Female Religiosity in Self-Narration: Some Indicative Elements and Suggestions from Empirical Materials

Abstract

This study stems from a collection of autobiographical narrations collected during a seminar held in February 2018 involving a small group of adults, representing the three major monotheistic religions: Catholicism, Judaism, and Islam. The seminar was organized by the University of Bologna (Department of Arts) in collaboration with the Association for Interreligious Dialogue “Abramo e Pace”. The aim of this paper is to re-examine the autobiographical narratives that emerged from the seminar, with a particular focus on the characteristics of female religious experiences in these religions, in order to identify distinctive trans-religious and transcultural signs. For this analysis, a sub-group of participants were selected, consisting of nine women, three Catholics, three Jews, and three Muslims, mainly between the ages of 35 and 45. The methodology used is a content analysis, which allows for a detailed examination of the narratives shared. From the narratives obtained, the religious education received in childhood and early adolescence emerges as a resource and support for the construction of personal identity regardless of the subsequent life paths taken by the individual. An additional pedagogical/educational theme of interest is represented by the intertwining of transformations of personal religiosity and dynamics of adult transformation, which is present in these narrations. Although the results do not aim for statistical representativeness, it is expected that the analysis will reveal certain constants that could inform subsequent, more systematic research efforts. In particular, it is expected that marriage, motherhood, and the education of children will emerge as moments of reactivation or revitalization of personal religiosity.

1. Introduction

In the pedagogical field, the subject of the specific characteristics of female religiosity still seems to be little explored. This silence, at least in Italy, is also part of a more general lack of interest that affects the whole religious phenomenon within studies dedicated to education.1 The lack of specific studies on female religiosity and its characteristics seems particularly problematic today, considering that religious education (where it is practiced) not only still passes through the privileged mediation of female/motherly figures in the family context, but also seems to be entrusted to female subjects even in school teaching and catechesis, in relation to the progressive reduction in the number of priests. Teachers in Italian educational institutions seem to be more than 70% female, almost exclusively in primary and nursery schools. The female component is therefore now predominant even among religious education teachers and catechists. Although there is a lack of rigorous and in-depth empirical studies, there are useful indicators from already published research material or from documented training experiences, e.g., writings by university students, dissertations, and reports from focus groups with adults.

This contribution operates a second-level re-reading of the materials produced in an adult education context, proposed in 2018 by the “Abraham and Peace” Association, to adult subjects of the three Abrahamic religions. The aim of the initiative was not specifically research, but rather to foster interreligious dialogue even with themselves (migratory experiences, multi-religious families of origin, adult conversions, and mixed marriages). There are existential conditions, such as those represented by this small group, which exacerbate or problematize the physiological difficulties of the educational relationship with their sons and daughters. Moreover, the reflections expressed by the subjects encountered are set in a social and cultural context in which the identity and role of women in society, in the family, and also in religion, are increasingly the subject of debate, rethinking, criticism, and vindication.

On the other hand, therefore, the theme of women’s religiosity is part of a broader horizon of reflection, which cannot be adequately analyzed here. The issue of the definition of “institutional” roles and functions in the ecclesial sphere and, thus, the question of gender equality in the various religious denominations,2 which is much discussed today, especially in Western Christian Churches, constitute important “background factors” of any reflection on femininity.

There are also important studies on the phenomenologically oriented gender perspective, such as Edith Stein’s dual anthropology (Stein [1959] 2010) which, in the universal structure of humanity, recognizes the fundamental articulation in the two singularities of male and female (see also Ales Bello 2018). A significant philosophical position is currently the one inaugurated by the studies of Zambrano ([1986] 1995, [1990] 1992).

Another essential theoretical reference is the psychoanalytic literature, particularly the theories of archetypes formulated by Jung ([1938/1954] 1997) and the analytical psychology derived or influenced by him (Jacobi [1957] 2004; Neumann [1956] 1981; Paregger and Risé 2015).3

The Jungian theory of archetypes, especially of the psychic male/female integration as a maturation task of the subject, flows into the pedagogical approach and then into M.T. Moscato’s studies on religiosity (cf. Moscato 1998, 2022a, 2022b), to which the author owes many theoretical suggestions and a long research experience, which also emerge in this study. In fact, a phenomenological methodological approach is currently being used, both in Europe and America, and in different disciplinary fields, even by different philosophical matrices (cf. Ammerman [2013] 2024).

The point, however, is not to what extent the theological, philosophical, and psychoanalytical positions developed in the 20th century (positions that would require lengthy and articulate presentations) are to be considered convincing and reliable today. Rather, it is essential to recognize that, having entered the fabric of culture, these visions influence researchers in their investigations as much as they condition ordinary men and women in their representations of identity. On the level of religious experience, then, the formative incidence of the sacred texts of the three monotheistic religions roots the representations in a fabric that is certainly mythical–archetypal, gathering propositional thrust as well as conflicting prejudicial residues. It must be a conscious premise to this exposition that what the narrators reveal about themselves expresses first and foremost a self-representation marked by culture and their religious training. To what extent their experiences realistically express “female” religious characters is another question to be examined and researched in other ways and with other methods. And yet, one cannot skip over, at least in an initial phase, how a human subject represents themself, either at the level of imagination or at the level of definition. Therein lies the value, even the scientific value, of collecting these materials. In the following sections, we will search for possible typical features of female religiosity starting from the autobiographical narratives of a dozen or so women in middle adulthood belonging to the three great monotheisms of Abrahamic origin.

