daveb@pogo.UUCP (10/05/86)
Recently Rich Richardson posted a flame to soc.women about my article
on the church decision on womens souls. Since I wish to answer his flame,
and talk.religion.misc is the proper forum for this, I am posting both his
article and my responce to talk.religion.misc. The following is Rich's
flame in entirety.
Enjoyed this Immensely,
Dave Butler
Remember: Silly is a state of Mind, Stupid is a way of Life.
Article 94 of soc.women:
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From: mtglass@mhuxt.UUCP (RICHARDSON)
Newsgroups: soc.women
Subject: Re: Church decision on whether women have souls: Results.
Message-ID: <1134@mhuxt.UUCP>
Date: 26 Sep 86 20:23:06 GMT
Date-Received: 28 Sep 86 11:50:00 GMT
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> In article <2738@pogo.UUCP> daveb@pogo.UUCP (Dave Butler) writes:
I don't know where this topic came from, so maybe I'm going to
end up shooting myself in the foot, but I think Dave Butler's
posting, along with this whole bizarre project he was driven to
pursue for one reason or another, smacks of great hubris and
arrogance.
> Well folks the verdict is in; the Catholic Church did indeed hold an
> official council on whether women had souls and you women did just make
> it by one vote.
What does this *mean*? What language was the discussion in? Does the 1986
American English word "soul" even roughly equate to whatever word they
were debating? If it's so clear to us here and now that "women have souls",
why didn't they see it just as clearly there and then? Could it be that
our notion of "soul" hadn't evolved yet? Could it be that a priori it wasn't
clear in those days that "soul" was separate from the notion of physical
strength, social position, or anything else? Could it be there was some
subtle theological or political consequence in the tangled fabric that was
and is culture that made the issue less than simple? Maybe even something
you don't *understand*?
Could it be they didn`t have the lessons of Jeffersons and Elizabeths and
Anthoneys to profit from? That they were starting from scratch in a world
where women died in childbirth at 13, children were thrown onto spears by
[gasp *illiterate*] pillaging barbarians and when the sun went down it got
very very dark?
Could it be that women had no rights because the notion of rights didn't
exist? That nothing like it was expressible in their language?
And that women weren't even *property* for the same reason, that the
word simply did not have the meaning it does today?
Could it be that "human" could not yet even be approximated by "homme",
a word that expressed a confusing [to us] bundle of meanings tied to
serfdom, social position, sex, and ultimately to "humus" [or, vaguely,
`earth`], and that maybe extending the meaning to include women was
indeed a radical and difficult notion?
Could it be that things were so very different in 584 that it's just a
teensy bit arrogant to judge them by our worldview?
Naaaah. Let's face it. they were women-hating pigs.
> "Are Women Human?" (In the year 584, in Lyons, France, 43 Catholic
> bishops and twenty men representing other bishops, after a lengthy
> debate, took a vote. The results were: 32, yes; 31, no. Women
> were declared human by one vote.) ---Council of Macon, France.
"43 Catholic bishops and twenty men represnting other bishops." What bishops?
Who were these people and what was their claim to ecclesiastical precedence?
Were they sent by the various patriarchs? In what sense were they entitled
to speak for the Church? What does it mean to be "Catholic" in 584?
>I now have 3 references: _The_Rape_Of_The_A*P*E*_ by
>Allen Sherman (page 202 for those who care), _Why_We_Burn:_Sexism_Exorcised_,
>written by Meg Bowman and appeared in _The_Humanist_ magazine in the
>November/December 83' issue and finally, an article witten by Dottie Lamm
>(wife of the governor of Colorado) that appeared in the November 6th 1983
>Denver Post.
This is all garbage, Dave. What sources did *these* books cite? How come
*they* could locate information on this alleged Council when you couldn't
with all your work?
The Denver Post is not my idea of an authoritative source. (Maybe I just
feel less comfortable with authority than you do.)
> If you wish to find references to this council in Catholic literature
> and:
> 1. you don't read french or latin or
> 2. you don't have access to rare books,
>
> give it up.
Dave, I'm not surprised that an alleged Church Council meeting in 6th
century France is incompletely documented and only then in French
and Latin.
Why are you?
Why do you take this very mundane fact and crank it up into some bizarre
insight about censorship? specifically:
> I searched through copious compendiums on church councils and
> history. Each of these books professed to be a veritable fount of Catholic
> knowledge. Only the _Catholic_Encyclopedia_ even mentions the council, and
> it refuses to discuss the decisions and votes made (If I sound slightly
> irritated, its because I am. You try searching through 17 or more 300 page
> tomes which have all embarassing facts edited out).
"edited out"? "refuses to discuss"?
Sorry. I don't buy conspiracy theories. While you seem to have some
unresolved conflict with Roman Catholicism [and authority in general]
your writing suggests a complete lack of insight about it as an institution.
It's huge, Dave. It's incredibly old and incredibly huge. Vast numbers
of bureaucrats from every culture in the world pursue their own agendas,
in musty backwaters of church hieracrchy. They preach Limbo, they preach
the Social Gospel, Militarism, and countless other doctrines and worldviews
inconsistent with those set down by Rome. They are Marxists, Jesuits, Humanists,
and Gnostics. The Roman Communion is too broad and varied to purge itself
completely of records no matter how "embarassing".
These compendiums you mention [assuming you were thorough] were written
by radically different men and women in different languages in different
times in different political circumstances. They reached the shelves
of our libraries through countless different paths in scores of different
editions. Church libraries, used bookstores, schools and public libraries.
And you want us to believe that there has been a monolithic, concerted effort
on the part of all these quarreling popes and cardinals to erase any
record of this Council you mention?
What do you mean "edited out"? With a knife? With a black marker
like the CIA does? How could you tell references were edited out?
From context?
I don't know if I'm being iconoclastic, reactionary, or just an old fart,
but, you know Dave, I wouldn't be surprised if, despite your [excellent,
I'm sure] scholarship, there WAS no Council of Macon. Call me old fashioned,
but sometimes I'm inclined to believe the hundreds of books that imply
that something DIDN'T happen instead of the three or four that insist
something DID happen, but everybody's trying to cover it up. ["Chariots
of the Gods?" comes to mind]. If there were such a Council, I would really
be curious to know how it came to meet in the West right in the middle
of a long period of Councils [and political domination] in the East.
> One of the other catholic
> embarassments was the _Malleus_Maleficarum_ ("Hammer of Witches") written
> in 1448 for Pope Innocent VIII.
> This book was kept around for hundreds of years (the church put out 28
> editions) and 3 different Popes endorsed it as official church law.
Boy, how about those Catholic embarassments? Boy, 28 editions and three
different popes endorsed it as official church law. Hey, that's *significant*.
You know, what's so strange?....those popes were such a *together* group of
people otherwise. Not a bad apple in the crowd.
> If you happen to think that this purely Catholic demigogery, forget it.
> The 3 sources I've got enumerate examples from every major religion and
> nationality (You should here some of the things Martin Luthor said).
Wha...you mean there's MORE?
> ...never underestimate the stupidity, bigotry and prejudice
> of any organized religion or government.
Damn those religions and governments. The world would be *so much*
better without them. There would be no stupidity, no bigotry, no prejudice.
There would be no misogyny, no oppression, no war. We'd all *LOVE*
each other.
R. Richardson