Lexington Books / Fortress Academic
Pages: 140
•
Trim: 6½ x 9
978-1-9787-0186-1 • Hardback • December 2019 • $95.00 • (£73.00)
978-1-9787-0187-8 • eBook • December 2019 • $90.00 • (£69.00)
Natalie E. Williams teaches religion at Saint Peter’s Preparatory School.
Introduction: Why Divorce Matters Now: Origins of the U.S. “Divorce Crisis”
1. The Theo-ethical History of Marriage and the U.S. Divorce Landscape
2. Shame in the Moral Frameworks of Marriage Regulation
3. Fetishizing the Family: Shame in Christian Divorce Doctrines
4. U.S. Divorce Policies and “Family Values” Rhetoric
5. Queer Resistance and Gay Assimilation: Marriage (and Divorce) Equality
6. Resisting Shame and Reimagining Family Success
Natalie E. Williams provides an important missing piece in the dynamic, fraught theo-ethical conversation on marriage. Both Christianity and the state sell divorce as a shame-inducing decision that unleashes catastrophes rather than a multi-faceted, sometimes liberating relational choice. Divorce’s negative press reinforces the hetero status quo, while queering the data reveals many creative relational options. Study this lest the advent of marriage/divorce equality lead to more of the same. — Mary E. Hunt, Co-director, Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics, and Ritual (WATER)
Why isn't there a Christian sacrament of divorce? Williams upturns debates over so-called traditional marriage by arguing that Christians should recognize and embrace divorce as a truth-telling practice that shatters Christians' idolatrous attachment to marriage. Indeed, Christians have a responsibility to transform the stigma of divorce and to support the families unjustly perceived as failures. This book shamelessly reimagines a Christian ethics of divorce. — Heather White, visiting assistant professor, University of Puget Sound
This is a startlingly fresh take on divorce as a moral good. It introduces a broad range of implications for Christian marriage, parenting, sexuality, and church policy. Written accessibly with concise and clearly articulated arguments, For Better, For Worse will provoke lively conversations on recent U.S. cultural practices surrounding marriage and divorce, especially in classroom discussions on queer rights, sexual ethics, or public policy regulating the poor. Williams' analysis offers a long-awaited gift to all who want to reject the relentless, religiously-based shaming of people who divorce.— Traci C. West, Drew University Theological School
One of the biggest strengths of For Better, For Worse is that Williams shifts the locus of shame and stigma from individuals to systems through an institutional, intersectional analysis. . .Williams speaks to both conservative Christian and progressive audiences in For Better, For Worse, and this is, I believe, essential in this polarized time.
— Bernadette Barton, Journal of Church and State