I just love that I scheduled one post for discussing the topics of marriage as social construct, divorce, contraception, abortion, “other errors,” and whether working makes a woman a wage slave.
Should be the work of a moment to slap down those bad boys.
{I may or may not have spent a week wandering around the house, clutching my hair, and moaning, “Why did I start this?”}
No. It's Friday. Saturday. We can do this. {Can you blame me for not getting it done yesterday?}
Snow. Check.
Encyclical. Check.
Reality check. Check.
Reality?
Reality is what we have to have before we can talk it all over.
Do you have your reality check in place? You can get it by taking a few minutes to look at the news and listen to your neighbors' problems.
Rape as a way of life in India. In America, a couple try to force/bribe their surrogate to abort their child, who turns out not to be their child, exactly, but a child of his and an anonymous egg-donor's. Women in some countries are sent to be child brides and murdered if they protest. In America, a child has three “parents” registered on the birth certificate. In China, the government insists on butchering babies. In America, a man was able to butcher near-term babies for years, mutilate and kill women, and lie about the money he made. He was only stopped because of the money thing.
And everyday families, not exactly facing horrors (yet), still are pressured and poked and prodded by some force outside of them that they can't identify and don't know how to resist.
This is our reality. This is now. This is the world that all the haters and scorners or at least ignorers of “chaste marriage” made.
I am not under the impression that “before” things were better, and “now” they are worse. Things have been very bad in the past. We in this country were blessed with a time of great prosperity and peace, even in difficulty — even the families who, in the last century, faced dire poverty and terrible discrimination because of their race — even they had families. This is verifiable.
Things are very bad now. At times, when a man and a women freely entered into a lifelong union, supported by law, things have been better, society has flourished, and children have been safe — although children, being weak, are always less safe than they should be.
Still, isn't it interesting that in 1930, the Catholic Church, not normally one for quick reactions to issues, decided to tackle purveyors of the “marriage as pure product of convention” school of thought?
That's what keeps striking me — how serious these questions seem to me today, and how serious they clearly were, seventy years ago.
And so the Pope wrote all this. You will recall your timeline and the spur for him to write: The acceptance of contraception (in certain limited cases, presciently foreseen by Pius as quickly burgeoning) by the Anglicans, and the rising influence of Margaret Sanger.
That Marxism and Fascism, both ideologies that seek to control human actions on every level, were poised to devour whole nations, also motivated him to plead with men and women to do what is right and according to God's plan.
So, deep in the heart of this document, he says this about the theory of personal revolution (the personal always being at the core of the universal):
(75) This [detaching the woman from her spouse and children, recounted in the previous paragraphs], however, is not the true emancipation of woman, nor that rational and exalted liberty which belongs to the noble office of a Christian woman and wife; it is rather the debasing of the womanly character and the dignity of motherhood, and indeed of the whole family, as a result of which the husband suffers the loss of his wife, the children of their mother, and the home and the whole family of an ever watchful guardian. More than this, this false liberty and unnatural equality with the husband is to the detriment of the woman herself, for if the woman descends from her truly regal throne to which she has been raised within the walls of the home by means of the Gospel, she will soon be reduced to the old state of slavery (if not in appearance, certainly in reality) and become as amongst the pagans the mere instrument of man.
We have lived out his prophecy. Now we see the insidious effect on, well, everything! when the elites — the smart, rich, revolutionizing few — convince the others — the ordinary, possibly not as educated, victimized many — to restructure things away from the home.
It suits the very few to live a certain way, and they have no trouble destroying things for others. The home has always been a refuge for the oppressed and the poor. That is taken from them now.
Especially women, who, despite what they tell you, have always found a way to work if they wanted to, or to work with their families at a common task (like a farm or small business) — but valued home higher and never relieved themselves of the high calling to make a home — women have been all too willing to accept the reasoning that what the world (men?) call success is truly success.
This has devolved to the absurdity of a woman being extolled on the cover of Newsweek as having her highest goal — for herself and for all women — be to succeed.
Simply that.
Raw ambition elevated to a higher place than the desire to serve others or to fulfill a talent.
