understanding of the laws and rituals related to menstrual impurity (nidah) – an area of Jewish law central to married women, since all sexual contact is prohibited, not only during menstruation, but for a further seven days (yemei libun, ‘white’ days) after the cessation of bleeding, after which the woman must immerse in a mikveh (ritual bath) before resuming sexual activity. Although this system obviously affects men too, it is women who ‘manage’ it in their daily lives, performing checks, keeping track of days passed, and immersing in the mikveh. Noting that the laws in halakhic texts were devised and formulated by men, thus hiding women’s perspective from view, Cohen suggests that ‘When the rabbis tell us that women were not doing what they were supposed to be doing, they give us a brief glimpse at the religious lives … of Jewish women’.21 The texts reveal that women took the purification process very seriously, but did not always follow the rabbinically prescribed procedure, maintaining their own rituals. Women in Ashkenaz (France and Germany) bathed at the end of their menstrual period and then waited for the rabbinically ordained seven ‘white’ days before immersing themselves in a mikveh, a practice which, the rabbis felt, ‘slighted’ the bath that women are required to take immediately before the ritual immersion in the mikveh, as part of the preparatory cleaning process. Women in Spain and the Byzantine Empire observed

110  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz the seven ‘white’ days, but then washed in a bath rather than immersing ­themselves in a mikveh. Egyptian women disregarded the ‘white’ days altogether and had themselves sprinkled with water at the end of their menstrual period instead of using a mikveh. These women’s responses to rabbinic criticism, preserved in some of these texts, show that they ‘thought of themselves as righteous and of their customs as legitimate. Their piety was no less sincere and real than that of their rabbinic opponents’.22 Cohen identifies the tension inherent in the struggle between rabbis’ insistence on their authority over ritual practices and women’s subversion of that authority and assumption of agency in preserving their traditional, mimetically learnt, and unwritten practices: On the rabbinic side, polemic against ‘incorrect’ or ‘heretical’ ­practices was a political statement, an assertion of power. Menstrual practices were the preserve of women, taught by mother to daughter and woman to woman and observed in privacy, but even here (male) rabbinic authority was to be supreme. Women’s traditions were wrong if they conflicted with the norms established by the (male) rabbis. Women must consult rabbis if they are to know what to do … Knowledge was power; ignorant women were powerless to resist rabbinic authority. The women of Byzantium and Egypt, however, were neither ignorant nor powerless.23 This precious, if small, piece of evidence suggests that there was conflict between text-based theory and mimetically-based practice at least as early as the Middle Ages and that it was often gender-based. In addition, like Raucher’s study of haredi women’s reproductive agency and my research into kashrut practices, ritual purity practices are another area in which ­women’s embodied or hands-on practice is a source of confidence and authority.24 I  suggest that there were many more examples, now lost, and that this double, gendered system of elite male theory and general female practice ­continued – and ­continues – into the modern era. Though Soloveitchik immediately thought of the gendered area of kashrut practices as an example of the contrast between the two types of transmission, he did not investigate this further, despite it seeming an obvious route to explore. Listening to modern Jewish women: how kashrut practices are transmitted The project interviewed Jewish women from different backgrounds on the way in which they learnt and practise kashrut. In addition, relevant material from earlier interviews on women’s religious lives was used.25 The preliminary stage of the project has been completed, with eight women providing four interviews and four brief written reports.26 It is already clear that most women learnt about kashrut practices from their mothers and other female

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  111 relatives and have only rarely supplemented that knowledge in a formal way by the use of books (generally modern handbooks in English, as described above) or by attending formal courses. The exceptions tend to be converts and those who grew up in non-observant households and began to observe kashrut later in their lives. In response to my query as to where they had learnt about kashrut, the answers were similar, regardless of age and origin. Anna Cohen,27 a ­Londoner in her 70s, recalled that ‘My only teacher re kashrut was my mother and she’d been well-trained by her mother’, and 25-year-old Tilla Lord, from Oxford, said, ‘I learnt mostly at home’. Fiona Richards, a Sefardi woman in her 60s in London, noted that ‘My mother taught me everything in the kitchen’, and Varda Gantz, an Israeli in her 50s, of Yemenite origin, remembered ‘My mum taught me how to keep a kosher kitchen’. However, factors such as work, marriage, and later education sometimes influenced women’s personal practice later in life: Varda Gantz:

Grace Everett (Brighton and London, 40s):

I was brought up secular, we ate only kosher meat, kosher fish…. We waited one hour after we had meat.28 We didn’t have parve dishes.29 After my marriage I also learned from my mother-in-law and my husband [an Ashkenazi from the UK]. Their standards were different. [When working for an informal Jewish education organization as an adult] I learnt how to kosher an oven,30 and about double wrapping,31 and how to keep kosher in a nonkosher kitchen with the least amount of prep… we had a couple of rabbis who we would phone if we had questions, we were very honest and sincere young people, and [my colleague] came from a shomer shabat and shomer kashrut home,32 so she was good to have there.

Marriage, especially to someone from a different community or with different religious standards, is a major factor in changing women’s original practice, usually in the direction of stricter observance. In Grace’s case, not only did she marry a man from a more observant family than her own, her job in a Jewish educational organisation provided her with the need and opportunity to learn more formal rules about kashrut, with input and training from rabbis, based on the written halakhic tradition, replacing the mimetic learning from her home. Though nowadays converts are required to attend educational courses or study with private teachers about all aspects of Jewish practice, Fiona Richards’ mother, who converted several decades ago, was apparently expected to acquire practical knowledge of kashrut in the traditional mimetic way, supporting Soloveitchik’s observation of the trend away from mimetic to text-focused transmission: ‘My mother [was a convert and] learnt everything she knew from my father’s family’.

112  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz For some women, their knowledge of kashrut evolves throughout their lives, not only because of marriage or work-related factors, but because of wider exposure to other families’ practice and to education as adults: Barbara Solomon: [I learnt the] basics from home, i.e. kosher meat, separate dishes [for milk and meat], waiting between meat and milk, [and I] had a more religious aunt who liked to bake and I would hang out at her house and she would tell me. But we had non-kosher biscuits, chocolates, etc.33… I learnt more at sem[inary] in Israel, aged 18 or 19, i.e. onions cut with a meaty knife can’t be used in a milky dish,34 the idea of halav yisra’el,35 [and from] visiting families via the sem, and formal classes on kashrut. Few religious seminaries for women existed before the 1980s, and the practice of sending girls there for a study year after the end of school education (nowadays often as a ‘gap year’ before university) only became common in the late 1980s–1990s. This practice could be regarded as the ‘thin end of the wedge’ for the move from mimetic to text-based practice, though since only girls from the more observant part of the community attend seminaries, it has had far less influence on the (majority) less observant, ‘traditionalist’ part of the British Orthodox community, who tend to cling to standards of kashrut that they learnt at home. These are much more flexible, less consistent, and occasionally decidedly idiosyncratic: Grace Everett: I grew up in a ‘traditional’ home – no-one goes out on F ­ riday nights but you do watch TV36… you have separate milk and meat for everything, and you wait three hours [after eating meat before consuming milk], but you know two hours is also fine if something comes up… you have separate milk and meat for everything, unless you can’t find something in the cupboard… and you might use it anyway! You wouldn’t use something you know you only melt cheese in for a [meat] casserole, but something like a plate. Especially utensils didn’t seem to hold the same level of kashrut as crockery… And washing-up all gets done together. We weren’t pouring cream on burgers, but it was flexible. Very British!… I learned to cook, but whether I learned to cook consciously kosher – it was just that’s how we do it, from my mum and my nana, who was a kosher caterer… I never remember being ‘taught’, we were a very cooking-based family. This account reflects a mimetic situation, with several layers of assumptions and knowledge visible. Grace pointed out that ‘the washing-up all gets done

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  113 together’, since she now knows that standard Orthodox practice is to wash up meat and milk utensils in separate bowls or sinks and to dry them with separate cloths; she implies that her original family practice was incorrect, though nobody was aware of this. She now follows standard practice, having learnt a stricter form of kashrut observance after marriage. However, she is still unaware that from a technical, halakhic point of view, if soap was used, the dishes would not be made non-kosher (treyf, in popular parlance) by being washed in this way. Though not recommended as daily practice, anyone who washed up meat and milk dishes together by mistake and consulted a rabbi to find out what they should do would be told that if soap had been used from the beginning of the washing-up process, the dishes are still kosher. The formal principle here is ta’am lifgam: a non-edible substance that spoils the taste prevents the taste of food remains being absorbed by utensils. However, only rabbis and Orthodox men (and possibly some younger women who have been to seminaries) would have any knowledge of this principle: most women who observe kashrut would assume that the dishes had been made non-kosher and would have to be replaced. This separation between popular, mimetically learnt knowledge and elite, text-based knowledge reinforces the different ways in which the central ritual practice of kashrut plays out in people’s lives, and plays a significant role in constructing and maintaining rabbinic power and authority. Listening to modern Jewish women: how kashrut problems are resolved Different types of transmission of knowledge, and different types of knowledge being transmitted, are also visible in questions of how women resolve problems in kashrut observance. When I asked them what their mothers or they would do if they encountered a problem, very little mention was made of consulting rabbis or texts: Varda Gantz: I mostly used my common sense and my mother’s methods. Wendy Silkin: [My mother] normally sorted things out by herself, with inherited things from her grandmother. She was always a bit wary of asking a question of a rabbi in case it was an answer she didn’t want. My father – it was you look it up or speak to the rabbi, my mother it was very much those handeddown minhagim [customs] that sometimes got twisted on the way. My mother never asked my father anything [about kashrut]. Grace Everett: [When asked whether anyone in her family asked kashrut questions of a rabbi]: No, occasionally something would be messed up and put in a cupboard, and later mixed up, but decisions were made in house.

114  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz The only interviewee who mentioned consulting books – though as a last resort – was Tilla Lord: Tilla:

Over the years, if I’ve had questions and stuff, I’ve either asked my mum or another family member, or potentially looked at a book, but very rarely looking at books. Interviewer: What sort of books? Tilla: The only one we really had around was Blu Greenberg’s How to Run a Jewish Household.37 But that was mainly around Pesach stuff. Other women also invoked ‘common sense’, ‘instinct’, and what they thought ‘was the right thing to do’ when discussing how they would resolve problems. Family members were also consulted: Tilla Lord thought her mother ‘might have asked the rabbi, or asked her mum. More likely asked her mum, actually’. There was a sense that running the kitchen was a female area of expertise, in which a rabbi – who would not do much, if any, cooking – would not have much experience.38 This attitude is exemplified in Wendy Silkin’s response: while her father would ‘look things up’ in texts or ask the rabbi, the textual expert, her mother ‘sorted things out by herself’ and never asked her husband. In addition, she was ‘wary’ of asking a rabbi who might give her the ‘wrong’ answer. A similar sense of independence of rabbis appears in Fiona Richards’ comment, when I asked her whether she ever went to a rabbi with kashrut questions: No. I do what my mother brought me up to do. I mean in those days one didn’t look at the packets of biscuits, and there weren’t kosher biscuits, and one bought normal biscuits, obviously now one buys kosher biscuits because one can. For example, Christmas time I will buy the stuff from the Spanish shop that we always had at Christmas time, and they do it with olive oil, they do some with olive oil and some with lard,39 so I know which ones are which, and so I just buy them; I’m certainly not going to ask the rabbi and I’m not going to give them to him if he were to come round! Another source of reluctance to consult rabbis appeared in Anna Cohen’s interview. In the wake of what she regarded as an unjustifiable and mistaken ruling by the London Beth Din, the main Orthodox rabbinical court in the UK, she felt a lack of trust in their judgement and turned to internet resources to find answers to her questions: I use the Internet to check whether fish are kosher,40 especially when not in UK. In general I use my common sense. I don’t think I’d ever ask a  rabbi, especially since the Beth Din ruled that quinoa is kitniyot.41

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  115 OK I don’t use it at Pesach [Passover], but there’s no reason why a South American pseudo-grain should be classified with European cereals. Even Barbara Solomon, whose husband has rabbinic ordination, rarely ­consulted him: I generally use common sense – have once in a blue moon thrown something out – like a meaty pan that mistakenly ended up being used for a milky dish. Have occasionally consulted with husband. The only woman who consulted rabbis on kashrut questions was Grace Everett, who had adopted her more observant husband’s standards, which included asking a rabbi about kashrut problems, when they got married: After we were married we used to have our kashrut questions answered by [three quite liberal Orthodox rabbis]. Rabbis expect to be consulted on kashrut issues, and the handbooks mentioned above frequently advise the reader to ask a competent Orthodox rabbi. Rabbinic concerns about untrained individuals trying to solve kashrut questions by themselves (and incidentally undermining rabbinic authority) are clear: Forst’s handbook, clearly addressed to men, notes on the first page of the Preface that: Placing a halachic handbook in the hands of the layman may tempt him to resolve halachic questions on his own. This should not be done. All problems regarding kashrus must be presented to a trained moreh hora’ah (a halachic decisor) who will weigh all of the particulars of the given circumstances and render a decision. The layman, even if learned, is usually not proficient enough in halachah to deal with most problems that arise.42 While compliance would be reasonable to expect in the ultra-Orthodox and more strict mainstream Orthodox sectors, many ‘middle of the road’ Orthodox women (the majority in the UK) are simply not interested in what rabbis know or think, and feel that their personal practice, authorised and hallowed by their family traditions and their experience, is perfectly adequate. Listening to modern Jewish women: evolving a parallel system(s) Because of their reluctance to consult rabbis, women often come up with resolutions to kashrut problems that do not match those prescribed by halakhah or which elaborate certain halakhic features and adapt them into a new system (or systems). For example, what should be done if a milky fork or spoon is used to stir a pot containing meat-based food? Halakhic

116  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz texts deal with this in terms of measurable parameters, creating a precise, science-like set of rules: Parameter 1: Whether the utensil has been used in the last 24 hours (ben yomo) or not – if it has, the utensil is considered to have the potential to transfer ‘milky taste’ into the meat-based food; Parameter 2: Whether the pot contains more than 60 times the volume of the part of the utensil that came into contact with the hot food in the pot; if so, the ‘milky’ taste imparted by the utensil would be considered to have been nullified (mevutal beshishim). Depending on the exact combination of factors, there would be different results for the utensil, the pot, and the food it contains. For instance, if the utensil was ben yomo and the pot contained a quantity of meat-based food less than 60 times the volume of the part of the utensil that touched the food, then the food would not be kosher; the pot would not be kosher; and the spoon would need to be made kosher again.43 None of these halakhic terms or concepts, or the quasi-scientific framework of rules and results, appeared in the interviews. Interviewees often cited this type of situation as an illustration of a kashrut problem, but their evaluation and solutions were quite different from those seen in halakhic works: Anna Cohen:

 he only problems I remember are when a spoon was used T for the wrong thing, e.g. meat/dairy cross-over. The guilty implement would be stuck in the garden until someone remembered to bring it back into the house. To this day I have no idea why! Wendy Silkin: Some of it was a lot of superstition. If someone used the wrong fork it had to be buried for 48 hours… if a milk spoon fell in the meat pot, you had to boil it for 24 hours – there was a terrific ‘aaaaahhh’ as though the world might come to an end. Bella Steinberg Certainly I learnt from my parents about sticking spoons in (London, 30s): the soil, I can remember going round there and my mother going ‘Don’t be surprised there’s a spoon in the soil’ – when it happened to us, we don’t have a garden, so I bought a pot plant and stuck it in… I wouldn’t ask anybody. While all the women were familiar with the problem, they did not evaluate each case according to the halakhic parameters, and indeed, Wendy Silkin thought such events were evidence of a ‘superstitious’ attitude rather than halakhic problems. The women assumed that the utensil would need to be ‘koshered’ (nobody mentioned any potential problem with the status of the  pot or the food in it, elements of equal interest in the halakhic view). The classical halakhic way of doing this for a metal implement is to clean

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  117 the utensil thoroughly, immerse it in boiling water (hagalah), and then cool it in cold water; if the pot in which it is immersed for hagalah is less than 60 times the volume of the utensil, the utensil should be left unused for 24 hours before being immersed. However, the women reported a range of procedures for ‘koshering’ utensils, from ‘boil[ing] it for 24 hours’ to burying it in the garden or sticking it in garden soil or a plant pot, for varying or undetermined periods. The ‘soil’ element also comes from a classical halakhic source, but is ‘repurposed’; the original function of pushing a utensil into the soil (a procedure only used for knives) was to clean the blade before it was ‘koshered’ by heating, as can be seen from Forst’s account of the process: [The Sages] mandated a specific method in which a knife (unlike other utensils), under certain circumstances, must be kashered [made kosher]. This method known as ne’itzah (thrusting) is discussed below… 1. How is ne’itzah done? A knife requiring ne’itzah must be thrust into the ground ten times in ten different spots… The earth should be neither too soft nor too hard…. Despite popular misconception, there is no halachic basis for kashering a knife by merely letting it remain in the ground for twenty-four hours… 3. When is ne’itzah ineffective? It should be noted that at no time may ne’itzah be substituted for another method of kashering.44 A knife requiring libun [heating in fire till red-hot] or hagalah [immersion in boiling water] cannot be kashered with ne’itzah. Popular misconception has it that any treif [non-kosher] knife can be kashered with ne’itzah; this is erroneous. A non-kosher knife… may be used temporarily for cold foods after ne’itzah, never for hot foods…. One living in an urban surrounding without accessibility to hard earth should do ne’itzah in a flower pot.45 Forst is clearly aware of the ‘popular misconception’ that burying a knife is sufficient to make it kosher, as well as of the other ‘misconception’ that sticking a knife into the ground is effective without any further process involving heat. He seems to be anticipating and criticising the actual everyday practice of non-experts, i.e. women, who are overwhelmingly responsible for food preparation in the Orthodox world. Like Shaye Cohen’s mediaeval rabbis, he is dismissive of such practices, secure in the knowledge contained in official halakhic literature. In contrast, the women are completely unaware of the existence of detailed halakhic principles intended to govern practice in such situations and rely on family practice, even when they have no idea of why it was done or even categorise it as ‘superstition’. Their practices revealed a degree of relationship to classic halakhic practices (e.g. the use of boiling water or of earth), but also a ‘flattening out’ of their contextual use

118  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz and theoretical infrastructure, and their practices varied from each other, as might be expected with a completely oral and mimetic transmission process. Investigating women’s kashrut practices highlights the difference, and the tense relationship, between elite text-based culture and popular practice, with issues of rabbinic control and authority versus family loyalty and self-confidence. Not only is transmission much more complex and nuanced than the binary mimetic/text-based division proposed by Soloveitchik, but different transmission methods are used among Jewish women at different times and under different circumstances. Rather than teaching and acquiring knowledge by means of formal text study, in the ‘banking’ mode of knowledge acquisition of traditional Torah education for men as practised in the yeshivah (religious college), women’s transmission of and initiation into kashrut practices take place in the context of co-operative, practical action in the kitchen, helping others in the daily task of feeding the family. Co-operation, ‘connected knowing’, and shared experience are central here, as are aspirations for ‘the empowerment and improvement of life for others’, closely matching the features of women’s learning identified in Women’s Ways of Knowing. In addition, my research highlights the reluctance of women to consult rabbis, and their suspicion that they ‘won’t get the answer they want’, leading them to make their own decisions. Another effect of this gap in communication is the creation of a variety of everyday ritual practices, linked in some ways to elite theories of correct practice, but more firmly rooted in mimetically transmitted family tradition and parental authority. There is divergence between a nominally hegemonic authority of elite, male-authored texts and their interpretation by rabbis, and an unacknowledged lived religion in which women decide everyday ritual practice.46 Even within Judaism, however, different attitudes to ritual practice and varying social contexts mean that such divergences carry different meaning and do ‘different work’ in the lives of those who observe ritual practices. Avishai’s study revealed a spectrum of women’s reactions to the nidah system, from ‘unconditional observers’ to ‘outspoken critics’, with a majority of ‘ambivalent observers’ between these two extremes, but all regarded some degree of observance as ‘central to their orthodox identities’.47 Her study examined ‘religious Zionist’ women in Israel, committed to Orthodox practice, and concluded that the ‘work’ done by this aspect of ritual practice was part both of constructing a religious self and of maintaining the symbolic boundary between Orthodoxy and the secular Other.48 In contrast, my interviewees were from the ‘traditionalist’ sector of UK Orthodoxy,49 less interested in religiosity and far more invested in ethnic/religious survival as a minority group. For them, the ‘religious’ marker of rabbinic approval paled in comparison to loyalty to their family and community identities, and the maintenance of the symbolic boundary between ‘Jewishness’ and ‘non-Jewishness’. Studies of women’s lived religion reveal differing rates and processes of change. In the conservative, traditionalist UK Jewish community, this was

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  119 not strongly evident in kashrut practices, though some interviewees noted that certain aspects of meat preparation formerly done at home had now been transferred to kosher butchers,50 removing them from the mimetic domestic sphere. Kosher certification of food (run by rabbis) has grown enormously in the last few decades. However, Avishai reports a definite move from mimetic practice to rabbinically supervised, and thus text-based, practice in the field of nidah practices in Israel: ‘niddah is in the process of being transformed from an oral cultural domain, sustained by women’s folk practices, to a professionalised, standardised, and institutionalised ritual domain’.51 Particular social, geographical, political, and cultural contexts are an essential part of ‘lived religion’ approaches to the study of Jewish women. Though Soloveitchik described a process of change that is or has been happening in the Orthodox Jewish community as text-based learning becomes more central, the investigation of women’s experiences of cultural transmission and ritual practice reveals a much more complicated picture of the past, and of current reality. Further research will produce a better understanding of the social, religious, and emotional factors at work here and of their gendered aspects. To gain a complete picture of any religious tradition, knowledge of elite written aspects must be balanced with the investigation of lived, everyday religion, and the relationships between these two must be appreciated and understood. Notes 1 See Orit Avishai, ‘“Doing Religion” in a Secular World: Women in Conservative Religions and the Question of Agency’, Gender and Society 22, no. 4 (2008): 409–433, for changes in the transmission and supervision of ritual menstrual practices (nidah) among Orthodox women in Israel. 2 Haym Soloveitchik, ‘Rupture and Reconstruction: The Transformation of Contemporary Orthodoxy’, Tradition 28, no. 4 (1994), 64–131. 3 See the papers in Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought 51, no. 4 (2019), for a wide range of critiques and commentaries on the original article. 4 There has been some extension (as opposed to criticism) of Soloveitchik’s ideas to recent developments in gender relations in the Orthodox world: see Nechama Goldman Barash, ‘A Rupture of Her Own’, Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought 51, no. 4 (2019): 5–11, who applies these ideas to the recent surge in women’s textual study, and the alienation to which this sometimes leads, and also Atara Eis and Laurie Noveck, ‘Reconstruction in No Man’s Land’, Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought 51, no. 4 (2019): 19–28, who analyse social media as a ‘new mimesis’ for women seeking answers to nidah questions. 5 Thomas R. Williams, Introduction to Socialization: Human Culture Transmitted (St Louis, MO: C. V. Mosby, 1972), and Thomas R. Williams, ‘Comments on Gearing et al.’, in Toward a Cultural Theory of Education and Schooling, ed. Frederick Gearing and Lucinda Sangree (New York, NY: Mouton, 1979), 151–166; and Mary Field Belenky et al., Women’s Ways of Knowing: The Development of Self and Voice and Mind (New York, NY: Basic Books, 1986). 6 Robert Orsi, The Madonna of 115th Street: Faith and Community in Italian ­Harlem, 1880–1950 (Princeton, NJ: Yale University Press, 2002), 38. See also

120  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz Nancy Ammerman, Everyday Religion: Observing Modern Religious Lives (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2006). 7 Soloveitchik, ‘Rupture and Reconstruction’, 66. 8 Ibid., 65. 9 The prohibition comes from a rabbinic reading of the thrice repeated verse, ‘You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk’ (Exod. 23:19 and 34:26, and Deut. 41:21). See Babylonian Talmud, Hulin 115b, which interprets the threefold repetition as mandating the prohibition of (1) cooking meat and milk together, (2) eating meat and milk cooked together, and (3) deriving benefit of any type from meat and milk cooked together. 10 Soloveitchik, ‘Rupture and Reconstruction’, 66. 11 Williams, Introduction to Socialization, and ‘Comment on Gearing et al.’. 12 Belenky et al., Women’s Ways of Knowing. 13 Ibid., 100–130. 14 Susan Starr Sered, Women as Ritual Experts: The Religious Lives of Elderly ­Jewish Women in Jerusalem (Oxford and New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1992). 15 Michal S. Raucher, Conceiving Agency: Reproductive Authority among Haredi Women (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2020); see pages 10, 45, and 89 for discussion of women’s assumption of authority and subversion of the ‘book and rabbi’ system of both authority and knowledge. Orit Avishai’s study of Israeli Orthodox women’s attitudes to menstrual ritual practice provides another ­example and revealed ‘discrepancies between orthodox women’s practices and the ­Jewish legal codex’; see Avishai, “Doing Religion”, 415. 16 For discussion of women’s exclusion from classical text study, and different interpretations of this in modern times, see Ilan Fuchs, Jewish Women’s Torah Study: Orthodox Religious Education and Modernity (Abingdon: Routledge, 2015), especially chapter 1. For a historical survey of women’s engagement in traditional study, see Shoshana Pantel Zolty, ‘And All Your Children Shall Be Learned’: Women and the Study of Torah in Jewish Law and History (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1993). 17 For an example of a modern handbook in English, written by an ultra-­Orthodox rabbi, and widely available, see Binyomin Forst, The Laws of Kashrus (New York, NY: Mesorah Publications, 1993); for a Modern Orthodox version, see Pinhas Cohen, A Practical Guide to the Laws of Kashrut (Jerusalem: Maggid, 2015). 18 The Shulhan Arukh was written by Joseph Karo (1488–1575), as a summary of his much longer work, Beit Yosef, itself a commentary on the legal code Arba’ah Turim, by Jacob ben Asher (c. 1269–c. 1343). Together with its accompanying commentaries, it is one of the most important halakhic works. 19 Very few Orthodox men in the UK who have not received rabbinic ordination would be able to read these texts either. 20 Shaye J. D. Cohen, ‘Purity, Piety, and Polemic: Medieval Rabbinic Denunciations of “Incorrect” Purification Practices’, in Shaye J. D. Cohen, The Significance of Yavneh and Other Essays in Jewish Hellenism (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), 433, 434. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid., 97. 23 Ibid., 97, 98. 24 See Raucher, Conceiving Agency, 101–113 and Avishai, “Doing Religion”. 25 The earlier interviews formed part of the ethnographic research for Lindsey ­Taylor-Guthartz, Challenge and Conformity: The Religious Lives of Orthodox Jewish Women (Liverpool: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2021). 26 The interviews were recorded in January 2020. A semi-structured interview format was used, with interviews varying from 15 to 50 minutes. Four women

Transmission, mimesis, and gender  121 preferred to write brief answers to seven questions. These eight women were the first to respond to a wider approach to friends and acquaintances, chosen to ­provide a range of ages, Jewish education, and location. 27 Pseudonyms are used throughout. 28 Waiting times between eating meat and then eating dairy meals varies by community (the reverse, eating meat after eating dairy, is usually half an hour): most Sefardi and many Ashkenazi communities wait six hours, British Jews wait three hours, and Dutch Jews wait one hour. This interviewee’s family practice would not be typical of Yemenite Jews (six hours). 29 Parve refers to dishes and utensils that are not used for either milk or meat, which can be used alongside both types of food. 30 According to halakhah, ovens used for non-kosher food need to be ‘koshered’ before cooking kosher food in them; the usual method is to clean the oven thoroughly and then leave it on the highest setting for half an hour. 31 According to halakhah, kosher food may be cooked or warmed in a non-kosher oven if wrapped in two layers of metal foil. 32 Shomer shabat – ‘sabbath observant’; shomer kashrut – ‘kashrut observant’. 33 In this context, ‘non-kosher’ refers to products that have not been certified as kosher. 34 Onions, garlic, radishes, horseradish, and some other foods are classed as harif (‘sharp’) in halakhic terminology: when cut by a knife previously used to cut either milk or meat, they are considered to absorb the primary taste of meat or milk from the knife (noten ta’am) and cannot be used with food of the other category. Halakhic categories of this type are unknown to most women, who only know the practical applications (if they know them at all: finer details of this type are not common knowledge). See Cohen, A Practical Guide, 11–14. 35 Halav yisra’el (‘Jewish milk’) is milk produced under Jewish supervision. UltraOrthodox and some more strictly observant mainstream Orthodox Jews will only use halav yisra’el, avoiding milk produced without Jewish supervision (halav akum). 36 Standard Orthodox observance would not include watching television on Friday night, since the operation of electrically powered machines (including lights) is forbidden on the sabbath. 37 Blu Greenberg, How to Run a Traditional Jewish Household (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1983), a popular introductory book with a short and very basic discussion of kashrut, with no textual sources (95–104). 38 Cf. another example of women’s perception of rabbis’ lack of authority in areas which men do not themselves experience: ‘Haredi women see rabbis (all male) as those who have never and will never experience divine authority granted through pregnancy, a fact that leaves men at a disadvantage when making reproductive decisions’. Raucher, Conceiving Agency, 4. 39 Lard is not kosher. 40 To be kosher, fish must have both scales and fins. Lists of kosher fish, with their names in several languages, are easily accessible on the internet, making life easier for Jewish travellers. 41 Kitniyot are legumes of all kinds, which a mediaeval Ashkenazi custom prohibits during Passover. When quinoa, which consists of seeds rather than legumes, began to appear on the UK market in the early 21st century, many people assumed that it could be eaten on Passover. However, the London Beth Din ruled that quinoa was prohibited on Passover, a move seen by many mainstream Orthodox Jews as unnecessarily strict and lacking any halakhic basis. The Orthodox Union kashrut authority in the USA, in contrast, permits the consumption of quinoa. In practice, many British Orthodox Jews do eat quinoa on Passover despite the Beth Din’s ruling.

122  Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz 42 Forst, The Laws of Kashrus, 17. 43 A diagram of the possible combinations of parameters and the results for the ­status of utensil, food, and pot appears in Cohen, A Practical Guide, fig. 2, closely resembling a scientific diagram. 44 Bold in the original. 45 Ibid., 336, 337, 339. I have omitted the accompanying footnotes, which gave references for authoritative halakhic sources for each part of the process, using a wide range of halakhic literature that included the Babylonian Talmud (c. 6th ­century CE), the composite mediaeval commentary on the Talmud known as Tosafot (12th–13th centuries), and the Shulhan Arukh (16th century). 46 Cf. the studies by Orit Avishai, Shaye Cohen, Susan Sered, and Michal Raucher. 47 Avishai, “Doing Religion”, 417, 418. 48 Ibid., 422–428. 49 See Taylor-Guthartz, Challenge and Conformity, 49–57, for an account of the religious topography of the British Jewish community, which differs from that of Israel in significant ways. 50 The process of ‘kashering’ meat to remove the blood (forbidden for consumption) is done by salting and draining meat; older women remembered doing this and were sometimes resentful of their practices being ‘taken away by the rabbis’. One younger woman regretted that she would never have this practical knowledge, as a result of the change. 51 Avishai, “Doing Religion”, 416.

