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Introduction
1.
The Church, expert in humanity, has a perennial interest in whatever concerns
men and women. In recent times, much reflection has been given to the question
of the dignity of women and to women’s rights and duties in the different
areas of civil society and the Church. Having contributed to a deeper
understanding of this fundamental question, in particular through the teaching
of John Paul II,(1) the Church is called today to address certain currents of
thought which are often at variance with the authentic advancement of women.
After
a brief presentation and critical evaluation of some current conceptions of
human nature, this document will offer reflections – inspired by the
doctrinal elements of the biblical vision of the human person that are
indispensable for safeguarding his or her identity – on some of the
essentials of a correct understanding of active collaboration, in recognition
of the difference between men and women in the Church and in the world. These
reflections are meant as a starting point for further examination in the
Church, as well as an impetus for dialogue with all men and women of good will,
in a sincere search for the truth and in a common commitment to the development
of ever more authentic relationships.
I The Question
2.
Recent years have seen new approaches to women’s issues. A first tendency
is to emphasize strongly conditions of subordination in order to give rise to
antagonism: women, in order to be themselves, must make themselves the
adversaries of men. Faced with the abuse of power, the answer for women is to
seek power. This process leads to opposition between men and women, in which
the identity and role of one are emphasized to the disadvantage of the other,
leading to harmful confusion regarding the human person, which has its most
immediate and lethal effects in the structure of the family.
A
second tendency emerges in the wake of the first. In order to avoid the
domination of one sex or the other, their differences tend to be denied, viewed
as mere effects of historical and cultural conditioning. In this perspective,
physical difference, termed sex, is minimized, while the purely cultural
element, termed gender, is emphasized to the maximum and held to be
primary. The obscuring of the difference or duality of the sexes has enormous
consequences on a variety of levels. This theory of the human person, intended
to promote prospects for equality of women through liberation from biological
determinism, has in reality inspired ideologies which, for example, call into
question the family, in its natural two-parent structure of mother and father,
and make homosexuality and heterosexuality virtually equivalent, in a new model
of polymorphous sexuality.
3.
While the immediate roots of this second tendency are found in the context of
reflection on women’s roles, its deeper motivation must be sought in the
human attempt to be freed from one’s biological conditioning.(2) According
to this perspective, human nature in itself does not possess characteristics in
an absolute manner: all persons can and ought to constitute themselves as they
like, since they are free from every predetermination linked to their essential
constitution.
This
perspective has many consequences. Above all it strengthens the idea that the
liberation of women entails criticism of Sacred Scripture, which would be seen
as handing on a patriarchal conception of God nourished by an essentially
male-dominated culture. Second, this tendency would consider as lacking in
importance and relevance the fact that the Son of God assumed human nature in
its male form.
4. In
the face of these currents of thought, the Church, enlightened by faith in
Jesus Christ, speaks instead of active collaboration between the sexes
precisely in the recognition of the difference between man and woman.
To
understand better the basis, meaning and consequences of this response it is
helpful to turn briefly to the Sacred Scriptures, rich also in human wisdom, in
which this response is progressively manifested thanks to God’s
intervention on behalf of humanity.(3)
II Basic Elements of the Biblical Vision of the Human Person
5.
The first biblical texts to examine are the first three chapters of Genesis.
Here we “enter into the setting of the biblical ‘beginning’. In
it the revealed truth concerning the human person as ‘the image and
likeness’ of God constitutes the immutable basis of all Christian
anthropology”.(4)
The
first text (Gn 1:1-2:4) describes the creative power of the Word of God, which
makes distinctions in the original chaos. Light and darkness appear, sea and
dry land, day and night, grass and trees, fish and birds, “each according
to its kind”. An ordered world is born out of differences, carrying with
them also the promise of relationships. Here we see a sketch of the framework
in which the creation of the human race takes place: “God said ‘Let
us make man in our image, after our likeness’” (Gn 1:26). And then:
“God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them” (Gn1:27). From the very beginning
therefore, humanity is described as articulated in the male-female
relationship. This is the humanity, sexually differentiated, which is
explicitly declared “the image of God”.
6.
