This image of Christ as the bridegroom is clear and unambiguous only when the priest is a man.
However, the Church in ordaining only men defends a deeper reality — a truth denied by this age — that men and women are, by nature of their creation, different and called to different vocations. The rejection of Christian truth that men and women possess equality of dignity, not identity of function, has caused confusion that diminishes womanhood, as well as manhood.
In his letter, John Paul II explores the differences between men and women, demonstrating how woman’s “feminine originality” and “essential richness” are rooted in the vocations of motherhood and virginity. This motherhood, which includes an openness to life and a special concern for the human person, is expressed in, but not limited to, pregnancy and the care of children. All women are called to a spiritual motherhood that expresses their receptiveness and willingness to give themselves to others. The Pope points to Mary, Virgin and Mother, as the image for all women.
The movement to recognize the equal dignity and worth of women, to offer them a wider influence in the world outside the home and opportunities to develop and use their gifts and talents — a movement the Church fully supports — has been perverted into a radical feminism that diminishes the value of motherhood. The differences between men and women are not deformities caused by unjust gender socialization but expressions of the richness of a humanity divided from the beginning by God’s plan into two distinct sexes.
But for radical feminists, such as Shulamith Firestone, “The end goal of feminist revolution must be, unlike that of the first feminist movement, not just the elimination of male privilege but of sex distinction itself: genital difference between human beings would no longer matter culturally.”
In Justice, Gender, and the Family, Susan Miller Okin says the only way to obtain equality for women is to remove all difference between the sexes. “It seems undeniable,” she writes, “that the promotion of justice throughout our society would be aided through dissolution of gender roles.”
Nothing could be further from the truth. Justice for women will not come from denying differences between the sexes but by understanding and accepting those differences. Motherhood and fatherhood are not artificial “gender roles” imposed on androgynous beings but expressions of the vocations for which we have been created. Attempts to create a homogenized parenthood do not liberate women but restrict them.
Women will find equality of dignity when they are free to express their motherhood fully, and when the insights, talents, and gifts that are unique to women have equal expression within society with those of men. In clearly proclaiming the differences between men and women, the Church calls for an equality that does not compromise the true nature of women and does not force them to sacrifice their womanhood in a vain attempt to imitate men. Such an imitation is fundamentally anti-woman.
Ms. Okin says that “the attainment of such a just future requires major changes in a multitude of institutions.” But even the most massive changes in the family and society will not change human nature.
The Church proclaims what our gut reactions confirm: Men and women are not interchangeable parts. The vocation of husband is different from the vocation of wife. Motherhood differs from fatherhood. The Church proclaims that the priest, representing Christ the Bridegroom, Who gives His life for the Church, His Bride, is a pattern for all men, who are called to sacrifice themselves for others. Christ’s love of the Church as a model for human love is destroyed by pretending that the sex of the priest is irrelevant.
(Mrs. O’Leary is the author of The Gender Agenda and a founding member of The Alliance of Catholic Women. This article is reprinted with permission from Canticle Magazine, the Voice of Today's Catholic Woman.)
