Hello and welcome to Mariology Without Apology. This is Dr. Mark Mirvalle. I have as my guest on this program, Dr. Monica Migliorino Miller, who is a nationally recognized pro-life leader.
She has taught at several universities, including Madonna, and presently at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit. And she has what I believe to be extraordinarily fruitful, timely insights regarding the role of women in the Church, which of course is a hot subject today. But our program and what we're dedicated to is of course Our Lady, and how the example of the Blessed Mother gives so much light and clarity to the issue of the proper role of women in the Church. So Dr. Miller, Monica, it's a joy to have you. Welcome to the program.
Thank you. Thank you so much.
So we're going to discuss and start with very basics because, you know, we're in a post-natural law era, and so we have to define everything. So let's start with the basic questions. I found it fascinating that one very popular podcast had to go over to Ethiopia and ask some natives, what's a woman? Because of course, we can't define that in the West here. So let's start with the basics. And, you know, very grateful for your particular expertise on this area, women, authority, and then we're going to move to the Church. So let's start with what is woman?
Well, again, you know, you mentioned natural law. In terms of what it means to be either male or female, I dare I say we are defined by the way in which we give life. And the way in which we give life is in relation to one another as man and woman. Women, when all is said and done, I mean, it's actually quite fascinating that women actually have a space within their own bodies to house another person, if you think of it that way, that we shelter, we actually literally physically shelter and grow and nurture another person or in some case persons, if you're having twins or triplets or quadruplets or whatever.
And that is an enormous responsibility. And therefore, certain dignity and certain rights are then associated with how a woman gives life. And then, of course, continues to mother and nurture life, even after birth. Now, granted, there are some women who will never have that experience for a number of reasons. If you're in consecrated life in the Church or for some reason you never marry or for some physical reason you're not able. But nonetheless, in terms of psychological, spiritual temperament, women and I can, you know, I can build or rely on the work of Saint Edith Stein in terms of her examination and thinking on the way women approach the world is different from the way a man approaches the world. And then, of course, we have that that great statement from Saint John Paul II that God has entrusted the human to women in a special way. 
And fascinating, by the way, just for our viewers, Monica's work, The Authority of Women in the Catholic Church, published by Emmaus, and then Sexuality and Authority in the Catholic Church, published by the University of Scranton. And we'll be calling on these a little bit. I find it fascinating, Monica, when they did find, I think it was Ethiopia, but it could be Kenya, but when they found this woman in the bush and asked her, she said, we have babies. We have babies. Men don't have babies. And, of course, as almost insultingly simple as that is, it's what much of the West is denying, that there's a difference because women have babies. Well, right, even the jargon that's used in academia, political documents, legislative acts, and so on, that we don't even use the terms father and mother. It's pregnant person.
It's extraordinary. Which, by the way, robs women of their special dignity, right, when all is said and done. Well, that's why Saint Edith Stein is masterful in talking about the, you know, I challenge my students, both at Franciscan and at Ave Maria, you know, in class of 50, how many of you women could define what a woman is?
And then, how many of you have read Mulieris Dignitatem, you know, by Saint John Paul II?
But then I asked the men, you know, you typically will get, you know, maybe 20% hands coming up, maybe, you know, 25%. But then I asked the young men, you know, how many of you have read it, and not a one. So herein lies the problem, right? You can't define one of two sexes within humanity and history. That's an issue. I mean, in a certain sense, when you know it, you don't have to define it when it's accepted. But we don't know it anymore. Society doesn't know it. So we have to define it. And you know, what Edith Stein says about the gift of the particular, the focus on persons.
Right, right, and to appreciate the essence of the thing in itself without taking it apart, appreciating the thing and a thing, literally a thing in its wholeness. I mean, she does have that contrast where men usually like to know something by taking it all apart, and examining its, you know, elements. Like, I think it was Thomas Edison, you know, wanted to see how a watch or a clock worked. And so take the whole thing apart. Now that all the parts are laying on the table, it doesn't work anymore.
Yeah, right. And it gets a little dangerous when you talk about knowing persons that way, right? We don't take people apart to be able to get to the heart and the essence of what they are. 
So, but just how much the role of women is connected with person, family, civilization, and that gets to, you know, how you define the term authority, which I think is outstanding. Can you unpack your concept of authority connected to women?
