If Mary the mother of God was a student in a Catholic school in the Philippines today, in all likelihood she would be suspended, expelled or ?exiled,? punished for the ?crime? of getting pregnant without benefit of marriage.

As our religion classes taught us, Mary was a young woman (some have put her age at the time at 14 years) betrothed to Joseph, a carpenter, when an angel paid a visit and told her that she had been chosen by God to bear His Son, the Messiah. And though she knew that accepting God?s challenge meant not just a personal risk (pregnancy outside of marriage was punishable by stoning at the time) but also taking on the religious power elite, Mary not only said ?yes,? but also proclaimed her affinity with the poor and powerless in her beautiful ?Magnificat.?

After all, in her own historical time and place, in a misogynist society where men began each day thanking God that they ?had not been born a woman,? no one could have been more powerless or oppressed than a young unmarried woman from a poor family pregnant with a child of no known provenance. And if Joseph had not stepped up in defense of the pregnant Mary, even if she had said she had ?not known any man,? Mary would almost certainly have faced the community?s opprobrium and possibly been stoned to death. Instead, Joseph, who had been visited by an angel in a dream and assured of Mary?s loyalty and fidelity, chose to stand by her and went ahead with their marriage. Even if, I?m sure, he had to face down the malicious gossip of idle tongues and dirty minds. And so, from the union of this poor troubled couple, was born the Savior.

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BUT in present-day Philippines, if she were studying in a Catholic institution, Mary would still have faced the disapproval of administrators and she would have been forced to quit her studies. But Joseph, if he were her schoolmate, would not have been similarly pressured or censured, much less punished, even if suspicion would have naturally fallen on him as the sperm donor (would school authorities have suspected God?).

It wasn?t just the blatant inequity of the situation?women students and teachers penalized for their sexuality while men remain perfectly free to sow their wild oats?that motivated the inclusion of this provision in the Magna Carta of Women. It was also the disastrous consequences on the women who had been punished by such hidebound regulations. A young woman forced to cut short her education in all probability would never be able to continue it, saddled as she would be with childcare duties. Without a college (or high school) diploma, her chances of gainful employment would be drastically reduced, condemning her to poverty and limited choices in life. Her daughters and sons, in turn, would face similarly constricted options, and chances are that they, too, would end up marrying young without completing their education.

By cutting short a woman?s education or employment, for the simple reason that she had gotten pregnant without a marriage contract, the school authorities could then be judged guilty of starting a multi-generational cycle of poverty, visiting on this woman?s family a lifetime?s suffering.

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MELODRAMATIC, yes, but I wonder if those who advocate the right of school officials to enforce their ?religious affiliations? have given a thought to the consequences of such policies.

Comedic, too, have been the reasons cited by such officials for enforcing such policies.

A student pregnant out of wedlock, they say, sets a ?bad example? to other students, who might be influenced or encouraged to taste some whoopee for themselves. But the power of a ?bad example,? to my mind, lies in precisely her daily presence, her living model of the consequences of early sexual experimentation.

Would a typical young woman follow her pregnant classmate?s example, when she sees how that classmate has to deal with bloating and nausea, changes in her physique, including not just the rapidly growing tummy but the swelling nose and dark lines in her neck, the swollen ankles and toes? Would a young person find the ?bad example? glamorous as she witnesses her friend transformed from a carefree teenager to a young person thrust suddenly into adulthood with all its burdens?

If the teachers and administrators were proper educators, they would use one student?s or teacher?s experience as a ?teaching moment,? to communicate the consequences of sexual behavior, the need to protect oneself and respect oneself, the dividends of planning one?s life and postponing gratification.

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BUT if, instead of allowing the student or teacher to proceed with her life despite the many challenges she faces, the school chooses to make her ?disappear,? then they would end up teaching their young charges malice and narrow-mindedness, the use of power to punish those they deem to have strayed outside the narrow confines of their social order, and disdain (and fear) for all sex and pleasure.

I don?t think the objections of Catholic school authorities have anything to do with ?religion? or the freedom to exercise it, either. As the Virgin Mary?s story shows us, God doesn?t really have anything against motherhood outside of marriage. What He condemns, however, is hypocrisy and the rush to judgment of those whose circumstances we have little knowledge of.

It is not the Catholic faith they are defending, but rather their right to discriminate against and penalize those they deem ?immoral,? against those whose rights they wish to trample on with impunity. The Magna Carta of Women exists primarily to ensure that women will no longer be vulnerable to the power wielded by the Talibans in our midst.