And not just mindless success, but success that admits and even extols trampling on the needs of her children and turning over the building of her home to hired help (of course, in the Sheryl Sandbergs of the world's case, the best help; whether everyone can afford the best help or whether money can buy it at all is left to your imagination and experience).
Success that never even asks about the justice to the hired help, undoubtedly women themselves, who in a less self-avowedly craven and grasping society, might have a shot at their own — their very own — humble abode, rather than being confined to raising others' children.
Success in the world (for the very few, remember!) that has the effect of reviling “domesticity” (even the word has a scornful tinge to it, but just means home-keeping). Who among us hasn't heard the word “drudgery” to describe what pertains to the home and its keeping?
The argument here has to be seen for what it is and is not. It is a simple statement of reality. The home needs an inviolable heart. It is not a commentary on the validity of a woman's involvement in things outside the home. It is a statement of priorities. It is not a proscription against individual expression. It is a warning of the quick ascendancy of power when the important, hidden, un-Success-ful things are lost.
So, I think you can read the paragraphs in this section (44-93) yourself and get the gist of them.
I hope you will understand them by keeping in mind the degree to which, in the name of justice, injustice has been done by convincing women and men that the home is nothing to sacrifice for.
It's probably the most quixotic and futile vision possible — the vision in this encyclical.
Not least because it will be instantly misinterpreted by the modern man and woman as having an oppressive message. Just as the message of Jesus Himself seems impossibly narrow, gate-wise, so this expression of what the family means, and specifically what the woman means to the family, seems impossible.
I can't help but think that absolutely no attention will be paid to what it means to be placed on a “truly regal throne to which she has been raised within the walls of the home by means of the Gospel.” Unless you have the imagination to picture what life is like for women who have the misfortune to be born in a society that does not know God's precepts, you will be misled by the flowery, somewhat 19th-century prose.
Unless you are honest about how women are treated today, you will not appreciate what it means for the humblest woman to be truly exalted in the bosom of her family.
I do get a little impatient with those who force their “facts” about the way women were treated in the “past” — meaning sometime in the dark ages before, say, 1978 — in the face of all the evidence, even pictorial, which shows that women were treated with dignity and respect (not least because they respected themselves as having a real effect on society through their faithfulness). They take as historical fact the films and shows produced today — by entertainers thoroughly imbued with feminist dogma.
Theirs is a Mad Men-as-documentary kind of history. They pay no attention to the actual record.
However, if you dare to bring up statistics and lived experience of this moment as to the utter trashing of anything feminine — the pile of aborted children, the rising tide of unwed mothers, the final objectification of the woman's body — they tune out.
So this little encyclical will almost certainly be dismissed as old-fashioned (even though this vision is held up against something older, namely a pagan, view of women).
Yet the modern way hasn't worked out. I can't see that smiling upon a woman as she leaves her infant in daycare to go earn her share of the debt represents anything other than enshrining her as a wage-slave, just as the Pope said it would. I don't know what more evidence we need. Is the answer to nail more two-by-fours onto the wreckage? (“However, they should take care lest the calamitous state of their external affairs should be the occasion for a much more calamitous error.” -61) Or is it to pull away the debris and recover the proper way of building?
The reality of this “disquieting glimpse” of what is truly human and how bitter “our epoch” is to it all, was proclaimed over and over by John Paul II:
All of humanity passes through the family.
Who finally takes responsibility for that?
Instead of quite despairing, however, or even dwelling further on these “errors” as Pius so quaintly calls them, I leave you here with what I hope is a bracing thought to stiffen the sinews of your resolve — if you have a flicker of resolve left. Back in paragraph 61, Pope Pius XI reminds us of the teaching of the Council of Trent, that it is anathema — to be condemned — to hold “that there are precepts of God impossible for the just to observe. God does not ask the impossible, but by His commands, instructs you to do what you are able, to pray for what you are not able that He may help you.”Have faith. Be a person of faith. Once a person determines that a thing would be wrong — and that no force on earth will compel him to do what is wrong — he then finds a way. Even more than finding a way, he finds the joy — she finds the joy — of serving the truth.
The encyclical isn't too long for you to catch up with us! Won't you join us?
Go here for a time-line of events leading up to the writing of the encyclical, and scroll down for a handy outline.Go here for a PDF file of the document. You can print it out.
