Category: Gender Issues

‘Barbie’: More Than a Doll

By Kathy Winings

I grew up with Barbie. In fact, I not only had a Barbie doll, but also had Midge (Barbie’s friend), Skipper (Barbie’s little sister), Ken, and Alan (Ken’s friend). I ended up with Barbie’s sportscar and wardrobe cases. My mother helped fill the wardrobes with beautiful clothes that she designed and made for each of them.

As Barbie was an important part of me, when the “Barbie” movie premiered last summer, I expected a film filled with cliches, trite dialogue and a simple plot-line about two iconic dolls.  But after hearing some positive reviews and knowing the reputation of the director, Greta Gerwig, I decided it might be worth seeing. You can imagine my surprise when the movie was none of these things. In fact, it provides a creative context for insights on some of our current social challenges.

“Barbie” hit theaters running in July and is still going full speed with eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Ryan Gosling) and Best Supporting Actress (America Ferrera), as well as several BAFTA nominations in the UK that include Leading Actress (Margot Robbie). Audiences will find the movie is about more than two iconic dolls as it motivates them to ask some hard questions about key social themes we face in today’s world.

The movie has two contexts — Barbieland and the Real World. Barbieland is home for three groups: Barbies, Kens and Weird Barbies. This world is idyllic and carefree with the Barbies living in well-kept houses and the Kens living on the beach. Barbieland is a matriarchal society where the Kens live to support and serve the Barbies. The streets are clean. There is an air that Barbieland is a perfect place to live with no crime or illness, no children, or any Barbie and Ken older than 30. The Weird Barbies live apart from the others because they are different. Their difference is primarily physically based, with some missing limbs or other body parts or missing hair.

As a matriarchal society, all of the jobs and leadership positions are held by the Barbies. What I found particularly refreshing was the racial and ethnic diversity of the Barbies. Of course, all of the Barbies are a perfect size 2, with perfectly styled hair, perfect skin and well-applied make-up. The Kens are also physically fit, with perfect hair and physical features. The Barbies and Kens do recognize, however, that there is such a place called the “Real World.” They don’t visit the Real World nor do those living in the Real World visit Barbieland.

Continue reading “‘Barbie’: More Than a Doll” →

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The Veneration of Mary and Its Implications for Women in the Church

By Mika Deshotel

The veneration of Mary, the mother of Jesus, has been around for as long as the early Apostles. It emerged in conjunction with the understanding of the dual roles of Jesus Christ, as both fully human and fully divine. As the “Mother of God,” naturally Mary’s position was elevated. In order to be a sanctified vessel for the Son of God to be born, Mary needed to be recognized as having exceptional qualities, similar to Jesus.

The qualities of perpetual virginity, being immaculately conceived herself, and her bodily assumption into heaven were implemented within Roman Catholic Church doctrine from the 16th century. Mariology is the theological study of Mary through written accounts and the subsequent doctrines associated with her throughout the history of Christianity. It is distinct from, albeit related to, the practice of veneration and devotion to Mary.

Here, I explore the underlying circumstances for the prominence of devotion to Mary, especially in the Roman Catholic Church, how it became official dogma, and how official statements about Mary have been somewhat problematic for women of the Church in particular. I also explore how the Unification Movement addresses such issues attributed to Marian devotion, through the current leadership of co-founder, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, and how she is trailblazing a new view on feminine value which may ultimately help reform and encourage women leadership in the Church.

Historical background of the veneration of Mary

Given that so little is said about Mary in the Bible, it is amazing how the church as a whole, and Roman Catholic Church in particular, adores Mary. The rise of Mary came naturally as a consequence of the church developing its Christology, and the idea of Jesus being both fully human and fully divine. The term Theotokos, meaning “God-bearer,” was ascribed to Mary by the Third Ecumenical Council at Ephesus in 431 CE.

This was in contrast to the idea of Mary as Christotokos, or “Christ-bearer,” meaning Mary was the mother of Christ only in the sense of his body, but not his divine nature. Theotokos was not to make the assumption that from Mary’s body came the Word of God, but rather, as theologian Raymond Potgieter notes, Mary “was the vessel through which the eternal Word was incarnated in [the holy body of] Jesus Christ.” At the Council at Ephesus, Mary’s special role, not only as divine mother, but divine virgin mother, became clear.

