A question that some well-meaning Christians have is this: “Can I be both a Christian and a feminist?” And if we’re going to answer that properly, I think the best place to start is by examining what the nature of the feminist movement has historically been.
There is one trend in particular that has stuck out to me over the course of my time researching the lives and beliefs of the historical figures that pioneered, influenced, and defined the feminist movement. Namely, that virtually all of the predominant voices that have influenced and shaped feminism throughout its various stages have rejected traditional, orthodox Christianity.
Now, I find that interesting. Of course, if you’re not a Christian, it may mean nothing to you. For me though, and not least because of my Christian faith, I find it necessary to examine, and that’s for several reasons.1 For today, I won’t expand on all those reasons. But I do want to demonstrate this claim by introducing the reader to the major feminist influences and their religious beliefs, albeit in a quick & summarized fashion, and then offer a brief reflection at the end that may serve to provide an answer to the overall question of whether or not a Christian can/should be a feminist.
Let’s take a quick look at 11 major feminist figures throughout first, second, and third wave feminism and observe where they fall on the religious spectrum.
Mary Wollstonecraft
Often considered the “first feminist”, who wrote the influential essay The Vindication of the Rights of Women in 1792, Wollstonecraft’s religious affiliation seems, at first glance, to be that of orthodox Christianity, if all you take into consideration is the fact that she was baptized (as an infant) as an Anglican. However, a deeper look into Wollstonecraft’s life reveals that she identified more with Unitarianism, as evidenced by her regular attendance at Newington Green Unitarian church and her connection with the influential Unitarian minister, Richard Price.2 For those unaware, Unitarianism is a liberal heresy that rejects the doctrine of the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, and man’s sinful nature.
John Stuart Mill
In 1869, John Stuart Mill (along with help from his wife Harriett Taylor Mill) published The Subjection of Women–a book that, along with Wollstonecraft’s The Vindication of the Rights of Women, was largely responsible for intellectually shaping the first wave of feminism. And Mill, while sympathetic to the cultural role of religion, was a declared agnostic and skeptic that rejected the supernatural.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Stanton is likely overall the most influential intellectual in the entire feminist movement. She drafted The Declaration of Sentiments, which was the manifesto for the suffrage movement, and she operated as the intellectual fuel behind Susan B. Anthony as the mouthpiece. Not only was Stanton a general agnostic, but she was a fervent critic of orthodox Christianity. In fact, she even rewrote the Bible–dubbing it The Women’s Bible, which I have written about it in greater length in a previous post. And Stanton did this because she believed that orthodox biblical Christianity was responsible for perpetuating the subjugation of women.
Susan B. Anthony
Perhaps the most notable feminist voice of the feminist movement, Anthony was best friends with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and owed much of her intellectual thought to Stanton. Anthony also rejected orthodox Christianity, as she was also a proponent of unitarianism.
Lucretia Mott
Mott was an instrumental figure in the women’s suffrage movement and allied closely with Stanton throughout the suffragist cause. She was a hicksite Quaker, which was another liberal heresy that resembled unitarianism. Hicksite Quakers, under the influence of Elias Hicks, rejected the doctrine of the incarnation. In other words, they believed Jesus was not God from eternity. They also rejected original sin, believed the Bible was fallible and capable of error, and were opposed to hierarchical versions of Christianity.
Simone de Beauvoir
Beauvoir, a French existentialist philosopher, authored The Second Sex, which served as an intellectual launchpad for second wave feminism. She was a lifelong atheist that, like Stanton, criticized Christianity as being an oppressive patriarchy. It’s worth noting that she was also a bisexual woman that was notably accused of grooming young female pupils prior to the age of consent and had a lifelong sexual relationship with Jean Paul Sartre, an infamous french atheist existentialist that also criticized Christianity as being oppressive.
Betty Friedan
Friedan authored the 1963 landmark best-selling book The Feminine Mystique, which along with Beauvoir’s The Second Sex, helped ignite second-wave feminism. For most of her life, Friedan was a secular Marxist humanist (interestingly, she later became a zionist). She also criticized Christianity for supposedly fostering oppressive gender stereotypes and patriarchal structures.
