ENGAGING THE FEMININE

SILVIO FITTIPALDI

A few years ago a member of the FCRP posed a question that

touches on the theme of these reflections. She asked: "Why do you

keep coming back to the FCRP?" At that time I had no immediate

response except that I returned to the conference because it offered

me a respect for my need for solitariness and because my creative

urges were stimulated. More recently another member of the FCRP

sent to me a copy of Chris Downing's 1978 Rachel Cadbury Lecture.

At the beginning of that lecture Downing spoke of the FCRP in the

following manner:

From its beginnings this group has tended to emphasize

what are traditionally regarded as more "feminine" or

more introverted approaches to religious experience. The

importance attached to intuitive insight and mythological

and metaphorical expression implies some suspicion of the

power of rational conceptual discourse to do justice to the

subtleties of religious experience.1

As I read these words and reflected on them I thought that, maybe,

that is why I, who was living in a all male monastic setting, returned

to the FCRP, namely, to reconnect with the feminine in myself, to

image metaphorically with the people there. I also have a suspicion

of the exclusive power of rational conceptual discourse and have felt

and taught the power of the intuitive in such rational sciences as

math. Each year at the FCRP I would become engaged in some art

form as poetry, dance, pottery or painting and begin to touch on

depths in myself that I had been missing. Maybe they can be called

the "feminine" aspect of my person.

Thus, for those of us who have experienced this conference, I

would suggest that a powerful image of the feminine, a living symbol

of the engagement of the feminine, is the FCRP itself.

Defining The Feminine?

The process of defining an aspect of reality is a process of

specification and the discovery of boundaries. It is a process of

abstracting a part from the whole. I, particularly, describe 4'defining"

as a "process" insofar as I want to communicate it as a living,

ongoing reality rather than a static conceptualization. The process

of defining is a process of continually discovering the limitations

and potential of one's life in the world, a process of identification

and creation, in an ongoing manner, of the ground from which a

person lives. It is with this in mind that I present three approaches to

the feminine that seem to me to touch on central issues, approaches

that present the feminine as engaged in a process of wholeness.

The first approach that I want to present is taken from an article

by Valerie Valle and Elizabeth Kruger2. Initially, the authors contrast

male and female in terms of the cultural stereotypes that define

the male consciousness as clear, logical, unemotional and in

complete control in contrast to female consciousness as nonrational,

intuitive and striving toward union. Then, after arguing for the

fullness and healthiness of androgyny, Valle and Kruger go on to

describe a feminine style of consciousness grounded in three experiences

that belong solely to women, namely, menstruation, pregnancy

and birth, and breastfeeding. Five traits are then listed as

present in feminine consciousness stemming from these experiences.

The experience of time as cyclical rather than as linear can

come from the experience of menstruation. The process of pregnancy

and giving birth lead to the experience of creativity as the

creating "of the environment necessary for the emergence of the

created,'' as well as the4 4 ability to let go of ego-control of a situation

and let one's inner nature guide." Thirdly, 4'responsiveness to and

awareness of the needs of others" as well as 4'interest in the development

of symbiotic, mutually fulfilling relationships" can come

from the experience of breastfeeding.

Secondly, Rosemary Ruether gives her readers a major challenge

in her article "Motherearth and the Megamachine."3 In the

end, Ruether's challenge is for us humans to realize our potential

for wholeness. She concisely sets us the problem in the following

words:

All the basic dualities—the alienation of the mind from the

body; the alienation of the subjective self from the objective

world; the subjective retreat of the individual, alienated

from the social community; the domination or rejection of

nature by spirit—these all have roots in the apocalyptic-

Platonic religious heritage of classical Christianity. But the

alienation of the masculine from the feminine is the primary

sexual symbolism that sums up all these alienations. The

psychic traits of intellectuality, transcendent spirit, and

autonomous will that were identified with the male left the

woman with the contrary traits of bodiliness, sensuality,

and subjugation."4

Ruether then argues for a reconciliation of these opposites. Her

image is the cultivation of a garden in which "the powers of rational

consciousness come together with the harmonies of nature in partnership.^5”

A third suggestion comes from Chris Downing in her recent

book, The Goddess: Mythological Images of the Feminine. At the

beginning of this book Downing writes:

The being of the goddess is related to her having a feminine

body but is not delimited by that. Indeed, the earliest traditions

seem to have imagined her as parthogenetic and thus

androgynous. She is feminine—and masculine. She represents

a unity that encompasses this duality."6

Each of these three women attempts to describe the feminine in

such a way that the wholeness of the human is realized. I would like

to suggest that there is some organic relationship between the male

and female sexual structure biologically and the complex of characteristics

designated respectively as masculine and feminine. At the

same time, however, each human person is more than her or his

biology. To define a human person only from a biologically grounded

perspective would be reductionistic and would destroy the multileveled

complexity of human persons. At our deepest level we

struggle to become fully human, reaching in and out for the wholeness

of which each of us is a living and dying symbol. And that is the

holiness we seek.

