Do souls have gender?

[PRmerger]

Babies do not think?
They may not think like an adult, or a child, but they do solve problems.
Primary instincts are intuitive thought processes. If this then that, if not then this,… These are making judgments, these are reasons.

No, Anony.

No right minded person would say that babies use reason.

In fact, using the definition you, yourself, provided above (ability to discern right from wrong), it’s clear that babies do not have reason.

 

[Anony_Mous]

No, Anony.

No right minded person would say that babies use reason.

In fact, using the definition you, yourself, provided above (ability to discern right from wrong), it’s clear that babies do not have reason.

Then I am not a right minded person, but a wrong minded one.

I am hungry, I’ll cry know, to get some attention.

 

[PRmerger]

Then I am not a right minded person, but a wrong minded one.

Well, I don’t care very much to dialogue with folks who aren’t right minded, but let’s see if I can continue this.

I am hungry, I’ll cry know, to get some attention.

Surely you see the pickle this creates, right?

Firstly, that means that animals, which know they are hungry and cry for their mamas, also have rational souls?

And this means that someone who’s unconscious (say, anesthetized), who can’t know if he’s hungry,*** has no soul?***

Is that what you want to argue?

 

[Anony_Mous]

Well, I don’t care very much to dialogue with folks who aren’t right minded, but let’s see if I can continue this.

Surely you see the pickle this creates, right?

Firstly, that means that animals, which know they are hungry and cry for their mamas, also have rational souls?

And this means that someone who’s unconscious (say, anesthetized), who can’t know if he’s hungry,*** has no soul?***

Is that what you want to argue?

Sorry you reason I am not right minded. That is your judgment of me, a reflection of one’s soul?

I am not familiar with what happens when I am unconscious for I am unconscious. But that does not mean ‘therefore no soul’.

Reason is not only related to a by-product of brain activity. It is also a by-product of spirit activity. The Holy Spirit of Truth also has an influence.
Truth revealed can be a ‘knowing’ that cannot be understood or reasoned by brain, only by heart.
Faith tells us that what is revealed is true, though brain reasoning may not understand it.
The reason of the soul contains both worldly and divine reasoning.

Animal reasoning operates differently to most humans. Yes they reason things out in a worldly fashion because they are in the world. But they also use reasoning that comes to them telepathically. They can read intentions, reasoning another’s thoughts and heart.

 

[PRmerger]

Sorry you reason I am not right minded. That is your judgment of me, a reflection of one’s soul?

Emmm…I am only going by what you told me.

Do you wish to recant this statement in which you declare yourself to not be right minded?

Then I am not a right minded person, but a wrong minded one.

I am hungry, I’ll cry know, to get some attention.

I will happily oblige with returning to a belief that you are right minded, should you wish to retract.

I am not familiar with what happens when I am unconscious for I am unconscious. But that does not mean ‘therefore no soul’.

Egg-zactly.

Reason is not only related to a by-product of brain activity. It is also a by-product of spirit activity. The Holy Spirit of Truth also has an influence.
Truth revealed can be a ‘knowing’ that cannot be understood or reasoned by brain, only by heart.
Faith tells us that what is revealed is true, though brain reasoning may not understand it.
The reason of the soul contains both worldly and divine reasoning.

Animal reasoning operates differently to most humans. Yes they reason things out in a worldly fashion because they are in the world. But they also use reasoning that comes to them telepathically. They can read intentions, reasoning another’s thoughts and heart.

All of this, while interesting, Anony, is a nonsequitur.

You asserted that reason is the soul.

This means when people do not have reason, they do not have a soul.

That is 100% INCORRECT.

And you also seem to conflate “reason” with “ability to recognize hunger”.

And that means, then, that animals can reason, and that animals have rational souls.

That is also INCORRECT.

 

[Anony_Mous]

I have opened another source of reason, that of spirit, which you have avoided. As a result, you do not understand where I am coming from, because you are not currently connected with your heart, but only with your head.

It would be pointless to carry on with this conversation because without the spirit reasoning, the topic of soul is reason, would be incomplete and not understood.

 

[PRmerger]

I have opened another source of reason, that of spirit, which you have avoided. As a result, you do not understand where I am coming from, because you are not currently connected with your heart, but only with your head.

It would be pointless to carry on with this conversation because without the spirit reasoning, the topic of soul is reason, would be incomplete and not understood.

Perhaps if you could just show me where the error is in this logic:

“Reason is the soul”
"Reason is the ability to discern right from wrong’. (YOUR definition, initially, remember?)
“Babies can’t reason”

Therefore Babies have no soul.

