On Babies, Bathwater, and Protecting One's Virginity

Have I mentioned before that I want to be Simcha Fisher when I grow up?  Not only is her baby pushing up on her knees before mine (I promise, I don't stalk her -- blame Facebook), but she wrote this wonderful piece on Maria Goretti and what it means to be a saint.

Before reading Simcha's post on Maria Goretti, I don't think I ever quite understood her and her saint-ness.  I have always had a hard time coming to terms with young female saints who died protecting their virginity and seemingly were canonized for it.  It seemed to emphasize the physical state of women's bodies more than the state of their souls.  

But Simcha explains the saint's virtue in this way:

...when her would-be rapist attacked her, she pleaded with him to stop because he would be committing a mortal sin, and he would go to hell.  She didn’t say, “Please, please, spare my virginity!” She begged him to spare himself.  

 She goes on to explain that we are in danger of becoming so focused on virtues or causes (e.g. chastity or virginity) that we can forget why they exist -- to show love of God and our neighbor.  We have the bathwater, but we forget that the baby even exists.

Simcha uses the example of St. Gianna Molla as well.  St. Gianna died in pregnancy because she refused to kill her child in utero.  She wasn't canonized for being pro-life or even for dying, but rather for her abundance of love.

I love this explanation of these two saints.  It makes them and their holiness make sense in a way that the popular presentations of them do not.  Holiness is about love directed to others and God, not obsessive protection of the self.


Image: © Milan Nykodym, Czech Republic [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons