As women from the Roman Catholic tradition, we
have a special expertise in analyzing and critiquing the language
in which the Vatican presents and sometimes cloaks
-its ideas and and aims. We have read with concern and
consternation the Report of the Holy See. In the Report an
aspect of religious fundamentalism that misuses tradition
and anthropology to limit women's roles, functions and rights is
shown.
The Vatican acknowledges that the difference between
its " nature" and that of other governments
results in a country report that is " different"
in character from those presented by the other groups.
We would add that, in asserting itself as a "
state" , the Vatican faces numerous challenges in presenting
a credible report. First, the governing structure of the
Holy See includes no women in policy making and no women in the
churches single existing electoral body , the College of
Cardinals. There is no requirement that women be consulted
regarding the development or content of Vatican documents,
including this Report, and no indication that such
consultation occurred voluntarily.
Secondly, we would note that, unlike other country
reports, the Vatican does not make even the pretence of including
information on the status of women within the church itself,
neither women's employment in church agencies, nor their political
rights, nor health care options within Catholic hospitals. In all
such areas, serious issues of discrimination exist, and Roman
Catholic women and men are working to correct these flaws. They do
so in the face of Substantial resistance from the very church
leaders who are responsible for this Report.
Given these flaws, we suggest that the
positions taken by the Holy See and the theoretical
that inform them should be read with caution and, indeed,
suspicion, by both governments and non-governmental organization accredited
to the Beijing Conference.
The prime problem: patriarchal
anthology
The Vatican's document calls for the promotion of
women's dignity. However, implicit throughout the report
is the fundamental flaw that plagues all hierarchical
Catholic teaching about women and anthropology about women which presumes that men
are the human norm and women are different.
The Vatican constructs a vision of women and men
in which men are normative persons and women are primarily
understood in terms of their reproductive and
mothering capacities. The most serious implications of this
outmoded anthropology are apparent in the terms, definitions and
proposals that are built on its inaccurate premises.
For example, the laudable ideal of women's dignity is
somehow based in reproductive capacity . No such assumption is
made ever with regard to men, whose dignity is presumed
simply to be conferred by their humanity.
Moreover, the roles of women in family life, in
the work place and in politics are all limited and
understood in relation to this anthropology. Nothing accrues
to women simply because they are humans. Now that women have
increasing control over their reproductive lives , and
now that men are understood to share equally the joys
and burdens of rearing the next generation for such outdated
notions, unless the intent is to discriminate.
We challenge the Vatican to reconstruct
this anthropological foundation if it wishes to be
taken seriously when it claims to have women's well-being in
mind.
A linked problem : hostility to feminism
Another aspect of patriarchal anthropology is
seen in the Report's. Deep hostility to all that modern
feminism has contributed to the advancement of new concepts
of women's nature and roles in society. Feminists
are implicitly divided into the good and the bad -- the latter
being " radical feminists". Radical feminists are
caricatured as having sought, in the bad old 1960s and
1970s, " complete uniformity of and undifferentiated leveling
of the two sexes" which is now rejected. " Radical
feminism" according to the Vatican, denied a woman the
"right to be a woman ".There is
the now classic attempt to divide women in the industrial
world, the Vatican claims it adopted " approaches to
the advancement of women in the South and are part and
parcel of " hedonistic and individualistic
culture".
Nowhere in the Report is there any
recognition of what women have done worldwide to improve
their own lives and those of their recognition that it is
women and feminists who
have articulated and struggled for measures that
have improved the lives of women in the North and the
south alike. Nor does the Report notice that
women have been the backbone and sometimes the leaders of broad
-based movements for peace and justice worldwide -from Ireland
to Argentina, from the Philippines to the United
States.
Equality admits no exceptions
In its Report, the Vatican pays lip service to
women's equality but, in every instance, adds qualifiers
that indicate that it is an equality predicated in
difference, which is finally not equality. In fact, the "
specificity of women" no more needs safeguarding than the
specificity of men, if both are taken as normatively human.
We who know the Vatican's mind-set best respectfully point
it out to those who might be moved by the rhetoric and not the
reality of the Vatican's theological politics.
Equal is as equal
does
The Vatican's
record of response to women " specificity" is dismal at
best . It is the Vatican's view of women's specificity that
has led to prohibitions on women's reproductive choices and
sexual expression, and to the banding of women as
priests and bishops. It is this kind of thinking that some
are more fully human than others that underlies the hierarchical
structures of the catholic church, structures that exclude and
demean women.
