R. Sungenis: This is another ploy of the liberal mindset - to make it appear as if the traditional Church was not "personal" or did not give "equal dignity of human individuals."Mr. Donovan makes it sound as if the Church in our day has just discovered these marvelous truths and, for the first time in history, has begun to teach the real essence of what it is to be human; and that the Church of yesteryear was impersonal and looked at people as objects. Again, this is a serious indictment against the Church, but fortunately, Donovan's thesis is totally baseless.

Pius XI, XII, Vatican II, Paul VI and John Paul II are only building on the "personalism" that was already in Catholic dogma and practice. If you don't think so, take a look at the voluminous footnotes referring to traditional Church teaching on the human person in Vatican II's documents, stemming from the early Fathers through the Council of Trent. They are drenched in traditional teaching. Donovan even helps prove the case by citing St. Thomas' distinction between the "person" and the "nature." But wasn't it St. Thomas who highly influenced medieval theology and practice long before Vatican II came along? Moreover, we will find the same distinction between "person" and "nature" in the early Fathers. Were they not the ones who made those very distinctions in understanding the Trinity itself, and which they then permeated throughout Catholic life and teaching? Wasn't it St. Augustine who wrote the "Confessions" - one of the most personal books of all time - and was he not the principle influence of the early and medieval Church? Mr. Donovan's talk of "personalism" and "anthropology" has all been said before, by many people in many places. Consequently, his appeal to something new in Catholic teaching is merely an attempt to buttress the liberal interpretation of papal and conciliar teaching from Pius XI onward.

Mr. Donovan: With respect to marriage we find this precept, or personalist norm, present in St. Paul's discourse on marriage, "defer to one another out of reverence for Christ". A marriage in which both spouses are baptized is a sacrament of the union of Christ and His Bride the Church. The subordination of woman to man is a subordination of love, to receive the "sacrifice" (self-gift) of the man and to render a return of love. The hierarchy of life and love within marriage, as in the Trinity, and between Christ and the Church, is thus an order of surrender, of self-gift, and NOT power. The Father, Christ, the husband, is the active lover; the Son, the Church, the wife, is the receptive lover. A merely natural subordination, that of authority and power, is not enough for a Christian marriage. The emphasis should be on an ordered communion of persons, and thus on deference (where principle or sin is not at stake), on collegial decision-making (where urgency is not an issue) and thus on forming a communion of heart, mind and will. The authority of the husband should be service, love and reverence, not power. The model is the Cross. This is undoubtedly more difficult to live than the natural reality, which has reigned throughout human history. What the Trinity does effortlessly is for fallen human nature a struggle. However, the Church in our time is calling Christian couples to attempt to live this model of marital communion, rather than just the natural reality. I believe this theological developmental also greatly influenced the decision to drop the sign of subordination.

R. Sungenis: Again, notice what Mr. Donovan is trying to do. He is trying to make it sound as if the Church after St. Paul, and up until 1983, was clueless about what St. Paul taught on the true nature of authority. To Mr. Donovan, it wasn't until the Church decided to "drop the sign of subordination" that she truly began to understand what St. Paul was actually saying in these crucial areas. Even Vatican II might not escape Mr. Donovan's censure in this case, since it quotes heavily from the 1917 Code of Canon Law which contained the infamous Canon 1262 requiring women to wear head coverings. If Vatican II didn't "drop the sign of subordination" perhaps Mr. Donovan thinks the 1965 Church had a little more learning to do. According to Mr. Donovan's above paragraph, the Church has finally arrived at the truth as of 1983.

But not only is he wrong about that, he is also wrong in his interpretation of authority. Mr. Donovan is giving the typical "mommy" theology of many of today's liberals. Notice his definition of authority: "The authority of the husband should be service, love and reverence, not power." Both by the fact that Mr. Donovan makes no effort to correctly define the command a husband possesses as leader of his household, and by his use of the word "power" to fill in the gap, Mr Donovan is engaging in exegetical demagoguery, trying to make it appear as if husbands who take control of their wives and families are power-hungry bullies. Mr. Donovan has not only distorted the husband's authoritative role, but he has, to a large degree, reversed the roles of husband and wife. No wonder he doesn't think the Church of yesteryear had the truth. If the Church didn't teach that the husband's authority was merely "service, love and reverence," no wonder Mr. Donovan can't find it from the time of St. Paul until the Church made "the decision to drop the sign of subordination."

