In this episode, we talk with Shauna Kubossek about her newly published paper "'So That She May Be Made Well' Themes of Salvation, Trust, and Healing in Mark 5:21–43." We discuss atonement theories, healing and cure, voice hearing, and how we can have better theologies around those in our faith communities who are "not liberated, whose bleeding has not stopped, and whose bodies are not resurrected."
There are also a lot of recommended resources in this episode for feminist and womanist trauma theologies and voice hearing (here are a few!).
-Bearing Witness: Intersectional Perspectives on Trauma Theology Ed. by O'Donnell and Cross
-Christians Hearing Voices: Affirming Experience and Finding Meaning by Christopher Cook
Read Shauna's paper here: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/cjtmhd/article/view/39548
Watch on YouTube with captions here:
In this episode, we talk with Shauna Kubossek about her newly published paper "'So That She May Be Made Well' Themes of Salvation, Trust, and Healing in Mark 5:21–43." We discuss atonement theories, healing and cure, voice hearing, and how we can have better theologies around those in our faith communities who are "not liberated, whose bleeding has not stopped, and whose bodies are not resurrected."
There are also a lot of recommended resources in this episode for feminist and womanist trauma theologies and voice hearing (here are a few!).
-Bearing Witness: Intersectional Perspectives on Trauma Theology Ed. by O'Donnell and Cross
-Christians Hearing Voices: Affirming Experience and Finding Meaning by Christopher Cook
Read Shauna's paper here: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/cjtmhd/article/view/39548
Watch on YouTube with captions here:
Welcome to this episode of the Mad and Crip Theology Podcast. There's a few announcements before we get to our fantastic guest this morning, the next journal will be on care giving and care receiving. So if you're a caregiver or care receiver or both, we know the lines are often not so black and white, uh, we would love to hear from you for creative submissions, or an idea for a commentary, or a research article, so please reach out to us. And Amy has some announcements about the press.
Yes, again, we just wanted to remind our listeners that we are looking for submissions for our upcoming edited volume called "Joyful Hard Work", which is about caregiving, so if you are a person who gives care to someone in your family, uh, or your friends with, uh, disabilities and or mental illness, we would love to hear from you, and we're looking for stories, um, you don't have to worry about it being super academic, not really looking for that anyway, so we'd love to hear your stories. And, uh, we're excited to announce that our forthcoming, uh, book that it's going to be published by the Mad and Crip Theology Press called "Beyond Saints and Superheroes: Supporting Parents Raising Children with Disabilities, a Practical guide for Faith Communities" is now available for pre-order on the Mad and Crip Theology Press website. So that is exciting, probably by the time this, um, episode airs it'll would have been out for pre-order for a bit, so you may have seen it on our Facebook, or around the interwebs, but, um, this morning we're just celebrating that our our first book is going to be coming out so, uh-- and that book is written by Laura McGregor and Alan G Jorgensen, and, uh, Wendy Newbury has done some very beautiful illustrations for that, so it's an eight-week guide that you can use, uh, for solar reflection, or also like, um, in small groups to learn about, uh, hear some store stories of parents who brought their kids with disabilities to church and some of them have had a good experience, and a lot of them have had a bad one, so we're trying to give some practical ways that faith communities can respond to that need. So yeah, if you want to check that out you can just head over to madandcriptheologypress.ca and just go to the bookstore, and you'll be able to pre-order that.
So we are very excited this morning to have, uh, Shauna here with us, Shauna, uh-- has joined us for the last little bit for some of our round tables, so for today she's going to be talking about her paper that came out in the fall issue of the journal that is about the gospel of Mark. So welcome Shauna, would you mind introducing yourself for our listeners?
