No Poor Among Us: The Faithful Feminists
An inside look with Channing and Elise, the creators of The Faithful Feminists podcast!
No Poor Among Us
A new series by The Utah Monthly in which we interview and amplify marginalized voices within The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The purpose of this series is to create a space for various perspectives that are not often considered “mainstream Mormon.” In order to amplify these voices, the format will be more or less a transcript so the reader can get a feel for the interviewees’ passions and perspectives.
Today, I am sharing an interview with Channing and Elise, the women behind The Faithful Feminists podcast.
Channing and Elise have been close friends for over four years. They initially met when Elise was assigned to be Channing’s visiting teacher in Phoenix. After about six months of what they called “friendship flirting,” carefully feeling out each other’s theological and political beliefs, they discovered they were both interested in feminism and feminist theology. Watching them interact, even virtually, I could tell their friendship is deep and abiding. Their energy and passion throughout the interview were contagious.
What made you decide to start this podcast? What is your vision for it?
E: Our personal conversations would just naturally go to feminist theology. Then one day, we were talking, and I said, “We should do a podcast; we should do a Come, Follow Me podcast through a feminist lens because no one else is doing that.” Whenever I would teach young women's lessons or give talks, I always Googled the scriptures I was assigned, plus feminism. I was always trying to find feminist resources about the scriptures. There are some, absolutely, but none of them were grounded specifically in the Come, Follow Me manual. In that way, I feel like we are doing something new. But that also means that we're going to make a lot of mistakes, we're going to get a lot of things wrong.
C: Elise and I try to stress that we are just two friends who sit down with a microphone and talk about the scriptures. We're not trained scholars; we’re not trained theologians. We bring the vulnerability of a genuine friendship: love and acceptance of every part of each other in our episodes. Our podcast also shows women, “Look; you don't have to be especially qualified, you don't have to have formal training to be able to engage in this work. It is open for everyone. We're just here to show you one way to do it.”
Our hope for the podcast is that people don't just take what we say at face value—they look at the example that we're giving them, and they take it and do something new, build on the work that we've done.
Something that I've been grateful for, as we've watched The Faithful Feminists community grow, is seeing that I am not alone. It's not just Elise and me having these conversations; it’s thousands of women in the Church who are needing this space, support, or permission to talk about these issues.
E: Female friendships are powerful; sisterhood is important. And we've been lucky enough to feel that on a deep level. Some things we say on the podcast is, “You need to find friends to talk about this stuff with, and if those friends are us, like fantastic, welcome.” Talking about the scriptures—talking about things that are really meaningful to you, you've got to do it with friends, you've got to do it in a community. You need other people to help make sense of the world.
The Faithful Feminists is such an affirming title because so many people believe that you can only be one or the other. Do you feel a tension between being faithful and being a feminist?
C: Doctrinally and theologically, I don't feel a tension. I feel like they complement each other and form a beautiful, symbiotic relationship. But I think institutionally, socially, and culturally there is a lot of tension with the stigma of feminism and how it pushes back on the more traditional gender roles, traditional thinking, and the very patriarchal structure of the institution of the Church. So on one side, I feel tension, but on the other side, the side that feels most authentic and important to me (my relationship with God), I don't feel any tension.
E: My feminism stretches my faith to be more inclusive, to ask more questions, be more critical of systems of oppression, and make sure the voices and the lived experiences of women are valued. On the other side, my faith keeps my feminism hopeful. It keeps it open to new surprises, it keeps it open to goodness, and it reminds me that God is in feminism too. They're not separate. I don't only find God in faith at church; I find God in feminist work as well.
How do you keep from swinging too far to either extreme: unquestioningly faithful on one side, and overly-critical on the other? How do you make sure that you're well-balanced? What advice would you give to someone who's trying to find a balance?
E: It's by remembering that I'm limited in my understanding, and I will never arrive at the one singular, True faith or the one singular True version of feminism. I think extremes show up when we close ourselves off to other views or other understandings because we think we have it all right as if there's no more work to do. The minute I think I have something figured out is when I'm kind of like, “Oh, shoot, this is actually the point where I probably have the least of it figured out,” and I need to remember to stay open to that.
C: Yeah, I feel like it's a constant balance between knowing what we know, seeing what we see, and not being able to unsee it, but also being willing to say, “My sight is limited. There is always something more to learn from this experience, this interaction, this person, etc.” I feel like that's what faith is. It's this willingness to be surprised by the people around us. It's the willingness to be surprised by the Divine. And that I feel like, for us, that's what keeps the work moving ahead. I hope I never get to the point where I feel like I am unwilling to be changed by anything because I would go against everything that feminism and our faith ask us to do.
When we talk about viewing something as extreme or not, I think that that can be subjective because the definition of extreme changes, depending on who's talking. For example, a hundred years ago, women wearing pants in public and having the vote was very extreme. Now, it's commonplace. The thing that I feel like keeps me the most in balance is trying to focus on the example of Jesus Christ, who I think in His time was pretty radical and extreme, and He still is even now.
I made a covenant that I would be a witness and example of Him at all times and in all places, even when my own faith community doesn't like it. That idea of having an example of someone to follow who has done it infinitely better than I could has been so important in keeping me balanced because that is what I check myself against; “Would Jesus do this?”
