I know a metaphor when I see one
Print Friendly Version| From Where I Stand by Joan Chittister, OSB | December 1, 2006 |
| Vol. 4, No. 27 |
The movie "Everest," now showing at the local IMAX theater, sent chills down my spine. There, in the middle of the Himalayas, a group of climbers found themselves blocked on their way to the summit by a fracture in the snow 90 feet deep. The crevasse was too wide to jump, but at the same time too narrow to simply accept as the end of their 30,000-foot attempt to conquer the highest mountain in the world. So they opened up a telescoped pole ladder, laid it across the icy ravine and in large, clunky, steel-clawed boots walked across the open spaces between its rungs, toes on one rundle, heels on the other.
I know a metaphor when I see one. I felt like I had just been part of a similar climb myself, sure of the need to go on, not sure that the passage was safe.
In Lebanon the week before, spiritual leaders from every side of the religious crevasse -- Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, and Orthodox -- met in the first-ever Middle East-Asian Spiritual Dialogue to discuss the role of religion and the road to peace. They were sheikhs and monks and archbishops and patriarchs and judges and theologians.
They were leaders of religious groups who had long been at odds with one another. And they were now trying to take the first steps across the historical fissures that were keeping them from uniting a globe where borders were fast disappearing, where cultures were all becoming polyglot, where no one was safe from having to deal with the others any more.
No doubt about it: This was not one more routine academic convention.
This meeting was happening in a city where the marks of bombs were frighteningly fresh. Bridges were still out in the center of the city. Makeshift steel beams creak and groan under the traffic they carry from one side of the overpass to the other. One whole section of the city lies in rubble. The apartment buildings that remain standing are hung with canvass. Why? Because families with nowhere else to go have crept back into the condemned buildings and live their still. The sheets of canvas cover the gaping holes left by the missiles and keep out the cold and rain from the children who peek around the corners of the scars.
This was a meeting where the participants, religious figures all, spoke across the great divides of time and tradition, of place and peoples, to heal the wounds of division and prejudice that threaten the very globe again. They shared their spiritual traditions with one another. They got to know one another. They defined their moral values. They talked about the sacredness of life and the need for compassion. They talked about how they saw God, how they prayed, what they knew to be the purpose of life.
Where I grew up, something like that was impossible. Catholics hardly spoke to Protestants; Protestants barred Catholics from public life, never mind Hindus or Buddhists, Muslims or Orthodox.
But the problem is that even now, even here in the United States, we still do far too little to bridge our own divides while those very differences are being exploited everywhere. Here imams cannot board a plane without being eyed with suspicion, and children cannot carry stuffed toys on board without being screened and searched and half undressed at checkpoints. Muslims are changing their names in order to get jobs and we, too, are building barbed-wired walls on our border.
Instead of launching great spiritual conferences and study groups and social projects together so that we can come to understand and respect one another's spiritual beauty, we are strengthening the walls of our own spiritual ghettoes.
For our part, we are worrying about stamping out feminine images of a God already called rock, tree, light, fire and dove. But this God, the very womb of the universe, must never ever be called "mother" in the hymns of the church.
We are worrying about keeping the gay community invisible, warning them not to talk about their sexual identity in their parishes, reaching out to them in one sentence, explaining their theological disorders to them in another.
We are tidying up our rituals and reclaiming our "identity" while "identity" -- if we mean the old WASP paradigm or White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant USA -- gets more mulatto, more Eastern, more "other" every day.
This conference, under the auspices of His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos of Cilicia of the Armenian Apostolic Church and the Most Venerable Master Sheng Yen, founder of Dharma Drum Mountain in Taiwan, called for a great deal more. As Master Sheng Yen put it, we must "focus on the shared needs of humankind as a whole. … We must find a common path that reflects a set of global ethics which transcends religion, ethnicity and culture."
Let's put it this way: Bombs and bullets are not doing it. The world is more dangerous now than when we invaded Iraq. Iraq itself is worse off now than it was when we first went there. The Middle East is less stable now than it was before we sent all our weapons in to stabilize it. And we ourselves are poorer for it: Poorer in international relations. Poorer in social development here. Poorer in moral stature around the world.
From where I stand, it seems to me that it's time for all of us to put a pole ladder over the fissures we have created between us and the rest of the world and start walking. Awkward as we are. Dangerous as it is. Unsure as we may be. There is no other way to get to the other side now because there is no "other side."
We are all in this one together and we are surely too close to the summit now to quit.
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If God is "He" then there is
If God is "He" then there is a limitation on who God is. So, God can't be God anymore. God's not he or she or it. God is God. Sometimes we attribute qualities to God in order to tell how God acts. Sometimes God acts like a father. Sometimes God acts like a mother. Sometimes God acts like a Judge. But, none of those qualities really tell us who God is. God just is. God is. God says: "I AM". Period. That's just freshman theology. So what's all the yak about? Next thing you know someone will try to contain God in a box in order to pretend God's real presence is lacking somehow in the rest of creation.
We Catholics believe that
We Catholics believe that God is most definitely without a doubt present in the Host reserved in the tabernacle. I assume that is what you were taking a shot at in your post. Any Catholic will proudly admitt to believing that, even in the face of ridicule (such as was your intention I assume). As far as God being 'contained' in the tabernacle...my friend nothing could be further from the truth. Too many people on this board, with many very different opinions on many many things (politics, history, inclusive language etc) receive Jesus in the Eucharist at Mass and spend time in prayer in front of the Blessed Sacrament and then go forth into the world sharing the light that burns within them, for you to say that we keep God 'contained' in the tabernacle. The Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist is something very near and dear to many of us. I just thought you should know.