Eventually the church credited her with titles like Mistress of the World, Queen of Heaven, and Mother of God. The early church historian and apologist, Irenaeus, called her the “New Eve,” as her son, Jesus, was the “New Adam.” Mary “obeyed” God, “whereas ‘the virgin’ Eve, did not.” Additional theological statements pertaining to Mary began from the 4th century, with church fathers such as Jerome and Origen promoting the idea of Mary’s perpetual virginity. The Council of Chalcedon, which reaffirmed Mary’s status as Theotokos, did not address the issue of her perpetual virginity, but by that time it was accepted within the larger ecclesial tradition. It was only a matter of time for the idea of the virgin Mary to be sinless.

Continue reading “The Veneration of Mary and Its Implications for Women in the Church” →

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‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’: More Than a Marvel Adventure Movie

By Kathy Winings

“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” is a rare sequel — one I found to be even better than its predecessor, “Black Panther,” in terms of the depth of its message and themes even though the Marvel Cinematic Universe film is minus its former lead actor with the 2020 death of Chadwick Boseman.

The movie is a typical Marvel film complete with lots of action, superhuman feats and high-tech wonders. “Wakanda Forever” also continues to emphasize the theme of diversity, but expands this focus more powerfully to highlight gender, age and Hispanic/indigenous culture along with that of Black culture. As good as this is, though, it is not the real power behind the film.

What makes the movie particularly poignant are timely and highly relevant themes that stand out for today’s world. Foremost is the focus on forgiveness vs. revenge. This leads to the closely-related issue of the meaning and power of love over hate that enables one to genuinely forgive. The final theme is the role of women as peacemakers.

What enables these themes to stand out is the context of age that is subtly present throughout the film. It took about 30 minutes before I realized that most of the main characters are part of the millennial generation. As an educator and minister, I found this to be a significant feature of the movie because of the issues the characters are facing. All this makes for a more sobering film this time around.

The death of King T’Challa (Boseman, the original Black Panther) is never far from the hearts and minds of the main characters and is woven into the storyline as the film begins with Wakanda mourning the death of its king despite his sister, Princess Shuri’s frantic efforts to save her brother. This sets Shuri (Letitia Wright) on the path of having to deal with her grief and anger over this loss, leaving her to question love, forgiveness and eternal life.

Soon after her brother’s memorial service, several pivotal events take place that become the catalysts for Shuri and several key women to come to terms with these important themes. One lingering question that hangs in the air from the first film concerns T’Challa’s previous offer to share Wakanda’s knowledge about vibranium with the world now that the Black Panther is gone. Are world leaders wise and mature enough to handle such an offer without greed and violence? Unfortunately, we know the answer to that question all too well.

In the year following T’Challa’s death, Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett) and the Dora Milaje security forces find themselves protecting Wakanda from those forces seeking to gain access to vibranium. Some efforts led to violent confrontations that were wrongly blamed on the Wakandans. So each event increases the tension and fear for the future of Wakanda in the heart of Ramonda and Shuri.

At the center of this struggle comes a new threat, whose very existence came about centuries earlier because of vibranium — an underwater culture known as the Talokan. Their leader, Namor (Tenoch Huerta), sets things in motion by confronting Ramonda and Shuri when he finds them alone on a beach preparing for a final family ritual to end their year of mourning T’Challa.

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The Need for a Unificationist Blessing, Marriage and Family Theology and Education Providence

By Alice Fleisher

I experienced a flash of insight a few days ago while looking at Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s picture (who Unificationists call True Father).

The gist of the revelation was that some 30+ years ago, I was in a position to facilitate and contribute towards the development of a Unificationist Blessing, Marriage, and Family Educational (UBMFE) providence.

If that was the case, you may wonder why am I only now proposing the development of such a providence rather than 30 years ago? (I was first active in the American branch of the Unification Church’s marriage and family ministry — known as the Blessed Family Department [USA BFD] — between 1987 and 1989 and then reconnected in 2004)

In the 1970s and 1980s, the USA BFD work consisted of supporting and administrating the Blessing providence. The providence of guiding Blessed couples and families mainly consisted of preparing couples for their three-day ceremony, counseling, and the publication of two Blessing-related magazines, which included True Parents’ speeches and some educational material, called The Blessing Quarterly and The Blessing Journal.

Family education was not pressing because most couples were just starting out and few had children. However, anyone connected to the USA BFD who was even remotely observant could see we were eventually going to need education material and programs that could minister to and provide life guidance for these Blessed couples and families.

Unfortunately, budgetary concerns and administrative decisions occurred that had a major impact on the USA BFD and the development of that kind of material. Around 1990, the USA BFD was completely shut down, an action that wasn’t reversed until 2004 (due to True Father’s prodding).

