The Role of The Church
in the Oppression of Women (1998)
Jennifer Drouin
For almost the last two thousand years,
there
has been one single institution
which
has had a significantly powerful
realm of control and oppression over the
everyday
lives of the majority of individuals,
especially
women, in Western Europe and
subsequently
North America.
This
insidious institution is the Roman Catholic
Church,
or, in fact, Christianity in general.
The
Church has always been an institution run by men
solely
for the benefits of men. Priests
have always
been
men. It is logical to assume that there could
potentially
have been some abuses of the power
which
this system grants to men.
In
addition, the exclusion of women from
this
sort of "boy’s club" has provided the
opportunity
for the existence of a conspiracy
of
silence as to the specific activities which
its
members could possibly conduct behind
closed
doors, for which man would betray
the
confidence of another by speaking out the
sometimes
unpleasant truth.
The
leaders of The Church did, in fact, often abuse
their
unlimited power to which they had access.
This
organization is guilty not only of crimes against
humanity,
but also of hideous offenses specifically aimed at
women. These crimes have taken on numerous forms,
such
as, crimes of silence as well as physical crimes.
If
one specific institution has been oppressing women for
nearly
two thousand years, it is time for women to finally
examine
this issue with a critical eye and should stand
up
for their rights and condemn this unacceptable behavior.
Crimes of The Church
The Effects of the Virgin Myth
In
examining the crimes of The Church and how
these
acts have oppressed women, it is extremely
important
to consider the following fact: since women
make
up more than fifty percent of the population of
humanity,
any act which directly or indirectly has
an
adverse effect on the development of humanity
will
play a role in the oppression of women,
for
they are half of humanity which would otherwise
be
more highly developed without the influence of this act.
It
is for this reason that the following evaluation of the
crimes
of The Church may not specifically deal with
women
in all cases, but rather, occasionally, with
the
general population of which women form an equal part.
The
worst and most influential crime by The Church,
and
one that has caused massive repercussions
specifically
for women, is the virgin myth. The virgin
myth
is the phenomena created by a translation error.
The
"Virgin Mary" was not actually a virgin, but became known
as
being so only when the Bible was translated in Greek.
In
the original Biblical version in ancient Hebrew,
Mary,
the mother of Jesus, was a young woman,
not
a virgin, as explicitly indicated by the Hebrew
word
"almah" which has no connection whatsoever
with
the idea of virginity. In Hebrew, the word "bethulah"
could
have been used to express the virginity of
Mary;
however, this word was never used. The meaning
"virgin" was never denoted until the Bible was later
translated
into Greek. The mistranslation came about
well
after the original transcription of the Bible
and
church scholars widely accept this fact.
The
Church wanted to continue, rather than condemn,
the
oppression of women which has come as a direct
result
of this error.
Until
the time of the "Virgin Mary" the concept that
being
a virgin as an ideal which all women should
hope
to always maintain was not nearly as profoundly
exaggerated.
It was only after the wondrous tale
of
this one specific virgin that the tendency toward
the
worship of this ideal was solidified. As a result,
a
snowball effect was created in which the pureness
of the "Virgin Mary" became so increasingly
respected that a standard for all women to follow
developed,
forcing women to always try to
maintain
the same level of impeccable pureness
as
that of the "Virgin".
Often
men, and sometimes other women, fail to accept
that
the true nature of women does not exclude sexuality.
This
denial of reality can lead to many other problems
for
women, such as, but certainly not limited to, being
labeled
as sexually promiscuous for nothing more, and
often
much less, than having the normal sexual habits
which
men are permitted.
In
fact, because of the basic need to procreate, it would
be
going against almost every atom in a woman’s body
to
blindly resist the natural desire for sexual activity, and
as
this would be quite difficult for most, it could only lead
to
unhappiness. The virgin myth is partly responsible
for
these complications to the natural order of humans,
and
by setting standards so high than few women can
resist
the natural urge to not follow these ideals, and
this
myth has caused women to be oppressed both
sexually
and emotionally.
Until
just recently, in the history of women, the life
of
a woman was always centered around marriage in
that,
until puberty the education of a girl was mostly a
development of those skills necessary for running a
household
and once puberty was reached, the girl was
expected
to be married. There was very little choice in
the
matter on the part of the girl, and even if she had had the
choice,
she would have probably in most cases chosen marriage
anyway because she was raised to believe that this was a
logical,
necessary step in her life.
The
classifications of Mother, Virgin, Slut are therefore
divided
as follows.
Virgin
or Slut are two binary opposite categories in which
girls
are placed before marriage, and once she has
reached
the age at which she can marry, she quickly
becomes a Mother. Once she has become a wife
and
mother the status of Virgin or Slut is no longer
discussed
by society with such criticism for the
village
gossips wouldn’t want to destroy the stability of
a
family in which the husband may not be aware of any
possible
promiscuity by his wife.
With
this classification neatly and tidily wrapped up by
society,
the only problem left to deal with was that of how to
classify
those women who did not fit into these categories,
that
is the Witches.
As
for these so-called witches, The Church found a simple,
efficient,
and absolutely brutal way to resolve its
problem
of women who refused to conform to traditional
stereotypical ways of life, such as staying single as an "old hag".
The
Church killed them.
The
number of people (80% women) estimated to have been
burned
at the stake or tortured to death for supposedly being
witches
is over 235 000, and this does not include the millions
also
killed for being heretics. All of these deaths were executed
in
the name of The Church and deemed necessary for its survival.
Evidently,
it was the innocent women, not The Church, who were
in
danger of extinction.
Silence, Propaganda, and Flawed Logic
The
Church is also responsible for many other wrongs caused by
silence,
propaganda, and a failure to correct flawed logic.