What are things that everyday members can do to reduce the tension of feeling faithful and feminist? How can we make feminism more accessible within the church?
E: For those who are looking to reduce tension, instead of trying to run away from it, I would try and wrestle with it. What is it that is making you feel that sense of tension or that potential conflict? Is it your family? Is it your bishop? Is it a challenging scripture that you came across, or you're worried about how your community will receive you? Questioning the tension will ultimately end up deepening your understanding of both faith and feminism, as opposed to feeling like you have to water one of them down in order to stay comfortable and secure. It’s a blessing, but it's definitely harder work.
C: Coming from the other side, I think that there's a lot that everyday members can do to ease the tension. I have a friend who believes totally differently than me about politics, religion—about everything. But she is one of my closest, most trusted friends because she serves me, and she's embraced me into her home and family. We never really talk about politics, we never really talk about feminism, but if I'm feeling upset about it, she will listen to me. And she still loves me so much. For people who may not feel ready to embrace feminism totally into their lives, it doesn't mean that you have to reject people who do find it nourishing.
In the Church right now, there's a big divide between generations, gender, and ideology. I think that there's a lot we could do in our community to actually build a community and rewrite the Church rhetoric of “We're all one, we're all unified, so that means we have to be the same.” We can move away from that and more into a space where we can embrace the diversity from each other, but not necessarily have to be like each other. I don't think that that's the ultimate end goal, but I do think it's a good start from where we're at right now.
What messages and teachings in the institutional Church help you connect with feminism?
E: Caring for the least of these, God and Jesus Christ showing up and siding with the oppressed, always caring for others, valuing community, and Heavenly Mother. Those are kind of like the immediate things that popped into my mind.
C: This fundamental teaching that I am a child of God. If I am a child of God, and if the worth of souls is great in the sight of God, then everyone is a child of God. And they deserve to have the same rights, the same opportunities, the same privileges that I experience. God is not a respecter of persons. So, if God loves me this much, then God loves everyone this much. And because I covenanted to bear the burdens of others, to comfort the afflicted, then I have a responsibility to ensure that everyone is, at the very bare minimum, having the same opportunities and privileges that I have.
What messages and teachings from the institutional Church did you need to unlearn in connection with feminism?
E: There’s a lot. For one, unlearning that I don't have access to God without a priesthood holder or that men know what's best and right for me over and above my own personal revelation. I had to unlearn deferring to outside authority. I had to unlearn distinct and strict gender roles and the idea of a preassigned gender in the premortal world or something. That women and femininity are kind of like, second class- second place. Things that are distinctly feminine like bodies, sexuality, birth, and blood; all of those things are deemed as bad and wrong and disgusting, and therefore not holy.
One of the things I love about our tradition is our understanding of Eve. For most other faiths, Eve is the one that screwed everything up and cursed all of humanity. But I think the LDS faith has a loving understanding of Eve, which validates the idea that Eve followed her own personal revelation even though there were outside authorities telling her not to.
C: I would just echo everything that Elise said. I feel like it's a pretty prevalent view that if God wanted something to change in the Church, it would happen, and I wouldn't have to do anything. My job as a woman is just to wait—wait for the prophet or the bishop, or whoever's in a leadership position to reveal that God has suddenly changed His mind.
Who benefits from your message? Is there any resistance?
E: I think that I think feminism is for everyone. Because patriarchy hurts everyone. Often.
As for resistance, I understand the leveling out of a power system or the redistribution of power can often feel like a really scary loss for those in power for those who live in a comfortable place of power and privilege. When people feel this kind of redistribution, or they feel like we’re critiquing them in our podcast, they resist. They tend to hold on more violently and more tightly to what they think they know is true. This means they're often more closed off to anything we would have to say after that point.
We want to make a point to say that we're not perfect; we don't have it all figured out. Channing and I are limited by our social locations, our privileges, and our biases. We're also limited because we've internalized other systems of oppression like homophobia, white supremacy, and ableism. We are still learning and unlearning. So even though everyone can benefit, I think that everyone is responsible, including us, for continuing to learn and dismantle systems and shape feminism to be truly inclusive, equitable, and safe for all.
C: I think that we do experience a lot of resistance. We often receive pushback about certain topics. People are very vocal about letting us know when they don't agree. In some ways, that feedback is helpful. In other ways, it demonstrates how they have internalized the patriarchal structure within themselves. It's a difficult space to navigate the resistance because oftentimes, we do find ourselves checking in with each other like, “Am I unwilling to be changed? Are we living in an echo chamber?”
And I think there's a balance. Yes, Elise and I are just two people who have a microphone and are reading the scriptures, but we come well-read and spend hours prepping and researching for these episodes. Elise teaches gender and sexism classes at a university. So again, it's that balance between, “Yeah, people may not agree with us, but what do we do when our work is rooted in sources?” It's very difficult to then say, “Sure, let me change my opinion, based on your Instagram comment. Let me change my viewpoint on the world based on your feelings being hurt by what I said about this particular quote given by a Church leader.” That is a tension point that we bump up against very frequently in our work. It’s required that we check in with ourselves often, that we try to remain open and mindful to the way that we talk on the podcast, we do our best to come with an ethic of care for our community—but also remembering that we're not going to please everyone. There's always going to be somebody out there who's disappointed or disagreeing with what we have to say.
