One of my sons asked me recently what patriarchy was. He is fifty-five, smart and resilient, and yet he asked, possibly because I’ve often said that we (the world) are experiencing the death throes of patriarchy.
I answered that patriarchy is a centuries old hierarchal system, the world over, of social organization and power that, simplistically, looks like this: God, man, woman, son, slave/servant, animals, natural life. Race, gender, role, and geography, were added. Death throes mean change. We must ALL respect each other and together save our Earth.
One of these changes is to de-patriarchalize divinity. It hurts, disorients and re-creates. In such times, I survive by noticing tiny graces that provide hope and evoke big thanks.
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-A very small boy in the supermarket insists on carrying the family turkey after it’s checked out. The child, maybe six, stands on tiptoes, stretches forward, hoists the good-sized, neatly packaged and trussed turkey off the check-out line and into his small arms. He staggers backwards then catches his balance and with a huge grin embraces the turkey with a hug and carries it out of the store, his mother probably praying as she watches this little family Thanksgiving hero. Maybe God occasionally upsizes human effort.
-From our window I have watched a birds’ nest being carefully built, twig by twig, high in a tree whose leaves soon fell. The good-sized nest looks sturdy and a work of art. Before long I observe baby birds, small brown and unprepossessing, emerge. One after another they take flight—not far at first, then experimenting with longer flights, all perching on branches of a nearby tree. Each time, after some signal, they simultaneously fly back to home base. One morning I see them all—twenty to my count—swoop over and land on the barren ground across the driveway from their home. They peck and peck at the barren ground. What food could be there? Then, on hidden command, they simultaneously ascend and fly back home. Many human teens do the same.
-A Tee shirt meme: “Hold on. Let me overthink this!” I’ve done this.
-Then there’s the resiliently resistant raindrop that simply will not continue its flow down the windowpane even after the rain stops. It’s large. It reflects sunlight. It does not dry up. It winks at me—God’s tear I think.
-Finally, a little bit of mischief with the fact of Jesus’s humanity, not something many Christians like to remember about the one we call Lord—fully human and fully divine, neither nature compromising the other. One Christmas I was preaching about the whole nativity scenario—a tender scene everyone loves to sing about, and no one would want to experience. I cautioned against over-romanticizing this narrative, denying all the pain and danger surrounding it. After all, I said, swaddling clothes were diapers. A woman shot up from her pew, turned tail, and stormed out, never to return. I was forgiven, not “fired.”
-Sometimes in the pitch dark of night I reach for my beloved’s hand. It’s still warm. We’re in our eighties. Life feels more fragile. Our 36th wedding anniversary is this week.
-In Corrie ten Boom’s holocaust memoir, The Hiding Place, she, a Dutch Christian, is tossed into prison—starved, freezing, alone, and facing death. In a barren cell, she spots a tiny ant crawling in from between cracks invisible to human eye. She is thrilled. She shares crumbs from her single piece of stale bread with the ant. Soon more ants appear, and she dines with them, praying with praise, “A relationship!”
-Christians move into both Christmas and Easter, with the same Bible story: Jesus about to face the trial of his life, leading to his hideous death. In this highly symbolic and historic story there is a stunningly tiny detail: he rides into town on an ass—a donkey!
There is no place that God is not. Hear the psalmist sing: “Your presence is known through all who help me; with them I can look danger squarely in the face.” (Psalm 118, Greenberg) And I say, Thank you.