Some of us authentic
Some of us authentic Catholics think some Catholics use the reserved Sacred Species as a way to dwell in their individualized, privatized kind of "spirituality" (Me and God) to the exclusion of the presence of God in creation and our obligation as sons and daughters to care for that presence. Some of us authentic Catholics know that it is only recently in the history of The Church that tabernacles and God in a Box have become a part of the tradition. Initially some elements of the sacred species were reserved in a wall safe or in a small room off to the side of the main worship space for use during the "last rites". As someone else has already noted some of these devotions came about because the institutional bureaucracy removed the liturgy, and particularly the Celebration of The Eucharist, from the people. I would further suggest the proper venue for adoration is the presence of God in those around you who aren't "nice" and who aren't "like you". As the song says, "You will know that you are Christian" when you can honestly worship the presence of God in the people around you.
But, if sitting there all by yourself, wrapped up in you and God, makes you feel holy, go to it. Be careful, though, because you might wind up worshipping the wrong god.
I think you are unfairly
I think you are unfairly stereotyping people who adore the Blessed Sacrament. Mother Teresa insisted that her nuns spend an hour in adoration every day. Do they strike you as the type who have trouble seeing Christ in others?
wwob: Please refrain from
wwob:
Please refrain from calling it "God in a Box". If you don't like to go to Eucharistic Adoration, then don't go. But don't disrespect God because of it.
Cool Catholic blogs:
American Papist
The Cafeteria is Closed
Shrine of the Holy Whapping
Perhaps the disrespect is on
Perhaps the disrespect is on the part of those who insist on keeping God in that box.
Some people, seems to me,
Some people, seems to me, discredit the 'box' so that they can refashion God into whatever experience of God they want to have, even the one that permits all. It is our business in relationship with God to discover who He is, not who we want him to be. It is not an easy thing to discover that on occasions we are wrong (in the God we have created) and the real God is right.
This is an occasion on which
This is an occasion on which I do not disagree with you at all, Spiritfed. God is a Mystery far too amazing and awesome to be discovered in Entirety. But what a measure of God's wonderful Love for Us Little Human Beings That God would Consent to Reveal to Us At All (Moses), to Covenant With Us (Moses) and even to consent to Live As One Of Us (Jesus) and to Love Us So Much He, (As Jesus) Would Live In Love and Die For Us.
Think of it! Every day, the scientists send us pictures of the amazing sweep of the Universe this Great Creator has created! We are but a tiny speck in this infinity! And yet we were so honored by this Great Magnificence, with Such Love! Why?
It does not matter. The fact is, Our Creator has spoken to us, has even come to show us how to live with one another. Soon we celebrate with joy the Feast of God's Coming as Man, Christmas. May we take time to recognize with awe this incredible Gift.
Those who only worship God
Those who only worship God in the Tabernacle and disrespect humanity are also being disrespectful, but this does not mean that you are not being disrespectful as well.
Cool Catholic blogs:
American Papist
The Cafeteria is Closed
Shrine of the Holy Whapping
It might just be time for
It might just be time for some of us to listen to the value in some messages rather than picking up and "retorting" to the bits we think we can chew on.
Some of us authentic
Some of us authentic Catholics think some Catholics use the reserved Sacred Species as a way to dwell in their individualized, privatized kind of "spirituality" (Me and God) to the exclusion of the presence of God in creation and our obligation as sons and daughters to care for that presence. Some of us authentic Catholics know that it is only recently in the history of The Church that tabernacles and God in a Box have become a part of the tradition. Initially some elements of the sacred species were reserved in a wall safe or in a small room off to the side of the main worship space for use during the "last rites". As someone else has already noted some of these devotions came about because the institutional bureaucracy removed the liturgy, and particularly the Celebration of The Eucharist, from the people. I would further suggest the proper venue for adoration is the presence of God in those around you who aren't "nice" and who aren't "like you". As the song says, "You will know that you are Christian" when you can honestly worship the presence of God in the people around you.
But, if sitting there all by yourself, wrapped up in you and God, makes you feel holy, go to it. Be careful, though, because you might wind up worshipping the wrong god.
Redkim, you directed me to
Redkim, you directed me to your answer to Bob to find an answer to the question I raised. I appreciate your concern to answer what was a serious question, but I still don't find that you've answered what I asked.
I pointed you to a scripture in which Jesus speaks of his concern for Jerusalem using the metaphor of a mother bird that wants to wrap her wings around her brood.
I asked that, if you believe (as you have repeatedly told us you do), Jesus images God for us, what are we to make of his use of this feminine, maternal image to express his divine compassion for Jerusalem?
I pointed you to a specific text because that's how you seem to prefer to deal with questions--and I respect that. This is a biblical text--the revealed word of God--that seems to show us that Jesus himself images God in feminine terms.
What are we to make of that text, if we insist that God must be imaged exclusively and only in male terms?
I'm puzzled by why some people appear to have so much invested in keeping God exclusively on the male side of the ledger. After all, all terms we use to describe God are analogical. Our theological tradition has always taught that God is beyond any terms we use to define Her. She transcends all human analogies. All of them limp. We do our best, extrapolating from human experience, to formulate our experience of God in the terms available to us, knowing that no term will ever capture God or wrap God up. That's what keeps us going in our journey of faith--the attempt to find ever more adequate ways of speaking of God and our experience of God. As cultures change, we have to keep formulating new ways to speak about God.
As spirit, God is surely beyond gender, and it would be not only grossly anthropomorphic to try to define God as gendered, but doing so would also fail to recognize that all human beings and cultures in their rich diversity mirror God in manifold ways.
I suspect that the need--unorthodox and untraditional as it is--to try to confine God to the male gender has a lot to do with a deep-rooted cultural and religious fear of the feminine. That fear causes us to miss the "feminine" (that is, cutting across our current gender roles and assumptions) aspects of Jesus and many saints--Francis of Assisi comes to mind. The privileging of male status and male gender seems to me close to idolatry.
I'd be curious to know how you deal with that text from Matthew. As a devout Jew, Jesus would surely have known that he was drawing on the very first image we find of God in Jewish scripture--a mother bird hovering over its nest to birth the world.
