Religious Fear of Menstruation

 Why are Men and Religions Afraid of Menstruation? 

The attached article concerning an India woman who was charged with a "deliberate and malicious"  crime against religious people because she entered a temple to worship while she was menstruating, is a  contemporary example of  women's experience globally and generationally. The Hebrew and Christian Scriptures give us examples of this fear of menstruation.  Leviticus 15: 19-30 prescribes the number of days a woman and anything she touches will be unclean because of menstruation or hemorrhage.  The story of the Hemorrhaging Woman found in Mark 5:25-34, Luke 8:43-48 and Matthew 9:20-22 is the story of a woman who had been unclean and untouchable for twelve years.  She reached out and touched Jesus making him unclean.  He offered not rebuke but healing.

Why are girls taught to fear their own bodily functions?

Fear producing colloquialisms like, "the curse"are used to name menstruation.  It is simply appalling that a woman's natural, necessary bodily functions are negatively labeled and used to restrict her movement and actions.  In Genesis 1:27 women and men are created in the image and likeness of God and in 1:28 they are told to multiply.  Without menstruation there is no multiplication.        
  Religious fear of menstruation.

How do we change?

If we are to change these attitudes we must teach girls and women to treasure their bodies, created in the image and likeness of divinity.  A divinity, which in some wonderful way must be female.  We must teach woman and girls that menstruation is not a curse, but a gift given to the female gender by the divine.  A gift which allows woman to bring forth life from their bodies.