Upcoming Review of Fr. Josiah Trenham's Lecture Series "The Good Wife"

Fr. Josiah Trenham

Back in 2014, when I was an eager and naive inquirer into Orthodox Christianity, I listened to Fr. Josiah Trenham's lecture series "The Good Wife." His words shaped my conception of my new faith and my proper role as an Orthodox wife. I took his teachings to heart and sincerely tried to implement them.

I didn't know at the time that Fr. Josiah is arguably the most reactionary voice in American Orthodoxy. I now realize that his views are more extreme than those of the vast majority of Orthodox Christians I have known. Yet, Fr. Josiah's podcast "Arena" is featured on Ancient Faith, the most popular English-language Orthodox media outlet. He also founded Patristic Nectar Publishing and is a prolific author. I have seen his books sitting on the shelves of my parish library.

In other words, Fr. Josiah is not an obscure, fringe voice. If he were, I wouldn't bother to address his views. But despite his extreme positions, he is mainstream and highly influential among American Orthodox Christians. As such, his work merits scrutiny and critique.

When I was a wide-eyed catechumen, I didn't think I had the authority to dismiss the teachings of an Orthodox priest. "The Good Wife" shocked and disturbed me the first time I listened to it, but I convinced myself that my reaction was due to my own prideful nature, which had to be conquered if I was to become a Good Wife. It's difficult to convey the damage this did to my marriage and my faith, damage which I am still working to repair.

For an Orthodox Christian, criticizing a priest is tricky. Our faith teaches us that a priest is an icon of Christ, and as such demands respect. We aren't required to take the word of any one priest as doctrine, but rigorous critique may be perceived as bordering on blasphemy. If we take issue with the teachings of a priest, we are to expected to respond meekly or not at all.

Well, I'm not going to do that. I don't have much status to lose within the Church at this point, and that gives me some freedom that well-behaved Orthodox Christians don't have. I want other Orthodox Christians to see clearly the extreme (and, I will argue, un-Orthodox) ideology that Fr. Josiah propagates, so that they can approach his work with skepticism. Towards that end, I will be writing a multi-part review of his lecture series "The Good Wife."

I have a very small blog with few if any readers. I don't know if my words can make a difference, but words are the only tool I have. If enough Orthodox Christians speak out against Fr. Josiah, maybe we could pressure mainstream outlets like Ancient Faith to stop giving him a platform. He could be relegated to the fringe where he belongs. Hey, I can dream.

The full series of "The Good Wife" is available for pay through Patristic Nectar Publishing, except for Part 1 which you can listen to for free. Part 1 is also available through Ancient Faith Radio, which is where I first heard it. In my reviews, I will summarize the content of his lectures for the benefit of those who can't or won't pay to hear them, and I will include extensive quotations.

Stay tuned.

The Problem of Misogyny in Christianity

Nine months ago I wrote a blog post called "The Problem with Orthodox Tradition on Female Virginity," and seven months ago I shared it on Facebook. In it, I had some harsh words about misogyny in Orthodoxy, and I proclaimed that I would no longer be taking Communion at Church. The Facebook post generated, shall we say, a stir among my Orthodox friends and my family.

I'm not going to take back anything I said. I have not been receiving Communion as I said wouldn't, because I still have not resolved my deep reservations about Orthodoxy, and I can't repent of what I don't regret. I do have one regret about the post, though. I wish I hadn't shared it on Facebook, at least not before I had private conversations with family and close Orthodox friends. I could have avoided some drama that way.

This is a follow-up post to the arguments I put forward in my last post.

First, I want to say that misogyny in religion is not a problem confined to Orthodoxy. It is entwined in the roots of all forms of Christianity. Other branches of Christianity may not venerate the saints I mentioned in the last post, but all Christians hold up the Bible as the primary source of doctrine, and the Bible itself contains numerous passages that devalue the spiritual worth of women. I will point out some of these passages in a moment. Misogyny is mixed up in many other major religions as well, but I will leave it to people of non-Christian backgrounds to critique their own religions.

Second, I want to say that individual Christians are not necessarily misogynists just because there is misogyny in elements of their tradition. Christian tradition is self-contradictory in its messages about the status of women, and many Christians choose to focus on the messages that affirm the spiritual equality of women. So why can't I do the same? Why can't I turn to the verse in Galatians where Paul says, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus," and ignore the rest? 