Here is Part II of our discussion: God has no grandchildren.
Here is Part III of our discussion: “You are building something.”
Sara says
Love you, Leila! Thank you for your courage and wisdom, and for saying everything I think and feel, but so much better.
Jill W. says
“Have faith. Be a person of faith. Once a person determines that a thing would be wrong — and that no force on earth will compel him to do what is wrong — he then finds a way. Even more than finding a way, he finds the joy — she finds the joy — of serving the truth.”
You have a gift. Thank you! Your words lift me up and “reality” has been pulling hard on me lately.
Jill W.
Colette says
Wow. Awesome post. “her truly regal throne' Love that. Homemaker is such a dismissive term anymore. Sad when you have to fight that attitude in your own family (in-laws!) when it is truly a most noble profession!
cirelo says
I'm behind and catching up a bit on all these posts (and skimming the encyclical). Something I've been wondering about and I'm not sure whether it has come up so excuse me if I'm being redundant, but how does the church see the family unit in action in society? What I am particularly wondering about is in living out the spiritual and corporal works of mercy–how does that happen as a family? I don't want to be so focused inwardly on the home that I become insular, so how do I guard against that danger? Because I do think I can get so caught up in the work of making a home that I forget my duty to any but my children/husband.
_Leila says
cirelo, it's not redundant and I plan to have a post addressing this topic. Stick with me 🙂 We all share responsibility for our neighbor. We can't be insular in the sense that you mention.
LJ says
Loving this series. 🙂 And composed salads, which I also learned from this blog.
Lisa G. says
Gosh sakes, Leila – this is pure beef! You don't mince words, woman! I could print this and meditate on it for a month. (not that it's anything I don't already believe or know, but – the way you say it so. very. clearly.) Thanks
Laura says
Excellent, excellent thoughts…And something I have wondered about is whether among any women who seek to become “fulfilled” outside their duties and identity of the home, are really just being overcome with self-discontent, not because their circumstances are so bad, but because they, inside, are discontent with who THEY are…their sins, faults, imperfections, and so on…and so that unrest (perhaps with a spiritual base) drives them to cover it up at all costs…or distract themselves from it…by complaining about everyone and everything else…looking for anyone or anything to be at fault other than their own sinful heart…if you think about it, I don't think I 've ever known anyone who claims to be a feminist who is truly peaceful and serene…who can laugh at herself and not take life, themselves or others too seriously…and most men, rather than try and attack this sort of woman, usually will run the other way! It seems to me that, (especially in this technological age), that it is easy to hide from the real reasons you are unhappy…and working or not doesn't address that deep spiritual need to be forgiven and regenerated by God…who is the only source of joy, contentment, or anything else…
Melissa Diskin says
Well… we are all sinful, whether we're home or not, and it's hard to feel content at something if you are totally ignorant of its systems and working details — all those things that make a home a haven and run like clockwork. Working “outside” was something that I'd been educated for, along with every other child born after 1970. Staying at home? Never trained for it at all. The expectation of family, with the concomitant expectations of outside work (for most men) and home-making (for most women), is barely mentioned in school. I've stayed home for 7 years, since my oldest was born, and although I've loved it, it's been SO hard in ways that outside work was not. (Computer files stay where I put them and behave predictably. Toys, books and children at home, never.)
There's also something else. Men who are not being raised to provide for their families — due to extended adolescence or just plain laziness — can put burdens on their wives that make staying home close to impossible. I'm thankful to have a husband who works very hard at making my staying at home possible. It's not just women who have bought into the myth.
That said, I LOVE staying at home, hard as it is to keep up with it all. My only wish is that anyone would have shown me how great it could be, and how important it is to learn a few things about a household before you do it! I do write on the side, but limit it severely to a few hours a week.
Nancy says
Excellent commentary! I am so glad you are writing about this…for younger women need to know the truth. I remember in the late 70s early 80s, and the tremendous pressure to work outside the home in the name of self-worth. Betty Freidan was an assigned author to read in one of my college classes.
Patty says
Best one in this series yet, Auntie Leila. Wonderful writing.
Kathy says
My husband and I read this together again – thank you Leila, thank you so much!
