Refiner's Fire - A Religious Engagement with Violence - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0800632532 ISBN 13: 9780800632533

Publisher: Fortress Press, 2000

Synopsis

What does religion have to do with fomenting or transcending violence? In this fascinating work, Kirk-Duggan documents and analyzes religion's involvement in violence, for good and ill, in the Bible, slavery, the Civil Rights Movement, and the youth scene of today.

About this title

About the Author

Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan is an African American womanist theologian; a professor, author, and poet; and an elder in the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. She is professor emerita of religion and women's studies, as well as director of Women's Studies, at Shaw University Divinity School.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

From Chapter One (pre-publication version):

Eyes On the Prize: Womanist Reflections She looked in the mirror: No immediate image did she see; The vastness of the horizon; Seemed to mock her: she could not see her reflection. Through the skewed lens of dominant culture: She saw nothing A sister came along, With dignity and joy, And a different way of seeing. She was mesmerized. A thing she could not fathom Was about to cross her path, And that incomprehensible other Opened her mouth; And spoke; And lovingly said: You are somebody. She looked in her mirror, again. And this time she saw Gazing back at her With a nobility and a peace. The empty objectiveness that was but a shadow Had been replaced By her mighty image. And she heard God say: That s good!

To know who and what you are and who you belong to, is to embody the Divine good, is being clear about what is at stake, and is the cost and benefit of the prize of total, salvific grace and freedom. From the wounds of oppression sown in slavery, pampered by Jim Crow, and titillated by internalizing the hurt; and venting the injury on others oozes the poisons of pain, self-hatred, self-defeatism, insatiable desire, and rage. The want-a-be like white folks syndrome and the failed project of integration have exacted a tremendous cost. Although the For Colored Only and For White Only signs have been painted over or dismantled, the poisons and prisons of racism, sexism, classism, ageism, and heterosexism now wear different masks. Keep Your Eyes on the Prize, Hold On! affirms and avows the attitude of Womanist scholars as they study, teach, preach, and write about the tri-dimensional race/sex/class oppressive experience of Black women, tempered with the life-giving power that ruminates in the beingness and doingness of women of the African Diaspora. Keep Your Eyes on the Prize is an invitation to confront systemic and personal evil.

This chapter introduces a hermeneutic, a way to see and hear and exorcise the evil and violence that exists in various pockets of society in these United States and the world. This methodology and embodied way of living facilitates consciousness raising, analyzes complex realities, and ultimately, helps transform injustice: Womanist Theory. the language of Womanist thought, is itself the anvil and the kiln for Refining the Fires of analysis towards the reformation and transformation of individual, communal, and systemic violence. After indicating the origins of the term and the theoretical basis of exploration, I express my own rubric of doing Womanist analysis.

What is Womanist ? Alice Walker coined the term Womanist and claims that a Womanist is courageous, in charge, loves, and commits to the wholeness and survival of all people. Many strong Black women have not heard the term Womanist and have not identified themselves as such. Womanist is a confessional term, thus some strong Black women do not make this claim nor support all the components of the Womanist definition. Nevertheless, many strong Black women are Womanist by virtue of the experience of oppression and the desire for liberation, which serves as a catalyst for empowerment, exhaling, and excelling. A Womanist, sometimes denigrated as domineering castrating matriarch, is a strong Black woman who has developed survival strategies in spite of the oppression of herself in order to save her family and her people. She takes charge; she acts; she is, she Refines the Fire of justice as she keeps her eyes on her prize. Keep Your Eyes on the Prize Paul and Silas, bound in jail, Had no money for to go their bail. Keep your eyes on the prize, Hold on, hold on. Hold on, hold on, Keep your eyes on the prize, Hold on, hold on. Freedom s name is mighty sweet, One day soon we re gonna meet. . . . God, my hand, on the gospel plow, I wouldn t take nothing for my journey now. . . . The only chain that a man can stand, Is that chain of hand in hand. . . . The only thing we did wrong, Stayed in the wilderness a day too long. . . . But the one thing we did right, Was the day we started to fight. . . . We re gonna board that big Greyhound, Carrying love from town to town. . . . We re gonna ride for civil rights, We re gonna ride both Black and White. . . . We ve met jail and violence too, But God s love has seen us through. . . . Haven t been to heaven but I ve been told, Streets up there are paved wit gold. . . .

The term Womanist arises from the use of the term womanish in African-American communities, and refers to a Black feminist who takes seriously the experience and oppression due to gender, race, and class. Walker s definition of Womanist is complex and fertile as a foundational rubric for doing critical analysis. In addition to the components of survival, of loving, of taking charge, the term also conveys a vitality of life, a quest for knowledge, and the paradox of being young and living wise or grown. Womanist sensibilities provide of freedom of being able to love all people, sexually and nonsexually, and gives credence to the manifestation of woman s culture and life. To be Womanist invites holistic health and loving the spectrum of colors of Blackness, like the flora and fauna in beautiful gardens. Womanist theory is aesthetic, physical, spiritual, emotional, and creative. Womanist evokes a palette of kaleidoscopic reality, daily Refining the Fires of passion, love, hope, and change.

Edition details

• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0800632532
• ISBN 13: 9780800632533
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224
• Editor: Kirk-Duggan Cheryl A.