Yeah, thanks Amy and Miriam, um, I'm so excited to be here again, uh, with both of you to chat, um, I am newly a torontonian, so within the last year I moved here, um, in order to continue my PhD at the Toronto School of Theology, so I'm a PhD student, my second year there at Emmanuel College, I'm working on, um, thinking about what redemption-- what kind of the language of redemption has to say, um, to folks, um, kind of like we talked about in the article a bit later, so when when your pain isn't lessened, or when you're-- you're the one who isn't resurrected, um, how do we talk about redemption, um, and salvation, and some of those kind of core doctrinal themes of Christian theology, um. So thinking about kind of those themes in my work as I-- as I work at Emmanuel, um, I-- for my adult life, most of my work has, um, involved kind of support work positions, outreach work positions in Vancouver, within the downtown east side and also a little bit without, um, working mostly with women and female identifying folks who, um, have experienced a lot of trauma, and different sorts of kind of intersecting issues of dealing with precariously-- precarious housing situations, poverty, um, how sometimes mental health can weave in with that, and addiction, so that's kind of my-- the lens at which I have been coming at this paper in my work sort of in general, more generally. Um, yeah.
Great, thank you Shauna, we're so, um, delighted that you bring a wealth of experience and knowledge to your work, and we wondered if you could provide a quick summary of-- of your paper just in case our readers haven't-- haven't read it yet and maybe, uh, a little teaser to encourage them to read more.
Yeah, absolutely, um, so this paper, uh, to be very honest, kind of grew out of a-- an experience in my-- in when I was writing in my master's program of, um, I wrote on-- on this same story, so it's a story in Mark about Jairus's daughter and the hemorrhaging woman, or the woman with the hemorrhage, um, and I initially wrote it in my Masters on-- on the Lucan version of the story, um, to which my-- one of my professors really quite decisively but kindly pulled it apart, and, um, had a lot of questions about my kind of secondary treatments of the text, and-- and where the literature had kind of led me, um, and so a lot of that hinged on this issue of purity, um, and Jewish Purity laws, uh, in the text and so I've been thinking about that for many many years, and themes of resurrection, healing, cures, um, what that means for our salvation, how Christians talk about these things, have been on my mind for many years, because of his really helpful comments, um, shout out to Harry O'Meyer in Vancouver for that, um, and so I've been thinking about this story, um, for many many years throughout my work, mostly in Vancouver, up until this year, and, um, decided to write on the Marcion version of the story now that I've been-- I-- you know, have had more time to think about if it's not about those things, if it's not about the purity of the woman, or the purity, or, um, of the young girl, of Jairus's daughter, then what is the story about, what does it mean? So this this paper was kind of my way of thinking through some of those questions, um part of-- part of the paper kind of starts with saying like, we reject these theories of purity, and the way that kind of literature leans into them, um, in a way that kind of pits Jesus against the Jewish community of which he was very much apart, um, it moves then into kind of talking about-- just kind of quickly about the harm that can be caused by classical theologies of atonement, theologies of atonement that have been centralized a lot in Christian discourse, which we can talk about a little bit later too if we want, um, and kind of rejecting those, um, and wondering alongside, uh, womanist and feminist theologians mostly, what kind of other articulations of healing and salvation are there? Um, so then after that piece, in the paper, we go into a kind of a word study mostly, of the Marcion pericope of this story, um, kind of looking at where it is, um, the word salvation, or to be saved, uh, come up, where does trust, well-being, relationship, how do all these themes kind of come up in the words of the story as they were written down, um, and then to think about, after having looked at those things, what does salvation, and healing, and well-being have to do with trust in our world, and then what does that mean for atonement, well, um, you know, in the end I have this this vision of atonement, and healing, and salvation, that includes, um, sometimes includes the body and sometimes maybe doesn't, but it's kind of a more holistic communal relational version of that, rather than thinking about it in terms of a person's individual salvation through belief. So, um, that's a little bit of what you might find in the paper as you go through.
Thank you so much Shauna, that was an awesome summary, um, there's so much good stuff in that paper, so we hope that our listeners will, um, head over to the journal website and take a look at it. So we have a couple of questions that we wanted to ask you, just like, to like pull forward some of the themes that we found interesting in the paper, uh, the first question that we wanted to ask you was, uh, what do you mean when you say-- when you say you reject atonement theories that understand suffering to be salvific? So what does this mean to you?
