To think that one cannot be both a Catholic and a Feminist?

[applesauce1]

Inspired by another thread on here, my husband and I had a lively debate about this earlier. I think that a Catholic person cannot also be a Feminist for many reasons, but among these reasons, that an anti-abortion stance is an anti-woman stance.
My husband thinks that a Catholic could be pro-choice and therefore be a feminist, or that a feminist might also disagree with abortion.
He is a cultural Catholic (now atheist), and probably took this stance because he'd like to think that his mum is a feminist. In the end, we agreed to disagree. I think it is a black and white issue and he would like to think there are grey areas.
Do you think there's a way that someone can be a Catholic and also a feminist?

@Sarahpaula, I haven't lied, at no point have I ever said I would give you a list of anything because there wouldn't be any point. Your cognitive bias is so strong that you see things that aren't there and don't see what is there, hence your posts saying that priests havent been charged and that Catholics won't condemn clerical child abuse.

I'm PMSL at the self appointed gatekeepers of feminism here and disappointed but not surprised at the ignorance of Catholicism and suspicion of Catholics by some members.

You know they put babies in sewers, right? Five years before I was born they were putting babies in sewers.

I left the Catholic Church recently (life long member) due to finally realising that they do not accept feminists. I tried to change it from the inside but realised that I am more than half way through my life on earth (if I live to normal age) and I cannot wait until death to change this. And anyway, after reading Sapians a number of years ago, I realised I am a believer in something out there but not a Catholic God (this came to me when I took to a logical conclusion the fact that I do not believe in the God of that religion which contained the 9 11 terrorists. Once I could accept they were wrong, I could accept that perhaps I too was wrong.

I got flamed on the other thread for being pro life. I have absolutely no interest in feminism or women's issues. But my friend is a very strong feminist. There are ways to be feminist in the Catholic Church. I know a few!

I'm a convert and I admit that there are some bits of church doctrine I will pick and choose. And God will be my judge on that!

I got flamed on the other thread for being pro life. I have absolutely no interest in feminism or women's issues.

Why not?

I have absolutely no interest in feminism or women's issues.

I assume you are a man who doesn't have any daughters/sisters/female friends?

I can't begin to imagine the type of internal misogyny a woman would have to feel to make such a statement. Utterly bizarre if you're female.

The difficulty for the RC Church is that they can't simply change doctrine, it needs to happen at a Vatican Council. Papal pronouncements are viewed as infallible like Scripture.

Protestant churches only view Scripture itself as infallible (whatever that really means isn't the point here). There's nothing biblical about priests being prohibited from marrying; most of the apostles were married.

The ban on contraception has everything to do with the early church fathers attitude to sex. They viewed it as inherently evil if not for the purpose of procreation. This really isn't what the Bible teaches.

I think the majority of Catholics realise that the church needs to move on from the ban on contraception and abortion, as can be seen by the result of the referendum on abortion in Ireland. It just isn't straightforward for the RC Church to change it.

I'm not a Catholic, but I can definitely see how a Catholic can also be a feminist. By contrast, it's very hard to be a conservative evangelical and a feminist, which is one reason why I'm not that now.

You know they put babies in sewers, right? Five years before I was born they were putting babies in sewers
Yes we do the Tuam discovery is despicable beyond belief.
Nobody is saying they Catholic religion hasn't done despicable things. Those poor DC were treated as sins.

I agree that change in the Catholic church comes awfully slowly but how much longer do we have to wait? The Second Vatican Council was nearly sixty years ago. What a missed opportunity... .

I'm a buffet catholic. I discard the bulls**t - admittedly there is a lot and accept the neutral bits. Not perfect I know.

How could you support the teachings of the Catholic Church as a feminist? I just don’t understand it. I mean, I understand how you could be culturally Catholic (I’m Irish, so of course I get it). But to practice the religion and support the church? No way in hell. Completely at odds with each other.

papal pronouncements are only infallible if declared as such. there have only been 3. not every church teaching is infallible.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lemaître

Just so people are informed Roman Catholics don't actually believe Adam and Eve is true. It's seen as a metaphor and the Big Bang evolution etc is only accepted by the church but cones from the work of a Roman Catholic priest

Catholics make up over a sixth of the world’s population. It’s a bit silly to say that they can’t be feminists.

@Onxob I'm
Most definitely female!

Yep. Latin America, Ireland, Poland, Congo, Italy...there are a lot of Catholics out there. And not all of them believe everything to the letter. Plenty of people are culturally Catholic and barely attend Mass.

I have a lot of criticisms of the Catholic Church, especially over the many scandals involving paedophile priests and abuse in care homes and schools, but I'm not going to attack ALL Catholics because I personally know Catholics who are left-wing and/or feminist.

@whatever1980 I live the term buffet Catholic. I'll have to remember that!

@Onxob

I have absolutely no interest in feminism or women's issues.

I assume you are a man who doesn't have any daughters/sisters/female friends?

I can't begin to imagine the type of internal misogyny a woman would have to feel to make such a statement. Utterly bizarre if you're female.

There are plenty of women out there who hate feminism or think they don't need these silly women's rights or whatever. Look at how many of them voted for Trump despite all the things he's said about women. People like Anne Coulter and Katie Hopkins are quite happy to throw other women under the bus.

You certainly can’t be a feminist and sit comfortably with the official catholic church’s views on women’s rights and roles.

There are many pix n mix catholics out there though (not meaning that in a derogatory sense at all, every catholic I know fits this definition).

@Graunaile2017

Yes, actually I do remember reading that (I studied doctrine during my theology degree, but that was a long time ago). I can't remember what the three pronouncements were, though; one of them was about the status of the Virgin Mary, as I recall.

So yes, I agree, there should be another Council, with it having been sixty years since the last one.

Thankfully for me, as I'm not a Catholic, so I don't need to spend time agonising about this. But I do think that it's unfair to assume that a practising Catholic can't also be a feminist. A lot of them clearly are, and don't hold with the traditional Catholic teaching on contraception and abortion.

I've found this thread really interesting.

@Onxob I also have a sister and all my work colleagues are female.

Toddler when you say 'I have absolutely no interest in feminism or women's issues.'

Do you mean that you sort of specifically have no interest in things that affect only women and girls, even if they are things that generally are seen as bad?

As someone Pro life and RC and with a stated zero interest in women's rights, what do you think or feel when you read about eg women in El Salvador being imprisoned for miscarrying, something that happens because they are female and living in a country that has very strong views about abortion based on it being an RC country?

I'm genuinely interested as to what you exactly mean.

www.google.com/amp/s/news.sky.com/story/amp/the-women-who-get-life-in-jail-after-suffering-miscarriages-11953922

This sort of thing.

Obviously this is not something you can do much about and certainly I'm not saying that Catholics in other parts of the world are responsible for the actions of el Salvador.

Bit given your views, what is your personal response to this type of stuff that goes on?