by Carrie Gress
This understanding of soil underscores the tight link connecting a woman’s respect for her physical fertility—both in virginity and maternity—to the health of her soul and fruitfulness of her actions.
Understanding women’s desire for fruitfulness sheds a new light on Adam and Eve. As we saw above, Adam, like most men, didn’t want to fight his wife. Betraying God, he took the fruit Eve offered instead of battling her. But we also see that Eve is every woman—she is reaching for fruit. She is trying to be fruitful. Like Eve, every woman has the option to reach for the appropriate fruit or the forbidden fruit. However she chooses, because so much depends on her, the consequences are far reaching.
Marian Fertility
Mary has long been considered the virgin soil, dating back even as far as roughly AD 180 when St. Irenaeus of Lyons wrote, “If Adam was created with the help of a virgin soil, not yet tilled, by the virtue and power of God (Gn 2:4–7), the new Adam also must draw his origin from a virgin soil, by the same power and virtue of God. Mary is this virgin soil from whom Christ became the ‘first-born.’”6
Mary’s maternity is not accidental; she wasn’t just a body that carried the Son of God, but much more than that. Her openness to the will of God, her yes, was what allowed her to be the perfect model of femininity. In a similar way that Mary expressed the truth about God and herself—his greatness and her humility—through her perfection, her fertility expresses the goodness of God. God is all good, and only through the perfect woman can his goodness be seen perfectly. Our Lady’s goodness can only exist because of the goodness of God. This is how she “magnifies” the Lord—she makes visible the invisible goodness of God—as she says in the Magnificat prayer.
She was everything—and the only woman who has ever been all of these things—virgin and mother, pure, immaculate. Because she was incorrupt, perfect, and pure, there was no dis-integration in her. Her soul and body were united so the fruitfulness that was happening in her body was simultaneously happening in her soul. Body and soul, then, worked together to express the fruitfulness that comes with being the Mother of God.
By honoring her own virginity, a woman imitates Mary. And by honoring her own maternity, a woman also imitates Mary. In imitating her, women can share in her remarkable fruitfulness, both in their own souls and bodies, their families, and society. No wonder, then, that Satan would attack a woman’s purity, that he would try to poison the ground that God hallowed, the very means through which women can truly be fruitful, both physically and spiritually.
Faux Fruit From Bad Soil
Before looking at the patterns of good fruit in the lives of women, we can see the desire for fruitfulness even among those furthest from God. Phyllis Chesler, as we saw earlier, described the activities of the early feminists, “We picketed, marched, protested, sat in, and famously took over offices and buildings; helped women obtain illegal abortions; … condemned incest, rape, sexual harassment, and domestic violence; organized speak-outs, crisis hotlines, and shelters for battered women”7 Within this list, edited slightly from the original, there are a lot of ways in which these women were actively trying to help other women. This is what motivated them, by large measure. What’s striking here is that—even when their intentions are separated from what is objectively good, which is the case with every anti-Marian movement—the underlying desire to be helpful, to give to others, to make a difference, to be fruitful, remains. This is what motivates social justice warriors and virtue signalers: they want to do good and to have others do good. They are just confused about what good is. Clearly, they are is misguided: in most cases, the assistance they offer is like adding a match to a gas leak. But the fundamental desires of the female heart are consistent.
Taking this point a step further, it is also fair to say that women generally have a fundamental desire to nurture. Sadly, we can also be remarkably misguided in what we choose to nurture. Instead of nurturing children or spiritual children, our nurturing can embrace something intangible, such as a grudge, anger, victimization, resentment, or pain. “We can hold our traumas tightly, perpetually nursing them,” Noelle Mering wrote, “and in so doing elevate ourselves to a special status where only we, who’ve suffered mightily, might enter. Our trauma can become both trophy and weapon.”8 For the more narcissistic woman, she might nurture her career, her figure, her bank account, her adventures, or her sexual exploits. This deep desire is also what is driving the pet craze in our culture, one that has led Americans to spend half a billion dollars on pet costumes for Halloween, to name just one of the outrageous animal expenditures,9 while folks in Virginia made sure shelter animals had a place to go to for Thanksgiving.10 Women must nurture something.
