Women and the Church

Doesn’t the Church, with all its rules and regulations, discriminate and patronize women, relegate them to second class citizens and deny them the Priesthood?  Doesn’t it want them to become baby making machines, and stay at home all day?

These questions are typical of public perception of the Church’s attitude towards women.  But I believe that no institution on earth has ever given women as much dignity, respect and worth as the Catholic Church.  It has stood against prostitution, discrimination, exploitation and radical feminism.

God’s plan for redemption of the world lay was reliant on the consent of a woman, Mary, the co-redemptrix of the world.  Mary, the mother of God, plays a central role in our faith,  having been conceived without original sin.  Women have a very important role in the economy of redemption.

G.K. Chesterton once said, “I do not deny that women have been wronged and even tortured; but I doubt if they were ever tortured so much as they are tortured now by the absurd modern attempt to make them domestic empresses and competitive clerks at the same time.” (Chesterton, what is wrong with the world? Op cit. p148).  Many feminists acknowledge the superiority of the male sex by trying to become like men.  When the differences between sexes are worked out in a relational approach before confrontation or competition, man and women can collaborate more.

Feminism has concentrated on equality and power in its quest for justice for women.  Because men and women complement each other, equality should not mean, ‘exactly the same.’  Human dignity is the foundation for equality, and equality is enhanced by collaboration.  Kierkegaard said that, “Femininity is a lynchpin of human life; once it is uprooted, the consequence are disastrous.  In fact, experience proved that feminism benefits men and harms women.” (Kierkegaard, either-or p ii, 260-1).

Pope John Paul II said that the “dignity and balance of human life depends at every moment of history and in every place upon who man will be for women, and who women will be for men.” (TOB 43:7).  In a letter to women, he wrote about the ‘genius of women’ and thanked them for all their contributions to society as mothers, sisters and workers in the Lond’s vineyard.  Women are made for relationships, they possess great beauty and have a deep element of mystery.  Teresa Benedicta of the Cross said that women’s natural role was to “To cherish, guard, protect, nourish and advance growth.”  Every woman is called to be a bride in some form or another.

By looking to the co-patronesses of Europe, St Brigit of Sweden, St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein), Saint Catherine of Siena and St Therese of Lisieux we have examples of wonderful women way ahead of their time.  They were outstanding for their fruitful love of Christ’s Church and their witness to the cross.  By their example, may we ever more learn the dignity and gifts of women.  The saints play an important role in the Church.  We can pray to them for guidance and so they can intercede to the Father on our behalf.  There are an abundance of women among the saints.  This is because the Church recognizes many women’s contribution to the world as holy and pleasing to God.  We can also look to figures such as Judith, Huldah, Deborah and Queen Esther in the Bible for role models.

Priesthood is about service, not power.  Von Balthasar did not believe in women’s ordination, seeing it rather as a demotion for a woman.  Many arguments for this have been argued on secular terms.  The Church does not have the power to confer priestly ordination on women and this is a teaching to be held definitely by Christ’s faithful (Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, 4).

The family is a ‘domestic Church’ and the fundamental unit of society.  Women have a special responsibility to defend the family.  Marriage is upheld by the giving and receiving of the gift of self in love.  The body of a woman is a tabernacle of life because it has the capacity to transmit new life.  The miracle of conception happens within a woman’s body.  Women are particularly privileged to have the gift of life and to be able to care for the completely helpless child.  But women cannot be defined simply by their capacity to transmit life.  Families are an image of the trinity: there is a three way relationship between God, spouse and self and also with spouse, self and child.

The 1983 charter on the rights of the family by the Holy See said that spouses had the right to decide upon the spacing of births and the number of children to be born, in accordance with the objective moral order which excludes contraception, sterilization and abortion.  Children are a blessing from God and large families are the result of great generosity.  Contraception is sometimes the reason why women are treated like objects like men. It is unreliable: after just 10 uses of the condom, the failure rate is 57% (meaning exposure to all STDs).  Some forms of contraception such as the pill cause abortions and have detrimental effects on health such as causing breast cancer.  The pill causes 150 changes in a woman’s body, including the curvature of the eye.

Pope John Paul called for an end to discrimination against women who had chosen to be wives and mothers in his letter to women in 1995.  He also called for “equal pay for equal work, protection for working mothers, fairness in career advancements and equality of spouses with regard to family rights” (n. 4).  The Church stands for an authentic appreciation of womanhood and the wonderful gifts this brings to humanity!eHe

Further reading:

The priviledge of being a woman by Alice von Hildebrand

Theology of his/her body by Jason Evert

Collaboration of men and women in the Church by CDF/Joseph Ratzinger

Letter to Women by Pope John Paul II.

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis by Pope John Paul II.

Charter of the Rights of the family

Apostolic Letter proclaiming co-patronesses of Europe by Pope John Paul II.

Bible Women speak to us today by Mary Jensen.

Elucidations by Hans Urs von Balthasar.