The second creation account (Gn 2:4-25) confirms in a definitive way the
importance of sexual difference. Formed by God and placed in the garden which
he was to cultivate, the man, who is still referred to with the generic
expression Adam, experienced a loneliness which the presence of the
animals is not able to overcome. He needs a helpmate who will be his
partner. The term here does not refer to an inferior, but to a vital helper.(5)
This is so that Adam’s life does not sink into a sterile and, in
the end, baneful encounter with himself. It is necessary that he enter into
relationship with another being on his own level. Only the woman, created from
the same “flesh” and cloaked in the same mystery, can give a future
to the life of the man. It is therefore above all on the ontological level that
this takes place, in the sense that God’s creation of woman characterizes
humanity as a relational reality. In this encounter, the man speaks words for
the first time, expressive of his wonderment: “This at last is bone of my
bones and flesh of my flesh” (Gn 2:23).
As
the Holy Father has written with regard to this text from Genesis,
“...woman is another ‘I’ in a common humanity. From the very
beginning they appear as a ‘unity of the two’, and this signifies
that the original solitude is overcome, the solitude in which man does not find
‘a helper fit for him’ (Gn 2:20). Is it only a question here of a
‘helper’ in activity, in ‘subduing the earth’ (cf. Gn
1:28)? Certainly it is a matter of a life’s companion with whom, as a
wife, the man can unite himself, becoming with her ‘one flesh’ and
for this reason leaving ‘his father and his mother’(cf. Gn
2:24)”.(6)
This
vital difference is oriented toward communion and was lived in peace, expressed
by their nakedness: “And the man and his wife were both naked, yet they
felt no shame” (Gn 2:25). In this way, the human body, marked with the
sign of masculinity or femininity, “includes right from the beginning the
nuptial attribute, that is, the capacity of expressing love, that love in
which the person becomes a gift and – by means of this gift –
fulfils the meaning of his being and his existence”.(7) Continuing his
commentary on these verses of Genesis, the Holy Father writes: “In this
peculiarity, the body is the expression of the spirit and is called, in the
mystery of creation, to exist in the communion of persons in the image of
God”.(8)
Through this same spousal perspective, the ancient Genesis narrative allows us
to understand how woman, in her deepest and original being, exists “for
the other” (cf. 1 Cor 11:9): this is a statement which, far from any sense
of alienation, expresses a fundamental aspect of the similarity with the Triune
God, whose Persons, with the coming of Christ, are revealed as being in a
communion of love, each for the others. “In the ‘unity of the
two’, man and woman are called from the beginning not only to exist
‘side by side’ or ‘together’, but they are also called to
exist mutually ‘one for the other’... The text of Genesis 2:18-25
shows that marriage is the first and, in a sense, the fundamental dimension of
this call. But it is not the only one. The whole of human history unfolds
within the context of this call. In this history, on the basis of the principle
of mutually being ‘for’ the other in interpersonal
‘communion’, there develops in humanity itself, in accordance with
God’s will, the integration of what is ‘masculine’ and what is
‘feminine’”.(9)
The
peaceful vision which concludes the second creation account recalls the
“indeed it was very good” (Gn 1:31) at the end of the first account.
Here we find the heart of God’s original plan and the deepest truth about
man and woman, as willed and created by him. Although God’s original plan
for man and woman will later be upset and darkened by sin, it can never be
abrogated.
7.
Original sin changes the way in which the man and the woman receive and live
the Word of God as well as their relationship with the Creator. Immediately
after having given them the gift of the garden, God gives them a positive
command (cf. Gn 2:16), followed by a negative one (cf. Gn 2:17), in which the
essential difference between God and humanity is implicitly expressed.
Following enticement by the serpent, the man and the woman deny this
difference. As a consequence, the way in which they live their sexual
difference is also upset. In this way, the Genesis account establishes a
relationship of cause and effect between the two differences: when humanity
considers God its enemy, the relationship between man and woman becomes
distorted. When this relationship is damaged, their access to the face of God
risks being compromised in turn.
God’s decisive words to the woman after the first sin express the kind of
relationship which has now been introduced between man and woman: “your
desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you” (Gn 3:16).
It will be a relationship in which love will frequently be debased into pure
self-seeking, in a relationship which ignores and kills love and replaces it
with the yoke of domination of one sex over the other. Indeed the story of
humanity is continuously marked by this situation, which recalls the three-fold
concupiscence mentioned by Saint John: the concupiscence of the flesh, the
concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life (cf. 1 Jn 2:16). In this tragic
situation, the equality, respect and love that are required in the relationship
of man and woman according to God’s original plan, are lost.
8.
Reviewing these fundamental texts allows us to formulate some of the principal
elements of the biblical vision of the human person.
