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Living In The Lap of Goddess: The Feminist Spirituality Movement in America

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Like all scrupulously fair journalism, Cynthia Eller's very readable survey, LIVING IN THE LAP OF THE GODDESS, THE FEMINIST SPIRITUALITY MOVEMENT IN AMERICA, is bound to please and offend in equal measure. Using a decade of research (largely literary but also including personal interviews), Eller attempts to generalize about the feminist spirituality movement in the United States. While her tone is respectful, her eyes are wide open, and inevitably some of her observations must irritate some members of the movement. Her good will, however, seems evident and her information appears to be accurate. Her approach is comprehensive, considering topics from ritual to theology, history to psychology, sociology to magic. The book is an easy read, mostly straight reporting enriched by a little analysis in areas such as psychology of religion. The greatest limitation of the book is that it was published in the early 1990's and does not reflect developments during the last 6-7 years. However, as an even-handed introduction to feminist spirituality, it is still very useful. Unlike most books written by insiders in the movement, it includes information on the historical development of this alternate religion and focuses on issues on which spiritual feminists disagree. For anyone interested in learning just who those "Goddess worshippers" are (witches? pagans? New Agers? flakes?), what they believe, what they do, LIVING IN THE LAP OF THE GODDESS is an excellent beginning.

Cynthia Eller's "Living in the Lap of the Goddess" was an early 1990's study that drew broad contours for the feminist spirituality movement, even as it claimed to define more the centers of practice rather than the periphery. Eller distributed a questionnaire, available in the appendix, and interviewed a number of both well-known and (for a lack of a better term) entry-level participants in the feminist spirituality movement.

The early chapters are devoted to discussing the different ways women came to the movement in their own voices, whether through gradualism, serendipity, or acute crisis. Contemporary Paganism's role in feminist spirituality is given its own chapter, as are the ethics of affinities and appropriations across racial, religious, and cultural lines, and a general sociological makeup of the movement at that time. Eller reinforces the notion that ritual, rather than belief, tends to hold feminist spirituality together, specifically collective ritual that has a very Wiccan structure to it, although other forms, such as talking circles and guided meditations are covered as well. Some attention is given to solitary work, magic, and thealogy. Thealogical emphases are immanence, pantheism, functional polytheism and parthenogenic cosmogony.

As in her discussion of ethics, the ethical dimensions of magic and hexing are emphasized. Eller refers to language used by practiioners, but sometimes fails to define it. For example, one name used for those willing to use magic to both hurt and heal are referred to as "Aradians," without reference to Charles Leland's "Aradia: Or The Gospel of the Witches," a 19th century document that chronicles the divine power of witches to cause harm to oppressors by magical means.

Much of the focus of the movement is somatic, including what some might see as a pre-occupation with bodies. But for Eller's participants this too is a matter of coming home, of attempting to re-member themselves first to their immanent experience of living as a healthy, rather than an estranged, connection. And the first step to this, at this time, was articulating a gynocentral myth of ancient matriarchy or "partnership" societies, which Eller summarizes in one chapter. She would later spend an entire volume critiquing this myth.

Perhaps related to this is her presentation of the debate between those feminists who find ecofeminist political power in feminist spirituality, and those who find it yet another form of distraction from the material reality of women's lives--yet another form of anodyne escapism. Yet Eller implicitly takes sides in this debate by finishing her volume and revisiting the subject of why feminist spirituality is here and what roles it fulfills, in a more concrete sense of her own conclusions, rather than the voices of the women who were first introduced in the beginning of the book.

The volume is a necessary addition to all who are researching feminist spirituality in the United States of any stripe, and presents much of its information in form of interviews and information from a wide variety of women's experiences, invaluable for subsequent researchers. Eller is also to be commended for her attention to popular art forms such as music, ritual, and altar construction as part of her study.

Cynthia Eller is a professor of Women's Studies and Religious Studies at Montclair State University, and the author of books such as The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory: Why an Invented Past Won't Give Women a Future, Gentlemen and Amazons: The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory, 1861-1900, Am I a Woman?: A Skeptic's Guide to Gender, etc.

She wrote in the Preface to this 1995 book, "This introductory road map to the feminist spirituality movement is based on my observation of the movement over the past ten years. I have attended rituals, classes, workshops, and retreats, and have read widely in the literature of the feminist spirituality movement... My goal has been to get inside the lives of the women who make up the feminist spirituality movement, to identify with their concerns, hopes, and experiences, to listen closely to their voices, and to see how they construct their worlds."

Here are some additional quotations from the book:

"The primary characteristic of feminist spirituality is variety. For virtually every belief that one woman claims as authentic spirituality, there is another woman who will assert the opposite belief but make the same claim." (Pg. 3)
"First of all, the movement is separatist, in the sense that it is focused on women... Men who cannot defer to the authority of women to define what feminist spirituality is and will be are simply excluded." (Pg. 7)
"And so the movement remains predominantly white, while the dream of a multilracial women's spirituality lives on." (Pg. 20)
"Still, probably the majority of spiritual feminists consider themselves heterosexual... In spite of this, lesbianism or at least bisexuality is something of a norm in feminist spirituality, and heterosexuality is regarded as a deviation---at times a wholly unacceptable one." (Pg. 21)
"Zsuzsanna Budapest originally called her witchcraft Dianic, and the term has been taken over particularly by lesbian witches, but also by women, heterosexual or lesbian, who are separatist in their practice." (Pg. 60)
"Nevertheless, it is also impressive to note the influence of the New Age on feminist spirituality, because it is ubiquitous." (Pg. 65)
"...several of those (books) that refer to plural goddesses in their titles quickly note that the plurality is only apparent, the many goddesses being but names or aspects for the one goddess." (Pg. 133)
"Thealogies cover the entire spectrum, but it seems that most spiritual feminists grant the goddess a much more substantial existence than one of concept, symbol, or linguistic device." (Pg. 141)
"The most difficult of these questions to answer is why the patriarchal revolution took place, given that the ancient matriarchies were utopias or nearly so, and both women and men were happy with them. Many spiritual feminists express frank puzzlement over how such an event could come to pass..." (Pg. 163)
"In feminist spirituality ... The goddess may be a resource, but change must be initiated and effected by human beings." (Pg. 181)
"...most spiritual feminists are not enthusiastic about preaching the good news of the goddess... they are not likely to post themselves outside the A&P clutching a sweaty handful of flyers encouraging people to worship the goddess before it is too late." (Pg. 219)