Seminar: Process/Feminist Theology – Fall Semester, 2004

Course Objective: A constructive and critical consideration of how several contemporary theologians combine process theology and feminist theology.

Assumptions: While many theologies of the last thirty years have moved toward positions similar to those held by process theologians, this has been particularly true of feminist theologians. Women who write process theology are also feminists; women who write feminist theology are often explicitly or implicitly process thinkers. This course will explore this dynamic.

Assignments:

Reading must be completed prior to class discussion
15-18 page paper dealing with an issue in one of the books assigned to the class. To write this paper you must read more than one book by the author you choose. Submit a paragraph stating the thesis you wish to explore to me prior to writing the paper.

Weekly Schedule

August 25^th: Introduction to course; A process/feminist model

September 1^st: Suchocki, The Fall to Violence, Preface, chapters 1-5

September 8^th: The Fall to Violence, chapters 6-Conclusion

September 15^th: Carol Christ, She Who Changes, Introduction, chapters 1-4

September 22^nd: She Who Changes, chapters 5-9

September 29^th: Catherine Keller, Face of the Deep, Pre/face, Parts I and II

October 6^th: Face of the Deep, Parts III and IV

October 13^th: Grace Jantzen, Becoming Divine, Introduction, chapters 1-4

October 20^th: Becoming Divine, chapters 5-8

October 27^th: Becoming Divine, chapters 9-11

November 3^rd: Sallie McFague, Life Abundant, Preface, chapters 1-4

November 10^th: Life Abundant, chapters 5-Epilogue

November 17^th: Anne Primavesi, Sacred Gaia, chapters 1, 9-14

December 1^st: Karen Baker-Fletcher, Sisters of Dust, Sisters of Spirit

December 8^th: Wrap-up: Where we’ve been, where we’re going.

December 12^th: Papers due

Required Class Texts

Baker-Fletcher, Karen. Sisters of Dust, Sisters of Spirit. Fortress, 1998.

Christ, Carol P. She Who Changes: Re-Imagining the Divine in the World. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.

Jantzen, Grace M. Becoming Divine: Toward a Feminist Philosophy of Religion. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999.

Keller, Catherine. Face of the Deep: A Theology of Becoming. London: Routledge, 2003.

McFague, Sallie. Life Abundant: Rethinking Theology and Economy for a Planet in Peril. Minneapolis: Augsburg Press, 2001.

Primavesi, Anne, Sacred Gaia. Routledge, 2000.

Suchocki, Marjorie. The Fall to Violence: Original Sin in Relational Theology. New York: Continuum, 1994.

Suggested Readings of Process-Influenced Feminist Books

Davaney, Sheila Greeve. Feminism and Process Thought: The Harvard Divinity School/Claremont Center for Process Studies Symposium Papers. New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1981.

Farmer,Patricia. Embracing a Beautiful God. Chalice, 2002.

Heyward, Carter. Saving Jesus from Those who are Right. Fortress, 1999.

Howell, Nancy. A Feminist Cosmology. Prometheus Books, 2000.

Major Books by Class Authors

Karen Baker-Fletcher: A Singing Something; My Sister, My Brother (a dialogical text between womanist and Exodus theology written with her husband, Garth Baker-Fletcher); Sisters of Dust, Sisters of Spirit

Christ, Carol P.: Diving Deep and Surfacing (1980), Laughter of Aphrodite (1987), Odyssey with the Goddess (1985), Rebirth of the Goddess (1997); She Who Changes (2003). Edited books: with Judith Plaskow, Womanspirit Rising (1979) and Weaving the Visions (1989)

Jantzen, Grace M.: God’s World, God’s Body (1984); Power, Gender, and Christian Mysticism (1995); Desire and the Divine (1996)

Keller, Catherine. From a Broken Web: Separation, Sexism and Self (1986); Apocalypse Now and Then: A Feminist Guide to the End of the World (1996); Face of the Deep (2003); Edited books: with Anne Daniell, Process and Difference: Between Cosmological and Poststructuralist Postmodernisms (2002).

McFague, Sallie: em>Speaking in Parables; Metaphorical Theology; Models of God; Super, Natural Christians: The Body of God;How we should love nature (1997); Life Abundant: Rethinking Theology and Economy for a Planet in Peril (2000)

Primavesi, Anne: Our God Has No Favorites: A Liberation Theology of Eucharist (coauthored with J. Henderson) (1989); From Apocalypse to Genesis: Ecology, Feminism, and Christianity (1991); Sacred Gaia (2000); Gaia’s Gift: Earth, Ourselves, and God After Copernicus (2003)

Suchocki, Marjorie: God Christ Church: A Practical Guide to Process Theology (1982, 1989); The End of Evil: Process Eschatology in Historical Context (1988); The Fall to Violence: Original Sin in Relational Theology (1994); In God’s Presence: Theological Reflections on Prayer (1996); The Whispered Word: A Theology of Preaching (1999); Divinity and Diversity: A Christian Affirmation of Religious Pluralism (2002); Theological monograph on John Wesley’s Plain Account of Christian Perfection in A Perfect Love, edited by Steven Manskar (2004). Edited books: with Joseph Bracken, Trinity in Process; with Michael Welker, Suende.