“THE OTHER HAND OF GOD”

www.thegirlgod.com

The words were disturbing and jarring to my little girl mind as I sat next to my Father and Mother in Church. The preacher was praying to the Lord saying it was only through the Heavenly Father’s love and Jesus’ dying on the cross that made the Grace of God possible though “we humans were not worthy to receive the crumbs that fall from the Lord’s table.”  It was totally confusing to me that God would go to the trouble of creating us and make us so unworthy and then ask His only Son to suffer and die for us.  As a child it was clear to me from my parent’s reactions that I wasn’t perfect, but I also knew that they loved me anyway and that God loved me just as I was, “cause the Bible told me so.”  I didn’t buy all that unworthiness in the sight of God stuff.  It was about then that I questioned the rightness of what the minister said and also what was done in the name of God.

Three generations of my Mother’s family had attended this church, always sitting in the third pew on the left side. Mother told me that my Grand Mother played the organ there when she wasn’t marching or writing as a suffragist. I observed that a man was always in the pulpit, preaching and praying, while other men ushered, took up the money and made decisions, and others stood at the door to welcome and bid goodbye.  Women only played the organ, sang in but never directed the choir, taught Sunday school and cooked supper for Wednesday night fellowship.

When an older cousin got married three years later, that same preacher said something in the ceremony to the bride about “obeying her husband” until she died.  Those words landed on that prayer and made a “screeching brakes” sound in my mind. Something didn’t feel right at all, but I couldn’t fully identify what it was until I was in college studying for my degree in Religion and Philosophy. I had longed to serve God in some way after Billy Graham came to our town when I was ten. I felt called by his invitation and got up from my stadium seat to accept Jesus as my savior while Cliff Barrows sang “Just As I Am.”  My Mother and Aunt looked on in amazement and I think also with some amusement.

Challenging theological and philosophical revelations of my college professors inspired me to service, yet I could not wrap my heart and head around the concept of being a “religious education director,” the expected career choice for young women pursuing that degree in the early 1960’s. In my late twenties, I finally understood what was missing all those years. I served on the Board of a national organization called Church Women United and attended an international conference of over 2000 women. It was there that I met the first woman Episcopalian priest in America as well as many other dynamic women ministers. We had heard that a special Sunday ritual was to conclude the conference. On a beautiful summer morning we assembled in an outdoor Amphitheatre, and to the sound of a triumphant brass processional, one hundred ordained women of the cloth entered sacredly, authentically, joyfully, and turned to  face us.  Some sang, some danced, words were proclaimed, prayers offered. Then, all these women, in full clerical robes and colorful vestments, served Holy Communion with freshly baked loaves of bread and chalices of wine to the women assembled from all over the globe.

A veil lifted and I felt a palpable shift in my consciousness. The sacraments shared by that collective of powerful women brought a transformative experience that lives in me still.  I was “priested” to, spiritually ministered to, sacredly served by women for the first time in this life. It was as though I finally felt the other hand of God gifting me with profound love and comfort. A new spiritual awareness awakened in me. A greater Grace, a more encompassing theology, a fuller perspective of the Divine birthed in me.

Was it that they represented the nurturing of the Divine, the tender touch of the Mother, the courage of personal convictions necessary to break through old patterns, or did it just feel “not other” as it always had in the traditional realm of the patriarchy. It was on that August morning that I first fully recognized that I could indeed be made in the image of God.  Surely, God must be all encompassing; both Mother and Father, everything and all, not limited by our understanding of God as only the Father. The God of creation must be a birthing God, and the God in Action that I had studied in Sunday school could be both Heavenly Father and Mother, a compassionate Spirit, not wrathful, nor vengeful, or punishing as the God of the Old Testament. I felt the claim of the New Testament in an expanded way, as the true promise of Love to heal and make new.

The experience of receiving communion from those women, women like me, was one of the most exhilarating moments in my spiritual life, for it forever shifted my awareness of woman’s role in the church and of the Spirit, and indeed in the scheme of things.  I began to reframe and revision my concept of God and see the feminine face of God, the Divine Mother, the Mother of Everything and All. The illusion was forever pierced of the powerful patriarchy sitting at the right hand of God, of only men having a direct connection to the sacred lineage.  I was deeply grateful to join in this momentous river of change.

When my life opened to a new career pathway a decade later, I was in New York City, longing for the kind of community I felt in those days of women centered faith and social action. I missed the warmth and courage of the Deep South where it was churchwomen, even among the patriarchal structures, who were on the leading edge of social change.  It came to me to gather like-minded women and we began a circle called Women and Wisdom.  We studied about the healing power of the Divine Feminine and learned of Goddesses in Eastern religions, of Mother Earth in Native American traditions, of different interpretations of women’s role in the early church, of the importance of women’s healing ways throughout history, of the eras when Goddesses were honored, and women acknowledged as rulers. And also of the persecution and fear surrounding women hearing and responding to the voice of the Divine. 

We boldly claimed our “right and responsibility as Co-Creators bringing forth the healing power of the Divine Feminine to balance the planet.”   With wise women as guides, many circles, workshops, and healing services later, thousands of women and many men have awakened to the Divine Mother. Many times, I have replicated the ritual of passing bread and wine through the loving hands of women, acknowledging the gift of acceptance and the essence of our Goddess selves.

