Catholic Women Research Articles

“Dear Lord, If It Were Up to Me, It Wouldn’t Happen”: Marital Duty, Consent, and Catholic Women’s Sexual Agency in 1950s French-Speaking Belgium

“Dear Lord, If It Were Up to Me, It Wouldn’t Happen”: Marital Duty, Consent, and Catholic Women’s Sexual Agency in 1950s French-Speaking Belgium

The relationship between religious affiliation and menopause symptoms and attitudes in United States women

ObjectivesThis study's aim is to examine patterns of menopause symptoms and attitudes among United States women from different religious affiliations. Study designWe used data from a national sample of midlife and older adults. For this analysis, we included only women who were postmenopausal or had undergone hysterectomy. We constructed univariate and multivariate logistic regression models to examine the relationship between religious affiliation and menopause symptoms and attitudes while adjusting for potential confounders. Main outcome measuresMenopause symptoms (hot flashes, pain in sexual interactions, pleasure in sexual interactions, trouble falling asleep) and attitudes (relief on periods stopping, regret on periods stopping, worry about becoming less attractive) measured by self-report on Likert scales. ResultsAcross denominations, 47 % of women experienced hot flashes, 48 % experienced pain in sexual interactions, 95 % experienced pleasure, and 88 % had trouble falling asleep. Regarding attitudes towards menopause and aging, 62 % felt relief in their periods stopping, while 56 % expressed worry about becoming less attractive with aging. Baptist women were more likely to experience hot flashes and trouble falling asleep compared to Catholic women. However, when adjusted for smoking status, this relationship did not persist. Unaffiliated and Spiritual women were less likely to experience trouble falling asleep and more likely to report pleasure in sexual interactions compared to Catholic women. Spiritual women were significantly more likely to feel regret on periods stopping compared to Catholics. ConclusionsThere is a relationship between religious affiliation and the menopause experience. These findings demonstrate the importance of considering social influences on women's health.

“Whether my Body Breaks or the Plum Tree Withers”: Iwanaga Maki, Social Welfare Pioneer, and the jūjikai Women's Religious Order

Maria Iwanaga Maki (1849–1920) was 23 years old in 1873 when she returned home after a community exile and persecutions of more than 3000 people carried out by the Meiji government. Historians in the public record refer to Iwanaga as otoko‐masari (man‐nish) when she stood up to a representative of the Shogun, while in her public work she became known as the sister of the intersection. She was a social‐work pioneer, believed to have cared for upwards of 900 children. During her family's imprisonment in Bizen (Okayama), Iwanaga's younger sister, Fui, and her father died. Iwanaga and her compatriots started the jūjikai Cross Society, that was the first Japanese Catholic women's order post‐persecution in 1879, working to assist those affected by epidemics and beginning one of, if not the first orphanage in the Meiji era in Japan. In this article by including a family tree, I consider how memory and emotion is transmitted across generations, drawing on Marianne Hirsch's “postmemory,” in the light of the narratives about Iwanaga. I examine three primary sources, including two spoken records and a photograph, to better understand the emotional person of Iwanaga, and her institution of onnabeya, or women's rooms.

Saintly Protest: Women Religious, Religious Women, and the Early United Farm Worker Movement

Abstract: While the image of César Chávez graces the face of U.S. postal stamps, less recognized are the women of the United Farm Worker Movement. Yet Catholic women, from the better-known Dolores Huerta to regional organizers like Lupe Anguiano, were critical to the union’s early victories. This article begins the work of excavating the lives and labor of the women religious and religious women of the union, with an emphasis on the activism of Catholic Latinas. When structural changes within the Catholic Church of the mid-to-late twentieth century prompted women to reexamine their faith, they responded by supporting movements, such as the grape strike of 1965–1970, on picket lines, with fasts, and for some, with full-time labor. “Saintly Protest” turns to the grape strike and explores how Catholic women, including women religious, came to support the union, and the dynamic relationship between la cotidiana , their activism, and their faith.

“San Juan is Catholic”: The Hijas de María in Puerto Rico’s Parishes and Streets, 1872–1918

Abstract: The Hijas de María, a global Catholic laywomen’s organization, were active in Puerto Rico from the end of Spanish rule through North American rule. Their organizational structure and their pieties buttressed the Church’s few pastors and, after the North American invasion, its new hierarchy. In the space that the institutional Church could not fill, the Hijas’ devotions provided the laity with new, feminized paths for holiness. The devotional life of the Hijas de María developed within new global currents in the Church, including increasing Roman influence and a greater focus on children and their potential sanctity. This is also a story of how Puerto Rican Catholic women met modernity and its secular influences and claimed the island for their own and the interests of religion and the Church.

Factors associated with postpartum family planning use in Rwanda.

