I very much enjoyed reading Louise Perry's book entitled The Case Against the Sexual Revolution, and can highly recommend it. In a related essay, she makes a point that I think goes unacknowledged--feminism, or at least Western feminism, is a child of Christianity. And I would argue that feminism began to lose its way as it severed ties to its parent.
Now that parent is guilty, too, I'm afraid. Christianity is guilty of contaminating its doctrine with sexism, meaning that the split was inevitable. But it was also tragic. And I think the future of feminism must rebuild upon a Restored Christiantiy--upon a Restored Gospel--that has been shorn of its erroneous sexism, even its misogyny.
In my own work, I've written that the revolutionary advances made for women in Europe were direct products of Christianity. Christianity taught chastity for both men and women--unheard of! Christianity taught that polygamy was evil--news to all cultures! Christianity taught that infanticide was unconscionable--another first! Christianity taught that cousin marriage and incest were wrong--though cousin marriage was the foundation of many cultures. Christianity taught that widows were not obliged to marry their dead husband's brother. Christianity taught that widows inherited their husband's goods, not his family--revolutionary! Christianity said that rape was always a crime, not just a crime against certain women whose families were respectable--wow!
The moral law applied equally to men and women. And men could no longer do to women what they themselves would not want done to them. Men's might no longer ruled--God's law ruled instead.
Now, of course this immense revolution for men and women was corrupted--by men in whose interest the old ways were created in the first place. The scandals attending, for example, the Catholic Church and its pedophilia crisis, are but one of numerous that tore from Christianity that which was revolutionary, and replaced it with the same old, same old "phallus uber alles" that categorized all of pre-Christian Western society.
But that did not have to be. It could have been different if we were building on a Restored Gospel. One that preached that we have a Father and a Mother in Heaven, and that the rule of the family was to mirror that in Heaven--a diarchy. One that preached that Eve did not sin in the Garden of Eden, but chose the better path, and that Adam was right to follow her lead. One that preached that only with the powers of priesthood and priestesshood combined could we hope to creat the Kingdom of God on earth. One that preached that porn and prostitution and surrogacy were evil, and that no child was born the wrong sex, for sex is eternal. If we were building on that foundation, feminism would never have rejected Christianity.
And the fruits of feminism's rejection of Christianity have played a role--among the roles played by others--in the hellscape of male-female relations we see today in our culture. As Perry puts it, we are "repaganizing," and women again are used and abused and cast aside without a thought--and some feminists call that "sexual liberation." Some feminists call that "empowering choice." The old, horrific rule of "phallus uber alles" is back with a vengeance--this time supported by some feminists who have lost their way and their marbles. There are many women who are fighting back--who are feminists also--but mainstream feminism has certainly embraced the bad old ways of pagan life. An act more anti-feminist is hard to identify.
Perry has a haunting finale to her piece, one which rings true to me:
"What if we understand the Christian era as a clearing in a forest? The forest is paganism: dark, wild, vigorous, and menacing, but also magical in its way. For two thousand years, Christians pushed the forest back, with burning and hacking, but also with pruning and cultivating, creating a garden in the clearing with a view upward to heaven. But watch as roots outstretch themselves and new shoots spring up from the ground. The patch of sky recedes. . . With no one left to tend the garden, the forest is reclaiming its ground."
She is right. The darkness is coming for women again. If only we women could build upon the Light of the Restored Gospel, this new Dark Age for women would not have to be.
I know that I will fight that fight. I am saddened so many do not even see the need for such a fight. And I am saddened so many of those who could be the fiercest warriors have let doubt sap their strength. Sisters, this is the fight worth fighting! This is the hill to die on, for this is the only Rock on which we may live!