Tina Beattie's intermittent reflections: please note that this blog is discontinued. To follow Tina Beattie's new website and blogs, please go to https://www.tinabeattie.com/.
In addition to: 1. Lectures, papers and talks 2. Published articles and essays
Could this archive include works in other formats, for example past and future audio recordings, and a current bibliography of published books.
It would be appreciated if you would, at some point, confirm and reiterate that any observations on the material archived, or items in the bibliography, or issues raised in the media, will be excluded if the source suggests a personal agenda inappropriate for the site. Thank you.
@Anonymous Thank you for these helpful suggestions. I hope eventually to make this a complete 'storehouse' of work and ideas, and I shall include the material you suggest.
Since all comments are moderated, those leaving inappropriate or irrelevant comments will find that they are not published. In the past I tried to be rather too accommodating, and too often that served to lower the tone of the discussion.
I read your article "Deadlier sin of the male", and I was rather puzzled by the following:
In a recent article in L'Osservatore Romano, the Pope's personal theologian, Mgr Wojciech Giertych, endorsed a theory by a 95-year-old Jesuit, Fr Roberto Busa, that men and women sin differently. Based on the Seven Deadly Sins, the list of men's sins includes lust at the top and greed at the bottom, while women's sins have pride at the top and sloth at the bottom.
As you wrote, there was a media flurry - though about nothing, as the stories in the BBC and the Telegraph were pure fabrications. In the issue of L'Osservatore to which those stories referred, the "article" by Busa is in fact the foreword to someone else's book (a sort of index to the places in which St Thomas discusses the concept of capital sin as such). It doesn't mention Giertych at all. The only thing I can recall in Giertych's article (an interesting brief history of the development of the concept of capital sin) that might in any way be construed as a theory of gender and sinning was an anecdotal observation at the end, in which he says [my translation, from an old blog post]: When one looks at the capital vices not from the point of view of their opposition to grace, but of that of the difficulties which they create, we see that men experience them in a different way from women. For men, often the most difficult vice to confront is that of lust, followed by gluttoy, sloth (acedia), anger, vanity, wrath, envy and greed. For women, the most dangerous vice is vanity, followed by envy, wrath, lust, gluttony and last, sloth. (he follows this up with examples of what one sees in religious communities, which certainly corresponds to what I've observed :) )
So I wonder- were you in fact writing about the same issue of L'Osservatore that the Media Hooha was? If not, I'd be interested to know what Giertych's theory looks like.
Thank you for this. If you read carefully the extract you quote, you'll see that I don't refer to an 'article' by Bussa. I refer to an article by Giertych, in which he endorses Busa's theory. I can't now find an archive of L'Osservatore Romano going back that far on the Web, but I checked it online before I published. I don't know about 'pure fabrications' - there was very extensive coverage in the Catholic media as well.
So yes, Giertych referred in passing in an article to Busa's theory, but my interest was why even in passing he should cite this particular source, when women scholars have been writing about the gendering of sin for many years, and I don't think any of them have ever been quoted by an official Vatican source.
You're right, I got them the wrong way round in my reply! Apologies. It was much too late to be writing.
However, it just makes things odder. Busa doesn't mention any such theory, at least not in that issue. The only thing by him in that issue was the foreword to this book. The only thing resembling any such theory was Giertych's bit of anecdote.
I don't much read the English-language Catholic press, but I don't see how they could have run a story about a survey of confessions without thinking "hang on, how would one do that?!" Perhaps Busa does have a theory about the gendering of sin, but it's not really his field.
I wish I could find the photocopy I had. If I remember next time I'm in the library, I'll see if I can get another copy and sent you a scan. Best to check anyway, as my memory may be playing tricks.
Would it be possible to have the transcript of the Thursday June 9 "Prayer for the Day" as a future post with a picture of a cave painting and the Siena altar piece? Thank you.
In addition to:
ReplyDelete1. Lectures, papers and talks
2. Published articles and essays
Could this archive include works in other formats, for example past and future audio recordings, and a current bibliography of published books.