Resumption and initiation of contraceptive methods after delivery are of critical importance in ensuring the well-being of the mother and the newborn. However, evidence related with postpartum family planning in Rwanda is scanty. This study employed survival analysis techniques to study the time to resumption or initiation of contraceptive methods after childbirth in Rwandan women and the associated factors. Data were collected from the 2020 Rwanda Demographic and Health Survey (RDHS). Descriptive statistics were obtained after adjusting for study design. Initial analysis was conducted using the Kaplan-Meier method, followed by univariate and multivariable Cox Hazard proportional models to study factors associated with the initiation of contraceptive use after delivery. Cox Model assumptions were tested using scaled Schoenfeld Residuals. 5682 women who delivered in the five years preceding the survey were included in this research. The percentage of women who used modern contraceptives was 32%, 55%, 67%, and 79% at one month, six months, one year and two years respectively. Delivery by cesarean section, access to health insurance, and an increase in the number of children under five years of age were associated with increased chances of utilizing modern contraceptives after delivery. An increase in women's age and in the ideal number of children and women with a history of terminated pregnancy were associated with reduced chances of using postpartum family planning. The influence of religion was highlighted, with Catholic women associated with high contraceptive use. There is a need to strengthen postpartum family planning in Rwanda. Policy makers and clinicians should provide additional customized interventions for women with factors associated with low use.

Chrześcijański feminizm w Afryce – kontynentalne dyskursy i lokalne praktyki

<p>This paper discusses selected research topics developed by feminist theologians connected with the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians. The Circle was established in 1989 and was led for many years by Mercy Amba Oduyoye, a Ghanaian Methodist theologian. Today the Circle attracts women theologians from three generations and various African countries. The paper refers to feminist and postcolonial theories as well as some more African-oriented topics developed in the Circle’s writings. Complex and ambiguous reinterpretations of the so-called African Traditional Religion are framed by references to inculturation and liberation theology. The final part of the paper refers to the concept of “oral theology” and theology in practice. The author’s ethnographic fieldwork in Ghana among Catholic women is mentioned to draw parallels between the theological practical approach and the anthropological concept of lived religion.</p>

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940

Fostering the sacred in a secular society: Catholic women practicing religion through intimate relationships

ABSTRACTThis article aims to contribute to the body of scholarship on lived religion by using intimate relationships as a lens in order to examine religiosity. Based on ethnographic research carried out among practicing Catholic women in Belgium, I unpack Catholic women’s understanding of the entanglement between religiosity and relationships by showing the ways in which these women perceive intimate relationships to enable—and at times hinder—their performance of religiosity. I draw on the study of lived religion in a twofold manner. Firstly, I mobilize it as an ethnographic tool to capture the experiences and practices of the women with respect to intimate relationships. Secondly, I contribute to the further theorization of the field by investigating religiosity and how religion is practiced in a non-religious setting, i.e. coupledom in a secular society. Hence, in this article I propose a novel road of inquiry that utilizes intimate relationships as a lens to understand how religion is enacted on an everyday basis. In doing so, we may come to see intimate relationships as a site where religiosity is constructed and performed, in particular against the background of a secularizing society in which Catholicism is no longer the default option as it once was.

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940: How Women Preserved the Power of the Catholic Church in Mexican Political Life, written by Margaret Chowning

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940: How Women Preserved the Power of the Catholic Church in Mexican Political Life, written by Margaret Chowning

Immaculate Conception of Gender: The Marian Phenomenon Among Catholic Women Pilgrims

This research concerns the phenomenological pragmatics of the Marian imaginaries in the study of gender and religion as intersecting and coconstituting themes. The contemporary constructions of antiquity occur in two ways: phantasmatic conceptions of the sacred as indoctrinated gendered catechisms, and embodied forms manifest on the body, thus serving as dogmatic disruptions for human sexuality. Reminiscent of Irigaray, what are the ways in which seemingly sexed bodies shelter the deterritorialized Queen? In what manner do bodies on pilgrimage facilitate the mediation of the mediatrix? This study examines how the queen of virgins, the Regina Virginum, demarcates the visions of womanhood and femininity through fieldwork among the Latina Catholic women pilgrims to the House of the Virgin Mary in Selçuk Province, Turkey. In this context, it further provides an analysis of discourse within the context of Pope Francis’ address at the General Audience held in the Paul VI Audience Hall on Wednesday, 23 August 2023. The research results are set to highlight how women can cultivate empowerment by embracing their inner selves, paralleling Mary’s spiritual influence on women’s agency. Findings demonstrate how women utilize pilgrimage experiences, inspired by Mary’s multifaceted symbolism, to challenge gender norms, reconstruct identities, and assert agency, emphasizing the transformative potential of religious practices in empowering women.

