Jots and Tittles

Mother always told me never to lie. ^.^ And I'm not sorry, not in the least. Well, I am sorry that she honestly believes this, but I'm not at all sorry for what I'm about to do to it. It's been far too long since I tore one of the VOS arguments to little bitty shreds. So, here goes!  (My comments will be indented and purple.)

Language in Our Church
By Jody York Phillips

A bit of background: Jody goes to my old church in Brighton. I grew up around her; her son, Rusty, was only a year or two younger than I was, and I felt a special affection for him as he always seemed to be as I used to be: alone, in the back of the room, just watching, not really having any friends. Though I must wonder now if he did it for the same reasons I did... I always enjoyed Jody's company, though I didn't know her that well, and I certainly respected her very much. I grew up in her church, how could I not? Sadly, however, this kind of diminishes the respect a bit...

Inclusive language use in the Presbyterian Church (USA) has made news the past few months inside and outside of this church. So I thought I’d just wade into the fray with some history and personal observations. I first became aware of inclusive language during Raymond Kersting’s time here at First Presbyterian Church of Brighton (Colorado). That would be 29 years ago. Rev. Kersting was way ahead of his time. We were doing contemporary worship here before other churches knew what contemporary worship was. Contemporary at that time was folk music and many of us have come to love that type of church music although we seldom hear it anymore.

The fellowship hall in 1st Pres is named the Kersting Fellowship Hall. I never knew how to pronounce that when I was little; I think I butchered it in my mind! But Kersting retired before I was even born. As for the contemporary worship, my parents never went to the contemporary service; therefore, neither did we, no matter how much we wanted to like all the other kids our age. We went to the traditional service, with the old hymns and the organ and the liturgies and everything. I love those, now! Of course, when they started to change the Doxology and stuff,  it got less awesome... They don't do traditional services at 1st Pres any more. It's all contemporary, and it's all "inclusive" and so liberal I could puke. And I have never heard half the songs they sing in that church at ANY other service, anywhere. It's worse than the music you hear anywhere else, really. Like, worse than Bobby Righteousness and the White Knights of the Apocalypse. Or whatever. You know what I mean. Cheeseball, ridic, stupid, you name it. But that's just a personal preference.  Of course, I don't know what it says that they like to sing "Shine, Jesus, Shine" there... complete with the part that goes, "...set our heaaaaaaaaaarts ooooooooooooooon fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiire (FIRE, FIRE, FIRE!!!!!!)" but mysteriously lacking the part that goes "Fill this land with the Father's glory." I think it's something like "Creator's glory" instead, which doesn't have the same number of syllables so it messes up the whole song. Lame sauce.  But I digress.

During that time Rev. Kersting began changing words like man, men, and mankind to words that were non-gendered. His favorite word as I remember was “folk.” At the time I thought, “What difference does it make?” Later, after he had retired and we had three pastors who didn’t follow his lead, I realized it was important, very important to me.

Because he sensitized you to that kind of language. I'd be willing to bet you would never have noticed if you hadn't had him as a pastor. That doesn't make him right. That takes your focus away from God and onto the language being used.

Recently I attended a worship service at a Southern Baptist Church in West Virginia that is very close to my husband George’s heart. The people are friendly, welcoming, warm, and very dedicated to God and their church. The adult education teacher and the pastor are passionate in teaching the Bible. However, as I sat there listening I realized that not one of their remarks was addressed to me as a woman. There was only he/him man/men and mankind. There was not one her/she or humankind in giving illustrations of the text relating to people.

Again, would you even have noticed this if you hadn't been sensitized to it by Kersting? I don't think so.

My feeling at that time was, “Where do I fit into all this?” Why aren’t women addressed in some way? We are not invisible beings. We are given lip service that we as well as men have been made in the image and likeliness of God, so why do some churches fail to address us as children of God? I was very thankful for my church in Brighton, Colorado, as I walked out of that church West Virginia.

You ARE addressed. "Mankind" is a generic term meaning "human beings." It only sounds cooler and takes less time to say. Be glad you don't live in a country which speaks French, or Spanish, or some language along those lines. There IS no gender neutrality. It's all either masculine or feminine, and that includes everything from people to God to inanimate objects. It's only in English that you can be so hypersensitive to gender-neutral language.

With regard to our language for God, it is important to me to have a part of God who looks like me.

Whoa! Hold the boat - there's your problem. You don't want to worship God, you want to worship a god who looks suspiciously like you. You want to worship yourself, reflected in a god you've created to look more like you. It's much easier to worship a god of our own making, I'll readily admit, but that doesn't make it okay.  When you start trying to project yourself onto God, you stop worshipping God and start worshipping yourself.

A button given out at one of the Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assemblies I attended several years ago said, “God is not a boy’s name.” I love that and wonder why so many continue to refer to God only in male terms and why a more inclusive God seems to be such a threat to some.