William D. Lindsey
Bill--I love this image; I
Bill--I love this image; I love your posts! I wish I could give you 20 for this one; the mother bird will stay with me for a long time. Hope you are having a great Christmas Season with lots of joyful music! Star
Thanks, star. That mother
Thanks, star. That mother bird brooding over chaos hovers over the whole history of Judaism and Christianity, since it's the very first image we encounter of God in our scriptures. It's interesting that we have paid so little attention to it, while trying desperately to draw lines that show men belong here and women there, and to keep everyone on "their" sides of those lines. I wonder why some of us seem so afraid about questioning those socially determined gender roles, and about allowing women to be treated as fully human and fully empowered? We're an odd group of people, we Catholics, with our certainties that remain so certain even when they dash right against evidence that totally contradicts what we have chosen to believe.
As with the statement that Jesus never once referred to God in the feminine....
Thanks for the Christmas season good wishes. These are harried days, since I have umpteen assignments before our school's semester officially closes. I'll look forward to the rest and family time after that! And lots of joyful holiday music. May the same be surrounding you these days, and better health in the new year.
William D. Lindsey
Star, I'm posting this here
Star, I'm posting this here and to you, because you've kept reminding us not to forget the children displaced by Katrina. This seems especially apropos as the Christmas season nears. We remember a child born in displacement when we read the Christmas story--one whose parents had to search for a place to stay while traveling, who were immediately displaced by political turmoil after the birth of their child.
Today's NY Times carries a story by Shaila Dewan called "Storm Evacuees Remin in Grip of Uncertainty." The story reports that families remain displaced even these many months after Katrina, due to the failure of our federal emergency management program to carry through on its mission to provide new housing for them. Here are some quotes from the story:
"More than a year after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, life is still precarious and unpredictable for many evacuees, especially those who have depended on the government for a modicum of stability. About 102,000 families are still living in government trailers scattered around the region, and an additional 33,000 are living in apartments paid for by FEMA. What trauma victims need most, stability, is just what has proved most elusive....
For thousands more displaced families living in apartments, FEMA has cut off aid with little explanation, but the agency was ordered by a federal judge late last month to reinstate the aid and pay months of back rent. The judge described the ordeal of the families, many of whom have already left their apartments or are on the brink of eviction, as 'Kafkaesque.'"
As you keep reminding us, this situation has traumatic effects on the lives of children, another point made in today's story:
"Mental health experts have repeatedly warned of the importance of a consistent environment for adults and children who are recovering from trauma, and evacuees complain that stress has aggravated their physical ailments, literally making them sick."
As Christmas nears, I hope we'll continue to remember those families right in our midst living through the story of displacement and exile that marked Jesus's birth and early life. God help me, as I read such stories, I cannot help remembering those bishops who did all but break people's arms to coerce them to vote "right" in the election that brought us such a dismal record of "pro-life" leadership.
I hope those bishops are reading these stories and meditating on them this Advent, and that they will think twice about anointing any given political option as the reign of God in the future.
William D. Lindsey
I hope so, too, William, and
I hope so, too, William, and I also fervently hope for some stability for these children. I have seen what happens to the displaced children even when the pressures of financial stress are not as much of an issue as they are for these familes threatened with homelessness. Still, change is change, displacement is still displacement, new schools are still new schools, having your old home in sodden tatters is still a shock, and the financial losses are still a burden that causes incredible family stress, which inevitably has repercussions for children.
Imagine how much worse it is for children when the parents have no reserves whatever to fall back on, when the lack of a check or a government decision really does mean homelessness, on top of all the other pressures (of new schools, no grandparents, wrecked homes, being away from "best friends", sports teams played on, being the "new kid", having suddenly "no friends", parents are irritable and grumpy when they used to be happy, they are fighting with each other or maybe one parent is now missing (back home trying to work or ressurect the old house) etc. One cannot imagine. And then one day the "manager" comes to the door and says, "You all will have to be out." And you have no idea where to go. It is sheer madness. Mama is hyterical. Dad is angry and bangs the wall. "Kafkaesque" is exactly right. And the children are so helpless! What are the Bishops doing, in the affected Dioceses, or other Dioceses, to help out? I want to KNOW!
Time to go to Mass and pray for these children, but MORE, time to call our Congresspeople and ASK, WHAT is BEING DONE?
Thanks, star--thanks for
Thanks, star--thanks for your passion and for sharing it so persuasively with us.
I, too, need to know what is being done. The displaced are in some cases my own friends. They include a family that had previously been displaced when they had to flee the Marcos regime. They worked hard to create a new life in New Orleans, and had a beautiful house full of handwork that they and their family had created--an oasis of peace in the city.
It's gone now, demolished, as is their car, and their insurance company won't pay for the loss of the house. The effect of Katrina on the local economy means their primary job will end next year. They are living in a one-room apartment now, the whole family.
I am very worried and feel helpless, though I have tried to help. In the case of this family, the children are now older, but have still been affected by upheaval in their schooling, the need to study while living in cramped quarters, and so on.
Multiply this story by thousands, and you begin to understand what has happened to many children affected by Katrina, and why depression is one of the continuing effects of the storm. You also begin to understand why even many of the New Orleanians who voted for the current federal leaders at the urging of church leaders who told them that they would be voting pro-life if they elected these leaders now laugh or cry when the federak response to Katrina is brought up.