As a young woman, I felt the touch of Spirit’s presence and was aware of the beauty of Grace moving through me. Yet since that day of Divine Mother energy infused into the bread and wine through women’s hearts and hands, I have known a deeper mystery of Grace that I cannot fully articulate, though it floods my being, my woman self, with a warmth and love beyond words. It is a sweet remembrance of the Divine spark and oneness with all that is.  It is my tether to “home” in challenging times.

I believe it is this Grace of the Divine Mother, the love and compassion of Quan Yin, the discernment and fearlessness of Kali, the wisdom and healing of Tara, the grounding of Earth Mother Pachimama, the power of Shakti and all the other many names for the Divine Feminine, that we are to invoke now as part of the evolution of the planet. Those of us who are “the other hand of God” are called at this pivotal point to “priest to the planet,” to do our essential part in harmonizing and healing our beloved Mother Earth and the human family.     

Blessings,

Gabrielle

A NEW WAY OF BEING.....

“You must learn a new way to THINK before you can master a NEW WAY to be.

-Marianne Williamson

It is clear to me that this Pandemic is allowing us to Rethink so much about our out-of-balance selves, our unequal society, and our multi-cultural nations and our mis-used Earth.

This Pandemic is slamming us all up against a WALL of inequality in our neighborhoods, our states, our nation and indeed the whole of humankind. For all the boundaries and walls that we attempt to erect to keep people out, COVID-19 is impervious to such illusionary safety nets. Death comes to all -- various time-tables, different END Times-- yet there are those that we seem to have brought to the front of the line in the great Pandemic of 2020. They are the poor, the unemployed, the homeless, those without insurance, the weakened and sick, those who have trampled on the NEW RULES for HUMAN DISCOURSE -- six feet away to keep from being 6 feet under. We are amazed at those who challenge the sanctity of science, as though the Creator of Everything and All doesn’t exist, has not set in motion the PRECISE laws of the Universe that govern us all.

As CONSCIOUS people it is our assignment to “learn a new way to THINK before we can Master a NEW WAY to be.” Especially during a world crisis and threat to our very lives. To me, a large part of NEW THINKING is fully WAKING UP TO LOVE. It is LOVE that dispels the darkness, that warms the HEART of HUMANITY, that kindles the spark of THOUGHTFULNESS and KINDNESS so needed if we are to recognize what separates us in our minds does not carry over into our hearts and our actions.

If we are truly to transcend this global challenge, we must conquer the habit of thinking in terms of US and OTHERS. There are no “OTHERS”. We come from the same SOURCE, and in remembering this, teaching this, demonstrating this in our everyday behavior, perhaps we will one day master a NEW WAY of BEING.

Timeline of the Women's Suffrage Movement begun in the U.S.A. in 1840

Dedicated to the memory and passion of Lily Gabrielle Wilkinson Thompson,

my Grandmother, born in Mississippi in1868 and an untiring advocate for the

Suffrage Movement and Social Justice in her home state until her death in 1942.

1840 Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton are barred from attending the World Anti-Slavery Convention held in London. This prompts them to hold a Women's Convention in the US.

1848 Seneca Falls, New York is the location for the first Women's Rights Convention. Elizabeth Cady Stanton writes "The Declaration of Sentiments" creating the agenda of women's activism for decades to come.

1849 The first state constitution in California extends property rights to women.

1850 Worcester, Massachusetts, is the site of the first National Women's Rights Convention. Frederick Douglass, Paulina Wright Davis, Abby Kelley Foster, William Lloyd Garrison, Lucy Stone and Sojourner Truth are in attendance. A strong alliance is formed with the Abolitionist Movement. 1851 Worcester, Massachusetts is the site of the second National Women's Rights Convention. Participants included Horace Mann, New York Tribune columnist Elizabeth Oaks Smith, and Reverend Harry Ward Beecher, one of the nation's most popular preachers.  At a women's rights convention in Akron, Ohio, Sojourner Truth, a former slave, delivers her now memorable speech, "Ain't I a woman?" 1852 The issue of women's property rights is presented to the Vermont Senate by Clara Howard Nichols. This is a major issue for the Suffragists.  "Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe, is published and quickly becomes a bestseller.

1853 Women delegates, Antoinette Brown and Susan B. Anthony, are not allowed to speak at The World's Temperance Convention held in New York City.

1861-1865 During the Civil War, efforts for the suffrage movement come to a halt. Women put their energies toward the war effort.

1866 Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony form the American Equal Rights Association, an organization dedicated to the goal of suffrage for all regardless of gender or race.

1868 Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Parker Pillsbury publish the first edition of The Revolution.  This periodical carries the motto “Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less!” Caroline Seymour Severance establishes the New England Woman’s Club.  The “Mother of Clubs” sparked the club movement which became popular by the late nineteenth century.  In Vineland, New Jersey, 172 women cast ballots in a separate box during the presidential election.  Senator S.C. Pomeroy of Kansas introduces the federal woman’s suffrage amendment in Congress.   Many early suffrage supporters, including Susan B. Anthony, remained single because in the mid-1800s, married women could not own property in their own rights and could not make legal contracts on their own behalf.  The Fourteenth Amendment is ratified. "Citizens" and "voters" are defined exclusively as male.

1869

The American Equal Rights Association is wrecked by disagreements over the Fourteenth Amendment and the question of whether to support the proposed Fifteenth Amendment which would enfranchise Black American males while avoiding the question of woman suffrage entirely.