Rosemary Radford Ruether

Descriptive Title

The Millstone Award

Description

The following article provides a brief look at Rosemary Radford Ruether, who calls herself a Catholic theologian, but she emphatically rejects the Bible, the divinity of Christ, the perpetual virginity of the Blessed Mother. In addition she supports homosexuality, abortion, divorce, and population control. She encourages left-wing radicals to remain in the Church in order to use it for greater impact on the Church and the world.

Larger Work

Front Lines

Pages

10 – 11

Publisher & Date

Human Life International, Inc., Front Royal, VA, Fall 2007

When writing about Rosemary Radford Ruether, it is almost impossible to know where on earth to begin. The well of her giddy nonsense is so deep as to be practically bottomless.

Ruether is not a Catholic; she is a pagan. To begin with, she rejects all organized religion, which she labels " . . . a tribute to the lasting power of alienation and its pathological need for illusory projections." She outlines her solution to this "problem" of religion in her 1985 book Womanguides: "Only the overthrow of the three-thousand-year-old beast of masculist materialism will save the race . . . No token accommodations will satisfy us. What is required is the total reconstruction of God, Christ, human nature, and society . . . we know we will die unless a WomanChrist pops up (like a rabbit out of a hat) between breasted mountains . . . "

She begins this process of "total reconstruction" with the Holy Bible: "Feminist readings of the Bible can discern a norm within Biblical faith by which the Biblical texts themselves can be criticized. To the extent to which Biblical texts reflect this normative principle, they are regarded as authoritative. On this basis many aspects of the Bible are to be frankly set aside and rejected."

Ruether was instrumental in uniting many feminist groups into a coalition called the "Women-Church Convergence" which " . . . is rooted in creation-based spirituality, which is the occult, the New Age teachings of Matthew Fox, who was expelled from the Dominican Order." One writer says, "Led by Ruether, women have created their own life-cycle ceremonies. They include rituals to mark the start of menopause, the union of a lesbian couple, mourning for a stillbirth, and recovery from abortion."

But Ruether goes far beyond paying tribute to the mythical feminist goddesses and celebrating abortion. She even sings praises to the pagan god Baal, committing the same idolatry that caused God to punish the Israelites so many times:

. . . we see the death of Baal, overwhelmed by the forces of drought and death . . . [the goddess Anath] buries him with rites of mourning . . . From her sowing of the new wheat in the ground, Baal rises. With a cry of exaltation, we rejoice at the close of the drama: The Lord has arisen, is seated again on the throne. He reigns! Alleluia!

But at least Ruether is showing a tiny glimmer of consistency. She was a long-time member of the Board of Directors of "Catholics" for a Free Choice and has said that "It is imperative that the reproductive rights movement become much more persuasive in convincing middle-of-the-road Americans that anti-choice is anti-life . . . Antichoice is antilife! This is the motto we need to claim." In fact, she sees pro-abortionism as an ideal way to attack and undermine the hierarchy of the Church: "For women to become the decision makers over reproduction is to overthrow the material and ideological base of the entire hierarchy of male power over women, based on control over women's capacity to bear children."

Ruether's reasoning spookily echoes the Nazis and eugenicists of the past, including Margaret Sanger, who advocated "weeding out" the "unfit." Ruether says, "We need to seek out the most compassionate way of weeding out people. It is not 'pro-life' to allow unrestrained fertility. . . . A good gardener weeds and thins his seedlings to allow the proper amount of room for the plants to grow properly . . . We need to return to the population level of 1930."

Ruether's terminally muddled thinking goes far beyond worshipping pagan idols. Her "theology" is as rubbery as a bowl of Jello on a mid-Summer day. For Ruether, redemption is not the saving power of Christ: "Redemption is about liberating women and all victimized people from violence and from injustice. . . . Redemption does not mean sending down the divine from some higher spiritual world. It is to say 'Flesh became Word,' not 'Word became Flesh.' . . . Some theologians, such as womanist Delores Williams, have answered this question by decisive rejection of the idea that the cross, or Christ s suffering, is redemptive. It is not Jesus' suffering and death but His life as a praxis of protest against injustice in solidarity in His life, it is this praxis that is redemptive."

Ruether frequently pleads for "tolerance" and "nonjudgmentalism," but has little patience for those who oppose her agenda. She says that such people, including Pope John Paul II, "are the seed of Satan and continue in the fallen state, not having received the inner light of the redemptive Spirit. Feminist Christianity is the true gospel of Jesus. . . . If we claim the Jesus story because it echoes our own story, why not just discard it and tell our own story? . . . Multi-religious solidarity and syncretism are not only allowable, they are required."

Such bombastic statements betray an obvious lack of humility on Ruether's part, which alone disqualifies her from being a theologian. As Pope Benedict XVI said during his May 30 general audience, "Humility is the essential characteristic of a great theologian."

So why does an agitator like this, who rejects virtually everything the Church teaches, insist upon calling herself "Catholic"? She says that "[Radical leftists] should stay in the Church and use whatever parts of it they can get their hands on. This way they will have far more impact, both on the Church and on the world . . . than they could possibly gain if they separated from it."

In summary, this self-proclaimed "Catholic theologian" flagrantly displays a mind-numbing ignorance of even the most basic Catholic theology. While embracing homosexuality, abortion, divorce, and population control, she rejects the Bible, the divinity of Christ, the perpetual virginity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the need for humanity's redemption — and thus, its need for a Redeemer.

Rosemary Radford Ruether qualifies as neither a "Catholic" nor as a "theologian." Her narrow-niche celebrity derives entirely from battling the Catholic Church on sexual morality and making outrageous statements for press consumption. To paraphrase an old saying, "With theologians' like this, who needs Satan?"

In light of the above (and much, much more), we are considering crafting Ruether's Millstone Award out of a material more appropriate than the traditional quartz or hard sandstone. Does anyone know if fruitcake floats?