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PAGE 5- March 2.1972
The Christian And Women’s Lib
By Russell Shaw
“Women ale an oppressed class.” “The Women’s revolution is
the final revolution of them all.”
These sentences, by two writers on the phenomenon of
militant feminism, sum up what the feminists see as the basic
problem of women (oppression) and the answer to that problem
(revolution). Many people do not take either the diagnosis or
the proposed remedy very seriously. But others are beginning to
sense that, despite its excesses, women’s liberation has hit on an
unresolved social issue that deserves serious attention.
It is obvious that the militant feminists are angry women.
Less obvious, at least to most men, is the cause of their anger. A
typical male response to feminist outrage is patronizing
laughter, followed by the assertion that the trouble with women
is that they don’t realize how well off they really are.
What is needed instead is an effort to see things from the
feminists’ viewpoint -- not in order to agree with everything
they say but at least to understand what it is they are saying.
Jesus And
The Women
By Fr. Quentin Quesneli, S.J.
“At that moment Jesus’ disciples returned; and they were
surprised to find him talking with a woman” (John 4, 27). The
disciples must have felt that same surprise many more times
before they came to understand Jesus.
They saw him talk with Peter’s mother-in-law (Mk. 1, 30f.),
with Jairus and his wife (Mk. 5, 21-43), with the woman
embarrassed by the flow of blood (Mk. 5,25ff.), with the bent
woman (Luke 13, 10-17). They saw him talk with the
Syro-Phoenician woman (Matt. 15,21-28), with the woman who
was a sinner (Luke 7, 36-50), with the women of Jerusalem on
the way to the cross (Luke 23, 27-31).
They soon found themselves surrounded by a large group of
women who traveled along with him wherever he went: Mary,
Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna, “and many other women who
helped Jesus and his disciples with their belongings” (Luke 8,2).
The disciples must have accompanied him when he visited the
home of Mary and Martha (Luke 10, 38-42). They must have
learned that “Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus”
(John 11,5).
Still, they seem never to have learned their lesson very well.
When a group of mothers tried to get near Jesus with their
children, the disciples wanted to keep them away (Mk. 10,
13-16). When a week before his death, the woman of Bethany
pours out her precious perfume on his person, “the disciples saw
this and became angry” (Matt. 26,8). Again, Jesus had to set
them straight and insist that the woman was right (Matt.
26,9-13).
The first appearance of Jesus after his resurrection are to
women. The first of these, Mary Magdalene, “went and told it
to his companions, and when they heard her say that Jesus was
alive and that she had seen him, they did not believe her” (Mark
16,10f.).
The disciples on the road to Emmaus say: “Some of the
women of our group surprised us. They went at dawn to the
grave, but could not find his body. They came back saying they
had seen a vision of angels, who told them he was alive” (Luke
4,22f.). Silly women. Who could believe them? So “some of
the group went to the grave and found it exactly as the women
had said, but they did not see him” (Luke 24,24).
In an age when women were passed over or passed around,
the disciples must also have been surprised and perhaps a little
annoyed at how often Jesus’ parables and examples were about
women or were drawn from the typical experience of women.
There were the parables of the wedding feast, of the ten
maidens, the lost coin, the measure of meal, the persistent
praying widow, the praise of the widow’s mite. And there was
his concern for the dignity of woman and the equality of
woman in his teaching on the permanence of marriage and the
malice of “looking after a woman to lust after her . . .” (Matt.
5,27f.).
It took them a long time to overcome their inbred prejudices
•■about the inferiority of women. St. Paul, twenty years later, still
has a few: “A woman should have a covering for her head, to
show she is under her husband’s authority” (I Cor. 11,10). “The
women should keep quiet in the church meetings ... .If they
want to find out about something, they should ask their
husbands at home” (I Cor. 14,34f.).