Right. Well, and for that matter, connected to men as well. I, in the introduction to my books, I talk about the misunderstanding that authority is understood, I think I say with some confidence, that the majority of people would understand authority as quantified power. So it's, how big are you? How large is your army? How much land do you own? How much money do you have in the bank? How many people are following you? And so, frankly, that, I guess I could say in some respects, it's power on male terms. You know, the male athlete will almost always beat out the woman, run faster, the statistics, and we measure everything by the statistics.
That is quite wrong. Authority, and I go back to the original Latin word for that, auctor, and that means that you are the author, the origin, you are the source of something.
And ultimately, you are the origin of life. So authentic authority, if authority is to be honored, if it's to be respected, if the person who has it is supposed to be followed or obeyed, it's because that person is giving life. And then you have the rights that are associated with what it means to give life. So you are nurturing and bringing a life to its completion and to its fulfillment. And I think that that also is indeed the way God himself exercises power, omnipotence, you know, God, the Father Almighty, right? But then you go back to the creed, you know, we believe in God, the Father, the Almighty, and then what? The maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible. So God is to be respected because he is the source of life.
And so he has to be respected and honored. If you want to exist, if you want to live, you have to be connected to that kind of authority. If you distance yourself or you sever yourself, as in fact, is the we could even say is the original sin to be to set yourself apart from authentic power, authentic, you know, life giving ability, then yeah, so if we have the proper understanding of that, then it then we can talk about the authority of women.
Right. Yeah. And I found to as you do in the text, it's a twofold dimension of that authority means, again, actor of source creator in a certain dimension. But then the part two is the rights that the author has or the creator has to seek to the sustaining the fulfillment of that light. And so sometimes we miss the second part of that, that and I find it and I don't want to get into the Marian stuff too quickly, but it's hard to push back. But, you know, Benedict, the 15th, it talks about and Leo, the 13th before him talks about how Our Lady at Calvary offered up her maternal rights, surrendered her maternal rights at Calvary, which means she had a right to protect Jesus. But for a higher call, she did not exercise that right. But before getting to to Our Lady in Calvary, just the more essential idea that a woman does have an authority because of her primordial role in giving life, and then also the right to sustain the fulfillment of the fruit of that life.
Exactly. And I think that that's, that's what Mary does. Again, I may be jumping ahead too much there, but she uses her maternal authority to nurture and sustain the salvific mission of her Son. So there is that. 
Right. And that also, you know, will, of course, find itself critical in even the mediation of graces. Once humanity is redeemed, humanity then has to be nourished with the fruits of the redemption. But yes, I'm using every tiny amount of temperance I have to hold back on Our Lady because this stuff is so massively relevant. But I do want to go from authority of woman in society, which includes, again, this primordial role. Of course, the man is involved in procreation. But without getting, you know, too specific here, technically, the participation of man can be almost instantaneous when that does not happen with woman. And just the existential giving of self involved in nine months of pregnancy. And again, we're not saying that good Christian husbands aren't there. But we're saying technically, biologically, minimally, the minimum is a moment compared to nine months of ontological emptying to the child.
Well, right. And one of the books, one book that had an enormous influence on my thinking, and I quoted in my work, is George Gilder. Actually, the book came out in 1973 or 74.
Sexual Suicide was the name of this work. George Gilder started out as an Episcopalian, eventually found his way into the Catholic Church. Wow, that book was so incredibly insightful.
And his thesis is that women are really in control of civilization. Okay, now, in what respect?
Men, men must. His argument is that men must come under the biological rhythms of female life-giving ability. And if they don't, if they don't allow themselves to be subjected, if you will, to use that word, or maybe to surrender themselves to what Gilder says, the long-term life-giving powers of women, then the man is projected into the future.
If he is aiding and serving, maybe there's the word you want, the life-giving role of women, and of course, he does argue that when it comes to procreation, well, the male role is momentary and over with quickly. Now, everything is given over to the woman. She is the one who will conceive. She is the one who will gestate life. This projects the man into the future. She will be the one giving birth. And then there is years, even after that, if we're talking about the woman nursing the child, babies are more attached to their moms in the early years than they are to their dads. And he even makes the argument, well, look, you know, the guy doesn't even have to be alive. So not that we want that, but he's making a point. 
Okay. Right. Right. And let me say that too, in terms of just to assure, you know, the problem when we talk about the true dignity of woman is there's so many triggers today to the radical, liberal, really anti-feminist lies that are out there, that as soon as people hear a good discussion about the uniqueness of woman, they say, well, gosh, is this crossing the line? And I just, I gotta say for our viewers, I mean, we are both unquestionably, completely orthodox Catholic theologians in this, and this stuff has to be said. And it has to be said because if we don't get woman right, we're not going to get the mother right. We're not going to get Our Lady right. 
