Suzanne Mulligan

This article explores the connection between virtue, social sin, and sexual violence against women. In the Catholic theological tradition, considerable time has been given to questions of sexual morality but often with disproportionate focus on the sexual act. Ethicists today are helping advance sexual discourse by examining how socio-economic and cultural contexts affect sexual agency, by analyzing more fully the quality of the relationships and by acknowledging how sexual choice occurs within the larger framework of the person’s life journey. For this reason, virtue ethics acts as a valuable interlocutor with sexual ethics.

The article is divided into five sections. The first section outlines some of the factors contributing to gender-based violence globally; section two considers how social narrative and virtue are connected and how negative social narrative can contribute to violence against women. Section three examines the idea of social sin, while in section four I argue that the virtue of resistance plays a pivotal role in changing unjust sexual practices. Finally, I outline some of the implications for Catholic sexual ethics today.

1.  Violence against women

On 12 January 2022, Ashling Murphy went for a run along the Grand Canal near Tullamore, Co. Offaly. She was twenty-three years of age and was beginning her career as a primary school teacher. She went jogging in the afternoon, in an area normally populated by walkers, runners, and dog- lovers. At 4pm Ashling was murdered.

Her violent killing sparked outrage across Ireland. Tens of thousands of people held vigils in the days following. Her death gained international media coverage, and as disbelief turned to anger, people marched in the streets of both Ireland and England to protest against rising levels of gender- based violence.

Vigils and protests are valuable ways of expressing solidarity and can act as a mechanism for personal and/or national catharsis. But long after protests have ceased and the vigil candles burn out, violence towards women remains a systemic problem in Ireland. A report by Women’s Aid in 2020 stated that one in five young women in Ireland have been subjected to intimate relationship abuse, and that 51% of young women affected had experienced this abuse before the age of eighteen years.² Most of these women also experienced emotional abuse. Statistics on global rates of femicide reveal an even more disturbing fact: approximately 137 women are murdered every day by someone in their family. This equates to over 50,000 women dying at the hands of a family member each year. And in Ireland since 1996, 265 women have died in violent circumstances. Of these, 63% were killed in their own homes, 55% were killed by a partner or ex-partner, and almost nine in ten women knew their killer.³

The violence visited upon Ashling Murphy is not peculiar to Ireland, of course. Women across the world face danger, discrimination, and death every day. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines violence against women as: ‘any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual, or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.’⁴ In addition, ‘intimate partner violence’ is defined as violence by an intimate partner or ex-partner that results in psychological, sexual and/or physical harm. This includes all forms of physical aggression, sexual coercion, and various types of controlling behaviour.⁵ ‘Sexual violence’ refers to ‘any sexual act, attempt to obtain a sexual act, or other act directed against a person’s sexuality using coercion, by any person regardless of their relationship to the victim, in any setting. It includes rape … attempted rape, unwanted sexual touching and other non- contact forms.’⁶

WHO data indicates that between 2000 and 2018, and across 161 countries, almost one in three (30%) women were subjected to physical and/ or sexual violence by an intimate or non-intimate partner, or both. More than a quarter of women and girls aged between fifteen and forty-nine have endured physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner on at least one occasion in their life.⁷ This violence is often extreme; approximately 38% of all murders of women globally are committed by an intimate partner.⁸ Gender-based violence⁹ is the result of a myriad of factors, including low levels of education, a history of family violence, substance abuse, and attitudes that condone violence more generally. Furthermore, women’s lack of economic independence, including lack of access to paid employment, heightens their sexual vulnerability. Moreover, gender-based violence remains a largely invisible and unspoken reality in most communities.¹⁰ Cultural and religious norms that reinforce harmful gender stereotypes exacerbate the situation. In some cultures, for example, deeply engrained notions of family honour or sexual purity are used to justify violence against women. Attitudes that promote a sense of male sexual entitlement, as well as inadequate legal penalties for sexual violence, serve only to worsen the problem.¹¹

The health consequences for women and girls are devastating. Unintended pregnancies, serious gynaecological injury, and infection with sexually transmitted infections (STIs) are commonplace in the aftermath of violent sexual encounters. Moreover, physical violence during pregnancy increases the chance of miscarriage, stillbirth, or pre-term delivery. Unsurprisingly, sexual violence often leads to depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, sleep difficulties, eating disorders, and suicide attempts among women and girls.¹²

Sexual violence is one reason why we see an imbalance in the occurrence of disease, especially STIs, within populations. For example, in 2021, 54% of all people living with HIV were women and girls. And this point is reinforced when one considers that, on average, 4900 young women aged between fifteen and twenty-four years became infected with HIV every week. In sub-Saharan Africa, six in seven new HIV infections among people aged fifteen to nineteen years are among girls. And females aged between fifteen to twenty-four years are twice as likely to be HIV positive than men in the same age category. Moreover, women and girls accounted for 63% of all new HIV infections in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2021.¹³

Women’s lack of economic, cultural, and social equality places them at risk of sexual exploitation. Women rarely enjoy economic parity with men: it is not uncommon for women to work in lower paid jobs, often working longer days and with fewer legal protections; and they perform most of the unpaid care-work.¹⁴ Women have fewer political rights and are more likely to be dependent on a male relative or spouse for financial security. In many cases, women have little say over their sexual and reproductive future and are regularly unable to negotiate safe sex with a partner or spouse. Thus, violence and power imbalances in relationships are one reason for higher STI infection in females, especially poorer women.

