Reflection on June 18, 1980

https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/jp2tb29.htm

Shame just doesn’t join the human person after the fall but JPII says that it “replaces the absolute trust” that we had with original innocence. He has reflected on that trust and the experience and what that meant to understanding, and now that trust just isn’t clouded, but replaced by a sense of shame. As deep as that trust was meant to be to be experienced, that is how deep shame digs in and effects our experience and what we understand it means to be human. We may get a sense that shame is only skin deep because it causes us to “cover” ourselves, but if you see it as replacing the absolute trust foundational in original innocence, shame effects so much more than what we see with our eyes.

JPII goes into a discussion of Genesis 3:16 (anytime you write a verse that is 3:16 you are drawn to John 3:16 but it is not the only important 3:16 in the Bible) which talks about male dominance of female. He says that this is a distortion of the communion that was to be fully given and received before the fall. Now, what is given and received will not be fully given or fully received in a way that was meant to be. He says that the warning or lesson is actually for both, which makes sense because the fall effects both, but only given to the woman. But there is a difference between male and female, so I think it is important that it was given to the female, or it means something that is was given to her. When you look at the conjugal act, when the two become one flesh, the image of God, the female is the main physical receiver. That is the physical difference. 3:16 says she will look on the man with desire, she will look on him and desire a gift fully given, in secular terms, she will look for her Prince Charming. Isn’t that the image girls grow up with? God is telling her that is what she will be longing for. But the male will dominate you, he will never fully give you what you want, he cannot be what you desire, there is no Prince Charming. But because you long for that, you will give in to a lesser prince in the hopes he is what he can never be and therefore, you will be dominated. I don’t know if that is exactly what JPII meant, but that is where reflecting on it led me.

The male side of that, I guess, is that we are told we are to be dominate, a woman wants a strong man, a protector, a Prince Charming. How we manifest that, in a fallen state, is through dominance and control. You may be more familiar with the idea of protecting your children by sheltering them, but I think that equates somewhat with what males may see. Protect your wife by keeping her home, not getting a job, in some generations not letting women learn to read. That is protection in a fallen state, and it turns into dominance, as God foretells.