And in fact, it should be the other way around. We should get Our Lady right. And that should be the model for us. 
But it's also true. I mean, as father of eight kids, and really, this really came from a new father recently, he said, I had to kind of learn my fatherhood a little bit in my attachment, my connection with my child through my wife. Well, right. 
And I, that's, I have my chapter on the authority of women, you know, the woman is the mediator of life to the man. If she doesn't honor his paternity, we have a problem. He's at kind of, shall we say, at the mercy of her knowledge that she has conceived a child with him. She mediates his fatherhood to him.
And then everything in terms of male authority is put to the service of the family. I mean, a guy is going to, you know, a man's going to go out and work, he's going to bring home a paycheck.
And who is it for? It's not just for him, and his aggrandizement. But his masculinity is put to the service of his family, his wife, his children. And in that sense, he's projected into the future with her and associated with her life-giving abilities. And of course, we want to be careful. We don't want anyone listening to this to get the impression, well, women are just baby making machines or something. Okay, that's not right. I mean, women make contributions in all areas. But again, going back to the insights of St. Edith Stein, but always with that feminine genius, if we borrow the language from John Paul II, not separate from it, not despite it, but because of it. Everything is humanized by that feminine outlook and that feminine genius. 
I mean, women ultimately are the defenders of life. And I used to give a speech on Mulieris Dignitatem, actually, and I argued there that how is it that embryos and fetuses could be experimented upon? Because they are detached from their mothers, and so they are completely objectified.
No one can experiment on a fetus, if the mother says, my child, right? My baby, so that there is that human connection between the mother and her offspring that says, no, you cannot do this to my child. But once that, that intimacy and that relation, okay, being in relation is severed, then the human person is reduced to a thing. And so then we're off to that terrible dehumanization that we see in fetal experimentation, stem cell embryo harvesting from embryos, and of course, abortion.
And as you're making reference to this, again, I can't, but again, return to this idea of, as you say, of course, women are not limited to baby makers, but babies are a manifestation of their femininity. It's not the source of their femininity. But you just, you don't want to underestimate, I mean, Thomas More is right. Every kid's a miracle. Every time a child comes forth, that's a miracle. Even if it happens in the natural order, it's still a supernatural event that's made possible. And the last thing we want to do is denigrate the importance of the role of good Catholic husbands and fathers in this. But the reality is the question of women, I mean, Kenneth Clark says, women are the protectresses of civilization. Women have a certain role in taming the male barbarian in a certain sense.
Well, then George Gilder would agree with that, I think.
Right. And so again, I'm very happy to be a man. I don't have any desires to make any types of changes. And that's what allows me to rejoice in the uniqueness of femininity and womanhood. 
So well, let's now bring this to the Church. So the question, if you want to, you know, perk up ears, we can talk about the authority of women in the Church. So let's give some foundations for appropriate dimensions. And even as before a program talking about, you know, one telltale sign of inappropriateness is the idea that women in the Church have the task of taking over male roles and to get into, you know, the sanctuary. So talk to us. Okay. The key to the whole thing is that we have to appreciate and respect the very way in which salvation, redemption of the human race is accomplished. And redemption is accomplished in a covenant relationship. Now, I say something a little, maybe a little disturbing, as people will hear it for the first time. Maybe I say, guess what? Jesus, and here we go, is not saving the world by himself. Jesus is not saving the world alone. Okay. He is saving the world in relation. 
I think that the key to understanding just about everything, including the Trinity, is that existence is not based on radical individualism on one side, or a reversion back into paganism, where radical unity is honored to the exclusion of distinctions and individuality. The key is that we are in relation, so that the reality is based on being in relation. And that includes even our Lord. So when I say Jesus is not saving the world by himself, okay. Now, this is where everything, in a way, really comes down. Why is Jesus male?
Okay. And it wasn't just, well, eeny, meeny, miny, moe. I got to choose one or the other. Okay. Oh, I'll come as a guy. All right. Jesus' masculinity has everything to do with his salvific work, because the covenant of redemption, going all the way back to the Old Testament, is marital. Marriage is the sign of the covenant. Jesus is a married man, so he accomplishes his masculine role in redemption in relation to a woman. Okay. And that woman is his bride, the Church. So this understanding that the Church is female, the mater ecclesia, mother Church, goes back all the way to the earliest fathers of the Church, understanding the Church is female. And of course, even all the way to St. Paul, and in particular, his letter to the Ephesians. The Church is the bride of Christ.