Written Interventions by Catholic Women: Reflections on Religion and Gender in the Interwar Period

Written Interventions by Catholic Women: Reflections on Religion and Gender in the Interwar Period

Catholic Women's Rhetoric in the United States: Ethos, the Patriarchy, and Feminist Resistance ed. by Christina R. Pinkston and Elizabethada A. Wright (review)

Catholic Women's Rhetoric in the United States: Ethos, the Patriarchy, and Feminist Resistance ed. by Christina R. Pinkston and Elizabethada A. Wright (review)

Negotiating Catholic Sexual Ethics

Abstract Catholic teachings on sexuality have long stirred controversies and global debates insofar as they put the value of women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights into question. In the Catholic Church, there are ongoing debates among scholars, including theologians and feminists. Various theologians, such as Tina Beattie, have argued that the Church’s doctrines on sexuality do not take into account the daily experiences of a large group of Catholics, especially in relation to the topic of birth control. In this paper, we present a review of empirical studies on the topic of ‘lived sexual ethics.’ Using an integrative review method, we compared nine empirical studies on ordinary Catholic women’s views on and experiences with Catholic teachings on sexual ethics with three aims in mind. Firstly, we present the methodology and conceptual framework (agency) that the study used. Secondly, we present one strategy and four arguments of the Catholic women in nine different contexts. Lastly, we analyze which approaches to agency from each of these could be considered when reflecting on sexual ethics from the perspective of lived experiences of Catholics.

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750-1940. By Margaret Chowning

<i>Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750-1940.</i> By Margaret Chowning

THE CATHOLIC WOMEN'S PRESS IN INTERWAR POLAND: IN LOOKING FOR THE FIGURE OF AN IDEAL WOMAN

This article explores the representation of the ideal woman and femininity in the Polish interwar Catholic women's press, focusing on two selected publications – «Kuźniczanka» and «Gazeta dla kobiet.» In the 1920s and 1930s in Poland, Catholic periodicals were widely circulated, and the women's press developed against the backdrop of social changes caused by World War I. The Catholic women's press promoted a religious and nationalist worldview while paying attention to the new emancipation of women. In creating the image of the ideal woman, the Polish Catholic interwar press sought to influence its readers' behavior and life strategies. The article analyzes how these publications shaped the image of the ideal woman and femininity, as well as the consequences of such representation for their readership. «Gazeta dla Kobiet» emphasized the care and upbringing of children, highlighting the irreplaceable role of the mother in these areas. It advocated for constant maternal contact with the child, rationality, and moderation in relationships. The importance of religious education was also emphasized. «Kuźniczanka,» a publication that gained popularity at the national level, aimed at the religious education of adult women and the formation of a patriotic position. The magazine promoted the concept of hardworking, modest living and active participation in public work. The magazine sought to prepare its readers for the fulfillment of daily family duties and protect them from worldly temptations. The ideal woman depicted in the pages of «Kuźniczanka» was a prudent wife and mother, skilled in organizing household affairs, and a sensitive educator of the weak or socially marginalized. Both publications promoted an ideal image of a woman based on religious norms, virtuosity, hard work, and modesty. This model served to mobilize defenders of religious and national values and moral traditionalism. It also emphasized the crucial role of a properly educated woman in creating optimal conditions for the development of younger generations.

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940 by Margaret Chowning (review)

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940 by Margaret Chowning (review)

Charisma, Gender and ‘Glocality’: Catholic Charismatic Women in the 1970s

This article addresses the role of women in Catholic charismatic renewal, with reference to the movement in both the United States and England. It examines the renewal in relation to a wider mid-century context in which the role of Catholic women was being re-evaluated. It looks closely at the role of women in Catholic prayer groups, showing how while a ‘rediscovery’ of the Spirit contributed, broadly, to a democratising tendency where the laity were concerned, the place of women was contested. It shows how the dominant approach to gender to emerge in the United States – a patriarchal model linked to high profile charismatic ‘covenant communities’ in the upper Midwest cities of South Bend and Ann Arbor – did not have the same influence in England, where a more egalitarian approach tended to develop. This study of gender in the Catholic charismatic renewal is therefore also a case study of the ‘glocality’ of the Catholic charismatic movement.

PANDEMIC OASIS: POPULAR RELIGIOSITIES AS WOMEN’S LIFE-GIVING COMMUNITAS

This article argues and explores how popular Catholic piety can serve as an agent to create life-giving communitas forwomen in Macao, China. This research uses the narratives of six Catholic women about how their immersion in various public and private devotional practices creates solidarity and communities that are inclusive, empowering, and nurturing during the outbreak of COVID-19. Besides petitioning their long-lasting devotional images such as St Roch and Our Lady of Fatima, women learn and move on to a new model of online and live stream religious response and ritual innovations at the time of coronavirus in Macao. The digitisation of gathering strengthens the global connection among women to the rest of the world, shapinga new form of devotional culture and community ties that are not necessarily institutionalised. Devotional practices act as a spiritual oasis, personally and communally, for women coming together and bring hope, strength, and consolation to this unprecedented time.

“Gifts of Light”—Chiara Lubich’s Mystical Narrative with Hindus: An Analysis of a Hindu–Christian Dialogue Experience

The present paper offers a presentation and a phenomenological analysis of a rather unusual event in the sphere of interreligious dialogue: a Catholic woman, the protagonist of a mystical experience, shared some of the traits of this experience with people of another culture and religion. The protagonists of this experience include Chiara Lubich and a group of Hindus, some neo-Vedanta scholars and other social activists inspired by Gandhian philosophy and ideals. These pages represent an initial study of this case, which, at least so far, appears to be rather unique.