Starting off with a big one, I like it. Um, so this one-- this is a question that I've had for so, so, many years, and again I think a lot of, um, theology is our attempts to kind of answer these big questions for ourselves, I know for myself as a kind of baby scholar and someone who's interested in academia and study in these ways, excuse me, um, that atonement theologies have always been a huge question mark for me, um, particularly for the ways that they kind-- they kind of strangely, or maybe ironically, both glorify suffering and dismiss it at the same time. Um, so, there's a couple different kind of classical theologies at the atonement which, um, I don't need to get into, unless unless you two are interested, but there's kind of the satisfaction model, which says that God exacts retribution on an innocent person, Jesus, um, and that was kind of-- Anselm's kind of the father of that, and then there's the moral exemplar which is more in um Abelard's kind of, uh, started that one off, and talked about it, which is that God chooses suffering as an act of love for creation, and then the Christus Victor, in which God kind of is the victorious hero who dies to defeat sin, and suffering, and devils, um, but in all three of them of these classical theologies, suffering is necessary before salvation or well-being occurs, and, um, in a sense so it glorifies it in that way, right? Like we need to do this, this is a Godly thing, to get to the salvation or the healing that God wants for the world we have to suffer, or God has to suffer, um, in some way. So the glorification, or deification of it, and then in another way, it kind of it-- it dismisses it in the way that these theories ask us to be kind of passive about our suffering, so if they're necessary, then let's not fight against them in particular ways. So that I find particularly, um, a difficult pill to swallow, so to speak, that, um, yeah should we-- where is our action then so what is, uh, what is the way that we interact with God, and we interact with the world and each other, if our suffering is meant-- um, is given meaning in that particular way, not that it can't be given meaning, um, in any way, but in that particular way I find it quite, uh, upsetting, I guess, and problematic, for sure.
Yeah, and I think growing up, um, I-- I was definitely taught the Christus Victor kind of, like victorious Jesus, you know, reigning, and Emperor, and all this like powerful stuff, um, that was definitely the kind of atonement that I was taught growing up and, um, yeah, I-- I appreciate you bringing this stuff forward, um, in the paper. Um, so, um, maybe, uh-- maybe Miriam, would you like to ask the next question? And I'll take a second to formulate my question around-- around-- that I was going to ask you Shauna, I'm sorry.
That's okay
Having a brain fart.
Yeah.
And so, our next question one chapter when--
Sorry, that was random. Sit down.
Um,
So, we pick on one of your footnotes, which is-- which may not be centered to your paper, but we found really interesting and noteworthy. And you picked up on James Clark shows, uh, differentiation between healing and cure, and that's-- that's, um, really helpful I think, for our listeners, so, how do you use this-- how do you employ this difference in your paper, how do you understand healing versus cure?
Yeah, that's, um, a great question, and honestly, um, it ended up in a footnote because I think that it it fit there well, but I, uh, the idea is so prevalent, I think, throughout-- I really used, um, Jamie Clarksville's, um, understanding of healing and cure was really central to how I wrote my paper, and how I understand those two things, so, um Jamie Clarksville, uh, differentiates between healing and cure, um, and understands healing, um, so the article that I'm quoting from is called Mark and Disability, um, in the journal interpretation, uh, volume 70 number two, if y'all are looking it up, um, but, uh, it differentiates between and says that healing really is understood, um, in this article, as the elimination as-- uh, sorry, not the elimination of an impairment, uh, which is a quote from, uh, the article at the individual level, but, um, to one's experience of integration and reconciliation to self, to God, and community. So, for Jamie Clarksville's, um, cure is more an individual-- on an individual, more physical level, or a physiological level, and healing includes that, but is much broader than that, and much more expansive than that, um, healing may or may not involve a cure, but is-- is, uh, bigger in the sense of it's a kind of, um, in their words, communally based liberation, um, that can include a bodily cure sometimes. So that's uh, I-- I loved that, and I took it and ran with it as kind of a, um, framework for how I understood healing, and well-being, and salvation, which in Mark I think kind of, um, can be used interchangeably in some ways, um. So and used that throughout the paper.
