Little will change while sentimental notions of nurture dominate Pope Francis’ idea of women
There's a picture I have in my mind of Pope Francis. I imagine a little Jorge Mario Bergoglio on tiptoe at his grandmother Rosa’s side, as she bakes a cake. Maybe he dips a finger in the mixture and she gives him a humorous slap on the wrist. The warmth and stability of his family relationships made Bergoglio the Pope who can connect with people so effectively. But his early relationships also made him deeply sentimental about women. He has described them as “the strawberries on the cake”.
I too, like almost all children, made cakes with my mother and grandmother. But my convent school headmistress was adamant that girls were much more than some decorative addition. “We leave matters like needlework and cookery for the home,” she once said. “It means there is more space in the timetable for Latin and mathematics.” But I wasn’t just taught Latin and maths. I was introduced to theological discourse, to authors such as Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Above all, I was taught that women were men’s intellectual equals and we girls were to go out into the world via university to serve God and his world.
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