Babaylan feminist multiplicity: Reclaiming Filipino women’s history and agency

Abstract

The article proposes “Babaylan feminist multiplicity,” as a theoretical concept, towards the honoring of the multiplicity of identities, bodies, and agency. It reflects on the history and struggles of the Babaylan, pre-colonial priestesses, contemporary Filipino females, and a queer transgender woman, Jennifer Laude, which are paralleled with Biblical characters and narratives reinterpreted from a post-colonial, gender, and queer perspective. The work exposes how popular readings of such passages perpetuate gender violence and disempowerment while reflecting on the theological issues of incarnation, desire, and body. “ Babaylan feminist multiplicity” is argued to allow space for queering and even the reimagining of the meaning of God’s love, Christ’s body, and human eros.