The Vatican's Women: Female Influence at the Holy See

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Four hundred of the 3,800 people who permanently live or work in the State of Vatican City, the smallest sovereign and independent state on the globe, are women. They are nuns and members of the laity; some are housekeepers of churchmen; others are secretaries, translators, editors, lawyers, and middle-level officials of the papal administration.

Expansive in scope and enlightening in detail, The Vatican's Women recalls women who wielded power in the Vatican, including St. Catherine of Siena, Queen Christina of Sweden, Mother Pascalina (Pope Pius XII's longtime housekeeper and confidante), and Mother Teresa. With an unflinching eye, Paul Hofmann examines the papacy's reaction to Catholic women's (and nuns') liberation, and women's struggles, especially today, to fortify their positions within the Church. The Vatican's Women is a thorough and revealing exploration that will herald a new level of insight and dialogue amongst feminists, theologians, and laypeople alike.

SYNOPSIS

Hofmann (for decades a journalist at the New York Times, he was chief of its Rome bureau) interviewed women who worked in the Vatican to supplement his research of written records in compiling this engaging history, which describes the role of laywomen and nuns in the Holy See from medieval times through the present. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

How do women influence the inner workings of the male-dominated Roman Catholic Church when the door to priesthood remains closed to them? To find out women's impact on the Vatican, Hoffman, a former Rome bureau chief for the New York Times, conducted interviews with more than 40 representatives of the church's distaff side and did historical research aided by two of the Vatican's women professionals. He learned that although they are barred from many official positions of authority, women have managed to exercise persuasive power at the Vatican into the present day. Indeed, some of Hoffman's strongest examples are of women who wielded great power while assuming traditional and even subservient roles. Chief among these was Mother Pascalina, a Bavarian nun who spent more than 40 years attending to the personal needs of Pope Pius XII, and who had so much influence that she was referred to by some as "the popess." This book is as much about the Vatican as it is about women and is full of interesting, gossipy tidbits drawn from the author's years of working and living in Rome. Although such details make for interesting reading and will certainly attract readers with a taste for scandal and rumor, their inclusion detracts from what otherwise might have been a more serious study of the role of women in the church. (Oct.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

Now over 90 years old, Hofmann, who served as foreign correspondent and Rome bureau chief for the New York Times, offers a glimpse into women's activities and powers within Vatican City, historical and contemporary. A cradle Catholic turned agnostic, the Vienna-born author covers everything from the Pope Joan legends to real-life stories of today's religious and laywomen working at the Vatican while also supplying information on the daily life and bureaucratic structures of the state. Though written in the engaging style of an insider and professional writer, the book is peppered with innuendo, conjecture, and heasay, as interviewed sources chose to remain anonymous. While pointing to women's genuine contributions within the Church's central administration over the years, Hofmann steadily focuses on the Vatican's lacunae regarding women and hardly at all on the spirituality of those the Holy See serves. Libraries owning the author's other publications (e.g., O Vatican! A Slightly Wicked View of the Holy See) may wish to purchase.-Anna M. Donnelly, St. John's Univ. Lib., Jamaica, NY Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Former New York Times Rome bureau chief Hofmann (Umbria, 1999, etc.) portrays influential women in the papacy￯﾿ﾽs history, culture, and work force.

About one-tenth of current Vatican employees are female, and the author speaks with more than 40 of them, including nuns, housekeepers, lawyers, and art curators. But before delving into contemporary life, Hofmann details the history of women in church legend. Among those featured are "Popess Joan," a ninth-century German who, disguised as a man, so impressed the papal city with her learning that she was made a cardinal and eventually elected pope, until an untimely pregnancy revealed her true gender; and Saint Catherine of Siena (1347￯﾿ﾽ80), who convinced Pope Gregory XI to move the government of the church back to Rome. The present-day church, many women feel, has a strong antifemale bias and a "purple ceiling" beyond which they can￯﾿ﾽt advance. "The great number of sainted virgins and matrons, as well as female martyrs, attests to the conspicuous role of pious women in early Christianity," the author notes. "Yet Saint Paul wrote to the Corinthians that ￯﾿ﾽwomen must keep silent in the church.￯﾿ﾽ " Judging from the profiles here, Paul￯﾿ﾽs admonition is still in force. Even though Sister Johanna is a highly qualified nurse, she works as housekeeper to an elderly cardinal who requested her services (without consulting Johanna herself) for six months, a "temporary" position that has lasted more than four years. A translator of papal addresses and other documents who declines to give her name expected to be promoted after her superior retired￯﾿ﾽafter all, she had 12 years experience in the department, was multilingual, and cheerfully worked overtime.Instead, the position was given to a man with limited Italian-language skills. The future seems to hold more promise; some Vatican insiders predict that the continuing scarcity of priests will lead to women￯﾿ﾽs admittance to the priesthood, as well as forcing the church to drop the rule of clerical celibacy.