Knowing Her Place

I've been listening to Laura Bush's recent interviews with interest. She has publicly disagreed with two of her husband's (and his administration's) signature stances on critical social issues: same sex marriage and abortion rights.
Some pundits have questioned why she did not speak up earlier (like Cindy and Meghan McCain). I don't believe that George Bush would have been able to gain and maintain the support of the conservative patriarchy if his wife espoused unacceptable social, political and theological positions.
Laura Bush's choice to support her husband's political ambitions over her own conscience suggest to me that she values patriarchy and the privileges she accrues from submitting to it more than justice for God's children.
Women like Laura Bush are the incubators of patriarchy. It couldn't succeed without them.

Superheroes, Saints, Gods and Angels

I love superheroes. (Yes, I just saw Iron Man 2.) I love the X-men and the Avengers and Spiderman and Batman and the Black Panther. I grew up in the Marvel universe.
Now that I'm a practicing and thinking theologian, I wonder, what's behind our love of these extraordinarily gifted women and men?
Are superheroes modern saints? Gods? Angels?
Are they symbolic of unrealized human potential?
Are they our way of proving that we can and will save ourselves without any supernatural interference, thank you very much?
Are they a form of sour grapes - we are our own salvation because God isn't saving us on a day to day basis?
Maybe it's not that deep.
All I know for sure is that I love them and I want to be one.
I'd be Dark Shadow, part of the Judith Squad. A group of women warriors who rescue women and children from physical and sexual abuse. And beat, kick and stomp the shit out the men who use and abuse women and children.

True Diversity

As important as is racial, ethnic, gender, orientation and ability diversity - and it is crucial - ideological diversity seems to be rarely invoked. I have noticed that some communities are happy with visual diversity as long as there is no theological, philosophical or ideological diversity. You are welcome as long as you think like the dominant culture (even if you don't look like them). Physical diversity has become for some an opportunity for self-congratulation, proof of liberal/progressive identity and/or fetishism. Frequently the basis for accepting visibly different bodies into a community is the degree to which they accede to the values and beliefs of the majority culture.
I do not suggest that communities - particularly believing and worshiping communities - have no right to theological, philosophical or ideological boundaries. I do wonder how much space there is - and ought be - between confessional communal identity and individual theological convictions.
My experience has shown me that my black woman's body is acceptable when it performs, preaches, teaches and worships in the image of whatever community I'm in, even if it is my own. Tension, rejection and rebuke arise when my theological commitments, perspectives, beliefs and practices are divergent.
How hollow is that diversity which is only as thin as a photograph of variably colored people!