In addition, child marriage continues to plague our world. Approximately twelve million girls are forced into marriage before the age of eighteen every year. And we know that the home is often the most dangerous place for women and girls. The United Nations reports that 13% of females between the ages of fifteen and forty-nine have experienced intimate partner violence in the preceding twelve months, and that one in three women will experience physical and/or sexual violence at least once in their lifetime. Approximately 47,000 women died in 2020 at the hands of a partner or family member. Poverty, coupled with a lack of social and cultural empowerment, is forcing women to remain in abusive and dangerous relationships.¹⁵ It is important to acknowledge that misogyny and sexism are drivers of gender-based violence too. Where women’s disempowerment and toxic masculinity combine, the physical and sexual abuse of women and girls is more prevalent. And although the topic is beyond the scope of this chapter, we know that women and girls face additional personal burdens due to climate change. This may heighten their socio-political and economic vulnerability, and result resulting in their forced displacement and exposure to the risks of human trafficking.¹⁶

2.  Social narrative and virtue

If we wish to tackle gender-based violence we must consider how social narrative affects our understanding of personhood and human dignity. Profound societal change needs to happen, including a thorough re- examination of prevailing social narratives and the value system that underpins them. Anne Patrick observes that:

Narrative plays a key educational role by communicating and reinforcing the values and virtues esteemed by a culture. Moreover, narrative also serves to criticize views of value and virtue once their favored status in a society is seen as ambiguous. The critical role of narrative, in fact, is an important part of the dynamics of change where value and virtue are concerned.¹⁷

For Aristotle, virtue was a trait of character that is good for the person to possess. However, who decides which traits of character are important needs close, and constant, scrutiny. Our ability to grow in virtue is influenced by our social groups and by the narratives that sustain them. These narratives can either nourish us or can cause moral blindness within us.¹⁸ Patrick contends that the Catholic narrative has contributed to the marginalization of women because of the patriarchal paradigm that has dominated the Roman Catholic tradition. This has contributed to patterns of thinking and acting that are characterized by misogyny. ‘This paradigm … articulates many ideals of character, but tends to assume that these are appropriately assigned greater emphasis according to one’s gender and social status’, she writes.¹⁹

By contrast, Patrick calls for an ‘egalitarian paradigm’ which recognizes the radical equality between the sexes. Control is replaced with respect for all human beings. It is a paradigm that values the body and the humanity of women. It accommodates the knowledge that sexuality and social justice are connected, and that sexuality is not just a matter of personal virtue. It therefore must include a commitment to the well-being of oneself and others, as well as commitment to establishing social relations based on mutuality, respect, and equality.²⁰ Moreover, Patrick believes that an egalitarian paradigm takes account of the impact of long-established power imbalances within relationships, which can harm the dignity and agency of women in particular.²¹

To help illustrate how narrative sometimes weakens our ability to see the moral parameters of a situation, Patrick recounts the murder of a Catholic nun, Marie Clementine Anwarite, by soldiers during Zaire’s civil war. Sr Marie chose to be killed rather than surrender her virginity to her aggressors. In putting forward the case for her canonization, Pope John Paul II praised the ‘primordial value accorded to virginity’, leaving one to ask why virginity would be considered a more important value than a woman’s life?

There are other disturbing features of this story. For example, John Paul did not appear to adequately appreciate the danger in which Sr Marie found herself. As we saw above, sexual violence is visited upon women daily, and yet we find no appreciation of this in John Paul’s response. Sr Marie’s murder was an opportunity for a pope to raise awareness of gender- based violence and to stand firmly in solidarity with women in dangerous situations, but instead, it seemed, the priority was to reinforce ‘traditional feminine virtues’ like obedience, docility, and submissiveness.²² The apparent lack of understanding of how these virtues place women at risk of sexual violence was a serious error on the part of John Paul. Furthermore, John Paul II forgave the man who committed the murder. This aspect of the case demonstrates once more how narrative can distort our moral sensibilities, especially where values like sexual purity and virginity seem to outweigh the personal security of women. Patrick writes: ‘What women in patriarchal society need are not exhortations to humility and self-sacrifice, or stories of saints who preferred death to rape. Women need instead new models for virtue and new stories that communicate them … [What are needed] are new narratives that go beyond criticism and theory to provide models that demonstrate – with a power scholarly prose can never attain – the goodness and beauty of lives governed by the egalitarian paradigm for virtue’.²³ Thus, deeper appreciation of the impact of narrative, social expectation, and cultural norms on our sexual mores would enrich magisterial teaching on sexuality. A critical aspect of this would be to listen to the voices and experiences of women.

