When I started at Harvard University, the first thing I noticed was the absence of femininity on campus. Gendered clubs of any kind are banned. Sororities and fraternities are known officially as “Unrecognized Single-Gender Social Organizations.” Even saying the word “woman” requires qualifiers such as “female-identifying” to be considered acceptable.  

Although I wanted to be a part of a women-only organization, I wasn’t allowed, so I resorted to searching off campus at the Catholic church. 

Amid a campus lined with portraits of historic men, the Women Doctors of the Church Chapel at Harvard University provides the femininity lacking elsewhere: It is adorned with icons of four humble women: St. Catherine of Siena, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, St. Teresa of Avila and St. Hildegard of Bingen.  

As women religious, the female doctors of the Church were all strong proponents of female-only spaces. There may soon be a fifth feminist saint joining this wall of women: St. Edith Stein.  

On April 18, the Discalced Carmelite superior general, Father Miguel Márquez Calle, petitioned Pope Francis that St. Edith Stein be declared a doctor of the Church. This petition is the first step in the “doctorate” process, of which Pope Francis has the final say. 

The petition requests for Stein, also known as St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, to be recognized as doctor veritatis, or “doctor of truth.” The 20th-century convert from Judaism is famously quoted, “All those who seek truth, seek God, whether this is clear to them or not.” 

The Harvard motto of Veritas is promoted everywhere across campus. This is the only word left standing of its original motto, Veritas Christo et Ecclesiae, meaning “Truth for Christ and the Church.” The full phrase is only found in a few places around campus, one of them being the Catholic Student Center. 

There, I became the leader of the Harvard Catholic Women’s Group — not by choice, but by necessity; there wasn’t an existing female-only group for Catholic graduate students. Without knowing much about St. Edith Stein, I elected her as the patron saint of the group due to her academic success.  

Stein is remembered as a distinguished philosopher, writer, theologian and co-patroness of Europe, alongside St. Bridget of Sweden and St. Catherine of Siena, two of the Church’s greatest medieval female mystics.  

In comparison with all of her great accomplishments, Stein’s feminism — a feminism that is holistically Catholic — often flies under the radar. 

 

 

Catholic Feminism 

Stein was the first European woman to earn her Ph.D. in philosophy (and she did so with highest honors). After being denied the further education required for professorship on the basis of sex, she turned to teaching young women at a Catholic school. It was there that Stein developed her Essays on Women, a series of eight papers on the vocation of womanhood and the necessity for feminine spirituality and female education. 

These essays were based on her studies of philosophical anthropology, namely phenomenology and personalism, which focus on the existence of individual beings. While she concluded that since the beginning of the world, “woman is destined to be both wife and mother,” Stein detailed the intricacies of these vocations for each woman, including spiritual motherhood. 

Stein herself was never a worldly wife or mother, though she was a faithful bride of Christ unto death. Before being killed at Auschwitz, she spent the last moments of her life caring for the children there, being a mother to the motherless. This is the crux of her feminism: Each woman is called to this same vocation, but through different paths.  

 

 

The Feminine Genius 

This personalist idea of feminism identified much of what is found in Pope St. John Paul II’s “Letter to Women,” especially the idea of the “feminine genius.” The feminine genius is marked by a woman’s receptivity, sensitivity, generosity and maternity. These traits are unique for each woman; therefore, they cannot be compared. Stein’s role as a spiritual mother differed greatly from her own mother’s, though both are necessary to complete the body of the Church. 

Today, the word “feminism” has been twisted to mean complete equality between men and women. The Catholic Church has always been feminist in the true meaning of the word: Men and women have equal dignity — they fulfill unique roles that complement one another. 

Based on today’s definition of feminism, the female doctors of the Church may appear passive and small, but in their times, they were remarkably strong in their identity as women. This strength allowed them to instruct popes, reform orders and ultimately leave behind an extensive oeuvre of theological teaching. 

 

 

Carrying the Cross 

Each of these women fought against the structure of their day that told them what women were meant to be. They carried the cross of being a woman, living out their vocations in spite of the injustices they faced due to their sex. 

After the Nazi Nuremberg Laws removed Stein from her teaching position, she entered the Discalced Carmelites, choosing the name “Teresa Benedicta of the Cross.” Stein had a deep devotion to the cross, much of which came from studying her order’s male patron, St. John of the Cross. She wrote an extensive study of his mysticism, entitled The Science of the Cross. 

The year before Stein died, she wrote to a fellow Carmelite sister, “One can only gain a knowledge of the cross if one has thoroughly experienced the cross. I have been convinced of this from the first moment onwards and have said with all my heart: Ave, Crux, spes unica (‘I welcome you, Cross, our only hope’).” 

Stein carried her cross her whole life, as she details in her autobiography, Life in a Jewish Family. Stein bore the cross of being a Jewish woman; though she wasn’t given the same opportunities as men, she did not let that stop her from becoming the woman God made her to be.  

 

 

Embracing Femininity in Male Spaces 

Stein exemplified the fact that women can be academics and professionals while still fully embracing their womanhood. They don’t have to abandon their femininity, but they can use it to become the women God made them to be. 

While gender-neutralizing all spaces may seem like a good idea, this at best limits a woman’s femininity and at worst forces her to be more like a man. Select female spaces are necessary to give room for female souls to bloom into who God made them to be.  

Stein is an inspiration for all women who struggle with navigating how to be feminine in these spaces. She embodied the “both/and” of Catholicism: One can be both strong and sensitive, guided by both her mind and her heart. 

After learning more about St. Edith Stein, I believe that I didn’t choose her as the patron of the Harvard Catholic Women’s Group, but she chose the group herself. As a potential future doctor veritatis, it’s no surprise that she wants to enter into the spaces where veritas is under attack. 

Her quote is used to drive the group’s mission: “A woman’s soul is fashioned as a shelter in which other souls may unfold.” Only when women are given the space to promote the feminine genius can their souls truly prepare to be that shelter for others. 

Whether a woman is an academic or a professional, a mother or a spiritual mother, or a sister or a friend, her experience as a woman is important. Stein’s personalist philosophy highlights the unique strength in femininity rather than eradicating the idea of the feminine altogether: This is true feminism.