Between Virgins and Priests: The Feminisation of Catholicism and Priestly Masculinity in Nineteenth-Century Spain

Abstract

The feminisation of religion in the nineteenth-century has been broadly discussed by historians and sociologists. Considering the main contributions of that debate from a critical perspective, this article defends the hypothesis that the Catholic Church identified itself with the same characteristics with which it defined femininity in the nineteenth-century through the symbolic link with the Virgin Mary. Although this discursive feminisation of Catholicism left laymen in a difficult situation, it did contribute to reinforcing the patriarchal and hierarchical structure of the Church. The great challenge to bishops and priests, the leading subjects in the project of re-Christianising society, was to demonstrate their condition as men within a feminised organisation. This article will mainly focus on Spain, although with the international perspective that any study about Catholicism requires.