Woman

Lately I have become increasingly aware that birthing professionals are undermining the inherent dignity of women in their attempt to remain relevant and progressive. Terms like pregnant person, birther, birthing person, chestfeeder, are now ubiquitous.

This is an abandonment of the very people these professionals claim to serve.

Women.

I don’t know why I continue to be shocked, but neutered language —coming from women, no less—when discussing one of the only inherently, innately female capacities, makes me question one’s ability to be a birth professional at all. Do they even understand basic science?

Women contain in their very beings the capacity to grow human life in their wombs and to sustain life at their breasts. The Theotokos, the great Mother of God, bore the God Made Man in her womb and fed Him with her breasts.

To deny this is to deny fundamental teachings of the Catholic Church.

CCC ❡369 Man and woman have been created, which is to say, willed by God: on the one hand, in perfect equality as human persons; on the other, in their respective beings as man and woman. "Being man" or "being woman" is a reality which is good and willed by God: man and woman possess an inalienable dignity which comes to them immediately from God their Creator. Man and woman are both with one and the same dignity "in the image of God". In their "being-man" and "being-woman", they reflect the Creator's wisdom and goodness.

Genesis 1:27: So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

“But not all women can have children!”

As a result of the fall of Adam and Eve, this is true. This is a great heartbreak for many women, and not to be ignored in our ministry towards women.

However, ONLY women are able to bear children. To say otherwise is to deny God’s authority to create, His omnipotence, and His perfections.

Human beings are not self-created. We are designed and created by the Creator of the Universe Himself, in His very image. That He thought to create us at all, much less with such beauty and grandeur, should inspire awe and gratitude!

Women of the world: you are known and loved by God. You are a woman, mama, mother, sister, aunt, daughter, niece. Daughter of the King, Daughter of Eve, Daughter of the Blessed Mother. You are nobility.

I will always call you what God created you to be.

Woman.