2. Materials and Methodological Approach

2.1. A Self-Narration Seminar

As already mentioned, this study operates a second-level re-reading on materials originally collected during a seminar cycle. This seminar, which took place over three sessions in February 2018, involved a small group of nineteen adults belonging to the three major monotheisms (Christianity, specifically Catholicism; Judaism; and Islam) and characterized by a lived experience of faith and the active exercise of an educational responsibility as parents or teachers. The opportunity was offered by a collaboration between the University of Bologna (Department of Arts, Chair of General Pedagogy) and the “Abraham and Peace” Association for Interfaith Dialogue, which identified the participants. The aim of the training activity, and of the entire cycle it was part of, was to explore the connection among religiosity/religious experience, educational processes, and citizenship.

The sample group, absolutely unrepresentative, was made up of those who had responded affirmatively to the invitation from “Abraham and Peace”; it had thus in fact self-selected itself, probably in relation to transversal needs for self-understanding and self-expression. The participants had agreed to talk about themselves and their own biographical/educational stories, also in relation to the religious dimension, with the exception of three subjects, two Jews and one Catholic, who asked to participate as simple listeners. The author was responsible for leading the group, which was conducted in a non-directive manner. Participants were asked to narrate, in turn, the events of their own history of religious formation, keeping as the only criterion the correspondence with the different seasons of life and the underlining of what the subject considered, within their own existential path, a particularly significant or “crucial” experience (see Draghetti and Pinelli 2019). In the Italian panorama, there are precedents in this direction, in which the criterion of recalling the different seasons of life in non-directive interviews was simply followed (Gatti 2012).

The group, as mentioned above, was made up of nineteen subjects in total; in reality, only sixteen of these made an active contribution, either by narrating their human and religious stories in front of everyone (four of Muslim affiliation, three of Jewish affiliation, and five of Catholic denomination) or by sending a contribution/narrative of themselves in written form, which was equally shared with all the participants (four Catholics).

Connelly and Clandinin, pioneers of narrative research in education, observe that “education is the construction and reconstruction of personal and social stories; teachers and learners are storytellers and characters in their own and other’s stories” (Connelly and Clandinin 1990, p. 2). Indeed, educational research cannot do without relating to narratives: those that pervade the socio-cultural world in which the educational process takes place and those that each person continually proposes to themself and to others in order to give the world a meaning capable of connecting experiences.

Firstly, the self/autobiographical narration as a tool of investigation allows one to understand what is relevant to the subject and to enter into their world of meaning-giving. Indeed, when people narrate their experiences retrospectively, they are never simply presenting objectivity. Even the most seemingly aseptic and objective account is actually the fruit of a retrospective work of selection, of highlighting or obscuring details, facts, and events, in a weave in which cognitive and affective–emotional elements are welded together with unconscious components, linked to sensory perceptions and mental images/representations, themselves emotionally connoted.

Secondly, narration allows the subject, at the very moment in which they narrate themself to others, to reknit the threads of meaning of their own experience. By narrating, in fact, they also “explain” themself to themself, reconstructing themself and continually attributing meaning, in the body of the story, to the contents that surface in it.

Finally, as already said, in the autobiographical narration, broader and more ancient narratives live and palpitate: myths, fairy tales, great stories (including religious ones), and, with them, the archetypal images that populate them. The latter offer content and categories to the subject that thinks itself. Disseminated in various cultural systems, they converse in a certain way with the person’s psyche, providing interpretive keys and principles for understanding reality while inserting the subject’s personal history into the larger human story (Bruner 1990, 2002)4. Of course, the mythical–archetypal contents are themselves reworked and transformed through the dynamism of subjective narration because each narrator is also the interpreter of the archetypal fabric. Whether the narration brings about a reconciliation with one’s own history and a “dressing” of one’s wounds depends directly on the subject’s personal interpretation of the archetypal material.

The self-narration seminar was thus structured according to the logic of Research Training (see Asquini 2018; Pinelli 2024b) and responded to the suggestions of the Narrative Inquiry (Clandinin and Connelly 2000). It aimed to investigate the contribution of education and religious experience with respect to the subject’s ability to positively experience the ethical dimension of citizenship. The theoretical assumptions had matured in previous research work, which identified the category of “religiosity” as an educable capacity/potentiality that every human being possesses: “a quality of personal being, which as originally natural remains a possibility for every human person” (Moscato 2015, p. 24). In this logic, it is possible to overcome the delegitimization of religious experience/religious education typical of our secularized societies.

The concluding focus group of the entire course had taken place at the end of the last of the three seminar appointments and had offered an initial confirmation of the starting hypothesis of the entire work (further substantiated by the analysis of the materials and the public restitution that took place the following October). Recurrent elements appeared in the narratives, apparently transversal and “transcultural”, showing affinities of experiences between subjects of different origins and religious affiliations. Personal religiosity had emerged as a resource capable of sustaining the subject through life’s vicissitudes (bereavement, abandonment, illness, migration experiences, etc.), generatively interwoven with them and therefore constantly evolving. This was significant with respect to the theme of citizenship in multicultural societies: the confrontation of personal life stories, rather than the dispute over respective faiths and dogmatic apparatuses, had proven capable of offering a meeting point from which to reciprocally “deconstruct the enemy”.

As anticipated, this paper will propose a reinterpretation of the materials collected, starting from a different research question. The analysis will concentrate on the materials produced by a subgroup of nine women: three Catholic women aged between 35 and 40, three women of Jewish affiliation aged between 40 and 45, and three Muslim women (one of whom is in the 25/30 age group and two in the 55/65 age group).

2.2. Sample Composition and Profile

The following, in brief, is the composition of the subgroup that will be examined in this paper.

Sex	Age Range	Religious Affiliation	Form of Narration	Acronym	Country of Birth
F	40/45	Jewish	Oral	J1	France
F	40/45	Jewish	Oral	J2	Egypt
F	40/45	Jewish	Oral	J3	Canada
F	60/65	Muslim	Oral	M1	Italy
F	55/60	Muslim	Oral	M2	Italy
F	25/30	Muslim	Oral	M3	Morocco
F	35/40	Catholic	Oral	C1	Italy
F	35/40	Catholic	Oral	C2	Italy
F	35/40	Catholic	Oral	C3	Italy

Before delving into the analysis of the narratives, it is useful to construct a brief profile of the women involved to better contextualize the discussion of the results.