8 Negotiating christening Mothers, family, and ‘folk religion’ Allison Fenton

Introduction As a parish priest in the Church of England, I observed a gulf between the understanding of the sacrament of baptism between mothers, who have their babies christened, and the explicit theology of the Church and clergy.1 Congregations and clergy wish to be welcoming to these mothers, with parish churches being required by Canon Law to baptise infants in their parish,2 but congregations often find it challenging when families who have had a christening service do not appear to want any further church (or indeed, Christian) commitment. As I began to listen to mothers talking about christening, I realised that one of the significant factors for them is their commitment to ‘family’. In this chapter, I argue that as mothers approach the church for christening, they also negotiate a family narrative that reinforces kinship bonds, family identity, and continuity. This chapter is based on the ethnographic research on baptism which I conducted in some Church of England parishes in the North-East of ­England.3 The research comprised four stages. Firstly, I met with five focus groups of women (mainly Mothers’ Union members), who discussed issues around the baptism of their children, often many years previously.4 Using these initial conversations, I produced a questionnaire which was distributed in six parishes and which I invited mothers who had had a child christened to complete. I then interviewed the clergy from those parishes about how they felt about infant baptism and its importance for mothers. I was less interested in what baptism meant for clergy or how they understood the formal theology than how they, as gatekeepers, negotiated the rite with the mothers. I went on to have conversations with 13 women who did not usually attend church, but who had approached the vicar of their local church for baptism. I met these women either just before or just after the baptism. Finally, where it was possible, I attended the service which enabled a ‘thickening’ of research findings as I experienced the practice of baptism. In this chapter, I describe the methodology of the research, which I frame by using the category ‘folk religion’. This is a contested term, often used pejoratively as a way of dismissing the meaning-making of those outside of DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-12

124  Allison Fenton church structures.5 Nevertheless, I use the term here in order to express the lived experience of communal and ritual practices that are not controlled by the institutional Church. I go on to describe the connections which christening enables, particularly to family and the church. I begin with a discussion of the feminist qualitative methodology I used, which enabled me to be attentive to the mothers’ experience of christening. Qualitative research: interviews and muted voices As I interviewed women, particularly in a church context, I was aware that the language of the dominant structure means that their voices may be muted. Part of the task of feminist practical theology is to attend to the untold stories of those whose voices have been ‘muted’. The term ‘muted group’ was coined by Charlotte Hardman in reference to the lack of attention paid to women and children by anthropologists6 and developed by Edwin Ardener. He writes, ‘We then become aware that it is muted simply because it does not form part of the dominant communicative system of the society’.7 That is, in societies where men’s models dominate, women can be unheard because their ways of speaking and meaning-making are overlooked. Celia Wall and Pat Gannon-Leary summarise muted group theory: ‘Unable to express their structurally generated views in the dominant masculine discourse, women are neither understood nor heeded, becoming inarticulate, “muted” or silent’.8 They go on to critique the theory, arguing that women have demonstrated their ability to express themselves, although in some situations they may still be dominated by male structures and therefore muted. Wall and GannonLeary argue that those ‘processes by which women are rendered mute’ should be continually examined.9 In exploring how women are rendered mute in relation to christenings, I am contributing to that examination. Nelle Morton observed the silencing of both women and men, and her phrase, ‘hearing to speech’, has been much referenced in feminist theology.10 I want to suggest that the mothers seeking to have their babies christened are not silenced in this way, but that the Church chooses not to hear them as if it has switched off the sound of their voices. Morton believes that reclaiming the experience of women is itself redemptive, describing God as the ‘hearing one’.11 I hope that this research will be part of that reclamation by paying attention to these muted voices and bringing them to the attention of the powerful church. It was valuable for me to conduct the research in such a way that the women who participated were enabled to find a voice to express their beliefs about, and experience of, baptism. As I paid attention to those muted voices, I needed to ensure that the interview structure, in Nicola Slee’s words, was ‘reframed with women’s communicative patterns in mind’.12 However, throughout the research, I was conscious of a complicated power dynamic between myself and the mothers. Some knew I was ordained as it had been disclosed to them by their vicar (the gatekeeper) in order to legitimate my

Negotiating Christening  125 interest and to persuade them to participate. They all knew that I was ­studying at doctoral level and in writing up the research would have control over the stories they shared with me. However, they all also knew that I was dependent on them in order to complete the research. They chose how much to share with me and how much to withhold. I drew on a tradition of feminist interviewing that was developed to allow women to participate fully. Ann Oakley was significant in developing this methodology, suggesting that interviewing women is a ‘contradiction in terms’: traditional interview techniques have been developed from a male hierarchical paradigm.13 This led to her adopting a less structured approach in her research on women and childbirth, during which she was asked questions by the participants (which she chose to answer), so the ‘interview’ was less formal and the boundaries of the researcher/participant relationship more fluid. Oakley revisited ‘Interviewing Women’ 35 years after its first publication, reflecting on its significance in relation to Mauss’s work on gift theory: The transactions of the gift relationship (Mauss, 1954, Titmus, 1970) are present when social researchers ask people to answer questions about their lives; the agency of the questioned, hidden in the text book prescriptions of hierarchy and unequal power, resides at least partly in their ability to choose to answer researchers’ questions and donate research material.14 Following Slee and Oakley, when I met with the mothers in my research, I allowed conversations to take place naturally – this happened with older women in Mothers’ Union branches, with younger women in church toddler groups, with grandparents, as well as with the 13 mothers. In all these conversations, I was prepared to disclose something about myself, my mothering and my research, so they disclosed more to me about the disappointments they had experienced, their hopes for their child, and the complicated negotiations with their family around the christening. The women were enthusiastic about talking to me: our conversations became a kind of ‘chatter’ rather than an interview, with many of the women showing me christening clothes or the shawl, photographs of their cake or of the party.15 As I met with the mothers individually, there was some hesitation initially. Sometimes also present was some kind of ‘chaperone’ (such as partner, parent, or sister) who left after a short time, and some seemed to think I was checking up on the vicar, but after a while, they relaxed. However, although I was a visitor in their home, very few offered me the cup of tea which would have indicated their hospitality: I was not treated as a guest.16 Nor did I behave as a good guest: I deliberately overstayed, allowing time for silence (which sometimes became awkward), and chat when my main topics had been dealt with. This space gave the mothers the opportunity to talk as much as they wished, often revealing painful aspects of their becoming mothers. Some described their yearning for a child and the emotional rollercoaster

126  Allison Fenton of fertility treatment, some talked about the trauma of miscarriage, and ­others told me of the ongoing grief following the death of a family member (­particularly parents and grandparents) which felt particularly poignant at this time. Nevertheless, all expressed a feeling of thanks (although not necessarily directed to God) for their child. The interviews also revealed the reasons why the women wanted to have their child christened and how they had managed the expectations of the church and their families in its planning. None of the mothers used the term ‘folk religion’ as they talked about the christening, but it was used by the clergy I interviewed. As I explore the term, I discuss its relevance as a framework for describing the mothers’ experience of christening beyond ‘official’ religion. Folk religion as a category of religious belief Folk religion is often portrayed as a set of inchoate superstitions beyond the structures of formal religion or theology and so lacking in meaning.17 Jeremy Morris goes further as he argues that folk religion is a corrosive influence upon the Christian faith. In a pamphlet written for the Anglican group, Affirming Catholicism, he refers to christenings as a problem for the Church as they are family centred and suggests the Church ‘impose some boundaries’ to avoid the danger ‘of building the house of faith on the shifting sands of folk religion’.18 For him, and sometimes other clergy, using the term ‘folk religion’ can be a means of dismissing the requests for christening by those infrequent church attenders such as the mothers I spoke to. However, sociologists of religion have taken folk religion seriously: Don Yoder defines it as, ‘the totality of all those views and practices of religion that exist among the people apart from and alongside the strictly theological and liturgical forms of the official religion’.19 He suggests that the term was coined in 1901 by a Lutheran minister named Paul Drews, who was concerned that newly ordained ministers should be better prepared for their encounter with the belief systems of those in their congregations to ‘narrow the understanding gap between pulpit and pew’.20 Japanese scholar Ichiro Hori, who studied folk religion in Japan, observed the practice of two belief systems that exist side by side. He describes these as the ‘little’ tradition, marked by close or blood ties, and the ‘great’ tradition, which is adopted from ‘without’.21 I suggest that in the context of christenings, the ‘great’ tradition is the church-based doctrine and liturgy of baptism, while the ‘little’ tradition might be considered to be that set of beliefs which are muted by the Church. In her study of religiosity in Southwark between 1880 and 1939, Sarah Williams found evidence of what she called ‘folk responses’, referring to the church-based religion and folk religion as two narratives which are intermeshed. She refers to the attitudes of ordinary people to church-based rituals – considered to be efficacious – as a way of placating the deity and avoiding bad luck.22 She suggests that as baptism allowed a child to enter

Negotiating Christening  127 ‘both the earthly fold of the church and the eternal fold of heaven’, it ­signalled nominal membership free from obligation but sufficient to ensure that, at the final judgement, he would be ‘all right’.23 Over 100 years later, I have encountered something similar in my research: an enmeshing of formal religion with what we can call ‘folk religion’. One of the practices I encountered, which highlight the symbiosis of church ritual and folk religion, is the taboo about admitting unbaptised babies into homes, which led to mothers striving to have their baby baptised as soon as possible after birth. For some of the older Mothers’ Union members, this was a deciding factor in having their child christened. One of the women I spoke to, Gemma, told me that her grandmother had expressed similar views: she was ‘quite mad’ that her daughter was not christened right away so needed some reassurance that the delay in christening would be ‘all right’. While the younger mothers recognised these taboos held by the older generation, they tended to separate themselves from them: they were less constrained by these communal norms than previous generations had been. Nevertheless, they were still committed to the continuity of the rite through which they would express family connection and mark their own social identity. There was one particular practice which I was told about – although it had several local variations, and no one was quite sure what it was called – the ‘Amiss’/‘Amass’ or ‘teacake and cheese’ or ‘alms’. This involves giving a package containing fruit cake (or fruit scone), cheese, and possibly silver to the first person (or child) of the opposite sex to the baby being baptised, who is seen either on the way into or out of the church: Parcel of cake and scone and a piece of silver, and gave it to the first stranger we met on the way to church. It was the first person you saw coming out the door. It was the first person of the opposite sex you used to give it to who you saw on the way to church. To bring good luck to them. As you bring them [the baby] to baptism. Silver, something for luck. Bread for your journey through life. Salt for getting rid of the devil … It’s a good luck thing. I have not encountered this practice beyond the North-East, nor found it referred to in any literature and, as it was mentioned only by the older women in my conversations, it may be dying out. However, I believe it is significant to this discussion because it demonstrates a set of rituals associated with christening which are not part of ‘official’ religion. Using the framework of folk religion helps us to see the boundaries that separate ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’ religiosity. However, my research suggests that the lines need to be less sharply drawn – in fact, the meaning-making would seem to be as much in defining the sacred and understanding meaning as it is in separating ‘official’ religion from ‘folk’ religion. In 1966, Wilbur Bock wrote an article on the dichotomy that exists between official religion and folk religion in which he suggests that the conflict which happens between them is because

128  Allison Fenton of ­differing understandings of symbols and the desire of official religions to dominate formal religious space. Although many folk items have been deprived of reference to transcendental authority, they have remained ceremonially sacred (i.e. resistant to change) and potential conflict between them and the official system persists. The conflict is not always overt because of the lack of clear-cut distinctions between the official religions and all other systems.24 Bock is right: the distinction is not clear-cut in many cases. Practices such as the ‘Amiss’ are clearly operating in a different cultural schema to official religion, but I will go on to highlight other elements of christening – the family, the dress, the sense of connection which might be considered sacred – which are not so easily categorised. I argue that these practices have developed within community and are dominated by family narratives. While the Church gives authority to the christening, it is the family which chooses the traditions through which its narrative is formed. Kinship connections The conversations I had with mothers and clergy acknowledge the importance of kinship, with mothers telling me that the rite was key in connecting them with others. This might happen through their choice of godparents which extended or reinforced family boundaries, through material aspects such as what the child wore, the place of the baptism, or through the sense of the presence of a deceased relative. The christening of the child and the gathering of the family – howsoever constructed – contributes to the symbolic significance of baptism as part of the kinship narrative of endurance. The new baby is the embodiment of enduring kinship ties. All of the women with whom I talked had considered carefully how to choose godparents. Tracey had chosen family members because only family could be completely trustworthy: ‘I try to stick to family members, they’re going to stay around, so they aren’t just going to disappear’.25 Liz had chosen her best friend with whom she has a ‘special bond’ and who she hoped would have a similar bond with her two children. Linda also had chosen friends, saying, ‘it would be nice to have a few more extra people to think that he is special too’. Julia, who was a single mother, said that for her, ‘it was as much about the godparents as it was about anything else’. She was keen to formalise these godparent relationships and to demonstrate that, despite the absence of his father, her son could still be connected to a reliable and loving network. For the mothers in my research, godparents are a means of extending the family and publicly acknowledging adherent relationships. The role remains a significant way of maintaining or formalising social relationships, of making connections permanent. Godparents provide the mothers with a way

Negotiating Christening  129 of reinforcing existent kinship bonds and choosing a suitable and reliable ­kinship group. Godparents thus become part of the narrative of family with responsibilities of care and support. Several of the mothers, in particular those who had been recently bereaved, talked about their awareness of the presence of their deceased relative at the baptism. This indicates that the rite of baptism not only confirms adherent relationships for the child’s future but also enables a continuing relationship with a deceased loved one.26 Jane talked to me about her grief at the death of her mother and her husband’s mother and her disappointment that they had not met her baby, but added, ‘I definitely think our mams will be there. Watching’. Janet Eccles observes a similar expression of belief among the women in her research, ‘[their] belief in the (Christian) afterlife, sometimes expressed as a belief in resurrection, was predicated on their certainty that their dead relatives were watching over them, sensed as a not quite visible “presence” or “as angels”’.27 Bev talked about it with specific reference to the vicar holding her baby at the baptism: Grandad died in March, but I feel like he is still here yes his presence is still here. When the vicar is holding the baby I feel like I will feel my granddad’s presence there more, partly because he will have wanted to be there. It is like a connection. In these practices we can see that, as Bock suggests, the distinction between ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’ practices related to christening is not clear cut. The meaning-making for the mothers does not sit comfortably within the ­boundaries of ‘official’ religion, although it depends upon its rites for the reinforcement of kinship bonds. The christening robe and family narrative The desire to reinforce a family narrative is also expressed in the use of a family christening robe or shawl. A quarter of the questionnaire respondents recounted that their baby had worn a family robe which had been passed on to them. This materially and experientially marks their relationships across generations and reveals a connection even to those deceased relatives whom the child will never meet. The robe has a history and, by wearing it, the child becomes part of that history and therefore part of the family.28 Younger women, whose babies were too big for the family gown, expressed regret that they had not been able to use it: some had found – or had made – a close copy. Jane said, All of mine have worn the same dress, the one we bought for Gill the eldest. We did have one passed down from Mike’s side but the neck was too tight. I would have quite liked something traditional through the family.

130  Allison Fenton Margaret told me about her daughter who had been hurt in an accident the day before the christening. Although this changed the plan for the dress, it was critical that she was still able to wear a ‘family’ robe: She was not able to wear my dad’s baptism robe from the early 1900s. It is one of those flowing lacy jobs. But Fred wore it, my son. She wore something that I was christened in which was a long silky thing but it was special, and belonged to the family. The gown embodies a family connection. Material anthropologists Jane ­Schneider and Annette Weiner argue that cloth creates a bond between generations: ‘Participants in life-cycle celebrations in general, and rituals of death in particular, frequently make of cloth a continuous thread, a binding tie between two kinship groups, or three and more generations’.29 I believe that the mothers in my research were creating such a bond: for some, this material thread is found in the christening robe itself. The significance of this thread is not just about the materiality of the gown: it also represents a thread of connectivity between generations. The very presence of the family, gathered together, is also significant. There is a joining of the infant to the family, their relationship reinforced as this new child is accommodated. The child is situated within the family: ‘to situate the person as a social object is to bring him [sic] together with other objects so situated and, at the same time, to set him apart from still other objects’.30 This sense of a continuation of family echoes that expressed by the women I have interviewed. Freda told me, ‘It was the frock my brother and sister were baptised in. A little bit of continuity. But it was nice’. The christening gifts given and received are also a material expression of the connection between individuals and between generations. These gifts are an expression of love, but also of blessing for both the child and the family which will be strengthened as a result. Claire, one of the young women I spoke to, told me the story of how her grandmother travels to a particular shop in Edinburgh to buy a silver spoon for each of her grandchildren as a christening gift. It has to be exactly the right spoon. This family tradition ensures the child is part of the family chain of memory.31 In this way, baptism strengthens family bonds and links the child with a ritual in which the family has participated for several generations. As the child, in baptism, is incorporated into the family, so the members of the family attending are reincorporated into that family and those connections across the family, living and deceased, are reinforced. Coming to church Although for the participants in this study christening is dominated by ­family narrative, the role of ‘official’ religion remains significant. All the mothers had chosen to bring their children to church in order, in some manner,

Negotiating Christening  131 to seek God’s blessing. The authority of the Church is needed to give ­legitimacy to the rite. It’s quite hard to explain really, but you get everybody together in the likes of church. You are all together there and obviously loads of my family are into that and they want to sit and pray. And it’s nice seeing that. As my research progressed, I was frequently told by church attenders that the young mothers who brought their babies to be christened did so at the behest of their mothers or grandmothers. But this was not the case. Although they were negotiating the family narrative, they were also making their own decisions about how their part of the story would be construed. Most wanted to ‘do the right thing’ for their child, which involved attending church, wearing their best clothes, and having a ‘proper’ party afterwards. Nevertheless, they were uncertain about how they would be received by the church and by the vicar. As Linda did not attend church, she had been reluctant to approach her local vicar because she felt hypocritical and was afraid that she and her baby would be rejected. She was so anxious that her parents had offered to go with her. However, she told me, ‘Eventually I did go and have a chat with the vicar and he was very nice’. Gemma had attended a Sunday morning service hoping to arrange the baptism of her daughter but had felt ignored and was told that they would not baptise her baby. Gemma did not understand why. However, in the next church she tried, the vicar was welcoming so she and her friend started going to a toddler group each week. I wondered why she had not given up after the first negative experience. She told me: ’Cos I believe me personally believe a child should be christened. My own personal belief I think they should be christened. ’Cos if there is a God, it is the right choice to make. Gemma’s response suggests confidence in her own beliefs and determination that I encountered in mothers across my research. While the clergy I interviewed were keen to encourage mothers, they were all aware of a culture clash which, in various different ways, they sought to overcome. One of the clergy, Gary, thought that this clash was largely about class and local expectations. As he explained his decision to hold baptism services on Sunday afternoons, privately and outside the usual service of Holy Communion,32 he told me, ‘We had people opening cans of lager and passing joints around. I just didn’t [pause]. I felt that the Eucharist wasn’t the right vehicle for that. A massive cultural clash’. While Gary’s experience may be extreme, it clearly demonstrates the differing expectations of behaviour between the church and other social situations. For many of those who are not part of the church community, asking the local parish priest to christen their baby requires some courage because

132  Allison Fenton their expectations are so far removed from those of the church and because the language clergy and the church might use to talk about God is unfamiliar. The choice of words used to refer to the rite exemplifies the challenge for those who do not usually attend church. All of the mothers interviewed use the word ‘christening’, rather than ‘baptism’ which sits more easily in the frame of official religion. One elderly participant and Mothers’ Union member asked me if the two words meant the same thing, saying, ‘We always used to call it christening and tea afterwards’. Sarah Lawrence, exploring the social and liturgical history of the words, writes that christening ‘survived in the folk memory, used and treasured among ordinary people to talk about this essential rite of family, community and religious rite’.33 In 2012, the Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England set up the Life Events team which led their ‘Christenings Project’. One of the most controversial decisions it took was in naming the project: clergy objected to the use of the word ‘christenings’ as a ‘dumbing down of theological truth’.34 The word ‘christening’ has its roots in the Old English word ‘cristnen’, which meant to be a catechumen, or to be dedicated to Christ,35 but as the rites of christening and the catechumenate became one, it came to have the same meaning as baptism.36 The word baptism derives from Greek, entering English usage through the Latin liturgy. Bryan Spinks quotes a form of the rite from the 15th century in which both terms are used: ‘I folowe (batize) the, or elles I crysteneþe’.37 The Latin word is followed by an Old English alternative. The use of both terms and languages together suggests that even in this early usage they did not quite mean the same thing, one being used more formally than the other.38 However, I would suggest that the word ‘baptism’ is the ‘insider’ word, in that it is part of an ‘in-group’ speech which, according to Dwight Bollinger, ‘marks the professional and maintains solidarity’.39 He argues that such specialisms both reveal and maintain structures of power. For the ‘in-group’, in this instance the church, the alternative word ‘christening’ has been stigmatised as being part of a ‘folk’ understanding of the rite and indicative, somehow, of insincerity. Conclusion Sarah Williams observed that for those in her historical study in Southwark, church-based religion and folk religion were two narratives which were intermeshed. That remains true, but I have observed a third narrative: the family. Christenings provide an opportunity for a public performance of family, bringing together elements of official and folk religion through ritual and tradition, while at the same time reinforcing and perpetuating family narrative, connecting one generation with both the previous generation and the next. The mothers in my research took great care in the planning of the baptism, hoping that everything might be ‘perfect’, or at least go well. They were aware of themselves on display as mothers and of the significance of the occasion. These women are not acting as independent selves but are ‘full

Negotiating Christening  133 of duty and obligation generated through their relationship to others’.40 The christening is, then, significant for these mothers not just in bringing the family together and reinforcing or developing a narrative, but also in expressing a world beyond themselves and their desire to connect with it. Not only is the family unified in its collective memory of christening and the memory of relatives who are deceased honoured, but God’s blessing is also invoked, and the family narrative perpetuated. Notes 1 Although the Church refers to the rite as ‘baptism’, only the clergy in my research used this term (although not consistently): all the others used the term ‘christening’. In this chapter, I usually use the mothers’ term ‘christening’, although I do use ‘baptism’ when referring specifically to the Christian rite. 2 Canon B22, Canons of the Church of England, accessed 10 July 2022, https:// www.churchofengland.org/about/leadership-and-governance/legal-services/ canons-church-england. 3 Allison Fenton, Meaning-Making for Mothers in the North East of England: An Ethnography of Baptism (Doctoral diss., Durham University, 2017). 4 The Mothers’ Union is an organisation which supports Christian family life – previously membership was only open to mothers who were married. See https:// www.mothersunion.org/what-we-do, accessed 27 October 2020. Abby Day describes these women as ‘Generation A’, the ‘backbone of the church’, a prebaby-boomer generation. Abby Day, The Religious Lives of Older Laywomen: The Last Active Anglican Generation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 6. 5 This is explored by Philip Walker in ‘Clergy Attitudes to “Folk-Religion” in the ­ Diocese  of Bath and Wells’ (PhD diss., University of Bristol, 2000), accessed 5 March 2021, https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/­ portal/34493880/340437.pdf. It is also discussed by Martin Ramsden in ‘Heeding the Great Commission: The Significance of Matthew’s Gospel for Baptismal Theology and Practice in a Post-Christian Age’ (PhD diss., Durham University, 2006), accessed 19 March 2022, http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/2645/. 6 Charlotte Hardman, ‘Can There Be an Anthropology of Children?’, Journal of the Anthropological Society Oxford 4, no. 1 (1973): 85–99. 7 Edwin Ardener, ‘Belief and the Problem of Women’, in Perceiving Women, ed. Shirley Ardener (London: Malaby Press, 1975), 1–19. ‘Muted Group Theory’ has been further developed by, among others, Cheris Kramerae, Women and Men Speaking: Frameworks for Analysis (Rowley, MA: Newbury House, 1981). 8 Celia J. Wall and Pat Gannon-Leary, ‘A Sentence Made by Men: Muted Group Theory Revisited’, European Journal of Women’s Studies 6, no. 1 (1999): 24. 9 Ibid., 27. 10 Nelle Morton, ‘Beloved Image’, in The Journey Is Home (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1985), 127–129. 11 Ibid., 129. 12 Nicola Slee, Women’s Faith Development: Patterns and Processes (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), 56. 13 Ann Oakley, ‘Interviewing Women: A Contradiction in Terms’, in Doing Feminist Research, ed. Helen Roberts (London: Routledge, 1981), 30–61. 14 Ann Oakley, ‘Interviewing Women Again: Power, Time and The Gift’, Sociology 50, no. 1 (2016): 208. 15 ‘The chatter of mothers, sharing the work of raising the world is not in the texts, is banished from the canon, is another discourse hidden from the acts of cultural

134  Allison Fenton memory. It is not found in important conversation’. Brenda Clews, ‘The ­Notebook of the Maternal Body’, Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering 3, no. 1 (2001): 22. 16 Wan Ching Yee and Jane Andrews, ‘Professional Researcher or a “Good Guest”? Ethical Dilemmas Involved in Researching Children and Families in the Home Setting’, Educational Review 8, no. 4 (2006): 397–413. 17 This is discussed in Paul G. Hiebert, R. Daniel Shaw and Tite Tiénou, Understanding Folk Religion: A Christian Response to Popular Beliefs and Practices (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2003), see especially 19. 18 Jeremy Morris, Catholicism and Folk Religion (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1995), 17. 19 Don Yoder, ‘Toward a Definition of Folk Religion’, Western Folklore 33, no. 1 (1974): 14. 20 Ibid., 2. 21 Ichiro Hori, Folk Religion in Japan: Continuity and Change (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1968), 49. 22 Sarah C. Williams, Religious Belief and Popular Culture in Southwark, 1 ­ 880–1939 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 88 and 94. 23 Ibid., 101. 24 E. Wilbur Bock, ‘Symbols in Conflict: Official Versus Folk Religion’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 5, no. 2 (1966): 206. 25 All names of people and places in this chapter are pseudonyms. 26 Abby Day also explores the phenomenon of ‘continuing relatedness with a deceased loved one’. This experience of continuing relationship was described by her respondents but not explained, ‘that they continued to experience belonging to that relationship was enough’. Day argues that these experiences are neither ‘religious’ nor ‘spiritual’ but rather an expression of interconnection belonging to a ‘wider set of belief understood as belonging’. See Abby Day, Believing in Belonging: Belief and Social Identity in the Modern World (Oxford: Oxford ­University Press, 2011), 112. 27 Janet Eccles, ‘Speaking Personally: Women Making Meaning through Subjectivised Belief’, in Religion and the Individual: Belief, Practice, Identity, ed. Abby Day (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 19. 28 Charlotte Hagström, ‘To Create a Sense of Belonging: Christening Gifts as Materialisation of Feelings’, in The Ritual Year and Ritual Diversity: Proceedings of the Second International Conference of the SIEF Working Group on The Ritual Year, Gothenburg, 7–11 June 2006, ed. Lina Midholm and Annika Nordström (Gothenburg: Institute for Language and Folklore, 2006), 145. 29 Annette B. Weiner and Jane Schneider, Cloth and Human Experience (­Washington, WA: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989), 3. 30 Gregory P. Stone, ‘Appearance and the Self’, in Human Behaviour and Social Processes: An Interactionist Approach, ed. Arnold M. Rose (New York: Houghton, Mifflin, Co., 1962), 109. 31 Hervieu-Léger argues that religion is a form of meaning construction, which she calls a ‘chain of believing’. This unites the believer with others and the collective memory and is expressed in tradition which forms the basis of the community. See  Danièle Hervieu-Léger, Religion as a Chain of Memory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000). 32 Canon B21 requires the sacrament of Holy Baptism to be administered ‘on Sundays at public worship when the most number of people come together’. The Canons of the Church of England, accessed 19 June 2022, https://www.churchofengland. org/about/leadership-and-governance/legal-services/canons-church-england/ section-b#b35.

Negotiating Christening  135 33 Sarah Lawrence, A Rite on the Edge: The Language of Baptism and Christening in the Church of England (London: SCM Press, 2019), 121. 34 Sandra Millar, ‘Christening or Baptism?’, The Church Support Hub, accessed 26 October 2020, https://churchsupporthub.org/article/christening-baptism/9. 35 Mark Searle, Christening: The Making of Christians (Collegeville, PA: Liturgical Press, 1980), 32. 36 Bryan D. Spinks, Reformation and Modern Rituals and Theologies of Baptism: From Luther to Contemporary Practices (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), 28. 37 Ibid., 150. 38 Thomas Pyles and John Algeo, The Origins and Development of the English ­Language, 3rd ed. (San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1982), 238–259. 39 Dwight Bollinger, Language the Loaded Weapon: The Use and Abuse of ­Language Today (London: Longman, 1980), 72. 40 Beverley Skeggs, Formations of Class and Gender (London: Sage, 1997), 164.

9 Crafting identity The spiritual formation of women in prayer shawl ministries Donna Bowman

Introduction Jeff Astley’s work with Leslie Francis, Ann Christie, and others to investigate what he calls ‘ordinary theology’ originates from a desire to understand the results of spiritual formation programmes. Ordinary theology begins with a qualitative process of interviews and conversations and emerges into a deep consideration of what additional factors in believers’ lives, aside from formal religious education, contribute to the theological positions at which they eventually arrive. Astley explains: … [I]t is often difficult to infer people’s beliefs from their practice. Unless one defines beliefs in terms of behaviour, there is rarely a one-to-one relationship between beliefs and their expression in actions, and sometimes only a weak empirical correlation.... This is why ordinary theology research normally concentrates on people’s beliefs as they are expressed in their words: portraying the theology in what people say (or write) rather than the theology implicit in what they do. I want literally to hear the theological voice of those who call themselves ‘just ordinary’.1 In 2013, I interviewed women in the United States involved in prayer shawl ministry (PSM). As described in the next section, PSM typically provides prayerfully handcrafted fabric wraps or blankets to the sick and the grieving. While clergy with the requisite handcrafting skills may participate, in church settings the groups are almost always led by and comprised of laypeople. A typical group meets regularly to craft together, review needs and resources, and plan strategies; members do most of the fabric-making work (knitting and crocheting in the case of my interviewees) outside the meeting in their own time. The purpose of this research was to investigate whether distinctive theological meanings arise from participation in this lay ­ministry – whether prayer shawl makers undergo a process of spiritual formation that converges on particular theological themes or values, regardless of the denomination or setting in which the ministry occurs. Using the framework of ordinary theology, I first asked participants about their background, their history DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-13

Crafting identity  137 of craftwork, and how they got started making prayer shawls. Then, the interview moved into topics related to the ministry group: its history, logistics, meetings, rituals, and group dynamics. Finally, I asked about the interviewee’s personal feelings about prayer shawl making. What makes a prayer shawl special? How do you see God working through the prayer shawl? What’s the connection between being a woman and making prayer shawls? What would be your dream for your PSM? The data collected address many questions, but one of the most interesting is that of the relative roles of individual and group experiences in spiritual formation. In this essay, I compare the content and tone of how-to and inspirational publications aimed at prayer shawl makers, with the reports from prayer shawl makers themselves. The ideals, suggestions, and experiences presented in these publications do not wholly align with the way my interviewees experienced spiritual formation in PSM work. While two of the structural features of PSM – setting intention2 and creating blessing r­ ituals – are often mentioned in prayer shawl books, shawl makers also reported being formed by the social ritual of ‘show and tell’ and by the act of releasing the shawl from their control. What is prayer shawl ministry? PSM, as a movement, began in 1998 with the website shawlministry.com. A repository of information that eventually came to include an interactive forum and list of ministry groups, the site was built by Janet Bristow and Victoria Cole-Galo to disseminate an idea arising from a women’s leadership course at the Hartford Seminary. To provide material comfort and to express the embrace of a sheltering, mothering God, participants in PSM would make handcrafted shawls, praying as they stitched. The shawls would be given to the grieving and the sick, primarily, but also could be items of celebration – for an ordination, wedding, or birth. The idea of PSM was disseminated first through workshops, then through the website, and finally through a series of books written by Bristow and Cole-Galo, starting in 2008. There is no official count of PSM in the United States, where my research takes place, but hundreds of groups have registered on shawlministry.com, and church websites show that many more are active – perhaps thousands. While the origin of PSM is in the liberal, feminist, interfaith-oriented Christianity of the Hartford Seminary Women’s Leadership Institute, directed by Sister Miriam Therese Winter, ministries are found in every denomination – evangelical and fundamentalist, Catholic and Orthodox, mainline Protestant, universalist and social activist, open and affirming – and also in non-church settings such as hospitals and organ procurement operations.3 Note that prayer shawls, as Bristow and Cole-Galo conceived them, have no relationship to the Jewish prayer shawl or tallit.4 They are not intended to be worn while praying. Instead, they are prayed over as they are made, and

138  Donna Bowman sometimes blessed in a more-or-less formal ceremony before being given. Although I encountered several groups eager to connect their shawls to what they saw as an ancient and authentic tradition in Judaism, the social meaning of the shawl travels in the reverse direction from a tallit. While a tallit is given to an individual (often to celebrate a bar mitzvah), it is designated for use in formal worship (communal or devotional). By contrast, the PSM prayer shawl moves from the communal and devotional setting of the ministry group to an individual for private, ad hoc use in a home or care facility. Method The interviews for this study took place in 2013. Over the course of two research trips, one to the birthplace of PSM (Hartford, Connecticut, and the surrounding area) and one to the opposite coast (Seattle, Washington, and environs), I interviewed 50 shawl makers. Most interviews took place in groups of two to eight women; some were one-on-one interviews. In a few cases, a clergy member also participated in the interview. These trips yielded 19 separate conversations and were documented in over 30 hours of recordings. After those trips, I continued interviewing shawl makers in person in my home state of Arkansas, mostly individually, with a few group conversations. I also conducted phone interviews with PSM participants in various locations around the country. These additional 35 interviews comprise another 36 hours of recordings. In total, 85 interviews were conducted, with over 100 shawl makers involved in the conversations. The interviews were transcribed, tagged by topic and theme, and brought into dialogue with the study’s research questions: what theological meanings do shawl makers find in their work? Are they governed by the doctrinal positions of their church, by the liberal positions of Bristow and Cole-Galo, or by imperatives arising from the ministry’s structure? Knitting as a spiritual practice By the late 1990s, publications began to appear proposing that the resurgence in knitting that had begun in the mid-1990s, fuelled by third-wave feminism and the World Wide Web, had the potential to offer spiritual benefits for the mindful crafter. Susan Gordon Lydon, in The Knitting Sutra: Craft as a Spiritual Presence, writes: If the devil makes work for idle hands, then could constantly busy hands entice angels to whisper in the knitter’s ear? And is it possible that female spirituality through the ages may have been concealed in the minutiae of domestic life rather than expressed in the grandiosity and pomposity of churches and sermons?5 Bernadette Murphy’s Zen and the Art of Knitting, subtitled Exploring the Links Between Knitting, Spirituality, and Creativity, explains: ‘The insights

Crafting identity  139 I’ve gained into the spiritual and creative benefits of knitting seem Zen-like to me in their emphasis on finding the holy spark in everyday life, in sitting still, in letting things unfold’.6 Tara Jon Manning’s Compassionate Knitting: Finding Basic Goodness in the Work of Our Hands takes an explicitly B ­ uddhist approach: in mindful knitting, we each join the components of the universe through the work of our hands. There we explore our basic goodness and expression of compassion without complication.... In our knitting we explore elements of ourselves, elements of the natural world, elements of giving and receiving.7 In the academic realm, contemporary consideration of the spiritual dimension of fibre crafts perhaps originates with Carol P. Christ’s 1997 article, ‘Weaving the Fabric of Our Lives’, in which she reclaims a denigrated domesticity typified by loyal Penelope at her loom, using Goddess spirituality to reconnect handmade cloth to an ancient legacy of women’s traditional knowledge and skill, recently interrupted by second-wave feminism.8 Lydon concludes her book, The Knitting Sutra, with this evocative statement: ‘I learned while writing this book that the purpose of the craft is not so much to make beautiful things as it is to become beautiful inside while you are making those things’.9 The idea of knitting as a spiritual practice is baked into PSM since its inception. Bristow and Cole-Galo’s original website includes information about setting an intention when one picks up the work: Because this is a spiritual practice, before one begins the knitting (crochet) process, a blessing, prayer or wish can be said, dedicating the work of your hands and the intentions of the receiver. You may want to light a candle and play soft music to enhance your knitting time, remembering that this is a prayerful time.10 Their later books reinforced the spirituality at the heart of PSM’s origin story: ‘As things progressed, we realized that what we were doing was becoming our spiritual practice. It felt different from other handiwork we did because we entered into the process through intention, meditation, and prayer’.11 The first major book on PSM to be published was Susan S. Jorgensen and Susan S. Izard’s Knitting into the Mystery: A Guide to the Shawl Knitting Ministry, predating Bristow and Cole-Galo’s series of books by five years. Izard, ordained in the United Church of Christ (UCC), writes that after she started a PSM in her church, she was struck by the contrast between her theological education ‘which valued intellectual achievement’ and shawl making as a form of contemplation and prayer in which she found ‘an experience of the living God’: ‘Was it possible that all I needed to know was how to knit?’12 Seeing knitting or crochet as spiritual practice is one example of sacralizing everyday life. Through intention, it is claimed, we can transform an activity into a discipline that furthers our spiritual formation. The term ‘spiritual

140  Donna Bowman formation’ most often refers to a sanctification process such as the imitatio Christi, in order to conform the believer to a sacred model for the purpose of growing in union with God. Right belief can also be the standard to which the Christian conforms, as in the type of spiritual formation sought by religious education. The aspect of conformity, however, is often downplayed as an individualist version of spirituality has taken root. Influenced by the value of rugged individualism or non-conformity celebrated in American history, as well as by the 20th-century phenomena of consumerism, new age ideologies, existentialism, and countercultural movements, spiritual formation and its practices are now often seen in a different light. They might emphasize each believer’s unique spiritual path and form of maturity, valorizing insights that come from her particular life experiences in combination with the shared or immutable truths of the faith. Spiritual formation in this sense is a way to be the Christian self that only you can be. While many mundane pursuits could be sacralized in the way we see here, the authors above make claims that knitting is particularly receptive to this transformation because of its inherent qualities. It is repetitive and therefore conducive to ‘flow’,13 or to the recitation of mantras.14 It is tactile and therefore brings one’s attention to the present moment. And in many cases of PSM, the item being made is for another person, not for one’s self, drawing us out of self-absorption and towards compassion for others. The instructions for spiritual knitting in these texts add familiar frames of spiritual disciplines to the activity. We are told to select our yarn and pattern so they will be conducive to the purpose: the fibre should have a soft hand, the colour should be soothing, and the pattern should not require intense concentration or constant reference to a chart. We should arrange the atmosphere to create intention, a set-apart or holy space. We may pray before, during, and after stitching. To end each session, we might reflect and journal on the experience. One shawl maker quoted by Bristow and Cole-Galo speaks about how this framing allows her to create ‘tactile prayers’: Years ago, I began a practice that I call ‘Seeds of Intention Knitting’. This is a personal kind of knitting that allows me to listen to my inner thoughts and focus on what or whom I care about. I begin by washing my hands in order to transition from the daily grind to sacred quietude. Next, I light a candle to welcome inspiration. Then I take my yarn from its special embroidered bag, place a clean white cloth on my lap, and begin to knit seeds of positive intentions, affirmations, wishes, hopes, prayers and gratitude into every stitch.15 Research findings Guided by these foundational texts and ideas, the prayer shawl makers I interviewed also connected the nature of their craft to its capacity to foster spirituality. Take Vivian as an example.16 A former Presbyterian missionary

Crafting identity  141 wife working in India, Vivian now belongs to a United Church of Christ ­community church in California. Knitting for me is a very, um, relaxing, um, almost meditative thing. So I think, um, it gives me something to focus on outside my own worries or concerns. I mean, it can be that, unless I’m very worried about something, and then it’s more difficult. I’m not a great meditator. But I am something that’s always -- I’m very tactile. I like to be touching something all the time, so that’s why I think I like the feel of the knitting needles and the wool and my hands are always moving, so that -- to put something in them that moves creatively. And I think it keeps me -- you know, it keeps me relaxed and grounded. In one brief response, we see two of the aspects of knitting mentioned above as making it suitable for transformation into spiritual practice. Vivian also mentioned the third aspect: she called it ‘being involved in something that was bigger than I am’. We’ll come back to that in a moment. Prayer shawl makers largely accepted the suggestions arising from PSM literature that they structure their knitting as a devotional practice. For instance, Christine, a Baptist in North Carolina, told me: As you’re sitting there knitting, many times especially as I know the person, I’m actively praying. I use the stitches, using that to count, and as I was doing a multiple of three pattern, I was saying ‘Father, Son, Spirit’. I was saying ‘bring healing, courage, comfort’. You know, so that -- yeah, in a way, it’s a spiritual experience to do it. Sometimes you’re just ready to get it done, like anything else. But for the most part it’s -- it can be, and often is, an act of worship. So yes. I mean, it’s a sacred thing from a sacred time. Sharing. But those suggestions sometimes became a source of shame for shawl ­makers – a standard they failed to meet. Vivian again: I don’t always -- I never when -- I think I was reading about it, the shawl ministry and starting out, when you started a project; starting out with a certain -- with a prayer at the time -- beginning. I’m not always good at doing that. Rosemary and Sherry, who led a Methodist ministry in Connecticut, told me that their group just hadn’t managed to muster the discipline: ‘We have tried, God knows, the ladies before us really wanted to open every meeting with a prayer and be more prayerful because it is a prayer ministry. And it doesn’t work with this group’. Sherry excused herself this way: ‘Some people are very, you know, intentional praying while they knit. I have a far more casual relationship with God’.