3.  Sexual violence as social sin

Social narrative and social sin are often intimately connected. Narratives legitimize our sense of self, they give meaning to our lives, and they shape our view of the world. But, of course, some narratives are destructive of human dignity. ‘Structures of violence’²⁴, or what we call ‘structural’ or ‘social sin’ in theological parlance, increase the risk of disease and premature death among the poor, contribute to the sexual exploitation of women and girls, and legitimize gender norms that do harm to women. These ‘structures of violence’ are both constructed and maintained by humans, and as Paul Farmer provocatively put it, these structures need their apologists.²⁵

In Towards a Politics of Communion Anna Rowlands provides a robust account of structural sin, drawing on liberation theology, the work of John Paul II, and the teachings of Pope Francis.²⁶ Structural sin is more than simply the social structures, policies, and laws that oppress people; it refers also to a pervasive culture that supports formal expressions of injustice, exclusion, and intolerance. It refers to the creation of a culture, a way of seeing and living that legitimizes the oppression of others. Speaking about the plight of migrants, Rowlands argues that if we are to correct our moral failure, we must first come to recognize what she calls our moral ‘disorientation.’ In other words, we must acquire the ability to first acknowledge our moral blindness before we can dismantle sinful structures.²⁷ Moral conversion is the companion of moral growth.

Rowlands highlights several omissions in the way the magisterium deals with social sin, including the sins of racism and child abuse. As she says, ‘To speak of human dignity held within the framework of doctrines of sin and salvation and not to address this issue in its social and structural dimensions seems incredible. The abuse crisis is manifestly an example of social sin turned inwards, and we live as yet with an absence of a fully adequate language to address this reality.’²⁸ In addition, I would argue that a pervasive culture of misogyny and sexism in the Church has yet to be fully recognized. We know that social sin depends on cultures and ideologies that excuse, or even encourage, injustice towards others. And a culture of misogyny, which militates against the dignity of women, must be clearly rejected.

Others like Heyer, Finn, and Massingale are also developing the theology of social sin. Although her work is primarily focused on the migrant crisis, Kristin Heyer’s insights on social sin are very helpful to discussions concerning sexual mores. For Heyer, Catholic theology recognizes the manner in which harmful structural relationships prevent good decision- making, and how they contribute to corrupt value systems. Ideologies such as racism, sexism, and xenophobia contribute to both individual and collective moral blindness. For Daniel Finn, ‘social structures emerge from the activity of individuals, yet have independent casual impact on people through the way structures affect the (free but constrained choices) persons make’.²⁹ Thus, when bias and prejudice distort our sense of what is right, it becomes more difficult to make truly moral choices. Social sin can encourage individuals to act badly, in turn inhibiting one’s ability to recognize the dignity of others or to enter into the chaos of their lives. Bryan Massingale writes extensively on the ways in which pervasive cultures of sin destroy our sense of justice and our ability to pursue it, with particular focus on the sin of racism.

For this reason, Kate Ward speaks of the fragility of virtue.³⁰ Human beings by their nature are fragile; we are changeable creatures, journeying towards greater self-understanding. This self-understanding may be flawed or incomplete and is susceptible to external patterns of thinking that can distort our perception of the world. If we are to grow in virtue, we require personal maturity and self-awareness, as well as social contexts that enable authentic human flourishing. Others such as Karen Peterson-Iyer have argued that safe, supportive environments are critical for the development of emotional integrity, something that in turn is essential for sexual self-care.

If we accept that social and cultural norms deeply shape our sense of what is right, how then can virtue ethics generally, and the virtue of resistance more specifically, help us confront social injustices including gender-based violence? I turn to these questions now.

4.  The virtue of resistance

Sexual violence in all its forms is an expression of social sin as well as individual sin, for its acceptance may be built into the ethos of a community, or failure to address its causes may be the result of inadequate education and poor legislative protections for women. But these problems, although perhaps deeply embedded in society, can be resisted. And understood in this way, resistance can be seen as a virtue.

Within the Catholic tradition since the Council of Tent, moral theology has been shaped by the approach, tone, and legalistic focus of the Manuals. These textbooks dealt with normative morality, concentrating on moral actions as if they were disparate things. However, since the renewal in moral theology, and in particular since the Second Vatican Council, we see a return to a more person-centered and relational approach to theological ethics. And the re-emergence of virtue ethics has played a significant role in how we understand morality and its claims on the person.

Ethicists such as James Keenan have been at the forefront of these developments. He has argued that virtue ethics directs us to fundamental questions about the human journey.³¹ Virtue ethics focuses on the cultivation and practice of virtue – those traits of character that are considered good for a person to have and which enable people to make good decisions consistently. The formation of moral character is a key concern here. And so, virtue ethics starts with the question, ‘Who should I become?’ rather than, ‘What should I do?’ To put it another way, it is concerned more with an ethic of being than with an ethic of doing.

Keenan proposes three related questions that capture the starting point of virtue ethics: Who are we? Who ought we become? How are we to get there?³² This provides a helpful entry into our discussion about sexual relationships and the values that underpin them, since virtue ethics directs us towards self-examination, personal growth, and a critique of our relationships. Given its person-orientated starting point, virtue ethics invites us to see ourselves as we are and to recognize the potential for who we can become. For Keenan, ‘virtue ethics encompasses our entire lives. It sees every moment as the possibility for acquiring or developing a virtue.’³³ Or as Daniel Daly explains, moral actions ought to be judged by how they respect human dignity and enhance human relationships.³⁴ Helpfully, Keenan proposes a set of cardinal virtues that he believes enables us to dialogue cross-culturally about the quality of human relationships. They are: justice, fidelity, self- care, and prudence.³⁵ Space does not permit a thorough examination of each of these virtues; instead I will concentrate on the virtue of resistance and its importance for sexual self-care and responsibility.