Yeah, thanks so much Shauna, and I-- I just took a second to like, collect my thoughts, and make my brain work again, so I was just-- what I wanted to mention before, about your first question if we could just circle back to that for one second, is I-- in the tradition that I grew up in women were often told that their suffering was salvific, I don't know why, um, I think like I-- I was thinking like, particularly, um, women who, um, have been-- experienced domestic violence, um, and other things, are told that-- at least when I was growing up, were told that you should stay with your partner, because, um, God will-- God's doing something important in your relationship, and so, you know you need to stay and kind of like endure all this like horrible stuff, um, and so some of that sort of suffering as salvific or very kind of like, um, what's the word, like formational to a woman's like, being, or like, part of their sort of spiritual journey, should-- I don't know if it should, but, often like-- we're not surprised when suffering is there, and like we're just kind of like-- it's like the norm I think for us to just be like, well that's a part of your spiritual journey, um, and I've heard-- I've heard that echoed, um, throughout my life, um, so yeah, does that make sense?
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, um, I've experienced some of those, uh, kind of comments as well, or even implied theologies, um, kind of coming-- coming at me as someone, um, as a woman and a girl who had grown up in the church, and now a woman who's kind of in the church as well, and I think, um, I wonder how closely it is connected to the idea in some faith communities, right, that women are meant to be more passive, and so, um, part of that means that like, it's this glorification and passivity piece again, so we're glorifying the suffering, this is part of your-- if God's will in your life, and it will be made into something beautiful, we're glorifying this experience of someone-- this really, um, really really difficult experience, and traumatic sometimes, and then at the same time, um, on top of that, we're saying, uh, to women in the church, often, that we're meant to be a bit quieter, a bit more demure, um, we're sitting instead of standing, these kinds of things, and so I think it just feeds into this kind of-- these sorts of atonement theologies, or the ways that we-- and the language we use to speak about them I think is really really important, and so the ways they've been, um, articulated in the past, um, kind of reinforce these same ideas, um, and it is-- and it can be used as a tool, and it is used as a tool of oppression to keep, you know, the submissive submissive because this is God's will for your life. Um, and yeah. I'll maybe just leave it there, I could talk about this for the whole time but, um, I think it-- particularly atonement theologies have that kind of bend in their-- in the way that we talk about them, and so often I think it's why it's so interesting to read, um, feminist and womanists theologians on this topic particularly, because, uh, it brings a new language to it, a different language, maybe not a new language, these ideas, uh, that we view as alternate, um, are not, they've been there for a very very long time, and have existed for many many centuries, um, and haven't just been centralized, so it's really, um, I would encourage readers, if you're interested to absolutely dig into atonement theologies, um, written by feminist and womanist theologians particularly, it's-- there's some really interesting things out there.
Well thank you so much Shauna. So we're gonna go forward to the next question now, um, can you tell us about how you see salvation as being both, uh, healing of the woman with the issue of blood's body, and her restoration into community? So, we-- we touched on this a little bit earlier, this idea of like, um, you know, cure may not necessarily mean healing of the body, but you-- you're really attracted to this idea of like, um, the woman being restored into
community, uh, as like a part of her, um, journey of salvation, so would you be able to talk to us a little bit more about that?
Yeah, absolutely. I think, um, the story is really interesting on so many different levels, and I think when we take the question of like, um, uh, ritual purity off the table, we can see some kind of interesting things emerge in the story, um, so one of the things, um-- in her connection to community, and her, uh, her trust of Jesus, kind of like their interaction together mostly, um, is really interesting to me, so, she's restored to community in the sense that Jesus calls her daughter, and she's included in this family, so, I don't mean she's re-included in community in the sense, uh, that a lot of the literature follows, which says that she's-- she was cast out of her community and now she's reintegrated, but rather putting that aside and kind of projecting those interpretations, she is still restored in some way to relationship and community through her trust and her active, um-- she and Jesus together, kind of interacting with each other, um, so I think her healing, um, you could read the story as a-- as a curative story, right, her body is cured in an individual sense, and I think it's as spiritual as it is bodily, so, in Mark, um, the word for saved or made well uh, sozo, so saved, is kind is used, uh, in many different instances, so it can mean saved in kind of a spiritual sense, and it can be made, um, healing or salvation in a-- in a more bodily or material sense, so, I was really interested in looking at the story, um, as like, a healing story in a holistic way, which includes her cure, if we want to, um, get specific and ask the question, like did that actually happen to her body, which I don't know is as important, um, to figure out necessarily, but um, yeah, that there are many ways of being afflicted in the gospel of Mark, and there are many ways of being made well, um, and this verb, sozo, to be saved, is used in all of those different circumstances in a variety of different ways, um, so I was interested in-- in, um, oh, well for this woman then, many of those interpretations could come to bear on her story, um, because that same word exists here for her.
