Learning from the ‘texts of terror’
On December 6, Canadians remember the murder of 14 women in Montreal in 1989. They have come to represent all women who face violence. Lucille Marr, a pastor and historian in Montreal, reflects on the horror women have endured through the ages.
In 1991, the Canadian Parliament named December 6 the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence against Women. The church is also working for change in this area. For example, the World Council of Churches has declared 2001 to 2010 the Decade to Overcome Violence.
These initiatives focus on what was so we can re-imagine what will be.
Some of the most horrific tales of violence against women appear in the Old Testament; for example, the story of the Levite’s concubine in Judges 19-20. Lois Wilson, United Church minister and past president of the World Council of Churches, includes this story in her book, Stories Seldom Told: Biblical Stories Retold for Children and Adults.
A Levite priest went to Bethlehem to collect his concubine from her father’s house. During the trip back, he let his enemies have her. They raped her and left her for dead. The priest dismembered her and sent her body parts to the 12 tribes of Israel.
This horror story was apparently told to undermine Saul’s authority and support a centralized government under David. Wilson emphasizes, however, that simply to advocate a political interpretation does not address the horror of a powerless woman’s life being violently taken. Worse, her murder became an excuse for the massacre of the descendants of Benjamin and for defiling virgin women of Shiloh and Jabesh-Gilead.
The mutilation of one woman escalated into a holocaust as hundreds of defenceless persons were massacred.
Thankfully, few stories in Christian history are quite this horrendous. Yet the attitude that women are the property of men persists.
Theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether has shown how the subordinate legal status of women was expressed in Christianity in an “elaborate theory of the inferiority of women’s nature.” Thomas Aquinas called women “misbegotten males.” He followed Augustine’s theory that while men are made in the image of God, women’s only hope of reflecting that image is to be connected to a man.
Their incompleteness was the justification for excluding women from the priesthood and insisting that they remain subordinate to their husbands.
The Anabaptists believed that the spirit of God calls people individually to faith, and that discipleship is expected of women as well as men. Obedience to faith could lead women to radical action, and even to martyrdom. Marvellous stories of these Anabaptist women are told in Profiles of Anabaptist Women, edited by Arnold Snyder and Linda Huebert Hecht.
Yet, Menno Simons directed women: “Be obedient to your husband in all reasonable things.... Remain within your houses and gates unless you have something of importance to regulate, such as to make purchases...or to hear the Word of the Lord....”
The Reformers considered women to be the epitome of Eve, the first sinner. This heritage justified punishing women to keep them in their place. I do not know if Anabaptists condoned violence for keeping wives in line.
Traces of these attitudes remain. “Who gives this woman...” is still used in marriage ceremonies as a woman is given by her father to her husband. Some churches still advise abused women to “submit” to their husbands. Marc Lepine thought he was justified in killing 14 women simply because they were women.
Thankfully, there are seeds of change. At a World Council of Churches consultation on violence against women several years ago, Elizabeth Soto Albrecht read a statement produced by the Mennonite Peace Council in Guatemala: “The time is right...to use our wonderful Anabaptist theological heritage of peace and nonviolence and give witness to this hurting world.”
As a church, we are called to address violence against women as part of our theology of peace. But how can we do this? How can we help ensure that crimes such as the killings in Montreal are not repeated?
We can listen and learn from the texts of terror, whether they be biblical or contemporary.
Historian Marlene Epp notes that Mennonite history tells little about the great victimization of women. She quotes a young woman from Prussia during World War II: “The Prussian soldiers came into the house and took everything they wanted.... Women and young girls were raped. This happened daily until the end of the war” (MCC Women’s Concerns newsletter on “Women, war and rape”).
This is part of our Mennonite story. It is also the story of countless women in Bosnia, Palestine, Rwanda, Zimbabwe—wherever there is war. We can be attentive to these stories.
We can also listen to those who are victims of domestic violence, sexual harassment and date rape. The Status of Women Canada has noted that in this country, females are the major victims of sexual assault (85%), criminal harassment (78%), other sexual offences (74%), kidnapping (62%) and common assault (52%).