William D. Lindsey
Hoping - I know you directed
Hoping - I know you directed your last post at Redkim, but I hope you don't mind if I chime in. I am not attempting to answer for Redkim, and I have little doubt Redkim will post a more thorough response. I think you have a good handle on why no one is promoting a complete ban on feminine imagery for God. Scripture uses it and many Saints have used it. It can be a very intimate part of one's spirituality. And you are correct in saying that God is not gendered. However, the use of feminine imagery and the idea that he/she can be interchanged when referring to God are two completely different things. We use imagery to get a better handle on various attributes of God, but we are called to a deeper relationship than simply an imaginary one. God became man, and with that drew all of humanity into himself. One of the benefits of this is that Jesus taught us the perfect way to pray to God. "The Our Father." Everything that was composed before or after (no matter how lengthy or beautiful it may be) pales in comparrison to this prayer. It moves us beyond image to relationship. Father is the predominant name Jesus uses for God, and it is how he gave us to address Him. St. Paul tells us that we receive sonship through Jesus and are able to call God 'Abba.' (Rom 8) And of course Father implies a gender...male. We have to see the importance of this, this isn't a pius platitude or another of the many images of God this is something that far surpasses any other imagery. It is not misogynistic to refer to God as Him because that is the language given to us by Revelation.
"It is not misogynistic to
"It is not misogynistic to refer to God as Him because that is the language given to us by Revelation."
Blueroyal, your explanation makes perfect sense in a fully realized perfect world. Unfortunately this is not a perfect world and sons of the biological kind are given preference over daughters and have been for millenia. We may all be 'sons' of God in a spiritual sense, but in the practical sense, women are still fighting to be heard as equals.
As Bob points out below, for some people, father is not the best way to image God based on their lived reality. Jesus had a pretty decent man for a father. Joseph gave up a lot to be His father. If anyone has gotten a raw deal in the development of Jesus it's probably Joseph. I've always thought starting the Lord's prayer out with 'Our Father, was a statement about Jesus's relationship with Joseph.
Joseph was the male model we hear very little about. One who honored his committments even when he didn't have to, and one who accepted a son who wasn't his. I'm thinking there is a message here about how Jesus saw his heavenly Father.
Colkoch, You wrote, "I've
Colkoch,
You wrote, "I've always thought starting the Lord's prayer out with 'Our Father, was a statement about Jesus's relationship with Joseph.
Joseph was the male model we hear very little about. One who honored his committments even when he didn't have to, and one who accepted a son who wasn't his. I'm thinking there is a message here about how Jesus saw his heavenly Father."
What a great insight! One I certainly have never considered.
I have often reflected on the way in which God speaks to us. Take Abram, for example, was he sitting quietly on his veranda at the end of a busy day, sipping on a martini and planning for tomorrow when, out of the blue, God appeared and said, "Abram, there is something I want you to do.", or did Abram, a prayerful man, reflecting upon the socio/political/economic/personal situation in which he found himself and fully expecting direction from his God, god(s), gradually come to the firm conviction that it was time to move on?
Did God really appear to Moses in a burning bush, or is this theophony simply Moses way of affirming his conviction that his mission came from God?
Jesus was the incarnate Word of God. He was both God and man. His human person was really human. He was not Clark Kent -- he was not God is disguise. As a man, he had to learn as we have to learn. He did not pretend to learn, he had to learn because he really did not know. He was a son of his environment. He learned the values of his parents, his family, his religion, his culture and his God just as we do.
Did the human Jesus learn who he was and what his mission was through direct, person to person, diologue with the devine Jesus, or did he come to understand who he was and what his mission in life was through a learning and relfecting process which was the same as ours? Was it a matter of face to face conversation with God, or was it a movement of faith bringing understanding and conviction?
What brought this relatively uneducated man to believe he was the Messiah? What moved him to go out and begin to publicly question the "traditions" of his people and his religion? Remember, his family (Mary?) thought he had lost his mind.
Did he fully understand who and what he was or did that understanding come only after the Resurrection? Were the statements he made to his disciples, as recorded in the Gospels, as clear as they appear or is that clarity also a post-Resurrection understanding?
I ponder these things because I believe we have the impression that God spoke to people in times past, but does not speak to us in the same way today. I believe we have lost the ability (for want of a better word) to recognize and hear the words God is speaking to us all the time and yet we have a hunger to hear God speak.
Perhaps, that is why, for some, the pronouncements of the Church are so important. If the Chruch says it, God says it and it is right there in black and white and clear for all to see.
I am quite convinced it does not work that way. I believe God is constantly communicating with each of us, usually in quiet ways but not always, through the people we come into contact with, the events we exprience, the growing understanding of who and what we are and so on. I know that when I bring life to prayer and just sit quietly in God's presence, understandings come, veils are lifted and I see things in different ways. Neither you nor I get the whole message, the big picture, but, as we share our thoughts and the fruits of our prayers and reflections, I think, as a matter of fact I am sure, God speaks to us as directly as to Abram, Moses and the human Jesus. God does not give any one person THE answer, but gives each of us an insight into an ever evolving faith relationship with God, ourselves and each other and, when we take all those insights and shake them all together, we begin to see and understant God's message.
It is not through black and white pronouncements that God speaks to us, but rather God guides us, in faith, to come to understandings that are ever unfolding and call us to move on and to grow.
Comfortable people stay put. God often knocks us out of our comfort zones into the unknown. It is a step into faith, into uncertainty. It requires risk. The risk of being wrong. The risk of living according to our convictions and taking ownership of our actions and our lives.
But, I firmly believe that is exactly what the Gospel calls us to do.
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Bob, you and colkoch have
Bob, you and colkoch have given my spirit much to chew on these days of Advent, when I'm itchy to have my work obligations done so that I can go home and be with family, laugh, eat, drink, relax a little.
I especially like the way you and colkoch shock me into new awareness of those stories I have heard all my life, so that my ears get tired of listening, and I hear only the trite and "true." Nothing is less true than what we think we understand, or can sum up in a formula, or can shut up in a book. God as truth is certainly not like that, since one of the definitions of God is that we cannot ever shut God up, as in stop God speaking or confine God to our expectations. As Karl Barth says somewhere, that's precisely what we think we have done--confined God to our expectations--when we believe God as truth is confined to scripture, church teaching, catechism, or any other text.
