This puts into words what I've been working toward: "Integral complementarity, in contrast, views men and women as whole human persons in their own right. The full range of human traits and virtues is open to cultivation by both sexes." THAT is what I've tried to do/try to do, in my parenting, in my outreach & support of others caring for boys, & in my advocacy for boys & men. I want my boys (all boys!) to have the freedom, space, & support to be full humans. (And I, of course, as a female, want that for females as well).
I love this because it puts into words an intuition I’ve had for a while about, as was said, dividing the virtues into pink versus blue.
I’m interested in why fractional complementarianism is so attractive to many? It certainly seems to be on the rise in some segments of Christendom - perhaps as a reaction against the extreme flattening of sexual differences in the broader culture?
Whatever its cause, it also seems just as disembodying as what it’s reacting against (and the two feed each other, if that makes sense.)
I think fractional complimentary is trying to respond to a real truth, we are made to live in relation with others, and the bond across the sexes is an especially important relation.
But fractional complimentary is not an accurate portrait of that coming together.
Makes sense. But do you also think something similar is driving the opposite, flattening approach, at least in part? It is perhaps reacting to excessive fractioning while also trying respond to the real truth that fractioning ironically flattens, if that makes sense? Of course, this is referring to the best aims of the flattening approach.
I think people just like simple stories, whether "gender is a total social construct and your identity is entirely self-willed" or "the virtues to which you are called are a deterministic result of your gender, no complicated discernment or uncomfortable stretching necessary."
Yes, I think Sr Hodder's claim is true. Since my world is mostly shaped by the study of early Christian theology, I'll say it reminds me of the post-Chalcedonian Christological debates. Both sides (miaphysites and Chalcedonians) agreed that priority must be given to the concrete over the abstract (actually, this goes back to Cyril of Alexandria's fight against Nestorius, and before that to the Cappadocian defense of the Trinity). Maybe that's a stretch, but I see a similarity in the sense of prioritizing the concrete.
As for Favale's distinction, I think it's a useful heuristic, but I do wonder if there is a risk in isolating traits and comparing them one by one. I'd be curious what it would look like to combine them and see if there is some identifiable "emergent property" that arises that is greater than the sum of their parts. I think it perhaps goes against Hodder's position in that it's abstracted from the concrete (which is, by nature of its concreteness, going to exist within a combination of such traits).
I just discovered your new book via the Law & Liberty review. I'm thankful for a human per se approach, and for more complexity around equality and difference when it comes to gender. Re: "integral complementarity," it is absolutely necessary for Christian soteriology. In Christ, God becomes *human* (and coincidentally male), and his full humanity (per se) is necessary for salvation.
An interesting variant on integral complementarity might be Timothy Patitsas's "Marriage of Priests: An Orthodox Theology of Gender" (available at his academia.edu page https://www.academia.edu/12035379/The_Marriage_of_Priests_Towards_an_Orthodox_Christian_Theology_of_Gender), where difference has more to do with the order of acquisition of the same set of, in this case, christological roles (rather than virtues): priest, prophet, king. I read this paper a decade ago, and I'm still not sure what I think about the idea.
I haven't read your book yet, but I'm already fully persuaded that interdependence is an obvious characteristic of all humans, as such. I would hesitate to say: men are "independent"/individualistic, while women are "dependent"/communal, or some such. (Not saying this is what you claim.)
In any case, an important corollary of interdependency could be that all humans have identities or "selves" that extend well beyond body limits. There are again deep theological implications. Strongly sacrificial theologies, for example, will misfire because they assume I sacrifice my "self" for you -- when in the case of a mother, for example, her child is already part of her extended sense of "self." A child is not an "other" to sacrifice for. Acknowledging strong interdependence would reduce atomistic assumptions about self-sacrifice as a basic theological precept, which to my mind is a good thing. (It does create a bit of havoc for some theological currents -- which again, I'd take as a good thing.)
Just to clarify, I'm Eastern Orthodox, not Roman Catholic.
@James J. Heaney @Dylan Campbell @Steven Umbrello @Eric Anderson @Donald Paul Maddox @J. A. Siemer @Ray Alex Williams @Jonathan Dunn @Brandon Ward 😎 @J. M. Terry @Thomas Salerno @Matthew Becklo check this out!
A mother's love is something else though. The special nature of a mother and the high value of a father, and that they are different, is difficult for the secular world to accept, and it is difficult to encode and defend in law when lost.
My problem is that the Catholic system Favale describes makes ir clear that women are in every single aspect inferior to males. Men image GOD and JESUS. Women, at best, image only humans as Mary or the church. Why can’t you see how inferior this makes women?