Perhaps because God has revealed himself only in male terms, and we're trying to stay true to him? In the Bible, the only feminine imagery used for God is in the form of simile, not metaphor. For you non-English majors, that means that, with a simile, God is LIKE something. With a metaphor, God IS something. That's a big difference. God IS never female. He is only LIKE a certain feminine attribute.  And the inclusivity that radical feminism lauds is not the kind of inclusivity that God can condone. You cannot just choose to "include" sin as a part of your life. Nor can you choose to "include" parts of other faiths. When you begin to do that, you are no longer Christian.

Wisdom in the Bible is feminine. (See Proverbs 8 or the story of Solomon in I Kings which is full of “the wisdom of God” given to Solomon.)

Yes. But wisdom is not God. Wisdom is an aspect of God's character that is personified in feminine terms, much like an author might personify a tree (take The Giving Tree, for example) or any other inanimate object. And, at the risk of being repetitive, let me emphasize: WISDOM IS NOT GOD.

I don’t remember a time when I did not believe the Holy Spirit to be the feminine part of God.

Indeed? o.O That's not orthodox theology at ALL...

The Holy Spirit is the one whom I depend on and trust to lead me in the paths I’m to take in my life. So, for me there is indeed a part of God that looks like me. And, I’m blessed to be in a church that is sympathetic to that.

"For me"? Ah, so truth is subjective, now! Glorious, then nobody can know anything and we'll all sink into an existential quandary, filled with loathing and self-doubt and wracked with the pain and isolation of our pitiful meaningless existence. Spectacular. (Kudos to those who can name the quote! ^_~)  And there with that "part of God that looks like me" we have again that part of God that is not actually a part of God at all, but a blatant projection of oneself onto the divine, and worshiping that instead of the true God.

Oh, and by the way - it should be "on whom I depend." (English major.)

It is my hope that we as a community of faith can come together and honor each person’s understanding of God.

Again with the subjective truth thing. If that person's understanding of God is fundamentally flawed, I refuse to sit there and pretend that it is worthy of being honored! No, indeed, I will do all that is in my power to guide her back to the truth (or occasionally bludgeon her over the head with the truth, if I'm getting frustrated and there seems to be no other way... ^_~), and to God.  There is only one God, eternal and unchanging, and HE is the One to whom we have dedicated our lives, to whom be all worship and glory and honor for ever and ever, world without end, Amen.  End of discussion.

Closing God into a small box keeps us from experiencing the fullness of life God hopes for us and puts restrictions on our understanding and acceptance of other’s feelings and beliefs.

But you canNOT take that to such an extreme as to deny the Bible, God, and Christianity. Just because someone "believes" that Hinduism is the way to salvation doesn't mean it is!  True, we cannot fully understand God, for he is infinite and we are finite. But we aren't clueless. We aren't blindly grasping at whatever straws we can find, hoping that they might be some poor reflection of the divine.  We have been given the Bible, God's holy Word to us, with which we can form an understanding of his character and exactly who we are to worship.  To deny that is to deny Christianity, because our faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God comes from the Bible and the Bible alone. There is no other book which claims him as Lord that did not take, as its source, the Holy Bible. If you throw that away, *slams Bible down on the table with a loud BANG* you have NOTHING left.

Glory be to God the Creator, the Savior and the Guide full of Wisdom.

I beg your pardon. That would be "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost." Or "Holy Spirit," if you prefer. Let's not get into the Holy Trinity debate. That's how I found out about this whole Voices of Sophia garbage, and I have no desire to discuss how God has named himself in the Bible AGAIN.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I got the Bible-slamming thing from my daddy.  He actually did that at the Session one day. I wish I could have been there, it must have been glorious to see the looks on their faces! I'm so proud of him!  ^.^
I wish I could be equally proud of the church in which I grew up. Admittedly, I never much cared for the place. I always felt as though they were judging me (and later found out that they were... go figure), and I never made any real friendships there. The only people I loved are the people who left when this radical feminist stuff started taking over. People like Bonnie DeLong. She was awesome, and one of the few people at that church I ever really, really loved.

One day soon, I'll post the letter I got from Don Wallace as a response to my first paper. He didn't really listen to my argument, of course, but that he took the time to write back (even if it was to say that he doesn't care, and he sees it all as a "non-issue," which freaks me out...) is somewhat encouraging. I get the feeling that this Sophia thing is far from over. The question is, can I make a living off of this? Because, as difficult as it would be, I would do it if God made it work. I would TOTALLY do it. Or if I married someone who could afford to take care of the finances and leave me free to fight this battle.  That would be sweet, too. Then I'd have an extra layer of support (not that God isn't enough; he's more than enough, but someone to hold me close when I've had a rotten day or they've been attacking me about my arguments, and kiss me and remind me that he doesn't think I'm wrong and neither does God, would be very nice). And I wouldn't have to worry about paying for stuff. Like, you know, life and whatnot.

But whatever. Clearly, that's not what God has in mind for me right now, so I'll just go with the flow and see what happens. I'm not in charge, here, and it's kind of fun. Wheeeeeeeeeee! Hang on, kids, God's driving! ^_^

-Jaya-