Nevertheless, she persisted.

Our group (surprise, surprise) departed from the reading for a large chunk of our discussion time. In a moment of brilliance, one member suggested that we start by sharing how each of our histories related to pneumatology has looked. At first glance I assumed it wouldn’t be a hard discussion. I realized that wouldn’t be the case as I felt myself dreading the moment I would have to share.

For the last few years the holy spirit has been the only member of the trinity that I can approach. The details of my stories make men untrustworthy and unsafe. It would be lovely to say that I don’t transfer those adjectives onto the other members of the trinity. But that’s a level of health and wholeness I don’t have yet. Jesus has the XY chromosome. And god? Well, for better or worse (and by that I mean worse), god always seems to be masculine when described, even when the speaker includes the throwaway sentence, “God is neither male nor female.” So I’ve largely (purposefully) steered clear of both as I navigate my trauma and history. But the holy spirit? I can get behind the holy spirit pretty easily.

As I listened to the other women in my group share I identified with bits of what was being said. The member of the trinity who convicts? Check. Pretty regularly given attributes we associate primarily with women? Check. Helper? Check. Named as an equal, but still hierarchically placed below god and Jesus? Check. Generally spoken about less than the god and Jesus? Check. There wasn’t much, for me at least, emotionally tied to any of those things, but the dread remained and grew.

My church journey started in the Foursquare denomination. After a few years I moved to a new city and dove into a non-denominational (but mostly evangelical and/or charismatic) church. Both believe in and rely heavily upon the movement of the spirit as part of the journey of the believer. The second church placed a special emphasis on demonstrations of the spirit. It was rarely specifically stated, but widely understood that if you didn’t speak in tongues, if you didn’t manifest when everyone else in the room was overcome by the power of the spirit…well, there was some sin or rebellion that was clearly keeping you from god. At the time I was pretty sure that line of thinking was bullshit. My relationship with person Lisa looks different than another person’s relationship with Lisa. Why would the holy spirit be any different? But I still wondered. It ate at me over the years. And that doubt, the fear that I was in fact in sin or rebelling, came back as my group shared.

All of that is to say that, for me, it’s complicated. It’s complicated to examine the holy spirit. It’s complicated to think about how the holy spirit was portrayed in our churches. It’s complicated to put words to what each of our personal experiences with the holy spirit have been. It’s complicated to analyze, as one of our readings did, why it may not be a good or helpful thing that the holy spirit is so often portrayed as the most feminine member of the trinity. It’s complicated to talk about what our ascription of feminine characteristics to the holy spirit say about who we believe women are supposed to be.

I chose this Feminist-perspective group rather haphazardly, but I’m so grateful to be in it. I want to sit in the complications, listen to the experiences and ideas of others, and be okay with not fixing the tensions that come. I want to listen to female voices discuss the holy spirit. I want to feel the dread, to hear the echoes of my old church’s teachings and admonition — and not run away. As my new favorite quote says, “She was warned. She was given an explanation. Nevertheless, she persisted.”