Tag: feminism

One of the hardest things for me to shed as an adult convert was the secular feminism I’d adopted since my late teens. Feminism that insisted “bodily autonomy”–the ability to control what I do with my own body–is the foundation of authentic freedom as a woman. If I want to have sex with a man (or woman), use birth control, or even have an abortion, so what? It’s my body, after all.

Part of the reason I “needed” the right to do whatever I wanted with my body is that I’d been taught this would ultimately lead to happiness. Casual sex and cohabitation (I thought) enabled me to “test drive” men, with each ex-boyfriend being one step closer to the man of my dreams. And since I’d clearly need to weed out the frogs on the way to my prince, contraception was not only necessary, but essential. Should contraception fail, I needed abortion to ensure I wasn’t accidentally tied to one of those frogs for life. Or have my plans for a career derailed.

There was only one problem: none of those things made me happy. Instead of empowering me, every new casual sex partner left me feeling used and worthless. The long-term relationships were even more damaging, because I had to repeatedly reconcile the “I love yous” with their refusal to sacrifice for me…the “I’ll never leave yous” with their exit from the relationship. With each new wound, my ability to trust grew weaker. I realized the only way to survive emotionally was to wall up the deepest part of myself so the pain wasn’t as devastating when it came again. By the time I met my husband, there was a fortress around my heart–a fortress that he is still, 15 years later, taking down, brick by brick.

Why didn’t living as an enlightened modern woman make me happy? In essence, because modern feminism is based on freeing women from their biology. Or more specifically, from their ability to conceive and nurture new life. But our femininity is not incidental to who we are, the way hair color or body shape is. Instead, it is inextricably linked to who we are as persons made in the image and likeness of God. The body God gave us–those inconvenient breasts and wombs– reflect the unique feminine dignity God bestowed on us. I believe, too, that our bodies are a reflection of our souls, whose very nature is to receive love, conceive new life, and bring that life forth to the world. And any feminism that pits women against their own natures is bound to fail.

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In his 1988 Apostolic letter, On the Dignity and Vocation of Women, John Paul II wrote that Genesis clearly shows that man and woman are of equal dignity. God made Eve for Adam, who looked at his wife and declared that she was literally a part of him: “Flesh of my flesh, bone of my body.” God made Adam and Even and then called them to “be fruitful and multiply,” which tells us that “to be human means to be called to interpersonal communion,” according to the Pope.

The Pope goes on to cite Paul VI, who wrote in Joy and Hope (1965):

The Lord Jesus, when he prayed to the Father ‘that all may be one … as we are one’ in John 17 opened up vistas closed to human reason. For he implied a certain likeness between the union of the divine Persons and the union of God’s children…This likeness reveals that man, who is the only creature on earth which God willed for its own sake, cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of self.

This is the Catholic vision of the human person, but especially what it means to be a woman. Every woman’s deepest desire is to make a gift of herself. We know this deep in our souls, don’t we? We want to shelter the vulnerable. We want to nurture souls, and not so much because we enjoy feeling needed. A woman wants to nurture souls because her real goal is to see that soul reach its potential. Women take supreme pleasure in helping others reach their potential. It is our unique genius.

We see this desire born out most obviously in the family, through motherhood. A mother’s greatest desire is to see her children grow up and become all they can be. But the desire to nurture and lift others up manifests in all our relationships. When we hear of a struggling new mother, we trip over ourselves to help her. We know she has the potential to be an amazing mother if we can just get her through this rough spot. That’s really why we nag men to death…because we know that within them are perfect husbands who volunteer to do the laundry and cook. Women see people not as they are, but as they can be. Women are visionaries! The deepest desire of a woman’s heart is to give herself away so that others may flourish.

But surely this is just a stereotype of womanhood that religion has perpetrated upon women, right? Surely if women get away from those oppressive influences they can be their real selves, which as the modern feminist tell us, is really rooted in self-interest. Far from giving herself away, women really desire to take from others to fulfill themselves, we’re told.

Believe it or not, one of the best arenas to look for when it comes to evidence about the true nature of women is among lesbians. After all, lesbians have arguably cast off the shackles of Judeo-Christian stereotypes about women more completely than many heterosexual women. They no longer have a man around telling them that they have to be “feminine” or “nurturing.” There’s no fear of pregnancy anymore.

Two phenomena about lesbians point to the fact that women’s desire to conceive new life and nurture others to reach their potential is an innate quality in women and not a social construct. First is lesbian fusion. Psychologists studying lesbian relationships in the 1980s found that lesbians often became unhealthily emotionally attached to one another. According to a 2001 article titled, “Not tonight, dear, I’m deconstructing a headache–confessions of a lesbian sex therapist,” counselor M. Hall claims that:

[A]relentless focus on nurturing would increase exponentially when two women coupled. This forfeiture of individuality created a relational greenhouse effect which suffocated passion.

