Knitters Greenhouse

One of my favorite shops is the Goodwill Store. The fun finds there are toys, wine glasses, dishes, books, and a potty chair. Florida Goodwill stores are amazing, a fact I discovered years ago when we searched for cheap, overseas travel clothes (that qualified for downright ugly, too). I think they are so good down here in Florida because of the shifting population (transient) and perhaps because older people typically get rid of their stuff when they move, or, since they are older, die. (Just our observation - I have no proof, but eventually older people do that.) All their stuff ends up at Goodwill.

Last year I found a recommended book, "The Good Book," by Gomes. I was so glad to read some thoughtful insight into church history and current interpretation, and I was also glad that I only paid ten cents for the book.

A few weekends ago I went to the Bargain Barn, which is the bin section of stuff that didn't sell fast enough in the regular Goodwill store. I picked up the book titled, "American Jezebel," and took it home.

I love reading history books, and early American history, including the colonial era float my boat. This book really shows just how oppressed women were in colonial days, and I wouldn't want to live in those times. Here are starters:

I read how Anne had 14 children who lived to adulthood, and she had more who died before reaching that point.

Anne and women of her time had no voice in affairs of church or state. NONE! Also, they were not recognized as education-worthy. (See above for the importance of women.)

No rights for women's property ownership or inheritance.

"There was and is no written account of most women's lives then, save their birth, marriage, and death dates," - page 116

Anne, specifically, was convicted and IMPRISONED because she led women's meetings that were also attended by men, and she opposed the local church and their ministers. She was convicted for what she thought about and for what she spoke about to the women in the community. Until her public trial, which was judged by an all-men council, she had not spoken publicly about her beliefs, and it was at that point that she was convicted and later sentenced to prison!

Then Governor Winthrop (1637) opposed a written code for law. Instead he brought charges, then that set a precedent and served as law. (I don't know what this system is called.)

Can you imagine living in a community like that?

We currently have the primaries for the 2008 Presidential election going on, and the growing support for Huckabee actually scares me. I don't want a fundamentalist preacher heading our government. I don't want anyone like him speaking for me, a college graduated, Christian woman who has gained, by written law, the rights to work, live, own property, marry who I want, and decide if I will have babies. (Well, I'm a little too old for that, but it's only been in the past 100 years that birth control has been available to women. Considering I'm 55, that is just two times the years of my life.) I don't want Pat Robertson (or others like him) setting up a theocracy for our country, based on how he believes it was intended. (The signers of the Constitution had even changed from the Puritan era of Massachusetts.)

(I don't necessarily think Huckabee would go back to colonial rule of law - but I do disagree with the fundamentalist view that a Bible-based theocracy would be ideal.)

I'm still reading about Anne Hutchinson's life, and I doubt I'd want to hang out with her for very long. She had a very different life than mine. But I applaud her for all that she stood up for and for all the words that have been recorded of her life.