ABSTRACT
Feminist engagements with discourses of the sacred particularly in feminist studies in religion have been largely about de-constructing the gendered dimensions of the sacred/profane dichotomy which have functioned as the central descriptive category of religiosity in the modern West. Feminist scholars continue to argue that a central task of contemporary feminist scholarship is to disrupt the universality of the masculinist symbolic, and explore new imaginaries of divinity and sexual difference. Christianity is sometimes proposed as an anti-sacrificial, anti-violent religion. Popular religion and magic characteristically inhabiting the profane require a language with which to articulate the spiritual experiences of oppressed and marginalized peoples. Indeed, casting feminist spirituality as oppositional to a hegemonic masculinized sacred has been a central strategy of feminist scholars in religion. Melissa Raphael makes a strategic and articulate case for the development and practice of a post-patriarchal sacred, which she locates mainly in theological discourse.