But the example of Jesus and the teaching of Jesus got
through sometimes anyway, so that Paul was able to leave us at
least one significant statement on woman’s equal place in the
church: “In christ there is neither male nor female; but you are
all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3,28).
In this century the options available -- theoretically at least --
to women have increased dramatically. More educational
opportunities and more career possibilities are open to them
than ever before. More legal protections are afforded them.
Progress has been impressive.
But a great deal remains undone. Many jobs are closed to
qualified women, as if an invisible “No Women Need Apply”
sign were hung on the door. Women are still frequently paid less
than men for doing the same jobs. Other forms of
discrimination exists and should be removed.
On the other hand, the militant feminists go further and, in
doing so, appear to have gotten themselves into a serious bind.
In some instances, their resentment seems to arise from an
inability to accept themselves as women.
It is as if they had been deluded - or deluded themselves -
into the belief that only male values, male forms of vocational
achievement, male avenues of self-fulfillment are valid and
worth pursuing. Their violent rejection of “male chauvinism”
could thus have the rather pathetic outcome of placing them
more firmly, though subtly, under the dominance of male
culture than they now suppose themselves to be.
A sensitive but unsympathetic observer of women’s
liberation, novelist Anne Bernays, has written that “Liberation
is irresistible to women who want to be men.” She adds that the
root problem of the movement is “the disabling anxiety that
different means the same thing as inferior.” For a woman
hooked on liberation, she says, “the psychic imperatives have
blinded her to the pleasures of her own uniqueness.”
This boils down simply to the rather obvious fact -- which
psychological research is now beginning to document - that
women are not men, and men are not women, and there is no
sense in a member of either group trying to pretend otherwise.
Discrimination against women, social, professional, or whatever,
should and must be eliminated. But the elimination of
discrimination ought not to be confused with the futile attempt
to eliminate differences, for this is an excellent way to
guarantee a good deal of grief for society in general and women
in particular.
As Pope Paul VI said in his 1971 apostolic letter on social
issues, it is desirable that there be a “charter for women” which
“would put an end to an actual discrimination and would
establish relationships of equality in rights and of respect for
their dignity.” But this is not the same thing as efforts to create
a “false equality” which would deny male-female differences.
Even more than legislation, perhaps what is most needed is a
re-thinking of what it means to be a woman in today’s society
and action to implement this new insight. There is no reason,
after all, why every woman - any more than every man -- should
have to adapt her life to precisely the same pattern, particularly
if that pattern is based on outmoded notions of feminine
inferiority. Unfortunately, this seems to be just what some of
the more radical feminists are demanding.
Their pattern admittedly deviates from the traditional
understanding of woman’s role, but it conforms instead to
male-derived notions of self-realization. Surely, though, there
are better ways of being a woman today than simply being an
ersatz man.
r
KNOW YOUR FAITH
Christ, Church And Women’s Lib
BY FR. CARL J.
PFEIFER, S.J.
“Every Christian woman is
a liberated woman.” That’s
exactly what she said. I
remember, because her words
took me by surprise.
Jerri dropped by my office
this afternoon with her
5-year-old daughter and a
stack of religious education
materials. She is a young
Catholic housewife, mother
of two, and a struggling CCD
teacher. She was on her way
from a civic meeting, picking
up her children from school,
hoping to be home in time to
prepare dinner before her
husband returned from work.
I asked her what she
thought of Christianity and
women’s lib. Without
hesitation she said, “Every
Christian woman is a
liberated woman.” I must
have looked somewhat
stunned, because she asked if
what she said was all wrong.
Perhaps I was a bit stunned
by the simplicity, directness,
and depth of her perceptive
response. It reminded me of
St. Paul’s challenging
statement about women - a
statement he apparently
found hard to believe himself,
judging from some of his
other assertions about women
- “All of you who have been
baptized into Christ have
clothed yourselves in Him.
There does not exist among
you . . .slave or freeman, male
or female. All are one in
Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28).
