The silencing of women as an obstacle to the discipleship of Equals

Abstract

This article seeks to trace a brief genealogy of the silencing of women in the ecclesial structure. It starts from the analysis of an altarpiece, painted in the century between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and shows the discourses and silencing practices in the Interior of the Church, in the eight centuries before and in the eight centuries after the painting. The silencing is presented as an element resulting from the patriarchy rooted in the ecclesial structure and reveals a power relationship that excludes women from decision-making bodies. Divided into three topics, preceded by a preamble that analyses the arguments of the altarpiece and the place destined for the woman who speaks in the church, the article presents silencing as an obstacle to the discipleship of equals. Composed of six hands, it intertwines the research objects of the trio of authors involved in its writing: the iconographic analysis of the first three centuries of the Christian era, with emphasis on the artistic transpositions of pastoral power; the beguinal movement − seen as a counter-conduct movement, according to Michel Foucault, and prophetic, according to José Comblin, as resistance to clerical power; the perspective of feminist theology, on the obstacles to discipleship of equals.