Leviticus Meditations: On the Outside, Looking In

Never let it be said that God does not have a sense of humor. I almost never miss church on a Sunday, but here we are on the first Sunday of a month when I'm supposed to be especially pious and I'm not going to church. I can't go, because it's that time of the month and I'm so unclean that anyone who touches me can't go. Fortunately, no one else cares about such silliness so I haven't cut myself off from human contact, but I am sitting around alone at home while everyone else is worshipping and celebrating the Lord's Supper. Oh, did I mention that I really don't miss church on Communion Sundays? I am not happy about this.

I try to remember that the ancient world thought of blood as the life force, endowed with deep spiritual significance. But I'm not totally sure that applies here. This is coming in a public health code about minimizing the spread of infection. I can understand how quarantines were necessary in a world before antibiotics. But menstruation is not a dangerous illness. This is not advanced science.

There's a point that ritual impurity is different from moral contamination. That might help a little, but only a little. And elsewhere in the Bible, there certainly seems to be a moral connotation. Ezekiel 36:17.

Brandy is a good person and points out that we humans are awfully good at twisting God's word for our own sinful purposes. That's certainly true. And it's also true that there are many many misogynistic cultures in the world and the spread of Christianity tends to improve women's status.

But still. Sometimes a misogynistic reading doesn't take much twisting. Sometimes it seems hard to read it any other way. And so I sit around, unable to participate in public worship because my body is functioning the way God made it to function.

But maybe I depend on our weekly worship gatherings too much. Maybe I need to better develop my individual spiritual life. As I was grouchily praying about this situation a few days ago, I sensed "Don't worry, I'll meet you another way." And God did -- today I had one of the most fruitful prayer times I've had in quite a while. I needed that.

So, is this a story about me kicking against the goads only to find that God's way is the best after all? Sorry, no. If periodic exclusion from worship is actually a good idea for women, it should be a good idea for everyone.

Although we believe that Jesus followed the law perfectly, he seemed to violate ritual purity laws with abandon. He touches a bleeding woman, touches lepers. He implicitly condemns a priest who passed by a wounded man, and does not seem to care that the priest had to do precisely that in order to keep himself pure. How do we understand this and also uphold the purity laws as the inspired Word of God? I have no idea.

Fortunately, today, I saw a God who can work through lousy structures -- but that doesn't make the structures any less lousy.