Oxford University Press's
Academic Insights for the Thinking World

  • Author: Kristin Kobes Du Mez

Is Christian feminism an oxymoron?

Is Christian feminism an oxymoron? For the past century or so, it’s often seemed that way. But it wasn’t all that long ago that many women not only considered Christianity and feminism compatible, but in fact believed each essential to the other. Perhaps no figure makes this case more powerfully than Katharine Bushnell. An internationally-known anti-trafficking activist in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, Bushnell repeatedly encountered Christian men who had perpetrated acts of appalling cruelty against women, often without remorse or consequence.

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The crime is the fruit of the theology: Christian responses to 50 Shades of Grey

The much anticipated Valentine’s Day release 50 Shades of Gray set off a flurry of activity on social media sites, with bloggers lining up to cajole, shame, reason or plead with women to resist temptation and abstain from viewing the film. In a case of strange bedfellows, if you will, conservative Christians and liberal feminists alike castigated the film for its packaging of abuse as mainstream entertainment.

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