1963–1987

The rise of feminist theology

Feminist theology took shape in the late 1960s against the backdrop of the American women's movement (Betty Friedan's "The Feminine Mystique," 1963; the National Organization for Women). It named patriarchy as the primary oppression and women's experience as the norm of theological reflection. Mary Daly's books "The Church and the Second Sex" (1968) and "Beyond God the Father" (1973) were the first sharp protests against the church.

Letty Russell, Rosemary Radford Ruether, and Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza developed different strands of the movement. Ruether in "Sexism and God-Talk" (1983) proposed the concept of "God/ess" and rejected Chalcedonian christology. Fiorenza in "In Memory of Her" (1983) reconstructed gender equality in early Christianity.

Feminist "Women-Church" communities became the most extreme expression of some feminists' alienation from traditional Christianity. Ruether described them in her book of that name (1986).