Because I want to be intellectually honest and consistent. If you believe the Bible's teachings are true and good, you have to reckon with the WHOLE Bible, not just the pieces you like. If you cherry-pick, then deep in your heart you believe the Bible is not completely trustworthy. To be intellectually honest, you must have some systematic way to determine which parts are true and which are false, or else you must admit that you are relying on your own value system independent of Christianity. It's fine to rely on your own value system, but to be honest you should admit to yourself that Christianity is not the foundation of your worldview, even if you may still value your faith as a source of community, comfort, and inspiration.

My crisis of faith was the result of realizing that I cannot accept all aspects of the Bible and Orthodox Tradition as true and good. I haven't yet come up with a systematic way to determine which parts are good and which are bad, so right now I can't trust any of it.

In case you are a Christian who doubts my claim of misogyny in the Bible, I'll give you a few examples.

• Deuteronomy 21: The Israelites are instructed by God that in war, they may seize women as captives and force them to be their wives.
• Deuteronomy 22: Under Mosaic Law, if a woman is raped in a city, she is to be stoned along with her rapist, "because she did not cry out." It is incumbent upon the woman to prevent rape. There is no mercy for women who are coerced but did not cry out, or presumably even for women who cry out but are not heard. (This situation, by the way, is exactly what happened to me. If I had been a Jew living before the time of Christ, should I have been stoned?)
• Judges 12: The tribe of Benjamin is saved from extinction through the violent capture of women in Jabesh Gilead and Shiloh. The other tribes of Israel ultimately had sympathy for the tribe of Benjamin and condoned their actions.
• 2 Samuel 11-12: David "sent messengers and took [Bathsheba]." There is no indication that Bathsheba had any say, and it seems unlikely that she would feel free to refuse the king. God sends Nathan the prophet to David to accuse him of his sins, but David is not accused of any offense against Bathsheba herself, only against Uriah for murdering him and taking Uriah's wife as his own. Furthermore, part of God's punishment of David is that his wives will be taken captive and raped.

This is not a comprehensive list, but it's enough to make my point. I'm focusing here on sexual assault because it's the most obvious example to me, but we could also talk about the scapegoating of Eve, the acceptance of polygamy, the general lack of agency women had in choosing their own husbands, and the treatment of women as possessions of men who are passed from father to husband.

These examples come from the Old Testament, and Christians may argue that they are superseded by the teachings of the New Testament. But are we saying that God used to disregard or even approve of rape under certain circumstances, but after Christ He didn't anymore? What kind of God would EVER approve of rape? Isn't God eternal and unchanging?

There is a very simple answer. These passages were written by men, fallible human beings who were influenced by the thinking of their time. They were not divinely inspired, and hence not completely trustworthy. This is hard to swallow for Christians, but it's better than trying to reconcile yourself to the idea that women's value is subject to change the same way that Jewish rules about unclean foods were subject to change.

I am not aware of passages in the New Testament that so obviously condone rape. However, that does not mean that the New Testament is free from deeply problematic teachings about the status of women. For one example, consider Ephesians 5:22-24: "Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as also Christ is the head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body. Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be subject to their own husbands in everything." This analogy likening the relationship between husbands and wives to the relationship between Christ and the church is even incorporated into traditional marriage vows in many Christian churches. (I had to fight hard against the Methodist officiant at my own wedding to omit that part.)

Think what an extreme statement this is of the authority of the husband over the wife! The wife is to be subject to the husband IN EVERYTHING. The relationship of the church to Christ is total, worshipful obedience. Christian marriage, according to this teaching, is in no way a relation of equals. This is similar to the statement in Ephesians 6:5 about the relationship of slaves to masters: "Bondservants, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ." (The implication here with regard to the morality of slavery is another troubling matter.) Wives must therefore be as obedient as SLAVES to their husbands.

I will not and cannot accept these misogynistic Biblical teachings. I have tried to reconcile myself to them through all kinds of mental gymnastics, and the effort tore at my heart. I am angry at the Church for encouraging me to do so. I am angry that the Church exacerbated the pain of my own internalized misogyny instead of helping me to heal. As painful as it is to reject my faith, it is more painful to believe in a God who would condone such treatment of women.

The Problem with Orthodox Tradition on Female Virginity

St. Pelagia of Antioch, Virgin-Martyr

 
The Orthodox Church grants special honor to saints, particularly female saints, who remain virgins throughout their lives. I used to explain this tradition to myself by reasoning that virgins, whether men or women, eschew worldly pleasures and the blessings of family life in order to devote themselves more fully to God. It makes perfect sense for the Church to honor people who were especially devoted to God, right?

