{"id":3675,"date":"2019-10-18T14:23:26","date_gmt":"2019-10-18T14:23:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/?p=3675"},"modified":"2019-10-18T14:26:22","modified_gmt":"2019-10-18T14:26:22","slug":"god-as-mother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/","title":{"rendered":"God As Mother"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"
Source: Max Pixel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A few months ago (perhaps in July) I stumbled upon a reflection on God as mother. <\/strong><\/h3>\n

It was powerful, moving, compelling. It spoke of the divine feminine and it was truly gorgeous. It made me want to believe in God again in a way not much has this past year. I shared the reflection into a facebook group a good friend of mine created to share artwork that moves us. This piece had moved me, and I knew the members of this group would appreciate it as I had.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

My God is a curvy black woman with dreadlocks and dark, cocoa-brown skin.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She laughs from her belly and is unashamed to cry.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She can rock a whole world to sleep, singing in her contralto voice.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Her sighs breathe life into humanity.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Her heartbreaks cause eruptions of justice and love\u2026<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

My God is an incarnate feminine power, who smells like vanilla and is full of sass and truth, delivered with kindness.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She\u2019ll do anything for her creation; her love is fierce.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She weeps when we do\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

and insists on justice.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She is God.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She is Love.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014Rev. Jacqui Lewis<\/span><\/i><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Immediately, a man responded.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

A man I know in real life, actually, as he was one of my English professors in college. And his response showed that he took issue with this female personification of the divine: \u201cGod is being itself.\u00a0 He is not a creature as we know it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This brief exchange (if you can even call it that) has bugged me for three months now. At the time I wanted to respond, but like so many other woman before me in the face of mansplaining, I knew it would only escalate and get me precisely nowhere\u2014except more frustrated.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I grit my teeth, sighed (or harrumphed), and tried to move on.<\/span><\/p>\n

But still it eats at me.<\/p>\n

I know that the church technically teaches that God has no gender. I\u2019m fine with that. There is a beauty in that.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I also know that had I shared a reflection on the masculine, muscular, or fatherly aspects of God, that man would certainly not have commented insisting \u201cbut God has no gender!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The subtext here is that it\u2019s fine for us to imagine, portray, and characterize a gendered God\u2014until we choose to portray her as female. <\/strong><\/h3>\n

Until we use female pronouns or meditate on the feminine side of the divine.<\/span><\/p>\n

And it isn\u2019t like this is new or heretical (despite what the trads who raised me brainwashed me to believe). It simply isn\u2019t. We read in Honors seminars the writings of the Fathers of the Church, and some of them certainly touched on this topic. I\u2019ve know <\/span>male<\/span><\/i> theology majors at Franciscan University who wrote their theses on the motherly aspects of the Holy Spirit. I helped them edit those theses in the Writing Center where I worked. So no, it is not some heresy introduced by Vatican II or feminism or the sexual revolution (just as, news flash Pope Emeritus, neither was sexual abuse, assault, or rape).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Yes, Christ incarnate was male. I don\u2019t argue with that point.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

But was he?<\/span>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

I went to a talk, once again during my time at Franciscan, where a Byzantine Catholic priest gave an evening lecture on the Theotokos<\/em>, the \u201cGod Bearer,\u201d Mary of Nazareth\u2014Christ\u2019s mother.<\/span><\/p>\n

This priest explained that one of the conclusions of believing in Mary\u2019s perpetual virginity, in her being Christ\u2019s sole human parent, is that Christ inherited his genes only from Mary.<\/span><\/p>\n

This priest\u2019s conclusion was as to the consecrated blood of Eucharistic wine, that as we consume Christ\u2019s consecrated blood so do we consume Mary\u2019s blood, that Mary\u2019s blood was sacrificed on Calvary too, since Christ\u2019s blood was Mary\u2019s blood.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But my query is, does this make Christ genetically female?<\/span><\/p>\n

Is Christ, in fact, intersex? Male presenting with two x chromosomes in his DNA?<\/strong><\/h3>\n

And does this disturb you?<\/span><\/p>\n

If so, why?<\/span><\/p>\n

Flannery O\u2019Connor wrote a story, \u201cA Temple of the Holy Ghost<\/a>,\u201d which is one of my personal favorites of hers. In it, a self-righteous bratty young girl sees Christ in a \u201chermaphrodite at a freak show.\u201d In a circus.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ironically, I first read and discussed this story in class with the male professor I mentioned above. And the thing is, I never found that story at all shocking until I ran into an SSPX-inclined young Catholic on twitter who assumed O\u2019Connor was a heretic for writing it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the thing: if the thought of God as female, intersex, or androgenous makes you uncomfortable\u2026 maybe you should be asking yourself why. No, not maybe. You absolutely should.<\/span><\/p>\n

