A liberating and inclusive reality.

Gender, Ethnicity and Religion: Views from the Other Side Rosemary Radford Ruether, (ed.) (Fortress Press, 2002, 262pp.)

ONE STATEMENT FROM Magarita Suarez's essay in Gender, Ethnicity and Religion: Views from the Other Side encapsulates the spirit of this anthology. "In the last thirty-odd years, theology has ceased to be a field whose practitioners are exclusively white, Western, and male." (p174) In moving the discourse on theology and religion away from the "white, Western, and male" point of view, this book presents a wide array of opinions that seek to find an alternative way of defining the theology and practice of religion. These new definitions come from quarters which have had little attention or visibility in the past: African American women, including lessons learned from the oppression of the Jim Crow South and from participants in the Civil Rights struggle; indigenous peoples fighting to maintain their cultural autonomy; disabled women; and Filipino immigrant communities in the United States.

Suarez, an assistant professor of Religion and Philosophy at Meredith College in North Carolina, is joined by n other contributors in this new volume edited by Rosemary Radford Ruether, Carpenter Professor of Feminist Theology at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California. The contributors illustrate how their respective social contexts have contributed to their world view, which they put forward as a more liberating and inclusive reality than that currently in fashion.

The book is divided into three parts. Part One presents a historical framework for re-thinking gender and religion. The four essayists in this section demonstrate how places of safety and self-validation can be created within hostile social environments. Some use historical examples to demonstrate how women were able to carve out such safe spaces, against tremendous odds. Rosalind Hinton, assistant professor of African American Religion at DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois, describes the rise of African American teacher, church choir director and professional musician Alma Lillie Hubbard. Hubbard established a career as a concert artist, first in New Orleans and later in New York, during the early decades of the 20th century. Hinton credits four factors that facilitated Hubbard's rise into the black middle class: family, church, college and travel, along with the strength and resilience of the African American community during the era of Jim Crow.

Elaine Calbeck, a theological librarian at the United Library of Garrett-Evangelical and Seabury-Western Theological Seminaries reviews the poetry of Pauli Murray, an African American civil rights lawyer and Episcopalian priest, who "used the written word to work through her own pain and joy ... [and] the languages of theology, law and poetry to improve the world and redress wrong." (p62) She used issues such as gender, identity, race, class and religion as well to express the strength and dignity of her oppressed people.

Barbara Isaacs, lecturer in religion at Loyola University, also in Chicago, examines the contrasting reactions by two Methodist academic institutions--Bennett College, a historically black college in North Carolina, and the predominantly white Randolph-Macon Women's College in Virginia--to the participation of their students in lunch counter sit-ins in the early 1960s. Isaacs portrays the sit-ins as "a remarkable effort to put the teachings [the students] had learned in family, church, and college into practice" (p90) but which led to striking differences in their respective institutions' response.

Jacqueline Battalora, a public-interest lawyer and law professor at the University of Illinois, looks at racial oppression through a wider lens, by critiquing the dominant culture of US society, and calls for a new "critical white racial ethics" that acknowledges the importance of race "not from an essentialist or biological/genetic viewpoint, but as having been assigned such tremendous significance, both historically and today, that it provides unearned advantages to those racialized white, albeit to varying degrees." (p12) Arguing that the "color-blind" approach in law and policy has failed, as it still goes through, rather than around racial categories, Battalora believes that the "paradigm of dominance can no longer pretend to reflect or shape human dignity."

Part Two looks at more contemporary social contexts, where alongside the creation of safe places, an acceptance of alternative perspectives must also be promoted. Four examples are presented of diverse groups working hard to achieve inclusion while maintaining their unique social and cultural characteristics against a larger background of "potential cultural erasure." In a very engaging essay, Jocelyn Eclarin Azada, a senior research analyst at the General Board of Pension and Health Benefits of the United Methodist Church examines what she calls the "Filipino diaspora" by laying out the patterns of Filipino immigration to the US during the 20th century. She points out that global trade deregulation and liberalization have led to worsening economic conditions in the Philippines, and continue to provide the push towards immigration.

Arbara Flores, a professor of theology and a member of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth in Belize, gives a fascinating and detailed glimpse into the spiritual worldview of the Garifuna people of Belize, descendants of West African slaves and Carib Indians. Flores concludes that their rituals are an anti-colonial mechanism, and have enabled the Garifuna to maintain their cultural autonomy.

Magarita Suarez's essay, referred to earlier, reflects on the lives and career paths of two Cuban Episcopalian female pastors who have managed to navigate a slippery path between the continued defense of the Cuban revolution and their pastoral work. Suarez also explores the notion of the "vulnerable observer," who assumes a more engaged, intimate relationship with research subjects, and can help theologians better hone their craft as they become open to the gifts their host communities are offering them. (pp187-8)

S. Sue Horner, an associate professor of Women's Studies at North Park University in Illinois, reviews the growing feminist movement within evangelicalism, and in particular, traces a difficult period during the history of the Evangelical and Ecumenical Women's Caucus (EEWC) which represented a period of dissension and ultimately a schism in that organization.

PART THREE LAYS OUT A NEW FUTURE for women in religion and wider society. The propositions in this section demonstrate a strong sense of justice, human rights and equity.

Patricia-Anne Johnson, an assistant professor of Black Studies at California State University, Long Beach, proposes the incorporation of a womanist theology against the sexism and chauvinism of the Black theology movement and the racism of white women's theological stances. In doing so, she also critiques Black male theology, white feminist theology, and third-world theologies of liberation.

Kimberly Ann Willis, pastor of Marina United Methodist Church in Marina, California, recommends a new perspective on people with disabilities--the social interaction model--as a way of decreasing their social and theological marginalization. With this new model, the experience of disability lies in the interaction between a person with a disability and broader society. Willis also introduces the concept of a disabled God, which many readers will find thought provoking. Rita Lester, assistant professor of religion at Nebraska Wesleyan University casts a critical eye at the environmental movement in a historical and current context. She concludes that the environmental establishment perpetuates "environmental racism" and sexism, by paying scant attention to low-income families and communities of color, and has even endangered their well-being. Stephanie Mitchem, associate professor of Religious Studies at the University of Detroit Mercy, calls for womanist theology to undertake personal and communal healing and the reconciliation of institutions and humans with each other and with God.

Many of these ideas will be new to readers who are not theological scholars or specialists. The collection is unique in that it presents such a wide range of opinions, the nuances of which it might be difficult to discern without specialist knowledge. Ruether gives a useful context to the essays in her preface where she outlines the logic of their sequence. What is also evident in the book is the reality that Christian denominations, despite their common commitment to social justice and equity, still demonstrate lingering instances of racism and sexism, which are blatant and institutionalized in some settings. Willis' essay on alternative perceptions of disability in particular gives voice to a rarely heard viewpoint. She articulates some disturbing truths about the perception of disabled persons by the able-bodied, including the concept of "wholeness" as the normative for Christian wholeness and redemption. Equally disturbing is Calbeck's analysis of Pauli Murray's poetry describing Christianity under Jim Crow as a "twisted, cross-burning Christian culture." (p61)

Readers with interest in feminist issues, minority communities and the cultural milieu of religious life will find that this new collection of essays goes far beyond a cursory examination of diverse viewpoints but in fact lays out new and--for some--disturbing truths.

MARIAN STEWART TITUS is Senior Program Associate in Communications at Engender-Health in New York City and a board member of Catholics for a Free Choice. She has worked in corporate and non-profit communication, and in academia in the Caribbean and New York for over 15 years.