Anyone who has read my posts for any length of time knows my enthusiasm and affection for Pope Francis. Perhaps as no other Pope in my lifetime has a Pontiff embraced and sought to incorporate the teachings of Vatican Council II into the practical experience of the Church.
He does confuse me, however. But, as friends have suggested to me often, I am easily confused about so many things.
Here’s a tidbit from the Pope’s daily morning Mass at Casa Santa Marta, as he reflected on the creation of woman, as told in Genesis, and on how God created woman, in his personal opinion, so that we would all have a mother.
“Without women, there is no harmony in the world, ” the Pope stressed, noting men and women are not equal. While clarifying that one is not superior to the other, he explained that it is the woman, and not the man, who brings that harmony which makes the world a beautiful place.
During the homily, the Pope considered three moments in Creation: the solitude of the man, the dream, and the destiny of both the man and the woman: to be “one flesh.”
Pope Francis was continuing his reflections on creation, and how God, seeing man all alone, took a rib from Adam and created woman, who the man recognized as “flesh of his flesh.” “But before seeing her,” the Pope said, “the man dreamed of her… In order to understand a woman, it is necessary first to dream of her.” The woman brings, Francis stressed, bring the capacity to love one another, namely harmony for the world.
“This is the great gift of God: He has given us woman. And in the Gospel, we have heard what a woman is capable of, eh? She is courageous, that one, eh? She went forward with courage. But there is more, so much more. A woman is harmony, is poetry, is beauty.
Without her, the world would not be so beautiful, it would not be harmonious. “And I like to think – but this is a personal thing – that God created women so that we would all have a mother.
The Pope went on to lament how often, women are spoken about or thought of in a ‘functionalist’ manner. Instead, he underscored, we should see women as bearers of a richness that men do not possess: women bring harmony to creation.
“When women are not there, harmony is missing. We might say: But this is a society with a strong masculine attitude, and this is the case, no? The woman is missing. ‘Yes, yes: the woman is there to wash the dishes, to do things…’ “No, no, no!” he said, “The woman is there to bring harmony,” and who “teaches us to caress, to love with tenderness; and who makes the world a beautiful place.”
I cannot ever remember a Pope speaking of women so beautifully, so passionately!
What confuses me, however, is this: if women were created to bring harmony into creation, why deprive the Church of that harmony?
If woman truly is flesh of man’s flesh, what ontological obstacle exists which would render women incapable of Priesthood? If woman is truly man’s equal, “in persona Christi” must equally apply to a woman’s capacity to act in ontological unity with the Lord, must it not?
The irony for the Church is this: the Church does not wish to speak of women in a “functionalist” manner, but does precisely that when denying even the metaphysical possibility of a woman (flesh of man’s flesh) acting “in persona Christi”.
There are many problems facing the Church.
Pope Francis jokingly said in a recent interview that he places problems he encounters in letters he writes to Saint Joseph, letters which he places under a statue of the Saint by his bedside. Francis said: “I sleep on a mattress of such letters!”
I wonder whether or not a number of the problems facing the Church come from the lack of harmony within the Body of Christ precisely because the People of God are not the beneficiaries of the tenderness and gentle spiritual caress that only women can offer by sharing in the Priesthood of Jesus Christ.
I offer this thought not as an agenda item for a revolutionary change in the Church, but offer it simply as a question occasioned by the Pope’s homily and my understanding of the metaphysical and ontological arguments that have been made against women being ordained.
Might not the Church do well to at least be willing to "dream" of women as Priests?
I guess instead of writing posts about the subject, I should just jot off a letter to Saint Joseph myself and putting it under my pillow.
If I did the same for all the things which confused me about the Church, I’d be in the same position as Pope Francis.
Problem is I don’t sleep well on paper. Apparently, the Holy Father does!
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