Fortunately for us, the Church of yesteryear, beginning with the early Fathers, used the biblical model of authority, which states quite plainly that the wife is to "submit" herself to her husband's authority (Col 3:18; Eph 5:22-33; Titus 2:5; 1 Cor 14:34-35; 1 Cor 11:3-5; 1 Tim 2:11-12; 1 Peter 5:1-5), which means that he is the leader of the family, the one who makes the final decisions, the one to whom all the members give reverence. St. Paul makes this distinction quite clear in Eph 5:33 when, after he tells the wife to be subject to her husband, he tells the husband to love his wife and for the wife to "reverence" her husband. She gives him reverence because he is in authority over her, and is responsible to God for her well-being and spiritual growth, as he is for his children. Mr. Donovan's version of a husband is one who has forgotten he is the leader of the house with the authority to make the tough calls, and is just there to service his wife's needs and reverence her while he is doing so. Unfortunately, this is precisely the problem with modern man today, and Mr. Donovan is just perpetuating this milquetoast image of manhood. You won't find a word about the wife's requirement to be subject to her husband's authority from Mr. Donovan's above paragraphs. That is because such teaching is frowned upon by today's liberal Catholics.

This is not just me saying so, this is part-and-parcel with our Catholic tradition. Look at these quotes from the Fathers and medievals, the very ones that Vatican II cites in its voluminous footnotes, regarding the roles of husbands and wives:

Ignatius: ...and one Church which the holy apostles established from one end of the earth to the other by the blood of Christ, and by their own sweat and toil; it behooves you also, therefore, as 'a peculiar people, and a holy nation,' to perform all things with harmony in Christ. Wives, be ye subject to your husbands in the fear of God; and ye virgins, to Christ in purity, not counting marriage an abomination, but desiring that which is better, not for the reproach of wedlock, but for the sake of meditating on the law" (To the Philadelphians, Ch 4).

Augustine: "For the man is the head of the woman in perfect order when Christ who is the Wisdom of God is the head of the man" (Against the Manichaeans 2, 12, 16)

"Nor can it be doubted, that it is more consonant with the order of nature that men should bear rule over women, than women over men. It is with this principle in view that the apostle says, 'The head of the woman is the man;' and, 'Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands.' So also the Apostle Peter writes: 'Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord'" (On Marriage and Concupiscence, Bk 1, Ch 10).

"For the name of Christ is on the lips of every man: it is invoked by the just man in doing justice, by the perjurer in the act of deceiving, by the king to confirm his rule, by the soldier to nerve himself for battle, by the husband to establish his authority, by the wife to confess her submission, by the father to enforce his command, by the son to declare his obedience, by the master in supporting his right to govern, by the slave in performing his duty..." (Letters, CCXXXII)

"Nor can it be doubted that it is more consonant with the order of nature that men should bear rule over women than women over men. It is with this principle in view that the apostle says, 'The head of the woman is the man' [1 Cor 11:3]; and 'Wives submit yourselves to your own husbands.'" (On Marriage and Concupiscence 1, 9, 10, NPNF1 5:267).

Clement of Alexandria: "The ruling power is therefore the head. And if 'the Lord is head of the man, and the man is head of the woman,' the man, 'being the image and glory of God, is lord of the woman.' Wherefore also in the Epistle to the Ephesians it is written, 'Subjecting, ourselves one to another in the fear of God. Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is the head of the Church; and He is the Savior of the body. Husbands, love your wives, as also Christ loved the Church. So also ought men to love their wives as their own bodies: he that loves his wife loves himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh.' And in that to the Colossians it is said, 'Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands, as is fit in the Lord'" (Stromata, Bk 4, Ch 8).

Chrysostom: "Wives be subject to your husbands" he writes to wives: "That is, be subject for God's sake, because this adorns you, Paul says, not them. For I mean not that subjection which is due to a master nor yet that alone which is of nature but that offered for God's sake" (Homilies on Colossians, NPNF1 12:304).

Observe again that Paul has exhorted husbands and wives to reciprocity...To love therefore, is the husband's part, to yield pertains to the other side. If, then, each one contributes his own part, all stand firm. From being loved, the wife too becomes loving; and from her being submissive, the husband learns to yield." (Homilies on Colossians, NPNF1 13:304).