Women are more than their reproductive capacities
Our primary concern follows on the Vatican's
actions in Cairo last year at the United Nations
International Conference on Population and Development . Note
that throughout the Vatican Report for Beijing, women's
reproductive capacity is emphasized. This strikes us as anachronistic
a time in history when so many other things could
merit priority.
All of these and many more aspects of women are
left aside in favor of the old tried and untrue statements
about the implications of women's reproductive capacity.
Even in those instances where women are
idealized, like Mary, there is the old fall black to stereotypical
notions of women as fundamentally wives and mothers. What is clear
and true is that not all women are mothers. It is hard to imagine -and it is
certainly never stated-that the Vatican has in mind a
similar notion of men as husbands and fathers. The far reaching
damages of this mistaken idea about women are such that the idea
must be eradicated.
Women's "Vulnerability" is men's
violence
Perhaps the most perplexing part of the
Vatican's analysis is its notion that " the life of
women remains more uncertain and more vulnerable than
that of men." No analysis follows that would suggest
what is missing from the equation, which is that the uncertainty
or vulnerability that many women experience is neither biological
nor essential. In fact, it is created by a patriarchal society in
which men are taught that women are inferior- and that men, as normative human
beings, can treat women as they will. The Vatican
conveniently leaves out this "absent referent". The statement would be more accurate if it said, "
Many men treat women with such disdain that women are vulnerable
and subject to violence in a patriarchal society. "
This acknowledgement - along with a condemnation of the fact
-would be welcome , but it is missing.
Such an acknowledgement would seem to come most
hard to those in the Vatican who , lacking the very family life
that they extol, instead having romantic visions of family life.
Not surprisingly, they fail to account for the well
documented fact that, against women's will and desire, the family
is the site of most violence against women, of the
" hazard and handicap" which the Vatican ridicules
as feminist cant.
There is another lacuna in what the Report
does say about violence and families. Families are said to suffer
violence " through the imposition from outside of various
programs which particularly concerns the obligatory control of
the number of births, forced sterilization and the
encouragement of abortion" . This strikes us as remarkable
and pernicious when promulgated by the very ecclesiastical institution
that has been responsible for prevention access to sexuality
education, contraceptives and
legal abortions. On this point the Vatican doth protest
too much. Indeed, if the Vatican had its way, the "
gift of life " it exalts would be coerced through forced continuation
of pregnancies that are unsupported and unsupportable.
A new vision of Catholic social justice
Given these concerns, it is clear that economic
policies, educational programs and political strategies for women which emerge
from the Vatican are deeply suspect. As women from the Roman catholic
Tradition, we respectfully suggest a new vision of
social justice, one that emerges from our feminist understanding of
the church and other communities as properly
consisting of a " discipleship of equals" that is,
our vision begins with the radical equality of creation:
women, men , children and the Earth. Justice for women , as
for men, is predicated on equality in deed as well as
in word. To that end we offer the following sketch
of a vision of social justice for the coming century.
-
A feminist anthropology rests on the radical
equality of women and men in the community . Both women and
men are expected to contribute to the work, education,
culture and moral and reproductive tasks of bringing forth successive
generations.
-
The radical equality of women and men
means just what it says. The diversity of creation, including
different genders, races and life styles implies that there
will be great differences among us. The task of a "
discipleship of equals" is to hold all of this difference
in common, encouraging it and making the world a welcoming
place for it.
-
Women are multifaceted, just as men are.
Women's contributions to the political world and in the
home, in the work place, sports, culture and religion are to
be taken seriously and valued. Reproduction is important
but it is only of the functions that women and men
share. Because women have been discriminated against in this
arena, we give special priority to women's reproductive
health needs, whose fulfillment has been shown to promote the
well being of children and the development of countries.
-
Community, rather than family, is our
programmatic focus. For example, as members of the
human community, we all require health care. This need is
not subsidiary to family roles and relationships, which
nevertheless often structure and limit the availability of
health care through insurance. Likewise, in education
and work we favor programs that leave aside the family relationships
in which people find themselves and instead look to
the tremendous needs, material and spiritual, which
remain to be fulfilled.
-
Safety is a human right. We strive to
dismantle hieratical structures and to end discrimination
because they can result in insult and injury. We encourage
change in attitudes, behaviors and laws to secure our
common well-being . Our reverence for the Earth, as well
as for all of its peoples, requires such
vigilance.
