The Assumption of Mary

So this is my first blog.  I am a theology student.  I am researching and questioning the patriarchal structure of our society and of the big three religions--Judaism, Chrsitianity and Islam.  I know there will be many people who will not be aware at all of what I am talking about, but that's OK.  Part of this exercise isto bring us into deeper understanding of the other and of ourselves.

Today is the Feast of the Assumption, of Mary, of the Theotokos.  She was bodily taken to heaven as Christ was at the Resurrection; she is co-equal in this respect and sits also at the right hand as Christ does.  She is crowned, she is royalty, of the royal priesthood.  In the Dormition, Christ holds her soul as a baby just as Mary held the physical body of the baby in our world.  They are co-equal.  Goddess and God together.  Why is our world not equal?

Even in the readings this week, Rev.12:1-6a, states in the footnotes: 'This corresponds to a widespread myth throughout the ancient world that a Goddess pregnant with a savior was pursued by a horrible monster, by miraculous intervention, she bore a son who killed the monster.'(p.1238, new American Bible)  Why is this not mentioned in homilies. The history of the Goddess precluded the Bible, precluded Judaism, Christianity and Islam.  Women ruled the temples.  The Temple Mount rose out of the Goddess Temples.  Matrilineal kinship was how the pre-historic world was ruled; then came the Northern tribes and males gradually overtook the temples and rewrote history for their own benefit.  I state now that it is time to rewrite the last 3000 years to the benefit of both genders, for the sake of gender equality.  We cannot be afraid.  Christ taught us that. Women have not been afraid of childbirth.

Women in childbirth are in a weakened state and not able to physically fight.   What happened in the temples that the males took over and the temples disappeared?  Where is this missing piece of history?  How did this imbalance turn from a matrilineal society to one of patriarchy?

In I Cor.15:20-27, Paul states how things come through the man. How could that be? That is only half the equation, the other half comes through the woman.  Indeed, then the New Testament is only half the story.  When will the other half be written or retrieved from the goddess stories of the pre-bible?  Do men feel inferior that they do not bare children?  Do they feel powerless in view of this mystery of life growing in a woman?  Even though as Fr. John Foley reminds us that we are all a product equally of the conjoining for  a man and woman in true union?  We are all the union of half female and half male; so just because I am embodied in a female physical body; that the patriarchal structure of our world claims that I am 'less' than male?  I hardly believe this to be so; especially if I am also a product of half a man's genes and half a woman's genes.  Scientifically, we are equal; so why are we not so in the religious world which should be the first place that things should be full of understanding, knowledge and compassion for all. So much of all of this points to the fact that we are all equal; the balance is an even playing field.

It's late.  Reflect on this and I'll be back later.