We can help to bring these women’s stories to light. Take Susie, for instance. Susie has been abused by her husband for decades. Her church teaches that her place is in her home, and she is afraid that if she tries to leave she will be killed or never see her children again. None of her friends dared go into her home. Recently, it occurred to Susie’s friends that they might act like a Christian Peacemaker Team and stand in solidarity with her. They are making their presence felt in her home.
One of the most frightful and beautiful stories I have heard is that of Yvonne Johnson, who called on Mennonite novelist Rudy Wiebe to help tell her story. Johnson is the great-granddaughter of the Cree chief, Big Bear. Her story is one of sexual abuse, alcoholism and finally imprisonment for murder in 1991.
Through telling her story in Stolen Life, Yvonne Johnson found healing.
Wilma Derksen tells another horror story. She and her husband, Cliff, went through a parent’s darkest nightmare when their 13-year old daughter, Candace, was abducted and killed. The Derksens knew that forgiveness would be preferable to spending the remainder of their lives planning vengeance. They are not denying their pain, but they are bringing to light the violence that has devastated so many women and children, and are helping people to cut the strings of anger that can perpetuate the crime.
Wilma’s journey motivated her to begin a program called “Victim’s Voice.” She coordinates meetings at Stoney Mountain prison in Manitoba where victims can ask the questions that are rarely addressed during a trial. The Derksens’ story is featured in the video “Journey toward forgiveness,” which Mennonite Media produced for the National Council of Churches. It has aired on ABC-TV.
In closing, I paraphrase the well-known words from Isaiah: “Gender shall not lift up sword against gender, nor shall they learn violence anymore.”
Paul urged Roman Christians to “lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armour of light” (13:12). Let us do likewise.
—Lucille Marr
The writer is co-pastor of the Mennonite Fellowship of Montreal. This is from a sermon she preached there.
Perhaps we are discomforted by Jesus’ response to his pursuing family members in Matthew 12.
One of the reasons I joined up with Mennonites is their love of family and connection. Yet because we are so passionate about our attachments, we may draw back when we hear Jesus re-framing the bounds of family by asking rhetorically, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” and then answering, “Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” Jesus’ challenge leads me to two reflections.
One involves stretching our family bonds, making them elastic and broad, as large as the love of God itself. Much as we love those family members God has given to us, we must remember that the Christian family goes beyond our blood and family ties. There’s an infinite amount of space in God’s family.
It’s like the welcoming poem my mother-in-law offered at our wedding: “A family is a circle composed of kith and kin, without a break it opens to let Missy in.” God’s family is a circle, not of kith and kin but of those who follow God. I believe that’s one of the meanings of this passage.
The second one I offer is also about stretching. It’s about letting go—of the ones we love so much. Letting go of our children over and over again as they grow from tiny infant to sturdy toddler and off to school, from questioning, challenging adolescent into young adult who travels far and wide, into men and women with their own homes and responsibilities. Letting go of our parents who cared for us, and then need our care. Letting go of old wounds and old patterns.
A couple of years ago at Christmas, my mother surprised me with a beautiful glass bowl. Included with the bowl was a note in my mother’s hand: “When your Grandmother Miller gave me this bowl she told me that it had been her mother’s. Gram said her mother used to open a half gallon of spiced peaches and they’d all fit in the bowl.”
My mom gave it to me as she was preparing to move out of the big house she and Dad built 45 years ago. She was letting go of some of her treasures.
I had another beautiful bowl in my cupboard, similar to this one. I bought it almost 20 years ago at the sale of my friend Ginny’s grandparents, Allen and Lizzie Schwartzentruber. Lizzie told me it had been her mother’s, making the two dishes roughly the same age.
I had lived with Ginny and often received hospitality from that clan. The dish graced our table frequently, often holding a peach and strawberry salad. Sometimes I felt a tug thinking this dish should go back to the Schwartzentrubers. When I received my great-grandmother’s bowl, I knew it was time, and last spring I returned the bowl to them.
Probably letting go of things is easier than letting go of people. But we can practise with our things, right?
—Melissa Miller
The writer, a counsellor and author, operates Family Ties in Winnipeg. She is a part-time master of divinity student and member of Charleswood Mennonite Church.
Letters
Bashing capitalism
does not help
This is a response to Aiden Schlichting Enns’ letter on capitalism (Nov. 4).