Thank you.
We're going to turn to another healing story you mentioned in the paper which is the gerasene demoniac, and he was scared and after that he was seen sitting by Jesus in his right mind, and we wondered-- I know Amy had said that she had an interest in this story and we wondered what that, uh, meant to you in-- in conversation with the feminist and womanist theologians you drew on.
Hmm, yeah, that's such a great question, um, I think in the story of The gerasene demoniac which, um, for the listeners right-- precedes the story of Jairus's daughter and the woman with the hemorrhage in Mark, so this kind of healing story almost sets things up for the next-- for Jairus's daughter and the hemorrhaging woman, um, and the gerasene demoniac is pictured first, I think the words are shackled and alone, um, sitting there shackled and alone, um, and I understand, so he's sitting there afterwards after Jesus, um, casts out the demons from his body, in the words of the-- of the story, um, sitting there in his right mind, so I understand that not as a, um, as a diagnostic language, that he wasn't in his right mind in terms of like a medical or a mental health diagnosis and now he is, but rather that, um, Jesus was an antidote to, um, being shackled and alone. So, um, sitting beside Jesus-- and then he becomes an emissary of the Gospel, so to speak, he-- he moves from that story onward out into the world to tell of what Jesus has done for him, so I think, um, it's not-- it's not about the person's diagnosis, but about the connection we have to the world and to others around us, so, from shackled and alone, if we take a mental health diagnosis out of it, he was alone and he was, um, constricted, um, and then after his interaction with Jesus he's sitting, um, reconnected to Jesus, they have a relationship after that at this point, and reconnected in terms of, um, he's speaking to people, and moving throughout his community in a way that he wasn't doing before in his solitude. So, I think, um-- I think about some of the people that I know and love, some of my friends who use medication, or don't use medication for their various mental health diagnoses, and, um, for some these, um, one in particular, hears voices, and hears spirits, and she understands these spirits to be very kind and beautiful, and when she takes her medication she can't hear them anymore, and they add to her life, so I think oftentimes we think of a story, um, of mental health is this like always a bad thing necessarily, I mean we all have mental health, but we think of mental health diagnoses is a bad thing, but for her it was this, um, integrative moment, she could connect in a way to her own spirit, to God, um, to her community, through the things that she was hearing, and things that she was experiencing in the spirit world, um, and for others, they are shackled and alone, are tormented by the thoughts that they have, and so I think that it's important to see that both of these things, um, that both kind of exist, you know, and so for my friend, um, who hears these beautiful voices and spirits and wants them around her, it's a connective piece, it's a relational piece, and she trusts them, and they trust her and interact together, and I think the problem where-- maybe not problem, where she runs into difficulties sometimes, is that the way that society understands her diagnosis disconnects her, and so it's not the diagnosis itself or her experience of it even, she believes that it's this beautiful thing, and experiences it as a beautiful thing, and I think that it is, um, but that how she is perceived is the thing that makes her shackled and alone, not the diagnosis itself. Um, anyways, I-- I went on a little a little bit of a tangent there, but I think that for the gerasene demoniac, it wasn't necessarily about the diagnosis, we can read the story without thinking about that in particular but that, um, Jesus redefines his life and his connections, and then his prognosis is-- and his connections, and his ability to, um, connect to the world around him, to God, and to others, to the world, is-- is redefined by this interaction with Jesus, so. I'll leave it there, I won't keep talking. But I could keep talking about that too.
