Faith in the Fracture: Toward a Womanist Cosmological Sacred Belonging and Citizenship

Abstract

This study examines how Black women navigate spiritual widowhood and cosmological disinheritance in contemporary America through the biblical figure of Ruth. Employing what I call a critical embodied epistemology (CEE)—a womanist methodology integrating Hortense Spillers’ hieroglyphics of the flesh, Michel Foucault’s genealogical analysis, and Emilie Townes’ ethical reimagination—this article analyzes Ruth’s transgressive movements as a template for sacred belonging beyond State-sanctioned citizenship. Against the backdrop of reproductive rights rollbacks, voting restrictions, and the political rejection of Black women’s leadership, the research reveals how African-descended cosmology offers alternative frameworks for community, covenant, and citizenship. Findings demonstrate that Ruth’s embodied risk on the threshing floor models what I term “faith in the fracture”—an insurgent spirituality that refuses to tether sacred belonging to empire. The study contributes to womanist theology, political theology, and diaspora studies by theorizing sacred citizenship as relational rather than national, and by centering embodied knowledge as theological epistemology. Implications include reconceptualizing belonging for all marginalized communities navigating displacement, State abandonment, and cosmological rupture.

Repository attribution: CL Nash. Faith in the Fracture: Toward a Womanist Cosmological Sacred Belonging and Citizenship. Religions, 17(5), issue year 2026; article page publication date 2026-05-19. Original: source article. DOI: 10.3390/rel17050613. Original PDF reproduced without changes under CC BY 4.0. No endorsement is implied. Copyright 2026 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/