This says to me that the full expression of feminine or masculine ways of living is 1) only borne out in community 2) relies on particular expressions of that community which is 3) reliant on actual individuals participating in that community. Same-sex spaces like religious communities develop a different dynamic than the face-to-face role-making of marriage; both embrace maleness and femaleness.
In society at large, we need more same-sex spaces, not fewer. It may be arbitrary who does the plowing of the field or the threshing of the grain, but in a particular community it is not arbitrary. The more comprehensive the divisions between the sexes the more flexible the whole thing becomes in times of necessity. (Women always take over male responsibilities in times of war, when men are off at war.) When men in a marriage know what their normal duties are they can work to get it done---and in times of necessity pick up the slack without worries. It might be your wife's work to change diapers when you aren't around, and you aren't around often, but if you have that sense then, in your wife's absence, you can do the Daddy diaper change without having that murky sense you are a traitor to your sex. That duty *is* arbitrarily female, but *because* it is firmly normative it *can* be assigned to the male in times of necessity, like when the wife is sleeping, working, showering, cooking, milling grain, or all the rest.
Unity (and equality) is only borne out when there is radical habitual division between men and women. Recognizing the call of necessity and the ability of the sexes to be interchangeable in any isolated task is only possible when it is an exception. When it is a norm, the identities of both men and women are lost.
Integral complementarity is achieved with a Christian ethos that embraces the sex binary and a comprehensive division of the world. It is when we are distinguished only by our bathrooms that we become neurotic about itemizing it all. The whole self should be mostly in a room with other whole selves if we are ever going to be embraced as a whole self outside of that room by the other sex.
(I'm pulling from a discussion about the Austrian commentator Ivan Ilyich on Gender.)
The idea that an act becomes masculine or feminine based on who's carrying out the act rings true to me as a stay at home dad. As my wife notes, there is something masculine about how I care for our kids and take care of our house, just like there's something feminine in how she does her work. It's hard to tease out all the differences, and how the work I do looks different by virtue of me being a father and a husband, but there is a difference there, certainly.
This puts into words what I've been working toward: "Integral complementarity, in contrast, views men and women as whole human persons in their own right. The full range of human traits and virtues is open to cultivation by both sexes." THAT is what I've tried to do/try to do, in my parenting, in my outreach & support of others caring for boys, & in my advocacy for boys & men. I want my boys (all boys!) to have the freedom, space, & support to be full humans. (And I, of course, as a female, want that for females as well).
I love this because it puts into words an intuition I’ve had for a while about, as was said, dividing the virtues into pink versus blue.
I’m interested in why fractional complementarianism is so attractive to many? It certainly seems to be on the rise in some segments of Christendom - perhaps as a reaction against the extreme flattening of sexual differences in the broader culture?
Whatever its cause, it also seems just as disembodying as what it’s reacting against (and the two feed each other, if that makes sense.)
I think fractional complimentary is trying to respond to a real truth, we are made to live in relation with others, and the bond across the sexes is an especially important relation.
But fractional complimentary is not an accurate portrait of that coming together.
Makes sense. But do you also think something similar is driving the opposite, flattening approach, at least in part? It is perhaps reacting to excessive fractioning while also trying respond to the real truth that fractioning ironically flattens, if that makes sense? Of course, this is referring to the best aims of the flattening approach.
I think people just like simple stories, whether "gender is a total social construct and your identity is entirely self-willed" or "the virtues to which you are called are a deterministic result of your gender, no complicated discernment or uncomfortable stretching necessary."
Makes sense. We love our Ockham’s razors, don’t we? Simple categories or no categories, and certainly no uncertainty.
That is, can the fractioning extreme be just as anti-female as the flattening one?
Ha! Surely so, because of the alliteration! 🤣
Yes, I think Sr Hodder's claim is true. Since my world is mostly shaped by the study of early Christian theology, I'll say it reminds me of the post-Chalcedonian Christological debates. Both sides (miaphysites and Chalcedonians) agreed that priority must be given to the concrete over the abstract (actually, this goes back to Cyril of Alexandria's fight against Nestorius, and before that to the Cappadocian defense of the Trinity). Maybe that's a stretch, but I see a similarity in the sense of prioritizing the concrete.
As for Favale's distinction, I think it's a useful heuristic, but I do wonder if there is a risk in isolating traits and comparing them one by one. I'd be curious what it would look like to combine them and see if there is some identifiable "emergent property" that arises that is greater than the sum of their parts. I think it perhaps goes against Hodder's position in that it's abstracted from the concrete (which is, by nature of its concreteness, going to exist within a combination of such traits).
