Review of Gender as Love

Fellipe do Vale
Gender as Love:
A theological account of human identity, embodied desire, and our social worlds
Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2023.

Review by Dr. Graham Stanton (Ridley College)

Fellipe do Vale’s study of gender is sure to become a much-cited source in this significant area of gender studies. Whether you agree with his proposal or not (and I’m a mid-strength affirmation of ‘yes, but…’) his engagement with the literature, his laying out of theological method, and the rigour of his proposal all warrant close attention.

The book is dense, which is going to limit the audience to those capable of and with the patience to wade through careful theological argument. Lines like

What gives my account its specificity is the means by which “appropriation” occurs, how this appropriation forges our identities, how the social manifestation of the sexed body retains the attenuated essentialism of the first thesis, how the process of attenuation is consistent with the complicated access we have to the right relation to gendered goods, and how the formation of love aids in our ventures toward gendered justice. Expatiating this operation of appropriation is the task of this and the following chapters (pp.144-45) are not for the faint-hearted! But in a conversation that has not been helped by sloganeering and simplistic assertions, dense is what’s needed.

As one who has only really waded in the shallows of the gender debate, I appreciated do Vale’s presentation of alternate viewpoints, both of his conversation partners (like Sarah Coakley, Charlotte Witt, Mari Mikkola) and particularly of those with whom he disagrees (such as Judith Butler, Ellen Davis, Susannah Cornwall, Megan de Franza). This is not a book that demolishes simplistic caricatures, but one that engages deeply with significant thinkers.

Where the debate has often lined up behind the team captains of gender essentialism versus social constructionism, do Vale is careful and sympathetic enough to recognise strengths and weaknesses on both sides. I do wonder whether do Vale had the chance to read Christopher Watkin’s 2022 tome, Biblical Critical Theory before writing this, since his ability to navigate the gender debate is a fine example of Watkin’s approach of ‘diagonalisation’ — where in place of false dichotomies or unsatisfying compromises ‘drawing on the complex truth of [the Bible], diagonalization presents a picture in which the best aspirations of both options are fulfilled, but not in a way that the proponents of those options would see coming’.^[1]

The proposal that gender is love, or more technically, ‘gender is the appropriation of social goods pertaining to the sexed body’ (175) offers a Watkinesque diagonalisation between essentialism and constructivism. Do Vale says of his conclusion, ‘this is an essentialist view of gender for on it a man is a male who appropriates social goods by his love, but this view does not say which goods are to be loved in any one time or place’ (175). The ‘what’ of gender is tied to biological sex; the ‘which’ of gender is socially constructed. But more important than both, do Vale argues, is ‘how these goods are loved’. By identifying gender in relation to love places gender within all human loves that must be submitted to our primary love for God.

There is much more in the argument than can be (or ought to be) summarised here. Read the book, it’s important and valuable. In response to do Vale’s work I offer one suggestion, one warning, and one urgent edit for a second edition.

My suggestion is to consider how the proposal would benefit from a practical theology rather than just a systematic theology of gender. Do Vale pursues a two-fold theological task: starting with a descriptive task, ‘making sense of the gendered lives we already live’, and then a normative task, ‘telling us not just what gender is, but what it ought to be’ (165). Practical theology is familiar with the descriptive and normative tasks, but adds two others: an analytic task, and a pragmatic task.^[2] After describing what’s going on, and before asking what ought to be going on, practical theology asks ‘why is this going on?’ It strikes me that there’s an analytic task missing from do Vale’s analysis of gender—not just what social goods pertaining to my sexed body that I am appropriating, but why am I appropriating them? Further, for practical theologians, following the normative task comes the pragmatic task: ‘how might we respond?’

Certainly do Vale offers some valuable discussion about the pragmatic question of how to meet intersex/DSD individuals with love and justice. Urging epistemic restraint that is content to live in the ambiguity of the intersex/DSD experience frees us to concentrate on the more urgent and Christlike task to ‘show patience and find ways to help individuals flourish, despite the ambiguity, and in the midst of a world eager to turn their bodies into burdens of shame’ (p. 202). Yet, further to this wise counsel, I would have appreciated more pragmatic discussion of current issues relating to gender - from use of pronouns to dress codes and gender norms, within as much as outside of the church. Chapter 7 does seek to address the ‘paradigmatic instance of sinful gender expression—namely, sexual assault’ (205). Helpful though this chapter is, the ‘sinfulness’ of sexual assault is not largely in dispute. Many other questions of gender are far more complicated. What do we do with a teenage boy who prefers wearing dresses to shorts? I agree with the analysis of the experience of intersex/DSD individuals and of victims of sexual assault to ‘result in experiences of shame and general lack of worth’ (217). But is this the case for all instances of ‘gender mired in the corrosive forces of sin?’ What of those gender expressions, loving social goods pertaining to the sexed body (to use do Vale’s definition) that are not loved according to God’s love that result in pride and boasting rather than shame or lack of worth? How ought we think and respond theologically to those experiences of gender in our world? While do Vale’s book has given me new categories for thinking about the complexity of gender and gender relations, I don’t feel a great deal closer to finding clear ways forward. Some guidance in the analytic and pragmatic tasks of practical theology would be a useful extension of the current work.

My warning is for readers as they approach chapter 7 and its discussion of sexual assault. In a chapter that is reflecting on gender and the fall accounts of sexual violence are unavoidable. Readers ought to be alert to the potentially triggering descriptions of harrowing experiences. We ought not turn away from horrors, but it can be helpful to be forewarned.

Finally, an urgent edit is required. Reaching for an illustration for the idea of ‘function’ as ‘what an entity is supposed to do, not merely what it does in point of fact’, do Vale writes this travesty: ‘the function of a heart ostensibly, is to pump blood, and the function of a librarian is to check out books. But further qualifications are required, for not just anything that pumps blood is a heart (machines do this too), and not everyone who checks out books is a librarian’ (p. 188). Of course, anyone who knows a librarian knows that merely ‘checking out books’ is far below their pay grade. I’d suggest a second edition comes soon with an alternative illustration before the librarians of the world find do Vale’s book and ‘check it out’ where no one will ever find it again. For that to happen would be a shame since this is a book that deserves to be read and pondered. Do Vale has done us a service in bringing clarity and direction to what is sure to be an ongoing discussion.

---

^[1] Christopher Watkin, Biblical critical theory: how the Bible’s unfolding story makes sense of modern life and culture (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2022), 17.

^[2] See Richard Osmer, Practical Theology: An Introduction (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008), 4.