Kate Millett
In 1970, Millet wrote the massively popular Sexual Politics, which left an indelible mark on second wave feminism. While Millett’s religious views aren’t exactly clear (there are reports that she became buddhist later in life), she contends in her book, like the feminists before her, that Christianity was responsible for perpetuating an oppressive patriarchy. It might be of note also to know that she was bisexual and was known for, in an interview, encouraging pedophilia. She stated that “one of children’s essential rights is to express themselves sexually, probably primarily with each other but with adults as well”, concluding that “the sexual freedom of children is an important part of a sexual revolution.”3
Gloria Steinem
Steinem is known for being a journalist and ardent activist for second-wave feminism, who has toured the world on behalf of women’s rights, in addition to being a former playboy bunny and a CIA operative (yes, that’s factually true). She identifies as a secular humanist with pagan tendencies and is critical of religion, including Christianity.4 In a 2001 interview with CNN, she is quoted, saying,
“I agree, that religion is often politics made sacred. If God is a man, then man is God. We need to return and go forward to the understanding that there is God in all living things, not more in men than women, and not more in humans than in nature. To believe otherwise is only an excuse for dominating women and nature.”5
Margaret Sanger
When people think of Sanger, they often know her as the founder of Planned Parenthood who coined the term “birth control”, but they often fail to see the association between her feminism and her fight for “reproductive freedom.” Those two things were inextricably linked. Moreover, most people don’t know that she openly supported eugenics (google it). These were, in part, fueled by her Darwinian views of life and her anti-Catholic posture. Like so many other feminists, she thought a religion like Christianity was too restrictive and dogmatic when it came to sex and gender roles.
Judith Butler
Butler, an author, “queer philosopher”, critical theorist, and feminist, is known as one of the most influential voices in the area of gender studies (a relatively recent area of scholarship that emerged in the 60’s/70’s), arguing that gender has historically served as a socially constructed concept in order to subjugate and oppress women. She has been one of the major players in the development of third-wave feminism, and, as a secular Jew, she has criticized (just like many other feminists before her) traditional, orthodox Christianity for supposedly repressing sexuality and perpetuating regressive gender roles.
Conclusion
Though certainly not exhaustive, this is a summarized sketch of the religious beliefs behind the defining figures of the movement. And in light of all this, what are we to make of the fact that virtually every major feminist figure rejected, and even, at times, opposed, traditional Christianity?
Well, for starters, I think it makes one thing abundantly clear: feminism, at its core, has never been a Christian movement. Whatever Christian strands of feminism there may purportedly have been, they’ve been so reserved to the fringes that they can’t qualify under what is historically regarded as “feminist.” More importantly, however, what this pattern of religious sentiment signals is something undeniably true about the feminist movement that only becomes more evident the deeper you dive into the history: namely, that at the heart of feminism is the belief that traditional Christianity perpetuates an oppressive patriarchy. In other words, feminism cannot be divorced historically from the notion that Christianity is inherently bad towards women.
So where does that leave us? Well, one is left with two options: one must either abandon their Christian faith in order to be a feminist or attempt to refashion Christianity to their own liking. Some may suggest there is an in-between–a sort of third way–but unfortunately the historical feminist movement has not left us that option, given that it’s founded on an anti-Christian spirit. Which is why we see that one of these two choices has been the historical pattern amongst the predominant feminist figures throughout its rise and spread.
So, in summation, can someone be a Christian and a feminist? Simply put, it doesn’t seem so. That option is not on the table. The Given feminism’s track record, the two movements are simply incompatible. To claim that you could be both simultaneously would either reduce what it means to be a feminist or it would reduce what it means to be a Christian.
Naturally, that leaves some Christians with a pressing question, especially if they’ve been force-fed the notion over the entirety of their lives that feminism has been a net good for women: namely, what if the feminists are right? After all, is traditional Christianity actually oppressive towards women? The answer to this, of course, is also a clear and resounding no. And in future posts, I’ll discuss at greater length why that is and why feminism, at its core, has always been a Satanic (yes, Satanic) attempt to subvert God’s intended order for male and female relationships, and why wherever feminism has spread its tentacles, it has had counterintuitive, damaging effects on women–showing how not only has it not been liberating for women. It has been destructive.
Moreover, I’ll also provide, to a greater degree, clear examples of some of the historic feminists’ stated resentment towards Christianity and why so many were fixated on abolishing the traditional family. That being said, if that interests you, follow along and subscribe with your email to get my future posts sent directly to you. There’s certainly more to come.
In the meantime, don’t abandon your faith. Abandon feminism.
Footnotes
- I expect there may be some objections to this claim. A well-meaning Christian may object and very well go off in pursuit of different strands of feminism and perhaps find a few Christian voices here or there. All power to them! My claim solely focuses on the main strand of feminism, not the various fringes. After all, it is the main strand that has influenced and effected the most change in our societies to date. Some have tried to co-opt the movement for redemptive purposes, but it has generally proven ineffective. ↩︎
- https://www.shu.ac.uk/research/in-action/projects/the-birthplace-of-feminism#:~:text=Wollstonecraft%20formed%20her%20ideas%20at,%2C%20a%20non%2Dreligious%20church. ↩︎
- https://www.ipce.info/ipceweb/Library/interv_kate_m.htm ↩︎
- https://thehumanist.com/magazine/september-october-2012/features/the-humanist-interview-with-gloria-steinem/ ↩︎
- https://edition.cnn.com/2001/COMMUNITY/12/27/steinem.cnna/index.html ↩︎
Colton Banks 