During the Mexican Revolution, male revolutionaries in Mexico repeatedly tried to suppress confession by invoking the trope of the sexually predatory priest menacing weak, superstitious women. Campaigns against the rite resulted from long-standing gender divisions over the Church, fears of Catholic counter-revolution, and male revolutionaries' drive to modernise marriage as companionate and secular but still patriarchal. Although ultimately unsuccessful as policy, attacks on the confession strengthened radical anticlericalism. By equating masculinity with reason, nation and progress while painting femininity as vulnerable, fanatical and potentially treasonous, the campaigns subtly shaped gender roles and helped to consolidate post-revolutionary patriarchy.
