[cross-posted at Austro-Athenian Empire]

Two weeks ago I discussed what I called the"paradox of religious conservatism" -- namely, the fact that those who are allegedly dedicated to the supremacy of spirit over matter are in practice committed to subordinating the spiritual aspects of human life to the merely biological aspects. The latest confirmation of this comes in the form of an anti-feminist screed from the Vatican titled On the Collaboration of Men and Women in the Church and the World.

While the insulting phrase"a woman is not a copy of a man" (insulting in its implication that feminists do regard woman as a" copy of a man"), which news reports have most often quoted from the document, does not in fact appear to occur in it, the rambling diatribe certainly does condemn the"human attempt to be freed from one's biological conditioning," and complains that among feminists"physical difference, termed sex, is minimized, while the purely cultural element, termed gender, is emphasized to the maximum and held to be primary."

For the Vatican, by contrast, women's biological role as mothers determines their spiritual destiny, which is -- you guessed it -- a" capacity for the other." As I've noted before (see here and here), one of the strategies of patriarchy is to define the function of women as fundamentally other-directed. Of course the Vatican document is quick to assure us that"in the final analysis, every human being, man or woman, is destined to be 'for the other'" (as if such a celebration of servility would be any more palatable if the servility were reciprocal) -- but women, we are told, are"more immediately attuned to these values," and it is their task to"live them with particular intensity and naturalness." One of the chief function of women, the Vatican opines, is to serve as a"sign" of this doctrine of universal servility by exemplifying the distinctively feminine virtues of"listening, welcoming, humility, faithfulness, praise and waiting," and thereby"recalling these dispositions to all the baptized."

In short, although every human being is called to self-immolation, women are supposed to specialise in it -- and all because of the reproductive role that nature happens to have assigned them. Isn't this precisely the biology-worship I've been complaining of? (Needless to say, these men in dresses also have no patience for those who" call into question the family, in its natural two-parent structure of mother and father" and"make homosexuality and heterosexuality virtually equivalent." Here too, the spiritual must be subordinated to the biological rather than vice versa.)

The Vatican anticipates the charge of biology-worship and seeks to rebut it. Although"motherhood is a key element of women's identity," this"does not mean that women should be considered from the sole perspective of physical procreation"; on the contrary, the"Christian vocation of virginity”" contradicts"any attempt to enclose women in mere biological destiny." (Of course, for a religion that condemns birth control, virginity is the only alternative to motherhood on offer.) Still, virginity is described as a kind of metaphorical extension of biological motherhood:

Just as virginity receives from physical motherhood the insight that there is no Christian vocation except in the concrete gift of oneself to the other, so physical motherhood receives from virginity an insight into its fundamentally spiritual dimension: it is in not being content only to give physical life that the other truly comes into existence. This means that motherhood can find forms of full realization also where there is no physical procreation.

In short, even women who are not mothers in the literal sense are still expected to model their human interactions on motherhood in a way that goes beyond what is asked of men. The Vatican, more subtle than its Baptist brethren (no surprise there!), insists that woman's role as a"helpmate" marks her not as an"inferior," but rather as a"vital helper" on a man's"own level" -- but all the same it is woman, not man, whose essence is defined in this other-regarding way. It is femininity, not masculinity, that is defined as"the fundamental human capacity to live for the other and because of the other." (From an individualist perspective, what greater insult to women can be imagined?)

The Vatican seeks to evade the charge of biology-worship by insisting that male and female are not purely biological categories. (Though when feminists say precisely this, the Vatican attacks them for emphasising gender over sex!) Although the"temporal and earthly expression of sexuality" is"transient and ordered to a phase of life marked by procreation and death," the distinction between male and female is described as"belonging ontologically to creation" and therefore as"destined ... to outlast the present time," albeit"in a transfigured form." Those who in the present life take vows of celibacy"for the sake of the Kingdom" are prefiguring"this form of future existence of male and female." But far from being the negation of biology-worship, this point of view elevates women's biological role in reproduction to a metaphysical principle entailing special duties of feminine servility from which even the grave will apparently offer no escape. (Though insofar as feminine self-immolation is supposed to be an inspiring model for men to imitate, this conception is no picnic for either sex. Thus patriarchy and altruism are complementary parts of an interlocking system that oppresses both men and women -- albeit not equally.)

The Vatican throws a sop to the feminists by acknowledging that"women should be present in the world of work and in the organization of society," and"should have access to positions of responsibility." But can women really be expected to compete on equal terms when they must also shoulder the special burden of serving as a visible"sign" of the servile virtues?

The Vatican also pays women the old false compliment of a special feminine"sense and ... respect for what is concrete," as"opposed to abstractions which are so often fatal for the existence of individuals and society." That sounds very nice; but propagating such a view of women is hardly likely to enhance their success in intellectual careers. (Admittedly some feminists have made precisely the same mistake, trumpeting hostility to abstraction as some sort of liberating"feminine voice" and"ethics of care," when in fact such stereotypes are more plausibly regarded as artefacts of women’s subjection.)

The document's tepid support for women's"access to positions of responsibility" is vitiated by its condemnation of feminists who"emphasize strongly conditions of subordination" and urge women to"make themselves the adversaries of men." Should feminists ignore the existing conditions of subordination? It is such conditions, and not those who point them out, that are responsible for adversarial relations between men and women. The goal of feminists is to abolish these adversarial relations by abolishing the conditions of subordination that maintain them.

The Vatican's insistence that men and women are equal partners is likewise belied by the document's stress on the"importance and relevance" of the fact that in incarnating himself as Jesus Christ, God"assumed human nature in its male form." Even for those who accept the (to my mind blasphemous and un-Biblical) notion that God once became a human being, one might have thought that he picked a male form for the simple reason that a female preacher in first-century Palestine would have had even more trouble gaining a hearing than Jesus did. But the Vatican apparently sees it as signifying that divinity is more appropriately expressed in male rather than female form. Thus patriarchy is undergirded by patriolatry.

In one of his better moments, St. Paul wrote that in Christ"there is neither male nor female." (Galatians 3:28.) In short, our physical biology does not determine our spiritual vocation. The Vatican document ingeniously interprets this passage in precisely the opposite sense, to mean that"the distinction between man and woman is reaffirmed more than ever," in that the"rivalry" which has"disfigured the relationship between men and women" will be replaced with harmony once the sexes reconcile themselves to their Church-assigned roles. In short, the ideal held out to women is: peace through surrender.

To this, the only proper answer can be: no peace without justice!

Écrasez l’infâme!