women to marry further outside their immediate family, which meant that their money would be more accessible to the church and state.
These laws allowed men more freedom than women, as do most laws which make women targets for the purpose of consolidating the power of secular or religious organizations which are run by men:
In some cases Irish men refused to accept church teaching on incest but then manipulated this teaching when they wanted a way out of an unsuitable or inexpedient marriage. Women lost out on both counts (157).
Women were pawns in the struggle between the church and the state as well. For example, in order to protect themselves from the state, women often contributed much wealth to the church: "Possibly the women realized that the church was the only ho
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