Bits of Yarn, Calico and Velvet Scraps                                                            Page 15

Language changed. Demythologising had begun.

Deconstruction was under way with what Paul

Ricoeur calls the 'merciless exercise of reductive

hermeneutics'. He rightly names this as 'perhaps

our good fortune and joy'.

The stripping went on through all the structures of

belief, beginning with the foundations:

scripture

                            tradition

dogmas                                        sacraments

                                       doctrines

            theologies

                                       religious practices

                                                                            vows

        dress

                            formation

prayer

                                                                    concepts of God

              belief in the 'fathers'           the ‘absence’ of women