This inability may be grounded in an inborn dull-mindedness (in the literal sense), or in a general indifference developed in the course of a lifetim… - Edith Stein

Only the person blinded by the passion of controversy could deny that woman in soul and body is formed for a particular purpose. The clear and irrevocable world of Scripture declares what daily experience teaches from the beginning of the world: woman is destined to be wife and mother.

Previously, perhaps using an Ignatian method, one has exercised the spiritual powers in the hours of meditation — the senses, imagination, understanding, the will. But now they won’t work. All efforts are in vain. The spiritual practices that up to now have been a source of inner joy become a torment, intolerably dull and fruitless. But there is no tendency to occupy oneself with worldly things. The soul desires more than all else to remain still, without bestirring itself, allowing all its faculties to rest.

As woman was the first to be tempted, so did God's message of grace come first to a woman, and each time woman's assent determined the destiny of humanity as a whole.