Wana says
Amazing! I will need to read this several times.
Beth says
Love you. Thank you for your work and your words. It will take me some time to read and meditate on this more. This message needs to be spread. I feel like making up little cards for your blog to just hand out randomly.
Elizabeth says
“Especially women, who, despite what they tell you, have always found a way to work if they wanted to, or to work with their families at a common task (like a farm or small business) — but valued home higher and never relieved themselves of the high calling to make a home — women have been all too willing to accept the reasoning that what the world (men?) call success is truly success.”
Yes! Women have always found a way to work and we dismiss this so much! This gives me hope.
Meredith_in_Aus says
Hear, hear! And Amen! I love the way you have so clearly articulated this.
I recently had a brief discussion with my SIL about “the past” (think Dickensian/Victorian working class) about how so many of those women would have loved the freedom to NOT work and actually spend the time to raise their families. And we have thrown it away with both hands.
In Him
Meredith
Amber says
Excellent, thank you!! I have hope that by faithfully serving my family in my home that I will carry forth some change. I do wonder, as a previous comment or mentioned, how I serve others outside my home. I think even my pastor finds my focus on joy home to be too insular. But still, I wonder if others are best served indirectly at this stage of my life (that is, by raising a family focused on God and His Church) and more directly in my later years? This is something I ponder frequently, especially as I am asked over and over to start new endeavors or to serve in a larger capacity than teaching an occasional religious ed class. It seems a shame that so many of the women ( at least around here) who are in their 50s and 60s, whose children have largely left the home are so busy with careers and activities that they have little time to serve in the Church – that is, if they are around at all! – so many of that generation have fallen away too. All I can do is reclaim, rebuild, and serve my family and then the Church as best I can. This is such an excellent series, I feel so heartened and encouraged!
Laura says
For more thoughts on the subject, look up a documentary on youtube called THe Monstrous Regiment of Women…should come up as the whole documentary…food for thought on feminism, abortion…and so on…
Laura says
Here is a question for you Leila–something I was just asking my hubby about this morning… When I have read throughout much of Scripture, I don't really ever remember seeing any example of women going away, out into the wilderness to meet with God…or be directed by God, or to learn the fear of God etc…there are many many examples of men leaving their families and communities to be alone with, or wrestle with God…I was wondering if that is a sort of precedent…Because within Christendom, there is this sort of push, to “get alone with God”…for extended periods of time…and while I don't doubt the wisdom of that advice in general, you don't see any women in Scripture doing it to the same extent as men (at the most there is Mary, who sat at Jesus' feet). So I wondered, 'if our roles are different, as men and women, could our approach toward God be slightly different, as well?' I mean, in a corporation, the treasurer and the vice president, while able to approach the CEO, might approach differently based on their different roles and responsibilities.
Laura says
.(cont from the last comment!)..Women are the nurturers…and I don't know about anyone else's family, but in mine, I rarely have even a half hour where there isn't some sort of need for the nurtering role…and as a result, the thought of “going away to meet with God” is WAYYYYY out of my ability/reach… There have been times when this has frustrated me and made me feel choked and stifled…but when it occured to me about the Bible women, I wondered if perhaps we really weren't MEANT to relate to God in this way…and that God knows all about our roles–He made them up! And that the snippets of worship, prayer, and study are exactly what our feminine role needs and what we can expect…In the other mentaliy, and I don't know if any other women have felt this way, but with the demands of family, “spending time with God” often just felt like another person I had to carve out time for…and that I constantly failed at “not spending enough time” With Him…Any thoughts?
cirelo says
I think if you look to the tradition the saints have left us you'll find many many more women (especially in the early church!) contemplatives then men. I think that is very much an argument for women having as much a need for stillness with God as anyone. Also, men need to be taught/shown/encouraged to nurture as well, it is not solely the role of women. “Love and Responsibility” goes into depth on this subject.
_Leila says
Men and women each have their gifts, which of course must be balanced and corrected, as we have a fallen nature — one that is subject to being distorted. It's not so much a role, as a deep mode of approaching life, to varying degrees depending on personality.
By nature a woman with small children must find her contemplation in a different way — in the midst of the “needs” of others. That much is borne out by experience!