However, I have come to realize that this explanation doesn't fully account for Orthodox Tradition on virginity. There is a dark side to Orthodox teachings on virginity which undermines the dignity and spiritual worth of women in the Church.

If the Orthodox elevation of virginity were all about honoring devotion to God, one would expect equal emphasis on male and female virginity. But this is clearly not the case. Only female saints are given the official title of "Virgin." Often this title is combined with the title of "martyr," as in "St. Daria the Virgin-Martyr." Many unmarried male saints presumably died as virgins, but their virginity is not usually specifically noted in stories of their lives, nor is there a title specifically for male virgin saints. What is going on here?

Another clue lies in a peculiar pattern in the lives of female saints: although many suffered torture and martyrdom, there are NO well-known female saints who were victims of rape. How can this be? Is it plausible, given the prevalence of sexual violence, that two millenia of Church history has not produced a single noteworthy woman saint who was a victim of sexual assault?

There are numerous examples of virgin saints who were threatened with rape, but who were saved from the loss of their virginity by divine intervention. St. Agnes of Rome was forced into a brothel, but when she was stripped, long hair miraculously grew from from her head and covered her nakedness. St. Juliana was also sent to a brothel, but God blinded anyone who tried to touch her. St. Daria was guarded by a lion. St. Markella of Chios was sealed in a rock up to her waist so that her father could not rape her (although he still could still behead her). There are many more examples.

Some female saints even chose death over the loss of their virginity. St. Pelagia jumped off a roof to avoid being defiled by Roman soldiers. St. Euphrasia of Nicodemia tricked her would-be rapist into beheading her. St. Domnina drowned not only herself but also her two daughters to protect them from rape (according to St. John Chrysostom's version of the story). Although the Church usually considers suicide to be a serious sin, Church Fathers such as St. Ambrose and St. John Chrysostom affirmed the virtue of women committing suicide (and apparently, in St. Domnina's case, murder) to preserve their chastity. These Fathers of the Church did not extend their acceptance of suicide to men in the same situation.

What conclusion are we to draw from these patterns? Why would God allow His saints to suffer all manner of torments for His name, but never rape? One begins to wonder whether being a victim of sexual violence disqualifies a woman for sainthood.

Clearly, this preoccupation with female virginity is about more that just honoring women for their devotion to God. No one is less devoted to God for having been raped, any more than one is less devoted to God for having endured torture. This isn't about honoring the purity of virginal women's souls, but about fetishizing their unpenetrated bodies. It was the physical state of virginity that St. Pelagia killed herself in order to preserve; her purity of soul was not under threat. God (supposedly) intervened to protect the virginity of St. Markella, St. Agnes, St. Juliana, and others because losing that physical state would have meant losing their glory in heaven, even if it were against their will. It was a woman's physical state of virginity, the state of never having been penetrated by a man, that St. John Chrysostom and St. Ambrose valued even more than her life.

What this means is that while both men and women are judged for the state of their souls, women are additionally judged for the state of their bodies. Virginity, the imaginary (not medically verifiable) physical state of never having been penetrated, is not something that can be restored by any amount of repentance. Thus, the loss of virginity (even by rape) becomes the one unforgivable sin. This perverse tradition of fetishizing female virginity directly contradicts core Church teachings about salvation and the dignity of all human beings.

The Church is supposed to be a “hospital for souls,” but it has failed to heal one of my deepest wounds because it is unable to unequivocally affirm my worth as a woman— specifically, my worth as a woman who is not physically “pure,” and as a woman who has experienced sexual trauma.

I am saddened to find myself drifting away from the Orthodox Church, which I have loved so much. I still see so much goodness and beauty in it. But until I can figure out how to disentangle the poisonous snake of misogyny that is entwined in Church Tradition, I will be standing out in the narthex during Communion.

Stay-At-Home Sisyphus

Some moms have hypothesized a Law of the Universe stating that you can never get to the bottom of the laundry hamper. I would like to offer my experience today as evidence in support of this theory.

This morning, I took all of our dirty laundry to the laundromat. I was trying out a new strategy: instead of trying to wash and fold 2 loads every weekday, a goal which I have continually failed to meet, I would spend one epic day sorting, spot-treating, washing, drying, folding, hanging, and putting away ALL of our mountains of dirty laundry. We have a baby inclined to spitting up and a partially potty-trained toddler, so that is a LOT of laundry. To accomplish this Herculean task, I took our laundry to the laundromat where I could wash all of it simultaneously.

