Note: In Naked in Church I address the issue of spiritual rape. The concept crystalized for me when I was reading a book edited by Margaret Carlson Brown (Pilgrim Press 1990) entitled, Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse, in which theologian Elizabeth Bettenhausen wrote an essay citing an exercise she gave to her students, to write a description of the crucifixion as if Jesus had been a woman. To a person, each one, without collaboration, wrote a rape story. This poem was inspired by that result.
TheSinsoftheFather
A different cross for a female Jesus
quisled for thirty pieces. Backs turned,
rocks getting off.
Snarls of fingers crawl like worms, bite like snakes
across her breasts (she is naked, her hands bound behind her
with fragments of her dress).
"This is
my body..."
There is dirt caked beneath her finger
nails piercing her hands, her feet
"...broken for you."
A sweaty palm clamps her mouth, tastes like vinegar and sand
and salt, tastes like a toilet rag,
while the next prick in line (take a number) twenty-nine)
(sold for thirty pieces)
leaves his stain, scars her brain, like a brand he
embosses pain upon her womanhood.
"Mother forgive them."
"Fath's" fatal attraction invoked by
genital genuflection.
on every altar stands a monument to this deception:
their golden calf, a bronze erection.
Daughter of God, the
true religion:
"this is my body, broken.
Do this in rememberance of me."
-John Wingspread Howell-
Next: Eucharist