Tara in Vajrayana Buddhism: A Critical Content Analysis

Tara is both a Buddhist and Hindu deity. She is widely worshipped in the esoteric branch of Buddhism: Vajrayana. Even in the exile, Tibetan refugees follow the practice and rituals associated with Tara. Lamentably, she has been given an auxiliary and secondary role in comparison to male deities. Various feminist scholars have begun to look at aspects of society through the lens of gender. They have been at the forefront of studying gender roles and its psychological consequences for those who try to abide by them. In religious studies, especially in Asian context, many of these discourses are difficult to perceive because they were unconsciously appropriated as truth by the people of the society in which they circulated as an inviolable aspect of the worlds or as nature. This study is an attempt to examine the representation of Goddess in various ancient texts as essential to the study of the divine feminine. This hybrid study merges traditional Indology with feminist studies, and is intended for specialists in the field, for readers with interest in Buddhist, and for scholars of Gender studies, cultural historians, and sociologists.

Reconciliating the Relationship Between Christian Churches and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex+ People: The Letter of São Paulo as a Counter Hegemonic Discourse in Times of Religious Conservatisms

The ‘1st Congress Churches and LGBTI+ Community: ecumenical dialogues for respect for diversity’ was held between 19th and 22nd of June 2019, in the city of São Paulo. The Congress was organised by the Parish of the Holy Trinity of the Episcopal Anglican Church in Brazil and Koinonia–Ecumenical Presence in Service. As we consider this congress a historic landmark in the debates concerning religions and sexualities that escape from cisheteronormativity in Brazil, in the course of this article, we propose to analyse the social and political conjuncture that motivated the event. In a second step, we will briefly describe the structure of the event, as well as its objectives, in order to understand the assumptions that guided the construction of the Letter of São Paulo, the official and public document of the Congress, approved in plenary by the participants. We believe that the Congress and the Letter of São Paulo have political potential, as they claim the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex+ people as people of faith and denounce forms of oppression, exclusion and marginalisation reinforced by conservative and hegemonic religious discourses.

A Nomadic Spirituality in the Dream of the Red Chamber: Seeking the Goddess in an Immanent Process

The multicultural work, The Dream of the Red Chamber, posits a field for exploring the interconnection between Confucian interpretations and its intrinsic Goddess narrative. In this article, I examine the reconciliation of the former with the latter. The immanent transcendence in Neo-Confucianism is not enough for interpreting this novel, for covering the question of a natural connection between Vermilion Pearl and Shen Ying, for a dichotomy of tian and the earth, the transcendent and the immanent. The Goddess narrative of repairing tian can rectify this difficult position and a nomadic spirituality forged in a mutually cultivating process is proposed, both to rescue the Confucian interpretation of the novel and to find a way of reconciling the Confucian ‘ tian’ and the Goddess.

Allegory and the Body as Icon: Evelyn Underhill and Barbara Brown Taylor

When faith traditions confront postmodern uncertainties regarding historical liturgical practices, political and cultural ideologies, the self and sacred space, the assurance of truth claims, allegorical readings and interpretations of sites where divine presence is found are equally questioned. Can allegorical interpretations offer a valuable strategy in postmodern understandings for identifying how Divine presence is embodied? One possibility is to discover how two Anglican women embody their faith community’s via media and in turn these women may be read as an “open icon.” To provide contrasting views, Orthodox Icons are particularly noted for their allegorical certainties that identify and point with sharp clarification to Tradition and the Church’s sacramental understandings. An allegorical frame “closes” the Orthodox icon. In a postmodern view, allegory “opens” said frame to a vast horizontal landscape that discovers spaces, places, and persons in which the Holy Spirit works mysteriously and unexpectedly. Both Evelyn Underhill and Barbara Brown Taylor writing almost a century apart and each encountering their respective historical reactions to “modernism,” trace the margins of their faith along the Anglican understanding of the via media. In doing so, both suggest the notion of “open” icon—the body itself.

Bleeding Women in Sacred Spaces: Negotiating Theological Belonging in the ‘Pathway’ to Priesthood

This article focuses on the theological journeying of women ordinands in the Church of England, who have had to negotiate their belonging in the ‘pathway’ to Priesthood in ordination training. Attention is given to the extent to which the personhood of women is enabled to truly flourish in a theological education system that is dominated by men and predominantly patriarchal and Western theologising. It suggests that a gendered politics of belonging has been used and maintained through the socio-religious construct of ‘shame’ in order to maintain the boundaries of belonging within the formation process, and therefore calls for an en-gendered ‘pathway to the priesthood’. This is exemplified in a re-reading of the bleeding woman who dares to challenge the hegemonies of patriarchy and purity by touching the cloak of Christ in Luke 8:40-48. This research is part of an ongoing project with Common Awards at Durham University that explores barriers to belonging in theological education for those in training for ordination. It has therefore received ethical approval for interviews and participant observations.

Queer(y)ing Naga Indigenous Theology

This article engages Queer Theology in conversation with Naga Indigenous Theology. A Naga folk poem is employed to help navigate the intricacies of indigenous experiences and the questions of sexuality in Naga Indigenous Theology. I do this by engaging both Marcella Althaus-Reid and Wati Longchar in their Liberation Theology and move towards queering Longchar’s theology. Using the hermeneutical lens of Althaus-Reid, I demonstrate that there are possible avenues of queering Longchar’s theology. There is also the prerequisite of a justice lens that demands a deconstruction of the colonial legacy in Indigenous Theology. This article shows that Naga Indigenous Theology rooted in Liberation Theology has a potential to propose a Queer Naga Indigenous Theology.

Gender and Sexual Desire Justice in African Christianity

This article explores the nexus of themes of sexual desire, gender and prayer in the Bemba mythology of creation. Approached from Sarah Coakley’s theology of participation in the divine desire, the article utilizes email technique to collect data from African scholars both women and men with an intention to find out their perspectives on the nexus of the entangled themes above as embodied within the widespread Bemba mythology. The second objective was to understand the ways in which these three themes are intersected in the mythology and demonstrate how the contemporary African Christian search for gender and sexual desire justice might be linked to a gendered prayer. The findings show that gendered prayer could be a place of sexual desire and gender healing and justice for women.