So then the question becomes, as far as we understand what the Church is, that is not just poetry. That is not just a nice way of talking, as if calling God Father was just a way of talking about God. So I have a whole section in my book on, how is it that God is really, really the Father? Okay. A fatherhood exists in God first, before it exists here in the natural order in actual historical males. Okay.
And so there is a, I would call it a metaphysical ontological relationship between the fatherhood of God and human masculinity. Okay. Those two things are sacramentally joined.
And so if Jesus is in relation to the Church as his body, the Church completes Jesus. She fulfills him. She extends his salvific work into time and space. So the women then become, and this is also from Edith Stein, as she said, I think maybe it's in the beginning of, let me just take a quick look here. My book on sexuality and authority. Yes. It's the very first sentence. Okay. In chapter one. So here's Edith Stein. If you don't agree with me, well, maybe you'll agree with her. So she says, woman is called upon to embody in her highest and purest development, the essence of the Church to be its symbol. Okay. Right.
 So that's, that is the thing that I think has yet to be fully appreciated. My dream would be that beginning in the second grade catechism classes, all right, with six-year-olds and seven-year-olds and whatever, that we start to actually have a catechetics on this very point that the Church is feminine and that women sacramentally are what the Church is. Baptized women are what the Church is in relationship to Jesus. Right. And so that also then tells us why women can't be priests, why they shouldn't be priests. Okay. Because again, to recognize, appreciate, and respect that the covenant of redemption is a marital covenant. And that the, I mean, unless you just want to disagree, I guess, with St. Paul, he says something absolutely remarkable in the fifth chapter of his letter to the Ephesians that husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church. Right. And then he talks about the purpose of male authority to love and respect women who are there. Women are in a sense complete the man. Okay. And then he has no introduction. There's no preface. All of a sudden we are back in Genesis chapter three or actually Genesis chapter two, the climax of creation in Genesis chapter two, verse 20, 24. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and his mother and cling to his wife and the two shall become one flesh. And then he gives the ultimate exegesis immediately after he quotes that he says, he says, this, this is a great mystery for it refers to Christ and the Church. Right. Right. Okay. So what's happening there is that Paul is telling us in divine revelation that from the beginning, and that's a beginning with a capital B, okay. That's a theological category. From the very beginning, God created men and women as sacramental signs of the covenant between Jesus and the Church.
So we are all, we are, this is not just mere biology, right? These are transcendent sacramental signs. And they, they, if you, if you, you know, can kind of crudely say mess around with them, uh, you're, you're, you're messing around with something sacred. You're messing around with a sacred language that was created by God in the beginning to speak the truth of what it means to be redeemed. And so automatically we have this enormous dignity that's created by God to speak the covenant that exists by which the whole human race is saved. 
And of course, St. John Paul II entirely agrees with that. And so much of the theology of the body is talking about the original unity of man and woman, right? Brings in Christ and the Church, you know, even with, you know, uh, Ephesians five, uh, you know, and again, in Mulieris Dignitatem, St. John Paul II talks about a mutual submission out of reference for Christ. Right. Yes. And you know, so if you want to be, if we want to be true to these images, if the husband is, is, is Jesus and the, the, the wife is the Church who did more for whom? Well, Jesus did more for the Church. That means the husband has to even strive for more sacrifice, more. 
Yes. This is so important. Um, because the whole, uh, uh, practice, the whole idea and practice of submission, you know, we, we chafe against it. You know, we find it repugnant in some respects. Um, and especially because, uh, Paul starts out with women be submissive to your husbands, uh, as the Church is submissive to, to, to the Lord.
However, um, what does he say about, about the submission there? Um, Jesus gave himself up for her, right? Jesus gave him the husband, Jesus to his bride. He gave himself. So the point, the point is that feminine submission is not according to a pagan Aristotelian model of, you know, ruler, ruler subject, right? Ruler subject. We are, we are, that's gone. Um, the ruler, if you will, has submitted himself to his bride. He gave himself up for her. So that means that feminine authority can be free. It can be freely given, not, not imposed. Um, and not, not as a denigration, but as a, but as a, a true authentic response to an act of love that Jesus poured himself out for her. So there's, it's made, there's male and female, if we can say submission and, and it's, and it's by that, it's by that mutual submission that they can become one flesh, uh, together as, as a sign of the, as, uh, the covenant of redemption.
