Quote of the day, 4 September: St. Edith Stein

In God’s new kingdom, the role of the human couple has changed; it has become a relationship of mother and son.

The Son of God is the Son of Man through his mother but not through a human father. God’s son did not choose the usual way of human propagation to become the Son of Man.

Can we not find here an indication that there is a flaw inherent in this fashion of procreation from the first sin, which can only be redeemed by the kingdom of grace? Also, does it not indicate the nobility of motherhood as the purest and most elevated union of human beings?

The distinction of the female sex is that a woman was the person who was permitted to help establish God’s new kingdom; the distinction of the male sex is that redemption came through the Son of Man, the new Adam. And therein, man’s rank of priority is expressed again.

Saint Edith Stein

The Separate Vocations of Man and Woman According to Nature and Grace
Lecture delivered 30 October 1931, Ursuline school, Aachen

Stein, E 2017, Essays On Woman, The Collected Works of Edith Stein, Book 2, translated from the German by Oben, F, ICS Publications, Washington D.C.