The virtue of resistance

Prudence, or practical wisdom, is the virtue by which we can discern what the just thing is at any given moment. It also helps us discern what self- care looks like and how best to achieve it.³⁶ Resisting damaging social narratives is a vital step towards sexual self-care. Anne Patrick explains that the achievement of self-care might at times require the strategic withdrawal from institutional or organizational bodies that are experienced as harmful, although she notes that permanent separation is not necessarily always the desired or best goal.³⁷ She speaks of how the virtue of courage is crucial to an ethic of ‘creative responsibility’: ‘Creative responsibility is distinguished by a willingness to think deeply and originally about the situations that confront us, and to take appropriate risks for the sake of promoting good and minimizing evil.’³⁸ Courage is accompanied by God’s mercy, as well as the virtue of humility, and plays an essential part in the resistance of injustice.

Since the virtue of resistance is born out of injustice it is not without risk. For this reason, Daniel Daly talks about ‘burdened virtues’, namely, traits of character that are considered positive in certain circumstances but which can simultaneously be bad for the person to bear. Burdened virtues impact negatively on the individual’s well-being and can come at a high personal cost. They are virtues that in a better world we could not have to display. Oppositional anger to injustice is an example of a burdened virtue.³⁹ This is not dissimilar to what Bryan Massingale calls ‘conflictual solidarity’. Massingale uses this term to show how solidarity with the oppressed may bring with it difficulty and sacrifice.⁴⁰ Similarly, Mauricio Alarcón Burbano examines how the virtue of fortitude emerges within migrant communities struggling to survive.⁴¹

Despite these theological developments, Daly insists that virtue ethics has largely ignored the experiences of those most oppressed, those on the underside of history, those who most often bear the weight of burdened virtues. Virtue ethics needs to ‘draw on more robust accounts of what constitutes a social structure if virtue ethics is to be relevant to all Christians, not only those who enjoy social privilege’.⁴² Sarah MacDonald and Nicole Symmonds make a similar point.⁴³ They cite the work of Nancy Snow who claims that Western approaches to virtue have contributed to the oppression of women. This is largely due to an emphasis on gender difference, which has reduced women’s moral agency in many situations. This is not to suggest that virtue theory is oppressive per se, but rather that its presentation and approach has often contributed to women’s oppression.⁴⁴

It is precisely here that the virtue of resistance becomes important. Can it help dismantle destructive narratives and foster instead better understandings of personhood, sexuality, and relationship? Can it be part of broader efforts to create contexts of sexual self-care, agency, and responsibility? Kochurani Abraham explores what a virtue of resistance might look like in her discussion of violence against women in India. In a culture where modesty and submission in women is glorified, people are nevertheless daring to resist norms that threaten their dignity. ‘Thanks to the political underpinnings of the feminist movement, women are finding ways and means to give vent to their anger at whatever is distorting their human dignity.’⁴⁵ The situation in India is exacerbated by cultural norms that prioritize ‘feminine virtues’ such as submission, self-sacrifice, and passivity, while social narratives reinforce the notion that preservation of the family is primarily a woman’s responsibility. These stereotypes heighten female vulnerability since they make women feel less able to speak out for fear of familial breakup. The cost of this to women is seen in many ways; for some, it is utter helplessness in the face of violence, for others it is an increasing vulnerability to violence within the ‘feminine space’ of the home.⁴⁶

But through the virtue of resistance, women can reclaim their agency, their subjectivity, and their sense of self, Abraham argues. It is through the virtue of resistance that power relations are critiqued and even dismantled. Abraham believes that in order to challenge sinful attitudes and structures we must first develop ‘a critical consciousness’. Forming this critical consciousness would help women see that oppression is not final, that resistance offers hope, and that current injustices can be overcome. I would argue that this critical consciousness needs to be cultivated by Church leadership also, and that the Magisterium’s teaching on the family ought to more clearly take account of the profound injustices endured by women and girls. Narratives of domination need to be unmasked and rejected. As mentioned above, women’s voices must be heard and their experiences taken seriously if we are to enrich our understanding of how best to live in right relationship with each other.

Julie Hanlon Rubio explores the idea of resistance by connecting it to the empowerment of vulnerable groups, particularly to women of color in the US.⁴⁷ Of course, we normally do not encourage cooperation in wrongdoing. But in some cases, Rubio notes, cooperation may be the only way for a woman to survive. In other instances women may opt to resist injustice. For Rubio, ‘The womanist commitment to resistance is grounded in a profoundly social anthropology that differs from manualist theology … There is a strong sense of duty to act, not to avoid culpability, but to avoid cooperating with the social structures that harm vulnerable persons whose connections to me are undeniable.’⁴⁸ Resisting unjust norms can be both difficult and dangerous. So, at times cooperation may be the prudent course of action. But the virtue of resistance remains a critical tool for social change, especially for those most affected by injustice. It requires the courage to defy established systems of oppression and challenge patterns of domination and control. And although this brings with it enormous risk, we see women resisting deep-rooted injustice in creative, sustained ways across the world.

Women oppressors

It must be said that women at times contribute to the very structures that are oppressive to themselves and others. Fear of violence can lead women to remain silent in the face of injustice. Or women might internalize ‘feminine virtues’ such as obedience and submission, which further adds to a culture of silence. And it is the case that some women take advantage of others for profit. One need only think of the women who collude in the trafficking and sex industries for their own material gain.