Ngofamilyfarm says
Not necessarily an answer to your question, but something I heard in a homily recently that I think applies, and I've found very encouraging as a mother. The priest pointed out that a mother is uniquely close to God, even more so/in a different way than the priest himself, because she is a co-creator and cooperator in bringing new life to being. In this sense, mothers doing their mothering work are always close to God.
-Jaime
Robin says
I think busy mothers always have some time to be alone with God….just maybe we don't realize it. When I started thinking about motherhood being a contemplative activity the first picture that came into my head (you may laugh) was the scene from “Ol' Yeller” where the little boy is being a pest, harassing his mother, while she is peeling potatoes (or some such). When he keeps talking and talking and talking, she just keeps replying, “Mmm-hmmm” with a far off look in her eyes. She is contemplating, but what? What do we contemplate (or pray about) when we are…(fill in the blank). When I was up to my eyeballs in littles, this is what my “prayer” life looked like. And there was a lot of praying in the middle of the night while I was nursing. I think those are some of the times, in our busy, busy stay-at-home life, when we encounter God.
guest says
I don't see why it has to be one or the other: either women stay at home, manage the home and raise the children OR desperately fail at trying to contribute to the household income, half-raise their own children and keep a tidy house only 3 days a week. It also seems horribly wretched for men/fathers. Their only role in all of this is to provide the money to keep everyone fed and clothed, disappear for many hours each day and return at night to read a few bedtime stories and tuck everyone into bed before lovingly trying to conceive the next baby?
There is absolutely nothing wrong with being a stay-at-home-mom; there's also nothing wrong with desiring to spend time pursuing a career outside the home. The message of your post seems to be that feminism is the answer to all the world's wrongs rather than seeing it as a movement that encouraged women to contribute their voices to the world around them beyond knitting circles and conversations with other moms at the playground. What is so gosh darn horrible about having a woman CEO? or a single mother who is a professor of epidemiology and conducts research to better understand health disparities related to cancer? or for that matter a father who chooses to stay home and take care of the children and a mom who enjoys her work and earns enough money to support her family?
Theresa says
As stated above:
“Especially women, who, despite what they tell you, have always found a way to work if they wanted to, or to work with their families at a common task (like a farm or small business) — but valued home higher and never relieved themselves of the high calling to make a home — women have been all too willing to accept the reasoning that what the world (men?) call success is truly success.”
I don't think it is about women working or not working but rather it is about making the role of wife and mother a priority. St Gianna is a great example. She was a loving wife, mother, doctor and Saint!
Laura says
I think that the dificulty is that too many women try to do too much and end up failing at everything…or at least the wrong thing…is it worse to fail at being a doctor or a mommy? If you really want to be a doctor, then be one! But don't assume that you can have the career and somehow raise and nurture children too…the pressure and frustration will overcome you…I'm not talking about a “job” working retail for 10 hours a week…I'm talking a career that is very consuming–like teaching, doctoring etc…it is just that combining those things with mother hood, USUALLY means that something must fail…and too often it's the mothering that gets the short end of the stick 🙁 perhaps there are a few women who can do it, but most will struggle to do so, and go through great mental strain trying to juggle all the plates…
DeirdreLMLD says
Dear Guest,
If you look carefully at this post, you'll see that my mom isn't condemning work outside of the home, but she is trying to help us recapture the depth of what the mother in the home truly means. I think it's important to keep in mind what she mentions: that what might be possible for the elite (having the resources and opportunities to balance outside work along with a healthy homelife) is not necessarily possible for the majority of folks. The effects of feminism, however, are to level the expectations across the board — as if we all had the same resources — and underprivileged moms and their families are the ones who suffer most as a result.
We do NOT all have the same resources; but we DO all have the same needs (home. family. nurturing.).
You also might take some time to read the other things that she has written on femininity and motherhood — you'll see that my mom (reflecting the attitude of the Catholic Church) is not opposed to women contributing, and developing their talents, in ways outside of family life.
