Making and sharing the space among women and men : Some challenges for the South African church environment

The aim of this book is to explore how contemporary notions of reconciliation as a process of building, rebuilding and transforming relationships may be applied not only to “race” but also to gender relations in post-apartheid and post-TRC South Africa. After highlighting links between the past, the present and the future with regard to such relations in wider South African society, critical questions are asked about the churches as spaces and agents of a gender-inclusive peace and reconciliatión. The focus is on two crucial issues: the potential of South African churches to be “safe spaces” for abused women and children, and their potential to be spaces for women and men to encounter each other in non-stereotypical roles. This critical examination is inspired by interviews with, and writings by, South African women active in various church environments and/or in the field of theology and religious studies. What lessons and challenges do they present with regard to “being church in South Africa today”?