J1 was born in France into a Jewish family. Her mother, of Russian origin, gradually distanced herself from religious practice and embraced communism while maintaining a bond of belonging and identity memory with Judaism. J1’s father, scarred by the death of his own father in Auschwitz during the Holocaust, experiences belonging to Judaism with difficulty. Because of this, no religion was ever practiced at home. Moreover, for the first few years, J1 and her siblings were not given any religious education; later, they were sent to religious school. Over the years, the family split up: in particular, J1 first lived in the USA, and then came to Italy, where she married an agnostic Italian, with whom she had two daughters (one of whom went through a serious illness in the first months of her life).

J2, an Italian citizen, was born in Alexandria, Egypt, to a Jewish mother and a Catholic father. She thus found herself experiencing the coexistence of the two religions, also materialized at home by the presence of her two grandmothers. Due to the Arab–Israeli conflict, she witnessed the progressive involution from a situation of positive multiculturalism to one of discrimination and distrust, with the impossibility of publicly manifesting the signs of Jewish faith and belonging. This also reverberated at home, in her upbringing, because her mother was afraid of exposing her children to risks. In order to leave home, J2 married an Egyptian ten years her senior, with whom she had a daughter. After the early end of her marriage, she moved with her daughter to Italy and later lived with her for a long time in Romania.

J3 is a Canadian Jew, the daughter of an American father born and raised in Judaism, and a mother from a German–Swiss Lutheran family, who converted to Judaism in order to be able to marry (the family of origin cut ties with J3’s mother after her conversion and marriage). This conversion, initially “functional”, saw J3’s mother sincerely embrace Judaism in the course of the time. J3 grew up in an inner circle, frequenting only Jewish places and friends until she was 12–13 years old, at which point she applied to attend public school. She married a Jewish boy but divorced him after a few years. At a study course in Boston, she met an Italian from Bologna, later deciding to join him in Italy, much to her father’s disappointment. After a crisis followed by a brief return to Canada, she returned to Italy and married and had two children.

C1 is an Italian from Bologna, born into a non-religious family. Attendance at a Catholic school and parish, in a climate of ferment following the Second Vatican Council, led her to embrace the faith sincerely, with a strong involvement in voluntary work. Her involvement with Catholic Action, a lay association, is strong. Her history and her work at a Catholic publisher led her to also deepen her Catholic faith from a cultural perspective. She married a man eight years older than her, from Southern Italy, with whom she had three daughters.

C2 is an Italian from Bologna, who grew up in a strongly practicing Catholic family and then in Catholic Action, where her parents were also formed. There, she met her husband, with whom she had three children. She works as a teacher in a middle school.

C3 is an Italian Catholic. Her mother was born from the marriage of a Hungarian man and an Italian woman, both of deep faith. In particular, the figure of her maternal grandmother (very attached to devotion to the Virgin Mary, to whom she made a vow on the occasion of the troubled birth of C3’s mother) marked her faith and human growth. Her grandmother also taught her the Hungarian language, which she learned for love for her husband. The maternal grandparents were an active reference point for many refugees from Hungary after the 1956 revolution. When her maternal grandmother died, C3 went on a long journey to Hungary. Further milestones were scouting, which she experienced in the Agesci association, and, during her studies, made contact with Jesuit priests involved in university pastoral work. C3 married a non-practicing man with whom she had two children. She works as teacher in a primary school.

M1 is an Italian born into a family of peasant origins, in which her father’s communism and her maternal grandmother’s deep Catholic faith coexist. She gradually distanced herself from her faith, although, starting in her university years and then in her work in the theater, she embarked on a path of rediscovery of transcendence. At work, she met her husband, of Moroccan origin, who led her to conversion to Islam. Two children were born from the marriage, one of whom came into the world after the family moved to Morocco, where M1 lived for twenty years until her return to Italy.

M2 is an Italian born in Liguria and later relocated to Bologna. In her youth, she abandoned the Catholic faith in which she was raised, only to convert to Islam after meeting her future husband. Before marriage, she already had a son with another man, while within marriage, she had two daughters.

M3 is a young woman of Moroccan origin. She was brought up in the Muslim faith by her parents and attended Koranic school. When she was still a young girl, her father moved to Italy. M3 joined him around the age of 17–18, followed later by the rest of the family. During her teenage years, she went through her mother’s illness, taking on the care and education of her younger siblings. She is currently involved in an after-school program where she teaches Arabic and Muslim culture to second-generation children.

This brief synopsis allows us to observe some characteristics of the group, which will emerge in more detail in the analysis of the narratives. Firstly, the group is strongly marked by migration experiences, either between different countries or within different regions of the same country (J1, J2, J3, M1, M2, M3, and C3).5

Secondly, the families of some of the respondents appear to be characterized by intercultural or interreligious conditions, namely those of origin (J2, J3, and C3) or those they formed later with their partners (J1, J2, J3, M1, M2, and C3).

Obviously, such conditions are intertwined with the evolution of personal religiosity and with the representation/reconstruction that the individual provides retrospectively.