And this, and this doesn't take it away from, you know, the classic key. I mean, this is why it's such a beautiful development. This doesn't take away from, uh, the husband being head and, and, and the wife being heart, it's different ways that they are called to submit to each other. So it's not equality doesn't mean identical. 
It doesn't mean sameness, right, exactly.
And it means equality. But now I've got to, because I no longer I'm holding back. Uh, I've got to bring this to the mother because quite frankly, for us to, to flesh out the role, the authentic role of woman in the Church, we have to go to Our Lady. And I want to read this, uh, this one, uh, uh, quote from the text, um, quote as the New Eve, Mary is the Co-redemptrix. Her role as such is revealed by Christ at Cana, when he addresses his mother by the word woman, this woman of Cana is the woman of Calvary, where Mary accomplished by her maternal authority, the covenantal role of the New Eve, whose work united to the sacrifice of her Son serves as the origin of man's regeneration.
Okay. Unpack that glorious paragraph for us. 
Um, yeah, Mary at Cana. Um, it's just so stuffed full of theological importance. Um, so what we see going on there, uh, that the, uh, the bride and the groom at the, at the, this wedding celebration, um, you know, this, this, there, there's about a, there's a disaster about to happen. They've run out of wine. Okay. You don't want that to happen in the middle of the cele…, you know, the celebration, Mary is attuned to the problem. Okay. She turned and she knows her Son can do something about it. Um, and she also knows because it's embedded in the actual text of this, uh, Johannine episode. Um, she knows that if Jesus performs a miracle and that will be his first miracle, this will launch him into his public life. And once he is, uh, once his public life has begun, um, that will lead to what they will lead to the cross. So she is mothering him to his mission. And so when she says, uh, they have no more wine, of course, then Jesus responds, uh, woman, what does this have to do with me and you? My hour has not yet come. Okay. So in, in John's John's, uh, um, theology, if you will, uh, the hour is a reference to the cross.
So even, so Jesus is telling us, telling her that he knows what is the, uh, the consequence, right. Of performing that miracle. And then she does that beautiful, uh, um, says that beautiful thing. She just turns to the, to the, uh, the servers do whatever he tells you. Yeah. Yeah.




Monica, it's, it's so extraordinary. And again, uh, and you know, uh, actually Sheen has a, has a wonderful commentary on this, um, and others where he, he's saying, you know, first of all, it's it's woman that's relating Mary to the woman of Genesis, right? Uh, the woman of Cana is the woman of Calvary is the woman of revelation is the woman of Galatians. She's the woman with the God-man in this process of redemption. 
But then secondly, both the Greek and Latin, it's one of the most mistranslated passages of the  New Testament. In, in the Latin it is “quid mihi et tibi” what to me and to you. 
Yes, this is a, this is so important. And if you go, yeah, that's why everybody should have a Greek interlinear Bible. A lot of the way it's translated, woman, what does this have to do with me? Yeah. What is your concern? How does your concern have to do with me? Why are you bothering me with this? It's, it's your thing, but it's totally divisive instead of the New Adam and New Eve are joined in the hour. Yeah. What does this have to do with me and you?
Right? Because you said Jesus doesn't redeem alone. Yeah. And that's mostly manifested by the fact that he's got a New Eve with the new app. Yes. He has a partner. Exactly. And also what's going on there, Eve and, you know, go back and go back to the remarkable theology of St. Irenaeus of Leon who really was one of the first to provide an exposition on Mary as the New Eve and in the second century. So Mary as the New Eve, she fulfills what the original Eve failed to do.
So the original Eve failed to call Adam to his godly responsibilities. Here we have the New Eve calling the New Adam to fulfill his mission and to go to the cross. So, you know, Mary, you know, and I argue in my book, you know, when Mary as the source of the incarnation, she doesn't just birth Jesus on Christmas Day, but she births Jesus and his mission. So she birthed Jesus to the cross. 
And that process, I mean, her yes at the annunciation is a maternal yes. And it goes back to your definition of authority. It's not only giving life, it's sustaining the purpose of that life. And for the redeemer of the world, that means she's going to be a Co-redemptrix with that, not just in giving birth to Jesus, but following that whole process. I want to read another quote because, again, this is so critically relevant to our question. This is on page 104. Quote, at Calvary, Mary is not a passive onlooker. The crucifixion of her Son is not something that just happens to her. Mary actively participates in the sacrifice by offering up her Son. It is a mother's sacrifice, the sacrifice of the New Eve. Her sacrifice is different from Christ's, and I'll comment on that, but is in covenantal union with it. Without her sacrifice, the new creation would not be established. That's a million dollar line in of itself.