You ask, "What moved him to go out and begin to publicly question the 'traditions' of his people and his religion?"
Following the logic of your analysis and colkoch's, there has to have been something in Jesus's own familial experience that prepared him for such a mission. In choosing to remain with Mary, Joseph was bucking the tradition of his people and religion, which expected a man who found his wife with child before they married to put her away.
And I often think of how the Magnificat is a really revolutionary song, in which we have an inkling, early on, of the spiritual insights driving Mary's life, even before we encounter Jesus in the story. Her religion is part of that prophetic tradition of Judaism that kept standing the sacral, priestly, hieratic strand on its head--the part of Judaism that believed it had God all wrapped up and controlled.
She describes an impossible world in which the lowly are lifted up and the Mighty cast down from their thrones, in which the hungry are filled with good things and the rich sent empty away. This is precisely the world Jesus began to describe when he announced that the reign of God was entering history in his life and mission. He had to learn that lesson from someone--and you and colkoch are making me reflect about how he learned it from Mary and Joseph.
I won't ever look at my little creche the same way again--those little black-haired figures bending over a creche in which the promise of the world looks back at them. God comes to those we who have so much least expect....
William D. Lindsey
"Comfortable people stay
"Comfortable people stay put. God often knocks us out of our comfort zones into the unknown. It is a step into faith, into uncertainty. It requires risk. The risk of being wrong. The risk of living according to our convictions and taking ownership of our actions and our lives."
This is great Bob. Your whole post gives me a lot to think about.
Lived Faith requires risk, but it's not just the risk of being wrong, it's also the risk of being right, of finding peace, love, and joy. One of the saddest things I have encountered in my life is how many people can't trust the feelings of peace, love, and joy. Thinking that this won't last, it isn't real, they don't trust the positive things life offers and seem to thoughtlessly go about undermining them in order to prove they don't last. Safety zones are hard to leave. Reminds me of trying to take the training wheels off my daughter's bike. She finally joyfully accepted extended freedom was worth letting go of the training wheels. And wonder of wonders, she really had learned to balance on her own.
Your post made me start thinking how much different Jesus's understanding of Himself might have been if Joseph had bailed on Mary and stayed in his rightful comfort zone. Jesus raised by a disgraced single mother might have told the same story but with a whole different emphasis, being human and all.
What a thought-provoking
What a thought-provoking reading of the nativity narratives, colkoch. I'm going to ponder these lines for quite a while:
"Joseph was the male model we hear very little about. One who honored his committments even when he didn't have to, and one who accepted a son who wasn't his. I'm thinking there is a message here about how Jesus saw his heavenly Father."
This gives a depth to the our Father that makes it a truly countercultural prayer. It's a prayer to a God who, in being named Father (in this particular prayer), images the father's role in a way for us that cuts across traditional macho definitions of the male....
Thanks for your keen spiritual insight, and for sharing it with us.
William D. Lindsey
You said it much better than
You said it much better than I could. :)
Cool Catholic blogs:
American Papist
The Cafeteria is Closed
Shrine of the Holy Whapping
Thank you for your reply,
Thank you for your reply, blueroyal. I understand you are not replying on redkim's behalf.
My response to redkim harks back to her initial posting on this thread, which really got this discussion going. If you consult it, you'll see that she states,
"And yes, that is correct, God must never be called 'mother' or 'she' in the hymns or any of the prayers of the Church. And for one very simple and good reason: Christ never once referred to God in the feminine."
I've pointed to a text that seems to me to be clear evidence that Jesus did, in fact, refer to God "in the feminine," and quite comfortably, it seems to me.
I'm unclear about the agenda being promoted here. Is the group which is arguing that the church should never use femninine images of God proposing that we excise the Matthew text from the canon--or, for that matter, the creation story of Genesis in which God is also depicted as a mother bird? Are you proposing that people leave the liturgy in protest when these passages are read?
I can't understand the passion invested in this issue. There has to be more riding on it than liturgical language.
You say, "It is not misogynistic to refer to God as Him because that is the language given to us by Revelation."
I, too, am pointing to Revelation, aren't I, when I cite biblical texts? If we aren't going to excise those from the canon or stop our ears when they are read liturgically, what are we to do with them--except learn from them, and broaden our understanding of the many ways God may be imaged and prayed to?
And if God may be imaged as mother and prayed to as mother--as Pope John Paul I urged us to do--then perhaps we do a disservice to half of humanity when we conclude that this half is somehow less human or less called then the other half, less deserving of all the rights others have, including the right to exercise power and have a voice in the church.
If we can validly pray to God as mother, because Revelation urges us to do so, then perhaps the feminine is not the threat that many patriarchal cultures (including the church's hierarchy) appear to imagine, but a gift to all of us that helps to expand what we know of a God who is far beyond our language and our imagining.
Thanks for your reply. I agree with you that prayer moves us to relationship. I also would suggest that your statement that we reach relationship "beyond image" is somehow impossible. We have to have images and analogies to lead us into relationship to the divine. This is why the tradition didn't stop with the "Our Father" or with Jesus's "Jerusalem, Jerusalem," but continues to develop new prayers throughout history.
We need to keep developing new ways to image God and pray to God, because cultures change and evolve, and language and worldviews change and evolve with them. If we remain wedded to "the" image and language, we become a museum. To try to stop history at one point and to identify the church and its future with one political or social arrangement is a form of idolatry.
We also need to develop ever-new images in which to speak of God and pray to God, because the world is unimaginably diverse, and the diversity of the world is itself a reflection of God. If we implicitly or explicitly exclude cultures, races, genders from our liturgical language or our language of prayer, we implicitly or explicitly diminish those cultures, races, genders, and suggest that they do not mirror the divine as well as do others.
That's not just. It makes nonsense of our theology of creation. It also robs the church Catholic of the richness promised in the term "catholic." God is not the exclusive heritage of one gender, nor is the world the exclusive birthright of one gender.