The theme of conversion deserves a separate mention. Declared conversions are those of M1 and M2, who, in late youth/early adulthood, went through the transition from Catholicism (in which they had grown up, but which they had abandoned) to Islam, through mediation with sentimental partners. However, the other narrating subjects, in reconstructing their own “religious history”, also recognized moments of re-conversion, especially in connection with specific existential/chronological phases (such as the exit from an adolescence experienced as an “inner work”) or at particularly tiring and painful junctures, such as the death of a parent/grandparent or the illness of a child. These dynamics are part of the more general dynamics of adulthood as an existential place of “putting oneself to the test” that is recognized and admitted as such by the subjects who tell themselves about it: this is a sign that a religious conscience is speaking, for which, a posteriori, it is also possible to integrate moments of crisis and rebirth into one’s own religious path (Pinelli 2024a).

A final notation concerns the existential condition. With the exception of M3, these are subjects who live in middle adulthood, distributed over several bands of it; according to Erikson’s model, they go through the dialectic between generativity and stagnation/self-absorption. As is well known, with the term “generativity”, Erikson refers to the ability/concern regarding the creation of a new generation and taking care of others and the world, which is expressed in the dimension of care. Stagnation, on the other hand, is the imprisonment of the adult within themself, a regression toward an eternal adolescence. In particular, the term “generativity”, as applied to both femininity and religiosity here, also aims to highlight the adult’s capacity to generate meanings and experiences that foster the development of the younger individual.6

As noted in the analysis of the narratives, this passage is also significantly intertwined with the events of personal religiosity and has a specific declination in female experience (Erikson [1964] 1968).

2.3. The Methodological Approach

The methodological approach employed here is part of the broad phenomenological tradition and is influenced by the insights of empirical phenomenology (Mortari 2023). Understanding religious experience does not start from predefinitions but from how it manifests concretely in each person’s life, keeping in mind that the narrative is filtered through the narrator’s self-awareness and mental images (both conscious and unconscious).

In the seminar, the request to organize the autobiographical narrative according to different life stages aimed to achieve comparability among the stories collected without losing depth. The goal was to initiate “research with” the participants rather than imposing preconceived theories and findings upon them.

As in 2018, the chosen methodology for analyzing the textual materials presented in this paper is content analysis (Schreier 2012). The initial plan to employ CAQDAS technologies, particularly the Nvivo software, was abandoned in favor of a manual analysis. This decision was based on the small number and compactness of the texts, which were not conducive to computerized clustering. Given the limited size of the corpora, computer-assisted coding would likely have overlooked nuances that direct reading can reveal. It was essential to delve into the subtleties of the text, into the choice of words and the implicit images contained within them (cfr. Cortelazzo 2013).

3. The Results

As previously noted, the narratives examined are structured according to a chronological criterion and by life stages, in accordance with the explicit “prompt” provided to the seminar participants. Thus, in all of them, there are accounts of childhood and adolescence or transitions such as partner choice, career decisions, and experiences of motherhood and parenting. However, within this predefined framework, deeper cross-cutting points of contact emerge, helping to outline the traits of a “feminine religiosity”.

3.1. Generative Femininity

As noted, the reconstruction of childhood experiences was one of the requests made to the participants. The narratives obtained emphasize the significant role of female solidarity—both intrafamilial and intergenerational—in the development of personal identity. When religious mediation is provided by female figures, it becomes a distinct component of both personal religious and feminine identity. Often, grandmothers, rather than mothers, serve as the true mediators of religious experience and meaning. Traditions, devotions, and rituals are profoundly shaped by a feminine imprint.

My Jewish mother explained things from a religious perspective. My Catholic grandmother gave us the traditions, like Christmas gifts.

(J2)

My mother distanced herself from religious practice but remained a believer. She was Russian and had embraced communism. However, being Jewish was something connected to her history; remembering this identity was like keeping the chain of memory and her past alive.

(J1)

My mother was a simple, patient, and sunny woman, but she didn’t pass anything on to me. My maternal grandmother, on the other hand, had faith—a very strong faith. I remember she taught me the Our Father in a mix of Latin and Italian.

(M1)

C3’s words are particularly significant. As previously mentioned, her maternal grandparents are deeply connected to the Hungarian Catholic culture and faith. Her narrative dedicates considerable space to describing her maternal grandmother, who creates a “bridge” between two worlds. The Hungarian language is recalled by C3 as a “mother tongue”, establishing a continuity between generations:

The faith in the Holy Virgin for my grandmother was a mission. It was truly a matter of entrusting one’s life. [...] I learned to pray in Hungarian, my mother tongue... the imprint of my family of origin was strong. Speaking to God who loves us in multiple languages is speaking the language of the heart, a communication that goes beyond a specific language.

(C3)

In recounting a vow made to the Virgin Mary by her grandmother at the birth of her daughter (C3’s mother who came into the world in dramatic circumstances), the narrator adds that her grandmother had also asked to be able to live intensely and to keep her wits and lucidity throughout her life, which she did. It is evident in the narrator’s account that there is a deep identification with this grandmother, who embodies the archetypal mother and represents a complete and generative form of femininity. Notably, the narrative extensively highlights the work of this grandmother and her husband in supporting Hungarian refugees after the brutal repression by the communist regime following the 1956 revolutions. This identification is so strong that C3 herself states that her grandmother’s death drove her to embark on a journey of self-discovery, which can be interpreted as a transformative pilgrimage into adulthood (Moscato 1994). It is revealing that this journey does not lead to Romagna, the Italian region that was the birthplace of the maternal grandmother, but rather to Hungary, which was at most her adopted homeland. In C3’s narrative (and thus in her self-understanding, laden with emotional and affective elements), the maternal grandmother is identified with Hungary and Hungarian culture. These, in turn, are perceived as a symbolically charged “Elsewhere”.

