¹ Paul, John II, Fides et ratio: On the Relationship between Faith and Reason (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 1998), #108Google Scholar.

² John Paul II, Fides et ratio, #108 note 132.

³ Catechism of the Catholic Church (New York: Image, 1995)Google Scholar, #1, 3, 543, and 825.

⁴ The Holy Bible, Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1966)Google Scholar. This text is used for quotations from Scripture unless otherwise indicated.

⁵ St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (Westminster, Maryland: Christian Classics, 1981), 5 vols, Pt. I, Q. 23, art. 1. Note that the Latin Theologiae has been rendered in the published English translation as Theologica.

⁶ Heidegger, Martin, What is Called Thinking? (New York: Harper and Row, 1968), 116Google Scholar.

⁷ Stein, Edith, Finite and Eternal Being: An Attempt at an Ascent to the Meaning of Being (Washington DC: ICS Publications, 2002), 438–39Google Scholar.

⁸ See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica,“[J]ustification, ‘implies a certain rectitude of order in the interior disposition of a man, in so far as what is highest in man is subject to God, and the inferior powers of the soul are subject to the superior, i.e., to reason; and this disposition the Philosopher [i.e., Aristotle] calls justice metaphorically speaking (Ethic. v. 11).’”, Pt. 1–11. Q. 113, art. 1.

⁹ Speyr, Adrienne von, They Followed His Call: Vocation and Asceticism (New York: Alba House, 1978), 3Google Scholar.

¹⁰ Stein, Finite and Eternal Being, 21. My emphasis.

¹¹ Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, III, Q. 27, art. 5, repl. obj. 3.

¹² John Paul II, Fides et ratio footnote 132 to #108. According to the Greek Patristic Dictionary, [PGL, 1399.]trápeza also includes: table of Last Supper, table of shewbread, manger at Bethlehem, the vessels laid upon the altar, Christ's tomb, Throne of God, place of Christ's death, burial, Resurrection, and Ascension, and womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

¹³ John Paul II, Fides et ratio, #108, note 132 referring to S.P.N. Epiphanii, Opera, Patrologiae Graecae, Homilia V in Laudes Sanctae Mariae Deiparae, vol. 43, 486–502, here 493. The phrase “he noerâ tés písteos trápeza” is translated by Marica Frank, PhD. The phrase comes from the following broader context: “You are the Mother of God who alone gave birth to the only-begotten Son of the one God. You did not bear God for the present time but God who is before you and before all, incarnate from you. The immaculate sheep who bore Christ the lamb. The heifer unyoked who bore a calf. The intellectual table of faith which furnished the bread of life to the world.”

¹⁴ The Oxford Latin Dictionary (L and S 1133): “A table for any purpose, as a dining-table; a market-stand for meat, vegetables, etc; a money-dealer's table or counter, a sacrificial table, etc.” The Latin for this passage in Fides et ratio#108 is: “…fidei mensa intellectualis appellabatur. Ipsam congruentem verae philosophiae effigiem respiciebant sibique erant conscii se debere cum Maria philosophari.”

¹⁵ Maritain, Jacques, “The Preconscious Life of the Intellect,” in Creative Intuition in Art and Poetry (New York: Meridian Books, 1955), 69Google Scholar.

¹⁶ To be celebrated on September 12, 2005. “Saint Bernard declared that the name of Mercy, Mother of God, should ever be on our lips and in our hearts. The feast of the Holy Name of Mary was first instituted in Spain in 1513. See, Magnificat, (September 2005), 148.

¹⁷ See John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem (On the Dignity and Vocation of Women) (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 1988), #5. See also Redemptoris Mater (Mother of the Redeemer) (Boston: Daughters of St. Paul, 1987), #13Google Scholar.

¹⁸ Lonergan, Bernard, “The Question,” in Insight: A Study of Human Understanding (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1957/1992), 33–34Google Scholar.

¹⁹ Meconi, David Vincent S.J., “Philosophari in Maria” in Foster, David Ruel and Koterski, Joseph W. S.J., The Two Wings of Catholic Thought: Essays on Fides et ratio (Washington DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2003), 69–90Google Scholar, here 71.