The Feminine in Religion?

The religions throughout the world have been deeply responsible

for the disengagement of the feminine in culture as well as for

the relegating of some aspects of the human to women and others to

men. At the same time, there are present in religion images that

symbolize the integration of the feminine and the masculine. In the

following I want to share some of my experiences of this integration.

From the time when I was a child I was nurtured by the Roman

Catholic liturgy and worship. These liturgical celebrations were

highly organized. There was a rhythm of word and silence, centered

at the altar, symbolizing the presence of Christ in the community

and manifested in the movement of the ministers, the color of the

dress, the world of the music and housed in some superb church

structures. When I think of a church building I think first of the

church on the campus of Villanova University with its two spires

reaching into the skyand the dark silence within, broken by shafts of

sunlight that filtered through the stained glass windows. I spent

many hours in this place where the liturgical services touched my

intuitive as well as my rational powers, where I often sat in quiet

meditation, a meditation that opened me to the sensitivity of Jesus

of Nazareth. This description contains images of both masculine

and feminine. I never thought of the experience in this way. Now I

realize that it integrated the feminine and the masculine.

I am carried from the church at Villanova to the magnificent

cathedrals in Europe, especially Cologne, Notre Dame and

Chartres. In their own silent way they symbolize the union of the

masculine and the feminine with their deep inner darkness and their

reaching toward the sky. In particular, the labyrinth at Chartres

reminds me of the god and goddess who are related in a labyrinth.

Religion has been a quest in a labyrinth for me, a quest for soul. I

have discovered that I do not have to reach the geographical center

to discover this soul. Rather, as I walk, holding both ends of the

string, I come upon soul at each turn of the corner. And I can also

discover that soul by sitting and resting on the journey, being at

home. I walk and rest with anxiety and fear as well as trust and

confidence.

My imagination now moves eastward to the Hindu temples at

Khajaraho, a small village in north central India. At the center of a

temple dedicated to Shiva is a small, dark womb chamber. Within

this chamber is a lingam. The feminine and the masculine are

joined. On the outside, in the societies surrounding this temple as

well as the cathedrals of Europe and the churches in the western

hemisphere, men and women are separated by a broad cultural

sexism. At the heart of the religious imagination, however, they are

joined. They meet. It is this image of Meeting that I point to as

central to a religious sensitivity to the feminine. It is here that, I

believe we touch on the heart of Quakerism. In the Society of

Friends the meeting is the central dynamic living symbol along with

that of the Inner Light.

1 want to conclude this section by sharing some reflections on

images of God. Insofar as we humanize God or divinize the human,

God is presented as female or male. The engagement of the feminine

calls for both male and female images of God. This will involve

a major shift in the western religions, at least, a shift that is necessary,

I believe, for us to realize the fullness of life—male and female—

that is possible. In order for this to happen there are aspects

of divinity that will have to come to the fore that might appear

strange and unusual. It is true that there are a number of images of

the nurturing God in the Bible. I affirm these and hope that they

enter more dynamically into Christian and Jewish consciousness as

feminine as well as masculine. However, there is another image

of God that evokes the feminine in me.

From my earliest years, the name God evoked in me a vague

presence. As I grew in age and especially in the midst of my meetings

with the Hindu traditions and Buddhism and the Christian

theology of Karl Rahner, I came to a realization of God as mystery—

the unnamable, the silent one who speaks in silence, the dark as

well as the light, chaos as well as order. I came to experience the

divine dimension of reality as that experience of an inability to fully

fence in reality, to fully define it or ourselves, to fully image a reality

in which I live whose images continuously change, whose boundaries

I cannot pin down. I came to realize that God is not to be symbolized

merely by the order of the clockmaker but also by the boiling

pot of water, not only manifest in the intricately structured Taj

Mahal but also in the teeming, tumbling back streets of Calcutta,

the city of Kali. In the end, we need the goddesses as well as the

gods. They can point us to images of the full humanity and then

beyond to the fullness of reality.

The Feminine: Receptivity and Power?

As I reflect on receptivity and the feminine, I am carried into

my own training as a minister which is training to be a servant. It

seems to me that this experience has parallels in the lives of women

who are reared in our culture to be women which is to be a servant,

and in the lives of men and women in the corporate world. There is

both limitation and power in this training to be a servant and this is

the limitation and power of being receptive. It also is a process that

involves much risk and trust.

Many Christian people, ordained and unordained ministers

have been trained to follow in the footsteps of Christ and to be for

others. A fundamental element of my own training involved serving

others, not on my own terms or on the terms of those being served

but rather on the terms of the church. From the age of 13, in the

seminary, as well as in my homelife, a style of life was given to me

and I was constrained to form myself according to its form and

patterns. That form was called the "will of God." Often it was the

will of a human director.

As a teenager I struggled with that will as I struggled for my

own identity. In the end I succumbed to the form, at least externally.