The narratives cited so far reveal strong intra-familial feminine imprints: they mediate an image of life as a tapestry or skein, which the feminine aspect is capable of unraveling and weaving. These figures of mothers and grandmothers, which evoke the archetype of positive motherhood, are profoundly religious because they allow individuals to connect deeply with life and its cycles, also appreciating its inherent limits (cf. Paregger and Risé 2015, pp. 53–54). In particular, C3’s depiction of multiple languages merging into a single “language of the heart” suggests that the encounter between different cultural horizons is not conflictual. Instead, it is framed within a profound relationship with God, who makes no distinction “between Jew and Greek, between slave and free, between man and woman” (cf. Galatians 3:28) and embraces everyone. C3’s religiosity emerges here as a personal resource (cf. Caputo 2022), also positively mediated by the grandmother.

Another maternal and mediating figure is the Arabic teacher described by M3, who, at the moment of an adolescent rebellion (also made explicit in the way she dressed, behaved, and spoke), found a turning point in the dialogue with this teacher: not only does the study of the sacred texts of Islam, provided for in the curriculum, cease to be a mere subject of study for her, but it is also linked to the entirety of her lived experience. As M3 notes, it was about “understanding that I had to accept my femininity” (M3). Thus, a dialogue focused on religious teaching actually prompted the young woman to a renewed self-awareness. Consequently, when her father emigrated to Italy and her mother became ill, M3 interpreted the responsibility for caring for her younger siblings—along with their religious education—as a “calling” connected to her own femininity and maternity.

In summary, female religious mediation seems structurally capable of embracing the life of the other within a unified perspective. Within this maternal/feminine gaze, the growing individual finds the space to unify themselves, progressively and increasingly fully expressing their own “self”.

J2’s narrative presents a unique variation in this context. As previously noted, she experienced her Jewish childhood in an increasingly hostile material and cultural environment, which led to forms of concealment. In her case, maternal mediation was interrupted, overwhelmed by fears for her children’s safety. Thus, living in Romania as a young single mother, she gradually reconnected with a dormant religiosity through seeking a “Home/Womb”—a sense of belonging where she can be herself without reservations. She finds this belonging through her participation in community life.

At first [in Romania], I didn’t care about finding a synagogue; I simply continued with my traditions at home. [...] My religious identity was initially built on a personal level. But Judaism is based on belonging. [...] So, I started to seek out the community and began attending the synagogue more or less regularly.

(J2)

3.2. Femininity and the Space of the Other

In the narratives examined, there is a cross-cutting theme of the need for a personal relationship with God, which the subjects report having experienced during adolescence or young adulthood. This element certainly fits into a need for authenticity and a tendency to personally evaluate the inherited heritage, which are typical of adolescence. However, the narrated experiences are not limited to an adolescent “distance-taking” but express a genuine desire for contact with a transcendent “Other”. The desire, in other words, is to go “beyond” forms and rituals perceived as “external” to reclaim the Mystery that pervades everything and thus also reclaim oneself. This Other is sometimes initially undefined but gradually takes on a personal face. Thus, a woman raised in Catholic education who later embraced Islam after a long departure from religious practice reconstructed her search and retrospectively acknowledges the religiosity of what initially seemed like disordered attempts.

In the 60s and 70s at the University of Bologna, I had some contact with drugs [...]. That’s when my approach to the beyond began, with what I call the “Other”. I had the perception of another reality. There is more beyond normal life, and this “Other” made an entrance through my two or three joints. They opened another level of reality to me; I began to think that everything couldn’t be limited to what I saw, touched, and felt. I started searching. During those years, I never heard about God. But I was looking for meaning.

(M1)

The experience described here is not yet strictly religious; it contains an embryonic religiosity, still indeterminate, non-immanent, and not purely subjective. A non-religious vehicle opens the way to the perception of an otherness with which it is possible to establish a relationship. It is still M1 who recounts her early experiences in theater with a “shaman of Grotowski”.7

I had many shamanic experiences with her [...]. She worked with rhythm and dance to cross the threshold. These body techniques allowed me to perceive a different reality. I also practiced meditation. They provided me with a different perception of reality. I began to sense the luminosity of things, a great peace and love. When I experienced this love, I came closer to what I would later identify as God.

(M1)

Notably, this initial mediation, which introduces the protagonist to a direct experience of a divine-like dimension, is facilitated by a female figure, described by the narrator with attributes of a guiding or sacerdotal nature. In other instances, the attempt to transcend involves the mediation of concrete figures, “spiritual fathers” and “mothers”, who awaken something that was never completely lost but merely dormant.

I needed someone to teach me how to read the Gospel. I needed someone to teach me how to pray. I met priests, but also... people who awakened me. They awakened my deepest ideals and my lived faith.

(C2)

Research can become an actual journey, a deliberately chosen migration, following in the footsteps of a feminine identity received and preserved, which one intends to deepen to gain a greater depth of experience. For example, consider the Catholic descendant of Hungarians:

When my grandmother passed away, I traveled alone to Hungary. I spoke Hungarian. [...] In Hungary, I sought out the scouts and the whole world connected to Taizé. I gathered many insights and tried to build my personal life”.

(C3)

C3 acknowledges the significant role of priests and spiritual guides in her journey. However, it is her maternal grandmother who provided her with the language and categories to address God. Therefore, her grandmother’s death marks a new stage for C3, almost endowing her with a sense of mission. The return to Hungary might seem like a form of regression, a “return to the maternal womb”. This is a constant temptation in the psyche of a growing individual, mirroring the degeneration of the maternal function in education—the “Great Mother” who engulfs the life she herself has generated, potentially negating the personal destiny of the child (Neumann [1956] 1981). In fact, as observed, the maternal grandmother exerts a positive form of motherhood; thus, C3’s adult journey also takes on initiatory characteristics. The “proper name” (represented by the mother tongue) received through maternal/feminine mediation serves as a prophecy about oneself that the young individual commits to and seeks to verify in a dynamic typical of vocational callings.