142  Donna Bowman However, many prayer shawl makers reported that the processes of their group were a more significant source of spiritual formation than their individual knitting. This spiritual formation occurs because a lay ministry involves decision-making, structures of interaction, rituals, and connection to the community. In all of these areas, shawl makers discovered spiritual and theological meanings that changed their thinking or practice and catalysed their growth. I’ll mention four specific aspects of PSM that repeatedly, in diverse settings, fostered spiritual formation. Structural facilitators of spiritual formation First, many PSMs do manage to create a communal atmosphere of spiritual intention. Christine’s group developed a ritual for their meetings that was ­particularly comprehensive, with several steps, although each in itself is simple. ‘We begin, I’ve got the quiet music on when they come in and we light a candle when every -- to settle everybody down. And then I have a beginning scripture and prayer ritual that we do. The same thing every time’, she told me. Infusing spirituality into group meetings is an aspiration for many shawl makers, to remove this kind of knitting from the everyday. A woman trying to start a PSM at a Congregational church in California said she was inspired by a group in Colorado Springs where she had first learned about prayer shawls: [T]hey gather weekly I believe, and they get together and they say hi and they get all comfortable, and then they put out some music or not, and they sit in silence and knit together, and they do it in a very prayerful and intentional way. She called this procedure ‘a really beautiful way to go’. Christine’s group also ends on a light-hearted note, sharing ‘communion’ in the form of a jar of hand cream: ‘Instead of bread and wine I have a large jar of hand cream that has become what’s known as the loaves and fishes jar, because the same jar is the same jar that we started with years ago’. Second, and nearly universal among PSMs, meetings usually involve ‘show and tell’, a ritual of each member displaying completed work or shawls in progress. The formative aspect here is group solidarity, mutual support, and orientation towards a shared purpose. In show and tell, common at knit nights and stitch and bitches,17 there is a strong social expectation that everyone in the group will admire the work being shown. Praise for colour, pattern, and yarn choice, as well as the quality of the work, buzzes throughout the room. For newer knitters, there will be comments about improvement and skill development; for veterans, admiration for productivity and consistency. ‘[W]e pass the shawls around so that everybody can ooh and aah and enjoy each other’s handiwork’, Christine told me, continuing her description of a typical meeting. I took part in a meeting of a large shawl ministry at an organ recovery agency and later asked Eleanor, one of the members, about

Crafting identity  143 the meaning of show and tell. ‘I think it does these people a lot of good to hear praise for their work, although I think they’re in it for the same reason I am, you know, that’s not -- which is not to get praise for what you’ve done’, she said, quick to place the ritual in the context of an other-focused ministry. Where those in ordinary knitter gatherings might ask who the item is for and anticipate how much the recipient will appreciate it, PSM participants express how much comfort the shawl will bring to the recipient – a congregant in need, a parishioner’s family member, or someone not yet known to the group for whom the shawl will wait in storage. Third, participation in blessing ceremonies sparked spiritual discovery and growth for PSM members. Most groups had developed some procedure to move a shawl out of its making phase and render it ready for giving. Ceremonies range from informal to highly structured. Sometimes they were internal to the group, and sometimes they took place in a more public setting. Christine’s group, which blessed its own shawls, had a simple, unusual, and highly effective procedure for transitioning into this part of their meeting: And then we have our own little blessing that we move from one room to the other, taking the shawls with us. And we’ve talked and chattered while we’re in one room, but when we take them to the other room we are silent and each person does her own sentence prayer type thing over each shawl as we pass them around after all the names are called of those that we know will receive them. On the other end of the spectrum, many groups bring their shawls to be blessed in a worship service. A Methodist PSM in Seattle did this once a month. They had a special wooden frame, handmade by a church member, which would be set up in the aisle and draped with the completed shawls. As the congregation came up to receive communion, everyone would touch the shawls as they passed. ‘That was a place everybody could be involved’, Eva, one of the PSM members, told me. ‘Because a lot of people -- everybody knows everybody. This is an old, old church and a lot of us have been here many, many years. So everybody got a chance to feel like they contributed’. These ceremonies redefine the spirituality of knitting from an individual practice to a communal act of giving. It is no less disciplined, but participants felt freed from the burdensome anxiety of their own failures to be intentional enough, bolstered by the shared purpose that they witnessed, in which they participated, and that was validated by group action. Finally, the act of releasing shawls to recipients proved, quite unexpectedly to most shawl makers, to have significant formative power. Barbara, a Presbyterian shawl maker in the Seattle area, succinctly expressed what I heard from many PSM participants about this moment: I worried about that when I first started doing this. How is this person going to feel? But I’ve given up on that feeling, because if I send -- if I’m

144  Donna Bowman moved to do it then I know God intends for it to happen, and I need to not worry about that. It’s not my responsibility. I give that over to God. If I’m moved, directed to do it, and I get the OK from the person that — because usually I have to get their address, then that’s not my worry. God’s already taken care of that for me. This act of releasing the shawl, relinquishing control of it, requires trust. I asked shawl makers if they ever worried about the prayer shawl being disrespected or discarded, as it is a material thing that persists long after the occasion that prompted it has passed. Janet Bristow and Victoria Cole-Galo, the founders of the PSM movement, told me that they have heard of so many destinies for prayer shawls: ‘People have been buried in them, it has been the altar cloth, it has wrapped the casket, it has wrapped the urn. Everything that you can possibly think of, that’s what has happened to the shawl’. They expressed confidence that the shawl will do and be ‘[w]hatever it needs to’ after it ‘falls into that unconditional flow, river, stream’. Valerie, a Catholic shawl maker in Seattle, spoke for many of my interviewees when I asked her about what I called the ‘afterlife’ of the shawl: So I really kind of had to decide that once I gave this, I no longer had -- well, you can see I still have an interest in it. These are my peeps here. But I didn’t have any control over where it went or what happened to it. I hoped that it would always be used for good, and that it would always have an aura of comfort around it, and then I had to let it go. And that the original purpose of this was to let people know that they were cared for, and if that went to someone who didn’t look at it that way, that was on them. I had made it with prayers and caring. I gave it with prayers and caring to someone who would appreciate it, and what happened to it after, we hoped it has a good life, but if it was used to strangle somebody or something, okay, that’s not so great. But yeah, at some point you kind of have to not go there with that, because you don’t have any control. Conclusion As promised, I want to come back to Vivian and her mention of all three of the vaunted spiritually receptive qualities of knitting: its capacity to induce a meditative state in the knitter, to bring the knitter to the present through the sense of touch, and to refocus the knitter outward to others. When she spoke of being a part of something bigger than herself, she was talking about something she found more fulfilling than prayer shawl making. She was an enthusiastic participant in the Mother Bear Project, an initiative to deliver handmade teddy bears to children in Africa. Ultimately, that last aspect of the ministerial and communal spiritual formation failed to catalyse Vivian’s particular process of spiritual maturation, precisely because the fate of the

Crafting identity  145 shawls was unknown. ‘You know with the shawls, it was wonderful to knit shawls, but then, they went off into the blue yonder really. You didn’t know who ended up – with a lot of them, you didn’t know who ended up with them’, she told me. By contrast, Amy Berman, the founder and co-ordinator of the Mother Bear Project, worked tirelessly to ensure that teddy bear makers got feedback: And one thing that she’s done repeatedly over the years, has sent me pictures of children in Africa holding the bears that I have knit. Now, mind you, she gives out or other workers give out thousands of bears. And they must take pictures of each child getting a bear, who gets a bear, and Amy then recognises the knitter and sends them pictures. … And it is just fabulous to see their expressions. So I think it’s that: you know where they’re going. You know that they’re bringing comfort for children. And it’s just very satisfying to have that connection. And that Amy keeps it so personal. Feedback comes to the prayer shawl makers as well, but on a much more irregular and uncertain schedule. PSM participants treasure those thank you notes or anecdotes from recipients, share them within the group and with their congregations, and recount them to me endlessly. While many of them were able to make an individual virtue of the communal practice of trust, ‘let go and let God’, as one Episcopalian shawl maker put it, threads of connection with the community they served still proved necessary nourishment for the continuation of the task at hand. This tension between sight and blindness, evidence and faith, highlights the unexpected influence of PSM group processes on these laywomen’s spiritual formation. Popular texts on knitting and spirituality focus largely on the individual and solitary moment of creation as the setting for spiritual discipline, treating connection with others either as secondary (in the sense of mutual support and accountability) or as mystical (in the sense of feeling connected to legacies of ancestors and descendants). While shawl makers were well aware of, and indeed had their practices and expectations shaped by, these frames, the novel and converging meanings of PSM that they expressed had more to do with the choices and structures of their ministry group. Decisions about what to do in meetings grew out of group dynamics and reflected consensus or contested desires about spiritual atmosphere. The context of having one’s solitary work on display for the group and the socially mandated positivity of responses was inflected by the common and overt purpose of providing spiritual comfort. Blessing ceremonies provided occasions to share the burden, responsibility, and celebration of transitioning a shawl into its destined role for the recipient. And the unavoidable relinquishing of the work, both as the product of one pair of making hands and as the product of many pairs of blessing and giving hands, out of the PSM’s control, produced the practice of trust and reflection on the need for cycles of connection. While

146  Donna Bowman this study takes particular interest in the singular aspects of PSM, including the relatively lengthy process of handcrafting and its singularly material and durable product, much work remains to be done on the spiritual formation that takes place in other lay ministries dominated by women, such as feeding, visitation, and caretaking ministries. Notes 1 Jeff Astley, ‘The Analysis, Investigation and Application of Ordinary Theology’, in Exploring Ordinary Theology: Everyday Christian Believing and the Church, ed. Jeff Astley and Leslie Francis (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2013), 5. 2 Janet Bristow and Victoria Cole-Galo describe ‘creating an environment of intention’ by thinking about the shawl’s recipient, choosing materials, and ritualizing the space and process of setting to work’, in Janet Bristow and Victoria ­Cole-Galo, The Prayer Shawl Companion: 38 Knitted Designs to Embrace, Inspire, and ­Celebrate Life (Newton, CT: Taunton Press, 2008), 9–11. 3 Organ procurement operations (OPOs) facilitate recovery and transport of donated organs and tissues from deceased individuals. In the United States, these regional agencies serve as coordinating entities between the local hospital where the organs and tissues are removed from the individual shortly after death and the transplant hospitals where individuals waiting for transplant can be called in for surgery. Many agencies, such as the one described here, offer ongoing services, support, and celebration for the families of the organ and tissue donors. The shawls made by the volunteer group at this OPO were given either at the hospital to the family members whose loved one ‘gave the gift of life’ by donating parts of their bodies or at special gatherings honouring the families. 4 For a discussion of the relationship between the tallit and these prayer shawls, see Donna Bowman, Prayer Shawl Ministry and Women’s Theological Imagination (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015), 253–255. 5 Susan Gordon Lydon, The Knitting Sutra: Craft as a Spiritual Presence (New York, NY: Broadway Books, 1997), 10. 6 Bernadette Murphy, Zen and the Art of Knitting: Exploring the Links Between Knitting, Spirituality, and Creativity (Avon, MA: Adams Media Corporation 2002), 29. 7 Tara Jon Manning, Compassionate Knitting: Finding Basic Goodness in the Work of Our Hands (Rutland, VT: Tuttle Publishing, 2006), 11. 8 Carol P. Christ, ‘Weaving the Fabric of Our Lives’, Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 13, no. 1 (1997): 131–136. 9 Manning, Compassionate Knitting, 137. 10 ‘Shawl Instructions: Knitting and Crochet’. Internet Archive, 21 July 2003, accessed 6 January 2021, https://web.archive.org/web/20030621090749/http:// www.shawlministry.com/instructions.html. 11 Janet Bristow and Victoria Cole-Galo, The Crocheted Prayer Shawl Companion: 37 Patterns to Embrace, Inspire, and Celebrate Life (Newton, CT: The Taunton Press, 2010), 4. 12 Susan S. Jorgensen and Susan S. Izard, Knitting into the Mystery: A Guide to the Shawl Knitting Ministry (Harrisburg, PA: Morehouse Publishing, 2003), 14. 13 Kate Lampitt Adey, ‘Understanding Why Women Knit: Finding Creativity and “Flow”’, Textile 16, no. 1 (2018): 84–97. 14 Bristow and Cole-Galo, as well as Izard and Jorgensen, recommend ‘knit three, purl three’ as the basic prayer shawl pattern and suggest a connection with the

Crafting identity  147 Trinity as well as other significations of the number three in various religious ­traditions. One Catholic prayer shawl maker I interviewed preferred this pattern to the many variations that followed: ‘Personally, for me, to be meditative, I like the original pattern because you’re not having to … because I feel like if you’re counting stitches and counting rows then I’m not meditating. … Like I can’t crochet without concentrating and I know that I’m counting, or ­whatever. Whereas, if you’re doing the standard knit three sometimes I will just keep r­ epeating “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit”, you know’. 15 Wren Ross, quoted in The Prayer Shawl Companion, 89. 16 All interviewees are referred to by pseudonyms. 17 The knitting revival that started in the late 1980s saw the growth of social knitting circles, often taking place at coffee shops, booksellers, yarn stores, or pubs. ‘Stitch and bitch’, a term dating back to the Second World War, captured for many knitters at the turn of the millennium a subversive, third-wave feminist spirit of these gatherings and became the basis for the title of a best-selling series of books, Stitch ‘n Bitch, by feminist knitter Debbie Stoller.

Part IV

Families and Formation

10 Mothers in Newfrontiers Charismatic spirituality, motherhood, and the Christian tradition Claire Williams Introduction In this chapter, the spiritual practices of mothers in a Newfrontiers church are described and examined, based on a piece of research conducted as a pilot study with five mothers who attended a Newfrontiers church.1 The research sought to understand the lives of women as they adapted to their changed circumstances upon becoming mothers and, in particular, the quotidian spiritual practices undertaken whilst raising young children at home. Three themes will serve as the framework for this chapter: the women’s practices of spirituality, community, and possessions. These themes will illustrate the formative acts of faith that construct these women’s faith lives. This work is a contribution to research into women in Newfrontiers (described further below), the spiritual practices of charismatic women, liturgical theology and the practices of women during the early phases of motherhood. This chapter will demonstrate that there is a significant gap in understanding the faith practices of women by leaders and others in the Newfrontiers movement, a church that is both numerically significant and ecclesiologically unique. The interviews and creation of themes in the research reflect the journey undertaken by these mothers: a journey beginning in early motherhood with discontentment in their ability to practise their charismatic faith. It moves on to reflections upon the women’s adaptations to normative charismatic spirituality focused upon church services. Over time, the mothers moved the locus of their practices into their home and their church community and by so doing achieved a degree of integration of motherhood and faith. These women display many similarities with charismatic spirituality and the wider Christian tradition, particularly in their approaches to prayer and hospitality. They were open and willing to consider ecumenical practices that were compatible with their beliefs. At the same time, Newfrontiers mothers appear unique in their beliefs about marriage, their emphasis upon the role of the church community, and their valuing of possessions. They thus combine what might be expected characteristics and theologies of Christian women with aspects of belief and practice that are distinctive. DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-15

152  Claire Williams Context Newfrontiers is part of a group of churches that arose during the so-called third wave of Pentecostalism. Variously known as house churches, new churches, restoration churches, and New Apostolic churches, for the purposes of this paper, the nomenclature of choice follows William Kay.2 The New Apostolic churches are the metaphorical children of Pentecostal and British charismatic renewal parents, and Brethren grandparents, especially in spiritual practices. These congregations were formed preferring the spirituality of the charismatic renewal. Ecclesiology of Newfrontiers Ecclesiologically, the New Apostolic churches formed as a result of a rejection of perceived bureaucracy, regarded as a human failing, and a desire to welcome the direct input of the Holy Spirit via biblical models of apostleship and eldership. Newfrontiers has actively rejected formal patterned liturgical practices perceived to inhibit the spontaneity of the Holy Spirit. This follows the pattern of the New Testament, for example, 1 Corinthians 14:26, and is associated with the New Apostolic churches’ rejection of the established church, their separation from the Renewal movement (which remained within denominational structures), and their belief in the need to start the church again without the ecumenical drive of the early Anglican charismatic movement.3 Practices in Newfrontiers are theoretically based on a Reformed theological and charismatic spirituality framework. This means that church life is modelled upon the interpretation of biblical norms, such as church structures mimicking the nascent church in Acts. It also means that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are not considered as relegated to the past but ‘restored’ and practised in lively church services as well as in personal spiritual practice. Founder Terry Virgo is quoted as saying that Newfrontiers should have ‘orthodox theology with the supernatural’.4 Such a combination of a high view of scripture and a participatory view of pneumatology is relatively rare in church life.5 Male elders lead the churches, always in the plural, in rejection of a solo clerical mode of leadership. Women are not permitted to enter these roles but are allowed to serve the church in all other ways, including being on leadership teams that work in ways comparable to charity trustees or as deacons. Most Newfrontiers churches permit and encourage women to preach, but not all. This extends into the life of the churches as a pervading complementarianism.6 Marriages are encouraged to follow a model based on biblical interpretation that has the man as the ‘head’ of the household and the women in submission. As well as this structural hierarchy, there is, what might seem to be somewhat contradictory at first glance, a body of Christ theology that informs full laity participation. Anti-clericalism is a key distinction, and all church members are encouraged to engage fully and actively in the life of

Mothers in Newfrontiers  153 the church, to the extent that one commentator is able to say of the New ­Apostolic church communities that they have: a shared life … with mutual practical assistance whenever necessary. A member’s monetary commitment will not only be to the church (tithing being a common practice) but also to any individuals within that church who may need finances – for a house, car, or holiday for example. It is apparent that the house churches have developed not only an alternative church, but also an alternative society.7 It is this alternative society, this model of an all-encompassing lifestyle in relation to women that this chapter seeks to understand. Although the church can be described as theologically distinctive, my research found that the mothers were unique only in some of their practices and behaviours whilst being very similar to the wider charismatic tradition in some ways and echoing broader Christian traditions beyond that. Women in Newfrontiers There is very little previous research investigating this particular group of women. Kristin Aune’s is the only academic paper I have been able to locate.8 Writing from a sociology of religion perspective, and having encountered the ideas of gender that are prevalent in Newfrontiers churches, Aune describes the formation of a counter-cultural gender philosophy in most Restoration congregations as having ‘aligned themselves in opposition to the sexual counter-culture and second wave feminism, supporting strongly conservative, gender-differentiated theology and practices’.9 Other research into Newfrontiers has explored the history of the movement,10 its ecclesiology,11 eschatology,12 and mission.13 None of this research addresses the life experiences or faith lives of women, nor do these studies engage with the motivations of women who choose to remain in complementarian churches. Theoretical framework and methodology The theoretical framework and methodology adopted by my study begin to fill the gaps in the literature. I posit that spiritual practices are pertinent to understanding the faith lives of women even in a church tradition that typically rejects traditional and historical church practices. James Smith advocates a critical appropriation of Christian traditions in service of a lay-focused spirituality for which habits and behaviour are linked to knowing and experiencing God.14 He presents knowing as a bodily as much as a ‘mental’ process, thus advocating an epistemology of the human being as embodied. Pictures, stories, rituals, and narratives form us at a pre-cognitive level more profoundly than the conscious reflections that they also enable.

154  Claire Williams Spiritual growth requires this pre-reflective dimension of formation. Smith proposes, therefore, ‘liturgies of the home’: domestic practices that orientate us to our telos in God: we should be attentive to the rhythms and rituals that constitute the background hum of our families and should consider the telos toward which these activities are orientated.15 Amos Yong describes this as ‘participatory ontology’, where knowledge of God is communicated through engagement with the created order.16 Similarly, Smith’s Christian anthropology places the believer in a participatory, embodied epistemology. The actions of individuals are investigated for their meaning in relation to their knowing. Smith speaks of the ‘being-inthe-world’ of the body interacting with its surroundings and by so doing, knowing. This epistemology can interrogate the most straightforward of behaviours – h ­ umming a hymn whilst washing up – and from that descriptive process understand how the world is encountered through the body and the knowing of faith is experienced. Since the Newfrontiers group of churches has not been previously analysed to understand the ritual or behaviours of its members, any methodology must seek to discover from the ground upwards, rather than being informed by pre-existing literature. The research methodology sought to ask questions of mothers concerning their emotional and psychological relationship to their professed faith and their embodied practices that aided their spiritual formation. I endeavoured to understand their daily routines and how their spirituality interacted with them, as well as to enquire whether there were identifiable unmet needs and the consequences to the individual of those unmet needs. The research was formed from an insider position as I am a member of the church community under investigation. Feminist research advocates insider research as one form of discourse with even power distribution between participants and a trusted insider.17 It makes no universalising claims but is for the benefit of the participants. Nevertheless, my position as the wife of an elder in this church has the potential for power imbalance. The participants were selected with this in mind as women who were less likely to acutely feel this power dynamic. The participants were all white middle-class mothers who had their own children of preschool age and one who had a foster child. They are all degree-educated and homeowners, thus ensuring a degree of similarity with me as the researcher. Importantly, it is women that in this case are also mothers of preschoolage children whose voices are heard, in contrast to published theology primarily written by male leaders of Newfrontiers. This chapter thus adds to the knowledge of feminist spiritual practices by expanding the work of Helen Collins regarding evangelical women in worship.18 In utilising Nicola Slee’s implementation of Clifford Geertz’s concept of ‘thick description’, as seen in her accounts of women’s faithing, it thereby adds to the compendium of accounts of women and their lived faith.19

Mothers in Newfrontiers  155 My research design closely followed Jan Berry’s feminist research in ­ ractical theology and Kamala Visweswaren’s feminist ethnography.20 The p research is inductive. Therefore, based on the ideas that emerged in the preparation for this research, I anticipated themes that might occur. I undertook in-depth interviews with the participants, involving questions and answers as well as using collaborative imagination between myself and the participants: when a participant described a memory or an understanding, we discussed together what they thought it might mean and engaged in some theological reflection upon it. Having collected the research data and analysed them, I then produced a rich description of the responses of the mothers. This follows Slee’s description of qualitative research and its aims to: […] produce a qualitatively rich account of women’s faith lives, which would be self-authenticating in its own terms, allow theoretical constructs to be developed from the ‘ground’ upwards, and suggest avenues for further exploration and study.21 Hearing mothers’ voices This section presents the analysis of interview data and is comprised of two parts: firstly, the description of the discontent the mothers experienced when they first had their children and secondly, exploring the adaptations of their practices as they responded to this discontent. Discontent

The interviewed mothers expressed discontent concerning their motherhood in a number of areas: identity, lack of time for practising their faith, and loneliness. Concerning their identity, the problems surrounded not having a sense of who they were because their daily life had changed upon becoming a mother: I think sometimes again, stay at home mum, you can start feeling a bit useless, and [to] have other people that you’re supporting, I don’t know whether that’s healthy or not, but it does me good. (Elizabeth) I think I felt a sense - I know this sounds really awful - but a sense of loss almost that I’d been involved in all these things and I had all these things that I was using like my voice or whatever, and then it was like, I’ve got to give everything up now and I’m now just sitting at home with children. There was a little bit of a mourning, in a way and I really did struggle with what my identity was almost. Like what is my role now, what is my role in church, what is my role at home or how do I meet with God and I would now say I’m in a really good place. (Charlotte)

156  Claire Williams I felt that I was at home doing a less important thing. He was out there earning the money, so I needed to show that I was doing something of value and contributing by keeping it nice and always having dinner ready. (Laura) There were moments of deep frustration and anger and not knowing who I was and really struggling with that, but that got less and less. I think everyone - I still have moments where I struggle with who I am and what I’m doing. (Laura) Time to encounter God was a struggle, both at home and in the Sunday worship services: Previously, I would have had time in the morning to start my day with some kind of devotion or focus time, whereas that is now more of a high stressful time. (Gemma) I remember in the early stages - and even now going to church is pretty pointless in some ways. (Charlotte) I’m finding it almost impossible to go to church because he’s running around, he’s actually taken someone’s communion - they laughed. (Tess) They also expressed a strong feeling of isolation from community: When I had M [daughter] I actually did feel quite lonely and it’s not to say I didn’t have friends, but it was not people that were walking through the same thing as me in that time. (Charlotte) Certainly, as a new mother you can feel incredibly lonely, because you just feel that everyone else is getting on with their life and doing stuff, and by the time you’ve got your act together it’s lunchtime. (Laura) The loss of identity was not particularly rooted in church attendance but rather in an understanding of their new role as mothers. This may stem from a sense of competing roles from within and without their faith c­ ommunity: their roles as working women before having had children and their roles as wives and mothers in a complementarian community were markedly different.

Mothers in Newfrontiers  157 In her work, Collins highlights how charismatic mothers had difficulty accessing worship services for the therapeutic and transformative experiences expected in charismatic worship.22 The Newfrontiers mothers do relate to these difficulties but also expressed discontent in their early years of mothering regarding practices outside the church too. They wished to ‘meet’ with God in their own homes and outside prescribed service times and were struggling to find methods and practices that were compatible with their new circumstances. The sense of community described in the literature as a key feature of the house churches, the close-knit ‘alternative communities’,23 was lost initially for these women until they were able to adapt to their new circumstances. It was of vital importance for them to reconnect with community so that they could sustain their own wellbeing and their faith practices. All of the women said that their routines were organised around the needs of the children or the children’s habits. The demands of childcare and the needs of a household impacted the women’s ability to choose what they did on a day-to-day basis. It is evident that, despite the demands of childcare and very young children, the women still attempted to engage in spiritual practices that maintained their faith. However, the reported dissatisfaction highlights the inadequacy of the time available to engage in their practices to meet their own spiritual needs. This is not unique to mothers in this type of church but is evident from written accounts across the spectrum of Christian traditions in which women have reflected on the relation between faith practices and motherhood. The challenge of modern, Western mothering is particularly difficult, according to Sharon Hays, who states that women who have children are required socially to conform to standards of ‘intensive mothering’.24 The demand is that the mother should ‘devote her entire physical, psychological, emotional, and intellectual being, 24/7, to her children’.25 For these women, continuing to sustain their previous spiritual disciplines alongside the expectations of this intensive mothering model is an additional burden. The women interviewed demonstrated that they both adapted to and struggled with these competing demands. Adaptations

Charlotte described ways in which she has adapted her spiritual practices in order to work around her constraints. She is a musician, and music functions as a spiritual practice for her. I’ve had to adapt even the way that I listen to music and try and incorporate worship music into my day-to-day so it’s just playing in the background. For Charlotte, this creates an ‘atmosphere’ of worship that is with her when the music is playing in the midst of quotidian tasks. This was also the case for

158  Claire Williams Tess, who at one time was a chorister and uses music in a similar fashion. She listens to a Christian radio station which helps her and helps her child, as he enjoys listening to it. This way, she is combining meeting her own spiritual needs with those of her child. Her connection to God is found through her singing, and she has changed how she practises that. Instead of singing in a choir, or latterly, in the church’s worship group, she sings whilst out walking or when she is at home. This adaptation to her current restrictions means that she can still meet her spiritual needs to some extent. Elizabeth also plays music at home and listens to a Christian radio station. Music forms a backdrop to the women’s attempts at adaptation to their combined mothering and spiritual lives. By engaging in listening to the worship of others, they are participating in performative worship that is congruent with the charismatic encounter with God via worship services. This is brought into the home rather than achieved in a more typical church service. For a number of women, the spiritual need for pausing and spending time in reflection is transferred to the evening and reinterpreted as a time of reflection before sleep. This way, these women are like other mothers who change their practice to suit their circumstances in early motherhood. The mothers found ways to redeem their discontent where they could not ‘find’ God in the midst of their mothering. They wished to maintain charismatic practices and beliefs and therefore needed to search for new spaces in order to have the ‘search, encounter and transformation’ moments that Mark Cartledge describes of the charismatic worship style:26 I think it’s finding the thing that works for you and building that into your routine, rather than trying to do what you think is the right thing. Thinking back to where did you find God previously, and trying to work out how that can – how you can take that forward. (Gemma) Prayer Each woman was asked ‘What do you think a good prayer life looks like?’ They factored in elements of their own experience and mothering to their answers. Gemma has further adapted since becoming a mother to meet her own spiritual needs for prayer by spending time outside: So, naturally now I’m taking my son to the places that I’m more likely to find those God moments and have those smaller bits of prayer … I think for me, if I’m happy with my connection with God, then that is a positive prayer life, rather than trying to replicate somebody else’s prayer life. Gemma’s spiritual growth is found by connecting to God through the natural world. She does not impose upon herself an external standard which she tries to meet but rather has a personal sense that if she has

Mothers in Newfrontiers  159 met God in whatever way or time, she is spiritually fulfilled. For her, the ‘search-encounter-transformation’ of Cartledge’s model of Pentecostal and charismatic spirituality is demonstrated in a new context because of her motherhood. Rather than demonstrating the social side of charismatic prayer, she is finding it in the midst of mothering a pre-verbal child.27 Elizabeth sees that prayer is ‘good’ when it is communication. This is mutually reciprocal, involving both speaking and listening. When she finds she has the need, she also prays the Lord’s Prayer and uses it as a model for extended prayer times. As well as this structured prayer, she prays continually, calling it ‘a constant conversation’. This is demonstrative of Cartledge’s characteristic of charismatic spirituality: that of the centrality of prayer.28 Charlotte believes that prayer is best when it is a ‘habit, a way of thinking’ and when it is undertaken with others. This is for the benefit of the individuals involved who will be encouraged by corporate prayer. By such an emphasis, she falls into Cartledge’s description of social charismatic prayer: The praxis of Charismatics can be seen in an enthusiasm for prayer with others. It is the primary theological activity of Pentecostals and Charismatics.29 This is difficult at the life stage these women are in, where accessing social prayer situations is limited by their child-caring roles. However, when it is able to be accessed, spiritual and emotional needs are met by this ritualised prayer. This happens when Tess is already engaged in other activities, such as walking the dog. Laura also believes that effective prayer is ‘a combination of routine and this background, constant prayer’. She did not want to be rigid with a routine; rather, her prayer should serve to facilitate spiritual moments. Communication with God is important to Kylie, for whom prayer is connection: I’m walking into town and I’m connection with God and I’m just praying and talking to God about this. I’m washing up and I’m, ‘Oh, God, what about this and what about that?’ These women did not practise elements of prayer that are habitually found in other parts of the Christian tradition. For example, they were unfamiliar with liturgical prayer or praying the hours. They did not discuss moments of silence and appeared unfamiliar with ideas suggested by Margaret Hebblethwaite, such as home retreats or prayer spaces.30 However, they did find a resolution to the difficulty of finding space, as expressed in their initial description of their discontent. Two participants demonstrated how they had adapted to recognise and use small gaps in the day for prayer, which they previously would not have considered as spiritual: I think probably I would have thought about all sorts of other things when brushing my teeth previously. Whereas now, I know that is

160  Claire Williams four minutes of the day, every day, that I can use actively rather than ­day-dreaming or something else. (Gemma) so that’s the time when if I can’t go back to sleep, I use it to, well, why am I awake, and start to pray. (Elizabeth) Although this is not the same as the structured or formal practice of silence that is found in historic Christian tradition, it does resemble the traditional quest for stillness and quiet, transposed into a new setting. To some degree, the women were aware of, and receptive to, the influence of other Christian traditions in their own experience, and I will turn to this now. Ecumenical practices The women were open – but cautiously so – to ideas of adopting practices from wider Christian tradition to enable their spiritual development. When asked about other Christian traditions and practices, Charlotte answered: Yes I do. I always think about the repentance side of things because we don’t - you know, like Catholics would confess their sins - I’m not saying going into a booth and chatting to someone else about your sins, but I’m saying that attitude of repentance always being more active in the way that you seek God in that way. Like at communion, it being a more revered or serious, not that it’s not serious … Theologically, these women are astute and well understand their particular denomination’s ideas and beliefs. They would not accept practices that do not fit well in this. They enjoyed the aspects of worship that were more contemplative than they were used to, recalling previous experiences visiting a cathedral: It was just the calmness of the service, the quietness, the place for contemplation, and the fact that you just came out feeling like you’d dealt with everything and you were ready for sleep. Our church doesn’t have anything that we do that with … (Elizabeth) Tess noted the embodied act of community that occurred when she left her choir stalls in the Anglican church she attended in her childhood and walked about the church sharing the sign of peace. She felt that she did not have access anymore to this type of action: Doing the peace was a real integral part of my journey, because you’d be up in the choir and I’d go out - not many people would go from the