Without her sacrifice, the new creation would not be established. Mary's offering up of Christ is the fulfillment of her fiat as the New Eve to the New Adam. This offer is specific to feminine responsibility for the faith. The New Eve held Christ in her womb, but her motherhood in bringing forth the head resides equally in letting him go. The mother of Christ must let him be the Savior.
There's so much there, but I want to comment on it not being the sacrifice. In a real sense, she's offering something different, but critically, and I think more fundamentally, it's one, and this is what comes out through the medievals over and over, Bernard and Arnold and John Tauller and Bonaventure. It's one single sacrifice offered by the New Adam and New Eve united for the redemption of the world. Now, of course, the New Eve can't give what the New Adam gives because she's not divine, but she gives what she can as mother of the New Adam in a single offered sacrifice, and that's why what you said Jesus doesn't redeem alone ultimately shows its fulfillment in Our Lady's role as the Co-redemptrix actively participating. We've talked about before, especially before the council, but some during the council, and it's not in the council, but there's a big push of saying, no, Mary was just a receiver at Calvary. Mary didn't have an active role. She just received the graces, then she distributed it, and I believe it's a violation of the authentic, active, maternal, feminine role of Mary at Calvary.
Well, and it can only be that way if we understand that the Church is founded according to the Marian pattern. In a way, the Church is the extension of Mary, and the Church, as Christ's redemptive partner, I mean, the Church is not just a thing. It's united to her head, and Jesus, dare I say it, but he depends on the Church. He, dare I say it, needs her, and wants to need her. He wills it. He wills to need her. Yes, yes. In a way, this goes back to an incredible optimism that even goes back into Judaism.
God wills to partner with human beings in the accomplishment of redemption. You are not getting in his way, as if to say, well, I've got to do a football game. I've got to go around all the tacklers and get to the end zone. No, he wills. He wills. He calls Abraham.
He calls Moses. He calls David. He calls the prophets, and they partner. They literally are his partners. Even just the Jewish people themselves as a nation are the prefigurement of the Church. The Church is the new Israel. Again, I'd just like to point out how incredibly optimistic God is when it comes to who we are in relation to him. The Church is an institution filled with people, but according to the New Testament and St. Paul, she is the pillar and the bulwark of truth. She is holy and immaculate without stain or wrinkle or anything of that sort, despite the failings of individuals. That, again, is very, very optimistic.
It is optimistic. As you say, this is God's providential plan. It's typical of the love of our Lord that he would take the massive lion's share, even in terms of redemption, but he wants every single human being to participate by free choice in a Christian context to be, as St. John Paul II said, co-redeemers in Christ. We're all called to participate in redemption. Augustine's right. God creates us without us, but he can't save us without us.
And so he wants that process, and that's why I and so many believe that a proclamation, a solemn definition of Our Lady's role as Co-redemptrix would help us to better … the world would appreciate, the Church would appreciate how, if it's true about the mother uniquely, and it's unique for her in virtue of her Immaculate Conception, but it's true for all of us in terms of participation, I think that's the great stumbling block. We've lost a concept of participation. And if we say Jesus does it alone, then we've lost our responsibility of what's in Colossians 1:24, that we're called to make up what is lacking in the substance of Christ for the sake of his body, which is the Church. That's a bold statement. That's bolder than you saying. It really is. Yeah, you know, Jesus redeems alone. We are called to make up what is lacking, but that's because he wills it, because he allows us to participate in the greatest act of human history, which is the redemption itself. Yeah, that's beautiful.
Right. Well, Monica, we are of time, but listen, fantastic. I think these things are very good. I again want to recommend these thoughts, and more are beautifully articulated in the Authority of Women in the Catholic Church. It's a great title, and I think sometimes people are surprised what's in here because they could get the idea that this is a misunderstanding of the proper role of woman, and I think it just hits the mark so powerfully, so I strongly recommend it.
Thank you, Monica, for the interview, for being with us, and I hope again we can even, you know, more promulgate these ideas, which I think are, you know, so critical for the Church in the world right now. So I look forward to doing this again with you. Thank you so much, Mark. God bless.
All right. God bless you, and thanks for being with us with Mariology Without Apology. God bless you all.