Real Fruit From Rich Soil
Women desire fruitfulness in our lives, and we desire to bring life, light, goodness, health, and salvation into the lives of those we love. What we scarcely understand on an intellectual level is that there is a deep relationship between a woman’s fruitfulness—what she does that improves the lives of others around her—and how she treats her own fertility and purity. We are embodied souls, not merely “meat” envelopes laboring through life from one pleasure or desire to the next. Our souls animate our bodies, as the two are intimately connected. How we treat one affects the way we treat the other. When we respect the body, the soul is better ordered; when we build up the soul, the body is likewise ennobled. By targeting a woman’s physical fertility, the anti-Marian spirit is able to deform the entire woman. When virginity and maternity are tossed aside as petty and inconsequential, the woman slowly disintegrates; her efforts become sterile, her relationships empty, and her soul searches under every rock, shopping mall, or fad for something to fill it up again.
Because fertility is a defining character of a woman, it should not be too surprising to discover that our physical fruitfulness is an outward reflection of our inward fruitfulness. If we look at holy women who are “interiorly fruitful,” we will discover that, despite all the superficial differences, a strikingly common pattern emerges. A woman goes to prayer, and during that time of silence and being present to the Lord, a tiny idea is planted in her heart. It is so small and seems so insignificant that she may even dismiss it. She tells no one about it, and yet whatever it is, this idea delights her, sets her heart on fire, draws her deeper into prayer.
Eventually, that little idea grows as the woman nurtures it, year after year. Eventually, it takes on a life of its own, one that she helps to guide and bring to maturity. As time passes, the woman realizes that this tiny idea has grown into something independent of her—it has taken on its own life, it is bigger than she is, and far surpasses anything she could have previously imagined. We can see an example of this in St. Teresa of Calcutta’s life. She was in her forties when she decided to leave the convent in Ireland and head to India. Her little idea to help the poorest of the poor led to the Missionaries of Charity, which has a life all its own that has far outlived the little Albanian nun who birthed the order into life.
Curiously, this process of interior fruitfulness looks an awful lot like the process of pregnancy. A tiny seed is planted. Initially, the mother is the only one aware of the new life within her. Time, great care, love, and sacrifice eventually bring a child to life, a child who will eventually have a life of his own, no longer needing the mother for his life to continue. The pattern of physical birth closely resembles the process of spiritual birth to which women are called. This beautiful pattern speaks clearly of the kind of relationship women are called to have with the Trinity—a fruitful one, where the woman is receptive to the seed of an idea and then nurtures it, helps it to grow and become something beyond her imagination—just like the children mothers give life to physically.
So, as we have seen, the physical fruitfulness we see in our bodies is a symbol of the fruitfulness available to us in our souls. But like anything else, this fruitfulness has to happen in accordance with nature, to “foster what nature grants,” for there actually to be good frui
t, both natural and supernatural.
What happens, then, when women act without God? The first half of this book gave us plenty of examples. When women don’t act in accord with grace and nature, an entry point is opened for the devil to come in and wreak havoc on their lives. As Gertrud von Le Fort wrote, “without eternal loyalties, we lose not only eternity, but this life as well.”11 The woman that does not have God at the center of her life will place her heart, her soul, and her efforts at the service of something else. In previous ages, like when von Le Fort was writing, misguided loyalties were typically directed at men. Our own age has unleashed all sorts of options and activism which women prioritize over God, not realizing the barrenness of their actions.