Mothers in Newfrontiers  161 choir - but I would go out and see all the people, and just meet with them. I think our church, there could be a bit more of that. Aspects of historic church tradition were embraced when they were considered compatible with charismatic worship, for example the mystical tradition: ‘I think you should read Julian of Norwich’. I remember at the time just thinking well, that’s really weird, but it’s about this real passion to know God more, isn’t it, and to understand how God sees. (Laura) Caution surrounded their concerns that too much formal and structured worship inhibited the work of the Holy Spirit and took away meaning from actions: I have and I see the negative of it as well because I didn’t take any notice of what I was saying. (Charlotte - in reference to use of liturgy in a childhood Anglican church) All of this, and I used to think well, where’s the freedom, where’s the spirit of God in all of that? Actually, some of the prayers are beautiful, and some of it is lovely. (Laura) The women embraced ideas that helped them rest, reflect, and spend time with God. They would not embrace perceived ‘empty rituals’ or practices that did not hold meaning for them, or that did not engage their minds as well as their bodies. Laura describes her concern with ‘religion’, which in her view is the opposite of faith; she believes that ‘religion’ is structured around the work of people, compared to the work of God via the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Spirit-led worship is, for Laura, necessarily both informal and unprepared, as this is how she has experienced worship before. Newfrontiers was founded in the spirit of anti-denominationalism. This is usually interpreted to mean that the group did not wish to create a new denomination but it also includes an open approach to those who are not considered participants in Newfrontiers.31 Despite being a non-liberal church, these women display an openness to actions of the wider church in line with a tendency amongst Newfrontiers to be a liberalising force amongst the conservative groups in the New Apostolic churches.32 Practices of hospitality Elizabeth is a foster carer. As part of our collaborative interview, my questions diverted from what I had planned in order to discuss the nature of

162  Claire Williams fostering in relation to the Christian view of hospitality. This focus upon hospitality is not a spiritual practice that is particularly represented in the literature about charismatic spirituality and is either a unique facet of Newfrontiers’ focus or, more likely, an under-researched and under-represented expression of spiritual behaviour in charismatic communities. Initially, the conversation focused on professionals visiting the home as part of her role as a foster carer. In response to prompting about views of Christian hospitality and visitors to her home, she replied: The nurses know that we’re Christians, possibly from the things we’ve got around. Certainly the social workers all do […] Her immediate response about hospitality is to connect it to evangelism. For her, welcoming these professionals into her home is to show them that Christianity is something good and attractive. It is not just the medical and social work professionals who are welcomed, it is the foster children themselves: My philosophy is with every single foster child, is that they’ll be treated like I would treat my own baby […] The foster child is welcomed into Elizabeth’s family as if she or he were biologically her own child. She describes the social workers’ response to this as noting that ‘we go over and above’. The motivation for this is that Elizabeth and her family represent Jesus in their work with these children. She says ‘other people just see it [as] a job, whereas we see it as a calling’. For her, there is a correlation in her own purposes between a specific Christian impetus for hospitality and a vocation to fostering, which she interprets as her motivation for her foster mother role. This way, Elizabeth demonstrates a wider spiritual practice of welcoming the stranger, in this case, a child. This is part of the Christian tradition found, amongst other places, in the Benedictine tradition of welcome. All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for he himself will say: I was a stranger and you welcomed me.33 Here we see a continuity between Elizabeth’s understanding of hospitality and the ancient Christian tradition, although it is unrecognised on an individual and community level. Practices of community Marriage

During conversations with these mothers, they spontaneously raised the topic of their relationships with their husbands. This was perhaps not surprising,

Mothers in Newfrontiers  163 as the discussion was orientated to their newly constituted family life. What was noteworthy was the difficulty these women had in relating the sustaining actions of their spirituality to their husbands’ requirements or demands upon them. For example, in a conversation about the important role of music as a spiritual resource in her home, Charlotte mentioned: I did that before having children and then I do it now - if Adam lets me I have headphones on. This notion of seeking permission for listening to music instead of listening to the needs of the children appears to be a combination of the usual demands of parental role-sharing with young children with what may be a unique feature of the complementarian view of marriage within the women’s religious community: the man has a measure of authority in the home setting that the woman does not. This belief is based upon the interpretation of biblical texts such as 1 Corinthians 11:2–13. The mothers demonstrated the effects of this commitment in their ­comments regarding their marriages and the impact of this upon their motherhood and their spiritual practices: Kris [husband] is definitely getting more out of church than I am, but I think that’s pretty normal. This relates to the research by Collins concerning the ability of mothers in charismatic churches to accomplish the therapeutic effects of search, encounter, and experience of God during church services.34 The mothers in Newfrontiers are charismatic, and their requirements for spiritual fulfilment are in line with the wider charismatic Christian community. This was highlighted at the beginning of the paper with concerns about loneliness and lack of connection to others. The mothers’ understanding of their role informed their understandings of both identity and community. … so you could be the stay at home wife getting sick of your husband’s underpants and smelly shirts, but actually that’s part of my role. (Elizabeth) For Elizabeth, caring for her husband is part of her identity as a mother. Some resolution to the crisis of identity expressed by the mothers upon their change in roles was to accept a new identity, as a wife and mother. Here perhaps, these women fall into a non-liberal definition of women.35 Although this may well be countercultural and assumed by some to be anti-feminist, the women did not conclude that it was oppressive, despite initial concerns (see above) about their position and role since the onset of motherhood. For example, Charlotte, who mentioned asking for permission from her husband, also

164  Claire Williams referred to the two of them as a ‘good team’. They also note the role their husbands take in supporting them: It’s not that I am the mum, therefore I have to do it all, and he is, he would be more than happy to take Toby [son] away or do some things to allow me to give my - to have that time that I need to give the permission for that. (Gemma) Gemma understands that she permits her husband to undertake caring responsibilities for her children. These women have to balance their own self-understanding of their roles with the support of their husbands and their church for their mothering roles. The manner in which this is practised as an expression of the complementarian belief is only briefly indicated here. Aune’s doctoral thesis research on gender in Newfrontiers found women in the movement to be ‘postfeminist’. This is central to the theological discourse of the network, ingrained in accounts of gender roles found in creation, Trinitarian submission and Jesus’ maleness.36 Aune finds that the network is postfeminist in that it is both ‘after’ feminism and ‘anti’ feminism. Newfrontiers understands this as the proper interpretation of the Bible, that there be male eldership in church leadership and male authority in the family home. Further research into Newfrontiers’ complementarianism is required for a fuller understanding. Aune’s work is the only specific research completed about feminism, gender, and Newfrontiers, and it is 17 years old, which is a significant period of time in a movement that only began in the 1970s, and which has undergone significant structural and leadership changes in that time. However, any way in which these women accept and participate in complementarianism makes them a part of a growth in religious movements which value the submission of women. These movements have increased in number since the 1970s.37 It is noted by Saba Mahmood that, although these beliefs appear to contradict the feminist movement’s aims, they are not necessarily actions of reduced agency. Mahmood comments that these women are potentially using their ‘instruments of oppression’ to ‘assert their value both collectively, through the ceremonies they organise and stage, and individually, in the context of their marriages, so insisting on their dynamic complementarity with men’.38 Post-feminism argues that feminism as a political movement is no longer necessary.39 However, communities such as Newfrontiers demonstrate that the aim of achieving gender equality via individualised meritocratic opportunities for full participation in all aspects of society has not been fully met. The question that remains in this type of community is whether those aims are valued by the women participants. If they do not desire to have full and equal agency with men in their religious communities, then they fall into the category that Mahmood describes. Post-secular feminism, especially in the

Mothers in Newfrontiers  165 work of Judith Butler, Rosi Braidotti, and Mahmood, describes a move away from importing Western views of agency in relation to non-Western subjects.40 Rosa Vasilaki notes the assumptions of secularism in feminist views of agency which impact critical engagement with religious practice.41 If Vasilaki is correct in her comments that existing feminist approaches fail to engage critically with these questions of agency and autonomy in non-Western contexts, it is also true that the nuance of the post-secular feminist dialogue should also be addressed in relation to those Western contexts, such as Newfrontiers, that buck post-feminist trends. This ‘religious Other’, whose subjectivity is thought of as being suppressed by the dominant secular culture and the kind of subjectivity it enables, is not to be feared or rejected but in many ways is thought to be much more open to the possibilities of alternative, happier futures in comparison to the outdated and melancholic secular subject.42 It remains to be seen whether the women in Newfrontiers are indeed ‘happier’ with their chosen gender roles or indeed whether they have expressed their full agency in choosing their roles. However, it is indicative of the need for further examination of agency and feminism in communities such as these. Church as family

The women identified their church as particularly suitable in offering the support they required, sometimes in comparison to other churches that they had previously attended: I definitely couldn’t just do that [attend an Anglican church] because I’d miss out on the worship and the greater feeling of family that I think you get from our church, and the wider variety of people that go to church. I don’t think there was a single black person at Holy Cross. (Tess) This church family functions like a ‘village’, says Laura, which is a community intimately involved and interested in her life and that of her children. This discovery of the church community in the new life of motherhood and the response of the community in supporting them serve to illustrate that the church recognises the difficulty these women have with early motherhood and strives to meet their needs. When we were looking for new churches, one of the things I particularly liked about our current church is that looking around, I could see all sorts of different generations. They all bring unique things and now, thinking about my friends - particularly my church friends - they are from all different walks of life, age brackets. (Gemma)

166  Claire Williams This sense of solidarity and community was particularly manifested in my interviewees’ companionship with other women, either as peers in early motherhood (as Charlotte, above) or from older generations. For example, Laura mentioned her relationship with two women in the church community who were 20–30 years older than her, both of whom supported her weekly. Church as a family, in the way that Charlotte describes, was mentioned by other participants as key to their sense of belonging, which supports their mothering and their sense of identity – two key problems for them early on in their motherhood journey: The church [collectively] are very similar and very supportive [with] the fostering, and yes, I think it’s exactly the same. I think within my family, if my brother is poorly or if one of my children is poorly, we all hurt and grieve, and it’s the same within the church, that everything affects, yes, and if someone needs support, we support them. (Elizabeth) Possessions as spiritual practices When asked about the role of possessions in their spiritual formation, the women answered with a degree of unity. Although some had thought about it before, others displayed an operant and implicit theology whilst articulating for the first time their thoughts about what they own. The themes identified in the transcripts are thankfulness, stewardship, and possessions as gifts from God. All five women were asked if a Christian can have too many possessions or an unhealthy relationship with their possessions. Two said ‘yes’ and three said ‘no’, but there was convergence in their explanations for these answers. I think possessions and money are a major block to growth. We trust in God the whole time we’ve got our money and everything. We trust in God but we’re still counting our money … When the shit hits the fan and there’s no money, where do we go to first? Do we phone the bank or do we open the Bible? (Laura) Laura believes there is a negative correlation between how much money one has and how much trust in God one exercises. This relates to the actual possession of money as well as her attitude towards it. If she had less money, she would be required to trust God to provide more for her. She illustrated the point with a micro-story about her father, a clergyman. When her father was a curate, he relied upon unsolicited food parcels from an anonymous donor. She correlates the provision of these parcels with her parents’ account of practising tithing. For her, this family story has been interpreted as a metaphor for possessions. The family had given away all they had and expressed

Mothers in Newfrontiers  167 trust in God. Laura analyses it as a cause and effect. Whilst her family provided for themselves and were not sacrificial in their giving to the church (and therefore God), they did not see miraculous provision by Him. Laura interprets this as disobedience or lack of trust in God. This attitude could also be interpreted as one which labels all goods as belonging to God, not to the individuals. This was reflected in Elizabeth’s answers also, ‘My view is that everything we have is given from God’. ­Ownership therefore belongs symbolically with God, and it is up to Elizabeth and her family to steward what they have in keeping with this belief. This extended to her beliefs surrounding her children, that they are also gifts from God and not her possessions. She acknowledged that it was possible that God could take them away from her, and this was a devastating idea. This attitude to money, goods, and family is one that emphasises the sovereignty of God as both one to be trusted and one who is the ultimate holder of all goods. The ‘grace table’

The church that these women attend used to run a mother and toddlers group that had a ‘grace table’. On this table could be placed any item that was no longer required by its owner. Anyone who had need could then take that item. Often it was used and then re-given by the families that went to the group. Gemma and Tess both reflected upon the practice of sharing possessions throughout the community. All of the things we bought, or gathered, or acquired for parenthood have very much gone round the church, and other people’s stuff has very much done the same. I think that if you hold those values [of keeping baby goods to remember the child by] too tightly you wouldn’t pass on that Moses basket that you had your first child in. (Gemma) Gemma understands that ownership can be corporate for the benefit of others. If the possessions are important in holding memories of the child, they cannot be useful to others because they are kept as a testament to a child’s infancy. Gemma and I collaborated in our analysis of this. Her son wears clothes that my four children wore and three others used before that. One item of clothing becomes a representation of community supporting one another with material needs and also of children growing up and entering new phases of life. Families can experience a pleasure in noticing that their once favourite Christmas jumper is now being worn by another little child and that can draw them into a closer relationship. The jumper or item becomes a symbol of a community acting out the behaviour in Acts 2:44–45, where possessions were held in common and/or sold for the common purse. Gemma understood this as a lifestyle that requires practice and could be particularly challenging when she placed value on something that was damaged

168  Claire Williams subsequently by another. She saw this as a prompt to value the person and the act of trust in lending an item, rather than the item itself. Tess understood this behaviour as countercultural: Whereas one of my friends – not a Christian, I don’t think – who’s got a baby: I’ve offered her loads of things, and she hasn’t accepted any of them. I’m just intrigued by that, why would you do that? Tess understands the rejection of her offerings to be connected with the other mother’s different beliefs. This connects religious belief with possessions in a concrete way for her: there is a different relationship with what belongs to Tess compared to her friend’s relationship with goods. Her belief was that individuals who shared their goods in this way did so because of their Christian convictions concerning the value of community in a way that she did not perceive occurring outside of the church. These women define themselves partially by their difference from the secular world. Ayala Fader describes the Hasidic practice of hyperbolising difference.43 The Hasidic women she studied were keen to differentiate between themselves and Gentiles and secular Jews. Although in the above example, Tess does not go to the same lengths as the Hasidic women, there is a common thread of separation from others based on distinctive religious practices. Tess shows how her faith is making her different from those who do not share her belief. The sharing of goods that are necessary for raising children is more than just an exercise in frugality for the two mothers and me. It is about connecting with other families in the church community, as well as viewing possessions as tools for relationship and spiritual growth. Conclusion The Newfrontiers mothers interviewed were demonstrably similar to other mothers in the pressures they perceived from their mothering and the conflict that it caused with their spirituality. They were similar in their desire to express and practise their faith whilst also parenting to the best of their ability. Their practices conformed to the charismatic practices of the wider church but were demonstrably adapted for their situation in line with what might be expected of mothers in the wider evangelical and charismatic tradition. However, by pursuing their experiences of community, their understanding of their possessions, and their more general faith practices, some differences with the wider charismatic Christian behaviour were discerned. They demonstrated some similarities with women of other faiths who could be classified as ‘non-liberal’ in their views about marriage and identity as Christians. They participated in a community that fits within the model of the New Apostolic churches, which values mutual giving and close-knit relationships, reliance upon one another, the sharing of goods and time to the benefit of the other, and to model the vision of the church described in the biblical book of Acts.

Mothers in Newfrontiers  169 The women’s faith practices that both conform to and differ from the wider Christian tradition have been used to illustrate both their beliefs and their identity as part of this unique and under-researched group. Further research is required to fully understand the lives of these women, based on the questions raised here. Notes 1 Newfrontiers was formerly known as New Frontiers International. Depending on their date of publication, texts referred to in this chapter will use both names for the church. 2 William Kay, Apostolic Networks in Britain: New Ways of Being Church (Milton Keynes: Paternoster, 2007). 3 Kay, Apostolic Networks in Britain, 10. 4 Barry Cooper, ‘Newfrontiers Church Planting in the UK: An Examination of Their Distinctives and Practices’, (DMin diss., Bangor University, 2009), 70. 5 Although not without precedent, for example the Mülheim Association of Christian Fellowship. 6 Complementarianism is the belief that the roles of men and women in churches and the home are different, although equally valued. 7 Anne Mather, ‘The House Churches: Their Emphases’, Evangel 4, no. 3 (1986), 14, quoted in Max Turner, ‘Ecclesiology in the Major “Apostolic” Restorationist Churches in the United Kingdom’, Vox Evangelica 19 (1989): 88. 8 Kristin Aune, ‘Postfeminist Evangelicals: The Construction of Gender in the New Frontiers International Churches’ (PhD diss., King’s College London, 2004). 9 Aune, ‘Postfeminist Evangelicals’, 10. 10 William K. Kay, ‘Apostolic Networks and Mission’, Journal of the European Pentecostal Theological Association 26, no. 2 (2006): 156–167; William K. Kay, ‘Apostolic Networks in Britain: An Analytic Overview’, Transformation 25, no. 1 (2008): 32–42; Kay, Apostolic Networks in Britain; Samuel Jefferey, ‘“A World-Wide Family on a Mission”: The History of the Newfrontiers Network in Transnational Perspective, c.1980–2011’ (PhD diss., King’s College London, 2019); William K. Kay and Sam Jefferey, ‘London’s New Churches: The Example of the Newfrontiers Network’, in The Desecularisation of the City: London’s Churches, 1980 to the Present, ed. David Goodhew and Anthony-Paul Cooper (London: Routledge, 2019), 241–261. 11 Benjamin G. McNair Scott, ‘Making Sense of Contemporary Charismatic Apostolates: An Historical and Theological Appraisal’ (Doctoral diss., King’s College ­London, 2012); Kay, Apostolic Networks in Britain; David Smith, ‘An Account for the Sustained Rise of New Frontiers International within the United Kingdom’, Journal of the European Pentecostal Theological Association 23, no. 1 (2003): 137–156. 12 James Martin Scott, ‘The Theology of the So-Called New Church Movement: An Analysis of the Eschatology’, (MTh diss., Brunel University, 1997). 13 Kay and Jefferey, ‘London’s New Churches’. 14 James K. A. Smith, You Are What You Love: The Spiritual Power of Habit (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2016); James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom: ­Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker ­Academic, 2009). 15 Smith, You Are What You Love, 113. 16 Amos Yong, ‘Radically Orthodox, Reformed, and Pentecostal: Rethinking the Intersection of Post/Modernity and the Religions in Conversation with James K. A. Smith’, Journal of Pentecostal Theology 15, no. 2 (2007): 233–250.

170  Claire Williams 17 Kamala Visweswaran, Fictions of Feminist Ethnography (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), 13. 18 Helen Collins, ‘When Worship Doesn’t Work – Contrasting Concepts of Transformation for Mothers in the Charismatic Movement’, Practical Theology 12, no. 5 (2019): 468–482. 19 Nicola Slee, Women’s Faith Development: Patterns and Processes (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), 4; Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays (New York, NY: Basic Books, 1973). 20 Jan Berry, Ritual Making Women: Shaping Rites for Changing Lives (London: Equinox, 2009); Visweswaran, Fictions of Feminist Ethnography. 21 Nicola Slee, ‘The Patterns and Processes of Women’s Faith Development: A Qualitative Approach’, British Journal of Theological Education 14, no. 1 (2003): 93. 22 Helen Collins, ‘Weaving Worship and Womb: A Feminist Practical Theology of Charismatic Worship from the Perspective of Early Motherhood’ (PhD diss., ­University of Bristol, 2016). 23 Mather, ‘The House Churches’. 24 Sharon Hays, The Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996). 25 Susan J. Douglas and Meredith W. Michaels, The Mommy Myth: The Idealisation of Motherhood and How it has Undermined Women (New York, NY: Free Press, 2004), 4. 26 Mark J. Cartledge, Encountering the Spirit: The Charismatic Tradition (London: Darton Longman & Todd, 2006), 25. 27 Ibid., 25. 28 Ibid., 82. 29 Ibid., 29. 30 Margaret Hebblethwaite, Motherhood and God (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1993), 97–109. 31 Smith, ‘An Account for the Sustained Rise of New Frontiers’, 145. In this article, Smith highlights the process that churches were required to take to join Newfrontiers. They were not required to leave their other affiliations, meaning that some maintained links to, for example, the Baptist Union. This indicates that being part of ‘the family’ of churches was more to do with relationships than shared beliefs. Local church independence was and is actively encouraged, resulting in an openness to any practice that can be interpreted as ‘of the Holy Spirit’. 32 My thanks to Alan Gregory for his help developing this point. For further sociological categories of New Apostolic Churches, see Andrew Walker, Restoring the Kingdom: The Radical Christianity of the House Church Movement (Surrey: Eagle, 1998). 33 Matthew 25:35. Regula Benedicti 1980: The Rule of St. Benedict in Latin and English with Notes, ed. Timothy Fry (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1981), 53:1. 34 Collins, ‘When Worship Doesn’t Work’. 35 Based upon this analysis, the women who are part of Newfrontiers can be described as ‘non-liberal’. Fader’s analysis states that ‘fundamentalism’ as a term has political and violent associations and Mahmood’s note that non-liberal stands in defiance of some assumed points of agency and feminism in the majority western discourse. These women are non-liberal because they are evangelical, believe in biblical inerrancy and the sovereignty of God, and are complementarian. See Ayala Fader, Mitzvah Girls: Bringing up the Next Generation of Hasidic Jews in Brooklyn (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2009) and Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011). 36 Aune, ‘Postfeminist Evangelicals’.

Mothers in Newfrontiers  171 37 Fader, Mitzvah Girls, 5. 38 Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 7. 39 Heidi Safia Mirza and Veena Meetoo, ‘Empowering Muslim Girls? Post-­Feminism, Multiculturalism and the Production of the “Model” Muslim Female Student in British Schools’, British Journal of Sociology of Education 39, no. 2 (2018): 227–241. 40 See Judith Butler, ‘Sexual Politics, Torture and Secular Time’, British Journal of Sociology 59, no. 1 (2008): 1–23; Rosi Braidotti, ‘In Spite of the Times: The Postsecular Turn in Feminism’, Theory, Culture & Society 26, no. 6 (2008): 1–24; Saba Mahmood, ‘Secularism, Hermeneutics, and Empire: The Politics of Islamic Reformation’, Public Culture 18, no. 2 (2006): 323–347. 41 Rosa Vasilaki, ‘The Politics of Postsecular Feminism’, Theory, Culture & ­Society 33, no. 2 (2016): 104, 105. 42 Ibid., 105. 43 Fader, Mitzvah Girls, 14.

11 ‘She taught me how to do it properly’ Religious practices in Muslim sister relationships Sonya Sharma Introduction Within research on families and religion, parents have been key figures of study and are often viewed as central to religious socialisation. In Christian traditions, parents have been viewed as influential in their children’s religiosity.1 In research on Muslim childhood, socialisation into religion was mainly from parents.2 Atheist parents have also had a hand in shaping their children’s beliefs and practices, sometimes encouraging their participation in religious activities.3 Grandparents have been studied too, with scholars noting their importance in passing religion on to grandchildren.4 Among sociologists, a focus on vertical socialisation into religious commitments, identities and practices has been predominant. However, what about siblings, and more specifically sisters? Sociologists have shown the impact of horizontal ties between siblings (i.e. biological, adopted, step and chosen) on shaping opportunities, identities and value formation.5 The strength of siblings is their capacity to be unique while still being part of a dyad or group.6 Sisters and brothers typically spend less time with their parents than they do with each other, and their relationships usually last longer. Servaas van Beekum observes that it is not from parents that one differentiates but from siblings.7 Parents have a vital role, but siblings crucially inform one another’s development, identity and life path. Sisters and brothers are typically researched together, with few studies offering a sociological and gendered analysis of adult sisters. Melanie Mauthner’s research is an exception.8 Her study uncovered sisterly ties in families, which are vastly overlooked compared to feminist sisterhood. Likewise, Muslim sister-familial relationships remain in the background compared to research on Muslim women’s participation in activism and mosques.9 Mauthner examined the ways in which sister relations inform feminine subjectivities and the power relations that happen between sisters via ‘motherly sistering’ and the ‘shifting positions’ they move in and out of over the life course.10 She also explored how relationships between sisters transform through various life transitions such as marriage, divorce, and bereavement, influencing the aspects of closeness and distance. Mauthner argues that sisters are often invisible because DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-16

‘She taught me how to do it properly’  173 they are embedded in the ordinariness of everyday life and less remarked upon compared to the mother–daughter dyad.11 Further, biological siblings are under-researched for their impact on religiosity and religious practices in families. A small body of research is, however, beginning to emerge. In an American context, it was noted that religiosity could be positively experienced in relation to increased communication between siblings.12 Eldest siblings in Turkey are significant in religious socialisation, with research describing the influence they had on their younger siblings.13 Adult women in England reported that their relationships with their sisters could maintain a sense of connection to their religious heritage that was a part of their family histories.14 While some sisters had kept, given up or taken on other forms of religion or spirituality, having this link with and through their sisters could contribute to shared rituals, memories and intimacy. Siblings can also help each other navigate and negotiate religious differences experienced in contemporary British society, becoming barometers of social and religious change.15 Sisters and brothers are, moreover, understudied for the ways they can influence and/or keep religious practices alive throughout their adulthood.16 This chapter expands the research on siblings and religion by analysing the interviews of women who were identified as Muslim and as sisters. Participants discussed imparting knowledge to and learning from their sisters about matters of faith such as how to pray, fast and wear the headscarf. The women also revealed that, while sisters encouraged and modelled religious practices, such dynamics were not without conflict and tension. Gender and power could play a role in the enactment of religious practices, shedding light on the intersection of lateral and vertical axes and notions of respectability. These influential Muslim sister ties though are hidden from view because of the focus on ‘the hypervisibility of Islam’ within ‘public and academic discourses’.17 More broadly, the religion lived between sisters has often been overlooked. The findings presented here highlight the importance of a lateral vantage point in order to interrogate the mutual shaping of religion and sibling ties, offering a new direction in examining faith, gender and families. Theoretical focus and methods The ‘lived religion’ approach frames this research.18 Lived religion takes into account the ways in which religion is lived beyond official religious institutions and how religion is practised in ordinary unofficial spaces such as contexts of work, leisure, education, home or nature: for instance, the act of reciting the Lord’s Prayer from the Christian tradition whilst washing the dishes. Meredith McGuire asks sociologists to think about religion ‘at the individual level, as an ever-changing, multifaceted, and often messy – even contradictory – amalgam of beliefs and practices that are not necessarily those [that] religious institutions consider important’.19

174  Sonya Sharma Lived religion considers how religion is embedded in the everyday. It also pays attention to religious practices. Practice ‘emphasises embodiment, habit and daily activity’.20 In thinking about religious practices, some contend that ‘they are activities that are intentionally articulated or acknowledged by religious groups’, while others who take a lived approach do not view religious practices as distinct from other kinds of living or social life.21 ­Robert Orsi argues that ‘“religion” cannot be neatly separated from the other practices of everyday life’.22 Thus, practices – including religious ones – are imbued with power in day-to-day contexts such as family, employment and education and intersect with the structuring effects of gender, class, age and race. Religious practices are not neutral. They are social acts that are individual and collective and are not separate from power relations. Some argue that lived religion opens up the opportunity to examine power and that which the dominant gaze can ignore.23 Similar to a feminist standpoint, the lived religion approach asks ‘what more there is to religion: whose lives, experiences and associational forms are being overlooked?’24 In examining Muslim women who are identified as sisters, their relationships and everyday religious practices are often invisible because they are in the shadow of ‘the dominant ways in which Muslims and Islam are depicted and represented in the Western imaginary’.25 It is the ‘public religious practices, Islamic political activism and institutionalised, public or semiofficial expressions of Islam that are studied, discussed, made visible’.26 The women in this research are away from the public gaze even though they discuss ­living with/in and encountering it, for example in relation to  the wearing of the headscarf. As in Nadia Jeldtoft’s study,27 the women in this research are brought into focus because they are living their r­eligion at the micro-level. It is in the micro-processes of everyday life that, ‘[b]eing a Muslim is not just something that you are but also something that you do’.28 The issue of doing is ‘doing Islam’, practising it in one’s daily life,29 amid the routines of home, family, work, school, and so forth. Just as David Morgan30 and Janet Finch31 describe ‘doing family’ as an ‘active, regular, everyday process’, likewise religion. Further, as Stirling and colleagues,32 and others argue,33 lived religion has largely been studied in relation to ‘Western individuals, often in Christian contexts’. This research expands the study of lived religion to bring in voices of Muslim women situated in Britain. Complementing the theoretical approach of lived religion is a feminist approach that centres on women’s lived experiences of being a sister and in a sister relationship(s). It is often the case that men’s accounts of being a brother, part of a brotherhood, or fraternity are more prominent in the public sphere, with stories of sisters and sisterhood less prominent, and confined to the private sphere.34 ‘Feminists are particularly concerned with getting at experiences that are often hidden’.35 The research presented here on Muslim women is part of a bigger study that has included Christian women who were identified as sisters and in a sister relationship(s).36

‘She taught me how to do it properly’  175 In what ways do sister ties influence religious practices and identities and, in turn, how do these affect relations between sisters? To investigate this question, a sample of ten adult women who were identified as Muslim and as sisters was recruited through known informants. The research took place in 2016. The women were an ethnically diverse sample self-identified as Pakistani, African, Arab, Saudi Arabian, Egyptian, Indian, Sudanese and of Mixed Arab and African heritage. All lived in Britain at the time of the interviews and were university educated and employed. Islam was investigated because of the growing population of those identifying as Muslim. According to the last UK Census,37 the number of those who were identified as Muslim increased from 3% in 2001 to 4.8% in 2011, with the highest proportion of Muslims living in London – 12.4% – where the interviews took place. The ages of participants were between 26 and 51 years old. Because of the small sample of participants, the study is not representative. Qualitative methods were employed to gather the women’s perspectives. This involved an individual interview and drawing a family diagram and timeline. For the purpose of this chapter, interview data is the focus of discussion as themes about religious practices emerged from this particular data. While there are different interpretative traditions of Islam, the focus here is not on these variations but on the co-constitution of faith practices (e.g. prayer and wearing of the headscarf) and closeness between sisters. The interview questions asked women about their family histories and religious trajectories, if religiosity influenced sisters’ sense of closeness and distance with each other and the kinds of religious practices they were engaged in, and how these were part of their sister relationships. Individual interviews were conducted as opposed to interviewing sisters together because of sensitivity to difficult issues and discomfort that might have arisen. Ethical approval was granted through my University’s Faculty Ethics Committee. The interviews were analysed through a process of coding, whereby answers to each question were analysed to create general codes and then line-by-line coding was applied to create more specific codes and draw out analytical themes. This chapter focusses on two overarching themes, namely, practices of prayer and wearing the headscarf or hijab, as well as intersections of lateral and vertical ties that could result in comparison and power relations between sisters. The women’s voices as a whole are represented, but some women’s stories are more prominent, exemplifying themes from the data. Sisters’ influence on praying and wearing the headscarf Within the home, mothers and fathers facilitate religious transmission. However, for many of the women interviewed, their sisters were a key source of religious modelling and support. Eshaal (age 32), who was identified as Pakistani and the eldest of two sisters in her family, said, ‘We encourage each other, not necessarily in a vocal way, but if I’m praying and she sees me, then she’ll pray too. Or if she starts praying and I see her, then I think I should

176  Sonya Sharma or will too’. On fasting during Ramadan, she said, ‘I tend to fast throughout the whole month and [if] she’s doing the same thing then we spur each other on’. Despite being taught the ways of Islam by their mother, Eshaal described a lateral shaping of religious practices through her sister: Especially when it came to Mecca [or hajj], the two of us did it together, with my parents. If I was being a bit lazy [about the hajj rituals], she would say to me, “Come on, you’re here”, and encourage me, and vice versa. Even though Eshaal was the eldest, she was influenced by her younger sister’s support and commitment to Islamic practices. In this sense, they are both ‘active agents who are mutually influential’ on each other’s religiosity.38 While women discussed influencing and being influenced by their sisters with regard to prayer, fasting and pilgrimage, their sisters were also important in teaching each other how to wear the headscarf. Mahira (age 27), who was identified as Arab and was younger than her eldest sister, said that her sister taught her how to wear the hijab: ‘She taught me how to do it properly’. Wearing the headscarf was often a point of similarity among sisters. In Kamal’s (age 29) family, she and her sisters, who were of Arab Egyptian heritage, wore the headscarf, and her mother started wearing it later on in life. Alima (age 32), who was identified as Saudi Arabian, saw it as a point of difference at one point in her life between herself and her younger sister: ‘When she was young, I couldn’t understand why she wanted to wear it’. Now they both do, and her sister says Alima is ‘not fashionable enough with it’, ­alluding to the proliferation of hijabi fashions.39 Several of the women who chose to wear the headscarf or not were supported by their sisters. Liyana (age 51), who was identified as Pakistani and the youngest of three sisters, explained her experience: Within my own nuclear family, I don’t wear the headscarf. In my extended family, my eldest sister always wears a scarf on her head when she goes out somewhere. My middle sister [for a number of years] wore the hijab, but then she decided ‘this doesn’t add anything to me as a Muslim; I can still be a good Muslim without wearing a scarf on my head’. So now she doesn’t wear it either … And I was okay with that. All three sisters came to their own decisions about the headscarf and were supportive of each other’s practices. Song, who has conducted research on mixed-race sibling relations, argues that ‘in Britain, Muslims constitute the main spectre of the “other”’,40 and hence even among siblings, ‘their understandings of who they are must constantly be negotiated in relation to the norms, discourses, and politics surrounding them in the wider society’.41 In light of this, siblings who took varied approaches to religion could find another sibling’s devout commitment to Islam problematic.42 While Liyana was aware of how the religious practice of wearing the headscarf among

‘She taught me how to do it properly’  177 Muslim women could be viewed by those outside her community, she and her sisters very much took their own approach, one that was a ‘personal decision’ that should have ‘nothing to do with anybody else’. In some ways, Liyana’s stance could be interpreted as being influenced by the context in which she finds herself being able to exercise her own religious practice in a society that allows for different religious expressions, and her family and sisters also reflected this attitude.43 The hijab is one way in which Muslim women work out social and religious identities in relation to non-Muslims and their families.44 It can also be a transitional tool in which women mark and renegotiate their religious practices and identities. The varied headscarf practices among Liyana and her sisters correspond with Sirma Bilge’s perspectives on religious agency and the veil.45 Choosing to wear the headscarf is not a binary between subordination and resistance but one that encompasses multiple positions. These are implicated in socio-historical processes and power relations, as well as in symbolic and material realities that intersect with social structures of gender and race. Just as the sisters chose different positions in relation to the headscarf, religion, too, is not lived out the same way by all sisters. There were different religious identifications among the women, but sisters nonetheless had an impact on their practices. Vertical and lateral axes intersect From a lateral vantage point, sisters encouraged each other in religious practices. Yet, sister ties could be lived along both lateral and vertical axes in which sisters negotiated responsibility and friendship, closeness and comparison. Within many Muslim families, the eldest sister is expected to help with and enact caring and domestic responsibilities. Sisters are viewed as integral to the transmission of cultural and religious practices and in home-making.46 Mauthner describes this process of caring between sisters as ‘motherly sistering’.47 Sisters experience ‘mothering work [as] a specific attribute of femininity [which], combined with gender location in the institution of the family and family power relations make it difficult to renegotiate caring roles’.48 Because many expectations rest on the eldest sister in Muslim families, there can be little renegotiation of this role and its motherly sistering qualities. Kamal was the eldest of two sisters in her family. She offered motherly religious guidance to her youngest sister: I always make sure that my baby sister doesn’t miss out on her prayers. She started noticing that I do my prayers, but my middle sister doesn’t. When my Dad told her off for missing a prayer, she would say ‘Why are you telling me off and not telling her off?’ She’s looking up to me as the one who’s practising and looking up to my other sister as the one who’s not practising and suddenly, she thinks, ‘People can not practise and still be fine’. I didn’t want her to get to that point and so I started getting involved.