I just discovered your new book via the Law & Liberty review. I'm thankful for a human per se approach, and for more complexity around equality and difference when it comes to gender. Re: "integral complementarity," it is absolutely necessary for Christian soteriology. In Christ, God becomes *human* (and coincidentally male), and his full humanity (per se) is necessary for salvation.
An interesting variant on integral complementarity might be Timothy Patitsas's "Marriage of Priests: An Orthodox Theology of Gender" (available at his academia.edu page https://www.academia.edu/12035379/The_Marriage_of_Priests_Towards_an_Orthodox_Christian_Theology_of_Gender), where difference has more to do with the order of acquisition of the same set of, in this case, christological roles (rather than virtues): priest, prophet, king. I read this paper a decade ago, and I'm still not sure what I think about the idea.
I haven't read your book yet, but I'm already fully persuaded that interdependence is an obvious characteristic of all humans, as such. I would hesitate to say: men are "independent"/individualistic, while women are "dependent"/communal, or some such. (Not saying this is what you claim.)
In any case, an important corollary of interdependency could be that all humans have identities or "selves" that extend well beyond body limits. There are again deep theological implications. Strongly sacrificial theologies, for example, will misfire because they assume I sacrifice my "self" for you -- when in the case of a mother, for example, her child is already part of her extended sense of "self." A child is not an "other" to sacrifice for. Acknowledging strong interdependence would reduce atomistic assumptions about self-sacrifice as a basic theological precept, which to my mind is a good thing. (It does create a bit of havoc for some theological currents -- which again, I'd take as a good thing.)
Just to clarify, I'm Eastern Orthodox, not Roman Catholic.
I usually order e-books but today I ordered a hard copy of this book to be able to share it with my girlfriends! Can’t wait to read it.
@James J. Heaney @Dylan Campbell @Steven Umbrello @Eric Anderson @Donald Paul Maddox @J. A. Siemer @Ray Alex Williams @Jonathan Dunn @Brandon Ward 😎 @J. M. Terry @Thomas Salerno @Matthew Becklo check this out!
A mother's love is something else though. The special nature of a mother and the high value of a father, and that they are different, is difficult for the secular world to accept, and it is difficult to encode and defend in law when lost.
My problem is that the Catholic system Favale describes makes ir clear that women are in every single aspect inferior to males. Men image GOD and JESUS. Women, at best, image only humans as Mary or the church. Why can’t you see how inferior this makes women?
This says to me that the full expression of feminine or masculine ways of living is 1) only borne out in community 2) relies on particular expressions of that community which is 3) reliant on actual individuals participating in that community. Same-sex spaces like religious communities develop a different dynamic than the face-to-face role-making of marriage; both embrace maleness and femaleness.
In society at large, we need more same-sex spaces, not fewer. It may be arbitrary who does the plowing of the field or the threshing of the grain, but in a particular community it is not arbitrary. The more comprehensive the divisions between the sexes the more flexible the whole thing becomes in times of necessity. (Women always take over male responsibilities in times of war, when men are off at war.) When men in a marriage know what their normal duties are they can work to get it done---and in times of necessity pick up the slack without worries. It might be your wife's work to change diapers when you aren't around, and you aren't around often, but if you have that sense then, in your wife's absence, you can do the Daddy diaper change without having that murky sense you are a traitor to your sex. That duty *is* arbitrarily female, but *because* it is firmly normative it *can* be assigned to the male in times of necessity, like when the wife is sleeping, working, showering, cooking, milling grain, or all the rest.
Unity (and equality) is only borne out when there is radical habitual division between men and women. Recognizing the call of necessity and the ability of the sexes to be interchangeable in any isolated task is only possible when it is an exception. When it is a norm, the identities of both men and women are lost.
Integral complementarity is achieved with a Christian ethos that embraces the sex binary and a comprehensive division of the world. It is when we are distinguished only by our bathrooms that we become neurotic about itemizing it all. The whole self should be mostly in a room with other whole selves if we are ever going to be embraced as a whole self outside of that room by the other sex.
(I'm pulling from a discussion about the Austrian commentator Ivan Ilyich on Gender.)
No, but this goes too far. It's not at all arbitrary who does the plowing of the field, any more than it's arbitrary who nurses the children.
The idea that an act becomes masculine or feminine based on who's carrying out the act rings true to me as a stay at home dad. As my wife notes, there is something masculine about how I care for our kids and take care of our house, just like there's something feminine in how she does her work. It's hard to tease out all the differences, and how the work I do looks different by virtue of me being a father and a husband, but there is a difference there, certainly.
Keep it up, Bandit!