Women long for meaning in our lives and for a sense of mission, both of which have been placed there by God and point to the hunger we have for him. The culture has left us confused about what is truly fulfilling, so most of us don’t know where to start beyond picking up the Bible or heading back to Mass. But what we miss, again because it is unfashionable, is that we simply must open ourselves up to God through active receptivity. The model for our fruitfulness and the spiritual shortcut back to God is imprinted in our bodies. We were made to allow God to plant beautiful things in our souls and then to help them grow. A woman’s holiness and fruitfulness are directly related to how she treats her fertility and purity. Yes, certainly, men are called to purity, but women have a deeper need for purity because of their capacity to bear children and its deep connection to her own fruitfulness.
Labor’s Lessons
Women, however, must not merely value purity or maternity for prudish or prideful reasons. Certainly, the human heart has a way of distorting even the best of things. To keep these values in the right order, we have to remember the cross. Our souls are fruitful when we allow the crucified Christ to dwell within us. Our fruitfulness is connected with the cross and cannot happen apart from it. The cross, however, is not just misery and pain. Like laboring to deliver a child, suffering is somehow different when it is “pain with a purpose.” The unique message of Catholicism is the recognition that our pain is not in vain, that there are reasons for it. We may not always know what they are, but again, when we are confident in the love Our Father has for us, it’s easy to trust in his plan and providential care.
Additionally, the saints speak of a great joy even despite—or because of—great suffering. Their suffering becomes the currency of love, where they can truly make their love known to God because it isn’t attached to pleasure, but sacrifice. In the Mass for the old rite of marriage, the Church reminded marrying couples that “sacrifice is usually difficult and irksome. Only love can make it easy, and perfect love can make it a joy.” Growth in love is connected with sacrifice and getting beyond our own vices, which is why motherhood is a natural route for women to become saints. The nature of raising children is meant to scour our souls of the vices we acquired when we were single, while replacing them with the virtues that come from the challenges of rearing children, including patience, perseverance, self-giving, compassion, and charity. But all of these efforts must be plugged into God’s grace. Without them, our efforts are like trying to vacuum without plugging the vacuum in.
There remains dramatic confusion about the role of purity and honoring motherhood, even among Christians. This is part of the reason why Protestants allow contraception; they don’t understand the deep mystery of fertility, virginity, and motherhood, or of the Virgin Mother herself, whom they often neglect. Because they don’t understand or appreciate the gift that Mary offers to us, they cannot access this rich connection between a woman’s fertility and the integrity of her soul. Until they see this connection, they will continue to use contraception, and confusion about a woman’s role in society and in the Church will remain.
Living Fruit
Our Lady offers tremendous hope to help us transform our anti-Marian culture, but again, the answer to it won’t be among the usual suspects. The evangelical answer is hidden in plain sight, for those with eyes to see: it is in the model of saintly women who brought Christianity to us, starting from the earliest days of the faith. Women like Mary Magdalen, Sts. Lucy, Agnes, Cecilia, Perpetua, and Felicity passed along the faith to husbands, children, neighbors, and those who witnessed their martyrdom. There was also Clotilde, who converted her husband, Clovis, introducing Christianity to the Franks, or Princess Dobrawa, who influenced Prince Mieszko, which sparked a conversion that set Catholicism ablaze in Poland. Women have always been instrumental in spreading the faith. This is the kind of fruit that Christ and his mother are calling us to. That call is not to become radical activists or social justice warriors but to take the words of St. Teresa of Calcutta to heart: If you want to change the world, go home and love your family. That is the place to start. We all know the challenge of changing ourselves, so the belief that we can change perfect strangers is overwhelming, but when we live in relationship to others, gentle and subtle changes can take place that truly change the culture, one family at a time. “It is through the mediation of women,” a theologian has noted, “that men are increasingly given anew to society.”12 Without women’s good influence, society cannot renew itself.
Mary has been called by the saints the “neck” or the “ladder” linking heaven and earth. Every woman is called to be a bridge between her family and heaven. Women are called to spark the flame of the divine in the souls of the men and children they love. Women are called to reveal the best of God’s love and give those around them the means to find that love. Again, Christianity is full of saintly women, such as St. Monica, St. Helen, St. Cecilia, and countless others that led their husbands, sons, and daughters to embrace the faith—even in the face of martyrdom.
