Good morning... I'm feeling a little sleepy today, and since I gave up caffeinated beverages for Lent, no coffee is going to help me out of this one.

Last night I visited both the University of North Texas and Southern Methodist University. They were two widely disparate discussions, with one relating to women's issues and the other focusing on the daughters of Zelophehed in Numbers. Together, however, what they made me wonder about was what it means to be a feminist in our society. The word itself, "feminism," has such negative connotations, as the women at UNT told me last night. Yet if you're under, say, 25 or 30, your world is what it is because of the feminist movement. We played competitive sports as children, we go to college, we seek out jobs. In 1950, for instance, these possibilities would have been much less likely for us. Even the most strident anti-feminist women have different lives because of feminism.

Many women I talk to shy away from the word as it refers to them, or are quick to tell me that they're not one of those "man-hating radicals." Nor am I. I, and most of the people I meet, instead claim the underlying values of acknowledging and respecting the equal personhood of women in the eyes of God (something that has blatantly been denied in the past by patriarchal figures in the church and society). There may be disagreements on how that plays out, but at least it is something most of us can concur with in Christian circles. From an ethical standpoint, it is as much a simple human rights issue as it is a women's issue.

Thus I would consider myself a feminist not purely for self-serving reasons, but as a point of Christian ethics. For if we are really one in Christ Jesus, if God really sees the sparrow fall, if God really is the woman rejoicing over her lost coin found, then it is my responsibility as a Christian to see that all of God's people are treated with human dignity. And as a woman, human dignity means respect for my intellect, for my talents, for my gifts to the church and society. This means a place at the decision-making tables of the church, a role in the boardrooms. This means an end, once and for all, to being shut out of avenues of power in society due to my sex.

The question I have for you is this: if women succeed in gaining full acceptance in the power structures, what are they going to do with it? In my mind, that is the ultimate question of any movement for liberation. For it is where movements seem to fail-- whether in communist countries originally espousing the values of the poor, or in corporations where women exploit others just as ruthlessly as men did. It is where women of color get caught, with both men of color and white women leaving their unique needs behind in their own quests for empowerment. Can we, as Christians, change these patterns of power?

"There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus." --Galatians 3:28

Kelsey