In Belief or Nonbelief, a conversation between Umberto Eco and Cardinal Martini (no this is not a cocktail), Eco posed the question of why the Church has always rejected women in priesthood, citing a huge amount scripture to prove that the Bible/Christ had always advocated equality in sexes. Eco also referred to Thomas Aquinas’ implicit skepticism on the issue though bound by his time he held the belief that men are superior to women. I thought the Cardinal would have given a more insightful answer than this: "A Church practice that is profoundly rooted in tradition, and that has not really been deviated from through two millennia of history, is linked not solely to abstract or a priori reasoning but to something that maintains its own mystery. The fact that many of the reasons gathered over the centuries justifying why the priesthood is accorded only to men have lost their validity today, while the practice itself endures forcefully, tells us that we are up against not merely human reason but the Church’s desire not to betray those redemptive events that gave rise to it and that derive not from human thought but from the very will of God.”
I can’t help but bursting into laughter. So what really is the point of any conversation with the religious people if in the event of not being able to give a reasonable or sensible answer they go back to the same loop of all’s God’s will and God is beyond human intelligence and if we don’t know why it’s because it’s God’s will that we don’t know why…
Friday, May 11, 2012
Belief or Nonbelief
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2 comments:
It's being too serious to question all that regarding priesthood. Isn't it obvious enough to see that the whole issue is more about keeping safe the power and interests handed down by tradition than, say, obeying the divine will which is open to whatever interpretation you like? In Faust, Goethe mockingly (and justly) compares the priests to stage actors (Komödiant); so consecration, essentially speaking, is just one among the many shows that go on every day in the world. As audience, we don't have to understand why a certain role is supposed to be male in order to enjoy the show, or to dislike it. We just need to bear in mind Nietzsche's advice: if you want to breathe pure air, don't enter churches. In fact, there is no mystery at all, except the sole mystery which is the Universe itself.
You think a man as intelligent as Eco aren't aware of that? In fact, before posing the question he has precisely noted "I confess that homosexuals who want to be recognized by the Church and priests who want to get married exasperate me. I take off my shoes when I enter a mosque, and when I'm in Jerusalem I accept that ... the elevators sun on automatic and stop at every floor. If I want to keep my shoes on or control the elevator, I go somewhere else." But it doesn't mean he, and especially him for his knowledge with the scripture, shouldn't probe the Church in a scholarlistic manner, and ask for a rationally satisfying answer. (which is precisely what the publisher asked of him and the Cardinal) Which the Cardinal failed to give. and it is all the more interesting to see how the Cardinal, as a representative of the Church, respond in such context.
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