I filled up 5 washers with less than a week’s worth of our laundry, not including sheets (I didn't have time to strip the beds). I spent most of this afternoon folding and putting away the clean laundry.

When I finally completed my task, I triumphantly surveyed the empty laundry hampers. I had done the impossible! I was a Titan among moms! (I'm on a roll here with the classical mythology references.) Then I remembered that in order to truly complete my task, I needed to unpack the clean clothes from our suitcases that we had used for our trip last weekend.

I opened my suitcase to discover that the cat had peed all over my and the kids’ clothes.

It’s really not the cat’s fault, you see. I tempted the Universe by trying to break one of its fundamental laws. The cat was just restoring the Cosmos to its proper state.

Being a stay-at-home mom is often a Sisyphean existence. But instead of rolling a boulder up a hill, I am eternally carrying a basket of clean laundry up the stairs, only to discover that there is a basket of dirty laundry waiting for me at the top.

8 Goals I’ve Abandoned Since Having Baby #2

Who doesn’t love a Buzzfeed-style list article? Here are 8 standards that are now hopelessly unattainable... because it’s important to know when to give up.

1. Arriving on time to anything

I’m proud if I manage to get out of the house at all. If we get to church before the Gospel reading, I believe it still counts as “Orthodox On-Time.”

2. Saying morning prayers in the morning

Morning prayers happen after we have all gotten dressed and ready for the day, which usually isn’t before noon. That’s if they happen at all, and I’m afraid I’ve been skipping them a lot lately. When I do say them, it might not be the prayers in the prayer book. It might just be a “Lord, have mercy!” muttered under my breath as I survey the chaos that has overrun my life.

3. Eating out with both children

If a restaurant doesn’t have a playground inside it, I don’t want to eat there.

4. Cloth diapering

Sorry, Earth. I can’t keep up with the laundry as it is, and I certainly don’t have time to add on a load of dirty diapers every day. Those Heavy Duty loads take like 2 hours on HE machines! The irony is that if I had a washer that was less “green,” I might be able to keep using cloth diapers. Hmmmm.

5. Strictly limiting screen time for the older child

Mommy needs you watch Daniel Tiger now.

6. Closely supervising the older child at all times

Sometimes my toddler runs off to another room while I am nursing the baby. Do I try to chase him down while the baby is still latched on? No. I figure he’ll be OK by himself for a few minutes. Probably.

7. Staying until the end of an event

This goes along with #1. Our strategy is arrive late, leave early. There is a vanishingly small window of time during which it is possible to keep a baby quiet and a toddler contained.

8. Maintaining respectable standards of personal grooming

It’s hard to find time to shower when you have two young kids. You could wait until both are asleep at the same time, but that’s like waiting for a planetary alignment. No, your best bet is to wait until the toddler is asleep (or watching Daniel Tiger in a toddler-proof space... see #5 and #6), and just bring the baby into the bathroom with you.

How long can you count on a baby to stay content in her baby rocker chair? Maybe 5 minutes? And what would you rather do with those 5 minutes: wash out the dried spit-up encrusting your hair, or shave your legs? That’s what I thought.

The Agony of Dirty Dishes

It’s been awhile since I last blogged. In fact, I forgot I still had this blog. When I rediscovered it just now, I almost deleted it out of sheer disgust with the title. The Joy of Dirty Dishes. Ugh! Someone please slap the saccharine faux-humility out of 2016 me!

Actually, I think 2017 did a pretty good job of doing just that. Not that it was entirely a bad year. My son grew from a baby into a toddler. We got to know some wonderful people at our new church in Wisconsin, although my husband and I still missed our Western rite parish in Denver and struggled to adjust to the Byzantine style of liturgy and fasting. We gradually worked to turn our townhouse, the first place we owned, into a comfortable home that reflected our tastes. I started to find my place in a community of other moms with young children.

Then everything changed abruptly. Our lives pivoted around the trivial circumstances of a single moment. We moved, again. But we tried (with partial success) to see the hand of God in the midst of apparent disaster, and the forced change gave us the opportunity to move back South and live with family. I was six and a half months pregnant. Then came another totally unexpected upheaval: I had an episode of preterm labor, which resulted in three weeks of mandated bed rest. I could only lie back and watch as others performed duties that were supposed to be mine, including caring for my son. Yeah, 2017 taught me a lot about relinquishing control and accepting imperfection, and it was not always a pleasant learning experience.