Researchers have found that lesbians can nurture each other so much that the sexual attraction fizzles. With two mommies, is it any wonder? (Ironically, as soon as studies showed lesbians were actually have less sex than heterosexual couples, lesbian feminists began to question the very notion that sex is a necessary component of a healthy relationship!)

And that’s just the nurturing part…surely these liberated women don’t want to actually use their fertility, do they? A quick Google search tells you lesbians are instead flocking to fertility clinics to have babies and have even sued to force fertility clinics to allow gays and lesbians (but mostly lesbians) to obtain treatment. Women–whether they are lesbians or bisexual or straight–want babies. The desire to conceive new life and nurture it is not a social construct–it is in our very nature as female persons.

What the Church teaches, and what modern feminists cannot accept, is that while men and women have equal dignity, we have different roles to play in the world. The Church says that a woman’s unique contribution to the world comes through her femininity and that a woman’s nature is to be in service to life. And that doesn’t just mean biological life, but all life. Consequently, when you suppress or destroy what is inherent to a woman—her ability to conceive and nurture new life—you do not serve her but visit great violence upon her as a person.

And yet, so many of us are willing and even anxious to suppress or destroy our own femininity through contraception and sterilization. We are so desperate for union that we will sacrifice the very part of ourselves that makes our gift of self so precious and unique: our fertility. We carve out the most unique part of ourselves (usually for a man) and then tell ourselves it’s empowering. Cosmo covers like the one here witness to this truth month after month.

Feminists insist that women’s equality with men requires us to be liberated from our biology–we will never really be free until we can free ourselves from our ability to bear children. We’ve become reluctant to admit that there are any  real differences between men and women, much less profound ones, as if acknowledging those differences might somehow keep us from success. But then again, acknowledging sexual differences might lead us to believe we have different roles and responsibilities, and feminists refuse to accept any responsibilities they don’t freely assume. Even ones stamped into their very bodies.

Edith Stein, a Jewish convert to Catholicism, reflected upon the role and vocation of women in the modern world during World War II. While firmly defending women’s opportunity to enter any profession they choose, Stein nonetheless insisted there were essential differences between men and women, perhaps the most important one being that the essence of woman is receptivity and motherhood. Stein argued that women are feminine to the core and that our bodies are in fact a reflection of our souls. Women are made to receive love, conceive and nurture new life, and then bring that new life to the world. Both on a spiritual and biological level.

This did not mean Stein believed in a “barefoot and pregnant” reductionist view of womanhood, the kind which sees woman as a passive prisoner of her biology, and slave to her tyrant fertility. Rather, she saw receptivity and motherliness as woman’s unique power, a power capable of transforming a home, workplace, professional environment, country, or society in ways that men cannot.

I recently discussed this with my daughter, who wanted to know what kind of boss I was pre-kids, when I headed a magazine. As a supervisor, I motivated my staff through lavish praise and encouragement–not competition. I encouraged them to work toward personal goals and I wasn’t threatened by their ambition; I even told my assistant I was training her for my job! I found that nurturing the individuals I supervised–not in a touchy-feely way, but professionally–was highly effective and made for a more cooperative and positive work environment.

Women, I told my daughter, bring unique gifts to the workplace because they know how to bring out the best in others. Which is why we will always need female doctors, professors, and executives. But the world won’t benefit from women’s unique gifts as long as they view masculinity as something more attractive to be emulated.

Men and women have equal dignity, but we were also designed by God to complement one another biologically, emotionally, and spiritually. And this complementarity in no way diminishes our importance. Nor should that complementarity be used as an excuse to deny women opportunities in work and education, as it was in the past (e.g, Women don’t “need’ to vote, don’t “need” to work because men take care of them). Sixty years ago, women saw men serving themselves and not the family. Their solution, sadly, was to demand the right to destroy their fertility and with it, their unique feminine gifts. In short, to be a man.

The Church is criticized because it refuses to embrace a feminism that sets women against themselves, and against the new life they’re privileged to shelter. It says to its sons, “Loving a woman requires you to accept all of her–body and soul–including her fertility.” And to its daughters, “Your femininity reflects a most profound dignity bestowed on you by your Creator and you deserve a man who will love and accept all of you–including your fertility.” The Church is called anti-woman because it insists women deserve to be respected just as we are and that we ought never surrender our feminine dignity for anyone. Ourselves included.

I was deeply unhappy as a secular feminist because I’d been taught the contradictory maxim that I could only be empowered by suppressing (usually for a man’s convenience) that very part of me most essential to who I am. My only consolation is that my three daughters will grow up knowing they can succeed, not despite being a woman, but because they’re one.

I am woman, hear me roar: true feminism is truly Catholic.