by Australian Christian women. Since September 2015

Do you try your best but your best never seems good enough? You strive to be the ultimate friend, wife, mother, sister, daughter, employee, student, Christian….the list goes on…..and on. What is the problem with perfection? I always identified myself as a perfectionist, and I was proud of my self-given title. However, my endeavour to live up to the title ‘perfectionist’ left me critical and crippled. The problem with perfection is found deep within the cogs of our heart and m

Tell us a little about you I am in Narrabri. I am a wife and Mother to two children and work full-time. I love to keep active and walk and swim most days. What's your favourite bible passage and why? I have too many favourite bible verses to mention. How do you keep your eyes fixed on Jesus? My local church has a prayer weekend every 2 months when the church is open for 36 hours and we all take times to come and pray and we also have home groups and try to be involved in eac

There have been times in my life when I’ve needed a kick up the butt to get moving. My teenage years ring a bell - all those lazy sleep-ins or dawdling in front of the TV when I should have been doing homework. There have been other times in my life when I’ve desperately needed to apply the brakes, but I just need to finish this one thing, then do that, and while I’m doing that I’ll do this… We will always experience tension between busy and not, doing and being, chasing and

The previous two posts discussed shame ascribed to women, and embodied in women’s bodies. Jesus’ interaction with women who carried socially ascribed shame enabled their public vindication. Jesus took on the shame of human bodies in his incarnation and particularly in his shameful crucifixion and death. Embodied shame finds particular and universal female form in menstruation. Menstruation is both a specific and all-inclusive aspect of how shame may be embodied in the natu

In the last post we discussed how shame (and blame) is often ascribed more to women, including in situations of crisis or violence. Rather than avoidance or even private counselling, thus colluding in the hiddenness and trauma of shame, Jesus openly encountered women who were carrying ascribed social shame, thus exposing the shame and at the same time publicly restoring their status. As well as socially ascribed shame, which comes to women through life situations, women also

Tell us a little about you I live in a corner of Five Dock, next to my church, with my husband and 2 little ones. Set adrift after doing my Bachelor of Science years ago, I was unsure of what sort of career path to pursue. I’ve recently had the epiphany that I’m a creative who loves science and the natural world and not a scientist who makes art. It’s been a harmonious realisation. Even though mothering and being creative keeps life full, I love making time to cook with edibl

In a pattern that is right on the cusp of comical and depressing, yet again I had thought I was ok. I had been reading all of the stuff about Weinstein and other offenders, I’d seen the disgusting Ben Affleck video, and I’d been angered, saddened, repulsed, but nothing that rose above what I recognise to be my own emotional flood line. And then, I wasn’t okay. This has happened before – during any number of social media storms, I often think to myself ‘Gee, I’m dealing with t

(In my discussion I am centring on the primary dynamic of men as the perpetrators and women as the victims, but please understand that such roles aren’t confined to one gender) Many men were surprised at the extent of the problem, that so many women could say “me too”. Me too, to experiences of sexual harassment and/or sexual assault. We women weren’t. Many women posted that they would think every woman could write #metoo. We know, because we tell each other our stories quiet

It has been good to see further discussion in western journals and books on the subject of shame and honour in the past few years. We welcome the recognition of shame and honour as significant categories, both in the Bible and in contemporary cultures, including western society. US author Brené Brown in her book on Women and Shame, comments, “…most of us, if not all, have built significant parts of our lives around shame. Individuals, families and communities use shame as

Here is a list of twelve (including five Australian) female theologians (in alphabetical order) you should know about, a little about them and a link to their site / work. Happy browsing! Christina Cleveland, is a social psychologist, public theologian, author and professor. She is an Associate Professor of the Practice of Organizational Studies at Duke University’s Divinity School and the author of Disunity in Christ: Uncovering the Hidden Forces that Keep Us Apart and is