Above
all, the fact that human beings are persons needs to be underscored:
“Man is a person, man and woman equally so, since both were created
in the image and likeness of the personal God”.(10) Their equal dignity as
persons is realized as physical, psychological and ontological complementarity,
giving rise to a harmonious relationship of “uni-duality”, which only
sin and “the structures of sin” inscribed in culture render
potentially conflictual. The biblical vision of the human person suggests that
problems related to sexual difference, whether on the public or private level,
should be addressed by a relational approach and not by competition or
retaliation.
Furthermore, the importance and the meaning of sexual difference, as a reality
deeply inscribed in man and woman, needs to be noted. “Sexuality
characterizes man and woman not only on the physical level, but also on the
psychological and spiritual, making its mark on each of their
expressions”.(11) It cannot be reduced to a pure and insignificant
biological fact, but rather “is a fundamental component of personality,
one of its modes of being, of manifestation, of communicating with others, of
feeling, of expressing and of living human love”.(12) This capacity to
love – reflection and image of God who is Love – is disclosed in the
spousal character of the body, in which the masculinity or femininity of the
person is expressed.
The
human dimension of sexuality is inseparable from the theological dimension. The
human creature, in its unity of soul and body, is characterized therefore, from
the very beginning, by the relationship with the other-beyond-the-self. This
relationship is presented as still good and yet, at the same time, changed. It
is good from its original goodness, declared by God from the first moment of
creation. It has been changed however by the disharmony between God and
humanity introduced by sin. This alteration does not correspond to the initial
plan of God for man and woman, nor to the truth of the relationship between the
sexes. It follows then that the relationship is good, but wounded and in need
of healing.
What
might be the ways of this healing? Considering and analyzing the problems in
the relationship between the sexes solely from the standpoint of the situation
marked by sin would lead to a return to the errors mentioned above. The logic
of sin needs to be broken and a way forward needs to be found that is capable
of banishing it from the hearts of sinful humanity. A clear orientation in this
sense is provided in the third chapter of Genesis by God’s promise of a
Saviour, involving the “woman” and her “offspring” (cf. Gn
3:15). It is a promise which will be preceded by a long preparation in history
before it is realized.
9. An
early victory over evil is seen in the story of Noah, the just man, who guided
by God, avoids the flood with his family and the various species of animals
(cf. Gn 6-9). But it is above all in God’s choice of Abraham and his
descendants (cf. Gn 12:1ff) that the hope of salvation is confirmed. God begins
in this way to unveil his countenance so that, through the chosen people,
humanity will learn the path of divine likeness, that is, the way of holiness,
and thus of transformation of heart. Among the many ways in which God reveals
himself to his people (cf. Heb 1:1), in keeping with a long and patient
pedagogy, there is the recurring theme of the covenant between man and woman.
This is paradoxical if we consider the drama recounted in Genesis and its
concrete repetition in the time of the prophets, as well as the mixing of the
sacred and the sexual found in the religions which surrounded Israel. And yet
this symbolism is indispensable for understanding the way in which God loves
his people: God makes himself known as the Bridegroom who loves Israel his
Bride.
If,
in this relationship, God can be described as a “jealous God” (cf. Ex
20:5; Nah 1:2) and Israel denounced as an “adulterous” bride or
“prostitute” (cf. Hos 2:4-15; Ez 16:15-34), it is because of the
hope, reinforced by the prophets, of seeing Jerusalem become the perfect bride:
“For as a young man marries a virgin so shall your creator marry you, and
as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over
you” (Is 62:5). Recreated “in righteousness and in justice, in
steadfast love and in mercy” (Hos 2:21), she who had wandered far away to
search for life and happiness in false gods will return, and “shall
respond as in the days of her youth” (Hos 2:17) to him who will speak to
her heart; she will hear it said: “Your bridegroom is your Creator”
(Is54:5). It is substantially the same reality which is expressed when,
parallel to the mystery of God’s action through the male figure of the
suffering Servant, the Book of the prophet Isaiah evokes the feminine figure of
Zion, adorned with a transcendence and a sanctity which prefigure the gift of
salvation destined for Israel.
The
Song of Songs is an important moment in the use of this form of revelation. In
the words of a most human love, which celebrate the beauty of the human body
and the joy of mutual seeking, God’s love for his people is also
expressed. The Church’s recognition of her relationship to Christ in this
audacious conjunction of language about what is most human with language about
what is most divine, cannot be said to be mistaken.
