Churching

ohnonotgmail

I was reminded of something by my mother the other day and i was curious if the practice was still followed. At the time of my birth, approximately 50 years ago, a woman who had given birth was considered unclean by the catholic church and was not allowed to attend mass until she had been "churched". I believe this was a special religious ceremony designed to make the woman clean and acceptable to attend mass. does anybody know if this practice still continues today?

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Not just Catholics but Anglican and Lutheran churches as well. It was phased out after Vatican 2.

Effects

Why were they considered unclean? Are they not doing God's work, continuing the species?

ohnonotgmail

Effects wrote: »

Why were they considered unclean? Are they not doing God's work, continuing the species?

from Leviticus apparently

Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child: then she shall be unclean seven days; according to the days of the separation for her infirmity shall she be unclean.

Hoboo

Similar nonsense continues in many religions.

Effects

ohnonotgmail wrote: »

from Leviticus apparently

Ah yeah, of course. Anti woman type reasons.
The church has moved on a bit from that thankfully.

ohnonotgmail

Effects wrote: »

Ah yeah, of course. Anti woman type reasons.
The church has moved on a bit from that thankfully.

they were still doing it in my lifetime and i'm not ancient.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

ohnonotgmail wrote: »

they were still doing it in my lifetime and i'm not ancient.

It should have been gone by 1967.

Peregrinus

Couple of misconceptions (hah! see what I did there?) in this thread, the main one being; Churching did not indicate a belief that a woman who had given birth was “unclean”.

It’s true that the ceremony derived ultimately from the Jewish rite of purification which was celebrated after a woman had given birth, and that rite did relate to a belief that, in Jewish law, given birth made you ritually impure. (It was one of many, many things that could make someone ritually impure.) But (a) ritual impurity in Jewish law had nothing to do with uncleanliness, either moral or physical, and (b) one of the key points of difference between Judaism and Christianity is that Christianity, pretty much from the outset, rejected the whole notion of ritual impurity; it was regarded as swept away by the sacrifice of Christ. This is one of the earliest things that Christians settled among themselves, and that they argued with the Jews about.

So, while Christianity did inherit the purification ritual as a practice, it did not inherit the theological basis for it, and had to develop a whole new basis. The basis was (a) as a thanksgiving for the mother’s survival and health after childbirth (until modern times, concerns about health and even survival were a big factor in women’s feelings about pregnancy and childbirth) and (b) as a social ritual to make the end of the period of “lying-in”, when a mother was considered sufficient recovered from childbirth to resume normal social and community links. Probably a fair amount of superstition and folk beliefs became attached to the churching ritual because the dangers of childbirth and its consequences were very real. Plus of course puritanical attitudes to sex and childbirth, and sexist attitudes to women, could very easily attach themselves to the ritual in the popular imagination - and they did. Ironically, we know about this because of periodic denunciations by the official church of people teaching that churching was appropriate because childbirth was defiling to a woman.

The ritual was never mandatory (and the suggestion that a new mother was not permitted to attend church until the ritual had been celebrated is not correct) but it was widely observed, probably because it met a genuine social and cultural need to address the factors just mentioned. It had started to decline even before Vatican II; with developments in medical practice and maternal care and changing attitudes to the experience of pregnancy and childbirth the need for it was simply not as great. My own mother, whose first child was born in 1960, was not churched and, while she experienced a certain amount of disapproval or disappointment from women two generations older than her, among her peer group this was completely accepted and quite common.

SFAIK the official liturgical books still include an order for “Blessing of a Woman after Childbirth” so , if you really want to be churched, you can be. The practice has not been banned, just abandoned.

hinault

Peregrinus wrote: »

Couple of misconceptions (hah! see what I did there?) in this thread, the main one being; Churching did not indicate a belief that a woman who had given birth was “unclean”.

It’s true that the ceremony derived ultimately from the Jewish rite of purification which was celebrated after a woman had given birth, and that rite did relate to a belief that, in Jewish law, given birth made you ritually impure. (It was one of many, many things that could make someone ritually impure.) But (a) ritual impurity in Jewish law had nothing to do with uncleanliness, either moral or physical, and (b) one of the key points of difference between Judaism and Christianity is that Christianity, pretty much from the outset, rejected the whole notion of ritual impurity; it was regarded as swept away by the sacrifice of Christ. This is one of the earliest things that Christians settled among themselves, and that they argued with the Jews about.

So, while Christianity did inherit the purification ritual as a practice, it did not inherit the theological basis for it, and had to develop a whole new basis. The basis was (a) as a thanksgiving for the mother’s survival and health after childbirth (until modern times, concerns about health and even survival were a big factor in women’s feelings about pregnancy and childbirth) and (b) as a social ritual to make the end of the period of “lying-in”, when a mother was considered sufficient recovered from childbirth to resume normal social and community links. Probably a fair amount of superstition and folk beliefs became attached to the churching ritual because the dangers of childbirth and its consequences were very real. Plus of course puritanical attitudes to sex and childbirth, and sexist attitudes to women, could very easily attach themselves to the ritual in the popular imagination - and they did. Ironically, we know about this because of periodic denunciations by the official church of people teaching that churching was appropriate because childbirth was defiling to a woman.

The ritual was never mandatory (and the suggestion that a new mother was not permitted to attend church until the ritual had been celebrated is not correct) but it was widely observed, probably because it met a genuine social and cultural need to address the factors just mentioned. It had started to decline even before Vatican II; with developments in medical practice and maternal care and changing attitudes to the experience of pregnancy and childbirth the need for it was simply not as great. My own mother, whose first child was born in 1960, was not churched and, while she experienced a certain amount of disapproval or disappointment from women two generations older than her, among her peer group this was completely accepted and quite common.

SFAIK the official liturgical books still include an order for “Blessing of a Woman after Childbirth” so , if you really want to be churched, you can be. The practice has not been banned, just abandoned.

An excellent and highly accurate summation.

Cabaal

Effects wrote: »

Ah yeah, of course. Anti woman type reasons.
The church has moved on a bit from that thankfully.

Has it?
I'm not seeing many women priests these days.

It's like saying a company has moved on in its policy's towards women but yet it still doesn't employee any women.

Wanderer78

I can see a good future for this 'the church'!