²⁰ Kierkegaard, Soren, Purity of Heart is to Will one Thing (New York: Harper and Row, 1948)Google Scholar, especially 197ff and 148 ff.

²¹ John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, #4.

²² Ratzinger, Joseph Cardinal, “Mariology and Marian Spirituality,” in The Church and Women: A Compendium (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988): 67–79Google Scholar, here 76.

²³ John Paul II, Redemptoris Mater, #16.

²⁴ John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, #4.

²⁵ Daly, Mary, Pure Lust: Elemental Feminist Philosophy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984), 74Google Scholar. See also the discussion of ‘The Immaculate Perception,’ in Nietzsche, Friedrich, Thus Spake Zarathustra (New York: Penguin Books, 1988), 122–123Google Scholar.

²⁶ Daly, Pure Lust, 104.

²⁷ John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, #30.

²⁸ John Paul II, Fides et ratio, #54.

²⁹ Speyer, They Followed His Call, 11.

³⁰ Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, III, Q. 30, art. 1.

³¹ Sokolowski, Robert, Eucharistic Presence: A Study in the Theology of Disclosure (Washington DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1993), 212Google Scholar.

³² See note 12 above.

³³ Clarke, W. Norris S.J., “The Complementarity of Faith and Philosophy, Communio 26 (1999): 562–63Google Scholar.

³⁴ Kierkegaard, Soren, Fear and Trembling/Repetition (Princeton: University Press, 1983), 65Google Scholar.

³⁵ Stein, Edith, The Hidden Life: Essays, Meditations, Spiritual Texts (Washington DC: ICS Publications, 1992), 113Google Scholar. I am making an analogous application with Stein's reflections on her religious vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

³⁶ Stein, Edith, “Ethos of Women's Professions,” in Essays on Woman (Washington D.C.: ICS Publications, 1987), 49Google Scholar.

³⁷ Stein. “Ethos,” 41.

³⁸ Stein, “Ethos,” 43.

³⁹ Paul, John II, Rise, Let us Be On Our Way (New York: Time Warner Books, 2004), 90Google Scholar.

⁴⁰ John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, #30.

⁴¹ Paul, John II, Letter to Women in The Genius of Women (Washington DC: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 1997), #10Google Scholar.

⁴² John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, # 26.

⁴³ For a more detailed consideration the complementarity of faith/reason, philosophy/theology, and philosophers/theologians see Allen, Prudence R.S.M., “Person and Complementarity in Fides et ratio,” in Foster, David and Koterski, Joseph S.J., eds., The Two Wings of Catholic Thought: Essays on Fides et ratio (Washington DC:, The Catholic University of America Press, 2003), 36–68Google Scholar.

⁴⁴ The passage continues:… The ultimate purpose of personal existence, then, is the theme of philosophy and theology alike. For all their difference of method and content, both disciplines point to that ‘path of life’ (Ps 16:11) which, as faith tells us, leads in the end to the full and lasting joy of the contemplation of the Triune God.”

⁴⁵ Sokolowski, Eucharistic Presence, 108.

⁴⁶ St. Francis of Assisi, Opuscula; (edit. Zuaracchi 1949), 87–94. The Liturgy of the Hours (New York: Catholic Book Publishing Co., 1975)Google Scholar, vol iv, October 4, Memorial of St. Francis of Assisi, Second Reading.

⁴⁷ John Paul II, Fides et ratio, #47.

⁴⁸ Sartre, Jean Paul, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology (New York: Philosophical Library, 1956), 613–14Google Scholar. I am grateful to Terry Wright, PhD for his suggestion that I emphasize the contrast between Sartre with Beauvoir and Jacques with Raïssa Maritain.

⁴⁹ Beauvoir, Simone de, The Second Sex (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1957), 267Google Scholar.

⁵⁰ Beauvoir, The Second Sex, xviii.