In
the course of the Old Testament, a story of salvation takes shape which
involves the simultaneous participation of male and female. While having an
evident metaphorical dimension, the terms bridegroom and bride – and
covenant as well – which characterize the dynamic of salvation, are much
more than simple metaphors. This spousal language touches on the very nature of
the relationship which God establishes with his people, even though that
relationship is more expansive than human spousal experience. Likewise, the
same concrete conditions of redemption are at play in the way in which
prophetic statements, such as those of Isaiah, associate masculine and feminine
roles in proclaiming and prefiguring the work of salvation which God is about
to undertake. This salvation orients the reader both toward the male figure of
the suffering Servant as well as to the female figure of Zion. The prophetic
utterances of Isaiah in fact alternate between this figure and the Servant of
God, before culminating at the end of the book with the mystical vision of
Jerusalem, which gives birth to a people in a single day (cf. Is 66: 7-14), a
prophecy of the great new things which God is about to do (cf. Is 48: 6-8).
10.
All these prefigurations find their fulfillment in the New Testament. On the
one hand, Mary, the chosen daughter of Zion, in her femininity, sums up and
transfigures the condition of Israel/Bride waiting for the day of her
salvation. On the other hand, the masculinity of the Son shows how Jesus
assumes in his person all that the Old Testament symbolism had applied to the
love of God for his people, described as the love of a bridegroom for his
bride. The figures of Jesus and Mary his mother not only assure the continuity
of the New Testament with the Old, but go beyond it, since – as Saint
Irenaeus wrote – with Jesus Christ “all newness” appears.(13)
This
aspect is particularly evident in the Gospel of John. In the scene of the
wedding feast at Cana, for example, Jesus is asked by his mother, who is called
“woman”, to offer, as a sign, the new wine of the future wedding with
humanity (cf. Jn 2:1-12). This messianic wedding is accomplished on the Cross
when, again in the presence of his mother, once again called “woman”,
the blood/wine of the New Covenant pours forth from the open heart of the
crucified Christ (cf. Jn 19:25-27, 34).(14) It is therefore not at all
surprising that John the Baptist, when asked who he is, describes himself as
“the friend of the bridegroom”, who rejoices to hear the
bridegroom’s voice and must be eclipsed by his coming: “He who has
the bride is the bridegroom; the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears
him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice; therefore this joy of
mine is now full. He must increase, but I must decrease” (Jn3:29-30).(15)
In
his apostolic activity, Paul develops the whole nuptial significance of the
redemption by seeing Christian life as a nuptial mystery. He writes to the
Church in Corinth, which he had founded: “I feel a divine jealousy for
you, for I betrothed you to Christ to present you as a chaste virgin to her one
husband” (2 Cor 11:2).
In
the Letter to the Ephesians, the spousal relationship between Christ and the
Church is taken up again and deepened in its implications. In the New Covenant,
the beloved bride is the Church, and as the Holy Father teaches in his
Letter to Families: “This bride, of whom the Letter to the Ephesians
speaks, is present in each of the baptized and is like one who presents herself
before her Bridegroom: ‘Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for
her..., that he might present the Church to himself in splendour, without spot
or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish’
(Eph 5:25-27)”. (16)
Reflecting on the unity of man and woman as described at the moment of the
world’s creation (cf. Gn 2:24), the Apostle exclaims: “this mystery
is a profound one, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the
Church” (Eph 5:32). The love of a man and a woman, lived out in the power
of baptismal life, now becomes the sacrament of the love between Christ and his
Church, and a witness to the mystery of fidelity and unity from which the
“New Eve” is born and by which she lives in her earthly pilgrimage
toward the fullness of the eternal wedding.
11.
Drawn into the Paschal mystery and made living signs of the love of Christ and
his Church, the hearts of Christian spouses are renewed and they are able to
avoid elements of concupiscence in their relationship, as well as the
subjugation introduced into the life of the first married couple by the break
with God caused by sin. For Christian spouses, the goodness of love, for which
the wounded human heart has continued to long, is revealed with new accents and
possibilities. It is in this light that Jesus, faced with the question about
divorce (cf. Mt 19:3-9), recalls the demands of the covenant between man and
woman as willed by God at the beginning, that is, before the eruption of sin
which had justified the later accommodations found in the Mosaic Law. Far from
being the imposition of a hard and inflexible order, these words of Jesus are
actually the proclamation of the “good news” of that faithfulness
which is stronger than sin. The power of the resurrection makes possible the
victory of faithfulness over weakness, over injuries and over the couple’s
sins. In the grace of Christ which renews their hearts, man and woman become
capable of being freed from sin and of knowing the joy of mutual giving.
