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The Raging Hearth: Spirit in the Household of God

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This is a must-read for those who take Feminist Theology seriously! The family model where a male head exerts authority, whether earned or not, has been challenged. Families now seek a more egalitarian model where each member is nurtured and heard. Victorin-Vangerud (V-V) argues that we also need to reject the male-dominated family model for God's household, the church. Many feminist theologinas have argued this, but V-V takes it further. "How can we talk about God's household in family metaphors that free women as mothers from self-giving roles, and children from self-surrendering roles, for the sake of the whole, usually the male head?" Her reflections come out of her experience as daughter, partner, mother and theologian, and her efforts to model a family model which upholds the dignity of each member. Traditional Christian Trinitarian theology has focussed on the Father and Son, with the Spirit domesticated as negotiator of harmony between the males of the household, ensuring the Son, and by extension human siblings, obey the Father. While feminist theologians have sought alternate ways of interpreting Jesus the Son in the Trinity, V-V suggests a new focus on God as Spirit, at work in Jesus, and not only in Jesus but in all of God's family. Thus everyone, through the Spirit, is treated with dignity, and life in the Spirit is not simply about conforming to the 'head.' Anger becomes another'fruit of the Spirit' when individuals are not heard with dignity.

To make her argument, V-V traces an amazing journey through theology, philosophy, family theory etc, allowing also her experience as women's advocate in clergy sexual misconduct to speak to the 'poisonous pedagogy' of silencing the victims to retain 'family harmony' and 'move on.' She identifies God the Spirit in early Church communities as its energy, later conformed and subordinated to an ordering, regulatory role between Father and Son. While some contemporary theologians have focussed again on the Spirit, she sees them still preserving conformity -- a personhood for Jesus and the rest of us as self-giving, self-surrendering and self-withdrawing, rather than rediscovering in Jesus his self-commitment, self-assertion and self-care as well. Such new visions are risky. While mutual recognition sounds like 'motherhood and apple pie,' it does not automatically play out in practice, particularly in the church where household fears of parental anger, retaliation, rocking the boat, keep people, trained in conformity, silent. Opening up God's household also raises questions of 'other religions.' If God the Spirit's role is not to force conformity but allow diversity and self-assertion, what about God the Spirit's activities in other faiths? V-V warns us that authentic honoring of dignity and difference also means not crossing boundaries -- not insisting self-surrender for the sake of some false unity across religious differences. It is violence to force another to embrace if the embrace is 'oppressive or distorting,' whether in family, church or the world. A unique feature of V-V's book is her development of 'anger' as a fruit of the Spirit. Anger has long been preached as OK in men but not nice in women. Nice women do not get angry, and victims of sexual abuse are encouraged to keep silent in order that the rest can 'move on.' Children's anger is called disobedience. Yet anger is necessary to express betrayal and lack of recognition if a relationship is healthy. Anger shows we care enough to preserve the relationship. VB-V's book offers a new and liberating model of family to help us image God's household. God the Spirit infinitizes the Trinity into an inclusive 'we' including wherever the Spirit is at work. Just as children are not extensions of parents, wives of husbands, lay of clergy, the two-thirds world of the first, the Household of God is not just a dance between Father and obedient Son, with us as spectators and obedient imitators of the Son. V-V's theology of God's household includes all the world, insisiting all work in dignity, all cries be heard, and using anger if necessary. Although this book is comprehensive and theologically technical, it is well worth the effort to discover new images to think about God and the world.