Lopez: What should we expect from a woman president?

I have a Barbie for President doll in my office. EMILYs List — a group dedicated to electing pro-choice women to political office — sent it years ago. The doll could be mistaken for Condoleezza Rice, though I suspect they didn't have a Republican in mind.

With Kamala Harris, the prospect of the first woman president of the United States is a plausibility again. But a critical question is what we want in the first woman president. It's a question that matters to EMILYs List. For that group, Harris fits the bill. She recently became the first president or vice president to visit an abortion clinic.

But do we want something else from the first woman president of the United States? Do we need something else?

In the Catholic tradition, women have a special gift called "feminine genius."

In a 1995 Letter to Women, Pope John Paul II thanked women in various states of life. "Through the insight which is so much a part of your womanhood you enrich the world's understanding and help to make human relations more honest and authentic," he wrote.

John Paul went on: "Women's dignity has often been unacknowledged, and their prerogatives misrepresented; they have often been relegated to the margins of society and even reduced to servitude. This has prevented women from truly being themselves and it has resulted in a spiritual impoverishment of humanity."

This isn't a commentary on Harris as much as a question. If a nation can have a longing, what are we longing for? Perhaps a peacemaker? But, again, if you'll allow me to borrow from some of what Catholicism has offered in the last century: At the end of the Second Vatican Council, it was said quite clearly and directly (and later reiterated by Pope Benedict to me): "Women of the entire universe, whether Christian or non-believing, you to whom life is entrusted at this grave moment in history, it is for you to save the peace of the world."

So, what does that mean for presidential politics? The back-and-forth about sexism and racism is a distraction, for one thing. And we are desperate for a new courageous type of leadership that is not on stage.

I harbor no illusions that Harris will change the miserable state of the abortion discourse, but in this bizarre political moment, we ought to reflect on what we want as a people. This starts on a more local level. Girls might be excited to see Harris running for president: We can do anything! But there are important questions that women should be considering, about how their unique position as life-creators can influence the work they do in the world.

Harris is obviously a Democratic Party gal. She's not going to break from those loyalties. But we need to raise a new generation of leaders. And so, to both girls and boys, women and men, the question of how we can do things better should be raised. We owe it to ourselves, to our nation and to our children.

I don't want Kamala Harris to be president. (Ditto, Donald Trump!) But there's a civics challenge they both present. The question is whether we are up to it.

klopez@nationalreview.com