Re: [HoB/D] Words

[Louie Crew <lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu>]

When I was growing up, I was told that God does not have gender and that our
terms for God are male merely as a generic shortcut as a convenience
for being able to talk about God.

Yet, if gender terms for God are simply generic, then gender specific terms
should be interchangeable with no change of meaning.

Several years ago for about a year as a spiritual discipline in private
prayer I prayed:

   Our Mother in heaven, may your name be holy.
   May your realm happen here on earth as it does in heaven.....
   For the realm is yours, also the power and the glory....

You will not hear 'Mother' as generic in my version, even if I tell you to.
Nor should you.

The novelty of my wording wore off for me in time, but its impact on me did
not.   With these terms I surrendered several of my patriarchal assumptions
about God, and what a blessing it has been!

Male terms for God are not simply generic.   They port the patriarchy,
especially when we think they do not or accept them without paying any
attention.

Louie, L1 Newark

----------------------

Lutibelle Eavesdrops on a Strait Male Prayer

God, I can't pray just now,
    though you're the ruler
of the universe.

Some people
    have been saying
that you
    might not even be a real man,
    might be instead an androgynous mutation.

Forgive me for my difficulties
    in paying attention.
I do find it distracting
    if I don't know for sure
what's under that robe
    you're wearing
and whether those whiskers are fake.

It was difficult enough
    when those black children
started coloring you black.
    Before long
even sissies will be saying
    that you lisp
or go about in drag.

God, I think I'm about to lose
    my religion,
and you'll
    just have to thunder again
if you're going to get me back.

           -- Louie Crew, 1980