This is an article from October 2018. I'm going through it again for the ideals, and to ponder over it before Good Friday. Elizabeth Barber's 'Lucetta Scaraffia Is Trying To Fight Catholic Patriarchy From The Inside', published in The New Yorker on October 28, 2018.
If the Church hadn't been progressive enough for my grandmothers (who aren't as vocal to their priests), then it's certainly not enough for me. I'm just glad that their husbands have been raised rather differently because their mothers took a different approach, marrying cultural traditions with living a purposeful life. However, it doesn't guarantee that you get a lovely set of relatives. In fact, they might be so zealously patriarchal that you wonder which generation they truly belong to.
At one point in our conversation, over pasta and a plate of mozzarella, Scaraffia said, "I would like for women to become cardinals." After the comment was relayed in English, I paused. A woman who doesn't think women should be cardinals, and occupy the rank just beneath the Pope, whom cardinals elect and advise?
Yes, Scaraffia said. It's true that the Vatican prohibits women from ordination into the clerical hierarchy—though nuns take vows, they are not ordained, and so they are laypeople, not clerics. Priests, who consecrate the host at Mass, must be ordained to do so, but Catholic theology does not mandate that cardinals be ordained. So theologically speaking, laypeople, including laywomen, can be cardinals. Pope Francis "would have everyone against him" if he named a female cardinal, Scaraffia said. "Everyone." She laughed. "He might do it just before he dies, or renounces his papacy," she went on. But "he could do it," she added. "He might."
Subversive? Perhaps. To me, it's necessary change. It's imperative. It's been a slow movement of change. Change doesn't happen overnight. 'Obey' is a word that has never sat well with me in any context. I will never submit to that world. NEVER. Which is why, all those years ago, I had a major conflict, fights and huge debates (with the church elders, family and random well-meaning humans who think it's their business to butt into mine) about religion when I was forced to think about Confirmation. Male patriarchy (and chauvinism) has been the way of the world for centuries. I don't accept that, and I try to surround myself with people who aren't like that. Otherwise I'd be losing my temper every other day. No one tells me how to live a God-centered life, except the Bible. I know how to live a purposeful life. Seek your own, and leave me be.
I find this article to be a little more than discussing about issues of female power or feminism within the Catholic Church. The ideal of feminism is not the stereotypes or caricatures to it. This is also not about busting that tiresome bra-burning/man-hating myth perpetuated by idiots since 1968. One can be a wife, a mother, a sister, a daughter, a lover, and above all, a woman. As long we do not bow down to male patriarchy, we are feminists. But if you let yourself be roughshod by patriarchal social privileges and moral authority, then you need ask yourself if you're truly comfortable with that.
Echo chambers are everywhere, and we wonder if we should live in our own circles where we feel most at ease. How we want to define this world, should start with how we define our little social spheres. History have taught us that religion and politics should remain separate, and for good reason. As I get older, conversations have emphasized how much I truly believe in the separation of secular law and church doctrines. These two should never influence one another so overtly; the separation of church and state is essential to multi-cultural harmony.
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