Tonight at 9 p.m. central time, Fox 9 news in Minneapolis will air a quiverfull news story.  Investigative producer, Julie Anderson interviewed me while I was in The Cities last summer for the girls’ surgeries.  She was asked to do the interview by an Indiana Fox 59 news reporter following the Carrie Chimielewski story.  After asking the initial questions which were provided by the Illinois station, Julie was intrigued enough to ask if we could continue the interview with her asking a few questions of her own.

I’ve been in contact with Julie ever since, assisting in her investigation of the Quiverfull movement in the Minneapolis area.  I provided her a link to John Piper’s pathetic and dangerous answer to the question, “What does a woman’s submission look like when there’s abuse?” (Here’s the video.)

Julie also interviewed playwright, Kevin Kautzman, who wrote a one-act play ~ “Quiver” ~ based on my No Longer Quivering story.

Be watching for the program to be posted online shortly after it airs in Minneapolis this evening: http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/.

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Preaching patriarchy and procreation, Quiverfull and like-minded groups live by the (good) book

West Sacramento resident Theron Johnson has a vision for an ideal society. In it, racism is eliminated. The United States disbands its large standing army and refrains from engaging in unjust wars. People live within their means and accrue no debt. The weak are protected, taxes lowered and inflation is considered theft. Government agencies stop encroaching on our daily lives, doing little more than protecting homes and property from fire or theft. Personal liberty and freedom reign supreme.

In his ideal society, women do not have the right to vote.

Male politicians fill government posts, as women seek higher personal meaning through submission to their husbands. Parents raise little girls not to attend college but to marry godly men and bear as many children as the lord gives them. Abortion, same-sex marriage and divorce: illegal.

This, to Johnson, is a Christian society.  Read the full story here.

From the article:

Breakaway blogging

For a long time, Vyckie Garrison, 43, lived out the Quiverfull image of a good Christian wife, with seven beautiful children and a popular newsletter run out of their Nebraska home. But two years ago, that all changed. Garrison, who lived in Sacramento as a child, now runs a blog called No Longer Quivering, writing about what she calls her escape from the Quiverfull movement.

At 17 years old, Garrison accepted Jesus Christ as her personal savior. After marrying her second husband in her mid-20s, she started to explore biblical family values, attending home-school conventions, urging her husband to adopt the lessons of the Bible, and to follow God’s plan in their lives and marriage.

“The promise of this ideal family, the security, the closeness, the high value placed on motherhood looked very appealing,” Garrison says. “I had a chaotic childhood and was looking for stability.”

Gradually, she grew so consumed by the teachings of the Quiverfull movement that she encouraged her husband to reverse his vasectomy. By that time, Garrison had mothered three children, each pregnancy life-threatening and each child born through Cesarean section.

To make ends meet, Garrison and her husband published a conservative Christian newspaper. Her husband held the title of newspaper president, but Garrison says she did the bulk of the work. As her family became more isolated and withdrawn—they home-schooled, operated a home business and had a home church—Garrison says her husband became tyrannical and paranoid. Held up as the leader of the household, his narcissism magnified itself, she writes, as he attempted to control every single aspect of the household and its occupants.

The family’s demanding lifestyle eventually began to take its toll. All the food was made from scratch. There was no television, no baby sitters, no time for a break. Meanwhile, Garrison’s eldest daughter began cutting herself, an act of rebellion that wasn’t supposed to happen. In the Quiverfull movement, it is believed that teenagers trained in the ways of the Lord will transition seamlessly to Christian adulthood.

One day, her daughter attempted suicide.

“That’s when it all crumbled for me,” Garrison says. “Her self, her emotions, her desires were completed negated. Something inside of her wanted to be an autonomous being, and this was not being allowed.”

Garrison divorced her husband and left the Quiverfull movement. She hasn’t looked back. “I have no regard for the Bible,” Garrison says. “I’m not hip to Jesus either. His symbol of martyrdom, the cross and laying down your life for others—you can’t just give and give and give without falling apart.”

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One Act (Full Length) * 81 pg * 3F / 1M

The Christian patriarchy movement stresses the differences between the sexes, insisting upon woman’s role as “helpmeet” for her man in an attempt to model lives after those of the Old Testament patriarchs.  When Faith, a devoutly submissive mother of seven, is drawn deeper into the militant pro-life movement by her pastor, she comes to question not just her adoption of the so-called “Quiverfull” lifestyle but her very belief in, and understanding of, God.

Based in part on the story of Vyckie Garrison (NoLongerQivering.com), QUIVER is the new play from award-winning playwright Kevin Anthony Kautzman that explores how beliefs shape our communities and the Quiverfull lifestyle’s impact on one woman’s life.

Please direct inquiries to the playwright through www.kevinkautzman.com.

*Note from Vyckie ~ I just read the script for Kevin’s play “Quiver” for the first time ~ and was so profoundly affected that I couldn’t help crying big sobs of appreciation and gratitude for the sensitivity with which Kevin presents my Quiverfull predicament and its resolution.  WOW ~ I’m just stunned.  Can’t wait until the official unveiling of this dramatic retelling of my No Longer Quivering story.

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Today’s front page of the Norfolk Daily News features an article by religion reporter, Kathryn Harris, who contacted me after seeing the article “All God’s Children” on Salon.com.

Check out, “Losing her religion: Norfolk woman no longer ‘quivering’ in fear of God” ~ and be sure to read the companion article featuring Lts. Heather and Xavier’s approach to ministering to our family ~ “Pastors ‘preach’ with love.”

I get the feeling that Harris is a little apprehensive about printing this article ~ on her blog, she wrote:

Garrison had a story to tell. I was assigned to tell it. So that’s what I did to the best of my ability. (Although if I had the space, I’d have doubled the length of the story.)

I realize religious beliefs can be a divisive issue, especially when someone as outspoken as Garrison presents a viewpoint that counters the popular belief in the area; I’m sure someone out there will feel it’s necessary to “shoot the messenger.”

Just give me a moment to put on my Kevlar vest first.

The overwhelming majority of my hometown’s population is conservative and Christian ~ so, it should be “interesting” to see what sort of response this article invokes.

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Interfaith Voices is a public radio show promoting religious harmony and interfaith understanding.

T he nation’s leading religion news magazine on public radio, Interfaith Voices probes the many ways that religion informs our politics and culture. In so doing, Interfaith Voices has grown to become an independent resource for religious and secular listeners on 62 stations nationwide.

From July 3rd through the 9th, the Quiverfull segment will air featuring Kathryn Joyce, author of Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement, and former quiverfull mom, Vyckie Garrison of No Longer Quivering.

You can listen to the program online at interfaithradio.org, starting Friday.

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