SEX AND GOD

SOME VARIETIES OF WOMEN'S RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE

'The erotic is in the realm in which the spiritual, the political and the personal come together.'

- Starbawk

CONTRIBUTORS: Polly Blue, Alla Bozarth-Campbell, Sheila Briggs, Léonie Caldecott, Jenjoy Silverbirch Strongbody Clevermind, Bryony Dahl, Susan Dowell, Heather Formaini, Susan Griffin, Mary E. Hunt, Linda Hurcombe, Dr Una Kroll, Mykel Johnson, Aileen La Tourette, Lauren Liebling, Sara Maitland, Rosemary Radford Ruether, Starhawk, Hannah Ward CSF, Elaine Willis.

These stories, essays and poems by women examine the connections feminists are making between sex and God. The women write from very different perspectives, cutting across the spectrum of feminist writing about sexuality and spirituality within the Judeo-Christian tradition. Some writers, though critical, are determined to retain their radicality in the very teeth of patriarchy by remaining within the traditional forms of faith. Others - impatient, suggests the editor, with the 'great inseminator in the sky' - have moved on to what might be described as a post- patriarchal spirituality.

Contributions indicate the exciting spiritual journeys women are currently making and focus on the following areas: monogamy and promiscuity; sex, politics and spirituality; childbirth; sex and healing in dying; feminist sexual psychology: lesbian identity; and feminist 'embodied' theology.

The recent and continuing debate about women priests in the Anglican church uneasily echoes the rumblings of change at a fundamental level in the relationship between women and religion. This book, with its reflections on both the politics of Christian feminism and the more widespread expression of women's spirituality, makes an important contribution to that change.