12.
“For all of you who have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ...
there is neither male nor female”, writes Saint Paul to the Galatians
(3:27-28). The Apostle Paul does not say that the distinction between man and
woman, which in other places is referred to the plan of God, has been erased.
He means rather that in Christ the rivalry, enmity and violence which
disfigured the relationship between men and women can be overcome and have been
overcome. In this sense, the distinction between man and woman is reaffirmed
more than ever; indeed, it is present in biblical revelation up to the very
end. In the final hour of present history, the Book of Revelation of Saint
John, speaking of “a new heaven and a new earth” (Rev 21:1), presents
the vision of a feminine Jerusalem “prepared as a bride adorned for her
husband” (Rev 21:2). Revelation concludes with the words of the Bride and
the Spirit who beseech the coming of the Bridegroom, “Come, Lord
Jesus!” (Rev22:20).
Male
and female are thus revealed as belonging ontologically to creation and
destined therefore to outlast the present time, evidently in a
transfigured form. In this way, they characterize the “love that never
ends” (1Cor 13:8), although the temporal and earthly expression of
sexuality is transient and ordered to a phase of life marked by procreation and
death. Celibacy for the sake of the Kingdom seeks to be the prophecy of this
form of future existence of male and female. For those who live it, it is an
anticipation of the reality of a life which, while remaining that of a man and
a woman, will no longer be subject to the present limitations of the marriage
relationship (cf. Mt22:30). For those in married life, celibacy becomes the
reminder and prophecy of the completion which their own relationship will find
in the face-to-face encounter with God.
From
the first moment of their creation, man and woman are distinct, and will remain
so for all eternity. Placed within Christ’s Paschal mystery, they no
longer see their difference as a source of discord to be overcome by denial or
eradication, but rather as the possibility for collaboration, to be cultivated
with mutual respect for their difference. From here, new perspectives open up
for a deeper understanding of the dignity of women and their role in human
society and in the Church.
III The Importance of Feminine Values in the Life of Society
13.
Among the fundamental values linked to women’s actual lives is what has
been called a “capacity for the other”. Although a certain type of
feminist rhetoric makes demands “for ourselves”, women preserve the
deep intuition of the goodness in their lives of those actions which elicit
life, and contribute to the growth and protection of the other.
This
intuition is linked to women’s physical capacity to give life. Whether
lived out or remaining potential, this capacity is a reality that structures
the female personality in a profound way. It allows her to acquire maturity
very quickly, and gives a sense of the seriousness of life and of its
responsibilities. A sense and a respect for what is concrete develop in her,
opposed to abstractions which are so often fatal for the existence of
individuals and society. It is women, in the end, who even in very desperate
situations, as attested by history past and present, possess a singular
capacity to persevere in adversity, to keep life going even in extreme
situations, to hold tenaciously to the future, and finally to remember with
tears the value of every human life.
Although motherhood is a key element of women’s identity, this does not
mean that women should be considered from the sole perspective of physical
procreation. In this area, there can be serious distortions, which extol
biological fecundity in purely quantitative terms and are often accompanied by
dangerous disrespect for women. The existence of the Christian vocation of
virginity, radical with regard to both the Old Testament tradition and the
demands made by many societies, is of the greatest importance in this
regard.(17) Virginity refutes any attempt to enclose women in mere biological
destiny. Just as virginity receives from physical motherhood the insight that
there is no Christian vocation except in the concrete gift of oneself to the
other, so physical motherhood receives from virginity an insight into its
fundamentally spiritual dimension: it is in not being content only to give
physical life that the other truly comes into existence. This means that
motherhood can find forms of full realization also where there is no physical
procreation.(18)
In
this perspective, one understands the irreplaceable role of women in all
aspects of family and social life involving human relationships and caring for
others. Here what John Paul II has termed the genius of women becomes
very clear.(19) It implies first of all that women be significantly and
actively present in the family, “the primordial and, in a certain sense
sovereign society”,(20) since it is here above all that the features of a
people take shape; it is here that its members acquire basic teachings. They
learn to love inasmuch as they are unconditionally loved, they learn respect
for others inasmuch as they are respected, they learn to know the face of God
inasmuch as they receive a first revelation of it from a father and a mother
full of attention in their regard. Whenever these fundamental experiences are
lacking, society as a whole suffers violence and becomes in turn the progenitor
of more violence. It means also that women should be present in the world of
work and in the organization of society, and that women should have access to
positions of responsibility which allow them to inspire the policies of nations
and to promote innovative solutions to economic and social problems.
