Vatican & Feminism
The Vatican has released a letter to bishops describing the role of women in the Church. This particular document is very based in the past, and has been signed by the Pope. The ban on female priests has been further continued. The main beef the Vatican has with Feminism seems to be the idea that men and women are fundamentally the same.
This is one of the prime tenants of feminism, with the differences being largely physical and cultural in nature. The Vatican sought to underline the differences between men and women, lest such distinctions be blurred. Yes, there are differences but not in terms of what each is good at.
What is interesting to note is that this document was released in order to address a perceived hostility. This hostility is what the Vatican believes exists between men and women as a result of north American style feminism, in the sense that it is almost a class issue. This document was released in order to provide a more Christian method of handling these issues.
The BBC had a nice article giving the views of a feminist on this, and was very complimentary. The Church has actually addressed feminism for the very first time, some forty years late. But it has addressed it. This is big, in her view. Very big. We're still no where near female priests, but no longer is the official view that women do not belong in the work-place.
One of the real downsides to the underlining of the differences between men and women was another attack on homosexuality. It seems feminism has also promoted the idea that gay people can create healthy families, and that just isn't the case. Ahem. I have to remind myself that this *IS* the Catholic Church here, and that it'll probably be several decades after same-sex marriage is legalized nationally before they get around to admitting that maybe it isn't so bad afterall.
This is one of the prime tenants of feminism, with the differences being largely physical and cultural in nature. The Vatican sought to underline the differences between men and women, lest such distinctions be blurred. Yes, there are differences but not in terms of what each is good at.
What is interesting to note is that this document was released in order to address a perceived hostility. This hostility is what the Vatican believes exists between men and women as a result of north American style feminism, in the sense that it is almost a class issue. This document was released in order to provide a more Christian method of handling these issues.
The BBC had a nice article giving the views of a feminist on this, and was very complimentary. The Church has actually addressed feminism for the very first time, some forty years late. But it has addressed it. This is big, in her view. Very big. We're still no where near female priests, but no longer is the official view that women do not belong in the work-place.
One of the real downsides to the underlining of the differences between men and women was another attack on homosexuality. It seems feminism has also promoted the idea that gay people can create healthy families, and that just isn't the case. Ahem. I have to remind myself that this *IS* the Catholic Church here, and that it'll probably be several decades after same-sex marriage is legalized nationally before they get around to admitting that maybe it isn't so bad afterall.
posted by Corwin at 3:54 PM
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