 

[PRmerger]

Perhaps if you could just show me where the error is in this logic:

“Reason is the soul”
"Reason is the ability to discern right from wrong’. (YOUR definition, initially, remember?)
“Babies can’t reason”

Therefore Babies have no soul.

Now, Anony, if you want to equivocate on the definition of “Reason” and now take it to mean “the ability to know there is hunger in the body” (which is a very, very strange definition, but it’s also one you asserted), then tell me where the error is in this logic.

“Reason is the soul”
“Reason is the ability to know that there is hunger in the body”.
“My puppy knows when he is hungry”

Therefore, my puppy has a soul.

(A rational soul, of course, is the universe of discourse here).

 

[MarcoPolo]

Is there a Catholic teaching on this?

Is it possible that there could be an anomalous pairing of the 2–that is, a female soul with a male body? And vice versa?

I didn’t see these resources after a quick keyword search.Although both of them together are parents of their child, the woman’s motherhood constitutes a special “part” in this shared parenthood, and the most demanding part. Parenthood - even though it belongs to both - is realized much more fully in the woman, especially in the prenatal period. It is the woman who “pays” directly for this shared generation, which literally absorbs the energies of her body and soul. (Mulieris Dignitatem (Dignity and Vocation of Women))

The Catechism also cites the Council of Vienne:

CCC#365 The unity of soul and body is so profound that one has to **consider the soul to be the "form" of the body**: i.e., it is because of its spiritual soul that the body made of matter becomes a living, human body; spirit and matter, in man, are not two natures united, but rather their **union forms a single nature**.

And:

CCC#2332 **Sexuality affects all aspects of the human person in the unity of his body and soul**. It especially concerns affectivity, the capacity to love and to procreate, and in a more general way the aptitude for forming bonds of communion with others.

See also this old thread for same discussion.

 

[PRmerger]

I didn’t see these resources after a quick keyword search.Although both of them together are parents of their child, the woman’s motherhood constitutes a special “part” in this shared parenthood, and the most demanding part. Parenthood - even though it belongs to both - is realized much more fully in the woman, especially in the prenatal period. It is the woman who “pays” directly for this shared generation, which literally absorbs the energies of her body and soul. (Mulieris Dignitatem (Dignity and Vocation of Women))

The Catechism also cites the Council of Vienne:

CCC#365 The unity of soul and body is so profound that one has to **consider the soul to be the "form" of the body**: i.e., it is because of its spiritual soul that the body made of matter becomes a living, human body; spirit and matter, in man, are not two natures united, but rather their **union forms a single nature**.

And:

CCC#2332 **Sexuality affects all aspects of the human person in the unity of his body and soul**. It especially concerns affectivity, the capacity to love and to procreate, and in a more general way the aptitude for forming bonds of communion with others.

See also this old thread for same discussion.

Ah.

So there is the suggestion, then, that the soul does indeed have gender?

 

[MarcoPolo]

Ah.

So there is the suggestion, then, that the soul does indeed have gender?

I would say yes from what I’ve read. There is a consistent teaching in the Church that the body and soul form a singular person and that includes sexuality, as mentioned explicitly in CCC2332 above and implicitly in the other quotes.

 

[PRmerger]

I would say yes from what I’ve read. There is a consistent teaching in the Church that the body and soul form a singular person and that includes sexuality, as mentioned explicitly in CCC2332 above and implicitly in the other quotes.

Yes. I think this is the conclusion I am drawing towards.

It does hold up to scrutiny in light of Church teachings on, for example, the ordination of men.

We know that at ordination a change occurs–ontologically–at the very essence of the man standing there before God. His soul is changed forever. What stood before us 10 seconds earlier exists no more. At the moment of ordination, the universe is changed forever. A new creation exists

And that’s why, even if ordination of a woman is attempted, it doesn’t “take”.

Because, ontologically, her soul, her spirit, her essence, is female, and the right “matter” for ordination is a male.

 

[MarcoPolo]

Yes. I think this is the conclusion I am drawing towards.

It does hold up to scrutiny in light of Church teachings on, for example, the ordination of men.

We know that at ordination a change occurs–ontologically–at the very essence of the man standing there before God. His soul is changed forever. What stood before us 10 seconds earlier exists no more. At the moment of ordination, the universe is changed forever. A new creation exists

And that’s why, even if ordination of a woman is attempted, it doesn’t “take”.

Because, ontologically, her soul, her spirit, her essence, is female, and the right “matter” for ordination is a male.

Yup. That same observation on ordination came up in that old thread I linked to above.

 

[Aloysium]

The only time the soul is separate from the body is after death.
At that point it does not matter; gender is not an issue.
In the resurrection, whatever disturbance will be made right.
The person will be whole.
The question seems moot to me.

 

[Gorgias]

MarcoPolo:

Although both of them together are parents of their child, the woman’s motherhood constitutes a special “part” in this shared parenthood, and the most demanding part. Parenthood - even though it belongs to both - is realized much more fully in the woman, especially in the prenatal period. It is the woman who “pays” directly for this shared generation, which literally absorbs the energies of her body and soul. (Mulieris Dignitatem (Dignity and Vocation of Women))
The Catechism also cites the Council of Vienne:
CCC#365 The unity of soul and body is so profound that one has to consider the soul to be the “form” of the body: i.e., it is because of its spiritual soul that the body made of matter becomes a living, human body; spirit and matter, in man, are not two natures united, but rather their union forms a single nature.

Ah.

So there is the suggestion, then, that the soul does indeed have gender?

No.

The first quote merely says that the woman has a special role in parenting, and this role “absorbs the energies of her body and soul.” It does not mean that her soul is gendered, but merely that she (as a gendered person) has a particular role that is different than differently-gendered persons.

That would be like saying that the soul is gendered by virtue of any action undertaken by a gendered person: is the soul gendered because a man plays in the NFL? is the soul gendered because a woman plays in the WNBA? Of course not: they are (1) persons who have the characteristic of ‘gender’ and (2) they perform certain acts. That does not imply that these acts cause gender to ‘bleed’ into their souls.

The second quote, in saying that “the soul is the form of the body” is to be understood from a philosophical perspective. Like any council, Vienne addressed controversies of the day; in order to understand what’s being said there, we must first understand the particular controversy and the context in which it arose.

Vienne addressed the philosophical claims of Pierre Jean Olivi, a Franciscan theologian. In his day, the writings of Aristotle were being discovered in their fullness, and were being hotly debated. One such notion was Aristotle’s philosophy of body and soul, in which he declared the soul to be the form of the body.

(One tangent: if we look at this from a non-philosophical perspective – and therefore, completely misinterpret it – we look upon the soul as a sort of homunculus: we have hands and feet and red hair (and gender) because our soul has hands and feet and red hair and gender. However, that’s not at all what the notion of soul as ‘form’ means. Rather, it means that the actions that can be attributed to us as humans proceed from our ‘intellectual soul’ (see the Summa Theologiae, I.76.1); it’s a claim about why we’re human, and not about our constituent physical parts. (I’ll leave the research to you, since it would otherwise take up a whole page of posts.))

Olivi, however, didn’t like that claim: he thought that, if we said that the soul is the form of the body, we were ok – but that if we said that the rational part of the soul was the form of the body, we’d be stuck in a paradox. (In other words, it would mean either that rational acts were physical acts – since the form gives rise to acts in the body – or that the rational soul was not the form of the body (since the rational soul did not give the body its own characteristics (immortality, etc).) See this discussion of Olivi’s arguments.

So, the Council of Vienne is not saying what ya’ll are attempting to make it say. It’s not talking about gender correspondences between soul and body; it’s talking about powers of rationality and what it means to say that our soul makes us human. Not physical; not gendered; but human.

One last point, since I see it’s come up again: PRmerger continues to bring up the notion of ‘ontological change’ in ordination as if it proves her point about souls being gendered. Yet again, ya’ll are conflating ‘souls’ with ‘persons’. The person who is ordained acts in the person of Christ the Head (see CCC 1548 – it’s that service in persona Christi Capitis that we’re talking about here!). It’s not that the person acts in anima Christi Capitis. Rather, his person has been conformed to Christ, for the sake of service to the ordinary priesthood of believers.

All humans may receive the ontological change to their person in the sacrament of baptism; all male humans may receive the ontological change to their person in the sacrament of holy orders. It’s not the soul, but the person who is affected. (And, it is the male person who may be conformed to Christ the High Priest… not the male soul.) In making the argument that ya’ll are making, you confuse ‘person’ and ‘soul’, and as a result, you’re making a claim about a soul that can only be made about a person.

 

[MarcoPolo]

All humans may receive the ontological change to their person in the sacrament of baptism; all male humans may receive the ontological change to their person in the sacrament of holy orders. It’s not the soul, but the person who is affected. (And, it is the male person who may be conformed to Christ the High Priest… not the male soul.) In making the argument that ya’ll are making, you confuse ‘person’ and ‘soul’, and as a result, you’re making a claim about a soul that can only be made about a person.

Thank you for your thoughtful post. What do take from CCC#2332 which references sexuality “affecting” the soul? And also, if what you say above that the indelible mark of holy orders is accurate, then what of the heavenly person retaining that mark. Are you saying the mark is never on the person’s “soul,” but only on the person’s “person”? I am getting lost in the terms.

Also, is not Christ the heavenly bridegroom, consistent with his masculinity in his incarnation? Is not all this consistent with the concept that the person’s soul retains consistency with the person’s biological character?

Finally, do you think the Church teaches that souls are sexless and do you have citation for that? Or do you think the Church is silent on the matter?

 

[GEddie]

I think some entanglement of terms has occurred.

As I understand it, in human life,

**Soul **is the spiritual or nonbody aspect of the human being. It is unitary and so non divisible and therefore deathless. It generates such processes as the life and the mind of the human being, but requires a human body to express these functions.

Person is the fully-assembled human being, soul and body, alive. A bodiless soul or ghost would not be a person, neither is a dead human body.

So the “person” could have “gender” (sex) while the soul does not.

But either way, the “wrong body” hypothesis of transsexuality cannot be sustained. Because the soul forms in association with one and only one body, (and inno way preexists the life of the body) it cannot, if gendered, have any gender different from his or her body.

And if souls are nongendered, there is nothing to have a gender opposite to that of the body!

ICXC NIKA.

 

[Sarcelle]

Yes. I think this is the conclusion I am drawing towards.

It does hold up to scrutiny in light of Church teachings on, for example, the ordination of men.

We know that at ordination a change occurs–ontologically–at the very essence of the man standing there before God. His soul is changed forever. What stood before us 10 seconds earlier exists no more. At the moment of ordination, the universe is changed forever. A new creation exists

And that’s why, even if ordination of a woman is attempted, it doesn’t “take”.

Because, ontologically, her soul, her spirit, her essence, is female, and the right “matter” for ordination is a male.

Femininity and masculinity go beyond male and female. Male and female are biological while femininity and masculinity go beyond the physical world. At least that is what I read from Peter Kreeft.

 

[Gorgias]

Thank you for your thoughtful post. What do take from CCC#2332 which references sexuality “affecting” the soul?

I take it to be a discussion of sexuality, which is something different than mere gender. Moreover, it would seem that the quote speaks to sexuality affecting the person rather than the soul (although, as an aspect of the person, the soul is included in this affectedness). On the other hand, the attempt to call a soul ‘gendered’ is an attempt to reduce the soul to physicality – which it transcends.

And also, if what you say above that the indelible mark of holy orders is accurate, then what of the heavenly person retaining that mark.

Once a priest, always a priest. A person is never ‘unbaptized’, nor can he be ‘unordained’. Once configured to Christ the High Priest, he retains that ‘spiritual character’.

Are you saying the mark is never on the person’s “soul,” but only on the person’s “person”? I am getting lost in the terms.

It is a “spiritual character”. The “indelible mark” is mentioned as affecting the soul (see the section on Confirmation in the CCC for this wording), but the conformation to Christ is on the person. One who is a male person may be ordained, not one who ‘has a male soul.’ There’s no Church teaching that makes that kind of claim. (In fact, the Church rejects that kind of thinking: that’s precisely the kind of nonsense that the Gnostics used to teach – in the so-called “Gospel of Thomas”, Gnostics asserted that Jesus taught that women had to become men in order for their spirits to be acceptable to God and to attain to heaven.)

Also, is not Christ the heavenly bridegroom, consistent with his masculinity in his incarnation?

Jesus is a human person – he has a human body and a human soul. As a human person – and a male person, at that – he possesses a ‘masculinity’ that is not inconsistent with any other human male.

Is not all this consistent with the concept that the person’s soul retains consistency with the person’s biological character?

I would answer that a human’s soul isn’t ‘consistent’ with the person’s biological character, but that it is united to the person’s body, such that the biological character of the body is the biological character of the person. Of course, that doesn’t mean that it flows backward, such that the gender of the body is the gender of the soul. (That would be like saying that, since my body is Caucasian, then I am a Caucasian person… and therefore, I have a Caucasian soul. That’s just illogical.)

Finally, do you think the Church teaches that souls are sexless and do you have citation for that? Or do you think the Church is silent on the matter?

I think that there isn’t an explicit teaching on it, per se. (After all, one’s salvation does not depend on their physical gender (that’s what Paul means when he asserts that “there is no male or female”)!) However, I think it can be inferred from the teachings of the Church on what a soul is, as I’ve outlined earlier in the thread.

 

[PRmerger]

Femininity and masculinity go beyond male and female. Male and female are biological while femininity and masculinity go beyond the physical world. At least that is what I read from Peter Kreeft.

Yes, this is what I understand as well, from reading Kreeft, as well as Catholic teaching.