Analogous traits of masterful mediation characterize the “highly trained nun” who leads a parish group focused on the reading and theological–analytical study of the Bible. This group, into which the Catholic C1 is integrated from the age of sixteen throughout her adolescence, is recognized by her as a milestone that profoundly influences her faith journey and shapes her personal development: “From the age of twenty onward, I have always been—and others recognize me as such—a challenging and very critical person. This is a source of pride for me; it’s part of who I am” (C1).

In the quest for a personal relationship with the Other/Transcendent, the experience of prayer takes on central significance. M2 states, “There was something that no longer belonged to me; I needed to understand what my religious identity was, to understand who I was”. In prayer and its various forms—ranging from inarticulate questioning to conscious dialogue with God—these women make space for the Other and gain a deeper understanding of themselves in light of such encounters.

At 18, I decided to return to studying in order to follow prayer, because for me, studying was strongly connected to prayer, and I resumed attending the Jewish community. [...] My father would tease me, saying, “If there were a Jewish convent, you’d already be in it”.

(J1)

3.3. Love Choices, Identity, and Intrapsychic Conflict

A significant chapter involves romantic relationships and partner choice. The “paths” followed by these individuals appear to differ according to their respective religious affiliations.

Regarding M1 and M2, as mentioned, their choice of partner coincides with their conversion to Islam. Both seem to have perceived their partners’ proselytizing efforts as a form of affection. For instance, M1 recounts, “My husband was a Muslim from Morocco and began trying to convert me, but it was out of kindness […]. If I know you, how can I let you go to hell?” Similarly, M2 shares, “When we met, [my future husband] was beginning a religious journey. He suggested that I try to understand his life, recommended readings, brought me books, and even taught me about the scientific miracles in the Quran”. At the same time, these events responded to a quest for meaning that they felt and which found no answers in the forms of Catholicism they had inherited, which they perceived as “empty”, extrinsic, and habitual. Not surprisingly, M1 emphasizes being “fascinated by the idea of living daily life with the continuous remembrance of God”. Once converted and married to their respective partners, they fully embraced Islamic customs, rituals, and traditions. As M1 notes, “I entered Islam and accepted everything, including polygamy and the requirement to leave the house only if accompanied by my husband”. Similarly, M2 recounts, “In Morocco, they have very strict customs... when my daughter was born, I began wearing the hijab to set an example”.

Catholic and Jewish women, on the other hand, approach the choice of a partner from within the religious affiliation in which they were raised.

In the case of Catholic subjects, the predominant element is a desire for sharing the same faith (C1 and C2) or at least overlapping human values between the partners (C3), which aligns with a broader wish for complete life-sharing with the other. This can happen programmatically (“I looked for someone who […] shared what matters to me so much that there was no need to even discuss it explicitly”, C2) or be built through ongoing dialogue within the couple, which happened with C1 and C3.

In the narratives of women of Jewish faith, choosing a partner often involves conflict or a redefinition of relationships with their family of origin, reflecting a quest for autonomy.

In Italy, I met an Italian man who was agnostic. I immediately found common ground with him, perhaps because he, although agnostic, had received a religious education as a child and young man. [...] My father was opposed; he didn’t take my choice well. He said, “But where are you going, where do you think you’re going? He’s not Jewish!” And I replied, “But how can you say that, when you taught me that as long as we are good, religion doesn’t matter?”.

(J1)

In this logic of “openness”, forms of compromise are sought, which do not exclude sacrifices from these women who remain deeply rooted in their faith and do not wish to abandon it. Such a compromise/sacrifice is seen as necessary to allow the partner to remain true to themself without coercion: “We reached a compromise. We had a civil marriage ceremony with a friend who included seven blessings from the Jewish marriage ritual. I couldn’t have a strictly religious marriage because my husband isn’t Jewish, and thus it isn’t allowed” (J1).

In the other two cases, the choice of a partner acts as the catalyst for conflict with the family of origin.

In Egypt, our parents were very strict with us to protect us. But you can’t live like that, amidst rigidity and vagueness… So I decided to leave home, but leaving meant getting married in that context. I was very young when I married and became a mother very early. I wanted to rediscover who I was. The marriage ended very quickly.

(J2)

Despite the end of the marriage and concerns about the “local Egyptian legislation, which was not in favor of a foreign woman with an Egyptian child”, J2 acknowledges that “all of this strengthens you: if I am considered different, I want to understand better who I am. It’s crucial to define one’s identity if one wants to engage in dialogue. You have to engage in dialogue, but dialogue is truly impossible without having an identity”.

In J3’s case, falling in love with someone who does not meet the implicit standards defined by her family marks a breaking point in a situation that was already perceived as “constrained” by the individual. She recounts attending Jewish school until she was 12 or 13, in almost complete isolation from non-Jewish people. “It was quite a closed circle; at times, it was even a bit restrictive. […] You saw the outside world, you knew it was there, but it didn’t affect you much”. For this reason, 13-year-old J3 asked and was granted permission to attend public school, wanting to broaden her world of reference. She remained anchored to her Jewish identity and was clear that she would marry an observant Jew, which happened when she was 22. The marriage was very short-lived. Reflecting on it, J3 comments, “Looking back, I think the closed nature of my original world made me miss many opportunities” (J3). When she divorced her first husband, she was in Boston (away from her family, who remain in Canada) for academic reasons.

In Italy, I met an Italian from Bologna, who was Catholic. We were together for a year in Boston, then he returned to Italy. I was still set on marrying a Jewish man, but I was in love with him and didn’t know what to do. I was torn [...]. It took me some time, but I concluded that love was stronger. When I finished my studies in Boston, I was single and hadn’t accepted a job. I told my father: “I’m going to Italy for a year”, obviously to come to Bologna. This caused a tragedy in my family. In particular, my father disagreed; he didn’t want an Italian Catholic as a son-in-law.