Upon reflection, I believe that from the 1990s going forward, the development of mature, professional and comprehensive educational material on the Blessing, Marriage and Family derived from the revelations of True Father and Rev. Hak Ja Han Moon (who Unificationists call True Mother; together they are called True Parents) would have occurred. Sadly, such efforts were stillborn and cut-off abruptly due to the USA BFD’s demise.

It was not a coincidence that during the time the USA BFD was dormant, the Coalition for Marriage, Family, and Couples Education, LLC (CMFCE) was founded by Diane Sollee in 1996. I believe through the CMFCE and the Smart Marriages Conferences they sponsored, God worked to encourage faithful professionals who were caring for beleaguered families to identify and make available to the greater public, ministries, clinical practices, and educational programs dedicated to enriching healthy marriages and saving marriages that were in trouble. The purpose of the CMFCE, found on their website, is below. These are worthy and laudable goals.

The coalition serves as an information exchange and clearinghouse to help couples locate marriage and relationship courses; to help professionals, clergy and lay educators locate training programs and resources; to connect those with an interest in the continuing development of the field; to support community initiatives, legislation and research; and to promote the effectiveness of marriage education programs and increase their availability in the community.

Continue reading “The Need for a Unificationist Blessing, Marriage and Family Theology and Education Providence” →

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Spiritual Connections: Living in the Flow of God’s Love

By Gordon L. Anderson

Spiritual Connections: Living in the Flow of God’s Love (Circle of Angels Press, 201 pp., 2022) is an engaging spiritual autobiography of Nora Spurgin, who joined what was then called the Unified Family (later Unification Church) in New York in 1967. She served in many central positions as the movement led by Rev. Sun Myung Moon developed into a new global culture. Nora’s identity is shaped by her connections to others in her lifelong pursuit to be in the flow of God’s love.

Her story begins with her ancestors who came to America for religious freedom. Her sixth great grandfather authored Confessions of Faith, which is still used for religious instruction among the Mennonites. She grew up in Lancaster County, PA, in a farming community with large families, connected to her parents, siblings, extended family, and nature. Life was a mixture of hard work, fun play, and worship of God. Personal responsibility and maintaining the community was stressed. Her community was self-sufficient. Nora learned to design and sew clothes and her father even taught her every step in building a house!

At a young age, Nora’s curiosity prompted her to ask questions about her faith in comparison to Catholics and others. She studied the people she met, wanting to learn behavior patterns and whether people were genuine or putting on a façade. She learned to approach others with confidence. While Nora wanted to learn fastidiously, her parents believed outside education would corrupt children’s faith. She dropped out of high school after one year and worked at home and in a sewing factory until she turned 21 and became a free adult. Then she grabbed lots of books, studied, passed the GED exams, and set out on the world.

A Mennonite Voluntary Service program caring for children of migrant workers in Florida exposed Nora to poverty and other cultures and broadened her faith. In college, she loved philosophy and history. On weekends she visited and served people in Appalachia, and experienced charismatic spiritual events. Then she went on for her master’s degree in social work at New York University. The intellectual confrontations and big city life were far different than life on a simple Mennonite farm. Through all her encounters, she continued her search for connections to God and was prepared to meet the Unification Church.

Continue reading “Spiritual Connections: Living in the Flow of God’s Love” →

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What Is Love? Here’s What to Know

By Tom Froehlich

Human love is passionate by default, as in “being in love.”

Poets and novelists intuit love as a most delightful phenomenon of highly personal and deeply intimate relationships. Love begets new belongings and makes life worth living. Thus, human love is rather virtuous.

Unification leaders talk a lot about love, that is, about God’s love and true love. Human love, however it may be implied, is usually not distinguished as a worthwhile virtue. This may have resulted in many Unificationist offspring seeking love outside their parent’s faith community.

More clarity and an appreciative attitude toward human love may help Unificationists to better reach out to a world full of smart and curious young folks.

Surely love — passionate as it always is — cannot arise without mutual attraction and be nothing less than profound affection and some esteem for each other. Reciprocal and non-exploitative, love eventually kindles surrender due to enchantment and thus delight in each other, both in body and mind so as to not leave anyone wanting.

Yes, that is a lot to ask of love.

Does love happen all the time, always to its fullest, and everywhere to everyone? No. Just imagine what a young, single male living with his parents in an Alaskan village of 187 people has to figure to make love come true for him. Or what about that single, middle-aged mother working as a street vendor in New Delhi, India? Can she worry about anything else than how to feed herself and her child?

