Women and the Medieval Church.

I'm slowly savoring Stages on the Road, a collection of Sigrid Undset's essays on saints. I'm half-way through St. Angela Merici, an Italian woman of Medieval times who explodes every preconception about the downtrodden Catholic women of the "Middle Ages."

Undset opens the essay with a sharp, incise overview of the Medieval view of the fairer, weaker sex:

"[W]e can find expressions of every possible conception of the relations between man and woman -- except the view that after all there may be no great difference between men and women."

She goes on to make and defend the astonishing claim that, "[T]he fact is that, so long as Catholicism was the dominating element in the intellectual life of Europe, a woman who really had a contribution to make to the spiritual life of her time was given an opportunity to do so."

Hold the horse and milk the cow, what did she say?

That's right: "Even in such spheres of work as in general were looked upon as the property of men were not closed to those women who really had the power to accomplish something in them. People did not exactly expect to find such qualities in women every day, but if a woman possessed unusual gifts nobody thought her unwomanly on that account; she was merely considered to be an unusual woman."

She cites as examples the tremendous (and--in our post-Protestant school systems--forgotten) lives of Julian of Norwich, Margery Kemp of Lynn, Hildegard of Bingen, Paula of Rome and her daughter, Eustochium, Roswitha of Gandersheim, St. Gertrude, St. Mechtild of Magdeburg, and St. Mechtild of Hakeborn. To these more obscure names are added Bridget of Sweden (Undset's own native land), Catherine of Siena, and Teresa of Avila. I could spend years and still not read everything these women wrote, travel to the cities they traveled, or even approach all the prelates and so-called "men of power" to whom they prophesied.

(Side note: What in heaven's name do we mean by "power in the Church"? Can anyone explain why power is even an issue? If power is an issue for me, then I'm obviously a very bad Christian... which I am, but you know.)

Undset notes, "What made it possible for all these women to develop and make free use of their peculiar and unusual gifts was the fact that they lived in a world in which women were encouraged to cultivate what talents they had. If they could read and write, and that excellently, this implies of course that women who had learnt to read and write were no rarities--that they were surrounded by women and men who shared the same intellectual life in some degree."

Then the kicker:

"The necessary condition for the lively correspondence between the nuns and their spiritual leaders was the recognition of a sphere in which men and women could meet as human beings of equal value; the belief that in the sight of God a masculine soul and a feminine soul were equally precious, alike of such eternal value as to deserve His imparting Himself to them and forming them--but a masculine soul was a masculine soul and a feminine soul was a feminine soul. The differences and variations were a part of the diversity with which the Creator had adorned His creation."

Hot dang. A "recognition of a sphere" in which men and women can be equally precious in the very fact of their existence sounds much better than the current NPR trope: "It's vital that we have the same number of women in science as men in science! Inequality in the math department is unacceptable! Until there's a woman in the White House, this country cannot be safe for women!" Really.

Undset's essay is a must read--and it's worth buying the book to let publishers know that we want more of her caliber. She has a way of cutting to the essentials of the faith that is so utterly refreshing that, for the first time in weeks, I have enough energy to write those letters to the editor I ought to be writing.

Me and St. Mechtild.

Butterflies wings in Carmel

In honor of the Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. Thanks to the Anchoress!

NFP or Condoms: What's the difference?

I wrote my senior thesis for the Catholic University honors program nearly 10 years ago. In my youthful zeal and eager for my own upcoming marriage, I tackled the prompt of "Nature and Technology" with a 35 page analysis of Humanae Vitae, Paul VI's vision of human nature, nature and morality, and contraception as "technology." 

It probably needed either 700 pages, von Balthasar style, or two paragraphs, Catechism style. But it sure was fun.

At the reception following our senior defense, however, a young freshman (upstart!) cornered me. "That was really interesting, but I still just don't see the difference between using NFP to prevent pregnancy and using condoms." 

He was right: At that point I had no good reason. 

He was also not alone: How many of us have heard that, in order to be holy and love fully, we must completely submit our fertility to God and that NFP is merely another way of contracepting Him out of our beds? Isn't timing our acts of intercourse simply setting up another barrier between each other? 

