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In the months after President Donald Trump took office in 2017, the outfits seemed to be everywhere.
Women wore red capes and white bonnets as they marched against sexual assault and abortion restrictions, and in favor of women’s rights.
These protesters drew inspiration from Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale,” which, although it was published in 1985, anticipated many of today’s fights over issues like church-state separation, family structure and the birth rate.
The book describes a new society that’s arisen after religious extremists killed nearly every American leader on a single day. In the wake of their attack, they suspend the Constitution and force the country to accept a new legal system, gradually, then all at once.
Under the new system, women can’t have jobs, hold property or even read or write. Some are allowed to remain with their husbands and kids, while others are trained to be handmaids, young women in red capes and white bonnets who are meant to carry babies for older couples.
In recent years, protesters in the U.S., Ireland, Argentina and other countries have dressed as handmaids because they believe their governments are headed down the same path. They believe women are being forced out of the public square by men who want all the power for themselves.
I reread “The Handmaid’s Tale” last week because it was my book club’s pick for our January meeting. As I did, I thought about red-caped protesters reappearing after Trump returns to office.
In some ways, reading the book made me nervous because of its reminders of where unresolved battles over women’s rights can lead.
But in other ways, it made me feel optimistic, not just about the next four years but about a more distant future, because the book captures how people continue to fight for their own freedom and try to free others even when they have almost nothing left to fight with.
Protesters dressed as handmaids aim to remind us of Atwood’s dystopian nightmare, but they can also remind us of how the handmaid at the center of the story didn’t give up. She continued to be curious and to make connections, to champion love over fear.
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Term of the week: ‘Hope: The Autobiography’
“Hope: The Autobiography” is a new memoir from Pope Francis. It’s thought to be the first autobiography written by a sitting pope, according to The Associated Press.
In the book, Francis describes how he was feeling during the 2013 conclave that resulted in his election as pope. He also writes about growing up in Argentina and how being from Latin America influences his leadership.
“It’s almost confessional at times, an 88-year-old Jesuit performing the Ignatian examination of his conscience at the end of his life to identify things he said or did that he now realizes could have been done better,” per the AP.
“Hope: The Autobiography” was originally planned to be released after Francis' death. He decided to release it early as part of his celebration of the Catholic Church’s Holy Year in 2025.
What I’m reading...
One of the bills that will be in front of the Utah Legislature during this year’s General Session centers on Sabbath observance and small business owners. The proposal from Rep. Ken Ivory, R-West Jordan, aims to prevent companies from adding requirements about what days a franchise must be open to a contract after the contract is already in place, per KSL.
House Speaker Mike Johnson is working to bring in a new House chaplain, according to Religion News Service. The current chaplain, Rev. Margaret Kibben, who is Presbyterian, has served in the role since January 2021.
On Thursday, Becket released the latest edition of its annual Religious Freedom Index. It showed that most Americans embrace religious diversity but fear that society as a whole is hostile to people of faith.
Odds and ends
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is celebrated as a political activist, but he was also a pastor whose civil rights work was deeply rooted in faith. In 2018, I wrote about King’s relationship to his church and his religious legacy.