Jerri had unwittingly
translated Paul’s insight into
more modern language. What
Paul and Jerri are saying is
that because of Christ’s
freeing activity there is a
fundamental equality within
the Christian community
between man and woman, an
equality with rights as well as
responsibility. Jerri sees
soffRagi&ts
1913, 3
MARCH TOTHE CAPITOL, RPR.
Suffragists’ March to the Capitol, 1913 - Activity of the women’s liberation movement began long ago and continues to the present. The activists have “come a long
but feel that they have not come far enough. (NC Photo courtesy Library of Congress).
womens lib within this
context. “Basically, women’s
life is against injustices. If we
were truly a Christian
community, there would be
no need for women’s life.”
She put her finger on a
sensitive point. If the Church
is, as the Vatican Council II
teaches, a sign or sacrament
of universal liberation, then
the community that makes
way,'
up the Church by word and
by example should be
pointing out to all the
fundamental equality of men
and women as human beings,
as unique persons.
Unfortunately the Church of
the present is often not
notably more successful in
this regard than the Church
of the past.
In an interview last year a
good friend of mine, Mrs. H.
Arnold Karo, a member of
the Presbyterian U.S. General
Council, producer of a widely
acclaimed television show on
the Bible and modern life,
stated that she could not find
in the teaching of Jesus Christ
“What has become church
practice - to consider women
as second-class citizens.” She
went on to say that Jesus
“apparently considered even
Confusion About Confession
By Fr. Joseph M. Champlin
Our before-Christmas Common Penance Service opened with
congregational singing of “Whatsoever You Do to the Least of
My Brothers,” included the traditional “Come Holy Ghost” and
ended with music from “Jesus Christ Superstar.”
A woman proclaimed the first scriptural selection, a man the
second, and a married couple led the community in an
examination of conscience by alternately reading appropriate
passages from the Old Testament (Deuteronomy 5, Leviticus
19) and the New (Matthew 5, Mark 7).
This 45 minute ceremony also featured the TeleKETCS film on
Penance (very, very excellent, moving many, perhaps most to
tears), joint recitation of two psalms, a brief homily, and words
or gestures of reconcilation and peace at the conclusion.
The questions and answers which follow guided us in our
evaluation of the experiment and reflect views of both the
planners and the participants.
Was it too long? Probably. The laity didn’t object and one
couldn’t detect in the congregation the usual deadly signs of
boredom - coughing, uneasiness, watch-glancing, but we felt it
could have been slightly shortened. Omission of one reading
with introductory remarks and its reflective pause would just
about take care of that difficulty.
How successful? Moderately so. It attracted fewer than
anticipated, although other factors (snow, shopping, basketball)
may have interferred with attendance. However, there were
enough to justify the effort and those who worshipped that
evening, as far as we could determine, generally found the
service inspirational and a source of true spiritual renewal.
Did they become confused and wonder if this replaced
confession? Very definitely. A sermon on the preceding Sunday
and the homily within the rite itself attempted to explain these
points: forgiveness of sins can come outside of confession in
many ways (e.g., reception of the Eucharist, works of charity);
serious failures require submission to the priest in the context of
confession; confession, even when not required, offers much to
us in terms of grace and growth. But some in the coffee and
cookie period after the service indicated by their conversation
that they really hadn’t grasped these nations.
Wouldn’t general absolution within the ceremony solve the
difficulty? I don’t really think so. Apart from current Church
legislation which prohibits this except in cases of emergency, it
seems to me there are serious practical, pastoral reasons which
make that unwise.
If mortal sin means a free, deep, total rejection of God’s love
and his plan for us, then is it sufficient for one guilty of this to
be reconciled through a group communal rite, however beautiful
and compelling? I have my doubts and the long tradition of the
Church would seem to support me in that conviction. Moreover,
if we believe that lesser sins can be forgiven outside confession
by sharing in something like a common penance service, then
why complicate matters by interjecting an absolution formula
within the ceremony.