For
example, one case of failure to correct flawed logic
is
that of the myth of "Eve’s Original Sin". Church leaders
insist
that the pain women endure from menstruation and
pregnancy
is a punishment from God. This lie is easily
disproved
by science and logic, yet Church leaders
continue
to tell the story and insinuate that all women
are
guilty
of the mistake of one fictional woman.
First
of all, there is much scientific evidence which
disproves
the misconception that Eve was the first
woman
on Earth. For example, Louis Leakey’s 1948
discovery
of Lucy, a 20 million year old female
hominid,
greatly predates the time of Eve as suggested in the Bible.
Another
example of the Church’s faulty logic and promotion
of
an unfounded truism is the ceremony of baptism
of
infants. In this ritual, the priest excuses infants
from their
"sins". Since infants at this time are
often too young to
even
speak or feed themselves, it is extremely illogical
to
accuse them of sins for they are capable of nothing
more
than lying helplessly, dependent on others.
Physical, Financial, and Sexual Abuse
In
addition to the crimes of silence, propaganda and
faulty
logic, The Church is responsible for many
other
physical, financial and sexual crimes against
both
women and humanity as a whole.
As
was already briefly mentioned, the biggest physical
crime
by The Church was the Inquisition and the witch hunts.
Church leaders organized a secret police to hunt down and to
torture
anyone who appeared to even slightly
disagree
with Church dogma. Church leaders created
a
reign of fear and terror which hindered the
development
of humanity, not only by the millions of
deaths,
but also by the uncertainty which citizens
living
during this time would have felt.
When
St. Peter’s cathedral was being built in Rome,
the
present Pope wanted to raise money to pay
for
the cost of construction. He exploited the people’s
fear
of death by selling insurance to eliminate past sins
guaranteeing
that anyone who bought an indulgence
would
go to heaven upon death. After producing
huge
revenues and profits with this scheme, he created
five
other indulgences in which he sold, for example,
insurance
for relatives, future sins, and dead relatives
already
in hell. This plan became an easy means to exploit
people’s
fear of death in order to personally benefit financially.
Another
physical exploitation of humanity by
Church
leaders was, and in some countries still is,
the
practice of “holy wars” in which many
have
lost their lives fighting simply because
their
religious leaders told them to do so.
In
the Middle Ages alone, there were four Crusades
to
"defend" the "Holy Land" (i.e. exploit and rob
others,
as well as rape the women that they met
along
the way ) and two Children’s Crusades. In all of
these
crusades many thousands of innocent people
were
blindly sent to their deaths believing that they were
protecting
their faith. The church leaders were not
ashamed
to send many people to their certain deaths just
so
that the church could feel reassured in their conceit that
they
were superior to the Muslims.
In
the ninth century, the church actually encouraged
the
rape
and abuse of women. Noblemen had a "natural right"
to
rape peasant women and to deflower the brides of their
vassals.
Sex without values (rape, prostitution, sadism)
was
not a serious crime; however, according to church
leaders,
sex with love was a sin. The
church encouraged this
attitude
and thus condoned the practice of raping and
abusing
women.
In
modern times, the the church leaders whom society
is
supposed to trust have continued to betray those
who
are helpless to defend themselves. For the first time
in
history, sexual abuse by priests is being made public
and
the perpetrators are finally being held accountable
for
their heinous crimes. For example, sexual abuse of
young
boys by priests in Newfoundland at the
Mount Cashel orphanage has recently
come to the
attention
of the public and compensation is finally
being
awarded to the men who suffered as young,
defenseless
boys. While the blame must be rightly
placed
on the individual priests who committed these
acts,
society must not forget that it is the church in
general
which is also greatly responsible. The church
forbids
that priests marry or have sex
(so
they won’t be corrupted by "awful" women) which
is
an unnatural condition to place on any human.
As
a result of unnatural conditions, these priests
logically
commit unnatural acts such as forced sex
with
young boys. Besides hindering the development
of
many potentially positive contributors to society,
the
acts of these priests also have large impact on the
lives
of many women. Of all the boys abused by
the
priests, 80-90% grow up to abuse others that they
meet
in the course of their lives, and most of their
victims
are women. If the priests had not abused
the
boys, these same boys would not be likely to
abuse
women and a certain percentage of women v
ictims
of violence would have been spared the aggressive
treatment that they suffered.
Today,
it is the religious fundamentalist groups
that
fight most vehemently against the improvement
of
women’s rights. These groups defeated the American
Equal
Rights Amendment of the 1980’s
Conclusion
It
should be obvious that The Church has committed
serious
crimes and has severely limited the development of
humanity
over the past two thousand years, especially the
development
and equality of women.
These
crimes have taken on several forms, from the
promotion
of religious catechism with no scientific
basis
to the real rape and destruction of the lives
of
innumerable young boys. The support of dogma
that
church leaders know to be false, such as the virgin
myth,
has been directly responsible for the
subjugation
of women and their unequal status in
society.
Church leaders have done nothing to correct the
falsehoods
written in this "holy" text. The Bible.
Why
has this patriarchal, oppressive institution
survived
for so long and successfully continued
its
immoral activities without opposition? The answer
to
this puzzle is simple: for the same reason that
the
church successfully profited from its subjects by
selling
indulgences.
The
Church is based on the exploitation of people’s
rational
fear of the unknown, their fear of "the
undiscovered
country, from whose bourn no traveler
returns".
The Church abuses the natural, human fear
of
death in order to maintain its reign of power over
the
general population.
Women
have never revolted and risen up united
against
this oppressor because they are also afraid
of
death and "hell". "The fear of God will therefore
repress
any impulse towards revolt in the
downtrodden
female."