When the world tends to allocate power very unevenly to one gender, then perhaps the church has an even stronger obligation to be countercultural and to pray and act in a way that urges the world to more just ways of behaving, ways that lead us more to the reign of God.
William D. Lindsey
Bill, I too find it
Bill,
I too find it difficult to "understand the passion invested in this issue." I firmly believe in cause and effect and that there must a sufficient cause to bring about a given effect. I see this operative in human behavior. When I see a response which seems out of proportion to something said, for example, I can only conclude there is more going on than meets the eye. Some "button" has been pushed and it is that button which has contributed more to the effect than anything said. I don't know what the "button" is in this case, but I am sure it is there.
When Jesus was asked to teach us how to pray, he gave us the Our Father. The Our Father is not so much a prayer to be said, but a series of points of reflection. We begin prayer by putting ourselves or becoming aware that we are in the presence of God. In telling us to refer to God as "Our Father", Jesus' interest is not in affirming that God is a male or giving God a title. Jesus is more interested in the relationship that we have with God. We come into or become aware that we are in the presence of a God who is not some distant "Supreme Being" who created us and therefore we are in a Creator/creature relationship, but we, as little children, come into the presence of our Abba. We come without fear. We come in confidence (faith) into the presence of a loving father who welcomes us as his very own children. It is this relationship that sets the stage for prayer.
However, while the dictionary can tell us what the word means, our personal concepts of "father" and "fatherhood" are far more apt to be based on our experiences of "father". Hopefully, while all human fathers are just that, human, and have failings, those experiences have given us a good and healthy, though not perfect, concept of the relationship Jesus is referring to. In all too many cases, this is not true and one's experience of "father" does not provide an example of the relationship we have and are to enjoy with our heavenly Father. I call to mind a story a Sunday School teacher told me. Seems each time she spoke of God as Father, one little lad began to cry. She later found out that the boy's father was an abusive drunk.
Therefore, if seeing God as Mother helps one to put oneself in proper relationship with God, then by all means, call God Mother.
I wonder if a loving, forgiving, welcoming God is a threat to some. I remember, years ago, a priest came to our parish to preach a retreat in honor of St Ann. He said, "We are so lucky to have someone like Good Saint Ann to stand between us and the wrath of God." I have heard the same sort of thing said of Mary.
I wonder if there is some unseen need for a "God of Wrath" who will ultimately punish all wrongs, avenge all transgressions and "get even" for all those nasty little things people have gotten away with in this life?
The image that we have of God is so very important to our relationship with God and our relationship with God is everything. I am wondering if, in some way, calling God she, her or mother is a threat to someone's image of God and therefore their whole relationship with God?
Just thoughts.
Bob, thank you for a very
Bob, thank you for a very rich meditation. I like your analysis very much: there is surely a lot more invested in this discussion than initially meets the eye.
Of course, I understand the passion when one considers how the scriptures and tradition have been used for generations not only to denigrate women, but also to give unfair advantage to males--any kind of male at all. As I have posted elsewhere, at one Catholic institution that taught me a great deal about the shadow side of our American church today, I saw that this means a kind of preferential option for men at their worst. Our church leaders seem intent on giving the future of the church into the hands of men who have little capability to lead it to the future--simply because they are males in the biological sense, and because they resist women's rights. That seems not only unfair, but unwise to me.
I think you're right to suggest that there's more to the discussion. When I read postings on other threads that propose women can never be leaders, that they engage in catfights in the workplace, that there are lines drawn between the genders and each gender should stay on his side of the line and behave, I begin to see what's at stake. This is about controlling people, when gender represents for some of us the ultimate way of keeping people in their place.
I think you're right to locate the psychological origin of this thinking in fear. The need to control, and to place a wrathful God created wholly in our image on our side and make Him the whip for all of our ravenous social angers--this emerges out of a tremendous fear. Some people have invested a great deal in giving socially constructed gender lines the force of natural law and divine revelation, and in policing those lines to keep naughty people from questioning or transgressing them.
What you have to say about the Our Father shows us just how socially constructed the lines are, however. As you say, it's not self-evident what we mean when we call God Father. Our experiences of father and mother have all been different, and they're definitely culturally determined. The role father and mother (and male and female) play in one culture is different from the role they play in another culture. As colkoch's brilliant posting above indicates, if we assume that Jesus is imaging father based on his experience of Joseph, we can understand what that he himself thought of father as someone who keeps his vows, is willing to run the gamut of social disapprobation to defend his wife, and is willing to raise a son not his own. Not every father or every male behaves that way.
Interestingly enough, I've just had my own little learning experience with these issues. My partner and I bought a creche for the Advent and Christmas season some weeks back. This was at a sale sponsored by a seminary, where all the items were from developing nations and the proceeds go back to the artisans.
This creche is from Peru. I set it up Sunday night, and when I had finished, I began to lament: "It doesn't have Jesus, Mary, or Joseph." My partner Steve is related to the physical world in a much keener way than I am, so he immediately pointed out that I had the crib with Jesus in it upside down. Since the baby Jesus is carved into the bottom of the crib, I couldn't see it because I had turned the crib upside down and was hunting for a separate piece to put into the crib.
And Mary and Joseph WERE there. I just didn't recognize them. They came with matching straw hats, and I had made a gender assumption based on those hats. I had decided that Mary was one of the shepherds. She wasn't the traditional adoring blond mother on her knees. She was standing looking awe-struck at the baby she had birthed. With the hat on, she truly doesn't look a lot different from Joseph or the shepherds, except for that look of awe on her face.
We managed, without knowing it, to buy a gender-bending creche set for this holiday season. Lots to ponder there! I'll be thinking about and praying to a God who may well laugh at how much some of us invest in these gender lines, as I go through Advent this year. In Her view of the world, the energy invested in drawing lines and keeping people on this side or that side, or inside and outside, may well be humorous, mystifying--and what has to be overcome to bring the reign of God into the world.