Shawnee M. Daniels Sykes examines how women and girls at times contribute to their own oppression.⁴⁹ She explains that for women living in patriarchal contexts, contexts that oppress and objectify them, a cycle of oppression is generated; women are oppressed and through this oppression become the oppressor of other women.⁵⁰ Hopelessness, despair, powerlessness, poverty, and marginalization contribute to circumstances in which women either remain silent in the face of oppression or participate in the sinful structures that cause their oppression.⁵¹ To illustrate the point, Sykes mentions how women are often involved in the organization of human trafficking, in facilitating female genital mutilation, and in the bullying of other women. ‘In order to transform this cycle of oppressor–internalized oppression, the persons involved must understand that a glimpse of the living God requires a profound rebirth.’⁵²

Sykes draws on the work of Paulo Freire and Elizabeth A. Johnson, noting that, for Johnson, acquiring the dispositions and traits that will halt the oppressor–internalized oppression cycle is vital. Again, we can see how the virtue of resistance is important here. Similarly, Freire tells us that we must ‘unlearn’ and dismantle the cycle of oppressor–internalized oppression if we are to build relationships of mutuality, respect, and love. Redemption of the oppressor is as important as freeing the oppressed, and for Sykes this includes the conversion of female oppressors.⁵³

Thus, a two-fold challenge exists. First, there is the moral responsibility to resist unjust social structures to help create more just communities. It is critical for individuals and groups to cultivate a ‘critical consciousness’ as Abraham puts it, since it is through this critical awareness that we can critique the values and practices of our culture. Furthermore, a critical consciousness empowers oppressed groups to see that injustice can be transformed and overcome. The virtue of resistance helps contest unjust power relations, and so for Abraham this virtue becomes an integral part of any ‘ethic for change’.⁵⁴

But, secondly, we see that there is an internal, personal, dimension to social resistance also. We are each called to moral conversion. Resisting social sin requires inner transformation; it requires a new way of seeing and interacting. Paul Wadell describes injustice as a failure of moral imagination and our efforts to reimagine a more just world will inevitably require a radical and unsettling change in attitude on our part.⁵⁵ This is especially crucial where the oppression of women is the consequence of women oppressors. Virtue ethics, with its attention on moral growth, the formation of character, and personal conversion has a vital contribution to make here.

The virtue of resistance is a crucial step towards sexual self-care, but resisting unjust sexual norms can be difficult. Prudence helps determine if, and when, resistance is called for. We each bear a responsibility to create more just communities, conducive to the flourishing of all peoples. Justice is rarely gifted. The virtue of resistance, accompanied by courage and prudence, plays a key role in positive social transformation. But as Sykes, Wadell and others recognize, the achievement of sexual well-being and the establishment of just sexual relationships depends on profound personal conversion as much as reform of social structures.

5.  Implications for sexual ethics

What, then, are the implications for Church teaching on sexuality, and how is theological ethics responding to the realities outlined in this chapter? I argue that Church leadership needs to address gender-based violence more forcefully and provide a robust condemnation of practices and norms that harm the well-being of women and girls. Furthermore, the dangers faced by women within the family poses challenges for Church teaching on the sanctity of marriage. Does Catholic teaching offer any hope to women in abusive relationships, or to women and girls who are forced into (often early) marriage?

The danger of harmful gender-stereotypes

Of concern here is the way official teaching relies on gender stereotypes that, as we have seen above, can in fact endanger the health and security of women and girls. For example, an emphasis on caregiving as a feminine quality might present problems for women, especially if caregiving is not a free choice but rather an imposed social expectation. In many contexts, caregiving is seen almost exclusively as a feminine virtue, and as a result can be used to widen the gender divide and reduce women’s freedoms outside the home.

For some, Pope Francis fails to address seriously the issue of women’s agency in his documents, relying instead on romanticized ideas of womanhood. This is problematic, for ideals of womanhood that emphasize self-sacrifice within the home create contexts of danger for millions of women and girls globally. And what about situations in which caregiving is not a free choice but an imposition placed on women to further limit their agency? For Abraham, feminist ethics calls us to destabilize the status quo where social narratives oppress women and deny them their voice.⁵⁶

Lisa Sowle Cahill says that in Pope Francis’s documents ‘women’s agency is essentialized, romanticized, politically subordinated, or entirely neglected’.⁵⁷ And Kristin Heyer argues that although the teaching of Francis shows development, ‘there remains anxiety about the weakening of sexual differences, maternal presence, and mothers’ self-sacrificial responsibilities’.⁵⁸ Magisterial teaching on the dignity of women has some way to go, and the issue of women’s empowerment remains underrepresented in Church documents.

Emily Reimer-Barry has argued that Catholic sexual teaching limits women’s bodily autonomy and undermines their agency. Heavily reliant on a particular theology of ‘woman’ that disproportionately emphasizes ‘motherhood’, this teaching legitimizes a narrow understanding of womanhood.⁵⁹ In addition, I would argue that official teaching does not go far enough in condemning the ‘toxic masculinity’ that contributes to gender-based violence.⁶⁰ What is needed from Church leadership is strong, clear condemnation of sexism and misogyny in all its forms, as well as a more comprehensive account of women’s experiences informed by women themselves.

