Encontros e resistências: o fórum de reflexão da mulher luterana, sua origem e contribuições às mulheres da IECLB

Abstract

Between encounters and resistances, the experiences of Lutheran women are recovered, with resources from feminist historiography, first to deconstruct the essentialist idea of the Lutheran woman. In a second moment, to present the questionings which the women made on the pages of the Evangelical Journal and other periodicals related to the IECLB, and in a third moment, to be a space where Lutheran women leaders, between encounters and resistances, came to recognize new ways of gathering and organizing themselves. The Reflection Forum for the Lutheran Woman resulted from the questioning of Lutheran women who are so often invisibilized, silenced and not named. From the beginnings on Brazilian land, the richness in the ways of being a Lutheran woman led to the question of who these women are. The perception that they are many and that they bring in their history a diversity of experiences is also a way to resist the homogenization which dis-characterized the many varied ways of gathering and organizing, in very different places, spaces and school levels, in very different relations and ages. The pages of the Evangelical Journal between the years of 1985 – 1995 show the context of the conception of the Forum, in 1990, presenting the talk and registers of Lutheran women of various segments. Although it is not the only one, it is the main means of registering the voices of women who wished to reflect on the many issues sparked by the Ecumenical Decade of Solidarity of the Churches with the Women, by Feminist Theology and by the movement of the Brazilian society in general. In the context of the VIII Assembly of the Lutheran World Federation these women leaders perceived their diversity and the lack of articulation and proposed to carry out gatherings aiming at exchanging experiences, seeking formation and the dream of a space which could coordinate the various groups and organizations of women in the IECLB. A Department of Women was the main demand of this group of leaders. A space which could articulate and represent all the women of the IECLB. But there wasn’t consensus and there was resistance to this project, implying in ruptures and new paths for this group of women leaders, who started to gather as the Forum of Reflection of the Lutheran Woman and has been carrying out national forums since 1995 up to current times.