In
this regard, it cannot be forgotten that the interrelationship between these
two activities – family and work – has, for women, characteristics
different from those in the case of men. The harmonization of the organization
of work and laws governing work with the demands stemming from the mission of
women within the family is a challenge. The question is not only legal,
economic and organizational; it is above all a question of mentality, culture,
and respect. Indeed, a just valuing of the work of women within the family is
required. In this way, women who freely desire will be able to devote the
totality of their time to the work of the household without being stigmatized
by society or penalized financially, while those who wish also to engage in
other work may be able to do so with an appropriate work-schedule, and not have
to choose between relinquishing their family life or enduring continual stress,
with negative consequences for one’s own equilibrium and the harmony of
the family. As John Paul II has written, “it will redound to the credit of
society to make it possible for a mother – without inhibiting her freedom,
without psychological or practical discrimination and without penalizing her as
compared with other women – to devote herself to taking care of her
children and educating them in accordance with their needs, which vary with
age”.(21)
14.
It is appropriate however to recall that the feminine values mentioned here are
above all human values: the human condition of man and woman created in the
image of God is one and indivisible. It is only because women are more
immediately attuned to these values that they are the reminder and the
privileged sign of such values. But, in the final analysis, every human being,
man or woman, is destined to be “for the other”. In this perspective,
that which is called “femininity” is more than simply an attribute of
the female sex. The word designates indeed the fundamental human capacity to
live for the other and because of the other.
Therefore, the promotion of women within society must be understood and desired
as a humanization accomplished through those values, rediscovered thanks to
women. Every outlook which presents itself as a conflict between the sexes is
only an illusion and a danger: it would end in segregation and competition
between men and women, and would promote a solipsism nourished by a false
conception of freedom.
Without prejudice to the advancement of women’s rights in society and the
family, these observations seek to correct the perspective which views men as
enemies to be overcome. The proper condition of the male-female relationship
cannot be a kind of mistrustful and defensive opposition. Their relationship
needs to be lived in peace and in the happiness of shared love.
On a
more concrete level, if social policies – in the areas of education, work,
family, access to services and civic participation – must combat all
unjust sexual discrimination, they must also listen to the aspirations and
identify the needs of all. The defence and promotion of equal dignity and
common personal values must be harmonized with attentive recognition of the
difference and reciprocity between the sexes where this is relevant to the
realization of one’s humanity, whether male or female.
IV. The Importance of Feminine Values in the Life of the Church
15.
In the Church, woman as “sign” is more than ever central and
fruitful, following as it does from the very identity of the Church, as
received from God and accepted in faith. It is this “mystical”
identity, profound and essential, which needs to be kept in mind when
reflecting on the respective roles of men and women in the Church.
From
the beginning of Christianity, the Church has understood herself to be a
community, brought into existence by Christ and joined to him by a relationship
of love, of which the nuptial experience is the privileged expression. From
this it follows that the Church’s first task is to remain in the presence
of this mystery of God’s love, manifested in Jesus Christ, to contemplate
and to celebrate it. In this regard, the figure of Mary constitutes the
fundamental reference in the Church. One could say metaphorically that Mary is
a mirror placed before the Church, in which the Church is invited to recognize
her own identity as well as the dispositions of the heart, the attitudes and
the actions which God expects from her.
The
existence of Mary is an invitation to the Church to root her very being in
listening and receiving the Word of God, because faith is not so much the
search for God on the part of human beings, as the recognition by men and women
that God comes to us; he visits us and speaks to us. This faith, which believes
that “nothing is impossible for God” (cf. Gn18:14; Lk 1:37), lives
and becomes deeper through the humble and loving obedience by which the Church
can say to the Father: “Let it be done to me according to your word”
(Lk 1:38). Faith continually makes reference to Jesus: “Do whatever he
tells you” (Jn 2:5) and accompanies Jesus on his way, even to the foot of
the Cross. Mary, in the hour of darkness, perseveres courageously in
faithfulness, with the sole certainty of trust in the Word of God.