Focus on relationships not only acts

For some time now, theologians have argued that the starting point for any just sexual ethic ought to be the human person and the quality of the relationship rather than the sexual act. Kevin Kelly, for example, was critical of a sexual ethic that focused excessively on the sexual act without sufficient reference to the context within which it was occurring. He was also concerned about the ways in which poverty and cultural oppression diminishes the sexual agency of people, in particular poorer women.⁶¹ Similarly, Margaret Farley has constructed a framework for a just sexual ethic which she builds around principles such as free consent, mutuality, equality, commitment, fruitfulness, and justice.⁶² Others such as James Keenan write about the importance of lay – and especially female – participation in the development of Church teaching on the family, child abuse, and sexuality.⁶³ And Lisa Fullam identifies the good of human embodiment and the good of relational intimacy as among the goals of sexuality, again highlighting the deeply relational significance of our sexual lives.⁶⁴

A more person-centered, relational sexual ethic demands clear condemnation of all forms of violence towards women, but especially violence within marriage. All faith leaders need to speak out against practices such as child marriage and female genital mutilation, as well as the abuse of women in the home. For Julie Clague, Church teaching on the family is too narrow, focusing largely on issues concerning divorce, remarriage, and same-sex unions. Consequently, it fails to address the complex problems facing families, especially women. There is an opportunity here, Clague contends ‘to broaden Catholic discourse about marriage and family life, and to mobilize Catholic action on behalf of the world’s poorest families and their most vulnerable and victimised members’.⁶⁵

Recognizing culture, consent, and agency

Catholic sexual teaching must also consider the nuanced ways in which culture, consent, and agency impact our sexual lives. Karen Peterson Iyer examines the hookup culture among young people, teen sexting, sex trafficking, and the commercial sex industry, for example.⁶⁶ She explains that hyper-individualism, freedom of choice, and agency are regularly cited in defense of the hookup culture: ‘This ethos, coupled with the media-fueled social script that college is a time for unbridled fun, experimentation, and unequivocal self-focus, results in widely held student reluctance to openly criticize hookup practices, individually or systemically.’⁶⁷ For Peterson-Iyre, any critique of hookup culture needs to be conducted with reference to the broader socio-cultural attitudes and assumptions that underpins it. Included here is hyper-masculinity, the objectification of women’s bodies, hyper- individualism, a lack of self-care for one’s own body or the bodies of others, all of which create damaging sexual expectations for people. Peterson-Iyre contends that hookup culture can be confronted through an emphasis on authentic human agency. That is, ‘a more complex version of agency that challenges the multiple social injustices structuring hookup culture and simultaneously prioritizes freedom of choice and desire, mutuality, equal regard, and emotional integrity … what we need is a holistic understanding of human flourishing animated by the demands of justice’.⁶⁸

Consent, of course, is complicated, and may be compromised in many ways. Poor communication, fear of violence, intoxication, peer pressure, and gendered cultural expectations serve to diminish consent. Cultural expectations that actively promote, even glorify, the hookup culture, and which discourage women from expressing true agency, are highly problematic.⁶⁹ The human subject, and her true agency, has to contend with the tensions that broader culture bring. We understand ourselves from within a culture. We are rooted, belonging to a particular time and place. And so, our sense of ‘self’ in hugely conditioned by a host of factors that converge to shape and form us.

Peterson-Iyer is critical of the growing cultural narrative around hyper- masculinity, noting how the gender norms that accompany it harm the well- being of men as well as women. She notes a 2016 meta-review of seventy- eight studies on masculinity and mental health that concluded that men who place value on power, strength, and dominance over women are more likely to suffer from mental health problems such as depression and anxiety, have body image difficulties, and are likely to suffer from substance abuse.⁷⁰ The virtues of self-care and resistance are as important for men to nurture as for women.

Cultivating emotional integrity

One crucial step towards sexual self-care is what Peterson-Iyre calls emotional integrity. ‘Emotional integrity invites persons to see themselves as centers of meaning, maximally thriving when all aspects of the self – interior and exterior – are understood to knit together into one whole, undivided cloth … there can be no doubt that integrating one’s sexual actions with one’s deeper sense of values and personal history contributes mightily to a sense of human well-being, including empowered choice-making.’⁷¹ We can see how this is crucial for men as they confront toxic notions of manhood, as well as for women. For emotional integrity is constitutive of human flourishing and requires all aspects of our personhood to be integrated into our self, including our sexual desires and acts.

Any notion of human flourishing is historically and culturally situated, and is in need of constant, robust investigation. But it must at least include recognition of human fragility. And it evolves as we grown in deeper understanding of what it means to be human, including the vulnerability and precarity that connects us all.⁷² And Peterson-Iyer argues that any sexual ethic interested in fostering genuine sexual agency and promoting human flourishing must encourage environments conducive to mature sexual discourse and true sexual self-knowledge. In other words, what is needed are supportive contexts in which integration of the sexual into our overall identity can be achieved, encouraging an ethic of care for both the individual and those with whom we share our sexual lives. An ethic that takes seriously sexual agency ‘will actively call people to consider their values, their histories, and their emotions as they make sexual choices, being honest with themselves about their fears, desires, and goals … A Christian ethic will seek to articulate and promote what might count as supportive, safe contexts for sex – contexts that foster human wholeness and therefore emotional, psychological, and spiritual well-being’, she writes.⁷³

This has major implications for Catholic sexual discourse given its often polarized and toxic nature. The fear of speaking openly about some sexual issues is not conducive to the emotional integrity that Peterson-Iyer speaks of. A mature, adult approach to the messiness and fragility of our sexual lives requires a context in which intelligent debate can happen. But more crucial still, sexual discourse ought to be conducted with compassion and gentleness rather than seen as a weapon with which to crush people in a deeply damaging culture war.

