Women in society and religion

In the context of the raging controversy

over the ordination of women to the

priest‐hood in the Catholic Church, it

may be germane to understand their

position in society as a whole. It is a

travesty of natural justice to ignore their

role in the scheme of things. . How long

the Church will ignore and deny the

inborn rights of one half of the human

race and push this most vital segment of

humanity as providers of sexual

gratification for the males of the species

with an assigned role of producing

innumerable children to people the

Church and confining them to grinding

and cooking and moping and a cursed

destiny to live on the margins.

The human female of today has reached

her biological status after undergoing

dramatic changes during the course of her

evolution – far more than the human

male. In the shape of modern women, she

has become a unique being of an

extraordinary kind. Every woman has a

beautiful body – beautiful because it is

the brilliant end‐point of millions of years

of evolution. The female body is loaded

with amazing adjustments and subtle

refinements that make it the most

remarkable organism on the planet.

The trend towards male domination is

simply not in keeping with the way in

which Homo Sapiens has developed over

a period of millions of years. Our success

as a species was due to a division of

labor between males and females, in

which the males became specialized as

hunters, that in modern times means

hunting for jobs and engaging in other

economic pursuits for making a living. In

old tribal societies, the males away

hunting, the females were left at the very

centre of social life, gathering the food

and preparing it, rearing the young and

generally organising the tribal settlement.

As men became better at focussing on the

task devolved on them, women became

better at dealing with several problems at

once. There was never any question of

one sex being dominant over the other.

They relied totally on one another for

survival. There was a primeval balance

between the human sexes – they were

different but equal.

The ideal social balance was lost when

human population grew, towns and cities

were built, and tribes became citizens of

settled societies.The role of the male in

the reproductive process was not known

In ancient times. The males realized that

they too have to contribute in producing

babies in that during their long absence

for engaging in fighting in distant lands,

no birth did take place in their tribe.. This

realisation along with better physical

strength enabled the male to assert

himself over the female and gain

dominance over her.

Religion, at the centre of most

human societies has had a major part

to play in this skewed social order.

In ancient times the great deities were

always the Earth and She ( not He) .

Only the earth and the woman generate

crops and children; they were worshiped

as Creators. As urbanisation spread and

social turmoil and incessant internal and

external fights for dominance in the

polity became order of the day, the

benign Mother Goddess gave way to the

authoritarian God the Father. With a

vengeful male god at the helm. The

ruthless holy men through ages have

ensured their own affluent security and

their higher social status In the society in

general at the expense of women who

sank to a low social status far from their

evolutionary birthright.

A normal healthy male cannot resist the

attractiveness of the female body. That

may be the reason why the so called

celibates try to keep the females away

from the alter . The Adam will become

supine and weak at the sight of the Eve,

Serpent or no Serpent present.

How long half of the humanity be denied

of their legitimate and inalienable birth

right? How long women be demeaned

and suppressed with layers and layers of

thick cloth to hide their alluring

curvaceous body, with their beautiful hair

shaven off replaced with wigs instead (In

orthodox Jewish society) ? How long they

can be made to wear the purdah hiding

their natural charm? How long the

charade of male celibacy will prevail?

Women have equal, if not more, right in

every sphere of life as men. It is time to

remove the blinkers.