“Bashing” ideas or people without providing an alternative is a poor method to build change or evangelize people to a cause. Why not call for insightful reflection on scripture and human creativity in using the bounty of the earth to create goods and services for trade?
It concerns me when the writer finds it hard to celebrate the success of immigrants who came from war-torn Europe. Traumatized by totalitarian communism and betrayed by National Socialism, they picked hops and berries for minimum wage. Through creativity, good fortune and perseverance they became successful entrepreneurs.
Isn’t that what we hope for in the immigrants who come to Canada today, wanting only the opportunity to use their ingenuity and hard work to provide a future for their family?
The “economic structures” Schlichting Enns complains about are put in place by a government we elect. This government taxes working people unmercifully: modern-day serfdom. Schlichting Enns would have us believe that government taxation is akin to Robin Hood—tax the rich and, for a small fee, redistribute the wealth equitably to all. Governments never create wealth. They consume it. And often squander the creativity of its citizens in the process.
What about philanthropy? To be an “Imagine Company” in Canada, you commit to giving 1 percent of pre-tax profits to charity. Last I heard, a Mennonite employer in western Canada was giving 10 times that amount. Our Mennonite communities and their business persons lead in philanthropy and make tremendous contributions to local and global communities.
I attended a Mennonite college. The only economics training I received was in Marxist economics. After serving in the former Soviet Union with Menno-nite Central Committee, I embarked on a program of reading other materials like “Natural Capitalism.”
Most recently I’ve read Hernando De Soto, a Peruvian economist who writes insightfully about capitalism. He’s concerned about human justice and equity, and articulates a fascinating alternative. Are our Mennonite theologians engaging this material and suggesting alternatives?
The last century saw three great ideologies compete for the hearts and minds of society: Communism, Fascism, and Free Enterprise/Capitalism. Wars were fought, people enslaved, gassed and ethnically cleansed. Of the three, free enterprise has emerged as the ideology most adaptable to the aspirations of the human community. It exists with injustice and failure. It also allows many to exercise creativity and ingenuity.
To bash the church and free enterprise without providing a reasonable alternative seems unhelpful. What we need is informed debate that leads to practical solutions to enable us all to be faithful followers of Jesus of Nazareth at the dawn of this century.
—Walter Bergen, Abbotsford, B.C.
Grateful for
critique of capitalism
I was grateful for Aiden Schlichting Enns’ letter (Nov. 4). I, too, was troubled by some of the assumptions made by Thomas Caldwell in the October 7 article on business people and the church.
I support Schlichting Enns’ call for “more sermons on [capitalism] and more creative business programs at Christian schools.” But this need for a Mennonite response to capitalism should extend further.
Education and discussion also need to occur in theology and history classes, both at the university and high school levels, as well as in Sunday schools and small groups...and in our church publications and organizations.
For example, in the same issue as Schlichting Enns’ letter, a review of Faith in Development: Partnership between the World Bank and the Churches of Africa, from a MEDA release by Wally Kroeker, appears (page 18). Nowhere in this item is there any critique of the World Bank; no questioning of its motivations, the implications of its policies of “structural adjustment,” of its contribution to the growing gap between rich and poor is provided.
Perhaps the authors of this book, or the MEDA board, have not seen “Life and Debt” (a video that shows the impact of World Bank policies on Jamaica) or read the m
any (secular) appraisals of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
In the same issue (“Changing attitudes toward the poor,” page 21), United Church pastor Susan Eagle declares, “Unjust systems cann
ot stand forever. Unexpected things happen when we act with integrity, and pray.”
We are all unavoidably implicated in global capitalism. What does the Mennonite church have to say about how we can “act with integrity” within this “unjust system?” If, indeed, we even consider it to be unjust?
—Janis Thiessen, Fredericton, N.B.
Forbearance more than
a question of love
James Reimer is provocative in his discussion of the relation between love and law (“Tolerance, exclusion...or forbearance,” Nov. 4). I agree that when we lose sight of the connection we may resort to exclusion of people from fellowship, contrary to the basic intent of the law itself. But I have some questions.
Reimer states that just cause for exclusion is not breaking a law as such—it is “breaking the command to love God and neighbour that is the basis of the law.” How can a person persist in breaking the law and be acting in love?