However we live, we throw up barriers. Every human person holds fast to some aspect of his life and refuses to let God reign there. We all lock Him out of some room or corridor in our hearts. He offers us the abyss of love, and we want the shallows. Before we discuss whether or not NFP is inherently a barrier to God, we have to recognize that every created thing can become a barrier. These are the shadowlands.

Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote: ‎"There is all the difference in the world between using one's awareness of the periods of infertility and arrogating to oneself the right to impose radical restrictions on fertility by the use of artificial contraception." That is, he claims there is a radical difference between using NFP and using a condom. Acknowledging that NFP can become a sort of "condom" in our hearts, we can nevertheless say with confidence that it is not "Catholic birth control." 


Why? Hans again:


"For in using the infertile days they are not setting bounds to their love. Otherwise, one would have to say that intercourse in the full Christian sense is impossible after a woman's menopause. Married persons who think as Christians set no barriers between the two objects of marriage: procreation and the expression of mutual love. They let the two stand together, the physical side, with its own proper laws, and the personal side. One's awareness of the opportunities provided by nature does not mean one is imposing calculation on the inner spirit of love."



That is, sex with a condom disregards the natural cycles of a woman's fertility (and, I would add, the power of a man's perpetual fertility). The condom sets a barrier (literally and spiritually) on procreation and the physical laws of our animal nature: the couple grasps at mutual love, mutual pleasure without acknowledging that in fact there can be no mutual love when we seek to escape our mutual responsibility to our fertility. 


Using a woman's infertile days as a time to express that mutual love, however, does not inherently involve the rejection of nature, physicality, and the integrity of the person (although, again, as human beings we are prone to misuse even NFP!).


The Church has not said that NFP is just fine in any circumstance or for every couple. We have a list of broad guidelines to bring to prayer as a couple, prayer with the Church, and the counsel of those we trust: 


"If therefore there are well-grounded reasons for spacing births, arising from the physical or psychological condition of husband or wife, or from external circumstances, the Church teaches that married people may then take advantage of the natural cycles immanent in the reproductive system and engage in marital intercourse only during those times that are infertile..." ~Humanae Vitae, no. 16


Von Balthasar's words only echo the words of Paul VI:


"[It is] lawful for married people to take advantage of the infertile period [and is] always unlawful the use of means which directly prevent conception, even when the reasons given for the later practice may appear to be upright and serious. In reality, these two cases are completely different. In the former the married couple rightly use a faculty provided them by nature. In the later they obstruct the natural development of the generative process. It cannot be denied that in each case the married couple, for acceptable reasons, are both perfectly clear in their intention to avoid children and wish to make sure that none will result. But it is equally true that it is exclusively in the former case that husband and wife are ready to abstain from intercourse during the fertile period as often as for reasonable motives the birth of another child is not desirable. And when the infertile period recurs, they use their married intimacy to express their mutual love and safeguard their fidelity toward one another. In doing this they certainly give proof of a true and authentic love." ~HV, no. 16 (emphasis added)


Particularly striking in Humanae Vitae is the pope's concern for the "reverence due to women" in particular and human love in general. 


"Responsible men can become more deeply convinced of the truth of the doctrine laid down by the Church on this issue if they reflect on the consequences of methods and plans for artificial birth control. Let them first consider how easily this course of action could open wide the way for marital infidelity and a general lowering of moral standards. Not much experience is needed to be fully aware of human weakness and to understand that human beings—and especially the young, who are so exposed to temptation—need incentives to keep the moral law, and it is an evil thing to make it easy for them to break that law. Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection."

Finally, though, all the explanation and clarity in the world are useless if the Church cannot honor and uphold the living example of men and women willing both to control birth by abstinence only and welcome with generosity the possibility of children when their circumstances allow. That is our mission: to be the men and women described by the pope and dear Hans. 

Without our witness, the words remain dead and without power. With our witness, the power of Christ is made manifest.

Gosh, wow.