Conclusion

What I wished to demonstrate in this essay is how virtue, social sin, and sexual violence intersect. For we cannot understand the underpinnings of gender-based violence without first considering the values that shape the world we inhabit. Virtue ethics, with its person-centered starting point, is a vitally important dialogue partner for Catholic sexual ethics since the virtues empower us to confront, resist, and reform social injustice. Moreover, growth in virtue demands ongoing inner moral reflection and moral conversion.

As individuals, we all share responsibility for the common good, and must work towards the creation of more just, caring, inclusive societies. Church leaders have an urgent role to play too, by condemning in the strongest terms all forms of gender-based violence. The message would be strengthened immeasurably by including the voices and experiences of women. And as ethicists, we recognize the call to critically reflect on the contemporary world, to be advocates for those on the margins, and to imagine new possibilities and new horizons of hope. We must identify the virtues that liberate our communities, the traits of character that enable us to flourish as God intended.

Dr Suzanne Mulligan is a lecturer in Moral Theology at St Patrick’s Pontifical University, Maynooth. She is a member of the Planning Committee of Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church and is the editor of Irish Theological Quarterly.

Notes

1. This article originally appeared as: Suzanne Mulligan, ‘A violência sexual contra mulheres, o pecado social e a virtude da resistência’, Sexualidade e Virtudes. por uma ética da sexualidade à luz das virtudes, ed by Ronaldo Zacharias (Aparecida: Santuário, 2024). The author wishes to express her thanks to Ronaldo Zacharias for permission to reprint in English.
2. Women’s Aid, ‘One in Five Women’ (2020) <https://www.womensaid.ie/app/uploads/2023/04/One- in-Five-Youn-Women-Report-2020.pdf>
3. Women’s Aid, ‘Femicide Watch Report’ <https://www.womensaid.ie/app/uploads/2024/01/ Womens-Aid-Femicide-Watch-1996-2024.pdf> [last accessed, 12/02/24]
4. World Health Organization (WHO), ‘Violence against women’ (9 March 2021) <https://www.who. int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/violence-against-women>
5. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
6. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
7. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
8. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
9. Gender-based violence can happen to someone of any gender, but typically women and girls experience violence on a more frequent and sustained scale. For the purposes of this chapter, I use the term ‘gender-based violence’ in relation to female victims of violence. On this point see: <https://www.un.org/en/observances/ending-violence-against-women- day?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8cC6_bvd_AIViu_tCh0XKg6yEAAYBCAAEgKPNvD_BwE> Suzanne Mulligan
10. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
11. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
12. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
13. WHO, ‘Violence against women’.
14. See Agnes Brazal, ‘Ethics of Care in Laudato Si’: A Postcolonial Ecofeminist Critique’, Feminist Theology, 29:3 (2021), p. 223.
15. See UN Women, ‘Facts and figures: Ending violence against women’ <www.unwomen.org/en/what- we-do/ending-violence-against-women/facts-and-figures>
16. For a comprehensive treatment of this point see Brazal, ‘Ethics of Care in Laudato Si’’.
17. Anne Patrick, ‘Narrative and the Social Dynamic of Virtue’, in Virtue, ed by Charles E. Curran, Lisa A. Fullam (New York: Paulist Press, 2011), p. 79.
18. Patrick, ‘Dynamic of Virtue’, p. 80.
19. Patrick, ‘Dynamic of Virtue’, p. 82.
20. Patrick, ‘Dynamic of Virtue’, p. 83.
21. Patrick, ‘Dynamic of Virtue’, p. 84.
22. Patrick, ‘Dynamic of Virtue’, p. 85.
23. Patrick, ‘Dynamic of Virtue’, p. 91.
24. This phrase is borrowed from the work of Paul Farmer. See, ‘Women, Poverty, and AIDS’, in Women, Poverty, and AIDS: Sex, Drugs, and Structural Violence, ed by Paul Farmer, Margaret Connors, Janie Simmons (Maine, US: Common Courage Press, 2011), p. 26.
25. Farmer, ‘Women, Poverty, and AIDS’, p. 26.
26. See, Anna Rowlands, Towards a Politics of Communion: Catholic Social Teaching in Dark Times, (London: T&T Clark, 2021), chapter four in particular.
27. Rowlands, Towards a Politics of Communion, p. 85. For an excellent account of the application of ‘structural sin’ to the migrant crisis, see also Kristin E. Heyer, Kinship Across Borders: A Christian Ethic of Immigration, (Washington: Georgetown University Press, 2012), chapter two.
28. Rowlands, Towards a Politics of Communion, p. 109.
29. Daniel K. Finn, ‘What is a Sinful Social Structure?’, Theological Studies, 77:1 (2016), 136–164.