It is
from Mary that the Church always learns the intimacy of Christ. Mary, who
carried the small child of Bethlehem in her arms, teaches us to recognize the
infinite humility of God. She who received the broken body of Jesus from the
Cross shows the Church how to receive all those in this world whose lives have
been wounded by violence and sin. From Mary, the Church learns the meaning of
the power of love, as revealed by God in the life of his beloved Son: “he
has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their heart... he has lifted up the
lowly” (Lk 1:51-52). From Mary, the disciples of Christ continually
receive the sense and the delight of praise for the work of God’s hands:
“The Almighty has done great things for me” (Lk1:49). They learn that
they are in the world to preserve the memory of those “great things”,
and to keep vigil in expectation of the day of the Lord.
16.
To look at Mary and imitate her does not mean, however, that the Church should
adopt a passivity inspired by an outdated conception of femininity. Nor does it
condemn the Church to a dangerous vulnerability in a world where what count
above all are domination and power. In reality, the way of Christ is neither
one of domination (cf. Phil 2:6) nor of power as understood by the world
(cf. Jn18:36). From the Son of God one learns that this “passivity”
is in reality the way of love; it is a royal power which vanquishes all
violence; it is “passion” which saves the world from sin and death
and recreates humanity. In entrusting his mother to the Apostle John, Jesus on
the Cross invites his Church to learn from Mary the secret of the love that is
victorious.
Far
from giving the Church an identity based on an historically conditioned model
of femininity, the reference to Mary, with her dispositions of listening,
welcoming, humility, faithfulness, praise and waiting, places the Church in
continuity with the spiritual history of Israel. In Jesus and through him,
these attributes become the vocation of every baptized Christian. Regardless of
conditions, states of life, different vocations with or without public
responsibilities, they are an essential aspect of Christian life. While these
traits should be characteristic of every baptized person, women in fact live
them with particular intensity and naturalness. In this way, women play a role
of maximum importance in the Church’s life by recalling these dispositions
to all the baptized and contributing in a unique way to showing the true face
of the Church, spouse of Christ and mother of believers.
In
this perspective one understands how the reservation of priestly ordination
solely to men(22) does not hamper in any way women’s access to the heart
of Christian life. Women are called to be unique examples and witnesses for all
Christians of how the Bride is to respond in love to the love of the
Bridegroom.
Conclusion
17.
In Jesus Christ all things have been made new (cf. Rev 21:5). Renewal in grace,
however, cannot take place without conversion of heart. Gazing at Jesus and
confessing him as Lord means recognizing the path of love, triumphant over sin,
which he sets out for his disciples.
In
this way, man’s relationship with woman is transformed, and the three-fold
concupiscence described in the First Letter of John (1 Jn 2:16) ceases to have
the upper hand. The witness of women’s lives must be received with respect
and appreciation, as revealing those values without which humanity would be
closed in self-sufficiency, dreams of power and the drama of violence. Women
too, for their part, need to follow the path of conversion and recognize the
unique values and great capacity for loving others which their femininity
bears. In both cases, it is a question of humanity’s conversion to God, so
that both men and women may come to know God as their “helper”, as
the Creator full of tenderness, as the Redeemer who “so loved the world
that he gave his only begotten Son” (Jn 3:16).
Such
a conversion cannot take place without humble prayer to God for that
penetrating gaze which is able to recognize one’s own sin and also the
grace which heals it. In a particular way, we need to ask this of the Blessed
Virgin Mary, the woman in accord with the heart of God, she who is
“blessed among women” (cf. Lk 1:42), chosen to reveal to men and
women the way of love. Only in this way, can the “image of God”, the
sacred likeness inscribed in every man and woman, emerge according to the
specific grace received by each (cf. Gn 1:27). Only thus can the path of peace
and wonderment be recovered, witnessed in the verses of the Song of Songs,
where bodies and hearts celebrate the same jubilee.
The
Church certainly knows the power of sin at work in individuals and in
societies, which at times almost leads one to despair of the goodness of
married couples. But through her faith in Jesus crucified and risen, the Church
knows even more the power of forgiveness and self-giving in spite of any injury
or injustice. The peace and wonderment which she trustfully proposes to men and
women today are the peace and wonderment of the garden of the resurrection,
which have enlightened our world and its history with the revelation that
“God is love” (1 Jn 4:8,16).
The Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II, in the Audience granted to the
undersigned Cardinal Prefect, approved the present Letter, adopted in the
Ordinary Session of this Congregation, and ordered its publication.
