Karen looks at how women have been treated by the church. All the guilt we still have stems from those days when the church blamed Eve for everything. Her sex was there to tempt men and her appetites were rampant! Women had very little choice. They were encouraged to become nuns, to shut themselves away from men and become the bride of Christ.
We may think we have moved on from this but no. The words 'original sin' are still spouted about by the church and people still believe it. The term 'born into sin' makes me angry. And reading this book reminded me what rot men believed and used their authority to keep women down for years. But this wasn't anything to do with Jesus. This wasn't his doing, nor that of Paul. For many years St Paul got the flack from women who thought him a misogynist but if you read his words (not that of his followers who tried to write like him) you will see that he had good relationships with women. What's more women taught in those days. Paul did make the odd slip up but nothing compared to what was to come from Augustine or Jerome. Reading their words made me feel quite sick.
Some of the letters these and other men wrote to women 'advising' them on how to behave is no more than pornography. You can almost visualise them having a wank while writing. This was more about their own sexual appetites. A lot of women enclosed in these places were virtually driven mad by the guilt of their own sex, of just being a women. They dealt with it through starving themselves and penances to make themselves unwomanly and ugly. Is it any wonder they had visions (probably hallucinations). While their visions were supposed to be of Christ he was not the Christ you would want to know but a perversion.
Women were not the only ones who fasted. A great many priests did too. I have read many books where they describe the hardships they put themselves through for Christ. I wonder, did Christ ask this of them? I have always felt this was wrong and far from what Jesus was about. Men had strange ideas about life and what they should do.
Armstrong looks at martyrs - another weird trend. These consisted of men and women. It was thought the highest accolade to die for Christ. Of course the first martyrs died because they would not renounce their faith. Later others offered themselves willingly (this was the trend) and eventually religious leaders put a stop to it.
Next came the inquisition and the witch hunts (I once helped my son in a project on witches so none of this came as a shock!) and even marriage guilt ridden. The poor woman dependant on her husband, tolerating sex as a duty, stuck at home, weak and manipulating. Ah yes, men thought of their wives like that. Women in the 1800's suffered greatly from headaches and other imaginary illnesses. They were hypochondriacs and were prone to hysterics.
At times this was a deeply disturbing look at women and the men who made the rules. If we look at what is happening today it is interesting to see how some things remain the same while others have turned the other way. Words like glamour and charm come straight out of the witches era. A woman put a glamour on a man (made his penis disappear - I kid you not!). Women still abuse their bodies by starving themselves but for different reasons, though it is still down to having control over their bodies. Powerful women are bitches, manipulative, castrating. But men still can't resist woman and that's their guilt.
Women have more independence now than they have ever had but the hang ups are still there. They are still bound by duty to husband and children. They will often put themselves last. Equality is what we strive for. That's always easier said than done and there are always women who go to the other extreme. Recently there was the woman who didn't want her father to give her away at her wedding because it was patriarchal. I loved it that my dad gave me away. Okay, so it might be old fashioned and comes from the days when children belonged to their father (especially women) and basically she was given away from one male authority to another (the husband) but I have no problem with this tradition.
There was one part which brought something home to me - space. Women wanted a room of their own to read, create, to write - gee I've been wanting one of those for years! Obviously I'm not alone in this. I found it quite amusing. I live in a house of men (three). I have always liked my own space and I literally have to escape sometimes. There you go then. Proof if ever you needed it.
This was a heavy book to read, quite depressing to see how women have been 'done down' all the way back through time. The church has much to answer for and unhelpful words still used today by certain sections of the church don't help.Women have brains. We no longer need to be told what to do by men. Actually we never did. But men made us think we did.
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