Occasionally I've gotten into some pointed "discussions" (read: arguments) with church folks about the gender (or lack there of) of God.
I'm currently reading through a very good little book on The Lord's Prayer with our deacons: Praying Like Jesus by James Mulholland. Rev. Mulholland (even though he's a baptist!) articulates my thoughts on the subject much better than I. Enjoy...
You can imagine the tongue-lashing I received a few months later when I suggested it was also appropriate to call God "Our Mother." I suspect this is precisely the language Jesus would choose today. He used father imagery to counteract those titles that kept God distant and impersonal. In our society, where nearly 50 percent of all children grow up without a father active in their lives, Jesus would probably call God "Our Mother."
Those who vehemently argue for the title "God the Father" miss the point. Jesus was not interested in replacing one rigid title with another. He was defining our relationship to God in a new way. Claiming God as a parent was far more than sentimental fantasy. In so doing, Jesus was challenging how we perceive God. For Jesus, God was the father we cry out for when we awake in the darkness, in the grip of a nightmare. God was the mother who dries our tears and kisses away our pain when we fall and skin our knee. God was a parent--intimate, loving, and committed.
...What concerned Jesus was not God's gender, but any image that denied God's intimate knowledge and concern for his children...
...Whenever the church emphasizes any image that contradicts the parental affection and commitment of God, it slanders God's character. When we portray God as an angry judge, we make God an abusive parent. When we suggest God is distant and demanding, we divorce God from his children. When we reinforce people's fears about God, we deny our Father's unlimited patience and grace...
...Remembering that God is a parent changes the way I pray.
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3 comments:
I think I agree, although it makes me nervous to step away from the scriptural language when explicating a text. That being said, there are plenty of maternal images in scripture that the apostles and Jesus apply to God.
"How I long to gather you like a hen gathers her chicks!"
i like this.
i always just assumed the scriptural language was more cultural since the bible was written in a male dominated society. since humans are formed in god's image, i've always thought of god as male and female. beyond that, i do like the visuals of god as a nuturing mother. nice.
Good thought, I tend to agree that God is asexual (so to speak) and if my wife is in His Image too then God is pretty hot. And he has some very feminine charactaristics too.
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