RECOVERING MOTHERHOOD

by Laura Garcia

The mother of Jesus appears prominently in the typical list of role models for women, but women's comfort level with this idea has dropped dramatically in recent decades. No doubt much of this can be laid at the door of extreme elements within the feminist movement, for whom power, status, wealth, and boundless autonomy define the good life. Judged by these standards, Mary's life clearly qualifies as a failure. In spite of a few scattered attempts to portray her as a revolutionary champion of the poor and oppressed, a kind of militant proto-liberation theologian, the Mary of the Gospels appears genuinely untroubled by a life of hiddenness and hardship. She would probably concur with the title of a recent book, Feminism is Not the Story of My Life. What can today's women - especially those working outside the home and those in positions of leadership - learn from this first-century housewife of Nazareth?

Everything, according to Pope John Paul II. It's safe to say that no other pope in the history of the Church has written so extensively and so eloquently about women, from his early encyclical on "The Mother of the Redeemer" through "On the Dignity and Vocation of Women" and, most recently, the beautiful "Letter to Women" of last summer. The Holy Father is fond of repeating the theme that Jesus Christ reveals man to himself. By looking at Jesus, we discover what it means to be a human being - the original meaning of our humanity, undistorted by original sin. When the Pope addresses women, he clearly wants to make the further claim that Mary reveals woman to herself. Mary's life shows forth in its clearest and purest form what is the essence of the feminine dimension of human existence, what is the unique contribution of women to our common life.

The key to this "mystery of woman" can be found in the two sides of Mary's vocation as virgin and mother. Her virginity is a sign of her total dedication to God, of that vocation to holiness which is also the vocation of every person. Mary's receptiveness to the will of God, "let it be done to me according to your word," is her greatest glory. It is true that all men and women are called to echo these words, but the Holy Father sees in women a greater sensitivity to God and to the things of the spirit, a kind of inside track on the interior life. As the member of the Church who is first in the hierarchy of holiness, the Mother of God is a model for all of us, but especially for women. Recent studies of the brain show that women generally hear better than men do and detect changes in tone of voice more readily. It would be wonderful if this ability translates into a similar sensitivity to the voice of the Holy Spirit, so that women will be able to teach others (particularly our children) how to listen to Him.

But it is especially in Mary's motherhood that John Paul II finds the "genius of women," and it is this womanly role that he looks to for the distinctively feminine contribution to the human family. The wonderful audacity of this suggestion should be obvious to anyone who followed the deliberations of the recent United Nations Conference on Women. Mercedes Wilson, Guatemalan delegate to that conference, reports that every attempt to add the word "mother" to the list of professions that should be open to women was soundly defeated by the Western delegates. Many women today see motherhood as a threat to women's participation in sectors of society outside the domestic sphere. Motherhood cannot liberate women, in their view, it can only frustrate and enslave them.

The real irony in all of this is that the vision of the Holy Father extends far beyond the narrow agenda of contemporary feminism; it is a vision of cosmic proportions. Of course equality and justice for women, and for every human being made in the image of God, must always be a goal of society. But these are not ends in themselves; they are simply the means to enable us to accomplish further ends. They create the conditions for women's full participation in every sector of society, and to a large extent these conditions have been met. Women have arrived! But now that we are here, what is our contribution? This will be very closely tied to what is distinctive about women, about every woman, and that is her connection to children. Whether or not she has natural children, every woman has the heart of a mother, a capacity for attentiveness to persons and to the value of each human life, for what Iris Murdoch calls "preservative love."

In "The Gospel of Life," the Pope calls for a "new feminism" founded on women's recognition of their dignity and the leadership role they must play in exercising a genuine cultural motherhood in the world forum. Women have always been champions of the truth that every person counts, and that harm to anyone, even the least of these, diminishes us all. Against the forces driving the culture of death - hedonism, materialism, individualism gone amok - it falls especially on women to defend the transcendent values of the sanctity of human life and our duties toward the weakest members of society.

Lest anyone think that this maternal task is for the faint of heart, recall that Mary's solicitude for her Son took her into Egypt as a refugee and, years later, to the foot of the cross. In Mary women can indeed find a model of empowerment - not the power to dominate, but the power to serve, the power to love. If women reject this vocation, if we slavishly follow male models of achievement and success at the expense of those values we know are more important, then the death of our culture will be an assisted suicide, and women will have much for which to answer.

Laura L. Garcia, a regular columnist for Catholic Dossier, is the mother of four and teaches philosophy at Rutgers University.