But our age desperately needs to reclaim what home actually is, how much it's worth, and what it takes to make one — and that's pretty much the whole story behind LMLD! 🙂
guest says
I will re-read and peruse the other posts you recommend. Surely, you are not suggesting that a woman with children who also works outside the home is by default doing a bad job? I'd like to think that just because I am a woman doesn't mean my options are either 1) remain unmarried and in the workforce 2) married and at home
I realize that financial resources are certainly a consideration but not every woman who conceives a child/children makes decisions to stay at home and tend the hearth purely based on finances-there are other considerations as well (intellectual curiosity? contentment following one's God given talents and skills?).
DeirdreLMLD says
Right. So the general sense isn't condemning one way of life or the other, but rather drawing attention to what the choice (as presented to us in our cultural moment) really is. If we don't understand what motherhood and home life actually mean – that is, the big picture in which mothers in their homes do the formation of humanity and the construction of basic social fabric – we don't know what we're giving up when we opt to leave the home for the sake of a job. That's where most people in our society are at when they encourage women not to get tied down by “just being a mom,” as if it's a hobby for the meager-hearted.
But you point out that it's not necessarily either/or, and (I believe I speak on behalf of the LMLD ladies here) we agree with that. The verses from Proverbs that Mena provided paint a picture of a woman, whom we hold as a shining example, who does more than just change diapers and sweep the hearth. She's an interesting and important part of society, even beyond her demanding role of raising a family. (But of course, it's her position in the family that makes her able to do the things for society that she does…)
In general, we are all for women pursuing what they're able and called to pursue, whether it's in the home or out of it. But we do certainly stress the practical and beautiful demands of *making* a home and being present in it, particularly when children are young. Since we're also in favor of the best kind of nourishment for young children, including nursing, the reality is that it does usually involve a foregoing of outside work, at least for a time…
Short story: we don't have a one-size-fits-all prescription for all women or all mothers!
Melissa Diskin says
Yes — it's that deep meaning and value that has been lost, not the superficialities of what job is appropriate. I love this: “we don't know what we're giving up when we opt to leave the home for the sake of a job. That's where most people in our society are at when they encourage women not to get tied down by “just being a mom,” as if it's a hobby for the meager-hearted. ”
It's NOT about some hazy Angel in the House role-playing, but about seeing what a home is.
Mena says
Hi Guest, maybe you'd like to read Proverbs 31, and note verses 16-18 and 24:
10 A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies. 11 Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value. 12 She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life. 13 She selects wool and flax and works with eager hands. 14 She is like the merchant ships, bringing her food from afar. 15 She gets up while it is still night; she provides food for her family and portions for her female servants. 16 She considers a field and buys it; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard. 17 She sets about her work vigorously; her arms are strong for her tasks. 18 She sees that her trading is profitable, and her lamp does not go out at night. 19 In her hand she holds the distaff and grasps the spindle with her fingers. 20 She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy. 21 When it snows, she has no fear for her household; for all of them are clothed in scarlet. 22 She makes coverings for her bed; she is clothed in fine linen and purple. 23 Her husband is respected at the city gate, where he takes his seat among the elders of the land.
Mena says
(Cont'd – original comment too long)
24 She makes linen garments and sells them, and supplies the merchants with sashes. 25 She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come. 26 She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue. 27 She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. 28 Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: 29 “Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.” 30 Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. 31 Honor her for all that her hands have done, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.
Claire says
Thank you for sharing your wisdom.
Ngofamilyfarm says
Wow, I just really love this and find it so affirming. Thank you so much for writing it! I haven't read an argument so profoundly encouraging of the dignity of the homemaker in a very long time.
-Jaime
Melissa says
Thank you for sharing your wisdom with the world! I'm very much enjoying this series.
Jenny says
So much here to think about and ponder. Several bits I want to respond to and a few more thrown out by me!
“I can't help but think that absolutely no attention will be paid to what it means to be placed on a “truly regal throne to which she has been raised within the walls of the home by means of the Gospel.” Unless you have the imagination to picture what life is like for women who have the misfortune to be born in a society that does not know God's precepts, you will be misled by the flowery, somewhat 19th-century prose. Unless you are honest about how women are treated today, you will not appreciate what it means for the humblest woman to be truly exalted in the bosom of her family.”
