Wrong on Women in the Church

by Letters Editor · Published April 30, 2017 · Updated April 26, 2017

Henry R Sylvester, president of Catholic Witness Apostolate, Cape Town – Jeanette van Heerden in her letter (February 8) misconstrues Church teaching with reference to the equality and dignity of women and human life, and tries to smuggle in secular and feminist notions of equality into theology.

The Church our Lord established is a divine institution whose mission it is to bring souls to Christ Jesus. Her mission is not to ensure equal opportunities that serve our materialistic, secular, liberal endeavours.

In the story of the servants that were hired to work in the vineyard, the ungrateful servant who grumbled about the owner’s unequal remuneration system received this admonition: “Friend, I am doing you no wrong…Take what belongs to you, and go; I choose to give to this last as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?” (Mt 20:13-15).

This text provides a hint that our secular notion of equality is far removed from Divine Revelation.

While it is true that in ancient times women have culturally been excluded from many areas of life, it does not follow that we can describe the practice as maliciously “unequal” treatment of women when viewed through our “modern” lenses which are framed by our politics.

The Catholic Church has been at the forefront of women saints who pioneered and headed up schools, colleges, nursing homes, orphanages, and monasteries.

Many women have produced great theological works and are revered, and even cities were named after many heroic women of faith.

St Mother Teresa, when she entered the convent, did not seek popularity or a position of authority and status — rather she sought to do the will of the Father. Through her gift of motherhood in serving the destitute, she established missions across the world that made her and her sisters the envy and inspiration of millions.

This saint never referred to herself as the CEO of the order of the Missionaries of Charity, but as the servant of the lonely and downtrodden.

Dr Francis Beckwith, a revert to Catholicism in his defence of Church teachings, puts it rather succinctly: “The Church and her teachings will not fit the political and cultural categories that guide popular entertainment and media, but fail to capture the sophistication nuances and anthropological beliefs of Catholic thought.”