Also, “redemptive” exclusion is referred to in Matthew 18:15-20. Since the word “sin” in the text can include a range of things, how can offence be limited to failure to love? We agree that sin most often involves relationships, but sin is not simply a failure to love. If the sin were adultery and a person repented, he would be restored, but adultery persisted in will lead to exclusion. It certainly is failure of love; concretely it is adultery.
Reimer says that the church’s acceptance of homosexual unions “becomes extremely complex” because “church members are divided on whether ‘sin’ applies here.” Is it that scripture is not clear or that the wit-ness of the church has been confused?
I know there are those who by redefinition think to avoid the judgement against homosexuality, or those who reinterpret scripture. But these attempts turn out to be largely self-refuting. If one is installed in wealth, teaching about sharing or greed will be difficult.
Scripture may be clear and the witness of Christian history largely consistent, but when something becomes an issue interpreters will construe the meaning differently. No community, whether scientists or historians or exegetes, is led simply by the weighing of evidence. So whether it is homosexuality or greed, what does it take for something to be convincing?
Almost any important matter involves controversy, and the question is whether one will take the pertinent evidence and exercise good judgement in making one’s way to truth. There are certainly shifts in scripture in understanding what God expects of his people. This presents a challenge for discerning God’s will. Therefore it is important to follow the line of teaching through to the covenant in Christ.
But in the case of homosexuality, affirmation of male-female sexual relations in marriage and negation of homosexual relations is consistent through both Old and New Testaments.
The emphasis on love in forbearance is clear. It shapes the process toward reconciliation in Matthew 18; there is no automatic exclusion. But taking love as a global command in place of specific Christian teaching is not the way love is present in the New Testament.
As we know love in God sending the son “who laid down his life for us” (1 John 4:7-9, 3:16) so we know love in the specifics of Christian conduct. In this sense to love is to fulfill the law (Romans 13:10). Love calls for response to clearly identified sins that negate the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 5:1-8; 6:9-11).
I believe Reimer’s article is important because of its challenge to think about the meaning of love beyond tolerance. My aim has been to probe for the full meaning of love as expressed in Christian life.
—Ben Wiebe, St. Catharines, Ont.
Need love deeper
than forbearance
I appreciate James Reimer’s willingness to discuss sexual preference (Tolerance, exclusion or forbearance,” Nov. 4). But within an unequal playing field where heterosexuals are “blessed” and non-heterosexuals are “forborne,” love becomes compromised and an attitude of condescension and judgement inadvertently seems to prevail.
Reimer’s “forbearance” creates a double standard in which the heterosexual majority is deemed more worthy to determine church procedures than non-heterosexuals who display “weaknesses, shortcomings, handicaps, or sins.” This hardly derives from Jesus’ teachings about love, nor from Jesus’ own silence about sexual preferences.
Imagine telling a dear friend, “I forbear you,” instead of “I love you.” We need a love deeper than forbearance, a reconciliation stronger than compromise; we need voices which welcome, celebrate, and are exceedingly grateful for the various sexual preferences given to the body which is the church. Afterall, the ones who suffer lead.
—Carol Ann Weaver, Waterloo, Ont.
An idea for
Christmas gifts
I have found a solution for “what to give children and grandchildren who have everything.” We have eight grandchildren ranging in age from 9 to 20, and for the last three years they have gone along with a scheme that taught them about needs around the world.
For each of the pre-16-year-olds, I order a $30 “sleeping kit” from Sleeping Children Around the World. The grandchildren receive a picture of the recipient standing beside the kit. The organization has information on its web site.
For the older ones, I either send a copy of “The MEDA Store” or have them go to the MEDA web site and select a project that appeals to them. They tell me where they want me to invest (donate) on their behalf.
MEDA sends me individual shares with the names of my grandchildren on them. I put these in envelopes with a letter and some Wendy’s coupons and present them to the grandchildren at Christmastime. E-mail and Visa make it easy.
The process begins by talking with each grandchild and allowing them to make the decision. I have a feeling that they are acutely aware that they have more than they need and welcome this opportunity to share.
—A Friend of Jesus, Vancouver, B.C.
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