What internal prejudices and discrimination will you find? What makes you revile the idea of a female or intersex god so deeply? Could is be your own feelings of superiority? Does the thought of a female god challenge your assumptions that you were made for God and woman was made for you, as Milton smugly wrote?<\/span><\/p>\n

Because the reality is, God is all of his\/her\/their children; that is where you find the divine. <\/strong><\/h3>\n

When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman\u2019s clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Christ there is no male or female, after all.<\/span><\/p>\n

Are you uncomfortable?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Image Credit:\u00a0https:\/\/www.maxpixel.net\/Religion-Sculpture-God-Goddess-Statue-Ancient-1405539<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few months ago (perhaps in July) I stumbled upon a reflection on God as mother. It was powerful, moving, compelling. It spoke of the divine feminine and it was truly gorgeous. It made me want to believe in God again in a way not much has this past year. I shared the reflection into […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3365,"featured_media":3681,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[373],"tags":[276,166,915,139,918],"class_list":["post-3675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-unconventional-catholicism","tag-catholic-faith","tag-catholic-feminism","tag-female-god","tag-feminism","tag-intersex"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Shoeless Banshee: God As Mother<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman's clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Shoeless Banshee: God As Mother\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman's clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Shoeless Banshee: Meanderings Beyond the Pale\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheShoelessBanshee\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-10-18T14:23:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-10-18T14:26:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/875\/2019\/10\/Female-God.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"504\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Marie\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ShoelessBanshee\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Marie\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/\",\"name\":\"The Shoeless Banshee: God As Mother\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2019-10-18T14:23:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-10-18T14:26:22+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#\/schema\/person\/664ceda45b8604663d56180db3df3c67\"},\"description\":\"When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman's clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"God As Mother\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/\",\"name\":\"The Shoeless Banshee: Meanderings Beyond the Pale\",\"description\":\"A blog about millennials carving a niche for themselves in the tradition of the Catholic Church.\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#\/schema\/person\/664ceda45b8604663d56180db3df3c67\",\"name\":\"Marie\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5afb4c0813f8fb392882cde9fbf4c9d3?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5afb4c0813f8fb392882cde9fbf4c9d3?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Marie\"},\"description\":\"Writer, seeker, lover of platipuses and all things nonsensical.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheShoelessBanshee\/\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShoelessBanshee\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/author\/mkopp\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Shoeless Banshee: God As Mother","description":"When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman's clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Shoeless Banshee: God As Mother","og_description":"When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman's clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/","og_site_name":"The Shoeless Banshee: Meanderings Beyond the Pale","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheShoelessBanshee\/","article_published_time":"2019-10-18T14:23:26+00:00","article_modified_time":"2019-10-18T14:26:22+00:00","og_image":[{"width":504,"height":720,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/875\/2019\/10\/Female-God.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Marie","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@ShoelessBanshee","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Marie","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/","name":"The Shoeless Banshee: God As Mother","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#website"},"datePublished":"2019-10-18T14:23:26+00:00","dateModified":"2019-10-18T14:26:22+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#\/schema\/person\/664ceda45b8604663d56180db3df3c67"},"description":"When you feed the hungry, you feed Christ. When you sneer at a woman's clothes in Mass, at her period pain at work, you sneer at Christ. When you demean an intersex person, a trans person, a gay or queer person\u2026 you demean Christ.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/2019\/10\/18\/god-as-mother\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"God As Mother"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/","name":"The Shoeless Banshee: Meanderings Beyond the Pale","description":"A blog about millennials carving a niche for themselves in the tradition of the Catholic Church.","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#\/schema\/person\/664ceda45b8604663d56180db3df3c67","name":"Marie","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5afb4c0813f8fb392882cde9fbf4c9d3?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5afb4c0813f8fb392882cde9fbf4c9d3?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","caption":"Marie"},"description":"Writer, seeker, lover of platipuses and all things nonsensical.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheShoelessBanshee\/","https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShoelessBanshee"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/author\/mkopp\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3365"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theshoelessbanshee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}