"'Subjecting yourselves one to another,' he says, 'in the fear of Christ.' For if thou submit thyself for a ruler's sake, or for money's sake, or from respectfulness, much more from the fear of Christ...rather it were better that both masters and slaves be servants to one another...Thus does God will it to be, for he washed his disciples' feet" (Homilies on Ephesians, Homily XIX, NPNF1, 142).

"Then after saying, 'The husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is of the Church,' he further adds, 'and He is the Saviour of the body.' For indeed the head is the saving health of the body. He had already laid down beforehand for man and wife, the ground and provision of their love, assigning to each their proper place, to the one that of authority and forethought, to the other that of submission. As then 'the Church,' that is, both husbands and wives, 'is subject unto Christ, so also ye wives submit yourselves to your husbands, as unto God.' For she is the body, not to dictate to the head, but to submit herself and obey." (Homilies on Ephesians 5:22).

"Wherefore, saith he, 'Wives, be in subjection unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.'...For if it is their duty to be in subjection 'as unto the Lord,' how saith He that they must depart from them for the Lord's sake? Yet their duty indeed it is, their bounded duty...For he who resists these external authorities, those of governments, I mean, 'withstandeth the ordinance of God (Rom 13:2), much more does she who submits not to her husband. Such was God's will from the beginning." (Homilies on Ephesians, NPNF1, 143-144).

Ambrosiaster: As the church takes its beginning from Christ and therefore is subject to him, so too does woman take hers from the man and is subject to him." (CSEL 81.3:117-118).

Epiphanius: "And the apostolic word has also escaped their notice: 'I do not permit a woman to teach in such a way as to exercise authority over men. She is to preserve the virtue of quietness.' And again, 'For man is not from the woman, but woman from man.'" (Panarion, 49, 3).

Serverian: Since man did not make woman, the question here does not concern the origin of woman. Rather it concerns only submission. (Pauline Commentary from the Greek Church, 15:260).

"For just as God has nobody over him in all creation, so man has no one over him in the natural world. But a woman does - she has man over her" (Pauline Commentary, 15:261).

Theodoret: "Paul is particularly concerned here with believing women who are married to unbelieving men: thus, their subjection is in service to the Lord, that is, as the Lord commands." (Interpretation of the Letter to the Colossians PG 82:621A).

"Man has the first place because of the order of creation" (Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, 234).

Tertullian: "Do you go forth (to meet them) already arrayed in the cosmetics and ornaments of prophets and apostles; drawing your whiteness from simplicity, your ruddy hue from modesty; painting your eyes with bashfulness, and your mouth with silence; implanting in your ears the words of God; fitting on your necks the yoke of Christ. Submit your head to your husbands, and you will be enough adorned" (On the Apparel of Women, Ch XIII).

"Now, when I find to what God belong these precepts, whether in their germ or their development, I have no difficulty in knowing to whom the apostle also belongs. But he declares that 'wives ought to be in subjection to their husbands:' what reason does he give for this? 'Because,' says he, 'the husband is the head of the wife.' Pray tell me, Marcion, does your god build up the authority of his law on the work of the Creator? This, however, is a comparative trifle; for he actually derives from the same source the condition of his Christ and his Church; for he says: 'even as Christ is the head of the Church;' and again, in like manner: 'He who loves his wife, loves his own flesh, even as Christ loved the Church" (Tertullian Against Marcion, Ch XVIII).

Origen: "First, if our prophetesses have spoken, show us the signs of prophecy in them. Second, even if the daughters of Philip did prophesy [Acts 21:8-9], they did not do so inside the church. Likewise in the Old Testament, although Deborah was reputed to be a prophetess [Judges 4:4], there is no indication that she ever corporately addressed the people in the way that Isaiah or Jeremiah did. The same is true of Huldah [2 Kings 22:14]." (Commentary on 1 Corinthians 4, 74, 6-16).

Thomas Aquinas: "For though the wife be her husband's equal in the marriage act, yet in matters of housekeeping, the head of the woman is the man, as the Apostle says (1 Corinthians 11:3)." (Summa Theologica, Treatise on the Theological Virtues, Question 32, Article 8).

