Women and Mysticism.
Women have been deeply connected with the great mysteries of God’s work of salvation. It was a woman, the Blessed Virgin Mary, who was asked to be the Theotokos. She would be, through her "fiat", the one to enable the Incarnation. She was intimately involved in the unfolding of the plan kept hidden until the fullness of time. She was intimately involved as a woman, as a virgin consecrated to the Lord, as a mother giving birth to the One "born of woman".
God’s action in choosing a woman to be so intimately involved in the work of redemption points to the particular feminine gift and the Church’s history gives eloquent witness to the special gift of women to be profoundly united with the mystery of Christ.
Reflection on the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the mystery of redemption provides a paradigm for the particular "genius" (to use Pope John Paul’s term) of women in the spiritual realm.
In the document on the "Dignity and Vocation of Women" (1988), Pope John Paul comments on the role of woman in the salvific action of God in the Incarnation:
On the one hand, this dignity consists in the supernatural elevation to union with God in Jesus Christ, which determines the ultimate finality of the existence of every person both on earth and in eternity. From this point of view, the "woman" is the representative and the archetype of the whole human race: she represents the humanity which belongs to all human beings, both men and women. On the other hand, however, the event at Nazareth highlights a form of union with the living God which. can only belong to the "woman," Mary: the union between mother and son. The Virgin of Nazareth truly becomes the Mother of God. (par 4)
In speaking of the "fiat" of the Virgin Mary the Pope notes,
Therefore she is truly the Mother of God, because motherhood concerns the whole person, not just the body, nor even just human "nature." In this way the name "Theotokos"--Mother of God--became the name proper to the union with God granted to the Virgin Mary.
This motherhood is not just a functional reality, but is as a reality of the person. It is a profoundly feminine reality. It is an expression of the feminine gift of association with the nurturing of life. It is an expression of the special diakonia of womanhood.
Here is also the mystery of the interrelationship between the Bridegroom and the Bride. This "great mystery", presented in the Letter to the Ephesians, is as the Pope states, "the Bride united to her Bridegroom; united, because she lives his life; united, because she shares in his threefold mission; united in such a manner as to respond with a sincere gift of self to the inexpressible gift of the love of the Bridegroom, the Redeemer of the world" (Mulieris Dignitatem # 27). This spousal imagery has long been a crucial image in the mystical tradition.
While identified and used by both men and women, it is to women a natural image with which they identify in their femininity. In the history of the Church women have received this imagery of the response of the Bride to the Bridegroom's redemptive love as expressing their profound mystical union with Christ. As women they know and embrace this image.
Women of great faith and great generosity of spirit responding to the love of the Bridegroom and entering profound and wondrous union with Him have incomparably enriched the Church.
In his conclusion to Mulieris Dignitatem (par. 31) the Pope rejoices in the gift that women are to the Church,
The Church gives thanks for all the manifestations of the feminine "genius" which have appeared in the course of history, in the midst of all peoples and nations; she gives thanks for all the charisms which the Holy Spirit distributes to women in the history of the People of God, for all the victories which she owes to their faith, hope and charity: she gives thanks for all the fruits of feminine holiness.