(J3)

J3 does not hide the difficulties she faced in Italy: the struggle to integrate into a much smaller Jewish community than the one she grew up in; the pressure from her parents; and a growing sense of loneliness and depression. After a severe psychological crisis and a temporary return to Canada, she eventually settled in Bologna and married her Italian fiancé. In this case, there was also a compromise: “We got married at the Town Hall in Bologna [...]. Then we went to Canada and had a Jewish wedding with a reform rabbi, as there are mixed marriages there. My husband isn’t Jewish, but I wanted to be married by a rabbi” (J3). The three Jewish women emphasize that they continue to fully live their faith. Each of them interprets their refusal to conform to family expectations and their willingness to embrace a partner who is different from themselves as a result of the religious education they received. Thanks to this education, they possess a profound resource, which appeals to an order—also an expression of the face of God—in which femininity is inscribed and intimately bound.8

In general, the narratives of both Islamic and Jewish women allow their marriages and religious conversions to be framed within a cultural and religious intrapsychic conflict, related to the pursuit and definition of their own identity.

3.4. A “Biophilic” Orientation

A distinctive chapter relates to the religious education of children. Among women of either religion, different emphases can be noted in their views on the religious freedom of their children. However, as will be seen, none of them outright denies this freedom. In some cases, the biophilic power of femininity emerges. The religious concern for the other’s (both earthly and spiritual) salvation does not exclude the desire for the other to remain true to themselves and to freely meet their own destiny. Making space for the child as the “other” thus outlines a symbolic “space of the Other”.

I passed on to my daughter a religion with a very strong basis in spirituality. [...] My daughter has atheist, Christian, Buddhist, Muslim friends... [...] At Christmas, she is invited here and there. One Christmas, I went to her place, where she hosts students. I went to be the mom for all of them, with the Sabbath bread. And there I saw something unusual. Two years ago, Christmas coincided with the day of the Festival of Lights. [...] The Festival of Lights means that you need to look at the light; things happen, but if you look at the light, you will not get lost. We lived this message together at that Christmas dinner, where there were also Christians and Muslims. A miracle to commemorate. [...] When I think back to my years in Alexandria, Egypt, I still feel difficulty and pain. [...] The only way to avoid discrimination and mistrust is that Christmas table. I am proud of my daughter. [...] I want my daughter to be free in her religious choice, to have a personal journey.

(J2)

In some cases, the tension between loyalty to one’s own religious affiliation and loyalty to the child’s individuality is particularly pronounced.

I’ve often wondered: how can you pass on to your children the warmth and experience of having God? You can’t, not directly. We can’t make them experience it as we do, in our place. So, usually, rituals are passed on. And at a certain point, things become rigid. I transmitted the rituals, which in Islam are heavy. I lived in Morocco for twenty years, in Fez. I did everything, the good and the bad. The situation indeed became rigid. When my daughter was six years old, she was asked to wear the veil. Once, my son was beaten for not memorizing the Quran. I am critical, if needed. But the Quran does not allow for choices. I have appreciated the Catholic and Jewish mothers who, in this seminar, said that it is important for their children’s choices to be free and authentic, that they desire a free faith for their children… But it’s difficult for a mother to say to her child: ‘Be free to believe or not, go to hell if you must, as long as you are free to choose’. As a mother, you know what the truth is, you know that what you offer them is the truth. Then you say: ‘My child must come to the truth’. Fine, but here we are talking about freedom of conscience versus paradise, coercion versus hell. If you see your child willingly throwing themselves into the fire, what do you do? You stop them! My daughter, in any case, has run away from home twice. […] Now she declares herself an atheist, is covered in tattoos, and has a fierce hatred of Arabs. I am now content with her, and I hope my husband will be too. And I hope God is with her.

(M1)

I have two daughters, one who is sixteen and one who is twenty. I also have another son, born from a previous relationship with another man, who is thirty-five. My son identifies as agnostic, but his child follows the Catholic practice. […] My relationship with my daughters is mixed. They are Muslims, and we are raising them in Islam. […] They are the children of a mixed couple. This causes issues for them; they don’t feel part of the Muslim community. […] Sometimes they wear the veil, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they come to the mosque when I go, but in other things, they are not involved. […] I try not to force them, […] to involve them as much as possible. I hope that as they grow up, they will also feel this need to embrace the faith and believe.

(M2)

This is a concern shared by the youngest of the women participating in the seminar, who, although she does not have children of her own, extends such care to her younger brothers and fellow believers: “I began to feel the role of the maternal figure. […] I applied what I was taught to my younger brothers […] I noticed the lack of teaching Islamic principles to the children of Muslims born here in Italy. So […] I started an after-school program: not only to teach Arabic but also Islamic education” (M3).

In any case, loyalty to the child involves recognizing their individuality and aligning the maternal role with their desire for autonomy. God is approached here as an ally of femininity in the path leading to the children’s happiness. It is this trust in a God with maternal attributes that supports the acceptance of the children’s freedom, recognized as an essential prerequisite for any religious choice.

In the religious education of our children, we decided not to force them. We lived our religious faith within the family, involving them in the experiences we had. [...] We care that our children remain in the faith and the Church, but we also want it to be a genuine choice, a choice of their own. [...] Faith stands strong only if there is a personal relationship between you and the Transcendent; otherwise, it is merely superficial, conformism, or worse. [...] It would not be an act of faith if it were not free.

(C2)

[With my agnostic husband] we agreed that I would raise the children in Judaism because he understood that I would provide them with a free education. We both agree that it is the woman who transmits the education. [...] My eldest daughter has stopped practicing. At twelve, she rejected everything and wanted nothing more to do with it. But even the rabbi advised me not to insist with her. [...] I try at least to impart a sense of belonging and memory to her.