For the higher reason which is assigned to contemplation is compared to the lower reason which is assigned to action, and the husband is compared to his wife, who should be ruled by her husband, as Augustine says (De Trinitate xii,3,7,12). (Summa Theologica, Treatise on Gratuitous Grace, Question 128, Article 4).

"The Apostle says (1 Corinthians 14:34): 'Let women keep silence in the churches,' and (1 Timothy 2:12): 'I suffer not a woman to teach.' Now this pertains especially to the grace of the word. Therefore the grace of the word is not becoming to women. I answer that, Speech may be employed in two ways: in one way privately, to one or a few, in familiar conversation, and in this respect the grace of the word may be becoming to women; in another way, publicly, addressing oneself to the whole church, and this is not permitted to women. First and chiefly, on account of the condition attaching to the female sex, whereby woman should be subject to man, as appears from Genesis 3:16" (Summa Theologica, Question 177, Article 2).

Pope Pius XI: "Domestic society being confirmed, therefore, by this bond of love, there should flourish in it that "order of love," as St. Augustine calls it. This order includes both the primacy of the husband with regard to the wife and children, the ready subjection of the wife and her willing obedience, which the Apostle commands in these words: "Let women be subject to their husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the Church."" (Casti Connubii, 30).

"For if the man is the head, the woman is the heart, and as he occupies the chief place in ruling, so she may and ought to claim for herself the chief place in love....Again, this subjection of wife to husband in its degree and manner may vary according to the different condition of persons, place and time. In fact, if the husband neglect his duty, it falls to the wife to take his place in directing the family. But the structure of the family and its fundamental law, established and confirmed by God, must always and everywhere be maintained intact." (Ibid).

Pope Leo XIII: "With great wisdom Our Predecessor Leo XIII, of happy memory, in the Encyclical on "Christian Marriage" which We have already mentioned, speaking of this order to be maintained between man and wife, teaches: "The man is the ruler of the family, and the head of the woman; but because she is flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone, let her be subject and obedient to the man, not as a servant but as a companion, so that nothing be lacking of honor or of dignity in the obedience which she pays. Let divine charity be the constant guide of their mutual relations, both in him who rules and in her who obeys, since each bears the image, the one of Christ, the other of the Church.""

While we are on the subject of the wife's submission to her husband, let's look at what the Fathers had to say about head coverings. Of the half-dozen or so Fathers that wrote on the subject, they are unanimous that head coverings should be worn out of the moral obligation of having a sign of authority upon her.

Pope Linus: Elected in 67 A.D. as the second Pope of the Catholic Church, he died in 76 A.D. and is buried near the tomb of St. Peter. The Liber Pontificalis states that "Pope Linus forbade women to enter a church with uncovered heads."

Clement of Alexandria: "For this is the wish of the Word, since it is becoming for her to pray veiled. They say that the wife of Aeneas, through excess of propriety, did not, even in her terror at the capture of Troy, uncover herself; but, though fleeing from the conflagration, remained veiled."(The Instructor, Book III, Ch. XI)

Augustine: "It is not as though one part of humanity belongs to God as its author and another to darkness, as some claim. Rather the part that has the power of ruling and the part that is ruled are both from God. Thus the apostle says, 'A man certainly should not cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God, but a woman is the glory of man" (Against the Manichaeans, 2, 26, 40)

"We ought not therefore so to understand that man is made in the image of the supreme Trinity, that is, in the image of God, as that the same image should be understood to be in three human beings; especially when the apostle says that the man is the image of God, and on that account removes the covering from his head, which he warns the woman to use, speaking thus: " For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God; but the woman is the glory of the man." What then shall we say to this? If the woman fills up the image of the trinity after the measure of her own person, why is the man still called that image after she has been taken out of his side? Or if even one person of a human being out of three can be called the image of God, as each person also is God in the supreme Trinity itself, why is the woman also not the image of God? For she is instructed for this very reason to cover her head, which be is forbidden to do because he is the image of God....

"But because too great a progression towards inferior things is dangerous to that rational cognition that is conversant with things corporeal and temporal; this ought to have power on its head, which the covering indicates, by which it is signified that it ought to be restrained. For a holy and pious meaning is pleasing to the holy angels. For God sees not after the way of time, neither does anything new take place in His vision and knowledge, when anything is done in time and transitorily, after the way in which such things affect the senses, whether the carnal senses of animals and men, or even the heavenly senses of the angels" (On the Trinity, Bk XII, Ch 7).

