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What would a religion founded by a woman look like?

Freiheit

Ok I know every woman is different and not all are gentle peace loving,nurturing etc,but just reading Caitlin Moran's 'How to be a woman' and she notes how every religion was invented by a man, with women doing things that men don't,no men wear the Burqua she laments,said she might consider it if men did it.:)

Anyway though how could a female conceived religion look like? maybe nobody would have listened to a woman 2000 years ago,but surely they would now?

Maybe some of us here could start a religion?.

Happy New year ,God bless you all!:)

K x

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Peregrinus

You don't have to do thought experiments on this one. You've got Christian Science founded by Mary Baker Eddy, the Shakers founded by "Mother Anne", Theosophy founded by Helena Blavatsky, Tenrikyo founded by Nakayama Miki and (at a pinch) Heaven's Gate, founded by Bonnie Nettles along with Marshall Applewhite. Ellen G White was one of the founders of Seventh-Day Adventism.

OK, one or two of these are churches or denominations rather than fully-fledged religions in there own right, but I suggest they're still helpful in illustrating how women claiming or holding religious authority can wield it.

Chuck Stone

Churches would be more comfy. Lots of cushions and scented candles... knock a wall down.. install a wood burning stove...

philologos

Freiheit wrote: »

Ok I know every woman is different and not all are gentle peace loving,nurturing etc,but just reading Caitlin Moran's 'How to be a woman' and she notes how every religion was invented by a man, with women doing things that men don't,no men wear the Burqua she laments,said she might consider it if men did it.:)

Anyway though how could a female conceived religion look like? maybe nobody would have listened to a woman 2000 years ago,but surely they would now?

Maybe some of us here could start a religion?.

Happy New year ,God bless you all!:)

K x

Not every religion was invented by man, because not all creeds are invented

You could set up another religion but it would be utterly futile.

kiffer

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Churches would be more comfy. Lots of cushions and scented candles... knock a wall down.. install a wood burning stove...

But you'd have to move the furniture all the time...
Wait positive stereotypes! Positive!
Hmmm.
I think it would go pretty much the same as all religions go.
One day she'd say something good, "don't fight"
The next she'd say "those people are bad, I don't like them"
And two hundred years later you'd have people killing the ****e out of each other because of a misplaced comma.

pauldla

philologos wrote: »

Not every religion was invented by man, because not all creeds are invented

You could set up another religion but it would be utterly futile.

That's a terribly defeatist attitude, philo. Sure they probably said the same thing to Saul of Tarsus, and look at the success he had! :P

Chuck Stone

philologos wrote: »

Not every religion was invented by man, because not all creeds are invented

midlands paranormal researcher

great topic to talk about, to be honest i think the rc church would be a relaxed in canon law and teachings,being a ex member of group that was mentioned in the de vinic codes where women outnumber men i feel the world and the churches would be a place of alot more love and smelly candles.

magicbastarder

why does everyone assume they'll be nicer religions?
take nuns for example. they're not exactly hippies.

seamus

Nuns in reality though are slaves to a patriarchal indoctrination.

It's a bit of an odd thought experiment, as it presumes that the kind of women with the qualities required to found a religion would differ fundamentally from the men.

It's the same line of argument which suggests that women in charge of governments would be fairer and less war mongering. Then Maggie Thatcher arrived and blew that argument out of the water.

Beruthiel

seamus wrote: »

Then Maggie Thatcher arrived and blew that argument out of the water.

She was a genetic anomaly and you can't blame half the planets population for that!

magicbastarder

you could argue that thatcher was the way she was by having to out-testosterone the men.

or that she was a genetic anomaly.
thatcher related pop fact (which i'm gonna shoehorn in here); the belgrano was the last ship still in service which had survived the attack on pearl harbor.

doctoremma

Well, the congregation would be mostly male as the head honcho would never let anyone prettier than her join...

kiffer

Beruthiel wrote: »

She was a genetic anomaly and you can't blame half the planets population for that!

Same sorts would rise to power though.
or power corrupts...

pauldla

I have dim memories of reading about various pre-Christian religions that were quite feminocentric. One fact that stuck was that women were given the extremely important task of brewing beer, and that a variety of beers would be brewed throughout the year, for different purposes. One beer was even brewed especially for childbirth, both to aid in the birth and to wash the child (beer having quite good antiseptic properties). If I recall, this was called 'groaning ale'. Don't push me on a source for any of this, though: it may be from Peter Brown's enjoyable Man Walks Into A Pub: A Social History of Beer, but I wouldn't bet my pint on it.

getz

many religions have woman gods,passed and present,druidism,hindoism,vestal virgins[who were the first to hang crosses around their necks],and wiccan,[ mother earth.]

Sarky

I suspect there'd be more sex involved.

SebBerkovich

I'm pretty sure it would have a much better PR department than any religions today.. If The Catholic Church had better PR they'd be dangerous..

Sarky

SebBerkovich wrote: »

If The Catholic Church had better PR they'd be dangerous..