When a publicly-professed atheist of highest intellectual calibre announces she's praying St. Patrick's Breastplate, along with the Liturgy of the Hours, the blogosphere's elite sit up a little straighter at their keyboards and take notice. Thus, Leah Libresco's post over at Patheos healed me of my slouch for the day. Read the whole thing. I particularly love her closing quotation:

It makes me so happy… A door like this has cracked open five or six times since we got up on our hind legs. It’s the best possible time to be alive, when almost everything you thought you knew is wrong.

Can anyone hear an echo of Edith Stein in there?

Good works, failure, and love.

A great undertaking (at least, one that appears great) is a frightening thing. 

For the more phlegmatic, the fear comes in the guise of work and conflicts. 

For the diffident, any demand that he really care about anything smacks of torture. 

For the controllers, the prospect of failure is terrifying. 

Controller. But that's a great bridge!

I fall into that controller group (strong northern European stock!). My natural vices tend to a real hatred of waste, laziness, and indifference. By nature, I also fear failure. 

And so, I am caught. I cannot help but undertake what seem to me Great Things. I often stall mid-way because I am afraid the efforts will come to Nothing. This is simply the sort of person I became through nature, nurture, and my own, regular rejection of God. Grandiosity, failure, shame. 

How does a controller--choleric, driven, and impatient--escape the brutal cycle? I'm facing this odd little project and all sorts of fears pile up. Have I disobeyed my archbishop? Have I tried too hard? Have I promised something unreal? Have I overreached my health? Is this to the detriment of my children?

Notice: at the heart of every fear is "I". I, I, I... as if everything depended on me. It does not. St. Ignatius wrote (and Mother Teresa was fond of recalling): "Work as if everything depended on you, and leave all the results to God."

Song of my heart. 

This is the salvation of the controller. If I must work (and I must, I am part German!) at some apostolate, then how has Christ redeemed my broken nature? 

In five words: You did it to me. 

The controllers and leaders can find freedom from all fear if they put all hope of success in this simple statement: You did it to me. 

It is a declaration and a promise. If I undertake this mission for Christ, to Christ, then whatever the outcome in human terms, all is fulfilled. He has fulfilled every action already. The goal of all our projects--great, small, successful, and futile--is to love God. And while our motives are always mixed and broken in life, He sees our hearts. He knows our love as intimately as our sins. We become "worthless servants," but servants set free by their worthlessness. Whatever we do is His, for Him to bless with success or to discard so that He might embrace us. 

My daughter brought me a painting yesterday. "Mummy, this is yours." I praised the effort and then I hugged her and told her I loved her. Now that painting is in the garbage outside, covered in milk and cracker crumbs. Failure? Only a cynic, closed to love, would think so. 

How beautifully the Father loves us, his poor little busy workers. I will bring Him a painting that He might discard it and hold me close.

Education Alternatives: Unschooling.

What with burying my life in alternatives to traditional education (hybrid academies! distance learning assistance programs! dig a hole in the dirt and sit in it! take a nap!), I've come across several families in which "alternative education" means "unschooling." It's always a little scary to address educational decisions--talk about tapping our deepest passions as parents--but it is also vital that parents working in alternative education face and discuss the implications behind our educational choices. What we do speaks to our children and they will ponder what we did for them (or to them!) all their lives.

Unschoolers tend to be as separate from home educators as they are from traditional educators. While "unschooling" suggests a negative--what it is not--there are actually a number of shared, positive principles in the unschooling community. Most parents believe that their children are natural learners, that a child driven by his own interests will learn more efficiently than a child driven by testing standards, and that a parent's role is to help the child set goals so he can reach goals he sets for himself. (Of course, within the unschooling community, these beliefs manifest in many different ways.)

Unschooling families choose to learn free from a set curriculum--unlike in many homeschool homes, there is no attempt to recreate the traditional school syllabus or scope and sequence.

The biggest question is, of course, Does it work? The maddening answer is, of course, yes and no.