178  Sonya Sharma In this excerpt, Kamal described the positive aspects of motherly sistering which are being ‘caring, nurturing, protective and responsible for’.49 She provided lateral religious support to her youngest sister when the parental teaching from her father led to conflict. Yet, the relationships Kamal had with her sisters revealed that being the eldest and taking on motherly sistering was not the same or straightforward for both sisters. With her youngest sister, she was able to enact this role more easily in relation to religion. But with her middle sister, because they were closer in age and compared for a range of things, Kamal found a way to renegotiate her motherly sister role to keep their relationship intact. Practising day-to-day, my sister is not the best person, but everybody has those times. I was better at practising daily prayers and all those things. I believe that was the main problem, conflict between her and my Dad all the time. He would always say ‘Why don’t you pray five times a day, your sister is doing it, why is it so difficult for you?’ … My Dad was always fighting with my sister about not practising properly and he always compared us, and I didn’t want that to become a war between us. As the ‘responsible one’, Kamal was good at school and good at practising her faith. While she was expected to be a role model for her middle sister when it came to religion, she did not want this to tear their relationship apart at home. It was enough to be compared in their schoolwork, without their religious life making it harder. She downplayed the importance of being a religious teacher as the eldest daughter and sister and instead shared a close relationship with her middle sister that involved sharing clothes, shopping, and social activities. It can be observed from Kamal’s experience that lateral and vertical axes intersected. Her experience also revealed that, as the eldest, she could reproduce and disrupt forms of power both placed on and expected of her. She resisted vertical expectations by shifting her position with her middle sister. Similar to other women’s interviews, as the eldest sister Kamal moved between parental and peer-like sisterly relations amid structures of religion and gender in the family. Further, the act of comparing siblings can be a way in which power operates within families. Parents compare children, and siblings compare parents and each other. Such dynamics can contribute to siblings disclosing or withholding information from each other. In this research, sisters noted that they did not always feel comfortable telling their sisters things. Often religion intersects with notions of respectability that are defined through feminine comportment and presentation, family honour and sexual morality, which in turn cultivate familial and social acceptance.50 Respectability and religion can operate together between sisters, acting as a ‘moral compass’ for appropriate behaviour, something Eshaal explained when she spoke about her relationship with her younger sister:

‘She taught me how to do it properly’  179 Well, I think that my friends won’t judge me but my sister may, and I think maybe religion has a part to play in that because sometimes there are things that you’ve done which you don’t necessarily think you should do from a religious perspective, or you’re not particularly proud of. I’m more likely to feel less comfortable talking to my sister about those things, because we share that similar upbringing. We share those similar values and those morals. So, she’s more likely to say to me, “Well, you were brought up not to do that”. Or that goes against whatever … I have very few Muslim friends. So that’s why in my friendship circle, religion doesn’t come up. They know I am Muslim, and they know there are certain things like my behaviour, what I do and don’t do. That’s fine. But it’s never a topic of conversation or discussion. Whereas with family, it’s different, especially with my sister, we’ve been brought up quite close with one another, and so she’s more of a moral compass when it comes to these things. Because of the intersection of morality and religiosity, Eshaal found it easier to disclose some things to her friends rather than her sister. In previous research with Christian women about sexuality and church life, some found it easier to talk to friends who were outside their faith communities, than to members of their families or religious communities, about topics such as dating, sexuality, and other experiences.51 This was because of fear of judgement and a sense of surveillance by their religious peers and families that can be felt externally and internally. Similar to Christian women, Green and Singleton found in their research on ‘safe and risky spaces’ in the lives of young South Asian women that Muslim women safeguarded their reputations and moderated their behaviour in public in order to manage and maintain respectability.52 Female family members can also perform a pivotal role in scrutinising women’s behaviour. Thus, sharing in private what one did in public with one’s friends could feel risky as Eshaal alludes to. From Eshaal and others’ experiences, the intersection of religion and respectability can be a way in which Muslim women survey and engender an acceptable position within their families and the wider community.53 Over the life course, power relations between sisters can emerge and shift because of ‘different ages, birth order, education and work trajectories and marital and mothering statuses’.54 Vertical and lateral positions between sisters can change depending on time, place and social circumstance. Elements of closeness, comparison and respectability also play a part. Thus, the power and relational dynamics evident between sisters are an uneven social process. Conclusion Muslim women who identify as sisters are important figures in the transmission of religious traditions and practices. Sisters nurture each other in the

180  Sonya Sharma religious rituals of prayer, fasting and other customs that are part of Muslim life. In talking to women about their adult sister relationships, they revealed how their religious practices continued to have a place in their relationships and contributed to feelings of closeness. Chaya (age 26), who was identified as Indian and as the middle sister, said, ‘Religion is definitely part of what makes us close … It is nice having someone to go home with and dissect the sermon with’. Yameena (age 39), the eldest of her sisters and of Pakistani heritage, stated, ‘We do a lot of religious and faith-related talks with each other … It would be different if we didn’t share the same faith. It plays a huge part in our relationship’. However, sister relationships were not without conflict, and sometimes religion could be seen as a source of aggravation. The women discussed the power relations that can exist between sisters. Sisters could be supportive but also act as surveyors of one another’s behaviour that can be part of the expectations of religiosity and femininity embedded within families. Muslim women’s sister relationships demonstrate that religion encompasses various activities and habits, and these counter the view that religious practices are ‘most meaningfully’ done and administered within institutionalised contexts and gatherings.55 Rather, sister ties are where one can observe and understand the mutual shaping of religiosity and lateral relations. The study of the micro-processes of Muslim sister relations expands the research of everyday lived Islam. Examining sister relations at this level ‘does not take for granted a priori identity of being a Muslim or to emphasise the “intrinsic Islamic nature” of Muslim life’.56 This research brings into view other dynamics involved in living out one’s everyday life as a Muslim. These are family, gender, the body, emotions, social life, and the spaces of home and neighbourhood. For several, one’s life of faith is not a linear trajectory but one of twists and turns. The women who were interviewed revealed this in their decisions to wear or not wear the headscarf, taking it off when they got a new haircut or when exercising and doing sport; how often they prayed, such as being more devout to not practising as much as they wanted to; to the kinds of faith activities they were involved in, which could all vary over a lifetime. As Mahira said, ‘Islam is different in every household’. It is also lived within a Western context where, despite Christianity having declined and secularisation having increased, religions and spiritualities are experienced and practised in multiple ways. Islam is lived moreover amid contemporary social and political worlds that can seep into daily faith practices. Levels of closeness and communication between sisters can vary over the life course because of parenting, caring responsibilities, marriage, a death in the family, and so forth. Despite the ebbs and flows of sister relations over time, there is much to learn from their laterality. The principal contribution of this research is its interrogation of the intersection of lived religion and feminist research on religion and gender, revealing hidden, intimate aspects of women’s lives. Mitchell argues that many forget how important siblings are

‘She taught me how to do it properly’  181 to the social histories of families, with sisters often tasked with taking care of younger siblings, thus having a profound impact on the psychodynamics of other social groups.57 Such histories of women’s lives often go unnoticed or are taken for granted. Bringing a lived religion and feminist stance to this research means that the micro-processes of Muslim women’s sister ­relationships are brought into view. They reveal the intra-generational and intra-religious impact of intimate faith ties on women’s lives and demonstrate how these are navigated against a backdrop of social and religious change. The lateral vantage point of sisterly life – its change and continuity – offers the studies of gender, family and religion a new direction. Acknowledgements The author is incredibly grateful to the women who gave their time to participate in this research and to Neus Beascoechea Segui for her generous research assistance. Notes 1 Jerry Z. Park and Elaine Howard Ecklund, ‘Negotiating Continuity: Family and Religious Socialization for Second-Generation Asian Americans’, The Sociological Quarterly 48, no. 1 (2007): 93–118; David Voas and Ingrid Storm, ‘The Intergenerational Transmission of Churchgoing in England and Australia’, Review of Religious Research 53, no. 4 (2012): 377–395. 2 Jonathan Scourfield, Sophie Gilliat-Ray, Asma Khan and Sameh Otri, Muslim Childhood: Religious Nurture in a European Context (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 3 Elaine Howard Ecklund and Kristen Lee Schultz, ‘Atheists and Agnostics Negotiate Religion and Family’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 50, no. 4 (2011): 728–743. 4 Vern L. Bengston, Families and Faith: How Religion is Passed Down Across Generations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 5 Juliet Mitchell, Siblings: Sex and Violence (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2003); Filomeno V. Aguilar Jr., ‘Brother’s Keeper? Siblingship, Overseas Migration, and Centripetal Ethnography in a Philippine Village’, Ethnography 14, no. 3 (2013): 346–368; Qian Forrest Zhang, ‘The Strength of Sibling Ties: Sibling Influence on Status Attainment in a Chinese Family’, Sociology 48, no. 1 (2014): 75–91. 6 Rosalind Edwards, Lucy Hadfield, Helen Lucey and Melanie Mauthner, Sibling Identity and Relationships: Sisters and Brothers (London: Routledge, 2006). 7 Servaas van Beekum, ‘Siblings, Aggression, and Sexuality: Adding the Lateral’, Transactional Analysis Journal 39, no. 2 (2009): 129–135. 8 Melanie Mauthner, ‘Distant Lives, Still Voices: Sistering in Family Sociology’, Sociology 39, no. 4 (2005): 623–642; Melanie Mauthner, Sistering: Power and Change in Female Relationships (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005). 9 Aleksandra Lewicki and Therese O’Toole, ‘Acts and Practices of Citizenship: Muslim Women’s Activism in the UK’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 40, no. 1 (2017): 152–171; Line Nyhagen Predelli, ‘Religion, Citizenship and Participation: A Case Study of Immigrant Muslim Women in Norwegian Mosques’, European Journal of Women’s Studies 15, no. 3 (2008): 241–260.

182  Sonya Sharma 0 Mauthner, ‘Distant Lives, Still Voices’; Mauthner, Sistering. 1 11 Mauthner, Sistering. 12 Layton M. Field, ‘Religious Similarity Among Siblings’ (MSc diss., Texas A&M University, 2011). 13 Gozde Ozdikmenli-Demir and Birsen Şahin-Kutuk, ‘The Role of Parents, Siblings, Peers, Relatives and Other Agents in Turkish-Muslim Emerging Adults’ Religious Socializations’, Archive for the Psychology of Religion 34, no. 3 (2012): 363–396. 14 Sonya Sharma, ‘A Lateral Reading of Religion: Christianity Between Sisters’, Journal of Contemporary Religion 31, no. 1 (2016): 51–65. 15 Miri Song, ‘Does “Race” Matter? A Study of “Mixed Race” Siblings’ Identifications’, The Sociological Review 58, no. 2 (2010): 265–285. 16 Sharma, ‘A Lateral Reading of Religion’. 17 Nadia Jeldtoft, ‘The Hypervisibility of Islam’, in Everyday Lived Islam in Europe, ed. Nathal M. Dessing, Nadia Jeldtoft, Jørgen S. Nielsen and Linda Woodhead (London: Routledge, 2013), 23. 18 David D. Hall, ed.  Lived Religion in America: Toward a History of Practice (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997); Robert Orsi, ‘Is the Study of Lived Religion Irrelevant to the World We Live In? Special Presidential Plenary Address, Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Salt Lake City, 2 November 2002’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 42, no. 2 (2003): 169–174; Meredith McGuire, Lived Religion: Faith and Practice in Everyday Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). 19 McGuire, Lived Religion, 4. 20 Courtney Bender, ‘Practicing Religions’, in The Cambridge Companion to Religious Studies, ed. Robert Orsi (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 273; Pierre Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990). 21 Bender, ‘Practicing Religions’, 281. 22 Robert Orsi, ‘Everyday Miracles: The Study of Lived Religion’, in Lived Religion in America: Toward a History of Practice, ed. David D. Hall (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), 6. 23 Linda Woodhead, ‘Tactical and Strategic Religion’, in Everyday Lived Islam in Europe, ed. Nathal M. Dessing, Nadia Jeldtoft, Jørgen S. Nielsen and Linda Woodhead (London: Routledge, 2013). 24 Woodhead, ‘Tactical and Strategic Religion’, 11. 25 Jeldtoft, ‘The Hypervisibility of Islam’, 23. 26 Ibid., 23. 27 Nadia Jeldtoft, ‘Lived Islam: Religious Identity with “Non-Organized” Muslim Minorities’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 34, no. 7 (2011): 1134–1151. 28 Ibid., 1140.  29 Ibid. 30 David. H. J. Morgan, Family Connections: An Introduction to Family Studies (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996); David. H. G. Morgan, ‘Locating “Family Practices”’, Sociological Research Online 16, no. 4 (2011): 1–9. 31 Janet Finch, ‘Displaying Families’, Sociology 41, no. 1 (2007): 65–81. 32 Nicole Stirling, Sylvie Shaw and Patricia Short, ‘Sifting, Negotiating and Remaking Religious Identities: A Redefining of Lived Religion among Muslim Migrant Women’,  International Journal of Humanities and Social Science  4, no. 8(1) (2014): 17–29, 17. 33 Courtney Bender, The New Metaphysicals: Spirituality and the American Religious Imagination (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2010); Mary Jo Neitz, ‘Lived Religion: Signposts of Where We Have Been and Where We Can Go from Here’, in Religion, Spirituality and Everyday Practice, ed. Guiseppe Giordan and William Swatos, Jr. (New York, NY: Springer, 2012), 45–55.

‘She taught me how to do it properly’  183 4 Mauthner, ‘Distant Lives, Still Voices’. 3 35 Sharlene Nagy Hesse-Biber, Feminist Research Practice, 2nd ed. (London: Sage, 2014), 190. 36 Sharma, ‘A Lateral Reading of Religion’. 37 Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2011). Religion in England and Wales 2011, accessed 30 May 2020, https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/ culturalidentity/religion/articles/religioninenglandandwales2011/2012-1211#:~:text=The%20largest%20religion%20in%20the,per%20cent%20of%20 the%20population). 38 Ozdikmenli-Demir and Şahin-Kutuk, ‘The Role of Parents, Siblings, Peers, Relatives and Other Agents’, 391. 39 Reina Lewis, Muslim Fashion: Contemporary Style Cultures (Duke, NC: Duke University Press, 2015). 40 Song, ‘Does “Race” Matter?’, 278. 41 Ibid., 278. 42 Ibid. 43 Kristin Aune, Sonya Sharma and Giselle Vincett, eds., Women and Religion in The West: Challenging Secularization (Falmer: Ashgate, 2008). 44 Claire Dwyer, ‘Veiled Meanings: Young British Muslim Women and the Negotiation of Difference’, Gender Place and Culture 6, no. 1 (1999): 5–26; Smeeta Mishra and Faegheh Shirazi, ‘Hybrid Identities: American Muslim Women Speak’, Gender, Place and Culture 17, no. 2 (2010): 191–209; Yafa Shanneik, ‘Religion and Diasporic Dwelling: Algerian Muslim Women in Ireland’, Religion and ­Gender 2, no. 1 (2012): 80–100; Heidi Mirza, ‘“A Second Skin”: Embodied Intersectionality, Transnationalism and Narratives of Identity and Belonging among Muslim Women in Britain’, Women’s Studies International Forum 36 (2013): 5–15; ­Madeleine ­Chapman, ‘Feminist Dilemmas and The Agency of Veiled ­Muslim Women: A ­ nalyzing Identities and Social Representations’, European Journal of Women’s Studies 23, no. 3 (2016): 237–250. 45 Sirma Bilge, ‘Beyond Subordination vs. Resistance: An Intersectional Approach to the Agency of Veiled Muslim Women’, Journal of Intercultural Studies 31, no. 1 (2010): 9–28. 46 Haleh Afshar, ‘Muslim Women in West Yorkshire: Growing Up with Real and Imaginary Values Amidst Conflicting Views of Self and Society’, in The Dynamics of Race and Gender, ed. Haleh Afshar and Mary Maynard (London: Taylor and Francis, 1994), 127–148; Deborah Phillips, ‘Creating Home Spaces: Young British Muslim Women’s Identity and Conceptualisations of Home’, in Muslims in Britain: Race, Place and Identities, ed. Peter Hopkins and Richard Gale (Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh Press, 2013), 23–36. 47 Mauthner, Sistering, 75. 48 Ibid., 75. 49 Ibid. 50 Beverley Skeggs, Formations of Class and Gender: Becoming Respectable (­London: Sage, 1997); Yen Le Espiritu, ‘“We Don’t Sleep Around Like White Girls Do”: Family, Culture, and Gender in Filipina American Lives’, Signs 2, no. 2 (2001): 415–440; Sonya Sharma, ‘Young Women, Sexuality and Protestant Church Community: Oppression or Empowerment?’, European Journal of Women’s Studies 15, no. 4 (2008): 345–359; Sonya Sharma, Good Girls, Good Sex: Women Talk about Church and Sexuality (Winnipeg, MB: Fernwood, 2011). 51 Sharma, Good Girls, Good Sex. 52 Eileen Green and Carrie Singleton, ‘“Safe and Risky Spaces”: Gender, Ethnicity and Culture in the Leisure Lives of Young South Asian Women’, in Geographies of Muslim Identities: Diaspora, Gender and Belonging, ed. Cara Aitchison, Peter Hopkins and Mei-Po Kwan (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007), 109–124.

184  Sonya Sharma 53 Marja Peltola, ‘Respectable Families: Discourses on Family Life, Ethnic ­Hierarchies and Social Positioning’, Ethnicities 16, no. 1 (2016): 22–39. 54 Mauthner, Sistering, 65. 55 Bender, ‘Practicing Religions’. 56 Jeldtoft, ‘The Hypervisibility of Islam’, 31. 57 Mitchell, Siblings.

Part V

Women’s Work

12 Does religious practice increase levels of economic inactivity among British Muslim women? A mixed methods examination Asma Shahin Khan Introduction Labour market outcomes are an important way in which the successful socio-economic integration of ethno-religious minority groups in Britain ­ is measured; economic inactivity is one among several of these outcomes.1 Muslim women are more likely to face labour market disadvantage than women of other religious belongings, and this disadvantage is greater in the case of economic inactivity than in other labour market outcomes.2 The economically inactive are those who are not in work, nor actively seeking work.3 ­British Muslim women are the only religious group of women more likely to be economically inactive than active.4 Labour market inequalities vary according to specific labour market outcomes.5 The research presented in this chapter applies this insight by examining a sub-category of economic inactivity: ‘looking after home and family’ (LAHF). LAHF is the modal labour market outcome for British Muslim women, explaining the economic inactivity of 57% of Muslim women.6 It is the persistent and significant presence of Muslim women in the LAHF category that sets them apart from women of the White majority and ethnic-minority women of other religious groups.7 Other categories of economic inactivity (sickness or disability, retirement, being a student) cause far less social and political concern in relation to Muslim women. High levels of economic inactivity among Muslim women attract policy and social concern for a number of reasons. First, low levels of economic activity are indicators of inequality and, specifically, unequal access to labour market opportunities. Recent research provides robust evidence that British Muslims are disadvantaged when applying for jobs.8 Second, low levels of labour market participation care are politicised, particularly when they are seen as the result of religiously informed choices by ­Muslim women and their families to conform to traditional gender norms. For example, the Casey Review, a UK government-commissioned review of social integration, expressed grave concerns that high levels of LAHF among ­Muslim women signalled a desire to remain apart from wider British society.9 Finally, and most importantly, high levels of economic inactivity DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-18

188  Asma Shahin Khan are likely to be s­ ignificant drivers of higher levels of poverty among Muslim ­households than those of other religious groups.10 Quantitative studies show that despite rapid social change since the 1970s, rates of economic activity for this group of women remain stubbornly low. Qualitative studies have not kept pace with the ever more detailed statistical data available on the labour market outcomes of Muslim women. Narrative accounts from economically inactive British Muslim women are either absent from discussions, or at least a decade out of date, which is surprising, given calls in quantitative studies for greater qualitative insights.11 Without a mix of quantitative and qualitative accounts, it is impossible to assess whether high levels of economic inactivity are a result of religious discrimination or religiously informed choices made by the women themselves. Whilst statistics can help us to identify broad patterns and trends, we can only begin to understand the choices that Muslim women make when they explain these in their own words. Using a mixed methods research (MMR) approach, in this chapter I investigate whether religious practice is a statistically significant variable in explanations of high levels of LAHF among British Muslim women. Beginning with a critical evaluation of the literature to explain patterns of economic inactivity, I then present an overview of the MMR approach, followed by my research findings. The statistical phase of the project involved bivariate and multivariate analysis of the LAHF outcome which included independent variables for religiosity, social capital, and socio-economic status. Statistical findings are then triangulated with qualitative data to understand whether and how those things that statistics cannot accurately describe and religious practice increase the likelihood of economic inactivity. Interviewees were prompted to describe and give examples of religious beliefs and practices in their everyday lives and in relation to their decisions around economic activity; the main religious practices that they spoke about were hijab (modesty and ‘covering’ practices) and salah (daily prayers). Existing explanations for high levels of economic inactivity: a Muslim penalty or a religiously informed choice? A question related to religious affiliation was introduced in the Census for England and Wales in 2001 and has been included in most national surveys since, enabling closer examination of labour market disparities by religious belonging. The religious penalty refers to any unexplained differences in labour market outcomes among religious groups after controlling for age, qualification, and UK birth. Analysing data from the 2005 and 2006 Annual Population Surveys, Anthony Heath and Jean Martin found Muslim women were more likely to be economically inactive than women of other religious belongings within all ethnic groups and that all ethnic groups of Muslim women were significantly less likely to be economically active than White

Religious practice and economic inactivity  189 ­ ritish Christian women. These findings suggest a consistent and shared B Muslim effect, or a ‘Muslim penalty’, on economic activity. Q ­ uantitative research has consistently shown that British Muslim women are more likely to be economically inactive than similarly aged, and qualified, Christian women.12 Within the labour market penalty literature, it is generally accepted that ethnic or religious discrimination explains a significant part of identified disparities in outcomes. However, because the extent of this penalty is greater for the outcome of economic inactivity (in comparison to, for example, unemployment), it is suggested that factors other than discrimination are at play.13 Some argue that higher levels of economic inactivity among Muslim women are caused by socio-cultural factors rather than discrimination. For example, in Koopmans’ analysis of data from the Eurislam Survey,14 a comparative survey of Muslims and non-Muslims in six Western European countries, they found that socio-cultural variables explain most differences in labour market participation between Muslim and non-Muslim women, whilst variables measuring self-reported discrimination were non-significant.15 Most often, however, socio-cultural factors, and other structural factors, are considered to act in addition to religious discrimination.16 In this chapter, I focus on individual (private) religious practice as a possible explanation for higher rates of LAHF economic inactivity among Muslim women. The inclusion of questions in relation to religious practice in national and international cross-sectional surveys is becoming more commonplace, because of increasing awareness of unequal socio-economic outcomes and wider concerns around integration among religious minority groups, for example in the Understanding Society (UK household longitudinal survey) and the Ethnic Minorities in British Election Survey 2010. The impact of religiosity on labour market outcomes in quantitative studies is, however, an emerging field supported by a limited number of datasets. Nabil Khattab, Roy Johnston, and David Manley make an important contribution: using the Understanding Society dataset of 2009, they compare economic activity rates between Muslim and White British Christian women and evaluate the impact of religiosity on the likelihood of economic activity.17 They hypothesise that more religious Muslim women are more likely to participate in the labour market than the less religious, on the basis that Islam is a source of empowerment and negotiation of traditional family practices (based on qualitative research, discussed below). Their measure of religiosity combines the frequency of religious attendance at a service with a measure of religious salience, and they conclude that whilst higher levels of religiosity do not significantly increase the likelihood of economic activity, they do not increase the likelihood of economic inactivity either. The selection of communal religious practice to measure levels of religiosity among Muslim women by Khattab et al. is interesting;18 communal practice is not obligatory for Muslim women, and there are low levels of female

190  Asma Shahin Khan attendance at mosques in Britain.19 In their examination of generational changes in religiosity, Siobhan McAndrew and David Voas find that being female is associated with higher religious salience, lower communal practice, and higher levels of private practice in comparison to men.20 I suggest therefore that the construction of the measure of religiosity might be improved with the inclusion of a measure of private practice as a better indicator of the effects of religiosity on economic inactivity among Muslim women. Measures of religiosity in most datasets are self-reported and cross-­ sectional; whilst they give us information on the frequency of religious practice for individuals and groups, this is only a snapshot of a given point in time. Cross-sectional data cannot tell us how religiosity might impact choices Muslim women make around economic activity throughout their lives, unless we make the rather simplistic assumptions that high levels of religiosity among Muslim women will necessarily entail adherence to the traditional patriarchal gender norms often associated with Muslim families, and that levels of religious practice remain constant throughout their lives. Recent quantitative research has found that the association between high levels of economic inactivity and preferences for traditional gender values is not upheld. In their analysis of the Worldwide Values Survey, Emma Abdelhadi and Paula England provide evidence that differences in employment rates between Muslim women and those of other religions do not result from differences in gender ideologies.21 The assumed association of high levels of religiosity with religiously informed gender ideologies risks playing into racialised stereotypes of Muslim families as deeply patriarchal and oppressive.22 Furthermore, it fails to consider significant ethnic and religious diversity in Muslim religious practice and interpretations, particularly around gender norms.23 Also, qualitative research suggests greater variation in the impacts of religiosity on economic activity by migrant generations than quantitative analyses.24 Detailed qualitative studies of the lives of British Muslim women (albeit now rather dated) have highlighted how their husbands and fathers have selectively interpreted religious texts to curtail their economic activity.25 More recent qualitative studies have found that younger (second-generation) Muslim women use religiously informed argumentation as the basis for negotiating greater access to higher education and employment within families.26 This is sometimes known as the ‘religion versus culture’ debate, where gender norms are associated with ethnic cultures rather than Islamic sources, noted most often among middle-class families.27 Research has also found that firstgeneration Muslim women hold different religiously informed beliefs around formal work than the second generation.28 Qualitative insights can help us to understand which religious practices are important in the lives of Muslim women and how these might impact economic inactivity. It may be the case that higher levels of religiosity are associated with lower levels of economic activity, and qualitative insights may reveal that high levels of self-reported religiosity are associated with

Religious practice and economic inactivity  191 adherence to traditional gender norms. It is important, however, that we come to this conclusion on an empirical basis rather than by assumption. In what follows, I triangulate quantitative findings with qualitative ­findings to uncover whether, and how, individual religious practice impacts economic activity, thus contributing to the limited empirical evidence in the literature on whether, and how, religious practice inhibits economic activity. I find that individual religious practice is not a significant predictor of LAHF among Muslim women in statistical analysis and that Muslim women themselves do not see religious practice as a barrier to economic activity. I suggest that because religious practices are often visible markers of sociocultural difference, they may well be sources of (unmeasured) labour market discrimination. Methodology: a mixed methods approach MMR bridges the theoretical and methodological divides between qualitative and quantitative paradigms and allows the articulation of different layers of explanation to create a holistic picture of the social phenomenon of interest.29 Within the limited examples of MMR in the examination of the economic inactivity of Muslim women, the contributions of Angela Dale and colleagues are notable exceptions.30 MMR is a pragmatic choice in light of the research question: whilst statistical methods can establish whether high levels of religious practice increase the likelihood of economic inactivity, qualitative methods can reveal how these practices affect decisions about work and employment from the perspective of Muslim women. The specific MMR approach taken was ‘systematic QUANT-QUAL’: the quantitative research phase preceded the qualitative; methods and analysis from both approaches were given equal weight.31 Quantitative methodology

I undertook statistical analysis using data from the Ethnic Minority British Election Study (EMBES) of 2010. The EMBES 2010 was a one-off, nationally representative, cross-sectional survey of the political and social life of five major ethnic-minority groups in Britain. Described as an ‘authoritative’ dataset,32 the EMBES 2010 includes an exciting range of questions for researchers of ethno-religious minority groups in Britain. The survey had 2787 responses in total, and 40% of the sample were Muslim.33 The sample for this analysis includes all EMBES 2010 survey respondents of working age who identified as female and were either LAHF or economically active. The LAHF category includes those unemployed for longer than six months; the economically active includes those unemployed for less than six months. Respondents who report other forms of inactivity are excluded from the analysis along with religious groups with fewer than ten LAHF cases. Therefore, the sample is composed of 934 valid responses within the

192  Asma Shahin Khan two categories of economic activity across the Christian, Hindu, Sikh, and Muslim religious groups. First, the association of high levels of religious practice with LAHF is assessed in bivariate analysis, comparing religious practice among Muslim women with ethnic-minority women of other religious belongings. Second, the results of logistic regression modelling assess whether a significant association between LAHF and high levels of religious practice exists among ­Muslim women when other relevant control and independent variables are taken into account. Alongside measures of religiosity, the models include control variables of ethnicity, educational level, age, marital status, migrant status, and presence of children, alongside additional independent variables: two measures of social capital and a measure of socio-economic status (source of household income). The results in relation to these additional independent variables are discussed elsewhere.34 Qualitative methodology

Qualitative fieldwork for this project was conducted between August 2015 and January 2016 in Cheetham Hill and Crumpsall, neighbouring urban residential areas in Manchester, UK. Both areas rank highly on the index of multiple deprivations and are ethnically diverse, with long histories of international migrations and dense concentrations of Muslims of Pakistani heritage. The Pakistani community is embedded in the area, both culturally and structurally: there are several long-established and purpose-built mosques and a range of local ethnic businesses providing goods and services catering for the communities. I used in-depth interviews to capture rich and nuanced data on the multifaceted and fluid nature of religious belief.35 Interviews can provide insights about everyday practices; these regular, normative, and often taken-forgranted activities can be of social scientific significance.36 Twenty-seven economically inactive Pakistani Muslim women took part: 13 first generation and 14 second generation. I interviewed Pakistani women only, to reduce the complexities of separating ethnic culture from aspects of religiosity.37 Interviews took place in the interviewees’ preferred location; this included private homes or settings such as local community centres. Interviews with second-generation women were conducted in English and in either Punjabi or Urdu with first-generation women. As a fluent speaker of these languages, I  was able to conduct, translate, and transcribe these interviews myself. Rather than using a structured interview schedule, I developed a thematic interview guide. This afforded greater flexibility to translate questions into other languages and greater responsiveness to the dynamics of each interview whilst providing prompts where required. The interviewing strategy was simple and effective, and followed the following principle: ‘simple designs that are parsimonious and well-focused are among the best’.38

Religious practice and economic inactivity  193 Quantitative phase: does individual religious practice increase the likelihood of ‘looking after home and family’? I now present findings from the quantitative phase of research, beginning with the bivariate analysis and then moving to the results of statistical modelling using logistic regression analysis. Although my focus is the impact of individual practice on economic inactivity, I also include results related to the other two measures of religiosity examined (communal practice and salience) to assess which measures of religiosity are most useful. Alongside a question about religious affiliation, the EMBES 2010 included three questions: individual practice, communal practice, and religious salience; all three questions had high response rates of 99%. The questions and response categories are shown in Table 12.1. To compare levels of individual practice between religious groups, bearing in mind small sample sizes for Hindu and Sikh women in some of the response categories, ‘daily’ versus ‘less frequently’ proved an appropriate point of comparison. For communal practice, those who partake in group religious activities once a week are compared with all those who do so less frequently. For comparisons in levels of religious salience, those who see religion as extremely or very important are compared with all others.

Table 12.1  EMBES 2010 Survey questions on religiosity: Salience and practice EMBES question [survey question code]

Response categories

How important is your religion to you? [eq4]

1  Extremely important 2  Very important 3  Somewhat important 4  Not very important 5  Not important at all DK REF 1  At least once a day 2  At least once a week 3  At least once a month 4  Occasionally (but less than once a month) 5  Only on festivals 6  Not at all DK REF 1  Five times a day 2  At least once a day 3  At least once a week 4  At least once a month 5  Only on festivals 6  Not at all DK REF

In the past 12 months, how often did you participate in religious activities or attend religious services or meetings with other people, other than for events such as weddings and funerals? [eq106_4] In the past 12 months, how often did you do religious activities on your own? This may include prayer, meditation and other forms of worship taking place at home or in any other location [zq106_5]

194  Asma Shahin Khan Individual prayer can mean rather different things for different religious groups. Salah (Islamic prayer) requires mental and physical preparation, including ablutions, specific clothing requirements, a clean space, and a prayer mat. Each of the five daily prayers takes place according to the position of the sun, marking sunrise, noon, evening, etc., and the prayer times change throughout the year. It is acceptable to make some adjustments if required; for example, it is possible to ‘make up’ missed prayers at the next opportunity to pray. This is likely to be different from meditation, which may involve simply finding a quiet moment and space to reflect, which Muslims might also do regularly throughout the day. Individual daily practice can signify a personal commitment to faith and prioritisation of the ritual aspects of faith, not least because of the personal organisation or adjustment required to undertake such activities at frequent points throughout the day. I found that Muslim women tend to exhibit considerably higher rates of individual religious practice than members of other faiths. 66% of Muslim women undertake daily religious activities by themselves five times a day and are more likely to undertake daily individual religious practice than women of other religious belongings. High levels of individual religious practice among Muslim women may be inflated because the survey question is subject to social desirability bias;39 respondents may have selected this response because it was the ‘correct’ response for a Muslim, but it may not be an accurate reflection of their practice. The question may also have been interpreted as religious activities other than ritual prayer – for example, beginning everyday tasks with a dua, or short verse in remembrance of Allah, is an aspect of Muslim religious practice.40 The measure of individual daily religious practice is significant when crosstabulated against LAHF for Hindu and Muslim women only. Of the 88% of Muslim women who practice daily, more are likely to be LAHF than economically active; the LAHF percentage for Muslim women who pray daily is 65%. Muslim women are more likely to be LAHF than women from other religions who undertake some form of individual practice daily. All women who practise infrequently are less likely to be LAHF than those who practice daily, yet there are at least two times more LAHF Muslim women than for other religious groups in the infrequent category. Across all three measures of religiosity, Muslims are the most religious group in the sample, followed by Christians whose religiosity appears not to impact their economic activity. Neither religious salience nor communal practice is significantly associated with LAHF for Muslim women. Although religious salience is not found to have a significant association with LAHF for Muslim women, it is associated with LAHF for all women. Therefore, both individual religious practice and religious salience are included in the modelling stage, and communal practice is excluded from the modelling stage. The results of logistic regression modelling showed that neither measure of social capital (high co-ethnic density in neighbourhood and friendship group) emerges as a significant variable that affects the likelihood of LAHF.