Far from wall-flowers or door mats, saintly women reveal the uniqueness that emerges in a soul tightly bound up in the love of the Father. Curiously, there is not a secular woman who can meet in any direct way the gifts, stature, and achievements of female saints such as Sts. Hildegard of Bingen, Catherine of Siena, or Teresa of Avila (incidentally, all virgins). When a woman’s self-will is erased enough to allow room for God, to become his instrument, that is when the miraculous happens. Both Sts. Bernadette and Teresa of Calcutta referred to themselves in this way—Bernadette as a broom and Teresa as a pencil. Through their erasing of self, of pride, of ego, women saints have achieved much more than even the most lauded of secular women. We look back and are astonished that women could accomplish so much because women “had no power” in these eras, but only because we are mistaken about the real power that women have—it doesn’t come from them, but through them.
____________________
1Edith Stein, Woman: Collected Works, vol. 2, trans. Freda Mary Oben (Washington, DC: ICS Publications, 1996), 51.
2“Golding’s Introduction to Lord of the Flies,” AbecedariusRex, video, 2:40, May 22, 2010, https://www.youtube.com/watch?-time_continue=21&v=vYnfSV27vLY.
3Joel Salatin, “Principles of Polyface Farm,” http://www.polyfacefarms.com/principles/.
4Fulton J. Sheen, The World’s First Love, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010), 184.
5Alice von Hildebrand, The Privilege of Being a Woman (Ave Maria, Florida: Sapientia Press, 2002), 28.
6Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies, III 18,7 I.
7Chesler, Politically Incorrect, 87.
8Noelle Mering, “Here’s the Danger of Weaponizing Legitimate Suffering for Revenge,” The Federalist, October 10, 2018, https://thefederalist.com/2018/10/10/heres-danger-weaponizing-legitimate-suffering-revenge/.
9Andrew Keshner, “Pet Owners will Spend Half a Billion Dollars on Animal Costumes This Halloween,” Market Watch, October 16, 2018, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/instagram-loving-pets-owners-will-spend-nearly-500m-on-animal-costumes-this-halloween-2018-10-16.
10Meghan Overdeep, “Virginia Families Are Hosting Shelter Dogs for Thanksgiving,” Southern Living, November 16, 2018, https://www.southernliving.com/news/richmond-ani
mal-shelter-thanksgiving-fosters.
11von Le Fort, Eternal Woman, 59.
12Feuillet, Jesus and His Mother, 206–7.
CHAPTER 9
Understanding Mary’s Beauty
“The splendor of a soul in grace is so seductive that
it surpasses the beauty of all created things.”
—St. Thomas Aquinas
It was the opportunity of a lifetime, Leah Darrow thought to herself, walking up the stairs to the old converted warehouse. As the former contestant on America’s Next Top Model prepped for the photo shoot, clothing, scarcely big enough to warrant hangers, was rolled out for her inspection. “I’m not really comfortable with these. Do you have something else?” she queried.
“Sure, you can find something else. But you will have to leave. These are your options,” came the dry, biting retort.
Selecting the outfit that appeared to have the most coverage, Leah tried to hide her horror as she put them on and made her way to the photoshoot, well aware that every eye was on her mostly naked body.
The camera started clicking, and the photographer, sensing her discomfort, tried to loosen her up. “You look hot!” he said encouragingly. “All the girls feel like this in the beginning.”
Unable to un-frazzle her nerves, Leah made the rookie mistake of looking at the flash as the camera snapped away. Her eyes locked shut as she scrambled to get the world around her back into focus. It was then that it happened. Her eyes still unable to focus, she looked up and saw a vision of Christ. He looked at her with sad eyes, asking what she was offering him. She looked down at her hands. Nothing. Her hands were empty. She wasn’t giving him anything. “You were made for more,” was all she heard, and in her heart, she knew she was done. She finally focused and told the photographer she had to go.