Realistically, love seems to be out of reach or otherwise not feasible for a whole lot of folks on Planet Earth.

Forsaken Delights

Nevertheless, it is not just a safe, new belonging that people seek, but also the delights of a passionate love — often rather secretly.

There aren’t that many delights to be had while “being loved” or “being cared for” by either a mate or a deity. Such one-sided love induces shame after all. More delights are found in the undisturbed act of reciprocal and non-exploitative loving between a man and a woman. That is to say, “being in love” with another in both mind and body is truly exhilarating!

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Reflections on Dr. Hak Jan Han Moon’s Memoir, “Mother of Peace”

By Eileen Williams

Reading the memoir, Mother of Peace by Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, became for me a contemplative personal reflection of the labyrinth-like journey of the Unification Church and its metamorphosis into Heavenly Parent’s Holy Community.

I was late to reading True Mother’s memoir.  It was daunting. I put it off. When I finally dove in, a few themes struck a reverberant chord: True Mother’s understanding of herself as a historical person, God’s healing power of love and forgiveness, and the singular purpose of the messianic mission.

I was moved by True Mother’s anecdotal retelling of her early life in the first four chapters.  Middle chapters lose some of their intimate narrative as they veer towards grandiloquence when describing some of the philosophical underpinnings of the various church organizations; however, there are some powerful testimonies regarding foreign missionary work and True Parents’ visits to countries, unthinkable to visit at the time.

The last third of the book, a head-spinning account of travels to Africa and island nations, highlights behind the scenes activities and their interplay within the international scope of the work of True Parents. Therefore, if the reader perseveres to the end (not a particularly easy task at 359 pages) then he or she could certainly be rewarded — as I was — with an amazing glimpse into a vast global vision whose purpose is to shine a spiritual light onto one’s own personal realm of influence.

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Heavenly Parent and the God of Dual Characteristics

By Tyler Hendricks

Soon after the ascension of her husband, Rev. Sun Myung Moon (for Unificationists, Father Moon), Dr. Hak Ja Han (Mother Moon) said that God is Hanul Bumo, Korean for Heavenly Parent(s). She thus upended 2,000 years of Christian understanding as well as the normative understanding of her own movement.

Some criticized her pronouncement and used it to justify rebellion. None of those people, to my knowledge, provided a meaningful theological basis for the rejection of Heavenly Parent.

Happily, others, including Dr. Ye Jin Moon and Dr. Andrew Wilson, developed meaningful theological reflections on God as Heavenly Parent. In 2013, I published on this blog an inquiry on the subject, and I appreciate the responses to it from both Dr. Moon and Dr. Wilson. Since then, I’ve continued my exploration into the idea of God as Heavenly Parent.

My purpose here is to show that the doctrine of God’s dual characteristics in Exposition of the Divine Principle (henceforth, Exposition) supports Mother Moon’s appellation of God as Heavenly Parent.

The Ontological God and Economic God

I begin with an important distinction. I will be talking about the dual characteristics in terms of the beginning of creation, the God beyond time and space, which I term the ontological God. God in relationship to time and space is the economic God. I derive these terms from the Christian theological categories applied to the Trinity. There is the ontological Trinity, God outside time and space, and the economic Trinity, God in relation to time and space. The subject of this article is Exposition’s teachings on the ontological God, which it calls “the causal reality.” (p. 15)

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A Response to Andrew Wilson’s Article on the Only Begotten Daughter

By Claude A. Perrottet

This recent article, “Why Does True Mother Call Herself the Only Begotten Daughter?” by Andrew Wilson suggests that True Mother has chosen to lower herself by taking on the title of Only Begotten Daughter in reaction to failure and opposition.

While acknowledging the many insights of this factual article, I submit that True Mother (Mrs. Hak Ja Han) has not lowered herself at all, but promotes this view much in line with her role as the first woman in history to fulfill the purpose of creation. Being humble, at least here, does not mean lowering oneself.

It is undoubtedly true that True Mother had no choice but to engage in a sustained effort to create a foundation for herself, just as Jesus and later True Father had been forced to do. And it is obviously true that True Mother had to start her lonely course under circumstances that were not the ones she or anyone would have hoped for (an understatement).

True Father was entirely victorious, but he was largely deprived of the fruits of his victory, and so were God and humankind. In True Family and our movement at large, fractures had begun to appear even before True Father passed on to spirit world.

I never had any doubts about the status of True Mother before, during, or after True Father’s ascension, and believe I am part of an overwhelming majority on this point. However, when we first heard the expression “Only Begotten Daughter,” several thoughts came to mind.

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