Yeah, thanks so much Shauna, that's so helpful, I really love what you've added to the conversation around this, um, this part of Mark and we-- we circle back to this chapter of Mark a lot, just because I'm kind of obsessed with it, um, I love hearing different people's ideas about it and, um, I was just thinking while you were talking, one book that I often recommend to my students, um, that might help with thinking about like voice hearing for Christians, not always being bad, is a book called Christians Hearing Voices by Christopher Cook, and, um, I think that's the one that's available for free online, um, I believe it's like open access, I could be wrong, but if it is, I will link it, um, below the podcast, um, and, uh, the podcast info for this episode, um, and it's like really good, because it goes to like a very wide spectrum of why Christians hear voices, and there are-- it's not-- like you said, it's not always bad, so this medical model of like pathologizing all voice hearing is not very helpful, um, and there's also another thing I reckon-- recommend to my students too, is if you have lived experience of voice hearing, there's some really good voice hearing networks around, um, too that you might want to hook up with and I could also put that link, uh, for you, um, and that's like mostly coming out of the UK, but there are some other like, sections of it that meet in different places around the world. So, it's like this idea of like normalizing voice hearing, is not always a bad thing. So yeah.
Great. I'm gonna check those out too.
Cool.
So um, the last question that we have for you, Shauna, is about your author's note, so, um, I think most of our listeners probably know at this point that whenever we have, um, basically anything that we publish in the journal, we always offer the authors, um, a space to like just like jot down some of their thoughts after that they want our readers to know, and so, in your author's note, um, you talked about how you thought about people who are not liberated, whose bleeding has not stopped, and whose bodies are not resurrected, and we were-- we were sort of reflecting on that statement, we're wondering, is there room for these people in contemporary Christian communities, um, and have we made space for the tensions to exist in faith communities where like, some of these things are maybe not happening and maybe won't ever happen?
Yeah, um.
I think, yeah, part of-- thinking about bodies resurrected, so mostly we've talked today about, um, the woman with a hemorrhage, um, and in the paper, I talk a little bit about Jairus's daughter as well, and how those two interact, um, to create the kind of-- a possible mark in soteriology, uh, this view of salvation by Mark, but I think, um, some of-- some of my biggest issues with a classical atonement theologies and the way that we speak as Christians about healing and salvation, is that we don't actually-- I haven't in very many spaces heard any, let alone a sufficient theology for those who continue to suffer, and for those who, um, that's the journey, or those who die in their suffering, or their addiction, so how do we talk about redemption, and healing, and well-being, um, for those whose bodies aren't cured in that physical sense, and or aren't resurrected the way that Jairus's daughter's body was. Um, so I think in faith communities, it's really important to at least ask the question: how does our theology understand-- does it completely exclude those folks, who have-- I'm thinking of folks with chronic pain, folks who-- whether it be mental, physical, spiritual-- that exists for their whole life, or you struggle your whole life, um, and-- and some folks that I know who have died in their suffering as well, it does-- how do we speak about their lives as redeemed lives, which they are, um, and our theology doesn't really know how to say anything about that, so I think that that's a really big problem, um, and something that the church, particularly today needs to contend with, and figure out, uh, if our theology as we explain it now, can't hold that, then we need to expand it, and we need to and talk it, out sometimes it's painful to do these things, and we need to, um. So I think-- there-- is there a place today, I-- I would say that there are the beginnings of certain places that are maybe feeling a little bit safer for some folks, I think, uh, that I-- I want more of that in the future, um, and the church isn't always-- the Christian Church, particularly, is not always good at holding suffering, um, so with an image of suffering like the cross at the center of our theology, the center of-- usually right up at the front of any church, or kind of, um, place of meeting, for that to be so central and yet we don't really know how to talk about suffering and what that means for our salvation and our well-being, um, how are they connected, how are they not? So I think more conversation needs to happen, I think-- and in terms of like, liturgy, and rewriting some of these things, thinking about the language we use, um, that it's really, really, important because oftentimes the experience of-- of those who suffer, we-- um, the church can feel uncomfortable with that and doesn't know what to do with that, and so instead of continuing this kind of, oh, we're gonna-- we're a little not sure so we pulled back, I think the call is to really lean in and ask-- ask ourselves like, how can our theology hold this, can it, and how do we reconcile some of those things? Um, did I answer both parts of the question? I'm not sure.
