feminine-genius

Am I my sister's keeper?

Women are notorious for checking each other out -- for analysing their choices, their wardrobes, their child-care arrangements, their exercise regimens, their decorating schemes, their educational options for their children, etc. It's not just that one woman takes note of what another woman does, but that in parsing her choices, she internalises them and applies some sort of invisible yardstick -- as though a different choice might indict her own choices. That's why women usually arrange their friendships around others who choose in similar ways; and the more fundamental the choice, the greater the degree to which the friendship will be trustworthy and comforting.

In this way, for example, women who remain childless by choice are not very close to those who embrace motherhood, and those who choose public school are a little distant from those who choose parochial school (when finances are not the issue). Obviously, values/morals are part of it, but it's not all. Women are most comfortable with women who have made the same life's choices.

That said, one college program for women who want to stay home is bugging college prof Mary Zeiss Stange, who has not made that choice, and she lets her discomfort rip. First the background:

When it comes to women and higher education, the old joke used to be that the only reason a woman would go to college would be to earn her "MRS" degree. That was the 1950s take on things. It was before the women's movement of the 1960s and '70s, and before females accounted for roughly half the students in most graduate professional fields and more than half of all undergraduate students.

But now, at least one institution — Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, in Fort Worth — appears to be trying to set back the clock. Southwestern is one of the largest fully accredited Southern Baptist seminaries, offering bachelors in addition to divinity degrees. Last spring, the school announced the establishment of a B.A. in humanities, with a concentration in homemaking.

At first glance, it's not that the degree takes homemaking seriously, which the author insists is a good thing (in keeping with her feminist credentials) but that the degree here is only open to women, which makes it, well, women's work. Ugh.

In rock-solid biblical literalism, a woman's place is neither in the pulpit nor at the lectern, but in the home. If this amounts to a return to the 1950s, so be it. As Patterson stated at the Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting in June, "We are moving against the tide in order to establish family and gender roles as described in God's word for the home and the family." The implicit reference here is to Genesis, when God created Adam and Eve and told them to be fruitful and multiply. God established marriage as the central social unit and reproduction as women's key social function.

Seen in a biblical light, Southwestern's homemaking program is consistent with the Southern Baptist Convention's social and theological conservatism. But seen in that same light, the program is fraught with contradiction. For one thing, if women's role as nurturer and housekeeper is written into the divinely ordained scheme of things, why should something so very natural need to be taught to them? Shouldn't these skills be innate? And mightn't they best be taught in the context of the home, not the classroom?

Now obviously Mr. Patterson and I would disagree with the premise of "gender roles" because he doesn't have an ecclesial framework on which to base his understanding of femininity, but what is that to Ms. Stange? No one is enrolling her in the Southwestern Baptist program or even sitting there criticising her career. Also, didn't she say earlier that the work of the home ought to be respected? While the desire may (or may not) be "natural," there is a science to nutrition, health care, and time management which are just some of the fundamentals of home making. Edith Stein promoted a solid education for women which would undergird the vocation in the home from her academic chair decades ago. What's the beef?

But surely the seminarians would be truer to women's biblical roots were they to recognize, as their savior did, that there is more than one career path open to women.

Wow. I find it interesting to find a professor of women's studies at Skidmore College lecturing fundamentalist Christians on the tenets of their faith. She justifies herself by pointing out Jesus' admonition to Martha as an eye-opener about His thoughts on house-keeping, while missing His point about the importance of meditation on the Son of God. In that very prayer, women should come to keep their eyes on Jesus, to listen for His personal call in their lives, and let others choose accordingly. If prayer brought Ms. Stange to Skidmore and guides her classes, Glory Be. But somehow, I think that women grounded in their vocations should be more at peace, and stop looking sidewise for affirmation -- or grist.

I once was lost, but now am found

Sweet Jen has a brilliant post on her "decline" into the the dark pit of motherhood, where many a fine woman has been known to disappear -- losing her charm, her brain, and her ability to create what the world can appreciate.

As I shuffled over to the laundry room to throw some clothes in the dryer, I was reminded of a thread going around on a local mom's email list. In it various mothers from my area are lamenting the fact that they've "lost themselves" since becoming mothers. I've heard countless friends, bloggers, and women on email lists voice this complaint, and have received tons of emails from another site I run (that has to do with motherhood) from women who want to know how to get their old selves back now that they're moms. And certainly I can sympathize. The old me from my pre-mommy days is loooong gone. But does that mean I've lost myself? I used to think so.

You would do well to read the entire post, to which almost every woman can relate. What I found clever was her connexion of "glamour" to "glamour" -- if you know what I mean. YKW appears clever, but in the end is insipid and banal, like high doses of, er, Glamour. How obvious is that!

Nowhere to turn

Here's another angle on prostitution, this time from Greece. Evidently, since the Athens Olympics, Nigerian women have been in great abundance as sex workers, trolling by Omonia Square downtown. They were sold into the business by their families or lured into it by offers of a better life abroad, and now all options are closed:

• they cannot walk away because of the prohibitive "travel expenses" they must repay;
• they cannot go home because shari'a law there mandates heavy penalties, usually death;
• they cannot appeal for help because they are illegal aliens subject to deportation;
• they cannot find health care, because only Greek prostitutes are eligible;
• they cannot indict their bosses because the Greek system is hard to navigate;
• they cannot escape in any way because of the superstitious voodoo curses they believe will hurt their families.

