Author Topic: Church teaching on women (Read 4546 times)

Tiffany · « **on:** July 17, 2013, 06:47:07 AM »

Where does the Church teach that women have less character and less intellectual capabilities than men? This is from the Zimmerman thread. I've seen where the ancients did but apart from Bishop Williamson, Telesphorus, and PereJoseph I have not read anything like that. I don't agree with it from my own experience dealing with women and men but I want to learn if the Church does teach it.

TKGS · « **Reply #1 on:** July 17, 2013, 08:11:41 AM »

I'm not aware that this has ever been a subject of doctrine. In fact, the Church exalts women in many cases. In fact, the only reason many men even have a chance for salvation is because of the influence of a woman (I would include myself in this category).

MyrnaM · « **Reply #2 on:** July 17, 2013, 08:18:39 AM »

TKGS, if I could give you 10 more thumbs up, for these words; "the only reason many men even have a chance for salvation is because of the influence of a woman", I would. It is so true!

True not in every case, not meant for all women, but generally speaking, women are more attracted to prayer, and religion, it is our God given nature.

Tiffany · « **Reply #3 on:** July 17, 2013, 08:43:13 AM »

Quote from: PereJoseph

Quote from: Tiffany
Quote from: Mithrandylan
Quote from: Ursus
Appears that the jury valued evidence instead of emotional media hype.

:applause:

Yes, very interesting-- considering they were mostly (all?) women!

Because women would convict the innocent without evidence? Seriously! First women can't reason now they lack a sense of justice and right from wrong.

Listen, the Church does not teach that women are incapable of mature moral judgment; woman are, of course, endowed with an intellect. That being said, the consensus of theologians and both historical Catholic culture and the classical culture of the ancients are all at one in holding that women are less perfect in their rational faculties than men are and that women are more beholden to emotional impulses and interpersonal pressures than men are. Are those propositions really so difficult to accept ?

It's from the Zimmerman thread and there have been other threads too.

Tiffany · « **Reply #4 on:** July 17, 2013, 08:49:18 AM »

Bishop Williamson has basically said that young adult women taking a class absorb information but they don't think about it.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #5 on:** July 17, 2013, 10:01:51 AM »

I wouldn't say the Church teaches it directly but it can be inferred by what the Church teaches about the roles of the sexes.

It's a truth accessible to reason and experience.

I haven't had time to find these quotes in the Summa, but here is someone summarizing some comments:

Quote

By nature, men are fit to rule women, claims Thomas. This claim is not merely descriptive of the relative perfection of man and woman, but also prescriptive regarding good social order. Thomas says that "good order would have been lacking in the human multitude if some were not governed by others who are wiser. And thus, from such a subjection woman is naturally subject to man."30 But if women are subject to men, women should not speak publicly in church as teachers or priests, or so Thomas reasons. Thomas argues that teaching and persuading are not activities that subjects perform.31

Woman, owing to her material deficiencies, is less wise than man, and should not be priests, says Thomas. Further, Thomas says, on the grounds of woman's lesser wisdom, raising children requires a father more than a mother. When he explains why marriages should last the lifetime of the husband and wife, Thomas says that the task of raising children requires a long time and that 'a woman alone does not suffice, but more is required in the work of the man, in whom there is more perfect reason for instructing and greater strength for punishing."

And not only do men have more perfect reason, but men are more capable of acting on the basis of their reason, according to Thomas. Women are easily led about by their passions.33 Thus Thomas agrees with Aristotle that men and women do not have the same ethical standards. Women, they think, are morally weak propter imperfectionem corporalis naturae, on account of the imperfection of their corporal nature.34 Thomas claims not only a metaphysical or constitutional inferiority for woman, but also a moral inferiority attached to that alleged constitutional inferiority. Thomas thinks woman, owing to her allegedly imperfect body, is the imperfectus sexus: she is spiritually and morally man's inferior.

Woman is the weaker sex, and not just physically.

This observation was considered mere common sense until quite recently.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #6 on:** July 17, 2013, 10:14:51 AM »

A good way to think about it is to think about colonization.

Groups of men can go into new lands and built towns and societies, settling territory, and then invite women to join them.

Men maintain order, keep utilities functioning, maintain the base of essential knowledge and skills, their activity is fundamental to a civilized existence.

While women can contribute in varying degrees they are to be saved by childbirth. They aren't expected to do the sorts of things men do, partly because of lack of capacity, and secondly because if they do have such a high capacity, it is generally foolish for such a woman not to be raising children, since women with high capacity are often the best candidates for motherhood.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #7 on:** July 17, 2013, 10:16:09 AM »

Quote

Further, Thomas says, on the grounds of woman's lesser wisdom, raising children requires a father more than a mother.

Custody of children, especially those past 7, went to fathers of children when women left their husbands.

Tiffany · « **Reply #8 on:** July 17, 2013, 10:57:22 AM »

Quote from: Telesphorus

A good way to think about it is to think about colonization.

Groups of men can go into new lands and built towns and societies, settling territory, and then invite women to join them.

Men maintain order, keep utilities functioning, maintain the base of essential knowledge and skills, their activity is fundamental to a civilized existence.

While women can contribute in varying degrees they are to be saved by childbirth. They aren't expected to do the sorts of things men do, partly because of lack of capacity, and secondly because if they do have such a high capacity, it is generally foolish for such a woman not to be raising children, since women with high capacity are often the best candidates for motherhood.