All along, however, I did feel a unique soul pressing itself forward.

A central element in my training was the development of the

virtue of obedience. Such obedience involved doing the will of another

and, again, shaping ourselves according to the terms of another.

Gradually, I began to realize that obedience meant to listen,

to take in, to receive. And I began to listen to many voices. Not only

did I hear the voices of our directors but I also began to hear my own

voice and to hear murmurs from the many people I was reading,

novelists and philosophers such as Tolstoy and Camus, Sartre and

Marcel, Buber and Carl Rogers. I began to realize that there were

other shapes and forms and that I had a hand in the creation, a very

small hand at first and a hand that I continue to struggle to discover.

In 1963 I was deeply touched by Carl Rogers who gave to me a

very personal way to relate with others. In his client-centered therapy,

I found a way to center myself on the other and to reflect their

side to the other. I had not yet found a solid side of my own. Rather I

tried to enter the side of the other, to imagine it and to search out

with that other opening ways beyond their own struggle and pain.

Such hearing is quite powerful. Yet there is something missing from

it.

The question was posed to me: Where do you stand? What are

your terms? Where is your ground? I had a difficult time responding

to those questions which are really the same question: Where are

you in all this? And that continues to be my major question. I was

experiencing what Buber calls the experience of the other side. I

was and am weak in the experience of my own side. I could receive

but I had a difficult time asking for what I wanted (not in an egocentric

way). I could give on the terms of the other but not as easily

on my own terms.

The power of receptivity, in the Buberian sense, is a power that

is not isolated but rather is joined with the power of having a side of

one's own. To receive only on the terms of another is unfair to both

the giver and the receiver. Rather a fair and full receptivity is one in

which I can hear the other side and hear my own side. Then I can

choose to give and to receive in accordance with a balance of give

and take. Hopefully, that would be more satisfying to all involved

over the long run.

Two images come to me with regard to this kind of receptivity.

The first is a mutual embrace where energy moves in both directions.

Trust and risk are involved in both receiving and giving. The

power is not simply in one or the other but in the exchange between

them.

Another image that is pertinent to me recently is that of a

doorway. To stand actively on a doorway is to stand in the "between,

'' a place of intense trust, a quite auspicious place. I stood on

a doorway in 1976 in a Shiva temple in Madras. Someone requested

that I go in or out. I did not understand. I respectfully went out. Now

I choose to stand in the doorway. For to bring myself to the doorway

is an act of trust in the past and the future. To stand between, giving

and receiving is to be a different kind of servant than one who lives

only on the terms of another. Rather the servant who lives in the

"between" is formed by self and other, is formed in the relation, in

the meeting. My center then is not in myself, or in the other, but

rather in the realm between or among us. The movement is not

simply toward an eternal Thou but rather in the eternal between.

This is the power of a receptivity that is a part of a process rather

than one in which I live on the terms of another solely. It is a

receptivity that is part of an exchange.

Thus the primary image that I offer as an image of the engagement

of the feminine is the image of a meeting. To enter a meeting

with openness and receptivity, as well as with ones own power, is to

trust and to risk and to engage all the elements of the present reality

in an exchange that grows and changes shape and rests in the

confidence of the processes of meeting.

SILVIO FITTIPALDI, one of the two speakers at the Haverford Conference

in 1982, teaches part time. He is participating in a program of Family

Therapy as he begins a new career in private practice. As a college teacher

he has taught and lectured on a great many subjects including "Religion

and Psychology."

REFERENCES

1 Downing, Christine, Religious Life and the Feminine Experience, Philadelphia,

Friends General Conference, 1978, pamphlet, p. 3.

2Valle, Valerie and Kruger, Elizabeth, "The Nature and Expression of

Feminine Consciousness through Psychology and Literature," in The Metaphors

of Consciousness, Ronald Valle and Rolf von Eckartsberg, editors;

New York, Plenum, 1981, pp. 379-393.

3Ruether, Rosemary R., "Motherearth and the Megamachine," in Woman

spirit Rising, edited by Carol Christ and Judith Plaskow; San Francisco,

Harper and Row, 1979, pp. 43-52.

4Ibid, p. 44.

5Ibid, p. 52.

6Downing, Christine, The Goddess: Mythological Images of the Feminine:

New York, Crossroads, 1981, p. 13.

ENGAGING THE FEMININE:

REFLECTIONS

HERTA JOSLIN

As I search for words with which to communicate my sense of

the feminine, my mind whirls, circles, intertwines, and that which is

uppermost gives way to that which rises. It turns, as the symbol for

the Yin and the Yang seems to turn on itself. In the Introduction to

his translation of the I Ching1, Richard Wilhelm helps to clarify our

concepts of feminine and masculine. He reminds us that when the

HERTA JOSLIN was also one of the speakers at the 1982 FCRP. She is a

Jungian therapist and a member of the Society of Friends. This year was the

last of a five year term as co-clerk of the Conference with her husband,

Elliott.