FEMININE SPIRITUALITY.[1]

INTRODUCTION: As many of you know, Alico Road is an 11-mile, major commuter route in Southwest Florida. It’s positioned between Daniels and Corkscrew Road and runs parallel with them starting at Highway 41 extending East. It crosses under the overpass at I-75, continuing East, and eventually turning South, where it connects with Corkscrew Road.

Apart from its location, what also sets Alico Road apart is that it’s the major truck route to the Alico Quarry, from which comes so much of the stone, rock and gravel feeding our area’s construction and road building. That means there are an enormous number of large, heavily loaded, dump trucks going back and forth on Alico. And since most truckers are paid by the load, that means the faster they go and the more trips they make, the more money they earn.

On the Tuesday morning of Feb. 5^th, Dr. Ingrid Martinez-Rico, was driving to Florida Gulf Coast University, where she is a professor in Spanish and German. She was heading South on I-75 and took Exit 128 at Alico Road. After exiting, there is a traffic signal allowing either a turn to the East towards the University or to the West towards Highway 41. Ingrid was in the left lane heading to FGCU, and two other cars were parallel with her, waiting to go East or West. When the light changed to green, Ingrid advanced forward.

But from the East, a loaded dump truck, trying to gain one or two minutes, sped up, with the intent of running the red light, so as not to have to stop and start again. He broadsided Ingrid on the driver’s side.

When the emergency workers came, they couldn’t remove her from the vehicle. The fire department came and cut the top of her station wagon open, but they still couldn’t get her out. Finally, they employed a crane, which hooked up to her car and dragged it from beneath the truck. She was then extricated from the car, a helicopter was waiting nearby, and she was flown to Lee Memorial Hospital Trauma Center, where she lay in a coma, with brain damage to her left side.

That was Feb. 5^th. Today is June 1^st, almost four months later. Dr. Amanda Evans and I visited her this past Friday at the incredibly impressive Florida Institute of Neurological Rehabilitation, situated on several hundred acres, outside of Wauchula, Florida, some 90 miles or so to the North of us.

We met Ingrid as she was being wheeled from the residence facility in which she has a tastefully appointed single occupancy room. We accompanied her to physical and occupational therapy.

She was able to communicate with us at a very basic level. We saw her occasionally struggling with having to speak in English, her third language. It was almost as if she had to process from one language, back and forth to the other.

We watched her walk with three people guarding her every step. And we saw how hard she tried to complete the dexterity drills the Occupational Therapist had her going through. At times, she seemed near tears, she was trying so hard.

Afterwards, we visited with her therapist alone. She mentioned what incredible progress Ingrid has made, and how proud they are of her. She said they’re now trying to persuade to go from her wheelchair to using a walker. At this point in her rehabilitation journey, it’s a huge step. Yet her caring and compassionate therapist said, “I’m sure that just as soon as we can help her make this transition, she will begin to make even more rapid progress.”

I’ve told you this for two reasons: one, I wanted you to know about Ingrid, and the challenges faced by her, husband Craig, and their children Victor and Cassandra. Your continuing concern is part of what it means to be a caring community.

It’s a miracle Ingrid is alive. The progress she’s making in rehabilitation is miraculous as well. It’s not easy, and she is working so hard to regain the awareness, the fluency, the capability that she had only four months ago.

I was so appreciative that I was able to see her and interact with her. And I wanted to tell you about that experience, regardless of the sermon topic selected. In fact, I would say there is nothing more apropos to a community of faith than what I’ve just reported.

SCRIPTURE.

Now, since I’m probably the only one in the house with a bible, which is so small that I sneaked it in without anyone noticing, please let me read the following three verses from the Jewish book of beginnings, Genesis 01:28ff:

And God said unto the man and woman he had created, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the Earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the Earth.

And behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the Earth, and every tree, in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

And to every beast of the Earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the Earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

When this creation myth was written some 3,000 or so years ago, it was an attempt to put into writing what others had written and said. Its meaning was very clear: This world was a beautiful place. It had been put here for one purpose: the use and benefit of humankind.

According to this creation account, humankind is in charge of everything. It is here for humankind to use and control. That includes all the fish, the birds, the animals, and the vegetation. It is ours. We are in charge. Subdue and dominate: Very masculine, right?

            Immediately following this first creation account is a second more theological creation myth. If we think the first one takes us down an environmentally destructive path, of subdue and dominate, consider this account: The first woman, Eve, eats fruit which God has said, “Don’t eat!” She also invites her husband to do the same.

God goes berserk. According to the myth, he curses the serpent, condemns Adam to hard work forever, and dooms all human beings to death. Whereas the first creation account, put both woman and man in charge, to subdue and dominate; in the second account, God puts into place a theological basis for male domination of women. That has been and continues to be, the curse of the Western and Middle Eastern worlds. Listen to these words:

Unto the woman God said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

EXPLICATION.