My daughter was born on November 29th, just a day before her due date. Everything about her was a surprise: her gender, the timing of her birth, her head of dark hair. She has immediately shown herself to be a distinct individual, different from her big brother in both appearance and temperament.

I feel again, as I did after my son’s birth, that my old self has shattered under the pressure of new responsibilities. In order to survive, I must adapt. Last time, I had to give up a lot of self-indulgent habits and learn to work harder than I ever had before.

I’m not sure yet who I am becoming this time, but I think my new self will have to be a LOT more tolerant of imperfection. I am running up against the absolute limits of what I can accomplish in a day and still falling far short of my own standards of Minimum Acceptability. Last time, I had to become more disciplined; this time, I think I need to become more forgiving, of others and especially of myself.

When I named this blog, I had in my mind an idealized image of myself as a diligent homemaker who could find joy even in the humblest household duties. I imagined that the challenge would be the task of washing dishes in itself, learning somehow to enjoy it. No, no. The challenge is looking at a stack of dirty dishes and longing to wash them, but choosing instead to leave them there because there is something more important you must do. The challenge is taking a hit to your pride in yourself as a Good Homemaker by neglecting the very visible stack of dirty dishes, in order to perform some invisible duty that will make a greater difference to your family’s wellbeing. Sometimes the less selfish choice is to leave the dirty dishes and take a rest, because if you don’t you will be exhausted and irritable with your family later. That is the agony of dirty dishes.

What is the Joy of Dirty Dishes? I will let you know if I find it. I hope that I can, because I’m sure there are a lot of dirty dishes ahead of me in 2018.

Facing East

The windows of our temporary apartment in downtown Milwaukee face west. When I look out, I see the east face of another high-rise apartment building a block away. The bedrooms in that building all have enormous bay windows. They are so large that it seems like the occupants are sleeping in glass pods protruding from the side of the building.

In the morning, I can see the light of dawn creeping down the side of that building, pouring in the windows. The people who live on the upper levels must be early risers, or else they have to sleep with the shades drawn. It must be quite a view, and I imagine that the people who live there pay a premium for it. I bet they can see dawn breaking over Lake Michigan. As for me, I can only see the sunrise indirectly, reflected in those windows.

This morning, I watched that indirect sunrise while nursing Peter and musing. I was thinking about the significance of having a sense of one's orientation in space. Some people, like my husband, have a clear sense of their spatial orientation at all times. I think such people must be continually tracking their location on a mental map. I, on the other had, am usually unaware of whether I am facing north, south, east, or west. My focus is small-scale: what is happening right in front of me, in this room. I don't think about my wider spatial context unless a view of some major point of reference, such as the sunrise or Lake Michigan, suddenly makes me aware of it. If I lived on the east side that other apartment building, I think it would be easier for me to maintain a constant sense of my location because the dawn would vividly remind me every morning.

Spatial orientation is important in Orthodox Christianity. Orthodox Christians all over the globe face in the same direction during Divine Liturgy and when saying their morning and evening prayers: East, towards the rising sun. The rising sun is a natural icon of Christ. St. John of Damascus argued, "Since [. . .] God is spiritual light, and Christ is called in the Scriptures Sun of Righteousness and Dayspring, the East is the direction that must be assigned to His worship." There are also many Biblical references to the East. When Christ returns, we will see him coming from the East: "For as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man” (Matthew 24:27). In our churches, the altar is to the East, and in our homes we (ideally) set up our icon corners on an Eastern wall or corner of the house. This is a very ancient tradition.

Orthodoxy emphasizes the physical aspect of worship as very important and inseparable from the spiritual aspect. Matter matters: spatial orientation, body posture, icons, incense, prayer ropes, and of course the Bread and Wine that become the Body and Blood of Christ. Human beings are both physical and spiritual, so if we are to worship God with our whole being, our physical bodies must be involved. The practice of physically facing East during prayer ought to reinforce the spiritual practice of orienting our souls and our lives towards Christ.

Sometimes, it is not practical to set up an icon corner on an Eastern wall. In our temporary apartment, I have broken with tradition and propped up our icons on the sill of the west-facing windows, simply because that is the only convenient place for them. But today, after indirectly watching the sunrise, glorious even when seen reflected in other people's windows, I decided to face East again to say my morning prayers: East towards the beautiful sunrise hidden from my view, towards the beautiful God I cannot see directly but Whose Light is reflected all around me.