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The Church and the Second Sex

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Mary Daly (1928-2010) was a radical feminist philosopher and theologian who taught at Jesuit-run Boston College for 33 years; she retired in 1999, after a discrimination claim was filed against the college by two male students who claimed to want to be admitted to her advanced Womens Studies courses. She also wrote the books Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women's Liberation, Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism, Pure Lust: Elemental Feminist Philosophy, Websters' First New Intergalactic Wickedary of the English Language, Outercourse: The Be-Dazzling Voyage, QUINTESSENCE: Realizing the Archaic Future A Radical Elemental Feminist Manifesto, and Amazon Grace: Re-Calling the Courage to Sin Big.

This book was first published in 1968, and this edition includes a (1975) "Feminist Postchristian Introduction" by Daly (where Daly wrote of her 1968 self in the third person).

Here are some quotations from the (229-page 1975 edition) of the book :

"The question that comes to my mind is, 'What sense does it make to assert that in Christ "There is neither male nor female"? ... But that is the point: it could not mean anything on earth, where there definitely were and are females and males and where that distinction has been overemphasized and distorted, especially in the church." (Pg. 22)

"One of (Daly's) contemporary critics argued that she had been selective in exhuming only misogynistic texts from the so-called Fathers of the Church. His assumption was that there were some philogynistic texts to be found. Clearly, Daly wins hands down since no scholar of her time nor of any period since has been able to find such texts to refute her position." (Pg. 23)

"Briefly, if God is male, then the male is God." (Pg. 38)

"Women discovering self-actuaization in sisterhood in 1975 ... rarely talk of 'partnership' with men, since this term seems to imply ... as if we could glimpse nothing more desirable than an equal slice of the patriarchal pie." (Pg. 41)

"There is no small irony in the fact that during an age in which opinion of women was so low, some of them were, in fact, members of the hierarchy, whereas in a later and more enlightened age, when the Church itself is urging them to take a more active part in public life, they are completely excluded from the hierarchy." (Pg. 90)

"If women's subordination were really so 'natural,' it would not be necessary to insist so strongly upon it. It would seem that people would not have to be told authoritatively to behave 'naturally.'" (Pg. 116-117)

"...that dream world which is precisely the 'metaphysical world of woman,' the ideal, static woman, who is so much less troublesome than the real article... For the celibate who prefers not to be tied down to a wife, or whose canonical situation forbids marriage, the 'Mary' of his imagination could appear to be the ideal spouse." (Pg. 161)

Daly, a leading contributor to the discussion of gender, the Church, and God-talk is the author of tis seminal book on the issue from what is commonly termed the feminist position. I heartily agree with her that there has been much discrimination against women within the history of Europe, and in part within the boundries of the Church. However, I cannot go so far as she does in her assessment of its roots. One can beleive the right thing for the wrong reason, and in my view, this book is an example of such faulty logic.

Starting her thesis with a very useful analysis of Simone de Beauvoir's role as a protofeminist, she uses her life as a stepping stone into the issue of God, gender, and the Church.

Tracing, what is in her opinion, scriptural support for the oppression of women, she goes on to show that modern scholarship has discovered that lo and behold, Genesis does not teach that women are subordinated to men in worth and function! Uh, is that really a modern understanding or did some Church fathers say the same thing? I would argue that it was in many respects Augustine who is the bearer of much of the Western church's understanding of Genesis and that inthe East, it was the influence of various gnosticisms that downgraded the value of women and their bodies- not at all representative of the whole tradition.

And when she speaks of St. paul, she has many cogent remarks that are quite true. Paul wrote to specific communities about specific issues. For us to generalize from this may be problematic, she write. True. However, the manner of her exegesis makes Paul a master of isogesis! For example, Paul in Corinthians 11:7ff makes a few outlandish statements and then, realizing that it was a dumb thing to write, "immediately" corrected himself in the following verse. This is silly. It may be true that that Paul is wrong about his interpritation of Gensis, and I doubt that he is, but it is stupid to say that Paul would write something (or dictate it) and then say to himself, whoops that was dumb, I guess I should say this instead. No scholar that I know of, and Daly is no scholar of scripture, teaches this as an acceptable exegetical method.

And then there is my favorite anti-female text in St. Paul that Daly latches onto in typical fashion. Of course it is not anti-woman in the least, but Daly does what is so predictable. She quotes the first section of Ephesians chapter 5 verse 22 and fails to read on in the sentence immediately following when it says that husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the Church and died for Her. If I am not mistaken, this injuction of mutual submission placed upon the man a crown not of gold but of thornes, or, as Lewis would say, of paper, while at the same time raising up the status of women (and marriage in general) by placing them within the context of the role of Christ and His own Bride.

Her criticism of the patristic period is needed and welcome, but again, it is not a thorough treatment.

Daly's analysis is not all together bad. In fact, I enjoy her writing very much. However, her premise seems to override her scholarship and logic by fitting a few round pegs into a few square holes. Maybe that is too harsh and I should write now, in accordance with her pualine interpritation, that she is right on. Alas, I cannot.

For me,the value of this work is found not in its conclusions, but in its questions.

I would recommend for those intersted in this issue the works of Manfred Hauke, especially his God or Goddess. SOme of his stuff is wierd for me, but he has a strong grasp of the so-called feminist movement as it pertains to Christian literature.