feminine-genius: Mother as the bridge to fatherhood

Available now from Servant Books

Set Free—The Authentic Catholic Woman's Guide to Forgiveness (due out, October, 2012)
From Fr. Christopher Mahar: "In her previous book, The Authentic Catholic Woman, Genevieve Kineke describes with brilliance the vocation of woman as icon of the Church, called to image the Bride of Christ in all Her splendor through everyday living and total self-giving. In this richly theological and disarmingly personal book, Set Free: The Authentic Catholic Woman’s Guide to Forgiveness, Genevieve enunciates anew that call of woman to be, like Holy Mother Church, a bridge facilitating reconciliation between fathers and children, and between God and all of creation."
Genevieve's first book, The Authentic Catholic Woman, is available from Servant Books now by calling 800-488-0488. With a forward by Christopher West, this work offers a spiritual and practical outline to help all women understand God's plan for their lives.
From Father Roger Landry:
"Genevieve Kineke does all of us a great service in this important new book. Through her profound yet clear exposition of the authentic femininity of the Church as the paradigm for Catholic women today, she not only provides concrete, practical help for women seeking holiness amidst the joys and struggles of married, religious or single life, but provides all Catholics, men and women, with a much deeper understanding of what the Church is and how we, in the Church, are called to respond to Christ and others. This book will nourish every disciple."

Pope Benedict's Monthly Prayer Intentions

General intention:“That the Eastern Catholic Churches and their venerable traditions may be known and esteemed as a spiritual treasure for the whole Church.”
Missionary Intention: “That the African continent may find strength in Christ to pursue justice and reconciliation as set forth by the second Synod of African Bishops.”

Comments

From Benedict XVI
“People have realized that the complete removal of the feminine element from the Christian message is a shortcoming from an anthropological viewpoint. It is theologically and anthropologically important for woman to be at the center of Christianity."
Anger and Patrimony (from Donna)
This is just another of the unintended consequences of the cultural acceptance of contraception and abortion! Men's sexuality has been robbed of its creative essence. It is now viewed as something that imposes a burden on women (when conception happens to occur), something used to control women or something that is purely recreational. Why would men bother?? In taking away their responsibility, we've also robbed them of their significance! In the big picture of humanity, men have been made into nothing more than a nuisance women have to figure out how to control in order to bring about the next generation. Men don't see it as their task to protect the vulnerable because they see themselves as the vulnerable ones. A few well preserved vials of sperm would make men entirely obsolete in the world's ethos today!!
Excellent, Dom! (from Teresa)
That is astounding Robin, and good for you for standing up. At the heart of that matter, I think, is even worse than a gender mixing message. There is an increased sharper and sharper focus on the "self." Solid Catholic teaching returns our focus away from ourselves to Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The original sin, Eve denied her womanhood when she desired to be like "gods." Since the only god she knew was the Father. Where was Adam? He stood impotent... in other words, they were divorced. There's a young girl at Robin's son's high school who was just told that she is the center of the universe and it's a tragic disservice to her.
Find the logic (from "me")
Ditto what Mary said! A lot of high schools have very poor math and science depts, for boys and girls. I also am educated as a chemical engineer, but chose to teach the two years before we had children because its hours were more suited to spending time with children. (I was looking ahead). When it came time and I was pregnant with our first, I realized that I did not want to leave him with someone else, and was able to stay home full time. I am not sure it would have been that easy if we were used to another engineering income and not just a private school teacher income. Also some of my first job offers were out on oil rigs - I had no interest in that at all even though I enjoyed my engineering classes and did well in them. No one discouraged me from an engineering job, on the contrary I got a lot of flack for my decision not to pursue an engineering career.
Find the logic (from Mary)
I've been lurking, but this is one that irritates me. Beats the heck out of me what these "barriers" are. I was educated as a chemical engineer, where 1/3 of our class was women. However, in electrical engineering, only 1 or 2 out of 30 were women. Is it possible that women are Just Not Interested in some areas? Nah, it must be The Man keeping us down so we must legislate (and, I agree -- when they say "legistlate", I hear "quota"). And actually, I have a friend that was also a chemical engineer. When she lost her job, she decided not to go back into engineering and started working from home so she could spend more time with her 3 kids. Also, if nothing else, there are all kinds of incentives for women to enter science and engineering -- scholarships not available to men, guaranteed housing on campuses that do not guarantee housing to the general population, etc. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said that schools in general are not preparing students for the hard sciences. It is truly a sad state of affairs, the lack of science education these days.

I had a good cry this morning, watching the video above. It touched nerves on many levels, the first being that I was once a Navy wife awaiting the return of my own beloved. While it was always difficult, it was obviously more challenging when I wasn't waiting alone, but responsible for children who were also missing The Man. The solitary wife can fall into moods, grumble, distract herself and do a variety of things to while away the months until the warrior returns, but when little ones are present, those indulgences evaporate. That's when some semblance of a schedule must be maintained, good cheer is essential (at least til they fall asleep) and a daily chit-chat about the missing family member must continue. As important as fathers are, the children grow hazy on the details, and the gap has a tendency to close around who he was and what he did with the family.

This is the job of the mother -- to keep dad alive and predominant in the hearts and minds of the children, no matter how much it hurts sometimes. She tells stories, revisits memories, explains who he is, and most importantly, provides constant reminders of his passionate love for his children. This happens at the breakfast table, in the car, while pushing the swings, while singing lullabies, amidst putting away groceries and when tucking the children in at night.

I realise it's a little different now, with skype, youtube and emails (no more hanging about the mailbox as the only point of contact) but children still drift. The children in the video above aren't thrilled because it's the guy they saw on the computer screen, but because some lonely mother kept his love alive in their family circle until he could return to embrace them once again. She kept the torch burning and maintained his place in relation to his children until he could prove his affections in person.

The daughters' signs of joy were especially poignant as each was swept off her feet by her own shining knight. No matter the age, the gawkiness, the distractions of the moment -- daddy was home to find his little princess. The sons' hugs spoke to me of a mixture of vulnerability (gosh, I'm glad!) and relief (no more being the little man for the family!)

I think every wife and mother could ponder what helped these families endure the distance and what we can incorporate into our own family circle. Obviously the wider community offers tremendous support that wasn't necessarily there decades ago (there were many families in my town who lost fathers for years in Vietnamese prison camps with little civic acknowledgement or assistance) but even in the civilian world we can do more to build support for fathers.

Mothers are extraordinarily resiliant and can keep the home fires burning, but she cannot replace the father. What she can do is be an effective bridge to fatherhood, and she does that best if she knows how important, how irreplacable he really is.

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