lesson nine
Nuptial imagery of the Bride and Bridegroom

• read the narration column first
• then do the exercises

Exercise 1

Can you find in the Gospels examples of women who 'represent Christ' in different ways?

1. Can women not represent the Groom?

Leaders in the Church represent Christ whose salvific power they administer through their guidance and through the sacraments. Since Christ was a man, can women represent him?

The Congregation for Doctrine in Rome maintains that in the symbolism of salvation, Christ is the Bridegroom and the Church is his Bride. A key source text for this view is the instruction for husbands and wives recorded in Ephesians 5,21-33. The view is elaborated most fully in Pope John Paul II’s encyclical Mulieris Dignitatem (30 September 1988).

This symbolism of bride and groom, the Vatican claims, should be maintained in the person exercising leadership in Christ’s name. And Christ was a groom, a man. Only a man can therefore represent Christ in the priestly ministry.

Jesus Christ performed his first miracle at the wedding feast of Cana (John 2,1-12). Did Christ thus present himself as the Bridegroom of God’s new era?

The ‘Bridegroom’ argument is really the re-formulation of an old, medieval argument for excluding women from religious leadership, namely the idea that women cannot represent Christ, because they are not perfect human beings.

Read about the biological reasoning behind the argument here: “Of godly men and medicine: ancient biology and the Christian Fathers on the nature of woman”, by Kim E. Power.

We find the same faulty argumentation with medieval scholars, such as Thomas Aquinas. He maintained that every female birth occurs through a mishap. Only men are complete human beings. Samm wonder that women cannot represent Christ, because they cannot, in his view, represent the perfection of his humanity. Study his views here.

However, what about the argument in its modern ‘bridegroom’ guise?

Exercise 2

Scholars say that the argumentation about the ‘nuptial imagery’ and ‘representing Christ’ is no longer exegesis [= finding out what the text says] but biblical theologising [= building up your structures of thought]. Do you agree.

Exercise 3

Spend some time reflecting on what 'ministry' means to you. Can you conceive of new forms of ministry for the 21st century?

Will they involve women?

2. Can women represent the Groom?

a. The image of a nuptial mystery does not apply to religious leadership in the Church. Where allusions are made to bridal synbolism in the liturgy, the symbolism is ambivalent, since all Christians represent both the Groom and the Bride.

2. Women too can represent Christ. The quality signified by the religious leader (bishop, priest or deacon) is not Christ’s maleness, but his role as mediator. This can be signified also by women exercise leadership roles in his name.

Women can represent Christ:

• because women and men are equal in Christ;
• women too bear Christ’s image;
• women already act as ‘another Christ’ as ministers of baptism and marriage;
• women reflect better Christ’s feminine traits
• women too can represent Christ’s love which is the essence of his priesthood.

Read also on the theological history of the expression ‘acting in the person of Christ’.

Conclusion

Excluding women from religious leadership on the basis that Christ was a man has no validity.