William D. Lindsey
"I had decided that Mary
"I had decided that Mary was one of the shepherds."
C'mon Bill, Mary is one of the sheperds, first among equals, see wedding feast at Cana. :)
Clever, col! You've
Clever, col! You've unveiled another of the many sly little metaphors in that creche set. Whoever made it must have
had a really good theological mind and a sharp sense of humor, since it bumps up against a lot of the tried and true assumptions we make about the Holy Family and Christmas.
I like it when a whole new perspective enters my life and turns things upside down. That's what Christmas was meant to be about from the beginning, wasn't it?
Maybe I'll start buying a different creche set each year, particularly ones from developing nations, and see what they have to teach me. Part of the fun about this one was that it was all boxed and wrapped, so that I didn't know what was inside until I unwrapped it when Advent began. And then out came the upside-down baby Jesus and the Virgin Mary who looked like a shepherd to me....
William D. Lindsey
William ~ Like a new,
William ~ Like a new, enchanting melody your creche story will echo through my Christmas and long after. So many lessons....
Thanks, Dennis. I'm
Thanks, Dennis. I'm honored!
Those lessons were "built into" the creche itself, once I began to think about it--and how my Western culturally determined presuppositions about the Christmas story were challenged by this Peruvian depiction of the nativity. My usual creche set--at home, but not with me in my present sojourn stop on my pilgrimage--is Indonesian, and I always enjoy unwrapping it and setting it up each Advent for the same reason: it has many little surprises built into it, which subvert our "normal" expectations of the Christmas story.
And that helps me to keep reading a story that was meant all along to be about surprise and even shock with new eyes and new ears, trying to hear the ever-new message inside this amazing story....
William D. Lindsey
"Those lessons were "built
"Those lessons were "built into" the creche itself...." Ah yes but you had the grace to "listen". So many lessons virtually shout their messages to those of us so preoccupied with judgements that they go unheeded. So much joy in wonder is missed because the sound of our own footsteps overpowers. Maybe there is another lesson here ~
To hear, to listen are lent to each
To tend as gifts ~
Tiny bits of salvation matter
Given in advance
By the creator
To be completed~
And in returning
Be the measure
Of our worth...
Dennis, you're a very gifted
Dennis, you're a very gifted poet. I love that phrase "tiny bits of salvation matter" for all kinds of reasons. There's the play on the word "matter," as in Cornel West's book "Race Matters."
We often don't think how the word "matter" itself is related to the Indo-European roots of the word "mother" (mater, Mutter, etc.). There's a deep recognition in our very language roots that all creation comes from a womb, that creation is birthed.
And as your poem so brilliantly points out, we become part of the birthing process, havign tiny bits entrusted to us to be tended and returned....
That's an Advent-Christmas insight, too, seems to me. A baby is by its very nature a tiny bit of salvation offered to a family, to be tended as a gift. As I look at my little Peruvian baby in his creche, I will now think--because of what you've told me in this poem, to start a day when I feel draggy--of how the baby Jesus shows God placing in our hands a tremendous responsibility, all of creation to be tended, nurtured, and returned.
We did badly with the gift when it was given to us at Bethlehem. I'm afraid we continue to do badly with it, but one of the Advent themes I hold close to my heart is that we have hope--we await a fulfillment that we see breaking into history here and now, often in very unexpected ways and places. May we do better with those tiny bits of matter that come into our lives here and now than we did with the gift sent to us at Bethlehem!
Thank you for sharing the little jewels of your poems, Dennis. They open new worlds for me, especially worlds of hope--and hope has always been the virtue I find hardest to live.
William D. Lindsey
Thank you NCR for providing
Thank you NCR for providing the environment within which this string of posts about Joseph, Mary, Incarnation and contemporary reflection has been made possible and shared. It is a long time since Advent has had such an impact on my, my stretched faith, and trepidatious adherence to the Church of my birth.
When I go into my room,
When I go into my room, close the door and simply sit in the persence of God, when no words are spoken nor thoughts exchanged, when it is simply being there with, this whole thing of Father/Mother, he/she, him/her is so very, very unimportant.
JT Forty years of public
JT
Forty years of public self confession on Phil Donahue and Oprah has brought us Jerry Springer. Some of the comments posted on these threads would make a stone weep. You bring me to the edge of despair.
Merry Christmas!
It is early AD (since we
It is early AD (since we don't know precisely when Jesus was born, some say 5 or 7 B.C.) and you are walking along a dusty road in Galilee, JT. You hear this bearded prophet preaching, curing people on (God forbid!) the Sabbath, (completely "against the rules" you are familiar with), and not only that, hanging about with despised people YOU would never think of being around (it's hard to put it into context and understand just how despised the people Jesus deigned to associate with were in His time by the people of His day--you have to read a few books by people who have researched the subject.) This man Yeshua is listening to stories that would "make a stone weep", and what's more, He shows COMPASSION for such people!
It's difficult to know who among us fine, well-spoken people would "make the cut" of recognizing such a Messiah. Or would we be among those denoucing the "riff-raff" who followed the Man? Secretly relieved that he was finally out of our hair? After all, he was so much trouble, and threatening to bring terrible problems from the Romans. Were we really willing to risk the security of ourselves and our families for Him? He certainly didn't look like the King come in Glory we were promised...
Yes, the edge of despair...it is difficult to live up to what God asks of us.
It's good we can wish one another "Merry Christmas" without having to pass the test.
Never despair! There is
Never despair! There is always hope in Jesus Christ!