Rome,
from the Offices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, May 31,
2004, the Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
+
Joseph Card. Ratzinger
Prefect
+
Angelo Amato, SDB
Titular Archbishop of Sila
Secretary
(1)
Cf. John Paul II, Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris
consortio (November 22, 1981): AAS 74 (1982), 81-191; Apostolic
Letter Mulieris dignitatem (August 15, 1988): AAS 80 (1988),
1653-1729; Letter to Families (February 2, 1994): AAS 86 (1994),
868-925; Letter to Women (June 29, 1995): AAS 87 (1995), 803-812;
Catechesi sull’amore umano (1979-1984): Insegnamenti II
(1979) – VII (1984): English translation in The Theology of the
Body, (Boston: Pauline Books Media, 1997); Congregation for Catholic
Education, Educational Guidance in Human Love (November 1, 1983);
Pontifical Council for the Family, The Truth and Meaning of Human Sexuality:
Guidelines for Education within the Family (December 8, 1995).
(2)
On the complex question of gender, see also The Pontifical Council for
the Family, Family, Marriage and “De facto unions” (July 26,
2000), 8.
(3)
Cf. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Fides et ratio (September 14,
1998), 21: AAS 91 (1999), 22: “This opening to the mystery,
which came to him [biblical man] through Revelation, was for him, in the end,
the source of true knowledge. It was this which allowed his reason to enter the
realm of the infinite where an understanding for which until then he had not
dared to hope became a possibility”.
(4)
John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Mulieris dignitatem (August 15, 1988),
6: AAS 80 (1988), 1662; cf. St. Ireneus, Adversus haereses,
5,6,1; 5, 16, 2-3: SC 153, 72-81; 216-221; St. Gregory of Nyssa, De
hominis opificio, 16: PG 44, 180; In Canticum homilia, 2:
PG 44, 805-808; St.Augustine, Enarratio in Psalmum, 4, 8:
CCL 38, 17.
(5)
The Hebrew word ezer which is translated as “helpmate”
indicates the assistance which only a person can render to another. It carries
no implication of inferiority or exploitation if we remember that God too is at
times called ezer with regard to human beings (cf. Ex 18:4;
Ps10:14).
(6)
John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Mulieris dignitatem (August 15, 1988), 6:
AAS 80 (1988), 1664.
(7)
John Paul II, General Audience of January 16, 1980, reprinted in The
Theology of the Body, (Boston: Pauline Books Media, 1997), 63.
(8)
John Paul II, General Audience of July 23, 1980, reprinted in The
Theology of the Body, (Boston: Pauline Books Media, 1997), 125.
9John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Mulieris dignitatem (August
15, 1988), 7: AAS 80 (1988), 1666.
10Ibid., 6, l. c., 1663.
11Congregation for Catholic Education, Educational Guidance in
Human Love (November 1, 1983), 4.
12Ibid.
13Adversus haereses, 4, 34, 1: SC 100, 846:
“Omnem novitatem attulit semetipsum afferens”.
14The ancient exegetical tradition sees in Mary at Cana the
“figura Synagogae” and the “inchoatio
Ecclesiae”.
15Here the Fourth Gospel presents in a deeper way an element found
also in the Synoptic Gospels (cf. Mt 9:15 and parallel texts). On the
theme of Christ the Bridegroom, see John Paul II, Letter to Families
(February 2, 1994), 18: AAS 86 (1994), 906-910.
16John Paul II, Letter to Families (February 2, 1994), 19:
AAS 86 (1994), 911; cf. Apostolic Letter Mulieris dignitatem (August
15, 1988), 23- 25: AAS 80 (1988), 1708-1715.
17Cf. John Paul II, Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris
consortio (November 22, 1981), 16: AAS 74 (1982), 98-99.
18Ibid., 41, l.c., 132-133; Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction Donum vitae (February 22, 1987), II,
8: AAS 80 (1988), 96-97.
19Cf. John Paul II, Letter to Women (June 29, 1995), 9-10:
AAS 87 (1995), 809-810.
20John Paul II, Letter to Families (February 2, 1994), 17:
AAS 86 (1994), 906.
21Encyclical Letter Laborem exercens (September 14, 1981),
19: AAS 73 (1981), 627.
22Cf. John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis
(May 22, 1994): AAS 86 (1994), 545-548; Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, Responsum ad dubium regarding the doctrine of the
Apostolic Letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis (October 28, 1995): AAS
87 (1995), 1114.
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