As a mother whose heart is at home but also leaves everyday for a full time job, this paragraph rings so true. Where I work most of the employees are women, but the number of children from these women is depressingly small. The reason is because it is terribly difficult to have young children and work full time. They have their 1-2 kids and then they are DONE! And I work in a pretty flexible, office environment. I cannot imagine the plight of shift or service workers.
I have seen a mother sobbing in the break room because the baby won't sleep through the night and she is exhausted and her marriage is in trouble because her husband blames her for the perfectly age appropriate behavior of the baby. I have seen an alarming amount of mental health issues with the only children. I have seen children shuffled between daycare, baby sitters, and grandparents so frequently that the children miss grandma more than mommy and only see their parents for a handful of hours a week. Quality time, I'm sure.
I am currently pregnant with my fourth child and you would think I was a freak of nature. I have had other women come into my office with their mouths agape in wonder that I am pregnant AGAIN. I must be careful to air any of the common complaints of pregnancy or infanthood because I am just as likely to be met with a snide remark about how I choose to have a baby as I am a sympathetic ear. Most sadly of all are the women who see me pregnant again and confide how much they want another baby but they just can't. It's all too hard. I won't even go into the problem of childbirth leave.
Related to the pressures and difficulty of having babies and working full-time is this:
“Have faith. Be a person of faith. Once a person determines that a thing would be wrong — and that no force on earth will compel him to do what is wrong — he then finds a way. Even more than finding a way, he finds the joy — she finds the joy — of serving the truth.”
This is true, but in a marriage the two spouses have to agree to what this truth is. And this, my friends, is easier said than done. So many women where I work would love to quit their jobs and go home to raise their children (I count myself among them), but they don't because 1) fear of lack of money or 2) their husbands don't see what the big deal is.
guest says
I'm just curious, as an only child, what “alarming amount of mental health issues” you diagnose and see?
Jenny says
I do not pretend to diagnose and see the mental health issues. I can only rely on what their mothers say.
One committed suicide last year and the other is on the verge of being institutionalized because he cannot function as an adult. His mother has to call him several times a day to make sure he is doing what he is supposed to do, stuff like getting out of bed.
I do not seek to indict only children or the parents of only children or anything like it. I can only say that in my office the only children with two career-oriented parents do not seem to be faring well. My observation is not a randomized study, but the very definition of anecdote. I do, however, find it alarming.
guest says
Thank you for the clarification. So, when you say “an alarming amount of mental health issues in only children” in fact, you are referring to two different families and two different only children whose medical records and official diagnoses you do not have before you (courtesy of federal law and HIPAA). I would say “two” individuals hardly qualifies as an “alarming amount.” Furthermore, I would posit that you do indeed use the anecdotal “evidence” of the only two only children and related families as fodder for your argument that only families with two spouses and multiple children produce healthy, mentally stable, citizens. Lastly, I would suggest that you begin to be more of an optimist and focus on your own happy home environment with 4 children and a committed husband instead of reading your own emotions into the lives of others (gasp! my co-workers only have TWO children! sigh, lament, sigh).
Jenny says
As I have said repeatedly, it is a small sample size. One does not need a HIPAA release to understand suicide is indicative of a mental health issue. When a small town is heavily damaged by a tornado, one does not tut-tut the citizens of the town when they are profoundly affected even though the same quantity of damage in a metropolitan area would be considered slight.
Dear guest, I don't know if you have ever been pregnant, but, if not, I will let you in on a pregnancy secret. People say bizarre things to pregnant women. If you are pregnant more than the socially acceptable number of times (i.e. twice), people say extremely bizarre things to pregnant women.
It is not my lament that these women only have two kids. It is their own lament. I am sad for them in that they seem to want it, but can't figure out how to make it work. They pop into my office randomly to explain why that third kid is just too hard. Believe me, I don't ask. I've had a random conversation with one woman about why she had her tubes tied. Well it wasn't really a conversation. She talked; I nodded. I only walk around with a giant belly and others feel compelled to unload their consciences on me. I don't know why except that people say bizarre things to pregnant women.
However, you can continue to believe that I am imagining these conversations out of my own lack of optimism. If you are pleased with your life, then I am pleased for you. If you are not pleased with your life, then I hope you find a way to work it out. That is all.
