It also emphasizes that God “gave us his Son through the Virgin Mary,” and “in her, the love of God finds its irrevocable home,” and “we are all debtors with this feminine 'yes.'”
“Young girls should not be encouraged to engage in a climate of struggle and demands,” the signatories say. “They should be encouraged to grow and account for their own talents and charisms. They must receive the fact of being a woman, for what it means: a remarkable grace!”
On the other hand, they say, boys must be educated to “the fear of God, the disinterested gift of themselves, and the admiration of the feminine and male human body.”
“As Catholic women, aware of our Marian privilege, we choose to put our energies and talents at the service of the effective complementarity of man and woman,” the document says.
The manifesto ends with a tone of encouragement to Catholic bishops willing to stand up to the pressures of “gender ideology” within the Church.
“We are aware that our pastors, in order to be faithful to their evangelical call and to the biblical and ecclesial traditions, have to undergo pressure and that they will still have a lot to suffer. We assure them of our prayer and our fraternal affection, so that their celibacy offered and united to the One Sacrifice may always be more and more fruitful,” the signatories say.
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Andrea Gagliarducci is an Italian journalist for Catholic News Agency and Vatican analyst for ACI Stampa. He is a contributor to the National Catholic Register.