Mary Daly Quotes
Mary Daly was an American radical feminist philosopher and theologian who taught for more than thirty years at Boston College, where she insisted on the right to teach women-only courses. The Church and the Second Sex and Beyond God the Father offered a sustained feminist critique of patriarchal religion, arguing that the symbol of an exclusively male God serves to legitimize male domination. The quotes below are attributed to Mary Daly, organized by topic.
Browse Mary Daly by topic
Mary Daly on Freedom
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“To exist humanly is to name the self, the world, and God.”
Beyond God the Father -
“(Women's Liberation) ... is an ontological, spiritual revolution, pointing beyond the idolatries of sexist society and sparking creative action in and toward transcendence. The becoming of women implies universal human becoming. It has everything to do with the search for ultimate meaning and reality which some would call God. p. 6”
Wikiquote
Mary Daly on God
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“If God is male, then the male is God.”
Beyond God the Father -
Attributed to Mary Daly:
“Patriarchy is itself the prevailing religion of the entire planet.”
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“The 'self-transcending immanence,' the sense of giving birth to ourselves, the sense of power of being within, which is being affirmed by many women, does not seem to be denoted, imaged adequately pointed to, or perhaps even associated with the term 'God'. p. 208”
The Qualitative Leap Beyond Patriarchal Religion." Quest 1 (Spr 1975) -
“The Qualitative Leap Beyond Patriarchal Religion." Quest 1 (Spr 1975)”
The 'self-transcending immanence,' the sense of giving birth to ourselves, the sense of power of being within, which is being affirmed by many women, does not seem to be denoted, imaged adequately pointed to, or perhaps even associated with the term 'God'. p. 208 -
“The first step in the elevation of women under all systems of religion is to convince them that the great Spirit of the Universe is in no way responsible for any of these absurdities. (Stanton, quoted on p. 13)”
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“She was a great trained philosopher , theologian and poet , and she used all of those tools to demolish patriarchy - or any idea that domination is natural - in its most defended place, which is religion .”
About | Gloria Steinem quoted in Mary Daly dies: feminist theologian, professor, by Bryan Marquard, Boston Globe (10 January 2010) -
“Mary Daly exposed the slimy underbelly of religion's treatment of women by Susan A. Ross, National Catholic Reporter' ' (5 December 2016)”
About
Mary Daly on Happiness
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“Daly’s work exposed the foundational misogyny in religion which continues to flourish.”
About | Mary Daly dies: feminist theologian, professor, by Bryan Marquard, Boston Globe (10 January 2010)
Mary Daly on Knowledge
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“The word ‘ radical ’ means ‘going to the roots’. It is derived from the Latin radix, meaning root. Radical Feminism goes to the root of oppression and the way out. And I define it as “way of being characterised by (a) an Awesome and Ecstatic sense of Otherness from patriarchal norms and values (b) conscious awareness of the sadosociety ’s sanctions against Radical Feminists (c) moral outrage on be”
Quoted in [ https://philosophynow.org/issues/33 Interview Mary Daly, Philosophy Now, Issue 33, (September/October 2001) -
“The correspondence between the minds of Musing women and the intelligible structures of reality is rooted in our promise, that is, our potential and commitment to evolve, unfold 'together,' in harmony with each other and with all Elemental reality. p. 163”
Wikiquote
Mary Daly on Life
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“Someone like Mary Daly doesn't even know how people live-but other women, I think they come from suburban lives or something like that, and no family. That's a certain kind of life but it's not general female life.”
About | 1981 interview anthologized in Conversations with Grace Paley edited by Gerhard Bach and Blaine Hall (1997) -
“I hope that in its richness, as well as in its incompleteness, Gyn/Ecology will continue to be a Labrys enabling women to learn from our mistakes and our successes, and cast our Lives as far as we can go, Now, in the Be-Dazzling Nineties.”
Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism(1978–1990) | p. xxxiii ( New Intergalactic Introduction ). -
“Bettina Aptheker Tapestries of Life: Women's Work, Women's Consciousness, and the Meaning of Daily Experience (1989)”
About
Mary Daly on Mind
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Attributed to Mary Daly:
“Be-ing is verb, not noun; the self is realized in active becoming.”
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“It requires a kick in the imagination, a wrenching of tired words, to realize that feminism is the final and therefore the first cause, and that this movement is movement. Realization of this is already the beginning of a qualitative leap in be-ing. For the philosophers of senescence 'the final cause' is in technical reason; it is the Father's plan, an endless flow of Xerox copies of the past. But the final cause that is movement is in our imaginative-cerebral-emotional-active-creative be-ing. p. 190”
Wikiquote
Mary Daly on Nature
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“To be a Radical Feminist now is to do quantum leaping. That means to act with fantastic courage because you see real hope now, not lovely little lah-didah hope (a very contained hope), but really great Hope for participation in Quintessence, which is the harmony of the universe.”
Quoted in Interview Mary Daly, Philosophy Now , Issue 33, (September/October 2001)
Mary Daly on Politics
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Attributed to Mary Daly:
“The story of women is a story of survival within a culture that has tried to silence it.”
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“As a creative crystallizing of the movement beyond the state of Patriarchal Paralysis, this book is an act of Dis-possession; and hence, in a sense beyond the limitations of the label anti-male , it is absolutely Anti-androcrat, A-mazingly Anti-male, Furiously and Finally Female.”
Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism(1978–1990) | p. 29.
Mary Daly on Time
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“Hags live. Women traveling into feminist time/space are creating Hag-ocracy, the place we govern. To govern is to steer, to pilot.”
Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism(1978–1990) | p. 15.
Mary Daly on Virtue
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“The word ‘ radical ’ means ‘going to the roots’. It is derived from the Latin radix, meaning root. Radical Feminism goes to the root of oppression and the way out. And I define it as “way of being characterised by (a) an Awesome and Ecstatic sense of Otherness from patriarchal norms and values (b) conscious awareness of the sadosociety ’s sanctions against Radical Feminists (c) moral outrage on behalf of women as women (d) commitment to the cause of women that persists, even against the current, when feminism is no longer ‘popular’; in other words, constancy.”
Quoted in [ https://philosophynow.org/issues/33 Interview Mary Daly, Philosophy Now, Issue 33, (September/October 2001)