I'm not questioning if women should be home. I believe they should be home in all stages of life not just after having children. (Under normal circuмstances she would marry as a teen and continue to have children through her forties.) For the best candidates for motherhood I think it's more how self-sacrificing she is.

ServusSpiritusSancti · « **Reply #9 on:** July 17, 2013, 11:05:07 AM »

Quote from: TKGS

I'm not aware that this has ever been a subject of doctrine. In fact, the Church exalts women in many cases. In fact, the only reason many men even have a chance for salvation is because of the influence of a woman (I would include myself in this category).

The influence of moral women, yes. Not the influence of feminists with no morals.

I'm sure you agree, just thought I'd add that.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #10 on:** July 17, 2013, 11:05:20 AM »

Under feminism, all the rules made for compensation of women's natural weakness have been grossly exaggerated, so as to make women unaccountable, while at the same time they are claimed to have all the abilities of men and they will be put into high ranking and high importance positions by affirmative action to "prove" that they are equal- while men have to shoulder the burden of putting up with them. For example, having some feminist affirmative action HR Jєωess deciding which white men in stem fields are hired.

It would be like a society where teenagers were routinely and intentionally put in charge of older more competent men because of their ideological conformity, are given the immunity that children are given, as though that were a special privilege of youth and not a compensation for weakness.

And if the older people were to complain, the response would be "you're jealous of youth, you're getting old and dying, you just can't hack it where these young people have more drive and ambition! You're prejudiced against the young! As someone and older and wiser (with age privilege!) you have no excuse!

Feminism literally is the imposition of an upside down social order for the purpose of wrecking the gentile family.

Tiffany · « **Reply #11 on:** July 17, 2013, 11:06:15 AM »

Quote from: Telesphorus

Men maintain order, keep utilities functioning, maintain the base of essential knowledge and skills, their activity is fundamental to a civilized existence.

I agree.

PereJoseph · « **Reply #12 on:** July 17, 2013, 12:14:55 PM »

Quote from: TKGS

I'm not aware that this has ever been a subject of doctrine. In fact, the Church exalts women in many cases. In fact, the only reason many men even have a chance for salvation is because of the influence of a woman (I would include myself in this category).

That's all quite beside the point. It might be true that many women are who hold their men accountable, or else their good example leads to conversion, etc. In fact, St Paul mentions this, that the pagan men might be converted by the good example of their Christian wives. In any case, that's not the issue. When somebody, such as myself, says that women are less perfect in intellect than men are, I am by no means debasing women. As for having "less character," well, that is rather vague and I would have to be given a clarification of what exactly the OP means. But there is certainly no reason to "come to women's defence," since women were not under attack.

When I say that women are less perfect than men in intellect and that men's rational faculties are more perfect, such that men should be given to serious intellectual pursuits and public activities (wielding authority, teaching, judging, ruling, rhetoric, strategy, enforcing the law, etc.), I am only repeating the teaching of St Thomas :

"Now the reliability of a person's evidence is weakened, sometimes indeed on account of some fault of his, as in the case of unbelievers and persons of evil repute, as well as those who are guilty of a public crime and who are not allowed even to accuse; sometimes, without any fault on his part, and this owing either to a defect in the reason, as in the case of children, imbeciles and women, or to personal feeling, as in the case of enemies, or persons united by family or household ties, or again owing to some external condition, as in the case of poor people, slaves, and those who are under authority, concerning whom it is to be presumed that they might easily be induced to give evidence against the truth.

Thus it is manifest that a person's evidence may be rejected either with or without some fault of his." -- St Thomas, Summa P. II-II, Q. 70, A. 3.

"...as a rule women are not perfected in wisdom, so as to be fit to be intrusted with public teaching." -- Summa P. II-II, Q. 177, A. 2.

"Subjection is twofold. One is servile, by virtue of which a superior makes use of a subject for his own benefit; and this kind of subjection began after sin. There is another kind of subjection which is called economic or civil, whereby the superior makes use of his subjects for their own benefit and good; and this kind of subjection existed even before sin. For good order would have been wanting in the human family if some were not governed by others wiser than themselves. So by such a kind of subjection woman is naturally subject to man, because in man the discretion of reason predominates. Nor is inequality among men excluded by the state of innocence, as we shall prove (96, 3)." -- Summa P. I, Q. 92, A. 1.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #13 on:** July 17, 2013, 12:41:44 PM »

This is another example of Traditionalists jumping on the bandwagon of feminism.

Now St. Thomas tells us women's evidence is less reliable than a man's,

and yet we typically encounter the kind of man who would rather see an innocent man punished than to cast aspersions on a woman's false testimony.

CathMomof7 · « **Reply #14 on:** July 17, 2013, 12:42:50 PM »

While it is true that men are created to build, lead, direct, and plan, it is also true that many of these men are so guided by their passions that they cannot see straight let alone accomplish anything.

And yet, there are women who are given great graces from God to accomplish great things in spite of being surrounded by weak and incompetent men.

Generally speaking, women think with their emotions. This is actually good because we are caretakers. We want relationships and no conflict. This is why women are easily deceived. We like compromise. But to assume that women are not capable of thinking logically is absurd and offensive.