If they are arrested, they then fall into a system that offers little recourse.

Lack of interpreters makes action more difficult. "Victims meet the police for the first time in operations when they are arrested for illegal prostitution or as irregular immigrants," Dafni Tsixli from Amnesty International told IPS. "The majority of policemen are not able to distinguish a victim, and often victims themselves are unable to explain their situation.

"After recognition the victims are given one month to decide if they want to co-operate with authorities, or face automatic repatriation. This is very short notice considering what they are going through. One way or another many of them are deported, and their cases don't go to court. More than half of them become victims of trafficking again."

In Greece support and protection services are organised in a way to reach victims only after they are detained for violation of the law. The help then often comes too late. The victims have already suffered immensely; many of them have been trafficked for years, and are trapped in the complications of a legal system that is largely hostile to them.

Dina Daskalopoupou is a journalist dedicated to bringing the plight of these Nigerians to the attention of the population. Her careful research seems to have come to nothing.

"I published my article in a big paper; I tried to provoke reactions going after the ministry of public with a second article. I left clues that I have information in my hands. No prosecutor, police or politician ever asked for them," Dina Daskalopoupou said.

"I tried hard to understand why so few people react to a crime taking place in front of our eyes, and I think I know the reason. The Nigerian girls are not 'big business.' They satisfy demand from low quality 'customers' -- young Greek guys and migrants. Perhaps they become the prey of corrupted authorities as well. Many seem eager to look the other way."

The good news

The mysogynistic, patriarchal construct, a.k.a. the Catholic Church has duped a plethora of smart energetic women into a lifetime of oppressed servitude. What gives??

The Anchoress has the stats -- the glorious stats. Deo gratias!

"Womb lynching"

I am delighted to read of a feisty speech given by Martin Luther King's niece at Valparaiso University:

Alveda King, a former member of the Georgia state Legislature and the niece of Martin Luther King Jr. promoted abstinence and adoption as alternatives to what she called "womb lynching" of unborn children. She encouraged efforts in state legislatures to reduce abortions.

A woman can do what she wants with her body, King said. "The baby is not her body. That's not a blob of tissue, that's a person."

King claimed the abortion industry is targeting African-Americans, saying that more than one-third of an estimated 49 million abortions since the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision have been performed on blacks. She characterized Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger as "a devout racist."

Abortion in cases of rape was not justified, King said. Rape is a violent act and an abortion forces further violence on the victim, she said.

King, who had two involuntary abortions as a young woman before taking a pro-life stance, called the sexual revolution of her generation a "disaster" that broke down the family.

If her uncle were alive, he could not condone abortion, King said.

"He absolutely couldn't," she said. "How can the dream survive if we murder the children?"

Amen. Amen.

Utilitarianism at its worst

Amsterdam has long been associated with libertinism, and it's that very reputation which creates the tourist draw, lining the city's coffers with euros, dollars, rupees, yen, and other forms of quantifiable exchanges. Besides the freedom to imbibe drugs, what are the tourists looking for?

[P]rostitutes posing and preening in their windows are a huge draw for visitors. This weekend, the roads and alleys, lined with old-fashion street-lamps, were packed with tourists from all over the world.

Outside the Casa Rosso theatre, large crowds were trying to get in to watch the live sex shows from red velvet seats. A few hundred yards down the street, an erotic museum was also busy. 'It is not reasonable,' shouted Joshua Saley, an 18-year-old on holiday from Woking. 'This is a place where you can be yourself.' His friend, Michael Bailey, said: 'The one place on Earth where you are allowed to do what you want.'

Beside them a tour group headed away from the canal towards another part of the district. Led by their guide, Chantal Moreno, a 28-year-old woman who takes tourists around the area three times a week, they stared in shock at the women beckoning them towards the windows.

Yep. Women in windows -- women for sale. Sex for a price. Prostitution on parade as a life-style choice, an unvirtuous man's dream come true. Not only is the sex-trade legal, and taxed, but the whole atmosphere has been packaged and put up for sale in thematic trinkets and gizmos:

For 14 years, [Mariska] Majoor has run the [Prostitution Information Centre] in order to support women in the area and inform tourists about prostitution in the Netherlands. It is also a souvenir shop with mini statues, T-shirts, mugs, paintings and key-rings. The tourists soon noticed, however, that in place of the models of buses or buildings were those of shapely women in high-heeled boots, leaning against images of the city's famous lampposts.

A huge mural, stretching from the floor to the ceiling, covered one wall, depicting scenes of women in windows. The image was painted by Majoor's father. 'It is his way of dealing with it,' she said. Close by, he had also painted a wooden folding screen with pictures of women dressed in lingerie with their faces lit by a warm red light.

So the men can "deal with it" by marketing it, enjoying the women who work on their backs, and counting the money that makes the town prosper. But lo, what is happening? Crime has crept in?