What do you hope a feminist lens on Church history will uncover? How will a feminist lens on the Doctrine Covenants change the way we view the Church today?
E: I think history is always someone's story about what happened. Sometimes history can stop us from asking questions or pushing past the given interpretation because there are facts, and proof, and diary entries. When we put all of our eggs in the basket of history, it almost feels like we're limited in what we can do with the story. We want to look at the unexamined parts of history, the facts, and the historical things that happened to find out where and how women showed up. We recently did an episode about Lucy Harris that was historically grounded. It was nice to dig up some things that aren't always talked about in Church history.
We also want to unravel the story part of Church history, “What does this story mean for us? What does it call us to do?” Sometimes history can feel like a separate place in a separate time with people that don't really concern us anymore, but I would hope that this year with the Doctrine and Covenants, we can push our imaginations to try and do something more with the story. We try and find something that is meaningful and applicable, even if it's not historically or factually proven. I still think there's value in the imaginative storytelling part of it. And so I would say more often than not our podcast, we'll explore the history, but we're more concerned with what the history means for us now. Oftentimes, our biggest takeaways aren't always historical. They're more creative and anthropological
C: Because we're not theologians or historians, we can't claim to be experts on it. And so, really, what we're doing on the podcast, is sharing all of the research that's been done before we even arrived here. We recognize that we stand on the shoulders of giants. They've already uncovered gender inequality; they’ve already uncovered white supremacy and colonialism at work in the early Church. I think part of our work is sharing that research in bite-sized pieces so that everyone can access it and understand the complexities of Church history without having to read so much. I'm currently working through a book that's a thousand pages long. That's great for some people, but our primary audience is women. And most often, women in the Church are stay-at-home or working mothers. They're very busy; they don't always have the time or energy to sit down with a deep, complex theological text. So part of our work on the podcast is to do a little bit of that work for them so that they can feel qualified and well-equipped when they show up in Sunday School or Relief Society. They can bring that work more forward without having to dedicate; I don't know, six months, to only find out one niche of what it means to be a member of the Church.
I think a feminist lens on the Doctrine and Covenants doesn't just focus on the actual historical women who are showing up in the text. We try to bring more subtle ways that the feminine shows up in the text, like references to Heavenly Mother, from an eco-feminist lens, anything that references the environment, or ecology, or anything that seems specifically archetypally feminine. In this way, not only are we adding more women's stories to Church history, but we also add another layer of understanding and appreciation. It's a multifaceted way to read the scriptures. The feminist style of interpretation that we will offer the text depends on that week’s text. That's one thing I love about us; our style of interpretation on the podcast is very diverse and showcases that there are so many ways to do this work.
To those who have never listened to your podcast, what episodes would you recommend?
E: Because it's so new in the year, all of our recommendations come from the Book of Mormon. But the first one that comes to mind is an episode called, Life's Work: Smashing the Patriarchy Through Personal Revelation. This is a good episode for those people who are looking for validation in bringing their feminism to church because the church already has such a robust understanding of personal revelation. And so we play on that idea. We say like, “Okay, if the Church says, ‘Yes, we believe in personal revelation,’ then that also means that like you, as a woman, get to receive your own personal revelation. And by choosing to listen to yourself over an outside authority, like you are doing God's work.” We’ve received a lot of great feedback about the episode.
C: Seeds and Circles: Understanding Faith. This episode talks about faith transitions and faith journeys. We highlight a little bit of our own experience with our feminist awakening and how that's informed our faith journeys. People have found this episode particularly helpful when they are trying to navigate that complex space of what to do with the tension of feminism and the institutional Church. “How do I move through this with grace and compassion and empathy?” We were so lucky that the text that week lent itself to a really robust and gentle conversation about what it means to move through a faith transition.
E: I think for the people who are wanting an example of how to read scriptures and offer a feminist critique is an episode titled, Fire and Brimstone: Women Suffering in Toxic Masculinity. This episode is all about the story of the women and children being thrown into the fires in Ammonihah. It's already an incredibly sexist and violent text, and it has femicide, the genocide of women, in it. So it from the get-go, it already says, hey, there's feminism at play here.
As a regular listener of the Faithful Feminist Podcast, I would recommend, Love of Lucy Harris and a Harvest of Frustration. In that episode, Channing and Elise dive a little deeper into the life and circumstances surrounding Lucy Harris, someone that has generally been characterized as a villain in Church history. As Elise says in this episode, “People are always more than we expect them to be.”
You can follow The Faithful Feminists on Instagram and find their podcast wherever you listen to your other podcasts: Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify, Pocketcast, etc.
A few books Channing and Elise recommend for additional reading:
The Birth of Pleasure by Carol Gilligan
Beyond God the Father by Mary Daly
If Women Rose Rooted by Sharon Blackie
Gaia and God by Rosemary Radford Ruether
Women Who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés