Women in Greece challange Medieval law

Originally posted by Anton And what was true for those people might not be true for us and vice versa. These practices are however kept in form of church traditions and because of church are changing too slowly if you ask me.

Most of these rules were created more recently, not 2000 ago. What was good and bad 2000 or 1000 years ago, is good or bad today in the same way.


Th idea that world is progressing is relative. For me, it was not a progress but a regress.


Edited by Menumorut - 12-Jan-2008 at 18:18

Anton, religion is not a tradition but an aspiration to truth. So, its forms of manifestation can be changed only if they are wrong in some aspects.

Look, I have to ask something to Aelf & Mix:
Why do you care?

So a few monasteries on a mountain don't permit women? This is completely irrelevant. I can't shop at the supermarket in the US embassy. Is this a restriction of my freedom of movement?
Well, yes, but it doesn't matter, because its trivial.

People have traditions, if it isn't hurting anyone leave it alone!
For example, the Dutch have a tradition of being completely uninhibited, I don't try to change this, why are you trying to change the Greeks?

Originally posted by Akolouthos If the monks have unjustly encroached on public land, then the protest may have been justified. If the purpose of the protest was solely to oppose the prohibition against women entering the Holy Mountain, then it was not. The prohibition is obviously recognized by the government, and it has practical as well as theological implications. � -Akolouthos

I agree!! but only on that point

but not with them
Several feminist groups in Greece

The early Church had had female priests and leaders.

es_bih check this link out. Women never had the same roles as men in the early church.

Pissing on someones property is not really accepted as normal behaviour by any group, religion or culture.

You must not have been to many hardcore punk concerts

And let's face the reality, there are many women for who tempting a monk is something interesting. Not all have the maturity to respect the efforts ofor chastity and purity of those men.

See this is the line of thought I cannot agree with. There are many many non-hermit monks who are active in the world and yet their faith allows them to maintain their celibacy. It shouldn't be about men being tempted because men will always be tempted as long as they still have hands . It's just the way nature designed us, I can understand that the monks want as little distraction as possible so they are spending less time to fight temptation, but to say there is no temptation without women is ridiculous. Besides maybe some of those monks are homosexual, does the amount of men there affect their chastity?

Mind you the purpose of a hermitage is to separate yourselves from the world. Which is why Mount Athos restricts it's visitors. I'm certain there is also a restriction on the amount of people that may come at any one time as to limit the distractions of the world.

I'm not a woman myself of course, but I don't see why a monk of all people could be considered an interesting partner.

People have many different fetishes and kinks and a woman might be attracted to the spiritual purity of a monk and want to take pride in the fact that they are better than all the women of the world because they were able to seduce the unseducable.

If there is one thing that is completely unnatural it is abstinence.

That's the point though yes? To rise above our bestial natures and to embrace our supernatural life.

Anyway, as far I know, for homosexuals the sentimental attraction is stronger than the bodily one, they don't have temptations like heterosexuals.

Homosexuals act just like heterosexuals. Some are more for sentimental attraction and some just want to be promiscuous, just like not all heterosexuals act the same.

Flee from temptation, or resist temptation? I repeat: the objectives of monkish life are others, transcedental.

So to answer your question they are trying to go to a place within themselves where they have no temptations, so there is nothing to flee from and nothing to resist.

Flee from temptation, or resist temptation?

For some people in the past it was a matter of faith that if the gods didn't get a human heart on a daily basis the sun would no longer rise. Doesn't change the fact that they were completely wrong.

There is not only that apparition, also a Byzantine empress entered in Mountain with some gifts and Mother of God appeared and explained her that is her mountain and is only for men. Also there are other stories about women entering the mountain and happening bad things.

By the way, one of the oldest documentary mentions of Vlachs (if not the oldest) is about Vlach women breaking the interdiction and entering the mountain.

I don't really think there are that many women who'd like to grab the opportunity and go to Mount Athos as soon as it's possible to tempt a monk. I'm not a woman myself of course, but I don't see why a monk of all people could be considered an interesting partner. Besides, even if they would, it would be a good way for those monks to show their faith. After all, resisting temptations is not difficult as long as those temptations are absent.

Is not about that monks are interesting partners but the idea of corrupting a monk, like an adventure.

Your arguing about facing the temptation is not correct. The objective of contemplative life is not gaining some anti-passion powers but to find God by life of permanent prayer.

If there is one thing that is completely unnatural it is abstinence.

There are other things which are unnatural too. We don't haver the duty to be natural, actualy the Christian faith call us to come over our nature. If you remain natural, you are condemned to be decomposed like the natural elements are.

Originally posted by Mixcoatl I don't really think there are that many women who'd like to grab the opportunity and go to Mount Athos as soon as it's possible to tempt a monk. I'm not a woman myself of course, but I don't see why a monk of all people could be considered an interesting partner. Besides, even if they would, it would be a good way for those monks to show their faith. After all, resisting temptations is not difficult as long as those temptations are absent.

There are male midwives and female doctors nowadays, and the world did not become worse because of it. Change is not bad by defenition.

Of course. There are bad chnges and good changes.

This is nonsense. If a big strong institution like the church cannot overcome the presence of females, it would have died long before now. Besides, the idea that hundreds would fall from fate because women have walked that peninsula is not only prepostrous, but rather insulting to people's strength of faith as well.

The interdiction of women access in Mountain was taken after a suposed apparition of Mother of God who consecrated this mountain only for male monks. It's a matter of faith, so you cann't question it after modern view.

The food, meat or anything, is not impure but fast is necesary for educating us that we have not to follow the body's impulses. For similar reason, there have to be in the world a place were genders are not present together.

And let's face the reality, there are many women for who tempting a monk is something interesting. Not all have the maturity to respect the efforts ofor chastity and purity of those men.

Secondly, a beautiful and married woman might be very interested in feminism. About twohundred years ago, women were not allowed to attend university, about a hundred years ago, women were not allowed to vote, about fifty years ago, married women were not allowed to own their own property or have payed jobs, about twenty years ago, women had little to nothing to say about the frequency and number of their pregnancies. The fact that women today can study, have jobs, vote for presidents and can decide to have no more than two kids are all very direct results of the hard work and preseverance of feminists. These things may not mean a lot to you, but they most certainly mean a lot to me, and many many other women with me.

The reality is that, at least in the pictures found on web, I have not yet seen a feminist with an attractive presence, and actualy most of them seems to be unmarried.

As for women's rights, I think that anyway they would have been put in practice by men, without the activism of women feminists. I disagree with you if you refer at abortion, I consider it a crime and any method of anticonception except the natural abstinence I consider wrong.

Originally posted by Akolouthos I think I might start a thread on this topic, and if I do so, I invite you to discuss it with me.

Of course.

Edited by Menumorut - 11-Jan-2008 at 16:11