Ambrosiaster: "The veil signifies power, and the angels are bishops" (Commentary on Paul's Epistles, CSEL 81:122).

"This was the church's tradition, but since the Corinthians were ignoring it, Paul made his appeal to nature." (Ibid., CSEL 81:124).

Ambrose: [On 1 Cor 11:14-16]: One act is becoming to a man, another to a woman...How unsightly it is for a man to act like a woman!" (Letter to Layman, 78; FC 26:436).

Chrysostom: "Being covered is a mark of subjection and authority. It induces the woman to be humble and preserve her virtue, for the virtue and honor of the governed is to dwell in obedience" (Homilies on First Corinthians, 26, 5, NPNF 1, 12, 153).

"For this cause He left it to nature to provide her with a covering, that even of it she might learn this lesson and veil herself." (Homilies on First Corinthians, Homily XIV, verse 6).

"A woman does not acquire a man's dignity by having her head uncovered but rather loses her own. Her shame and reproach thus derive from her desire to be like a man as well as from her actions" (Homilies on First Corinthians, 25, 4).

"No governor should come before the king without the symbols of his office. Such a person would never dare to approach the royal throne without his military girdle and cloak, and in the same way, a man who approaches the throne of God should wear the symbols of his office, which in this case is represented by having one's head uncovered" (Homilies on First Corinthians 26, 4).

[On 1 Cor 11:14-16] "To oppose this teaching is contentiousness, which is irrational. The Corinthians might object, but if they do so, they are going against the practice of the universal church." (Homilies on First Corinthians, 26, 5).

Jerome: "It is usual in the monasteries of Egypt and Syria for virgins and widows who have vowed themselves to God and have renounced the world and have trodden under foot its pleasures, to ask the mothers of their communities to cut their hair; not that afterwards they go about with heads uncovered in defiance of the apostles command" (Letter CXLVII:5, NPNF: VI, 292).

Tertullian: "To her, then, to whom it is equally unbecoming to be shaven or shorn, it is equally becoming to be covered." (Veiling of Virgins, Chap VII)

"Behold two diverse names, Man and Woman 'every one' in each case: two laws, mutually distinctive; on the one hand (a law) of veiling, on the other (a law) of baring." (On The Veiling Of Virgins).

"What is the meaning of the expression 'every woman' except women of every age, every rank and every circumstance? No one is excepted." (On Prayer, 22, 4, on 1 Cor 11:5)

"It is on account of the angels, he says, that the woman's head is to be covered, because the angels revolted from God on account of the daughters of men" (On Prayer, 22, 5).

"Thus he says concerning the veiling of women: 'Does not nature teach you this?' Again, in saying in his letter to the Romans that the Gentiles do by nature what the law prescribes, he hints at the existence of natural law and a nature founded on law" (The Chaplet 6, 1, FC 40:242).

Mr. Donovan: Personal Piety: While it is absolutely clear that there is no canonical or moral obligation for women to wear a head-covering in Church, women are certainly free to do so as a matter of personal devotion. They should, however, see it as a sign of subordination to God, as that better suits the liturgical context. Those who wear a covering or veil, and those who don't, should not judge the motives of the other, but leave each woman free in a matter that is clearly not of obligation. Answered by Colin B. Donovan, STL

R. Sungenis: As we have seen, it is not the case that "it is absolutely clear that there is no canonical or moral obligation for women to wear a head-covering in Church." Second, Mr. Donovan seems to want to rewrite Scripture and revise Tradition, for neither of them teach that head coverings are: (1) for "personal devotion," and (2) are only a sign of subordination to God. Scripture and Tradition are very clear that a head covering is a sign that the woman is under the authority of the man - a principle of Scripture and a teaching of the Church that Mr. Donovan has done his best to avoid in his entire answer. According to Mr. Donovan, it is the "liturgical context" (whatever that means) which is the criterion by which we judge such matters. I think what Mr. Donovan is really trying to say is the same thing the liberals have been trying to tell us for the last 40 years - that they want things changed from the way they are presently.

Robert A. Sungenis, M. A.
Catholic Apologetics International
April 22, 2004

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