Religious practice and economic inactivity  195 In contrast to socio-cultural variables, the measure of socio-economic status (source of household income) emerges as significant and with greater explanatory potential for LAHF than measures of religiosity. This model is based on a relatively small sample, with missing values on some variables. Nevertheless, it is a robust predictor of LAHF among Muslim women. Despite the inclusion of socio-cultural and socio-economic variables, the models provide incomplete explanations for high rates of LAHF for Muslim women; this is unsurprising because unmeasured discrimination is likely to form part of the explanation for this labour market inequality. Although individual religious practice emerges as a stronger predictor of LAHF than religious salience or communal practice in the bivariate analysis, it is not a significant predictor of being economically inactive in the LAHF category. Data from qualitative interviews, presented below, provide insights into whether religious practice impacts economic activity from the perspectives of Muslim women. The impact of everyday religious practices on economic activity Drawing on Muslim women’s understanding of the relationship between religion and economic activity highlights the value of supplementing quantitative analyses of cross-sectional data with qualitative insights, demonstrating the value of bringing a longitudinal perspective to understandings of employment trajectories.41 The qualitative data show that the experiences of Muslim women are better described in terms of changes over time and life-stage, rather than in static and simplistic binary terms. However, the ‘big picture’ provided by statistical analysis remains essential to understanding the extent of the ethno-religious penalty and to identifying themes and research questions for qualitative inquiry. Interviewees were prompted to describe and give examples of religious beliefs and practices in their everyday lives, as well as in relation to their decisions and choices around economic activity; this allowed comparisons to be made about levels of religiosity among the women in the sample. The main religious practices that the women spoke about were hijab (modesty and ‘covering’ practices) and salah (daily prayers). Hijab is the covering of the head and hair with a scarf from forehead to chin. It is a visible symbol of Islamic belonging; both a source of empowerment and a source of discrimination for Muslim women.42 In an environment of potential prejudice and Islamophobic hostility for Muslim communities, including in the labour market, British Muslim women are subject to stereotypes wherein they are regarded as passive or oppressed.43 The hijab is also considered to be an indication of the level of religious salience and practice. Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor suggests that Muslim women who wear the hijab and pray are ‘practising Muslims’, whilst those who state Islamic affiliation but do not undertake either of the two practices are ‘believing Muslims’.44

196  Asma Shahin Khan Interviewees included 27 British Pakistani Muslim women, half of them first generation and half second generation. These women displayed a range of covering practices: from wearing hijab with an abaya (loose cloak, usually black), to women who did not choose to cover their head at all. Some women wore traditional Pakistani clothing in the form of shalwar kameez (loose-fitting tunic with trousers); wearing ‘ethnic’ clothing is an additional visible marker of cultural distance from British majority norms, in addition to the hijab. I asked all interviewees an explicit question about their covering practices; this meant that I did not make assumptions about individual covering practices – it is not required in Islam for one woman to ‘cover’ in the presence of another so the way in which they were dressed during oneto-one interviews might not represent how they normally dress in public. The question also led to interviewees talking about their religious choices and preferences in a way that seemed conversational. All first-generation women wore hijab, usually in combination with the ethnic dress of shalwar kameez with a loose-fitting outer garment. There was greater diversity in covering practices and dress among the second generation. Three of the second-generation women did not wear hijab, four combined hijab with ethnic clothing and four with ‘Western’ clothing, and the other wore hijab with abaya. Hijab-wearing first- and second-generation women spoke about a point in their lives at which they had made a conscious decision to adopt hijab, as opposed to covering their head with a light veil or not covering at all; for most, this was in adulthood and after marriage: I didn’t even wear the scarf when I used to work […]. If my husband saw an Arab lady he would say, ‘I like the way these women look, they cover their head outside’. I would say, ‘Allah will give me the hidayat [guidance] too’ - but I would say this just to silence him [laughs]. He never said to me that I should, never, he has never forced me to do anything. So I performed Hajj [in 2007] and then I covered my head, and then after that I wore the abaya […]. (Maqsooda, first generation) None of the women interviewed saw wearing hijab as a barrier to their economic activity, and there was no evidence of women being forced to cover in specific ways by their families or husbands. Second-generation women spoke about how their first-generation husbands had influenced their religious practice. Most second-generation women spoke about becoming more religious (praying daily, learning more about Islam, wearing the hijab) after marriage to a Pakistani-born husband. Second-generation women had discussions about Islam with their first-generation husbands and felt encouraged to increase their religious practice. Halima, a secondgeneration interviewee, describes how her covering practices, and level of practice, have changed over time and with the encouragement of her firstgeneration husband:

Religious practice and economic inactivity  197 [Before marriage] I was just like wear a part-time scarf […] read the Quran now and then and pray the Jummah salah [Friday prayer] that was it […]. He’s [husband] been very religious, he has always been close to Allah kind of thing and then he started saying to me Halima you know you need to read your namaaz, […] he used to say it with laad (affection) and pyaar (love) you know he didn’t say Halima you need to do this. And then there used to be a study circle in [the] Masjid (mosque) and then I started going to that because I didn’t even know what Islam was […]. I started finding out about Islam, I started studying more about it, researching about things. I started to wear scarf first and then the abaya came later and then since then I have been practising and I’ve been praying my five times salah. (Halima, second generation) Younger first-generation women, who were married to second-generation men, were less likely to talk about sharing religious knowledge and having discussions around practice and belief with their husbands. This may be related to a socio-cultural expectation that first-generation women are betterversed in Islamic knowledge due to their upbringing in Pakistan, which has an explicitly Islamic state and educational system.45 Hijab is not a static symbol of oppression; covering practices vary between women and over life-stage and between women within the same family. ­Shameem is second generation and adopted the hijab at a young age; she chose not to wear it in early adulthood and returned to wearing it in her mid-20s; her elder sister does not wear hijab, and her younger sister has only recently begun wearing hijab. She was nervous about how she would be treated in the public-facing role she worked in by non-Muslim clients and colleagues but found that she was not treated differently. She stated that her first-generation husband is ambivalent towards the hijab and is not convinced when she tells him that it makes her more confident when using public spaces in Cheetham Hill, where wearing hijab is common: I said to my husband, ‘Do you know, there is a massive difference in the way people look at you’. He was like, ‘How is that?’ I was like, ‘Because they look at you with respect, they do’. And he said, ‘You’re just paranoid’. I said, ‘No I’m not’. I said, ‘Seriously, they’ll say baji [sister] or they will address you differently’, and so from there I was like ‘Yeah this is for me, this is what I like’. (Shameem, second generation) Overall, hijab is a conscious display of Islamic identity and a declaration of commitment to the value of modesty in behaviour and dress. Interviewees spoke about the confidence and comfort they felt in wearing hijab and modest clothing that did not reveal their figures. Hijab gave the interviewees greater confidence in their interactions in mixed-gender settings, particularly

198  Asma Shahin Khan in their interactions with Muslim men, as a visible symbol and reminder of the ­boundaries of their physical and social interactions for themselves and others. In contrast to literature that associates the wearing of hijab with greater religiosity, not all women who wore the hijab prayed regularly. Shabana (second generation) stated that she did not qualify herself as a ‘religious person’ but she was dressed in a black hijab and abaya whilst being interviewed by a female interviewer in her own home. If religiosity was measured by observations of dress, then Shabana would personify a very religious Muslim woman. She said ‘if you see the way I dress, you would think I pray all the time’. Shabana explained that her choice to wear an abaya during the interview was because she was wearing her pyjamas under her abaya; she usually wears hijab with traditional Pakistani clothing in public. Shabana has worn modest dress since childhood and feels most comfortable in shalwar kameez. She began to wear the hijab at the age of 26, although her husband had asked to wear hijab a few years before that: I wear the hijab because I want to cover myself […] and I know it’s a good thing and that’s it. But I want to cover myself, I don’t like being on show basically. Like some women can wear tight fitted clothes, I can’t - I have to feel comfortable. (Shabana, second generation) Shabana does not think that whether a woman wears the hijab or not is an indicator of religiosity in terms of ritual prayer: ‘because I wear it and I know I’m not [religious], and I know!’ When I asked Shabana what she thought about the EMBES survey results, which show high levels of daily prayer among British Muslims, she did not believe the statistic was accurate. Like Shabana, Zara, another second-generation interviewee, did not think that hijab is a marker of religiosity but that some young women in Cheetham Hill wear it to please their parents and to give the impression of being ‘clean and pure’. Interviewees did not see wearing hijab as an indicator of a Muslim woman’s preference to work, but it may be a barrier because it can make them subject to religious discrimination. A number of second-generation interviewees remarked on an increase in religious discrimination from the 1990s onwards and most associated this with the Gulf Wars and the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States: I got a lot of abuse from young children, across the road we had a family, they’d only newly moved in and one of the kids was shouting for the upstairs window, and said that I was Bin Laden’s wife, he says, ‘Where’s your husband?’ He said, ‘What, can’t you find your husband?’ I said, ‘Who?’ He said, ‘Bin Laden’. I said, ‘That’s not fucking nowt to do with me!’ (Amina, second generation)

Religious practice and economic inactivity  199 The amount of racism that’s happening now, I have never seen the like. I think more so when we were growing up it was all about being a Pakistani, nothing to do with Islam […] it wasn’t racism about your religion, it was more you’re a brown face, you’re from Pakistan, you’re a Paki […]. Now it’s everything is about Islam, everything is … its hard […] from what I’m seeing there is a lot of change and a lot of hatred towards Islam. (Rizwana, second generation). Individual religious practice Individual religious practice is the most stringent test of religiosity.46 There was wider variation in levels of practice among interviewees greater than would have been expected from the EMBES 2010 data, supporting the suggestion that individual religious practice was overstated in the survey. All interviewees who adopt stricter covering practices of wearing hijab and abaya also pray five times a day; some women who wear hijab pray five times a day, whereas others do not pray at all. Women who prayed daily but not five times a day stated that the prayers they missed were Fajr (sunrise prayer) and Isha (nightfall prayer) because of tiredness; these were usually older women or those with young children. Shabana describes her husband as ‘religious’; for Shabana, being religious requires praying five times a day. Shabana does not regard herself as ‘religious’ or ‘practising’ because she prays three or four times a week, if that. Her husband encourages her to pray, and she wants to pray more regularly: I don’t know what you mean by religious, it depends, but to me if you ask me are you religious I would think you are asking me do I pray, am I practising. And I don’t pray five times a day so I wouldn’t qualify myself as a religious person … you have to pray five times a day to be religious, that’s why I say my husband is religious, he takes his religion very seriously which is good, I think it’s brilliant and I need that in my life. (Shabana, second generation) None of the interviewees saw individual religious practice as a barrier to economic activity. There is an accepted Islamic practice of making up missed prayers (Qaza). Additionally, many women recognised the willingness of workplaces to accommodate the prayer requirements of Muslim employees. I can still pray namaaz and read my Quran. I can think whatever I like in my mind. I can still make dua in my mind. Allah has commanded that we pray, he has not forbidden us from working, we should work and you can pray alongside, it makes no difference. (Kishwar, first generation)

200  Asma Shahin Khan Overall, the accounts women gave of everyday religious practice in their ­ households indicate that higher levels of religiosity are not indicative of oppressive patriarchal regimes. Instead, they described the sharing of knowledge and a shared desire for higher levels of religiosity as an act of self-improvement for the benefit of themselves and their families (particularly their children). These findings support those of Joanne Britton,47 and ­Katherine Charsley and Anika Liversage,48 who suggest that negative stereotypes of Muslim men, particularly first generation, are not always borne out in everyday interactions in households and families. The ways in which interviewees spoke about the supportive nature of first-generation husbands around religious practice presents a more positive view of spousal relationships within Muslim households, particularly those involving transnational marriage, and contradicts views that these relationships are frequently coercive and unsupportive. Religious practice did not emerge as a barrier to economic activity from the perspective of Muslim women themselves. Although overt religious practices such as wearing hijab and praying in workplaces may be sources of discrimination in the labour market, they were not seen as deterrents to economic activity from the perspectives of the interviewees. Conclusion: triangulating quantitative and qualitative findings on the impact of individual religious practice on economic inactivity The statistical analysis presented here supports the findings of Khattab, ­Johnston, and Manley, who found that religiosity does not increase the likelihood of economic inactivity among Muslim women:49 individual religious practice emerged as a non-significant predictor of economic inactivity for Muslim women. The lack of significance for individual religious practice having a negative impact on economic activity is upheld by the qualitative analysis, as none of the women felt that prayer would, or should, prevent them from being economically active. There are accepted practices of making up missed prayers in Islam, and most women felt that workplaces would be accommodating of their religious needs. The proposition that the question on individual religious practice in the EMBES was subject to high social desirability bias (overreporting of socially desirable behaviour) was upheld in the qualitative phase, where there is greater variation in the qualitative data related to individual religious practice than the EMBES data reveal. Importantly, the qualitative data suggest that the association of higher levels of religiosity among Muslim women with adherence to traditional and patriarchal gender norms in relation to their economic inactivity should not be assumed. Overall, the research findings presented in this chapter provide evidence that religiosity, in the form of individual religious practice, is not a barrier to economic activity for Muslim women. Prayer and hijab are both visible markers of socio-cultural difference; whilst these religious practices are

Religious practice and economic inactivity  201 not found to be associated with economic inactivity from the perspective of ­Muslim women themselves, they may well be a source of (unmeasured) labour market discrimination. The well-established association between religious affiliation and economic inactivity (the Muslim penalty) may therefore result from discrimination or from structural or socio-cultural factors other than religiosity.50 Socio-economic status was a significant predictor of economic inactivity in the LAHF category in the quantitative analysis, whilst religious practice was not. The findings presented here therefore indicate that the structural factor of socio-economic status, or social class, is a more fruitful line of enquiry for understanding high levels of economic inactivity in the LAHF category than religiosity. Certainly, the consistency of the penalty in relation to LAHF across ethnic groups and migrant generations would suggest that the explanation is most likely to lie in structural, rather than socio-cultural, explanations. Notes 1 Sin Yi Cheung, ‘Ethno-religious Minorities and Labour Market Integration: Generational Advancement or Decline?’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 37, no. 1 (2014): 140–160. 2 Cheung, ‘Ethno-religious Minorities’; Anthony Heath and Jean Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain “Ethnic” Inequalities in the Labour Market?’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 36, no. 6, (2013): 1005–1027; Nabil Khattab, Ron Johnston and David Manley, ‘Human Capital, Family Structure and Religiosity Shaping British Muslim Women’s Labour Market Participation’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 44, no. 9, (2017): 1541–1559. 3 Office for National Statistics (ONS), Religion, Education and Work in England and Wales: February 2020: Statistics and Analysis of Education and Employment Outcomes of People of Different Religious Identities in England and Wales, accessed 26 February 2020, https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/ culturalidentity/religion/articles/religioneducationandworkinenglandandwales/ february2020. 4 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain’; Khattab, Johnston and Manley, ‘Human Capital’. 5 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain’; Khattab, Johnston and Manley, ‘Human Capital’. 6 ONS, Religion, Education and Work’. 7 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain’; Alison Shaw, Kinship and Continuity: Pakistani Families in Britain (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic ­Publishers, 2000). 8 Wouter Zwysen, Valentina Di Stasio and Anthony Heath, ‘Ethnic M ­ inorities are Less Likely to Find Good Work than their White British Counterparts, Even when Born and Educated in the UK’, British Politics and Policy at LSE, accessed 19 January 2021, https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/ethnicpenalties-and-hiring-discrimination/. 9 Louise Casey, The Casey Review: A Review into Opportunity and Integration (London: Department for Communities and Local Government, 2016). 10 Anthony Heath and Yaojun Li, Review of the Relationship Between Religion and Poverty: An Analysis for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, CSI Working Paper 2015–01, (2015), accessed 22 March 2022, http://csi.nuff.ox.ac.uk/.

202  Asma Shahin Khan 11 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain’; Khattab, Johnston and Manley, ‘Human Capital’. 12 Cheung, ‘Ethno-religious Minorities’; Nabil Khattab, ‘“Winners” and “Losers”: The Impact of Education, Ethnicity and Gender on Muslims in the British Labour Market’, Work, Employment and Society 26, no. 4 (2012): 556–573. 13 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain’; Ruud Koopmans, ‘Does Assimilation Work? Sociocultural Determinants of Labour Market Participation of European Muslims’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 42, no. 2 (2016): 197–216. 14 Koopmans, ‘Does Assimilation Work?’. 15 Ibid. 16 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religious Affiliation Explain’; Khattab, Johnston and Manley, ‘Human Capital’. 17 Khattab, Johnston and Manley, ‘Human Capital’. 18 Ibid. 19 Katherine Brown, ‘The Promise and Perils of Women’s Participation in UK Mosques: The Impact of Securitisation Agendas on Identity, Gender and Community’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations 10, no. 3 (2008): 472–491; Siobhan McAndrew and David Voas, ‘Immigrant Generation, Religiosity and Civic Engagement in Britain’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 37, no. 1 (2014): 99–119. 20 McAndrew and Voas, ‘Immigrant Generation’. 21 Eman Abdelhadi and Paula England, ‘Do Values Explain the Low Employment Levels of Muslim Women Around the World? A Within-and Between-Country Analysis’, British Journal of Sociology 70, no. 4 (2019): 1510–1538. 22 Katharine Charsley and Anika Liversage, ‘Silenced Husbands: Muslim Marriage Migration and Masculinity’, Men and Masculinities 18, no. 4 (2015): 489–508; Joanne Britton, ‘Muslim Men, Racialised Masculinities and Personal Life’, Sociology 53, no. 1 (2019): 36–51. 23 Sophie Gilliat-Ray, Muslims in Britain: An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Jonathan Scourfield, Sophie Gilliat-Ray, Asma Khan and Sameh Otri, Muslim Childhood: Religious Nurture in a European Context (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 24 Angela Dale, Nustrat Shaheen, Virinder Kalra and Edward Fieldhouse, ‘Routes into Education and Employment for Young Pakistani and Bangladeshi Women in the UK’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 25, no. 6 (2002): 942–968; Parveen Akhtar, ‘“We Were Muslims but We Didn’t Know Islam”: Migration, Pakistani Muslim Women and Changing Religious Practices in the UK’, Women’s Studies International Forum 47, part B (2014): 232–238. 25 Haleh Afshar, ‘Muslim Women in West Yorkshire: Growing Up with Real and Imaginary Values Amidst Conflicting Views of Self and Society’, in The Dynamics of ‘Race’ and Gender: Some Feminist Interventions, ed. Haleh Afshar and Mary Maynard (Abingdon: Taylor and Francis, 1994), 127–147; Rabina Mohammad, ‘Gender, Space and Labour Market Participation: The Experiences of British ­Pakistani Women’, in Handbook of Employment and Society: Working Space, ed. Susan McGrath-Champ, Andrew Herod and Al Rainnie (North Hampton, MA: Edward Elgar, 2010), 144–158. 26 Jody Mellor, ‘“I Really Couldn’t Think of Being Married. Having a Family with Nothing Behind Me”: Empowerment, Education, and British Pakistani Women’, in Pakistan and its Diasporas: Multidisciplinary Approaches, ed. Marta Bolognani and Stephen M. Lyon (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 217–237; Paul Bagguley and Yasmin Hussain, ‘Negotiating Mobility: South Asian Women and Higher Education’, Sociology 50, no. 1 (2016): 43–59.

Religious practice and economic inactivity  203 27 Marta Bolognani and Jody Mellor, ‘British Pakistani Women’s Use of the “­Religion Versus Culture” Contrast: A Critical Analysis’, Culture and Religion 13, no.  2 (2012): 211–226. 28 Angela Dale and Sameera Ahmed, ‘Marriage and Employment Patterns Amongst UK-raised Indian, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi Women’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 34, no. 6 (2002): 902–992; Akhtar, ‘“We were Muslims”’. 29 Alan Bryman, Saul Becker and Jo Sempik, ‘Quality Criteria for Quantitative, Qualitative and Mixed Methods Research: A View from Social Policy’, International Journal of Social Research Methodology 11, no. 4 (2008): 261–276; Julia Brannen and Gemma Moss, ‘Critical Issues in Designing Mixed Methods Policy Research’, American Behavioral Scientist 56, no. 6 (2012): 789–801; Sharlene Hesse-Biber, ‘Qualitative Approaches to Mixed Methods Practice’, Qualitative Inquiry 16, no. 6 (2010): 455–468. 30 Angela Dale, Ed Fieldhouse, Nusrat Shaheen and Virinder Kalra, ‘The Labour ­Market Prospects for Pakistani and Bangladeshi Women’, Work ­Employment & Society 16, no. 1 (2002): 5–25; Dale, et al, ‘Routes into Education and Employment’. 31 John W. Creswell, Vikki L. Plano Clark, Michelle L. Gutmann and William E. Hanson, ‘Advanced Mixed Methods Research Designs’, in Handbook of Mixed Methods in Social and Behavioral Research, ed. Abba Tashakkori and Charles Teddlie (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2003), 209–240. 32 Anthony Heath, ‘Patterns of Generational Change: Convergent, Reactive or Emergent?’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 37, no, 1 (2014): 1–9. 33 Nicholas Howat, Oliver Norden and Emily Pickering, 2010 Ethnic Minority British Election Study: Technical Report (London: TNS-BMRB, 2011), accessed 22 November 2022, http://doc.ukdataservice.ac.uk/doc/7529/mrdoc/pdf/7529_technical_report_2011.pdf. 34 Asma Khan, ‘Beliefs, Choices, and Constraints: Understanding and Explaining the Economic Inactivity of British Muslim Women, (PhD diss., Cardiff University, 2018). 35 Wade Clark Roof, ‘Research Design’, in The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in the Study of Religion, ed. Michael Stausberg and Steven Engler (Abingdon: Routledge, 2011), 68–81. 36 David Silverman, ‘How was it for you? The Interview Society and the Irresistible Rise of the (Poorly Analyzed) Interview’, Qualitative Research 17, no. 2 (2017): 144–158. 37 Gilliat-Ray, Muslims in Britain, 209–211. 38 Roof, ‘Research Design’, 78. 39 Jonathan E. Brill, ‘Likert Scale’, in Encyclopedia of Survey Research Methods, ed. Paul J. Lavrakas (London: Sage Publications), 428, 429. 40 See Scourfield, et al., Muslim Childhood. 41 Heather Elliott, et al., ‘Narratives of Fathering Young Children in Britain: Linking Quantitative and Qualitative Analyses’, Community, Work & Family 21, no. 1 (2018): 70–86. 42 Emma Tarlo, ‘Islamic Cosmopolitanism: The Sartorial Biographies of Three Muslim Women in London’, Fashion Theory 11, no. 2–3 (2007): 143–172; Irene Zempi, ‘“It’s a Part of Me, I Feel Naked Without It”: Choice, Agency and Identity for Muslim Women who Wear the Niqab’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 39, no. 10 (2016): 1738–1754. 43 Gillat-Ray, Muslims in Britain: 211–216; William Shankley and James Rhodes, ‘Racisms in Contemporary Britain’, in Ethnicity and Race in the UK: State of the Nation, ed. Bridget Byrne, et al. (Bristol: Bristol University Press, 2020), 213–217. 44 Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor, Muslim Women in Britain: De-Mystifying the Muslimah (London: Routledge, 2012), 5–7.

204  Asma Shahin Khan 45 Katherine Charsley, ‘Risk and Ritual: The Protection of British Pakistani Women in Transnational Marriage’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 32, no. 7 (2006): 1169–1187. 46 McAndrew and Voas, ‘Immigrant Generation’. 47 Britton, ‘Muslim Men, Racialised Masculinities’. 48 Charsley and Liversage, ‘Silenced Husbands’. 49 Khattab, Johnston and Manley, ‘Human Capital’. 50 Heath and Martin, ‘Can Religions Affiliation Explain’.

13 Apostolic till the very end The contribution of older Roman Catholic sisters’ experience of ageing to the evolving identity of women’s religious life Catherine Sexton Introduction Some 20 years ago, I undertook consultancy work with a congregation of Roman Catholic (R.C.) sisters.1 Their congregation was an apostolic, or active, congregation founded to minister to young people, which the sisters had done faithfully for many years. Now however, with an average age of 73 and few younger women entering, the sisters seemed conflicted about how to continue to live their vocation to active ministry in later life and indeed what ministry itself means in old age. In private, they admitted to being exhausted and questioned why they were collectively driving themselves into the ground. They wanted to think differently about what ministry means for older sisters. Yet outwardly, they maintained an unflinching commitment to exacting ministries, based on an understanding of religious life whereby a ‘good’ woman religious is defined by the amount of work she does. Since then, in my work with other apostolic congregations, both in the UK and more widely, I have realised that this experience of being conflicted was far from unique. This is unsurprising given the contemporary context of Catholic religious life. Membership of religious orders of women began to decline in the UK and more widely from the mid-1950s onwards.2 Between 1960 and 2010, the numbers of Catholic sisters worldwide fell by 30%, and the decrease has been more severe in the Global North.3 By 2010, 49% of sisters in England and Wales were aged over 80 with less than 10% under the age of 50.4 The fall in new vocations has continued to the extent that many congregations will no longer have a presence in the UK within the next 20 years. This has led to the increasing use of the word ‘diminishment’ in connection with women’s religious life, and sisters themselves are only too aware of the absence of newer members coming behind them, yet it is not a word which sisters readily embrace. In my conversations with sisters, I noted they often preferred the language of ‘there’s still life in us yet’ and ‘we need to keep going until the end’. I interpreted this as a form of resistance to being defined by others, but also considered whether it reflected a fear of a loss DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-19

206  Catherine Sexton of purpose, entangled with a sense of grief for the numerical diminishment of their own congregations and for their own increasing physical or mental frailty. I was also left with questions about sisters’ attitudes towards diminishment and their reception of this as a descriptor of their religious life at this point in its history. Listening to these voices led to reframing my question away from diminishment to exploring how older and more infirm sisters continue to live apostolic life. I wanted to understand how sisters make meaning and sense of their apostolic vocation in old age, and how this contributes to the evolving theology and identity of apostolic religious life for women. In order to do this, I interviewed and drew on the lived experience and narratives of 12 older R.C. sisters in their 80s and 90s, from five congregations. In this chapter, I will present two factors: sisters’ initial training or formation, and the decline in membership of congregations, as contributors to the tensions and contradictions I heard. I will then explore how sisters make meaning of this, through what appear to be new articulations of ‘being’, as opposed to ‘doing’ in active or apostolic ministry. Within this, I acknowledge the widely recognised ministry of prayer, long viewed as the chief ministry of older sisters. In addition, I identify three distinct and emerging forms of ministry, through which sisters contend with ‘diminishment’ and the loss of active ministry and through which they move away from a task-based identity towards one of being apostolic. These are an emerging understanding of presence as ministry, an acceptance of the validity and necessity of ministering to each other instead of those outside their congregations and ministry to their carers. In this piece, I use the sisters’ own words but have changed their names to protect their identity and that of their congregations. Methodology and method Access to sisters

Four factors guided my strategy of purposive sampling in terms of whose voices I wanted to hear: the nature of the congregation to which the sisters belonged, the sisters’ age, the extent to which they were still in formal or paid external ministry and ease of access.5 Religious orders can be considered ‘exclusive institutions’ in that they are outside mainstream society and most readily respond to approaches from someone already known to them.6 I had been a sister myself for a short period earlier in my life and so had a network of relationships with sisters across many congregations. I began by targeting those with whom I either already had a personal contact or whom I could reach through a trusted personal contact. Using a snowball sampling approach, often employed with hard-to-reach populations, I conducted several interviews in two initial congregations.7 I was then able to approach less-familiar congregations with evidence that others were already co-operating with me. This led to positive responses from a further three congregations.

Apostolic till the very end  207 In all cases, the Provincial Superior played a gate-keeping role, particularly in those congregations less familiar to me.8 The Superior, in consultation with her leadership team, provided the names of possible participants. After gaining the Superior’s permission, I interviewed each sister twice, with one initial main interview and a second one a year later to present and discuss my findings with them in a form of member-checking or participant validation. Profile of interview participants

The 12 sisters interviewed were all retired from paid ministry external to their communities and aged between 68 and 92 at the outset of the study. Ten were former teachers who had taken up pastoral work upon retirement, one was a retired probation worker and one had worked in domestic duties in her own congregation’s community houses. Two sisters now had informal roles in their own congregation’s retreat houses, five were retired but still undertook some limited voluntary work in local parishes or schools and four were resident in care homes, no longer involved in formal, paid, or full-time ministry outside their own community, and thus limited to ministry within their own home community. Most of the sisters’ ‘activities’ were therefore largely home-based and domestic and took the form of relationship-based ministries with those living in and visiting the community. Approach to data analysis

I drew on several sources in designing the data analysis stages of my work. Most important was my belief in the value of women’s faith lives as a location for the ongoing revelation of God’s nature and actions, and thus as a valid site for theological reflection. I drew on feminist research methods and, within this, a deep commitment to reflexivity. This was particularly important, given my close involvement with women religious and also my own experience of discerning a vocation to religious life. I was acutely conscious of the need to register and disentangle my own emotional responses to religious life and my response to the sisters’ own stories. Therefore, I identified a method of data analysis which would allow me to hear and foreground the experiences of the sisters and both hold and distinguish my own responses – Natasha S. Mauthner and Andrea Doucet’s VoiceCentred Relational Method, with a relational ontology or ‘selves-in-relation’ at its heart.9 The method’s four structured readings of the data enable the reader firstly to hear her own responses and then read for each participant’s ‘I’ voice, listening for ‘how she speaks of herself before we speak of her’.10 The final two readings focus on reading for relationships, and for environment and context. I have argued elsewhere that I experienced the interviews with the sisters as a form of Holy Listening.11 I therefore decided to bring aspects of my own daily practice of lectio divina, or sacred reading, into conversation with my

208  Catherine Sexton method of reading the transcripts. Lectio is an explicit practice of listening attentively for and to the voice of God. Michael Casey speaks of the deep sense of respect and reverence for the text with which early monastics came to lectio divina, and I found myself engaged in a similar act of reverence in listening and reading for the ‘I’ voice and thus approached the work with a theological epistemology, in understanding my research practice as one of discernment.12 Such a theological stance felt truthful to my own experience and approach, and to what I perceived and heard from these women’s lives. Having presented the nature of my research encounters with the sisters, I will now turn to consider the first of the two influencing factors mentioned in the Introduction, the role of religious formation. This, I believe, was foundational in the shaping of sisters’ attitudes to work or ministry and a taskbased identity. Formation Entering a religious congregation entails a long period of formation, normally between 5 and 7 years, divided into an initial period, the postulancy, followed by 2 years as a novice, at the end of which sisters take a temporary form of the religious vows of chastity, obedience and poverty. They then enter the juniorate, a period of between 3 and 5 years, culminating in the public profession of final vows for life. The training involves formation in the congregation’s founding charism, character and spirituality, and some theological education.13 For the sisters in this study, preparation for professional ministry, especially in nursing and teaching orders, would have begun in this juniorate period, when sisters were sent to colleges and universities to train as nurses and teachers. The word ‘formation’ is used intentionally for, as Carmen Mangion reminds us in her historical work on religious life for women in the 19th century, ‘The identity of women religious was carefully crafted from their first entry into the convent’.14 There are two interrelated aspects of this formation, which laid the basis of a task-based identity and shaped how sisters in this study approach the role of ministry in their later lives. Firstly, they were taught to focus on the love of God, to set their own desires and interests aside, and that only continual self-sacrifice would contribute to the perfection of self and to the sanctification of their own souls, and those of others. This was the dominant theology of religious life before the Second Vatican Council.15 Secondly, this setting aside of themselves enabled them to dedicate themselves to service to and for others. This was done in imitation of and as apostles of Christ. Susan O’Brien, in her comprehensive history of the Daughters of Charity in England and Wales, writes that their fundamental purpose of service to the poor was modelled on the life of Christ ‘who worked constantly for His neighbour’.16 Sisters were taught to offer their whole lives and selves in service to others. They learned the importance of

Apostolic till the very end  209 work – of ‘doing’ for others in Catholic teaching and tradition as well as in their own congregations’ founding stories, and that an apostolic vocation can only be fulfilled through purposeful roles in active ministry, shaped by a work ethic and a theology of total self-surrender.17 A work-based identity Sandra Schneiders, the pre-eminent theologian of ministerial (apostolic) religious life for women, says that in the history of the development of this form of life, ministry has become intrinsic to what they are, which ‘is at least as important as what they do’.18 Although identity comprises many elements, there is a connection between the sense of worth as a ‘good’ woman religious and purpose and work. Work output contributed to the development of an element of sisters’ identity becoming strongly task-based. Both the Catholic Church and the sisters’ own religious orders have ascribed to them and shaped an identity defined by activity.19 Mangion, again, in relation to religious life in the 19th century, found that by that point in the history of religious life for women, ‘the professional identity of nun as teacher or nurse was firmly in place’.20 Congregations have always had to support themselves financially, receiving no support from the Church. Therefore, their schools and other institutions such as orphanages and hospitals became the main means of achieving economic stability. Sisters’ lives spent in service of these institutions, through congregational or corporate apostolates, contributed to the development of what Catherine Sexton and Gemma Simmonds identified as ‘an instrumental perception of religious as an apostolic work force’ in service of the congregation’s institutions and of the Church.21 Sr Pamela, a participant in the study, aged 81 at the time, described how, as younger sisters, they were defined and driven by what she described as a ‘work ethic’, which ‘they [the congregation] put at the top of their priorities’. Sisters spoke of not being seen as a ‘proper nun’ and even being seen as ‘a failure’ if they were not working and fully occupied for others in every moment of every day. This ethic remained with them into later life. The central dilemma facing ageing sisters thus formed becomes clear. The sisters in my study are forced to ask, as did Sr Maeve (85), ‘Who am I at a later stage in life when I can no longer “do”?’ This challenge of finding meaning without an ostensible purpose, facing ‘retirement’, is articulated clearly by Sr Beatrice (87) as she reflects on what it means to be an apostolic religious: The very word apostle - this idea of being sent out to carry the message somewhere … that is where the problem comes of feeling you have got to have a special job to do, no matter how small or how big, the very idea of being apostolic comes in, so how does it work out with being apostolic to the end?

