Even though divorce stayed uncommon, it would be a way to escape horrible husbands in the future. Although Protestants had very liberal ideas, they stayed conservative in the home. Most leaders advised that the husband should always have complete mastery over his wife. Also, most new branches excluded women from the ministry therefore not preaching or presiding over baptisms or communion. Since marriage was so encouraged, and the convents were closed, single women faced more problems and fewer options than their Catholic counterparts.
Facing the threat of a huge number of defections, the Catholic Church was forced to make some concessions toward women. New religious communities were opened across Europe to give Catholic women the opportunity to get involved in educational and charitable work. Now young women were given the opportunity to be educated all over Europe. The Catholic Church helped to educate women from every class, although not completely by choice. A new religious sect, the Quakers, offered women the opportunity to preach and become ministers. If the Protestant Reformation had not occurred, it is uncertain at what point in time women would have been educated by the thousands. But the Reformation did more than that, it also supplied ideas to be used for the next few hundred years and beyond. The Western Civilizations were seeing the first glimpses of the transformation of the second sex to equal individuals. .
Ironically, the appeal to reason led to the idea that the mind is essentially the same for females as it is for males. The Enlightenment was created because of this appeal to reason and the belief of self-realization. Scholars began discovering more universe workings which led to philosophers exploring how humans could live better on earth. The idea of individualism was growing in strength and most philosophers admitted women at least had some capacity for learning and creating thoughts and ideas.