Why not interrupt the rite, make sufficient priests available
and have participants confess individually to them? This
apparently is a frequent resolution of the problem. In it, the
penitent skips the initial formula (bless me Father . . .), merely
recites a list of sins and the confessor omits advice, counseling
or other words tailored to needs of the specific person. All then
normally complete a single, previously agreed upon penance.
I am not one to quibble with success - and this procedure
does seem to enjoy considerable popularity -- but I retain
serious reservations about the practice. The confessor here
becomes an absolving machine and, further, is in effect
prohibited from any type of dialogue or discussion with the
penitent should then seem desirable or necessary.
Anything which tends to interfere with the freedom of either
the priest confessor or the person confessing has always made
me most uncomfortable. I view this solution in that light and, in
addition, see it forcing confession into a false framework for the
sake of giving participants the best of both worlds.
What did we do about confession? We invited other priests
over for the occasion and, following the service offered those
who wished this opportunity for individual confession of sins.
Moreover, the ceremony didn’t really conclude. After the
gesture of peace and reconciliation the musicians (organ and
guitar) played for about five minutes, creating an atmosphere in
which those who attended either pondered what took place,
moved toward the confessionals, or walked downstairs for
refreshments.
The quiet sense of repentance and hope (not really an
ebullient rejoicing) continued on and we were busy with
confessions (fruitful ones I would add) nearly an hour
afterwards.
My overall impression? The common penance service serves
an excellent purpose, should be conducted several times a year
(e.g., Advent, Lent), complements confession, but does not and
ought not to replace it.
w o men who were
under-privileged to be very
valuable persons .. .He
treated them as equals, as
individuals. This, I think, is
the cue in the life and
teachings of Jesus that the
rest of us must follow in this
respect.”
Her point is well made.
Even though the Church of
Jesus has only very slowly
overcome cultural bias and
social discrimination against
women, Jesus himself stands
out by his respect for women.
Some of the most moving
moments in the Gospels are
the encounters of Jesus with
women, moments rich in
human love and divine
revelation.
Reflect for a moment on
the sensitive respect with
which he related the accused
adultress (Jn. 8:1-11) and the
public sinner (Lk. 7:36-50).
Some of his deepest insights
were revealed in conversation
with women like Martha (Jn.
11:17-44) and her sister Mary
(Lk. 10:38-42) and with the
women he met at Jacob’s well
in Samaria (Jn. 4:5-42). Even
in the midst of His agonizing
walk to Calvary, he had
respectful words for the
weeping women (Lk.
23:17-23), and one of his last
thoughts was for the care of
his bereaved mother (Jn.
10:25-27). It was Mary of
Magdala who first met him on
Easter Sunday morning, and
he entrusted to her the
mission of telling the
Apostles that he was alive
(Jn. 20:11-18). He responded
to each person, male or
female, with the same deep
respect and sensitivity. He
lived out what St. Paul later
taught: in Christ there is no
discrimination between men
and women: all are free, all
are liberated.
Fortunately the teaching
of the Second Vatican
Council comes closer to
Jesus’ life and teaching
regarding the role of women.
Recognizing women’s claim
for equal rights (Church in
World, 9) the Council
condemns all discrimination
against women (Church in
World, 29). Recognizing the
vital role of women in the
home, the Council seeks to
preserve the domestic role of
the mother (Church in World,
52) while encouraging women
to assume an active role in
the cultural life of
contemporary society
(Church in World, 60) and
the apostolic work of the
Church (Laity, 9).
It would seem that one of
the major educational tasks
of the Church is to encourage
and enable genuine respect
for the rights of women --
both in the Church itself and
in society. It would seem also
that this educational task can
be accomplished only
through the shared insights
and mutual collaboration of
men and women in the
Church’s educational life.
Only then will Jerri’s insight
be true factually as well as
theologically: “Every
Christian woman is a
liberated woman.”