(J1)

My children are Jewish [...], raised by Jews within the Jewish community, but they do not follow all the rules. [...] They socialize with other Jewish kids [...] but they also participate in the lives of their Catholic cousins. In our home, we only celebrate Jewish holidays, but my children also take part in Christmas and other Christian holidays with their grandparents. [...] If I could choose for my children, I would prefer a Jewish woman or someone willing to convert [...]. But I also hope that my children will marry for love; I don’t think I would do like my father did.

(J3)

Motherhood is thus explicitly experienced by these women as a place of familiarity with the transcendent, which reveals itself even in the harshest and most dramatic circumstances.

When my second daughter was born, we discovered that she had a congenital malformation. She had to spend a lot of time in the hospital. At that moment, I had many doubts about my faith: why does God allow this, why send such a bad thing to an innocent child? […] [But] I was able to confront the doubt by drawing on Jewish culture, which allowed me to recognize signs in the events. For example, my daughter was operated on the day of Yom Kippur: it couldn’t have been a coincidence. Believing gave me strength.

(J1)

4. Conclusions

The empirical material analyzed in this contribution has certain limitations, typical of an exploratory study. It is indeed meager and, above all, peculiar in nature: the subjects had joined an association whose aim is to foster dialogue among the three Abrahamic religions. They were therefore motivated by a desire for interfaith dialogue and peace. With this in mind, the author will now attempt to draw some conclusions, which could serve as a useful foundation for further research.

The first notable element—in the author’s opinion—is the fact that these women all still experience themselves as being “on a quest”: their religious journey is still ongoing, although they may not be fully aware of it. In reality, such awareness surfaces intermittently in their stories. An illustrative example, not without self-irony, is offered by M1: “Spiritual direction is not an easy experience for women in Islam. For men, it is easier to be in contact with the wise ones. I couldn’t. […] Recently, the most important reference for me is… a Catholic monk”. It could be hypothesized that the very act of agreeing to participate in the seminar demonstrates this ongoing search, which unites them all.

The narratives examined also allow what, following Paden (2005), can be called “pan-human categories” to emerge, underlying and intertwining with the various religious sensitivities. In these women, what emerges first and foremost is the propensity to encounter “face to face with God”, to seek and recognize Him by continually freeing Him from the accretions of habit, empty forms, and others’ expectations that obscure His presence. This search for the “authentic God” appears, in turn, to be connected to the search for an “authentic Self” beyond the intrapsychic conflicts through which they seem to be traversed. It is as if the God they encounter, even following conversion experiences, is simultaneously posed as the “You” and as the “container” of the ego (Winnicott [1965] 1970). That is, the following becomes recognizable: “the implicit relationship […] placed between the unity of God and the unity of consciousness, as if only by mirroring itself in the divine unity could the ego/consciousness maintain its own functional unity” (Moscato 2022b, p. 31).9

Feminine religiosity, as revealed in the narratives examined here, also embodies an attitude of care for both others and the world. Erikson ([1964] 1968) characterizes this aspect as a virtue or strength of the ego typical of adulthood. However, in femininity, it manifests as an orientation towards reconciliation, integration, and unification, enveloping vulnerable life in a gaze of ultimate benevolence and understanding. This is reminiscent of the figure of the “smile of the Goddess”, a key element of the “demiurgy of the smile”, as explored from various perspectives by Campbell (2013) and Moscato (1998).

In short, a coessential link with the religious sphere emerges in female religiosity, which is explained precisely by the specific traits of femininity in its entirety and appears inseparable from education. Indeed, if we observe the educational functions of the adult from an archetypal perspective, we find that those symbolically associated with the feminine/maternal aspect are characterized by the ability to respond to the subjective needs of the immature subject, including emotional security; the possibility of directly experiencing one’s own being loved and capable of loving and, more generally, experiencing the world around oneself under the gaze of an encouraging adult presence; the recognition of one’s personal identity, and with it, one’s moral freedom; as well as the possibility of receiving forgiveness for one’s transgressions and failings. In this “fidelity to the person of the child” on the part of the adult, resulting from a full identification with the “weakened” subject of the educational relationship, a religious nucleus shines through. This, as Maria Teresa Moscato (1994) suggests, can be found symbolized in the biblical passage of the Judgment of Solomon, where the wisdom of the King/Judge attributes the fullness of motherhood/femininity to the one who chooses the salvation of the child’s life, even at the cost of losing him.10 The feminine/maternal perspective is thus revealed as “biophilic” (Fromm 1964), capable of sustaining life with a care that is poured over each individual existence, welcoming it and making room for it to be. This act of working for the other’s being and growth under a protective gaze is, fundamentally, a religious act.

In summary, the connection between femininity and religiosity seems to lie in the potency of affirming personal life—both one’s own and that of the other. The mystery of generation, understood both materially and symbolically, makes femininity the gateway to the sacred, and for femininity, it already represents an entry beyond that threshold11. It presents itself, then, as the “guardian of the Mystery”, the “keeper of God’s gifts”. Like Pandora, who, by opening the jar in explicit defiance of the gods’ command, manages to retain hope within it. As Moscato (2022a, pp. 194–96) suggests, more significant than the transgression itself is the archetypal figure of hope as the “gift of the mothers”, the “gift of the archetypal feminine”. A hope that is inherently religious12 and serves as the foundational condition for life to unfold. As already mentioned, this hope represents the first, original “force of the ego” (Erikson [1964] 1968), which in the child’s psyche begins to take form precisely through the experience of personal recognition and care received. It enables resilience against life’s challenges, grounded in the belief that it is good to exist in the world, and that human events have meaning and direction, however inscrutable.

It is precisely this guardianship of hope—and the infinite horizon it opens—that constitutes the enduring contribution of female religiosity to contemporary humanity.