Last week, the city announced that it would be closing down a third of its famed brothels. Within a matter of months, 52 of the iconic window displays that line the streets of the busy red-light district will disappear.

In a deal worth £18m, officials will buy 18 buildings from [Charlie] Geerts - known as Amsterdam's Emperor of Sex - and close down the 'windows'. The final decision came from the city's mayor, Job Cohen, who argued that the brothels were attracting crime and money-laundering to the area. 'We want to get rid of the underlying criminality,' he told a TV station last week.

"Emperor of sex." An antihero, another contemptable soul using women for his own gain. Who would have ever guessed that prostitution would draw crime! I thought the premise was that legalisation by its very nature made crime disappear. How could this be? Vice breeds vice? Darkness spreads its own shadow? And through it all, Geerts has made cool millions, the town is raking in the tourist revenues, busloads of young fellows like Joshua are salivating and snapping pics, and Majoor and her dad are selling key rings to help the local women get by. Anything wrong with this picture?

Word is out

Vatican Prepares World Congress on Woman to Mark 20 Years Since "Mulieris Dignitatem"

VATICAN CITY, SEPT. 24, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Women from the world over will gather in Rome next year to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Pope John Paul II's apostolic letter on the dignity of women.

The congress, organized by the Pontifical Council for the Laity, will be titled "Woman and Man, the Fullness of What Is Human," and will take place Feb. 7-9.

Rocío Figueroa, organizer of the event and the director of the pontifical council's section on women, told ZENIT that the congress will gather a wide array of women to reflect on the letter "Mulieris Dignitatem," published Aug. 15, 1988.

"We want women to come from all the five continents," she said. "There will be a delegate from each episcopal conference and there will be representatives and leaders of Catholic associations that promote the woman in the Church and various movements and new communities.

"There will also be academic women who reflect on the theme of the woman as theologians, philosophers and psychologists."

Figueroa said that participation in the congress is by invitation only, and that about 250 people will be invited.

Speakers for the congress have not yet been announced, but Figueroa said that topics for the various talks will focus on themes such as John Paul II's letter on women, Mary and the women of the Gospel, the Christian vision of women and feminine anthropology.

Culture specific

The conference will also address the situation of women in various situations and cultures. Talks will be given on promoting the dignity of women in Asia, the role of women in faith education in Africa, the dignity of women in a technological and consumerist society such as the United States, and the integral formation of women in Latin America.

Figueroa explained, "One of the objectives will be to study in-depth the new cultural paradigms such as the reduction of women to objects of consumption, the ideology of gender and the rejection of motherhood and family, as well as women in the world of work."

She added that the celebration of the letter on the dignity of woman is to mark a milestone in the Church: "It is the first time that a pontifical document speaks specifically on the theme of the woman."

Figueroa pointed out to ZENIT that Benedict XVI has also expressed on several occasions the appreciation that the Church has for the contribution of the woman: "It is enough to cite the catechesis of the general audience of Feb. 14, 2007, dedicated precisely to the woman and her ecclesial responsibility from the first Christian communities until today."

North America's planning site is here. Please pray and put together events in your area. This is a marvelous opportunity to spread the good news about the Catholic teaching on authentic femininity.

History led her Romeward

This is a lovely obituary of a dear nun, Sister Gregory Kirkus, who died in August. She was a student of history before entering the Church, and a teacher of it after joining, and she made an indelible mark -- not only on the souls of her students but in the diligent compilation of the history of her order.

[Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary] had been founded in 1609 by the Yorkshirewoman Mary Ward, a niece of two of the Gunpowder Plotters, as an independent self-governing congregation of nuns who, like the Jesuits, would be free of the cloister and would pursue their ministry outside the convent walls. She set up communities and schools on the Continent and her missionaries were sent under cover on the English Mission to support priests. But the idea of a community of religious women living free from the restrictions of the cloister aroused opposition within the Church.

In 1631 the institute was suppressed by Pope Urban VIII, and Mary Ward was imprisoned for a time by the Inquisition. With papal permission she eventually left Rome in 1638 and returned to London, where she worked with the "underground" church. At the time of the Civil War she and her little community sought refuge in Yorkshire, where Mary Ward died in 1645.

Even though her institute was not to receive the Vatican's full approval until 1877, members continued to pursue their calling; and in 1669, in response to a plea by Sir Thomas Gascoigne that "We must have a school for our daughters", Frances Bedingfield, an early member of the community, returned from the Continent to found a hidden convent and school at Hammersmith, followed by the Bar Convent in York in 1686. The community ran the school for 299 years, handing it over to the diocese in 1985. It also opened other schools around the country.

Critical to her vocation was the careful separation of what human elements were lacking and what authentic faith required. To that end, Sister Gregory knew that girls deserved a solid education, that the Church needed consecrated women unrestricted by convent walls, and the faithful must have the ability to take the Inquisition at face value: a limited pursuit with legitimate if occasionally misguided intentions. Thus her historical inquiry led her to embrace Catholicism and her faith in Christ Jesus added immeasurably to the human institution. What a gift she was to the Catholic Church in England. RIP, dear sister.