Laura says
i see so many little boys who are schooled too early and overly corralled and not allowed to be wild enough…and I think that breeds a hatred for school…like a high strung border collie that can't run because it's kept inside constantly…they get stifled and snappish…and then labelled as a behavior problem…or with a learning disability…
Laura says
I hear FB rants all the time about this sort of thing…and yet when I dare to bring up the option of staying home the same women are offended and jump on me…when all I want to say is “PICK ONE!” Don't spread yourself so thin you can't do it all well! Unfortunately, too, so many women don't know how to cook on a budget, either…if at all…and dads…well, if I was at the end of my rope and my hubby had that attitude…I might cheerfully wake up at 5 am and just disappear with a note that I'd be back later 🙂 and let him do it all for the day!
_Leila says
Jenny, your comments about the first point are poignant and yet, refreshingly honest. Everything is so sugar-coated that no one is telling the truth about the shocking burden on women.
As to your second point — that the husband sometimes isn't aware of this reality, or can't empathize with his wife's desires and plight — I am all too aware of this. Although I'm pretty sure that it's mostly women who read my posts, this one in particular wasn't directed only at women. In fact, my dearest hope would be that husbands and wives would read this encyclical together. Until men understand their great call to be protectors and providers — of every aspect of their dear wives' lives — women will continue either to clamor for more of what, in fact, hurts them (convinced that men can't understand and won't take responsibility) — or will continue to suffer.
I believe that men do have a deep desire to be *men* — to be the rescuers of their wives crying in the break room. They are afraid to admit it, however — and to be honest, the cost in our society is high. A man can hardly open a jar for a woman without being mocked and laughed at. He doesn't dare raise a child without all the “things” that society says he must have — that's the only sense in which he sees himself as provider.
Of course, being a husband and father is so much more. Material poverty is nothing compared to not having the security of knowing what a Father is.
Let's pray and let's be brave in speaking of these things to each other.
Jenny says
And comment #2 from me….
In paragraph 50 while discussing the error of man believing he can change the basic structure of marriage to suit his whims is this phrase, “as though to suggest that the license of a base fornicating woman should enjoy the same rights as the chaste motherhood of a lawfully wedded wife.”
I thought this phrase is the harshest phrase in the whole encyclical and I didn't particularly care for it for two reasons. 1) There is no base, fornicating woman with children as a result that ever existed without the help of a base fornicating man and yet he goes unmentioned. Duly noted. 2) To which rights does he refer? As an American in American culture, I have no idea what extra rights are accorded to me as a married mother that are denied to unwed mothers. Maybe it is a flaw in American culture and married mothers should have more rights, but what are they? I honestly have no idea.
Susan says
I think what he' means is that sacramental marriage elevates us out of depravity.
tess says
you know, i really agree with you here. but there's something that worries me.
it's that sometimes, part of a woman's calling is to do everything you've mentioned about home and family, and also something else. not woman-pursuing-success, but woman as wife-mother-midwife, or wife-mother-clerk for the family business. wife-mother-artist. wife-mother-intellectual.
modern careerism as wage slavery? yes, i totally agree with you. but some sisters have roles that are not so easily classified into “wohm” or “sahm”.
Melissa Diskin says
It's not the roles that are the problem. But if women in general buy in to a (formerly specifically) male work paradigm — 40+ hrs a week outside the home, plus a commute — then is it any wonder that those become the only jobs available? That children — and age-appropriate childish behavior — become seen increasingly as burdens, because they don't fit into that paradigm once 2 parents have to uphold it?
Mary says
Hello, I love your blog, and I agree with your thoughts. I write not to argue or disagree but to ask for prayers and understanding. I work outside my home with four children, because my husband asks me to. I love the Church, my husband and my children, and I am trying desperately to live as God wants. Thank you for your words and the series.
Emily says
I just found your blog, and am enjoying many posts. As a Protestant, I am delighted that we share so many common loves: truth, virtue, family, and this–to sit on my regal throne in my home, establishing rhythms in my home that will make for peace in our hearts, as “virtuous peacemaker”. I just wanted to say thank you for writing, you are encouraging many, I am sure.
Leila says
Welcome, Emily! Thank you!