30. Kate Ward, ‘Virtue and Human Fragility’, Theological Studies, 81:1 (2020), 150–168.
31. James F. Keenan, ‘Virtue Ethics and Sexual Ethics’, in Virtue.
32. Keenan, ‘Virtue Ethics and Sexual Ethics’, p. 119.
33. Keenan, ‘Virtue Ethics and Sexual Ethics’, p. 121.
34. Daniel Daly, ‘Virtue Ethics’, in T&T Clark Handbook of Christian Ethics, ed by Tobias Winright (London: T&T Clark, 2021), p. 63. Emphasis added.
35. Keenan, ‘Virtue Ethics and Sexual Ethics’, p. 126.
36. Keenan, ‘Virtue Ethics and Sexual Ethics’, p. 126.
37. Anne E. Patrick, ‘Getting Ready for Voice Lessons: Towards a Catholic Feminist Ethics of Spirituality’, in Feminist Catholic Theological Ethics: Conversations in the World Church, ed by Linda Hogan, A.E. Orobator (New York: Orbis Books, 2014).
38. Patrick, ‘Getting Ready for Voice Lessons’, p. 264.
39. Daly, ‘Virtue Ethics’, p. 69.
40. Cited in Kate Ward, ‘Virtue Ethics in Social Contexts’, Building Bridges in Sarajevo: The Plenary Papers from CTEWC 2018 (New York: Orbis, 2019), p. 101.
41. Mauricio Alarcón Burbano SJ, ‘Fortitude in the Midst of Weakness: The Case of Haitian Migrant Associations in Equador’, in Living With(out) Borders: Catholic Theological Ethics on the Migrations of Peoples, ed by Agnes M. Brazal, María Teresa Dávila (New York: Orbis Books, 2016), p. 145ff.
42. Daly, ‘Virtue Ethics’, p. 69.
43. Sarah MacDonald, Nicole Symmonds, ‘Rioting as Flourishing? Reconsidering Virtue Ethics in Times of Civil Unrest’, Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, 38:1 (2018), 25–42.
44. MacDonald, Symmonds, ‘Rioting as Flourishing?’, p. 27.
45. Kochurani Abraham, ‘Resistance: A Liberative Key in Feminist Ethics’, in Feminist Catholic Theological Ethics: Conversations in the World Church, ed by in Linda Hogan, A.E. Orobator (New York: Orbis Books, 2014), p. 98.
46. Abraham, ‘Resistance’, p. 99.
47. Julie Hanlon Rubio, ‘Cooperation with Evil Reconsidered: The Moral Duty of Resistance’, Theological Studies, 78:1 (2017), 96–120. Sexual Violence Against Women, Social Sin, and the Virtue of Resistance
48. Rubio, ‘Cooperation with Evil Reconsidered’, p. 111.
49. Shawnee M. Daniels Sykes, ‘A Feminist Ethical Perspective on Women/Girls as Oppressors: The Cycle of Oppressor–Internalized Oppression’, in Feminist Catholic Theological Ethics: Conversations in the World Church.
50. Skyes, ‘Women/Girls as Oppressors’, p. 269.
51. Skyes, ‘Women/Girls as Oppressors’, p. 270.
52. Skyes, ‘Women/Girls as Oppressors’, p. 270.
53. Skyes, ‘Women/Girls as Oppressors’, p. 276.
54. Abraham, ‘Resistance’, p. 105.
55. Paul J. Wadell, ‘Reimagining the World: Justice’, in Virtue, p. 189ff.
56. Abraham, ‘Resistance’, p. 106.
57. Kristin Heyer, ‘Walls in the Heart: Social Sin and Fratelli tutti’, Journal of Catholic Social Thought, 19:1 (2022), p. 37.
58. Cited in Heyer, ‘Walls in the Heart’, p. 38.
59. Paper presented at a conference in Rome, May 2022. See my account in The Furrow: ‘Receiving Amoris Laetitia: Learning and Listening as a Global Church’, The Furrow, 73:7/8 (July/August 2022), 387–94.
60. By this I mean male stereotypes that place priority on physical strength and power, as well as views of men as dominant and dominating. At best, such stereotypes contribute to an increase in misogynistic and sexist attitudes; at worst, it contributes to rising levels of violence and abuse against women and girls, often leading to serious harm and/or death.
61. See Kevin Kelly, New Directions in Sexual Ethics: Moral Theology and the Challenge of AIDS, (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1998).
62. Margaret Farley, Just Love: A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics, (New York: Continuum, 2006), chapter 6.
63. See for example James Keenan, ‘The Gallant: A Feminist Proposal’, in Feminist Catholic Theological Ethics: Conversations in the World Church.
64. Lisa Fullam, ‘Sex in 3-D: A Telos for a Virtue Ethics of Sexuality’, Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, 27:2 (2007), 151–170.
65. Julie Clague, ‘Amoris Laetitia and the State of the World’s Families’, in Vocation and Mission of the Family: Reflections on Chavarul and Amoris Laetitia, ed by Shaji George Kochuthara (Bengaluru, India: Dharmaram Publications, 2020), p. 260.
66. See Karen Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics: A Feminist Christian Account (Washington: Georgetown University Press, 2022), chapter 3 in particular.
67. Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics, p. 55.
68. Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics, p. 56.
69. Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics, pp. 63–4.
70. Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics, p. 69.
71. Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics, p. 74.
72. For more on this see James Keenan, ‘The World at Risk: Vulnerability, Precarity, and Connectedness’, Theological Studies, 81:1 (2020), 132–149.
73. Peterson-Iyer, Reenvisioning Sexual Ethics, p. 75.