Yeah, yeah, I think so, and, uh, I just want to say, like I'm really looking forward to reading some more of your writing on this, um, as you're like journeying through your PhD, and also like hopefully publishing more with the journal and stuff, and we can like, um, just like, being a part of the conversation of like grappling with some of these tensions around like, not-- like, the church not like mirroring in a lot of ways, like what is actually happening in Canada, or around the world, like seems sometimes is a very like shiny fluffy, you know, flowery things that are happening instead of like, really just being, uh, a part of like people's shit. I don't know how else to say it.
Yeah.
Um, you know. So yeah, I-- I'm really looking forward to, um, reading more of your writing, and talking to you more about this.
Oh, thanks. Yeah, I'm-- I'm interested to see where this journey will take me as well, and I think the way that you said it was really good, it's like we often have this idea in the church that we're moving towards something in a linear way, towards something that's, um, clean and light and good, like this idea of salvation or, um, the after, our eschatology is very much built on a purification towards a very particular idea of what that means, um, and I think atonement theology fits in all of that, we have this kind of linear view that takes us out of the material, which I think is so necessary to remember in these conversations, it's critical, and that's part of the reason that we haven't been able to speak about suffering, um, in a way that is responsible, I think, in the church, because, um, we've-- we've dismissed it in a lot of ways, the material, and so, um, one of the things that I found really helpful is Shelley Rambo's work on Holy Saturday as she draws on Sphere and Balthazar's understanding, and says like, the spirit suffuses, and bears witness, or bears with, um, the death of Holy Saturday, so in those moments of death, we exist there, and that in and of itself is a really holy thing, um, to be in the midst of someone's pain and suffering, in the midst of their death, or our own, um, and God exists there in the death as well. Um, there's another book that just came out at the end of August, I believe, called Bearing Witness, it's intersectional perspectives on trauma theology, it's an edited collection, edited by Karen O'Donnell and Katie Cross, and-- and in there is-- are a lot of stories of bearing witness to pain, how can the church on a-- on a global, communal, individual level, pay attention to these conversations, so I would definitely suggest, if you're interested in those kinds of conversations, how might we start to articulate some of that, um, it's a really-- it's a really kind of, easy way in, and, um, each chapter kind of has its own something to say to the conversation, so, um, just to lay that there as well. Can be helpful that one.
Following on that, I wonder what is the importance of bearing witness to pain? And how-- how might we be encouraged to-- to do that in churches?
Yeah, good question, yeah, I think, um, a lot of trauma theory these days-- well, so specifically Judith Herman had this book that came out, Trauma and Recovery, which has been kind of the seminal work for a lot of, uh, trauma theorists, and, um, kind of this like big bang that's happened, uh, in trauma theory lately, in the last few years, but she speaks about, um, having a witness to your pain, so I think about it in terms of like, something happened, I don't know what even happened to me in some ways, and saying that out loud to someone, and having them first listen to it, which is a skill all in it-- all in its own, first to listen to it, and then just say, that really sucks, or, oh-- you know, like just to acknowledge that it was wrong, or whatever happened was wrong, or bad, or painful, or whatever it is, so it doesn't-- I think, um, a lot of times people are worried what do I say, you know, when someone's, um, grieving, or when someone's lost something, or when someone's in pain, I feel so useless, well, I would venture to say like, in those moments it's not about you, it's if you're caring for this person who's in pain, to just sit with them, um, letting those feelings wash over you, yeah maybe you do feel useless, and knowing that part of, um, reintegrating ourselves after very hard things happen to us is having someone see them, and mirror back to us like, that was wrong, and that was bad, and that was painful, yes. Um, so I think it's simpler than a lot of folks, um, think. I think the church, uh, I think it wants to be a place, in a lot of ways, where these kind of moments can happen, where we-- where we see the pain of others and we come alongside, um, and I think it also asks something of us on top of bearing witness, um, compassion for me includes actions you see with empathy, and you understand the situation as it is, and then you act, as well, alongside the person in the world, and so I think-- I wonder if some of the hesitancy that the church has, uh, to bear witness or to come alongside in those ways, is the, uh, the responsible-- the responsibility we have after, to hold those stories with a weight, and with love, and with our own energy and action, towards, um, something different in the future, towards making, um, making the world a better, more hospitable place for people and the church, um, so I think, yeah, it's twofold, we're a little bit nervous, we're a little fearful of-- of what will it feel like for us to be in those situations, and to hold those kinds of stories, and-- and sometimes we can be nervous about what it might actually require of us, um, beyond that conversation, um, and yeah. Yeah.