210  Catherine Sexton Post-institutionalisation: an evolving identity The Second Vatican Council had an enormous impact on religious life and on the conceptualisation of and approach to ministry. The document of the Council which dealt with updating religious life, Perfectae Caritatis, called on congregations to revisit their founding charisms and re-shape their apostolates accordingly.22 Many congregations responded by relinquishing institutional-based apostolates, gradually withdrawing from the institutions they owned and served. This gave them the freedom to return to and explore their original founding charism and develop what came to be known as ‘ministries’ in line with this. The two decades following the Council saw a flourishing of new and individual ministries as sisters moved out of corporate apostolates, in a move from works of charity or mercy to individualised, justice-oriented ministries, working with the marginalised, in imitation of Christ. All but one of the sisters in this study spent their professional – or ministerial – lives in common institutional apostolates, mainly schools and mostly until statutory retirement. In later life, or after formal retirement, they worked in individualised ministries which reflected their own interests and gifts. However, the work ethic already so firmly implanted remained a significant part of their identity. Although no longer acting as a workforce to staff institutions, sisters continued to be driven by this connection between doing and identity, having absorbed the belief that work defined worth. However, this significant shift in the nature of ministry combined with a shift in the underpinning theology of religious life from saving one’s soul and those of others through work, to a life lived following and in imitation of Christ, opened the way to a beginning of a change in the sisters’ identities – what I term a post-institutional shift. Impact of congregational diminishment on older sisters Before looking ahead to the evolving post-institutional identity, and how and where I found this expressed in practice, I first want to consider a second factor sisters contend with as they ‘retire’ or enter that stage where capacity for active ministry becomes curtailed. The continued decreasing in size and increasing in age of congregations in the Global North affect the sisters in several concrete ways. Firstly, it means that this generation of sisters are often the first in their congregations without ranks of younger sisters coming behind them to continue the work and the congregation. This makes looking to the future of religious life with hope more challenging. However, many sisters are learning to accept the reality of the situation and place their trust in God. Secondly, it means that there are often few, if any, younger sisters still engaged in active ministry, for whom the older sisters can pray. Prayer becomes directed more widely for the needs of the world and for each other. Third, sisters know that they will not be looked after by these younger sisters, as might have been the case in the past. Finally, they are often all

Apostolic till the very end  211 ageing together and even, in some cases, ageing together in a care home or ­community. It is the third of these factors which is of most relevance to my purpose here, in considering how sisters adapt their ministry as they age. As noted earlier, this decreasing membership has led to a dominant narrative of diminishment of the life itself. Among sisters internationally, there are attempts to reframe this discourse, most notably to one of communion. Mary Pellegrino speaks of the need to replace this narrative with a more positive one: ‘a narrative of deepening communion’.23 Patricia Murray has drawn on Pope Francis’ theology of encounter to reframe an understanding of religious life around the concept of encounter with others, particularly with ‘the other’.24 Sisters embrace both these concepts of encounter and communion in the way they turn to each other and to their carers, articulating a depth of encounter and a sense of communion and mutuality. Personal response to diminishment I argue that the nature of their formation and the challenges related to diminishment presented above affected how sisters see themselves in later life. Although sisters claim to value ‘being’, striving to live life on a more contemplative level, this can also be construed negatively and understood as unproductive and self-absorbed, in contrast to work and ‘doing’. Sisters in my study stated emphatically that religious do not retire and that they do not see themselves as withdrawing from ministry in that way. If we accept Schneiders’ contention that religious life is not an organisation but an organic state of life, then ‘retirement’ as a concept is not relevant for these sisters.25 Sr Bernadette (74) illustrates this attitude: ‘Retirement? It’s a figure of speech. You entered this order to be of service’. Sr Dorothy (82), sounding more like Martha than Mary, commented ‘Well, we can’t simply sit around all day and fill the dishwasher’, and Sr Beatrice observed: We shouldn’t equate retirement with doing nothing just because we don’t work. Then we only say our prayers and go to bed early and have a nice little life. I think that’s the kiss of death to religious life – definitely. Reflecting this sentiment, most of the sisters believe that those who are housebound due to physical infirmity or living in a care community can have a ministry and see even the oldest or most infirm as continuing to be apostolic in some way, and therefore not ‘retired’. Sr Maeve noted that in her elderly community, ‘there’s not one person in this house who hasn’t a ministry’, including herself. I will explore these forms of ministry in more depth in this and the following sections. In somewhat contradictory mode, Sr Martina, the oldest sister in the study, aged 93, and living in a care community, was reluctant to acknowledge continuing ministry. Although she described herself as involved in what could be interpreted as activities of service or ministry such as prayer, visiting other

212  Catherine Sexton sisters in her community and spending time with them talking and ­listening, she claimed that this was just ‘a ministry for old age’. At this stage in her life, she continued to equate ministry with purposeful employment, such as ­teaching or counselling. Sr Bernadette noted that many older sisters still consider themselves to be chiefly valued for their formal ministry. Sr Collette, at 68, the youngest sister in the study, also confirmed this: We look at ministry as being out there, whereas we should really see it as here and now … This is ministry – what we’re doing now. That’s my understanding of it, but I don’t know that others would view it so positively. Becoming apostolic Sr Collette’s words point to a certain fluidity in understanding what constitutes ministry – a gap opening up between how it used to be, and still is, viewed, and how sisters in her situation now have to re-evaluate this belief. Although I found sisters continuing to wrestle with ‘not-doing’, I found that they were mostly either moving along the continuum of this shift in perception or have moved beyond a task-based identity. In this, they demonstrated a much-changed understanding of the ‘apostolic’ vocation and look back on the interpretation presented to them through formation as being too narrow. Sr Susan (81) acknowledged that she had understood ‘apostolic’ ‘in a too channelled way, like teaching, nursing, that sort of way’. These sisters had come to the point of rejecting the association between ‘ministry’ and ‘doing’ and often understood ‘ministry’ as helping others ‘out there’ rather than one’s own sisters. Sr Kathleen (72) now laughs at the language she used when she was young because ‘apostolic’ for her now means something less ‘done to’ people and more ‘being with’, through listening and accompanying. Sisters found James Sweeney’s use of the term ‘impulse’ helpful as a means of articulating that the heart of this form of life is an orientation or desire to turn towards others rather than doing things for them.26 Sr Kathleen again: The word ‘impulse’ actually helps enormously because it takes away the sense of work, as a defined work … this is really helpful because the apostolic impulse of our charism is to take out the good news that Jesus lives … and to use the word ‘impulse’ rather than work, frees me …: enormously … Over the course of their lives, the women’s understanding of what constitutes apostolic in terms of their vocation has changed and deepened, partly in response to their circumstances of restricted social influence. It is also the result of their lifelong commitment to conversion and to minister Christ until the end of their lives. They have come to understand their apostolic vocation in terms of being apostolic. As a result, they reject the association of

Apostolic till the very end  213 ministry/apostolic with a specific employment, task, or role, and in turn, the ­association between ‘doing’ and identity and work and worth. Sr Pamela concluded: So, in one way, you see, apostolic doesn’t necessarily have to be active, does it, or at least I don’t think it does but that is something I have come to and possibly because of how I can no longer do actively all the stuff I used to be able to do. Thus, Sr Pamela claims the continuing worth of sisters and their capacity to live their vocation because they have been able to overcome the connection between worth and doing and see themselves as being apostolic. I will now turn to where and how I found this evolving understanding and identity expressed in practice. Three new forms of ministerial response I suggest three articulations of this shifting understanding and identity among sisters in the study, in addition to the identification of older sisters with a contemplative prayer ministry. They have come to understand how they minister Christ to others at this stage of their lives in terms of being actively present through relationship, through ministering to each other, and ministering to their carers. Exploring the recognition of these forms of ministry demonstrates how sisters are rejecting a task-based identity and moving beyond the narratives of doing and of diminishment, to a relational identity rooted in their embodied self. Presence as being with and being for others

Sisters identify presence as both a ‘how’ and a ‘what’ – a coming together across the binary of ‘being’ and ‘doing’ inherent in the active and contemplative dimensions of religious life. Not only is active presence identified as a form of ministry but it also signifies an ontological orientation towards others and as such permeates and is even constitutive of their relationships with other sisters and their carers. Maximilia Um writes of the impact religious can have on apostolic ministry simply through their presence: ‘a contemplative gaze capable of generating communion’, by imbuing the situation with an indication of God’s presence and love.27 Sisters use ‘presence’ to denote being present to and listening to those who have no one to listen to them, in a world where, as they perceive it, this is so common. This too becomes relevant in their own context, where they must adjust to dependency and reduced social influence. They also describe being ‘present’ as an intentional orientation and openness to the other, an attitude of availability, and of self-gift, of evangelisation, helping to transform others as they themselves long to be transformed. Sr Pamela explains presence

214  Catherine Sexton as being for and with another, in a purposeful mutual exchange and a full recognition of the other: To be fully present to the person … to be aware, to look at the person, to respect the person for who he or she is, to bring out what is good in that person as well, bring out something positive, and to explore that and develop that within the person’s standpoint. Developing the explicitly evangelical understanding of presence as mutual ­conversion, another sister in the study, Sr Anne, explains this in strongly embodied and incarnational terms: simply by being we can be mission … We can be a mission … it’s being counsel … – incarnation – bearing the gifts and the purposes of God for His people. This entails drawing very deeply upon oneself so that the embodied self is a key resource, indicating that sisters bring something to a situation because of who they have become, experiencing the fruits of a lifetime committed to spiritual growth and conversion. With age come physical and social limitations, but nonetheless, an older sister may have greater personal and spiritual resources on which to draw so that that being present to, and with, is a coherent expression of being apostolic. Ministry to each other in community

Along with the development of recognising ‘being present’ as a form of ministry, the sisters come to hear a call to be present to and for each other. I identify this as a new realisation and, in some cases, a new experience, particularly for sisters formerly focussed on serving those outside their congregation and now faced with a new reality where most of their sisters are often in a care community together. When first asked, most sisters did not see caring for each other in community as a form of ministry as they primarily understood ‘ministry’ to mean serving those in need, ‘out there’: those who are not their own sisters. However, they have begun to realise that this is a call to which they must respond, resulting from a new awareness of and openness to the needs of their sisters. It is also the result of not having younger sisters who they will assume will take on their care. This constitutes a new turning to each other, asking how each is called to be apostolic in this context. As this need to refocus on each other can be challenging for many sisters, I suggest that there is value in recognising or reframing this as a new form of ministry, as expressed by Sr Maeve: I listen, I hear the pain of people, including my sisters. That is something else – my sisters … That’s new and kind of significant – charity begins at home.

Apostolic till the very end  215 Therefore, caring for each other becomes the primary way in which they live out their vocation. As Sr Bernadette says of ministry for her time of life, It’s a ministry inside the house: you can accept that and work on, either with the elderly there in helping care for them or do what you’ve got to do like here with guests. Nevertheless, you’re doing what you have to do but you’re doing it inside the house. This ‘ministry inside the house’ includes ordinary domestic tasks. For the more physically able, this might include cooking and some cleaning. Others exercise ministries such as preparing and leading prayer, being portress28 or even ‘the ministry of the telephone’. Sr Anne expands on the notion of being apostolic until the end of life, in one’s own home setting: While I’m physically and mentally able, there are contributions to community living that I can still exercise; there is the ministry of prayer and intercession, and there is the ministry of hospitality. So, I think we would never retire from trying to be good community members although our external apostolic ministry might well diminish. The continuing contribution to and celebration of the domestic are accompanied by being dependent on but in communion with others and helping each other on their way to God. Edward Collins Vacek identifies one challenge of infirmity in later life, to learn dependency: ‘those who have lived their active lives caring for others as their way of co-operating with God now must cooperate with God by letting God take care of them through others’.29 In this period of increasing dependency, the sisters’ self-understanding of being apostolic serves them well as they age, as they give increasing value to ‘being’ because they can no longer ‘do’. Vacek sees finding new ways to care for others as one of the moral priorities for an earlier stage of old age, and it is what we see sisters continuing to do in this later stage of life.30 Ministry with and for their carers

The third and final expression of ministry in old age is ministering to one’s carers. Half of the sisters understand their relationship with those who care for them as offering an opportunity for a very context-specific form of ministry at the end of their lives. Even in their own state of increasing dependency, the sisters in Sr Pamela’s congregation’s care community find meaning through this form of care: They see that they have an apostolate with the carers; the carers look after them, but they also look after the carers. Whenever there’s a carer who has some kind of problem at home, they will find somebody down there who will listen to them.

216  Catherine Sexton When I asked Sr Pamela if she thought the carers were aware of this t­ wo-way aspect of the relationship, she said, ‘I think some of them are. Yes, I do’, highlighting the potential for a two-way relationship of gift. Sr Dorothy, at the age of 82, moved into a care community during the research. Although she accepted that she needed to move, she knew it would not be easy. However, she commented that the move had been surprisingly positive, in several ways. Firstly, she described herself as being ‘missioned’ to the care community. This practice of being ‘missioned’, as with other sisters being sent out to any new ministry, imbues the transition to a care home with both a normalising feel and also a deeper, theological meaning. Sr Dorothy had also expected the move to represent simply a loss of independence, but to her surprise she found that as she lost certain freedoms, she gained others. In discovering that the use of a walking frame was enabling and freed her from certain constraints, she is both obedient to the new physical limitations in which she finds herself and also recognises that she is being presented with a new opportunity. It is a further example of mutual recognition: the helpers and the helped are recognising each other for who they are and what they can offer. This connects to a third element of Sr Dorothy’s experience, which was that she found a community, rather than the helpers and the helped, the dependent and the independent. Thus, the experience of mutuality within relationship continues into later life. Sr Dorothy recognises and responds to the opportunity to continue to be of service, in what could be described as an encounter with grace. Whereas she was expecting going into care would ‘bring a good deal of diminishment’, instead it’s opened up ways of ministry that I’d never imagined, and my biggest surprise … the staff are the ones to be enabled and encouraged, and I find this very, very interesting and something that never crossed my mind, but they are all human beings and they have needs and they all love to be listened to, and I just find that quite exciting really. More specifically, she identifies the quality of what she can do with and for her carers, who also need loving attention and to be listened to. Her final comment to me on this situation was ‘There’s room for growth there’, and the growth she was referring to was her own, as she noted, ‘I just think it’s exciting’. I have found that sisters’ outward orientation towards and awareness of the needs of others continue well into old age and its stages of completion or relinquishment. Sr Maeve (87) still keeps the needs of others in mind: Trafficked people, what they suffer... and the dangers for them today … it is something that I try to get involved in some small way myself, even though at this time in my life … but I think it is good to try as much as I can to focus outward.

Apostolic till the very end  217 Vacek views retirement as a time which ‘should first bring to mind … new opportunities for serving others’, and I argue this is how sisters in the study fulfil their vocation as they demonstrate this orientation to others continuing until the end of their lives.31 This is indeed an orientation that has been lifelong, nurtured during their formation, but done so through and in a taskbased identity. With age and changed circumstances, it comes more and more to define the sister, to become her identity itself, so that through this self, she embodies her mission of ministering Christ to others. Conclusion I fully acknowledge that in my work, I found sisters with conflicted and sometimes contradictory feelings towards their own ageing and engagement with ministry. In addition to an already recognised ministry of prayer, sisters continue in ‘ministry’ through at least three emerging and not yet widely acknowledged forms: the ministry of presence, ministry to each other and ministry to their carers and visitors. Through and in these ministries, sisters appeared to transition from an understanding of apostolic as task-based, articulated through ‘doing’, to one of being apostolic through and with their very selves. This is expressed through self-gift and concern for mutuality and reciprocity: a form of self-emptying for the sake of communion and mission, which offers a way through the binary of doing or being, and the active or contemplative forms of identity. These emerging forms of ministry challenge women’s congregations to explore more fully how life is lived in the richness of relationship with God until the end of life, whereby the response to vocation is not diminished in any way. They also offer insights into the changing roles and identity of apostolic/active women religious. The recent, post-conciliar and post-institutional period in the history of apostolic religious life for women can be viewed as a flowering of who they and their congregations were called to be, in line with the original intentions and charisms of their foundresses. However, it may be that this relatively small window in which women have been able to shape this form of religious life is closing as membership continues to decline. Women religious were never meant to be a workforce for the church, nor was religious life meant to be characterised by large membership, but rather by the quality and nature of the response to the call to ministry. These points are relevant to religious life which continues to evolve. This is illustrated by a comment from Sr Anne: So, I think to be apostolic is something to do with the way in which we are with people – people who try to follow ‘the way’ – we are people of ‘the way’, and to be as much as we can Easter people, people of hope; not always easy but that’s the ideal.

218  Catherine Sexton This increasing emphasis on how sisters relate to others, also noted by S­ exton and Simmonds,32 points to this evolution of a post-institutional identity. I  argue that the lives of these older sisters, rooted in an understanding of ministering through one’s converted, embodied self, offers a significant contribution to that evolution. Notes 1 ‘Sisters’ belong to apostolic or active orders or congregations, as opposed to ‘nuns’ who live in monastic or enclosed orders. They live without cloister and have an external ministerial focus such as nursing or education. In this article I refer to ‘sisters’ also as women religious, whereby ‘religious’ is a noun and denotes a member of a religious order. 2 Carmen Mangion, ‘Women, Religious Ministry and Female Institution Building’, in Women, Gender, and Religious Cultures in Britain, 1800–1940, ed. Sue Morgan and Jacqueline de Vries (London: Routledge, 2010), 72–93; and Susan O'Brien, Leaving God for God: The Daughters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul in Britain, 1847–2017 (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2017), 281. 3 Staff Reporter, ‘Number of Catholics in the world grows by 15m in a year’, Catholic Herald, 21 February 2011, accessed 3 March 2020, http://www.catholicherald. co.uk/news/2011/02/21/number-of-catholics-in-the-world-grows-by-15m-ina-year/. 4 National Office of Vocations of the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales and The Compass Project. Executive Report: Religious life in England and Wales. (London: Compass Project, 2010). 5 Alan Bryman, Social Science Research Methods (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 33. 6 Marta Trzebiatowska, ‘When Reflexivity is Not Enough: Doing Research with Polish Catholics’, Fieldwork in Religion 5, no. 1 (2010): 82. 7 Rowland Atkinson and John Flint, ‘Accessing Hidden and Hard-to-Reach Populations: Snowball Research Strategies’, Social Research Update, 33 (2001), accessed 16 November 2020, http://sru.soc.surrey.ac.uk/SRU33.pdf. 8 A Provincial Superior is the leader of a Province, a sub-unit of the congregation. 9 Natasha S. Mauthner and Andrea Doucet, ‘Reflections on a Voice-Centred Relational Method: Analysing Maternal and Domestic Voices’, in Feminist Dilemmas in Qualitative Research: Public Knowledge and Private Lives, ed. Jane Ribbens and Rosalind Edwards (London: Sage Publications, 1998), 119–144. 10 Lyn Mikel Brown and Carol Gilligan, eds. Meeting at the Crossroads: Women’s Psychology and Girls’ Development (Harvard, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), 27–28. 11 Catherine Sexton, ‘Method as Contemplative Enquiry: From Holy Listening to Sacred Reading and Shared Horizons’, Practical Theology 12, no. 1 (2019): 44–57. 12 Michael Casey, Sacred Reading: The Ancient Art of Lectio Divina (Ligouri, MO: Liguori Publications 1996), 4. 13 Charism, or founding impulse, is understood as a gift from the Holy Spirit which inspired an individual or individuals to found a congregation for a particular purpose. 14 Carmen M. Mangion, Contested Identities: Catholic Women Religious in Nineteenth-Century England and Wales (Manchester: Manchester University ­ Press, 2008), 90. Although relating to 19th-century England, this approach to

Apostolic till the very end  219 formation would have been experienced by sisters in this study and up until the time of the Second Vatican Council. 15 The Second Vatican Council 1962–1965. 16 O’Brien, Leaving God for God, 4. 17 Since the Rule of St Benedict, written in the 6th century, work has been seen as central to human dignity and worth, and to our relationship with God. It is also one of the seven principles of Catholic social teaching. 18 Sandra Schneiders, Buying the Field: Religious Life in the New Millennium (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 2013), 248. 19 For more on this topic see Megan Brock, ‘Force of Habit: The Construction and Negotiation of Subjectivity in Catholic Nuns’ (PhD diss., University of Western Sydney, 2007) and Chika Eze, Graham C. Lindegger and Susan Rakoczy, ‘Catholic Religious Sisters’ Identity Dilemmas as Committed and Subjugated Workers: A Narrative Approach’, Review of Religious Research 57, no. 3 (2015): 397–417. 20 Carmen M. Mangion, ‘“Good Teacher” or “Good Religions”? The Professional Identity of Catholic Women Religious in Nineteenth-Century England and Wales’, Women’s History Review 14, no. 2 (2005): 223. 21 Catherine Sexton and Gemma Simmonds, Religious Life Vitality Project: Key Findings (London: Heythrop College, 2015), 4. 22 Pope Paul VI, Perfectae Caritatis: The Decree on the Adaptation and Renewal of Religious Life, 28 October 1965, accessed 27 May 2020, https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/ vat-ii_decree_19651028_perfectae-caritatis_en.html. 23 Mary Pellegrino, ‘The Future Enters Us Long Before It Happens: Opening Space for an Emerging Narrative of Communion’, Presidential Address to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, 10 August 2017, Orlando, Florida, USA. 24 Patricia Murray, ‘Wineskins – Old and New: The Creative Faithfulness of ­Consecrated Life’, Address to the Annual General Meeting of the Conference of Religious of England and Wales, 21–23 May 2018, Swanwick, Derbyshire, UK. 25 Sandra Schneiders, Selling All: Commitment, Consecrated Celibacy, and Community in Catholic Religious Life (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 2001), 9. 26 James Sweeney, ‘Religious Life Looks to the Future’, in A Future Full of Hope?, ed. Gemma Simmonds (Blackrock, Co. Dublin: Columba Press, 2012), 139. 27 M. Maximilia Um, ‘Evangelical Mission’, in The Foundations of Religious Life: Revisiting the Vision, by the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious (Notre Dame, IN: Ave Maria Press, 2009), 172–173. 28 The Sister who opens the door to, and welcomes visitors. 29 Edward Collins Vacek, ‘Vices and Virtues of Old-Age Retirement’, Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics 30, no. 1 (2010): 172–173. 30 Ibid., 169. 31 Ibid. 32 Sexton and Simmonds, Religious Life, 2.

14 Looking back on a life of faith Qualitative empirical research with Belgian missionary Sisters Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen

Introduction A missionary Sister must not only love Christ. She must live Christ, with a heart as wide as the world. Dame Marie-Louise De Meester, Founder of the Zusters van de Jacht.1 A Christian life of faith is frequently associated with prayer, liturgy and ­devotional practices. For many, however, faith must lead to social action, and personal spirituality must be practised on a daily level. In this chapter, we will explore how Catholic women who devoted their lives to others by choosing to be missionary religious Sisters speak about their vocation and the relationship between their faith and their works of service. We focus here on one particular congregation, the Zusters van de Jacht, also called the Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Sisters’ voices and their thoughts about their faith and lives are highlighted. In the terms used by Helen Cameron et al., we are referring here to the Sisters’ espoused and operant theological voices as they emerge from the interviews.2 The Zusters van de Jacht are one of the oldest female Flemish missionary congregations. Founded in 1897 by Dame Marie-Louise de Meester, they are exclusively missionaries and have worked in many countries around the world. In Belgium, the community today consists mainly of retired Sisters: there are no new Belgian postulants. Worldwide, the congregation is still welcoming vocations. This chapter looks at the nature of the Sisters’ specifically missionary vocation. It examines how they evaluate their original missionary intentions when looking back on their lives. It also considers their different faith practices. All of them were living out the original charism expressed by the founder to serve the poorest of the poor, particularly women and children, but expressed in different ways. In particular, we look at how faith led to practice and practice to faith in the lives of the Sisters, and the diverse ways that faith and religious vocation can be expressed and located in daily life. We examine how everyday encounters in the mission field engendered or changed their faith. DOI: 10.4324/9781003228431-20

Looking back on a life of faith  221 This close relationship between faith and practice (in serving the poorest in society) is one of the reasons missionaries are admired within Belgian society. Recently, in the light of post-colonial reflections, a more critical position may be adopted which highlights missionary complicity in the colonial project. Missionaries have been referred to as the third member of the Holy Trinity of colonialism, alongside industry and the State.3 In listening to the Sisters’ voices and reflections on their positive intentions, and considering the relationship between faith and practice, we will also investigate whether the Sisters have reflected on their roles in the colonial project. This chapter considers how the positive intentions of lived faith in service and post-colonial critique of missionary activities can be looked at together. Context: listening to female missionary voices The interviews on which this chapter is based were undertaken by Jane McBride in 2019/2020, as part of her doctoral research. They can be considered as a form of oral history, recording the stories and opinions of religious missionary Sisters.4 This research offers a contribution to missionary history by ­retrieving the voices and describing the roles of women who have frequently been ignored. Although there has been recent research into the history of women in the missions, much of this research has dealt with the role of Protestant missionary women. The Catholic perspective has been less widely covered.5 In addition, the contribution of religious Sisters within mission history has been neglected.6 This is remarkable, given the fascinating and unique niche occupied by religious Sisters in mission historiography from the earliest days of colonialism and empire. As members of a patriarchal church with clear views on gender roles, religious Sisters complicate the picture by their work. Using whatever agency they could claim, they endeavour to improve the lives of indigenous women in the missions.7 An examination of their lives and work is therefore important for an understanding of mission history as a whole. The diversity of faith practices within the Sisters’ congregation can be illustrated using extracts from their life stories. The Sisters recounted memories of their time abroad and how they shared their faith in their various contexts. Five Sisters are highlighted in this chapter, whose accounts express how particular aspects of their lives and work embody different expressions of faith in practice. Research methodology To lead into the Sisters’ stories, there follows a brief overview of the research methodology used. The practices discussed have emerged from a feminist, qualitative research project based on semi-structured interviews with 16 of the Belgian Sisters. This project offers the unique perspective of the Sisters’ personally expressed motivations for choosing to exercise their faith by becoming missionaries.8 All those interviewed are now retired and living in

222  Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen or around Leuven, Flanders, Belgium. Interviews undertaken with the Sisters focused on their views on vocation, spirituality, missionary experiences and being a woman and a Sister. Each interview lasted, on average, 60 minutes. Voice-centred analysis was used.9 Particular attention was paid to the Sisters’ upbringing and how it influenced their vocation (since this was a subject of importance for those interviewed). The Sisters spoke about their roles in the missions, the people with whom they worked and whether or not the post-/colonial context or their gender affected their work. In addition, Jane asked whether, in retrospect, the Sisters had spiritual insights to share and whether they would change anything about their lives if they could. The interviews were participant-led, respecting the stories the Sisters wanted to tell and highlighting the points they raised as important. Seeing this research as a feminist research endeavour, in this spirit, Jane wished to identify her location in relation to that of the participants and was conscious throughout of possible bias regarding her own religious stance.10 The aim of the research was stated as being to share the unheard voices and stories of the Sisters and to preserve their names and accounts for posterity. In addition, the interpretation and analysis were conducted with a conscious effort not to distort the first-hand statements of the Sisters. The interviews were mostly in Dutch, with only two Sisters saying they preferred to speak English.11 Brief history of the congregation of the Zusters van de Jacht The Zusters van de Jacht had no previous incarnation in Belgium as teachers, nurses or contemplatives, and they were not a branch of an already existing male missionary congregation. Their charism is described in the congregation’s Constitutions as ‘Ad Gentes – to announce the Gospel of Christ through the word of God and the witness of their lives, to all who do not yet know Jesus’.12 In addition, the Constitutions state that the Sisters will remain loyal to the charism and spirituality of the founder, ‘doing all that they can to live out their call as Sisters and as missionaries. This entails nurturing a deep spirituality coupled with a fearless apostolic fervour’.13 Dame Marie-Louise De Meester, the founder, began her religious life as a canoness of Saint Augustine, which was a contemplative and teaching congregation. Her original vocation had been to missionary service, but she had been dissuaded by her spiritual director from exercising that particular ­calling – a rare one for women at that time. She linked the class at the convent school in which she taught with an orphanage in India. She was then keen to travel to India to help run it when requested to do so by the orphanage’s priest in charge. Refused permission by her bishop in Belgium, in 1879, she travelled to India anyway, thus began many years of fighting to exercise the vocation she felt God had called her to, in the face of opposition from ecclesial authorities.14 The Sisters in this research are in many ways different from one another, but all share a specific calling to missionary work. They have expressed

Looking back on a life of faith  223 this calling in different ways, depending on their particular skills as nurses, teachers, social workers, midwives, lawyers and human rights’ activists. ­ However, it seems to be, intriguingly, the same calling in essence: one of service to those the world considers to be the least, the last and the lost. The life and work of the founder, characterised as it was by a need for flexibility, spontaneity and creativity, has clearly left its mark with them. Faith in practice Each Sister brings personal insights to the intrinsic link between their faith and its practice. For them, their faith only makes real sense when expressed practically. Each life story is extremely personal and the women’s personalities vary, from quiet and introverted to more outgoing and garrulous, and everything in between. Each of them recounts having to take the initiative for new projects in the missions, and one Sister described their lives in retirement as ‘interesting given that every one of us is a leader and no one is used to being led’.15 The Sisters were drawn to the missionary congregation not just because they wanted to go abroad and work among the very poor but because there was something attractive and, they felt, different about the way the Sisters lived. Sister Jeanne describes her tour of various convents, torn between a contemplative and missionary vocation: I got right to the door of the contemplative congregation, and I saw them gesturing to one another in a kind of sign language and I thought, how ridiculous, and turned and went away […] And we had a crisis with the youth group. We were going camping and we found we had no cutlery or plates and so I thought I would put some of the convents to the test, see if they would help us, see how flexible they would be in a crisis. […] at the Jacht, they came back to us with a creative solution, gave us half their kitchen supplies and said they would eat in shifts that weekend so that we could borrow their stuff. And I thought - that’s the place for me, adaptable in the face of the unexpected. As will be seen in the more detailed account of Sister Jeanne’s life, this flexibility was something she sought to implement in her own work. An approach to basic daily needs that was not rigid and rule-bound, but spontaneous and adaptable, led her to look beyond her teaching and pastoral care roles. She became engaged politically, fighting for change in the situations of extreme injustice and exploitation experienced by domestic workers in India. Individual expressions of faith in practice The Sisters were clear that theirs was a missionary vocation and that this was how they wanted to live out their faith. They did not want to join

224  Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen a  contemplative congregation centred on prayer and liturgy (although, as Sister Jeanne’s story illustrates, some Sisters did explore other possibilities before discovering the Jacht). The missionary work took different forms, expressed in this chapter by four key themes: inculturation, solidarity with women and children, prison reform and empowerment through education. There are other examples and expressions of faith in action expressed in other interviews but most can be contained within these overarching terms. Sister Rosa in Taiwan: inculturation

If you drive in the early morning up to the mother house of the Sisters, you might see Sister Rosa doing tai chi on the lawn outside. This is something she learned from her 45 years in Taiwan and is, as she explained, an important part of her spiritual life today, along with Zen meditation and more traditional Christian spiritual reading. When in Taiwan working alongside young girls, she went with them to the Buddhist temple and felt moved by the beauty of ritual she encountered there. She describes how this came as a ‘religious shock’ to her and, given the importance of these forms of worship to those among whom she worked, she did not dismiss them out of hand. It was such a beautiful liturgy, so solemn […] and then that got me thinking […] about the question in the Gospels - are you the promised one or should we wait for someone else? What does all this mean? […] Finally I got an answer, the answer Jesus gave to his disciples - look at what is happening, the deaf hear, the blind see and the lame walk and then the deep realisation dawned that I was the one who was blind and deaf and lame, that I was proclaiming a Jesus whom I didn’t know. And something happened inside me that opened me up to read the Gospels with a new heart. Sister Rosa extends her understanding of the influence and power of God beyond the limits of her own faith tradition in the Roman Catholic Church. From that day on, whilst remaining a devout Catholic to the core, she included some Buddhist practices (such as visiting a temple with some of the girls in her care), in her own personal devotions as a way of expressing solidarity with those she was serving. She feels that opening her mind to the importance of Buddhist beliefs and practices for the local population made her a more compassionate missionary. Sister Rosa felt she could love Jesus and, at the same time, appreciate Buddhism. Her tai chi and Zen meditation are part of the legacy of spiritual practice she feels she received as a ­missionary from the traditions of those she met in Taiwan. The idea of faith sharing as a two-way process is one that recurs throughout the Sisters’ narratives. This required an open-hearted approach that was prepared to relinquish control and let go of any fear of what inculturation might mean for the missionary. Having embraced difference, a space was

Looking back on a life of faith  225 created for mutual learning and sharing – an inclusive space, with benefits for all involved. Sister Jeanne in India: solidarity with women and children

Sister Jeanne went to India to work with deaf and blind children. She soon realised that there was an invisible group among the population working inside the homes of the rich, namely, very poor women and often young children working as house servants. They were abused and exploited, but no one could reach them since they never emerged. She immediately knew she had come to India to help these people. She began what today has become the National Domestic Workers’ Movement in India, starting with three people at a house meeting and expanding to a membership of two million, and growing, today. As a result of her work, a new convention has been drawn up and approved by the International Labour Organisation, recognising that domestic labour should be governed by the same rules as any other type of work. This has radically transformed the lives of huge numbers of people. Sister Jeanne describes it as a solidarity movement: The people came and asked me to help them and I said - we will find a solution together - but they were set against one another by their bosses, because there would always be someone else who would take their job if they proved difficult and then their children would starve - but when they came together they discovered they were all in the same boat - and that was the beginning of solidarity which remains the strength of the movement today. Sister Jeanne has been able to break some of the destructive patterns that prevent social change, namely, the fear and division sown by those who exploit their workforce and threaten them with loss of livelihood should they protest their circumstances. Her method is simple: she creates community. One of the reasons she feels able to exercise her faith in this politically active way is her shared background with many of the other Sisters. They belonged to a church youth movement which encouraged solidarity and provided young people with role models for social work and work with the poor. In Belgium, the Christian youth movements were inspired by the life and work of Joseph-Léon Cardijn (1882–1967), a Belgian cardinal, and political and social scientist. He began a youth movement known today as the Christian Youth Workers’ Movement, which started among young industrial workers in Brussels, with the mission of encouraging working-class lay people to discover their own calling and evangelise those around them. His movement spread internationally, and he was cited by three of the Sisters as having influenced them by his ‘see–judge–act’ approach to social work.16 Sister Jeanne describes how she put this method into practice in her early days in India when trying to encourage groups of children from different

226  Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen schools to play together and trying to overcome the caste system at the same time. When nothing was working, she says, I thought about the Cardijn method, ‘see – judge – act’. […] I said, look, I have the feeling that there is something else going on here so let’s do things differently. Everyone go home with someone new for half an hour after school and then come back and tell me how it was. […] When they came back they were completely amazed. The richer ones said, these poor kids, when they get home they have to sell flowers or deliver leaflets, they don’t have electricity, they have to look after little kids. They needed to be confronted with poverty and exclusion in their midst. Sister Jeanne’s political engagement was a natural extension of her Christian upbringing and its association with youth work and social activism. It is directly linked to her faith. She describes one of her favourite Bible passages, which inspired her life’s work: What I find important in the resurrection narrative is the fact that Mary went out early to the tomb, when it was still dark. […] That is my approach and I dare to interpret that for me - it isn’t clear at the start because it is still dark, but I’ve acted like that time after time in my life. Sister Jeanne feels empowered by the Gospel story to dare to step out faithfully into the unknown. She is able to work with and through women easily and is frank in her admiration of how open the women in India are to new and ground-breaking approaches. She is further helped by her attachment to the concept of Jesus as Emmanuel, God-with-us, immanent rather than transcendent, who is with people in the small and messy everyday details of their lives. Emmanuel, God-with-us, you can feel that power, that marvellous power in the movement. Things happen where you say, we didn’t plan for that to happen but it suddenly just does. Back then we would have called it ‘provision’. The power is there, and it works through the women. Sister Rita in Cameroon: prison reform

Sister Rita trained and worked as a lawyer before joining the congregation and going out to work in Cameroon. She worked alongside a local bishop who had received letters from prisoners asking for help. She relates that the prison system was corrupt and inefficient, and many people were imprisoned for years, awaiting trial in terrible conditions. Sister Rita’s call began with what she calls ‘feelings of unrest’ at the age of 24 and a desire to deepen

Looking back on a life of faith  227 her faith and study theology. Working in human rights in Cameroon felt like a natural extension of her legal training, and she was deeply fulfilled in ­integrating the different strands of her personality into her vocation as a religious Sister engaged in social work and prison reform. She was delighted to be directly involved in one of Jesus’ express commissions, ‘to set the prisoners free’. In Cameroon you are dropped in a prison and the process drags on and I wrote, and I had a prisoner, also a lawyer, he became my friend - me outside and he inside the prison. And he checked for me those who were more than one year in prison without a trial […] and I wrote to the Minister - I drafted a letter which the Bishop always signed […] from church authorities addressed to the Minister of Justice […] and that worked! It is clear from Sister Rita’s account that huge energy and patience were required to keep faith with the corrupt and painfully slow system of justice in Cameroon. This tenacity was part of the vocation. She is also very proud, looking back, to recall the work she did to mentor and encourage other local women in their legal studies – particularly human rights law – and to hand over some of the social work she later engaged in. Passing on the practical expression of her own beliefs has been very important to her. This illustrates another aspect of importance for the Sisters’ faith practice: encouraging others to express their faith actively. This included a concern for justice and equality and for levelling the playing field for all, particularly across gender and class divisions. Sister Maria in Mexico: empowerment through education

Sister Maria was brought up by loving parents who encouraged her to pursue her education and to stand alongside the poor. Not all the Sisters interviewed had such liberal backgrounds, with many coming from poor, Flemish farming families where the boys’ education took priority and the girls were expected to help around the house and look after the younger children. Sister Maria is clear that, from a young age, she knew her work would be about empowering weaker people, particularly women, to stand up for themselves and improve their confidence – and thus their lives – through education. I had a liberal upbringing on all fronts. My father said that the girls were just as clever as the boys […] he said they can all go to secondary school and university. And that was rare at the time. […] I had a very thorough Catholic upbringing at home, although in the village they said my father was too much of a liberal. At that time being a liberal meant wanting nothing to do with God. That wasn’t the case with my father. He was deeply Christian and, in principle, I think, well, I’m

228  Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen a theologian and that is a richness and I find that the morals and ethics of people are important and, if you infringe that, if you can’t see people’s individual worth any more, then you can’t be a good theologian. Like Sister Rosa, Sister Maria was happy to meet people spiritually on their own terms. She did this in Mexico when she lived in a small village high in the mountains. She combined traditional Catholic teaching with expressions of folk religion, preparing the villagers for communion and confirmation, and incorporating traditional religious practices in the celebration of church festivals. I taught catechesis and I educated the girls and prepared them for baptism, for first communion, for confirmation, for marriage. […] There were 5 villages that I visited regularly and, for instance, Easter […] I  said, the people should organise this themselves. Because if people come in from outside and the people just sit there passively then it might be a nicer liturgy but, really, they need to do their own celebration […] and the girls were singing - really badly - but still they were singing. And for Palm Sunday we had huge leaves to protect ourselves from the rain and I said - choose 12 apostles, 6 men and 6 women - they had no idea about Easter. […] And also for baptisms - we all stood around the child, and we all blessed it, laid hands on it, poured water together, made the sign of the cross on it, and the child was welcomed into the community. Where Sister Rita nurtured the next generation of young women lawyers, Sister Maria offered the community she served more than simple participation in faith rituals, instead giving them full ownership of these faith practices, to continue them in their own way. Having explained and taught the background to the symbolic actions involved in the liturgies she shared, she handed over control to the people, trusting that the work would be carried on. In addition to this empowerment vocation, Sister Maria also feels called to express her faith in spiritually prophetic ways, to live up to the additional calling which she has experienced. In my final years in Mexico they called me a prophet. […] A prophet, for me - and I’ve taught extensively about this - must do two things. I can only say it in Spanish - annonciar and denonciar [announce and denounce], and that’s what I do all the time. I can’t do otherwise. I can’t do otherwise. And it’s essential and I, and every Christian must do that - every Christian must annonciar and denonciar. It’s our duty. And every missionary must do that. But then you also have people whom God specifically calls to be prophets and I am one of those. I can’t get past that and sometimes I don’t like it at all but I really am a prophet. I know this.