Remember the superbowl episode of The Simpsons where there was an ad full of shapely young ladies very suggestively cleaning a man's car and filling the fuel tank to rock music, which ended with someone saying "The Catholic church: We've made a few... changes."?

Pope Benny needs PR guys who can do that.

robindch

philologos wrote: »

You could set up another religion but it would be utterly futile.

I'm sure they said that to L Ron Hubbard, Joseph Smith, Jesus and Moses too.

Morag

One which respected men and women equally and revered Gods and Goddesses equally?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doreen_Valiente

Doreen Edith Dominy Valiente (4 January 1922 – 1 September 1999), who also went under the craft name Ameth,was an influential English Wiccan who was involved in a number of different early traditions, including Gardnerianism, Cochrane's Craft and the Coven of Atho.

Responsible for writing much of the early Gardnerian religious liturgy, in later years she also helped to play a big part in bringing the Neopagan religion of Wicca to wider public attention through the publication of a string of books on the subject.

Having had a significant influence in the history of Wicca, she has been referred to as "the mother of modern Witchcraft" and is today is widely revered in the Wiccan and wider Neopagan community.

Sycopat

I am not convinced at all that men and women are somehow fundamentally mentally different, so aside from gender swapping the major players and swapping the balance of power in a religion I doubt it would be much different.

To say their would be more smelly candles and cushions in a typical church is also to completely ignore the many modern churches (And lets be fair, I'm thinking catholicism but so are most of you) obsession with ridiculous fabrics, incense and jewellery.

ShooterSF

The only genuine difference I can imagine might be more openness to birth control if it was a religion that not only was founded by a woman but also went down a similar path of dividing up the sexes with one getting preferential treatment.

pauldla

Sycopat wrote: »

To say their would be more smelly candles and cushions in a typical church is also to completely ignore the many modern churches (And lets be fair, I'm thinking catholicism but so are most of you) obsession with ridiculous fabrics, incense and jewellery.

Ach, that's probably all down to local church groups looking after the church, most of which seem to be dominated by middle aged women. If the churches were only maintained by men, there would probably be back issues of the Catholic Herald strewn all over the place (left open at the racing pages, too), half-finished bottles of altar wine in the confession boxes, and all the kneeling boards would be perpetually left up.

Dades

All the hierarchy would wear dresses and fancy hats.

Oh, wait...

condra

Fair chance men would be treated like dirt.

kiffer

condra wrote: »

Fair chance men would be treated like dirt.

It would depend on what sort of people set up religions, and why...
What sorts of people set up religions?
Crazy True Believers, who think they've heard the truth after eating some nice mushrooms, or what ever.
ConArtists, who want money, power, status, etc.
People who have had a genuine revalation... Sure, might happen, but how would anyone tell the difference? (No, a 2000 year old book doesn't cut it, no your personal feeling doesn't cut it)
People who have thought long and hard and experienced life and want to help people, but who may or may not actually have good or practical ideas.

What happens next depends on the followers and the teachings and time.
There are so many factors.

I think if you got a randomly mixed group of modern women in a room and asked them to design a religion you'd get something that wasn't half bad... At first.

swampgas

<tangent>
Funnily enough, a number of friends & relatives from the UK and Holland are rather perplexed when they visit West Cork at the number of Marian shrines about the place. More than one has commented that it's as if Irish people worshipped Mary and not Jesus, and have asked whether this goes back to the worship of mother goddesses in pre-Christian times.

Haven't really looked into it, but every time I drive past one of them (and there's a huge one just outside Clonakilty) it makes me wonder. Not that having female gods would necessarily imply a female priesthood.
</tangent>

Morag

and have asked whether this goes back to the worship of mother goddesses in pre-Christian times.

Yes and the queen of heaven cult.

Bannasidhe

swampgas wrote: »

<tangent>
Funnily enough, a number of friends & relatives from the UK and Holland are rather perplexed when they visit West Cork at the number of Marian shrines about the place. More than one has commented that it's as if Irish people worshipped Mary and not Jesus, and have asked whether this goes back to the worship of mother goddesses in pre-Christian times.

Haven't really looked into it, but every time I drive past one of them (and there's a huge one just outside Clonakilty) it makes me wonder. Not that having female gods would necessarily imply a female priesthood.
</tangent>

As my Nan always said 'Why would you ask the boy for a favour when you could ask the boy's mother?'

Peregrinus

Dades wrote: »

All the hierarchy would wear dresses and fancy hats.

Oh, wait...

Good point. The Catholic church - founded by men, run by men, bastion of institutionalised discrimination against women - is one of the few environments in which it is socially acceptable, and even admired, for men to frock up in gorgeous fabrics of elaborate design, while at the same time eschewing the stereotype of men as permanently randy, and ready to sleep with anything with a pulse. Perhaps it's only in such a male-dominated environment in which men feel safe in transgressing the usual stricture of conventional expectations of masculinity.

So perhaps in a female-dominated church, women could escape the expactations of femininity and give free rein to the masculine side of their natures. I shudder to think what that would involve, but Margaret Thatcher has already been mentioned in this thread!