That's awesome, thank you Shauna. And we just wanted to open it to you and say anything you want to add that we haven't covered in our time.
Um, I-- yeah, I'm really grateful for a space to have these conversations, I think, um, that they're really important questions for the church to contend with, um, and I would love-- I would love to hear more conversations about theology and suffering without jumping towards the hope, without jumping towards the healing, or the meaning making, and I understand that those things are also important, and they happen, I mean they sometimes need to happen, but I don't think they need to happen as quickly or as often as we believe that they do, um, and so, for those who aren't healed or aren't cured from their bleeding in their body, and or aren't resurrected, um, that these-- we need to start looking at our-- at our tradition, at our texts, our sacred texts, at our doctrines, in ways that question, um, how-- how do they exclude those experiences, and can they be, um, rear-- not rearranged, but how can they be expanded to hold more than they already hold, because I, um, I mean, I've had days where I'm not sure that they can, um, where, um, I want to let things go, instead of work to rebuild or retrieve or um, whatever else, but I think that there is--
I think that these things exist already, we just haven't known how to talk about them, so, um. My hope Is that we'll get better at it. Um, and yeah. Because I think it makes-- it makes all the difference in the world to folks who-- and everyone experiences their own pain, and everyone experiences things in life, and I think, um, so this isn't an issue that-- "an issue" quote-unquote issue, that exists out there for other people who are experiencing whatever, it exists within our own communities, um, and it's just hidden in certain ways, because it's not safe to bring it out, so, um, yeah. Just a-- a call to to think about these things in deep ways, and, um, wrestle with it, lean into the struggle. We need the struggle.
Is there anything else that was lingering for you both, any other questions or, I'd love to hear your thoughts, if there is anything that bubbled up in reading through, or.
Um, I was very-- I think when Miriam and I were chatting with you about publishing the paper, we were just excited, we're always excited when, um, like, people are willing to like tackle these kinds of things, um, you know, we've been talking-- this is kind of like an aside, but some of us that are working on the Mad and Crip Theology Press have been talking lately about like, how it's it seems like, um, when you're doing a PhD and you're-- you're some of the PhDs-- some people might move through the PhD program a bit quicker when they're doing a little bit more of a traditional project, um, like let's say picking apart character guard, or going back and looking at Luther, and for some of us who are doing more difficult projects, that might be a bit more close to the chest, it might take us a little bit longer to journey through, but, um, there's a lot of like wrestling that comes along with asking these huge questions, um, and like-- like you said, it's not like they haven't been asked before, um, they have but, um, I just want to like, affirm like, your writing, and also just like affirm our struggle here, at like, on the podcast, on the press of just trying to like, wade through all of this, um, and hopefully like as we're moving through, um, some of these conversations, our listeners will feel like we're providing some kind of, um, good resources, maybe like, um, alternative resources to what may have traditionally been disseminated, or you may have learned like, sort of like this-- I don't want to say safe, maybe it is safe, maybe you're-- the safer stuff, when you're going through seminary, and so we're trying to like push-- push against some of that safety, um, here at the press, and also like, at the on the podcast in journal and stuff, um. So yeah, so I appreciate your willingness, Shauna, to help us push, to be a part of that-- that conversation.
I'm excited it's happening.