Looking back on a life of faith  229 For these Sisters, it is clear that their spirituality and calling needed to be expressed most frequently in very practical forms of service. The spiritual vocation to the vowed religious life has been the foundation for all those interviewed, and on this foundation, their additional vocations to teaching, nursing, social work and human rights activism have been built. The Sisters’ spirituality is also clear in the work that they do, and it flourishes for them and for others through their service.17 Additionally, the cement that holds the foundations and their construction together has been the Sisters’ personal faith and spirituality. Part of the charism of the congregation to which the Sisters belong has been sacrificial service. Several Sisters expressed their feeling of connection to Jesus as he was poured or emptied out for the world. None of the Sisters interviewed admitted to any regrets about the choices they had made or how they had chosen to express their faith. The lived faith practices of the Zusters van de Jacht in a broader context An essential addition to the stories recounted above is that the Sisters’ lives and work played out in the small details of everyday existence, where their long-term presence and commitment to individuals, families and communities built faith in the lives of those they served. This all-encompassing way of living has left them feeling grateful for lives lived among the poor, which strengthened their own faith in return. Where people are poor, every small possession is precious. In these situations, which were habitual for the Sisters, the surrounding physical reality takes on a heightened significance. This includes everything that can be touched, held and felt: spaces, places, structures, local practices and customs. Lived religion in the everyday becomes a matter of what, in very real terms, gives or takes away life and what helps or hinders survival.18 This is illustrated by Sister Josée’s account of life in some of the poorest areas of India. We were in the slum and the novices went out to look for work and there was no work and every evening we came back home and the neighbour women said - didn’t the workers earn anything today? No, we earned nothing. So one woman came with a handful of rice and the others with two eggs and something with some vegetables and they said - you’ve still got to eat tonight. And those were the moments when we thought - we are not here to offer anything to these people, the poor - it was also a breakthrough for them. We are not here to announce the good news, we are here to discover it, together with the people. Sister Josée is clear that the faith that they had come to share was a reciprocal process, one of mutual learning and sharing, as experienced also by Sister Rosa in Taiwan. Working and eating were necessities and proved to be opportunities to build relationships and learn from one another’s generosity.19

230  Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen The Sisters extended a variety of different services to the local populations in the countries where they served, according to their individual characters and skills. They demonstrate different manifestations of faith in action, and practical action as an expression of faith. Service and (post-)colonial discourses The testimonials quoted in this chapter bear witness to a strong faith that is lived out in the reality of everyday experience. The Sisters shared the lives of the poor, learning from them and trying to offer them something. However, we might wonder whether this missionary commitment may also have been used, or even instrumentalised, by colonial governments. It might have been in governments’ interests to have missionaries on site to put a humanitarian face onto their projects. The missionaries themselves were given resources and free rein. We might consider how best to reflect on the lives the Sisters led in dialogue with contemporary ethical critiques of colonialism.20 The Sisters were drawn to the missions as places where they could be of practical help to the poorest. This was the charism of their community, handed down to them by the founder. Their intentions, as they formulated them in the interviews, appear to have been to help and emancipate in ways that involved self-sacrifice and self-giving. They wanted to educate and provide health care in particular, and feel that they did make a difference to the lives of individuals and communities, as illustrated by the above extracts from their interviews. However, the Sisters have not reflected on the complex paradox of whether they also imposed Western stereotypes on local populations or disrupted local health care practices in the cause of doing good. In the interviews, where they were also asked to reflect critically on their lives, they did not raise this issue. Most of the Sisters interviewed lived through the transition years from colonialism to independence. The Sisters were possibly complicit in the structural problems of colonialism. Their presence and service made life more bearable for many, thereby camouflaging the paternalistic and colonial ideas behind the help extended by the West to the Global South. In the interviews, they refer to religious and ethical ideals such as service, love, faith and selfsacrifice.21 However, they also explain how their concrete service and work were intended to promote the dignity of the local people. In the Sisters’ own words, in contrast to earlier generations of missionaries, they did not see their role as being to convert or civilise but rather to encourage and offer practical help. The fact that they lived for many years in close proximity to those they had gone to serve has led to their continued involvement with those communities, even in retirement in Belgium. They frequently expressed their gratitude for all they received in the missions and all they learned from the people there. This might be considered as an indication that they strove for partnership from within rather than imposing Western ideas from outside. On a more structural, institutional level, they probably contributed to the

Looking back on a life of faith  231 legitimisation of colonial ways of thinking at the end of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries. Additionally, their positive narrative about service and faith in practice might have prevented more critical thinking about forms of dependency and the more ambiguous aspects of working as European missionaries in countries of the Global South. Nevertheless, the stories of the Sisters, as presented in this chapter, reflect a deep faith which requires concrete action. For them, this takes the form of missionary work. Conclusion The voices of the Sisters show how faith and action are connected and require delicate balancing in ways that overcome classic dualisms. Firstly, faith is not only expressed through social action; social action itself deepens and changes their faith. Secondly, there is no clear distinction between the religious and secular spheres. The Sisters are clearly members of a religious institution (their congregation within the Catholic Church), but they experience faith in the messiness of everyday life with others. Finally, faith and action are intertwined in the ongoing challenge of combining trust with practical action and avoiding fanaticism in the work by continually invoking trust and faith in God. The founder of the congregation illustrates this challenge: ‘There are you, just looking on and waiting and doing nothing! You are like a set of wet hens’.22 As well as her inspirational words, she was noted for acerbic critique of those who were not getting on with the work that had to be done – who were not showing faith in action. Finding the balance between nurturing a faith that trusts in God’s providence – as expressed by Sister Jeanne – and taking action which involved proactively stepping out in faith was never easy. The final words go to Sister Martha, who worked in the Philippines for 35 years. When asked about the development of her own faith and spirituality over the years, she speaks about the pain involved in letting go of any sense of personal control in life. She also expresses how difficult it is to trust God in times of need, fear and uncertainty. Creative faith practices such as those illustrated in this chapter require courage and resilience, and a willingness to keep going in times of suffering and hardship. Well I guess faith grows from suffering, from difficult situations and I think I learned much from the Filipinos. The Lord will provide - you have to hand it over, let go of the reins. We want to do everything ourselves and we act as if everything was down to us but that isn’t the case. It is the Lord that provides. Notes 1 ‘Sisters of the Hunt’. They are known as the Sisters of the ‘Jacht’ – the hunting ground – because the mother house where they live in retirement was part of a hunting estate.

232  Jane McBride with Annemie Dillen 2 Helen Cameron et al., Talking about God in Practice: Theological Action Research and Practical Theology (London: SCM Press, 2010). 3 Idesbald Goddeeris, Missionarissen: Geschiedenis, Herinnering, Dekolonisering (Leuven: Lannoo Campus, 2021), 123. 4 For example, Abbie Reese, Dedicated to God: An Oral History of Cloistered Nuns (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016); Carole Rogers, Habits of Change: An Oral History of American Nuns (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). 5 Anne O’Brien, ‘Catholic Nuns in Transnational Mission, 1528–2015’, Journal of Global History 11, no. 3 (2016): 387–408; Mary Huber and Nancy Lutkehaus, eds. Gendered Missions: Women and Men in Missionary Discourse and Practice (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999). 6 Patricia Grimshaw and Peter Sherlock, ‘Women and Cultural Exchanges’ in Missions and Empire, ed. Norman Etherington (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 173–194. 7 Hilde Nielsen, Inger-Marie Okkenhaug and Karina Skeie, eds., Protestant Missions and Local Encounters in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: Unto the Ends of the World (Leiden: Brill, 2011); Barbara Ramusack, ‘Cultural Missionnaires, Maternal Imperialists, Feminist Allies: British Women Activists in India, 1865–1945’, in Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance, ed. Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), 119–136; Lisbeth Mikaelsson, ‘Marie Monsen: Charismatic RevivalistFeminist Fighter’, Scandinavian Journal of History 28, no. 2 (2003): 122. 8 Reese, An Oral History of Cloistered Nuns and Rogers, An Oral History of American Nuns. 9 Natasha S. Mauthner and Andrea Doucet, ‘Reflections on a Voice-Centred Relational Method: Analysing Maternal and Domestic Voices’, in Feminist Dilemmas in Qualitative Research: Public Knowledge and Private Lives, ed. Jane Ribbens and Rosalind Edwards (London: Sage, 1998), 119–147; Carol Gilligan, ‘The Listening Guide Method of Psychological Inquiry’, Qualitative Psychology 2, no. 1 (2015): 69–77; Jonathan Smith and Virginia Eatough, ‘Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis’, in Research Methods in Psychology, ed. Glynis M. Breakwell, Sean Hamon, Chris Fife-Schaw and Jonathan A. Smith (Harlow: Pearson, 2006), 322–342. 10 Gayle Letherby, Feminist Research in Theory and Practice (Buckingham: Open University Press, 2003). Jane is a Protestant lay woman, whereas the Sisters are vowed religious Roman Catholics. 11 As a Dutch-speaker, Jane has translated the interviews into English for the purpose of sharing the Sisters’ narratives. 12 ICM Constitutions Zusters Missionarissen van het Onbevlekt Hart van Maria (Rome: Vatican Press Poliglotta, 1988), 7. 13 ICM Constitutions, 8–9 (English translation by Jane McBride). 14 Cecile Sandra, The Message of a Life (Leuven: ICM Press, 1979). 15 Sister Josée. 16 Joseph-Léon Cardijn founded the Jocists, an organisation that brought Roman Catholic factory workers together, and which became the Young Christian Workers’ movement. Cardijn’s ‘see – judge – act’ approach has been widely employed by liberation theologians, and was recently invoked in the context of the encyclical letter of Pope Francis, Laudato Si’: On Care for our Common Home (London: St Paul’s, 2015). See https://www.catholiccharitiesusa.org/, accessed 16 July 2022. 17 Annemie Dillen, ‘Caritas: Powerful Ecclesiastical Salvific Action. Aspects of Diaconal Service in Light of Power Mechanisms’, Diaconia: Journal for the Study of Christian Social Practice 2, no. 1 (2011): 66–80. 18 Trees Versteegen, Geleefde Genade: Een Bijdraag aan de Theologie van Genade Vanuit Ervaringen van Katholieke Vrouwen (Gorinchen: Narratio, 2013), 35.

Looking back on a life of faith  233 19 Versteegen, Geleefde genade, 36. 20 For example, Carine Dujardin, ‘Gender: Een Belofte Invalshoek voor de Studie van Missie en Zending’, Trajecta 12, no. 4 (2003): 275–310; Barbara Ramusack, ‘Cultural Missionnaries’, 119–136. 21 Goddeeris, Missionarissen, 124. 22 Dame Marie-Louise De Meester, quoted in Sandra, The Message of a Life, 232.

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Index

abuse 5, 50, 60, 65, 67, 71, 72, 80, 198, 225 Adams, Marilyn McCord 47, 55, 56 agency 7, 29, 30, 36–42, 62, 64, 66, 69, 76, 80, 90, 94, 110, 119, 120, 121, 125, 142, 164, 165, 170, 177, 183, 203, 221 Alison, James 47, 48, 55, 56 analysis 12, 13, 18, 21, 29, 36, 48, 56, 60, 74, 75–77, 85, 90, 100, 106, 133, 146, 155, 169, 170, 172, 181, 188, 189, 190–195, 200– 201, 202, 207, 222, 232; coding 91, 175; statistical analysis 11, 191, 195, 200; thematic analysis 46, 76, 77, 84, 85 Astley, Jeff 136, 146, 146 Bangladesh 8, 87, 88, 89, 94, 96, 97, 98, 202, 203 Baptism 5, 6, 9, 34, 123–135, 228 belonging 8, 20, 23, 25, 26, 31, 46, 52, 134, 166, 167, 183, 187, 88, 192, 194, 195 blessing 10, 52, 53, 54, 130, 131, 133, 137, 139, 143, 145 Bolz-Webber, Nadia 61, 66, 71, 72 Bristow, Janet 137, 138, 139, 140, 144, 146 Britton, Joanne 200, 202, 203 Cardijn, Joseph-Leon 225–226, 232 Casey, Michael 208 charism 208, 210, 212, 217, 218, 220, 222, 229, 230 charismatic vi, ix, 10, 14, 105, 151, 152, 153, 157, 158, 159, 161, 162, 163, 168, 169, 170, 232

Charsley, Katherine 200, 202, 204 Cheung, Sin Yi 201, 202 Christ, Carol P. 139, 146 christening vi, 9, 123–135; christening robe 9, 125, 129–130 Christianity 2, 3, 53, 61, 72, 137, 162, 170, 180, 182; Anglican Christianity 2, 5, 6–7, 14, 19, 22, 24, 45, 46, 56, 126, 133, 160, 161, 165; Catholic Christianity vi, 2, 7, 12, 27, 29–41, 43, 53, 55, 126, 134, 137, 144, 147, 205–219, 220–233; Newfrontiers 151, 169 civil partnership 7, 46, 48, 52 class 3, 21, 24, 33, 42, 83, 131, 135, 154, 174, 183, 190. 201, 22, 225, 227 clergy wellbeing 3, 6, 17–28, 75, 82, 84, 157, 237 Cole-Galo, Victoria 137, 138, 139, 140, 144, 146 communion 23, 142, 211, 211, 213, 215, 217, 219; Holy Communion 30, 31, 131, 143, 156, 160 (see also Eucharist) complementarianism 20, 152, 153, 156, 163, 164, 169, 170 connection 8, 14, 42, 68, 76, 79, 100, 173, 182, 205; communal 96, 98, 124, 127–130, 142, 145 consciousness raising 69, 72; consciousness raising groups 69 consent 34, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72 conservative evangelicalism 59, 60, 61, 62, 64, 65, 66, 161 control 6, 24, 25, 61, 63, 64, 67, 72, 90, 107, 118, 124, 125, 137, 144, 145, 224, 228, 231

258 Index crafting 9, 136, 139, 141, 143, 145, 146, 147; knitting 10, 136–147 Dale, Angela 191, 202, 203 Day, Abby 5, 14, 133, 134 deconstruction 62, 99 Denzin, Norman 46, 55, 100 digital lives 8, 9, 76, 87, 88, 90, 92 diminishment 12, 205, 206, 210, 211, 213, 216 discrimination 25, 188, 189, 195, 198, 200, 201 divorce 37, 93, 172 dominant religion 30, 31, 34, 35, 39, 41 domination 33, 35, 39 Doucet, Andrea 207, 218, 232 eating disorders 64, 72 economic activity 11, 24, 55, 76, 187– 203, 209; economic inactivity 187–203 embodiment 3, 60, 72, 78, 81, 82, 83, 128; embodied faith 4, 6, 9, 10, 32, 108, 110, 154, 160, 214; embodied research 60, 88, 154; embodied self 19, 26, 69, 81, 94, 183, 213, 218 empowerment see power Eucharist 5, 6, 31, 131; see also communion, Holy Communion faith 1–13, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34, 41, 43, 45, 49, 50, 51, 53, 54, 55, 56, 64, 88, 90, 92, 93, 94, 98, 99, 119, 126, 133, 140, 145, 151, 153, 154, 155, 157, 161, 168, 169, 170, 173, 175, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 194, 205, 207, 219, 220–233 family 9, 10, 11, 18, 19, 28, 29, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 38, 46, 47, 49, 66, 90, 91, 93, 105, 111, 112, 113, 113, 115, 117, 118, 121, 123–135, 143, 146, 149–184, 187, 189, 193, 197, 198, 201, 202, 203; blood ties 126; family narrative 9, 123, 129, 133; fathers 113, 114, 128, 166, 175, 178, 190, 203, 227; husbands 10. 33, 37, 108, 114, 115, 162, 163, 164, 190, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 202, 204; kinship 9, 123, 128, 129, 130, 201;

lateral ties 173, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183; marriage 7, 37, 44, 48, 49. 52, 56, 60, 61, 92, 93, 98, 111, 162, 163, 168, 196, 202, 203; sisters 10, 11, 172–184 Farley, Margaret 53, 56 fasting 5, 11, 173, 176, 180 femininity 8, 35, 38, 74, 75, 76, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 100, 177, 180 feminist spirituality 75, 78, 82; Goddess spirituality 3, 75, 77, 82, 84, 86, 139; Red Tent movement 2, 8, 14, 74–85; women’s spiritual circles 74, 75, 76, 82, 83, 84, 86 feminist/feminism 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 27, 30, 33, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 41, 42, 51, 53, 54, 56, 60, 64, 67, 69, 71, 72, 74, 76, 78, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 97, 124, 125, 133, 137, 139, 147, 153, 154, 155, 163, 164, 165, 169, 170, 171, 172, 174, 180, 181, 183, 202, 207, 218, 221, 222, 232 finding voice see voice folk religion see lived religion formation 7, 9, 10, 43, 47, 72, 94, 135, 136, 137, 139, 140, 142, 144, 145, 146, 149, 154, 166, 169, 172, 183, 206, 208, 211, 217, 218 gender 3, 4, 5, 9, 11, 13, 20, 22, 24, 25, 27, 30, 33. 36, 39, 40, 42, 48, 49, 52, 53, 55, 67, 70, 72, 74, 75, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 88, 91, 92, 93, 94, 100. 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 113, 115, 117, 119, 121, 135, 153, 164, 165, 169, 172, 173, 174, 177, 178, 180, 181, 183, 187, 190, 191, 197, 200, 202, 218, 221, 222, 227, 233 Gill, Rosalind 76, 84, 85, 86 Gilliat-Ray, Sophie 181, 202, 203 Gish, Elizabeth 61, 62, 71, 72 God 10, 13, 17, 19, 27, 30, 31, 34, 37, 38, 44, 45, 47, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 66, 71, 79, 82, 124, 131, 132, 133, 137, 139, 140, 144, 145, 154, 155, 156,

Index  259 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 163, 166, 167, 170, 207, 208, 210, 214, 215, 217, 218, 219, 222, 224, 226, 227, 228, 231, 232; queer God 51, 52, 56 Graham, Elaine 4, 13, 27 Gray, Breda 17, 27 habit 8, 44, 77, 94, 153, 157, 159, 169, 174, 180, 219, 229, 232 habitus 32, 35 Hajj 176, 196 halakhah 107, 115, 121 healing 5, 8, 53, 62, 69, 72, 74, 75, 78, 80, 81, 83, 84, 85, 141 Heath, Anthony 188, 201, 203 hermeneutics 24, 46, 51, 56, 171 Hervieu-Léger, Danièle 134 Hijab 11, 88, 91. 94, 96, 98, 99, 175, 176, 177, 188, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200 holistic milieu 75 identity 7, 8–9, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 27, 30, 35, 36, 40, 43, 47, 57–101, 183, 197, 202, 203, 205–219; family 8–9, 123, 172–183; feminist 7, 19–23; queer 43–55; religious 7, 19–23, 91, 95–97, 136–147, 155–170, 197, 205–219, 220–233; researcher’s 19–23, 35, 36, 40 intention 3, 10, 33, 80, 89, 99, 137, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 146, 174, 208, 213, 217, 220, 221, 230 intersectionality 3, 13, 21, 86 interviews 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 29, 33, 34, 36, 37, 40, 42, 46, 48, 49, 50, 52, 54, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 96, 97, 100, 105, 106, 108, 109. 110, 114, 116, 118, 119, 120, 121, 123, 124, 125, 126, 130, 131, 132, 133, 136, 137, 138, 140, 144, 151, 155, 156, 157, 161, 166, 168, 173, 175, 178, 180, 188, 192, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 203, 206, 207, 220, 221, 222, 224, 227, 229, 230, 232; interview rapport 50, 88, 90 Islam 2, 3, 5, 11, 12, 42, 88, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 98, 99, 100,

101, 171, 173, 174, 175, 176, 180, 182, 184, 189, 190, 194, 195, 196, 197, 199, 200, 202, 203; British Muslims 11, 91, 100, 183, 187, 188, 189, 190, 195, 201, 203; Islamophobia 95, 100; Muslim women 5, 8, 9, 11, 87–101, 172–184, 187–204 Islamic dress 98–99, 196–198; burqa 98; jilbab 98; niqab 98, 203 Izard, Susan S. 139, 146 Jeldtoft, Nadia 100, 174, 182, 184 Jewish 9, 105–122, 137 Jorgensen, Susan S. 139, 146 Kashrut 9, 105–121 Khattab, Nabil 189, 200, 201, 202, 204 Klein, Linda Kay 61, 71, 72 Koopmans, Ruud 189, 202 Kosher 105–122 Kwee, Janelle L. 64, 72 labour 53, 76, 97; labour market 187, 188, 189, 191, 195, 200, 201, 202, 203, 225 listening 9, 45, 46, 48, 50, 55, 78, 79, 83, 93, 110, 113, 115, 158, 159, 163, 203, 206, 207, 208, 212, 213, 218, 221, 232 lived religion 5, 9, 13, 32, 41, 106, 118, 119, 173, 174, 180, 181, 182, 229; folk religion 9, 123, 126, 127, 132, 134, 228 Llewellyn, Dawn 1, 17, 27, 42 Longman, Chia 2, 8, 76, 81, 82, 83, 84, 86 Mangion, Carmen 208, 209, 218, 219 Mauthner, Melanie 172, 177, 181, 182, 183, 184 Mauthner, Natasha, S. 207, 218, 232 McBride, Hillary L. 64, 72 McCarthy, David Matzo 49, 56 McGuire, Meredith 5, 13, 31, 32, 41, 173, 182 meaning-making 9, 123, 124, 127, 129, 133 menstruation 75, 80, 81, 109 mikveh 109, 110 mimesis 105, 107, 109, 111, 113, 115, 117, 119, 121

260 Index ministry 9, 10, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 43, 44, 46, 136– 147, 205–219 modesty 11, 61, 96, 188, 195, 197 motherhood 10, 14, 19, 20, 32, 33, 151, 155, 157, 158, 159, 163, 165, 166, 170; mother-daughter relationship 107–120, 173; mothering 11, 125, 134, 137, 157, 158, 159, 164, 166, 168, 177, 179; mothers 9, 10, 36, 38, 77, 85, 89, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 151–171, 175, 176 music 10, 13, 51, 77, 139, 142, 157, 158, 163 Muslim 2, 8, 9, 10, 11, 87, 87–101, 171, 172–184, 187–204 narrative 9, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 31, 32, 35, 68, 74, 77, 89, 90, 100, 123, 126, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 153, 183, 188, 203, 206, 211, 213, 219, 224, 226, 231, 232; counternarratives 8, 74, 83; family narratives 9, 123, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133 Neitz, Mary Jo 35, 40, 41, 42, 182 Oakley, Ann 42, 125, 133 Oliver, Gordon 27 ordination 18, 19, 20, 21, 24, 27, 28, 115, 120, 137; ordained 5, 6, 18, 19, 20, 22, 23, 26, 109, 124, 126, 139; see also priest O’Brien, Susan 208, 218, 219 Orsi, Robert 119, 174, 182, 237 Pakistan 197, 199, 202; Pakistani 175, 176, 180, 192, 196, 198, 199, 201, 202, 203, 204 pastoral cycle 59, 60, 69, 70 Pattison, Stephen 17, 27 Percy, Emma 27 pilgrimage 176; see also hajj Poland 3, 7, 29–42 postsecularism 42, 164, 165, 171 power 24, 25, 26, 27, 40, 47, 48, 51, 55, 61, 62, 67, 72, 74, 79, 80, 81, 82, 84, 99, 105, 110, 113, 124, 125, 132, 133, 143, 154, 169, 172, 173, 174, 175, 177,

178, 179, 180, 181, 224, 226; empowerment 7, 8, 12, 46, 68, 71, 73, 76, 79, 83, 87, 93, 96, 97, 98, 108, 118, 183, 189, 195, 202, 224, 226, 227, 228 practical theology 4, 5, 12, 13, 14, 17, 27, 43, 45, 46, 48, 55, 56, 124, 170, 218, 232 practices 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 37, 39, 45, 74–86, 88, 89, 90, 92, 94, 97, 105–122, 124, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 134, 135, 140, 145, 151–171, 172–184, 187–204, 220–233; dress 129–130, 175– 177, 195–199; food 105–122, 127; hospitality 161–162; prayer (see prayer); ritual (see ritual) prayer 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 32, 38, 71, 78, 79, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 151, 158, 159, 161, 173, 175, 176, 177, 178, 180, 188, 193, 194, 195, 197, 198, 199, 200, 206, 210, 211, 215, 217, 220, 224; salah 11, 188, 194, 195, 197 presence 2, 12, 13, 18, 21, 25, 34, 47, 52, 54, 71, 74, 76, 77, 90, 128, 129, 130, 138, 146, 187, 192, 196, 205, 206, 213, 214, 217, 229, 230 priest 6, 7, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 40, 43, 45, 46, 47, 49, 50, 51, 54, 123, 131 purification 109, 120, 240 purity culture 8, 59–73 queer theology 49, 50, 51, 52, 54, 56 race 3, 13, 33, 86, 174, 176, 177, 182, 183, 202; black 2, 4, 13, 20, 27, 28, 36, 67, 83, 165; brown 20, 95, 97, 199; global majority heritage 2, 4, 6, 10, 21, 24, 25, 26, 27; mixed-race 176, 182; white 2, 4, 20, 21, 22, 25, 26, 34, 59, 60, 67, 75, 79, 85, 94, 154, 183, 187, 189. 201 Reese, Abbie 232 reflexivity 6, 15–56, especially 17–18, 19–20, 26, 29–30, 39–40, 41, 42, 55, 100, 207, 218

Index  261 Reid, Marcella Althaus 51, 52, 56 religiosity 29–41, 98, 118, 126, 127, 172, 173, 175, 176, 179, 180, 188, 189, 190, 192, 193, 194, 195, 198, 199, 200, 201, 202; morality and religiosity 179 religious practice 6, 11, 12, 30, 31, 32, 33, 106, 109, 165, 168, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 180, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 199, 200, 201, 202, 203, 228; communal 31, 75, 124, 127, 138, 142, 143, 144, 145, 189, 190, 193, 194, 195; as social acts 174 research methods 1, 12, 26, 31, 45, 46, 87, 88, 91, 100, 113, 173, 203, 207, 218, 232; autoethnography 3, 87–101; conversation 20, 62, 68, 69, 70, 90, 96, 162; creative methods 89, 91, 139, 141; feminist research methods 124, 207; guided visualisation 69; interviews 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 29, 33, 40, 46, 50, 54, 64, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 96, 97, 100, 105, 106, 108, 109, 110, 116, 120, 124, 126, 136, 138, 151, 155, 173, 175, 178, 192, 195, 206, 207, 220, 221, 222, 224, 230, 232; Lectio Divina 207, 208, 218; methodological Catholicism 31, 32, 41; mixed methods 11, 88, 187–204; narrative (see narrative); online 29, 76, 80, 84, 87–99, 182; pastoral cycle (see pastoral cycle); qualitative 1–2, 12, 17, 27, 29, 32, 40, 41, 42, 46, 55, 76, 84, 100, 124, 136, 155, 170, 175, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 195, 200, 203, 218, 221, 232; quantitative 7, 29, 30, 31, 45, 188, 189, 190, 191, 193, 195, 200, 201, 203; recruitment 89, 175; stories 8, 20, 47, 51, 52, 60, 62, 63, 65, 66, 68, 69, 78, 80, 84, 89, 90. 92, 93, 124, 126, 153, 173, 174, 175, 181, 207, 209, 221, 222, 229, 231 ; survey 31, 45, 74, 76, 77, 87, 92, 120, 179, 188, 189, 190, 191, 193, 194, 198, 199, 203; transcription 40, 63, 90, 91, 100,

138, 166, 192; triangulation 188, 192, 200; ‘thickening’ 123, 154 research question 44, 45, 46 researcher 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 17, 19, 26, 27, 30, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39, 46, 50, 61, 88, 89, 100, 125, 134, 154, 191; researcher’s habitat/ habitus 32; researcher’s identities 30, 33, 34, 36, 37, 39, 89; researcher’s positioning 17, 19, 26, 27, 30, 33, 35, 36, 37, 39, 40, 41, 88 Riley, Sarah 84, 85 ritual 2, 5, 8, 9, 10, 13, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 82, 83, 84, 85, 105, 106, 109, 110, 113, 118, 119, 120, 124, 126, 127, 130, 132, 134, 135, 137, 142, 143, 153, 154, 161, 170, 173, 176, 180, 194, 198, 204, 224, 228; transmission 105–119, 177, 179, 181 Roberts, Michael Symmons 43, 55 Rogers, Carole 232 Rogers, Eugene 49, 55, 56 sacraments 32, 123, 134; see also baptism, communion, holy communion, Eucharist, marriage Sandra, Cecile 232, 233 Schneiders, Sandra 209, 211, 219 Sexton, Catherine 12, 205–219 sexuality 3, 5, 35, 36, 42, 45, 48, 49, 53, 55, 56, 59, 60, 61, 63, 64, 65, 66, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 80, 93, 179, 181, 183; gay 7, 28, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 55; heterosexual 33, 44, 49, 51, 53, 60, 66; lesbian 7, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 51, 52, 53; queer 7, 28, 49, 50, 51, 52, 54, 56, 59, 81, 85; same-sex marriage 3, 7, 47, 48, 53, 56 Sharma, Sonya 10, 11, 172–184 silence 10, 12, 46, 50, 51, 125, 142, 159, 160 silencing 44, 45, 46, 48, 52, 83, 124, 125, 202, 204; mute 9, 124–126, 133 Simmonds, Gemma 209, 218, 219 sisters (religious) 12, 205–219, 220–233 sisters see family

262 Index Slee, Nicola 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 124, 133, 154, 155, 170 social media 8, 29, 33, 38, 87–101, 119 spirituality 2, 3, 5, 41, 75, 78, 79, 82, 84, 85, 99, 138, 139, 140, 142, 143, 145, 146, 151, 152, 153, 154, 159, 162, 163, 168, 173, 182, 208, 220, 222, 229, 231; see also feminist spirituality Swinton, John 45, 55, 56 taboo 7, 8, 46, 47, 48, 53, 54, 55, 56, 93, 127 theological reflection 17, 45, 47, 71, 155 transitions 8, 140, 143, 145, 172, 216, 217, 230 trauma 5, 60, 61, 62, 68, 71, 72, 80, 126 Vacek, Edward Collins 215, 217, 219 Versteegen, Trees 232, 233

violence 4, 27, 48, 50, 53, 65, 67, 75, 93; domestic abuse 4, 71, 75, 93; intimate partner violence 65, 67; sexual violence 65, 75, 181 virginity 61, 68, 72 vocation 7, 11, 12, 19, 24, 25, 162, 205, 206, 209, 212, 213, 217, 220, 222, 223, 227, 228, 229 voice, women’s 9, 12, 26, 39, 52, 54, 64, 69, 70, 96, 124, 136, 155, 174, 175, 206, 207, 208, 218, 220, 221, 222, 231, 232; voicecentred analysis 12, 207, 218, 222, 232 Walton, Heather 50, 55, 56 worship 10, 13, 14, 46, 75, 93, 134, 138, 141, 143, 154, 156, 157, 158, 160, 161, 165, 169, 170, 193, 224 Yoder, Don 126, 134