Women Priests Assigning Penance in Love's Labor's Lost?
In Shakespeare's play, Love's Labor's Lost, King Ferdinand of Navarre and his friends confess in the end that they made mistakes, or "sins" in the words of Lord Berowne. They had taken an oath to avoid the company of women, so when the Princess of France and her ladies in waiting show up, one of their sins is a failure of hospitality, forcing the women to camp out in tents outside the castle instead of welcoming them in. Another of their sins is that they quickly break their oath by falling in love with the women. They also make fools of themselves by dressing up as "Muscovites, or Russians" to profess their love, but the women exchange some articles of clothing to fool them (the fools!). The women confess their deception but blame the men, and the men confess their broken oaths and foolish behavior, but blame the women's beauty and heavenly eyes. The men have more to confess.... If it seems a bit like the Catholic sacrament of confession, it sh...