Now here is the question I want us to raise: If the God of the Jews had been understood as female, what would have been different about the place of women in the world today? And if that had happened, then the religious knockoffs of Judaism, which we know as Christianity and Islam, would they have created such a sexist culture and world: Where only men can be priests in the Roman Catholic Church, not to mention bishops, cardinals and popes…. Where only men can be pastors and deacons in the largest Protestant denomination in America, the Southern Baptist Convention…. Where some Islamic imams do not shake the hands of women because the women may be having their period and hence unclean….

What would the world be like if their God had been a woman? And for those of us who may no longer subscribe to belief in God, what if we had been conditioned from an early age to a culture which thought of God as woman? Would we still be atheists or agnostics, or might we have been true believers?

GOD AS IMMANENT: IN ALL THINGS.

One of the distinctions that most theologians advocate, who prefer to think of God in feminine terms, is the notion of God’s being a pervasive presence in the world, rather than the masculine notion of God being separate and apart from all that is – in a supernatural place above and beyond the natural – up on a throne, and with his number one son, Jesus, in the seat to his right.

However, from a spiritually feminine perspective, God is the Earth, the Mother who birthed us, the planet we live on. God is in the green, the growth, the trees, the flowers. God is in us. God can never be separate and apart, because a part of God is us – it’s we.

That means then, that destruction of the environment where we live…the polluting of the atmosphere…global warming…the extinction of species and their habitat…the introduction of poisons into precious resources – all these would be seen as an act against God and her being.

SPIRITUALLY CONNECTING.

And if that be our perspective of God, then how would we connect to Mother God? What would feminine spirituality look like?

Wouldn’t one of the ways that we could connect to God be, connecting to Nature? Wouldn’t it be a divine wonder at the remarkable balance on our Planet Earth? Wouldn’t we be fascinated by the design of spider webs, and the place they fill in the order of things? Wouldn’t we be forced to find better ways of dumping industrial wastes than pouring them in our rivers and lakes and oceans? Isn’t it a tragedy that so many fish are dangerous to eat because of the poisons they have imbibed from the waters we’ve polluted, even though we depend upon those waters to provide us fish to eat?

If the body of God were this Earth, and we are a part of that body, wouldn’t we want to insure that this part of the body is fed well?

A couple of weeks ago, I had Al Brislain, from the Harry Chapin Food Bank, speak to my Civic Engagement Class at FGCU. He offered one of the most provocative explanations for the epidemic of obesity in America. It was this: Calories are cheap; nutrition is expensive. Then he charted America’s obesity epidemic starting with 1988: Back then, there were only two states whose statistics indicated a problem with obesity. Then year by year by year, more and more states were included until by 2004 every state had an obesity problem. And guess what: the growth of the fast food industry parallels the increase in obesity.

But this is not an attack on fast food. Rather, for the hungry, a $1 hamburger has lots of calories; fresh fruit and vegetables are much, much more expensive. With the slow demise of the middle class, and the continuing growth of the working poor, less and less people can barely afford fast food, much less costly nutritious food. Add to that the disgrace of a health care system designed for the affluent and the lucky.

Again, the question is: Would we have so many people going hungry? Would we not have universal health care? If we had been taught that God were woman and she cared about our health and the planet that produces healthy food and safe water to drink?

CONCLUSION.

Several years ago, at the congregation in which I ministered in Oklahoma, there was an architect. He had designed his own home on a two-acre site, along with a stream, bridge and trees. And one of the unique things about it was that there was no grass to mow.

One Sunday, he told during “Joys & Concerns” of working around the house one Saturday. He noticed that some wasps had built a nest, but that a board had blown away and the nest was now exposed to the bright sunshine. As he looked closer, he saw that there were several adult wasps furiously flapping their wings over the nest, trying to protect their wasplings from birthing prematurely due to the heat. He found the board that had blown away and fixed it so that the nest was now protected.

He continued working around the yard, and he went to replace a light bulb which was in an overhang. As he stood on a ladder, he reached his hand up into the recessed hole in the overhang. When he covered the light bulb, he felt something. He pulled his hand out very slowly, and it was covered with wasps.

He took a deep breath, not moving or saying anything. Then he spoke to the wasps. He said, “Remember me? I’m the one who saved your babies from the hot sun. I’m not going to hurt you, so please, don’t hurt me.” Momentarily, they all flew away without even one bee sting.

The lesson from that is not what to do when covered by bees; rather, it is to suggest that there is a way of relating to Nature, to our planet, and yes, even to God, that is loving and caring of all its parts…and yes, even the wasps.

Shalom, Salaam Aleikum. Amen. And may God bless Ingrid this morning as she – God – blesses each of us today. Blessed be.

We will pause now for 7½ minutes of brief questions as a part of our Conversation Café. The Service and Support Council will provide microphones for you to speak into.