⁵¹ Chicago, Judy, The Dinner Party: A Symbol of Our Heritage (Garden City, New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1979), 11Google Scholar. Judy Chicago's thirty-nine guests at the dinner party table included the philosophers: Hildegard of Bingen (1098–1179), Christine de Pizan (1363–1431), Anna van Schurmann (1607–1678), and Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797). The floor in the middle of the three triangular sides of the table lists the names of nine-hundred and ninty-nine guests, including the philosophers: Lucrezia Marinelli (1571–1653), Maria le Jars de Gournay (1565–1645), Margaret Cavendish (1624–1674), Mary Astell (1666/68–1731), Emilie du Chatelet (1706–1749), Simone Weil (1909–1943), and Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986).

⁵² Chicago, The Dinner Party, 67.

⁵³ One could add as another example in transition to the second fall, Eve Ensler's recent vulgar drama “Vagina Monologues” which according to Sister Renée Mirkes, OSF, PhD, “A Tale of Failed Feminism,”Fellowship of Catholic Scholars Quarterly (Summer 2005): 7–9, “celebrates the basest of human instincts.” 7. The philosophers Robert J. Spitzer, S.J. and Brian J. Shanley, O.P, as well as Bishop John M. D'Arcy, Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend have also recently written significant critiques of the VM Dialogues to Faculty at Gonzaga University, Providence College, and the President of Notre Dame respectively.

⁵⁴ Beauvoir, Simone de, Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre (Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1986), 284–332Google Scholar.

⁵⁵ Beauvoir, Adieux, 275.

⁵⁶ See Sartre, Jean-Paul, The Words (Greenwich, Conn.: Fawcett, 1969Google Scholar), “I have just related the story of a missed vocation: I needed God, He was given to me, I received Him without realizing that I was seeking Him. Failing to take root in my heart, He vegetated in me for a while, then He died.”, 64–65; See also, Beauvoir, Adieux, 432–445.

⁵⁷ In the 1970's Beauvoir signed on to the Manifesto of 343, admitting (it is now thought falsely) to an illegal abortion, in a campaign for free contraception and greater access to abortion. See Bair, Deirdre, Simone de Beauvoir: a biography (New York: Summit Books, 1990)Google Scholar and Thody, Philip, Jean-Paul Sartre: a Literary and Political Study (New York, Macmillan 1961)Google Scholar.

⁵⁸ Beauvoir, Adieux, 105 and 118.

⁵⁹ Beauvoir, Adieux, 127.

⁶⁰ Daly, Mary, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women's Liberation (Boston: Beacon Press, 1973), 34Google Scholar.

⁶¹ Daly, Beyond God, 88. She cites Whitehead, Alfred North, Process and Reality: An Essay in Cosmology (New York: Macmillan, 1929), 519–33Google Scholar. For others who have followed Whitehead down this same path see Sheila Greeve Davaney, ed., Feminism and Process Thought (New York and Toronto: Edwin Mellen Press, 1981), and Rosemary Radford Ruether, “Mistress of Heaven: The Meaning of Mariology,” in New Woman New Earth: Sexist Ideologies and Human Liberation (New York: Seabury Press, 1975), 36–62; and Conscience: The News Journal of Catholic Opinion, sponsored by Catholics For Free Choice, for which Ruether is the Editorial Advisor.

⁶² John Paul II, Fides et ratio, #23.

⁶³ Daly, Beyond God, 96. Her emphasis.

⁶⁴ Daly, Beyond God, 96. Her emphasis.

⁶⁵ Maritain, Raïssa, We have Been Friends Together and Adventures in Grace (Garden City, New York: Image Books, 1961), 65Google Scholar.

⁶⁶ Raïssa Maritain, We have Been Friends Together, 68.

⁶⁷ Bartunek, John L.C., Inside the Passion (West Chester, PA: Ascension Press, 2005)Google Scholar.

⁶⁸ Raïssa Maritain, We have Been Friends Together, 121.

⁶⁹ Bartunek, L.C., Inside the Passion, 114–115.

⁷⁰ John Paul II, Fides et ratio, #54, citing, Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Letter Humani Generis (1950), AAS 42, 563–564.

⁷¹ Stein, The Hidden Life, 98–99. See also, 107.