Cool Catholic blogs:
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All the problems of the
All the problems of the world result from the ignorance of Ultimate Reality and Absolute Truth. God is not anthropomorphic, thus, God is not a man. God is Spirit. This is why Jesus said that he was one with God. Because Jesus had the CONSCIOUSNESS OF LOVE TOWARD ALL. When one has a consciousness of pure love toward all, then that person is ONE WITH GOD. When humankind finally rids itself of the historic lie that God is a man, then we can move forward to a more accurate understanding of God as a consciousness of love, a universal force for Good. A consciousness of love is Spirit. Spirit is that which is eternal, universal, ubiquitous, unfettered, boundless and free. A consciousness of love is not dependent upon gender, skin color, ethnicity, culture, education level, social position, political affiliation, monetary status, religious denomination, religious dogma, religious doctrine or whether a person attends church or synogogue or mosque. A consciousness of love is the only salvation for the world because it is God. An ego consciousness divides and separates because the ego concentrates on gender, skin color, ethnicity, culture, education levle, social position, political affiliation, monetary status, religious denomination, religous doctrine and dogma. A consciousness of love simply sees the "other" in terms of love. We all have the choice of whether we want to adopt an ego consciousness which excludes, separates and divides or whether we want to adopt a consciousness of love, generosity and compassion which unites. St. John of the Cross said, "In the evening of life, we will be judged on love alone". Only until every human being on this planet awakens to the fact that God is a consciousness of love and stops dividing humankind based on ego affiliations of religion, gender, race, wealth, political affiliation, education level or social status, then and only then can we finally be ONE WITH GOD. Only then will we have peace on earth and justice for all.
When you say that God is not
When you say that God is not a man, it almost sounds like you are denying the Incarnation. However, I will give you the benefit of the doubt and chalk that sentence up to poor wording. Of course God is a man in the form of the Incarnation. What I think you are talking about is God the Father. It is true that He is neither male nor female. The issue isn't in calling Him a man, because He isn't a man. What God did though, is reveal to us that He wanted to be referred to in the male pronoun. In other words, while God the Father (to distinguish from God the Son and God the Holy Spirit) is not a man, He wants us to refer to him in the male pronoun. How do we know? The words of Jesus Christ.
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The abysmal triteness of
The abysmal triteness of "He" exclusivity in invoking or referring to God is set out in almost unbelievable starkness amid the beautiful, intelligent, compassionate and challenging posts here.
We can only hope and pray
We can only hope and pray and work for a world where all people of good faith no matter what the elaborations of their doctrines and dogmas may be can work together for the good of all the Earth and all of the creatures on this Earth.
Many, like me, have left the Roman Catholic Church for other Catholic churches where the genuine Gospel of inclusion and the radical, unconditional love of God, no matter how we refer to Her, is offered to all people - as did Jesus our Lord.
The Holy Spirit requires open hands, open hearts, open minds and open doors in order to function.
Fr. Leland, Holy Spirit ECC
http://bpleland.wordpress.com/
Frleland: You wrote about
Frleland:
You wrote about the Gospel of inclusion. I agree that the Gospel is about inclusion, after all the Truth is always inclusive: it is there and available to everyone. The Roman Catholic Church's teachings (not to distinguish from the other Catholic rites under Papal Authority, but to distinguish any other Catholic denominations which aren't) are true and right.
I know and understand what people here mean by "inclusiveness", and it is a false understanding. What they want is a compromised truth, or rather, they want their version of "inclusiveness" to be more important than the truth that the Catholic Church teaches. What they want is for the Catholic Church to suddenly change it's mind on sin and recognize same sex sex as good. Of course, it is not, nor will the Church recognize it as such.
Can the Church do better outreach to homosexuals? Sure, but not at the expense of her teachings.
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Maria Davidson Blessed are
Maria Davidson
Blessed are the peacemakers...
Sr. Chittister's reports of the different religious leaders who are getting together in sincere attempts to find solutions to the fractured and prejudicial spiritual divisions of mankind, give me a surge of hope. But when I read the comments on this page, I am just disappointed at how people get caught up in arguments over some of Sr. Chittister's observations and comments, and the larger issues become sidetracked into theological, doctrinal discussions that no one can actually decide.
T'was ever thus. If we can't see beyond our own pet ideological theories, how do we expect to solve the issues that have separated mankind for thousands of years. It seems to me that if we try to understand what Christ meant when he taught that we are to love God first, and then love your neighbor as yourself, it should change our mindset to stop thinking about winning our little arguments and start learning what loving means, in respect to our family, our neighbors, regardless what gender, what race, what sexual orientation. It should put us into a completely different place to begin thinking and looking for ways to live that life. Just judging how hard it has been, and still is, for me to learn how to do that, with all that entails, like forgiveness and selflessness, compassion, and keeping my mouth shut when I should listen and understand what I am hearing, and give up on interjecting or proving my strong opinionated arrogance and prejudices, I know it will be a difficult achievement. But only when we each learn to attempt to do that, will our spirits be quiet enough to find any answers to our modern problems.
By Sr. Chittister's descriptions, it is hopeful that some of these religious leaders have let their devotion to their faiths put aside their own doctrinal separatist theories for a moment of human compassion and lateral communication with their neighbors, to find a way to peace for mankind. I, for one, appreciate her tireless travels toward this end, because her footsteps are walking the walk I can't take.
Maria: I can appreciate your
Maria:
I can appreciate your post. I have one question that I am asking very sincerely: Would you sacrifice truth for peace?
I know a lot of people are willing to do that without knowing it. The Truth brings about peace for people who accept it. The Church teaches nothing but Truth in her doctrines, and to sacrifice that just so "everybody can get along" is awful.
It's the Truth that sets us free. Not compromise. Not "getting along." And certainly not sacrificing the Truth so that all might just be happy.
The Truth was sacrificed so that we can be reconciled back to God. Let's not sacrifice Him again just so we can okay sin.
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Thank You Sister! You are
Thank You Sister!
You are forever trying to mend relationships. What else can we do? You do what you have to do until you don't have to do it anymore! :-)
Bless You Sister! :-)
The more we discover how much we are Loved by God, the more we want to do God's Will