‘Mama I Can’t Breathe!’: Black/African Women of Faith Groaning for Social Justice and Gender Equality

This article explores some residual entanglements of colonialism, Christianity, and Afro-western engagement in Africa by using the murder of George Floyd at the hands of police and his cries for “breath” and “mama” as a framework for examining the following. First, we argue that one way in which the repercussions of the transatlantic slave trade remain evident in Africa is the continued police brutality and dehumanization of African citizens. Secondly, with the invocation of “mama,” we consider the plight of African women and colonial/postcolonial Christianity, challenging the African church’s silence on social justice issues, and complicity in the exclusion/oppression of women. We call the church to reckon with its silence, and we offer a corrective towards constructing a theological and missiological response to our cries for breath. While this article is based on African feminist reflections, it invites global participation and indicates wider implications for social and gendered justice.

Conservative Christianity and Intimate Partner Violence in Brazil

Based on empirical research in a women’s shelter in São Paulo, Brazil, this article examines how ‘secular’ professionals and service users negotiate conservative Christian faith, gender roles and domestic violence. The article demonstrates how staff use theological arguments with feminist interpretations of religion, in order to better communicate with abused women of faith. A key finding is that both the religious service users and the ‘secular’ professionals discover it is not religion per se which allows for situations of violence, but rather the patriarchal way in which conservative Christianity is taught in some churches, ultimately functioning as a method of controlling women. Moreover, through feminist consciousness-raising and attention to women’s rights, some abused women of faith find ways of negotiating the violence they experience, leading to an understanding of it as both personal and political.

Defining and Enabling ‘Justice’ for Victims/Survivors of Domestic Violence and Abuse

The article is based on a qualitative field study of how justice (in its wider sense) is understood by practitioners and religious leaders from Judaism, Islam and Christianity, who work with victims of domestic violence and abuse. The article focuses on two key questions: a) how do practitioners from the three faith communities conceptualise justice in relation to domestic violence and abuse (DVA)? b) how far do these practitioners believe that victims of DVA have access to justice within their respective faith communities? The findings suggest that the concept of structural spiritual abuse should be given more attention by the DVA literature and also by those who are working with women of faith.