First, the yes. Unschooling can work very well in particular situations. I've found that it can be fun and fruitful for a mother (or father) who enjoys hands-on work, long walks through muddy fields, and doesn't feel much need to "check" her kids' progress against the rest of the world. Unschooling is generally what does happen (by default) for small children in a large homeshcooling family. The 3-year-old doesn't need a curriculum, but does need lots of time to absorb herself in play, a little guidance in getting started (or finishing) on a project. Even a 5-year-old can flourish with a pile of books, a sketchbook, and lots of time.

Again by default, we naturally find ourselves in "unschooling" periods of life. Mom is pregnant and sick, or postpartum and tired, so the syllabus just doesn't happen in full. She can get everyone to the library (maybe) and order art supplies online, but that's about it. Great things can happen.

But then there's the no.

There does come a time when the parents must answer this question: What is the goal of education? Clearly, the goal of everything we do as parents must eventually redound to eternal salvation. There are many ways of bringing our children up in the Faith. But if education at eternal salvation, it does so in a more specific way. Education both helps the individual to flourish as an individual and as a social animal.

The basic philosophy of unschooling presupposes a sort of Rousseauian "voluntarism"--or, the assumption that all a child's activities should voluntary, as far as is possible. The problem is that, in the Catholic worldview, a child's capacity to choose the good is not yet fully formed. A child is not a "noble savage." He's just a savage.

Once the children reach a certain age, there are certain skills that become necessary for her to pursue her passions. There are virtues and strengths that she has not yet encountered and which she will need in order to--later in life--be both a strong individual and a "servant of all." Not all children will become the next Pascal, but all children need an ordered and sequential introduction to the beautiful numbers Pascal saw. Not all children will become teachers, but all children need to learn how to communicate effectively--not just in lengthy opinion pieces on a blog--but also in the specific situations in which their world and culture place them.

In a sense "unschooling" is a wonderful way to introduce children into the world of a more formal course of study. It's also a perfectly normal and acceptable break from the formal lesson plans over which most moms slave. For a few children, unschooling may indeed be the only way they will ever learn--think of Mozart. But parents must make the decision to abandon all structure in the full awareness of what unschooling implies about human nature, human society, and the reasons we exist.

John Garvey Brings It On.

John Garvey, president of The Catholic University of America, posted a clear and moving explanation of CUA's decision to bring the HHS mandate to court. Alma mater, I salute you.

Particularly poignant is his commentary on Eleazar of Maccabee fame (if your family is unfamiliar with the Books of Maccabees, now is a good time to read them aloud!):

"A wonderful story in the second book of Maccabees describes the martyrdom of the old scribe Eleazar. It occurred during the Hellenizing campaign of Antiochus Epiphanes. He forced the Jews "to forsake the laws of their fathers and cease to live by the laws of God." 


Eleazar was ordered on pain of death to eat pork. He refused. The men in charge of the sacrifice, who had known him for a long time, took him aside and offered to spare him if he would just eat something that looked like pork. "Such pretense is not worthy of our time of life," he said, "lest many of the young should suppose that Eleazar in his 90th year has gone over to an alien religion[.]" And so they killed him."

The point, Garvey says, is twofold: First, God's law is higher than the law of the state, and it is "cruel" for any government to force its citizens to choose between their beliefs and their freedom. Second, Eleazar is a witness to the communal aspect of our Catholic praxis. Whatever we do, "the young" --and I would add, those who have rejected the Faith-- are watching. Even the appearance of compromise in matters of morals is a grave sin against the spirit of the law.

Garvey also mentions the much-touted reality that a majority of Roman Catholics do not practice the Church's teaching on fertility and sex. While this is a tragedy and symptom of our human failure, however, it hardly changes the truth. Truth does not shift and change with societal norms: rather, practice seeks to conform to truth, goodness, and beauty. That's why the True, the Good, and the Beautiful are called transcendentals. They transcend the changing and shifting man-made laws.

Garvey's essay is brief, but forceful. It is a great example of the unapologetic, but nevertheless sympathetic, approach we all need to be ready to take toward the world. He does not dismiss objections. He does not call names. He doesn't even mention the leaders in government behind this mandate. He simply states who he is, what he believes, and what he must do.

Bravo.