It would be appreciated if you would, at some point, confirm and reiterate that any observations on the material archived, or items in the bibliography, or issues raised in the media, will be excluded if the source suggests a personal agenda inappropriate for the site.
Thank you.
@Anonymous
ReplyDeleteThank you for these helpful suggestions. I hope eventually to make this a complete 'storehouse' of work and ideas, and I shall include the material you suggest.
Since all comments are moderated, those leaving inappropriate or irrelevant comments will find that they are not published. In the past I tried to be rather too accommodating, and too often that served to lower the tone of the discussion.
Best wishes,
Tina.
Hello
ReplyDeleteI read your article "Deadlier sin of the male", and I was rather puzzled by the following:
In a recent article in L'Osservatore Romano, the Pope's personal theologian, Mgr Wojciech Giertych, endorsed a theory by a 95-year-old Jesuit, Fr Roberto Busa, that men and women sin differently. Based on the Seven Deadly Sins, the list of men's sins includes lust at the top and greed at the bottom, while women's sins have pride at the top and sloth at the bottom.
As you wrote, there was a media flurry - though about nothing, as the stories in the BBC and the Telegraph were pure fabrications. In the issue of L'Osservatore to which those stories referred, the "article" by Busa is in fact the foreword to someone else's book (a sort of index to the places in which St Thomas discusses the concept of capital sin as such). It doesn't mention Giertych at all. The only thing I can recall in Giertych's article (an interesting brief history of the development of the concept of capital sin) that might in any way be construed as a theory of gender and sinning was an anecdotal observation at the end, in which he says [my translation, from an old blog post]:
When one looks at the capital vices not from the point of view of their opposition to grace, but of that of the difficulties which they create, we see that men experience them in a different way from women. For men, often the most difficult vice to confront is that of lust, followed by gluttoy, sloth (acedia), anger, vanity, wrath, envy and greed. For women, the most dangerous vice is vanity, followed by envy, wrath, lust, gluttony and last, sloth.
(he follows this up with examples of what one sees in religious communities, which certainly corresponds to what I've observed :) )
So I wonder- were you in fact writing about the same issue of L'Osservatore that the Media Hooha was? If not, I'd be interested to know what Giertych's theory looks like.
many thanks.
@berenike
ReplyDeleteHello 'Berenike',
Thank you for this. If you read carefully the extract you quote, you'll see that I don't refer to an 'article' by Bussa. I refer to an article by Giertych, in which he endorses Busa's theory. I can't now find an archive of L'Osservatore Romano going back that far on the Web, but I checked it online before I published. I don't know about 'pure fabrications' - there was very extensive coverage in the Catholic media as well.
So yes, Giertych referred in passing in an article to Busa's theory, but my interest was why even in passing he should cite this particular source, when women scholars have been writing about the gendering of sin for many years, and I don't think any of them have ever been quoted by an official Vatican source.
Best wishes,
Tina.
Sorry - excuse the typo: Busa has one 's', not two, as in the second line above.
ReplyDeleteTina.
You're right, I got them the wrong way round in my reply! Apologies. It was much too late to be writing.
ReplyDeleteHowever, it just makes things odder. Busa doesn't mention any such theory, at least not in that issue. The only thing by him in that issue was the foreword to this book. The only thing resembling any such theory was Giertych's bit of anecdote.
I don't much read the English-language Catholic press, but I don't see how they could have run a story about a survey of confessions without thinking "hang on, how would one do that?!" Perhaps Busa does have a theory about the gendering of sin, but it's not really his field.
I wish I could find the photocopy I had. If I remember next time I'm in the library, I'll see if I can get another copy and sent you a scan. Best to check anyway, as my memory may be playing tricks.
Would it be possible to have the transcript of the Thursday June 9 "Prayer for the Day" as a future post with a picture of a cave painting and the Siena altar piece?
ReplyDeleteThank you.
@Gabrielle
ReplyDeleteThank you Gabrielle. I've uploaded all the scripts for this week's Prayer for the Day, together with images relating to the topics.
Tina.