⁷² Rev. John Bartunek, Inside the Passion, quoting Elizabeth Lev describes how in Gibson's Passion of the Christ: “Mary [holds] one hand cradling his [Jesus'] body and the other hand open toward the viewer… Mary looks straight out at us… provoking a full and conscious acknowledgment of whom this suffering has been for.” 164.

⁷³ Raïssa Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 85.

⁷⁴ Raïssa's Journal presented by Jacques Maritain (Albany, N.Y.: Magi Books, inc., 1974), 8Google Scholar.

⁷⁵ Raïssa's Journal, 13.

⁷⁶ Raïssa's Journal, 162. She adds: “God loves us with friendship by providing for all our necessities and by dying for us on the Cross.” 163.

⁷⁷ Maritain, Jacques, Untrammeled Approaches (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1997), 165CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁷⁸ Raïssa's Journal, 251 (Loose Leaves from one of my notebooks, J.) His emphasis.

⁷⁹ Raïssa's Journal, 13.

⁸⁰ John Paul II, Memory and Identity, 148–49.

⁸¹ Speyr, Adrienne von, Mary in the Redemption (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2003), 108–109Google Scholar.

⁸² John Henry Newman, The Mystical Rose: Thoughts on the Blessed Virgin from the Writings of John Henry Cardinal Newman (Princeton: Scepter Publishers, 1996), 95.

⁸³ Mary: The Virgin Mary in the Life and Writings of John Henry Newman, Boyce, Philip, ed. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 2001), 188–89Google Scholar.

⁸⁴ Paul, John II, Theotokos: Woman, Mother, Disciple: A Catechesis on Mary, Mother of God, vol. 5 (Boston: Pauline Media, 2000), 203Google Scholar.

⁸⁵ Paul, John II, Redemptoris Mater (Boston: Daughters of St. Paul, 1987)Google Scholar, Part II ‘The Mother of God at the Center of the Pilgrim Church,’#25–49.

⁸⁶ Balthasar, Hans Urs von, Mary for Today (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988), 44Google Scholar.

⁸⁷ Balthasar, Mary for Today, 150.

⁸⁸ Léon Bloy quoted by Raïssa Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 148.

⁸⁹ Léon Bloy quoted by Raïssa Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 48–49.

⁹⁰ For a history of the dogmatic bulls on the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, see Mother of Christ, Mother of the Church: Documents on the Blessed Virgin Mary (Boston: Daughters of St. Paul, 2001)Google Scholar.

⁹¹ Balthasar, Hans Urs von, My Work: in Retrospect (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993), 114Google Scholar. See also Roten, Johann S.M., “The Two Halves of the Moon: Marian Anthropological Dimensions in the Common Mission of Adrienne von Speyr and Hans Urs von Balthasar,” Schindler, in David L., ed. Hans Urs von Balthasar: His Life and Work (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1991): 65–86Google Scholar, especially 79–81.

⁹² In another well-known example, St. Thérèse of Lisieux recounts how, after being gravely ill, she became instantly cured while looking at a statue of Mary in her room: “The Blessed Virgin had seemed very beautiful to me, and I had seen her smile at me.” Balthasar, Hans Urs von, Two Sisters in the Spirit: Thérèse of Lisieux and Elizabeth of the Trinity (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992), 99–100Google Scholar.

⁹³ Paul, John II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994), 221Google Scholar.

⁹⁴ John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold, 200–21.

⁹⁵ John Paul II, Memory and Identity, 159.

⁹⁶ John Paul II, Memory and Identity, 163.

⁹⁷ With gratitude for suggestions for composition and revision of this paper by John Hittinger, PhD, Michael Torre, PhD, Marica Frank, PhD. Michael Woodward, PhD, Sr. Rita Rae Schneider, RSM, PhD, Sr. Mary Judith O'Brien, RSM, JD, JCD, Sr. Esther Mary Nickel, RSM, SLD, Mother Mary Quentin, RSM, Superior General, and Mother Mary McGreevy, RSM, Vicar General, Religious Sisters of Mercy of Alma, Michigan. It was presented at the American Maritain Association Conference, Washington DC, October 14, 2005Google Scholar.