In the Name of the FatherBy Halbert Katzen You only get out of it what you put into it. Anthropomorphism asks, “How do people construct a concept of God based on their own experience of reality?” Theopomorphism asks, “How is reality a reflection of God's creativity?” Theopomorphism is an art form. It interprets creation in terms that are harmonious with a set of spiritual values and beliefs, and it seeks to express these insights in ways that are meaningful and relevant. Because anthropology does not start with a set of values and beliefs about God or even belief in the existence of God, anthropologists are disposed to viewing theological beliefs as the projection of subjective experience. When God is premised as the source of objective reality, theopomorphism can generate symphonies of spiritual creativity that nourish our hearts and minds. The topic du jour is the name game. The name we use to symbolize our relationship with God is important because it offers an opportunity to glorify core values and beliefs. Appreciation for the fundamental facets of our relationship with God can be deepened and nurtured by the way we name God. Additionally, regard for our own parenting roles can be uplifted through using a word that reflects our idealistic aspirations for familial love. “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me” is a principle taught to children in an effort to help them prioritize the relative value of the spiritual, mental, and physical aspects of life. As an accurate reflection of the human psyche, however, such an adage is a bold-faced lie. People are hurt by negative labels and inspired by positive ones. Military, political, religious, and industrial institutions know how to get creative with language in their efforts to promote their agendas. The use of language has a profound effect on how we think, feel and act. Said Socrates, "The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms." Feminist critique of language exposes how the power to name can effect social discourse as well as the thought patterns of our collective consciousness. One of the great lessons from the feminist perspective is the admonition to be personally proactive when faced with language that fails to reflect the progressive march of societal and individual values. We are encouraged by the feminist critique of language to not only rename where appropriate, but also to redefine in those instances where an old word has an opportunity to take on new meaning. This process of redefinition is going to be applied the fatherhood of God. The task at hand is to generate of name for God that most powerfully connotes and glorifies the value of love. Though I reach the conclusion that a redefined use of Father is the best reflection of love, this should not be interpreted to mean that we should stick to just one name for God. Different contexts call for different names. Some contexts call for reference to God's parental love. Others focus on God's creative power, primacy, or universality. There are three beliefs that act as the primary colors for this particular theopomorphic painting: 1) we are the spirit children of God, 2) we share with God the quality of being persons and, 3) we share with God that which makes love possible¾freewill. The value in incorporating these three connotations is that they provide a foundation for spiritual identity and relationships. These core qualities of relationship provide guidance about who and how to love as well as affirming that we can love. In order for theopomorphic inquiry to be most meaningful, we must combine the ideal of the Divine with the reality of common experience. The first belief–that we are the spirit children of God–can bring up some very negative associations for some people. What we share in common is only that we were born of parents; we do not necessarily share similar experiences of our parents. Though it may be challenging for some us to leave it behind, there is no room for family baggage on this trip. The shortcomings of our biological parents must not be allowed to cloud our conception of our spiritual parent. If love we received from our parents helps us appreciate our Divine Parent, great. If not, we need to let it go. Because God is our spiritual parent, this leads us to the exploration of what is common, and what we should strive to create as common, to everyone's parent-child experience. Admittedly, the question of how families should function is a topic on which there is a great diversity of passionate opinion. There are many different types of families in today's modern world: traditional nuclear families, families that have experienced divorce, same sex couples, plural marriages, families who have adopted children, etc. For the purpose of this discussion, there is only one belief that needs to be accepted in order to appreciate the logic of what follows. It is simply that, in general, fathers provide a unique and valuable experience for children by participating in their upbringing. With this premise in mind, let's explore the three beliefs mentioned above.
By choosing a name for God that identifies us as children of God, the fundamental relationships of spiritual life are reflected back through the archetypal relationships of family life. Choosing a name with the connotation that we are children of God serves two purposes. First, it glorifies the parent-child relationship as a supreme expression of love and, second, it implies the siblinghood of humanity. In general and ideally, the greatest expressions of love are found in the parent-child relationship. The family always has been and continues to be the arena wherein we exhibit extraordinary levels of care and concern. A word for God that carries a parental connotation allows us to tap into our idealization of what it means to be a human parent. Using a parental word for God conjures up images of care and concern that inspire and challenge us in our efforts to express and receive parental love. Parental love is primarily expressed through generosity and mercy. These expressions of love are appropriate because of the hierarchical relationship between parents and children. The parent-child relationship also gives rise to the sibling relationship. In contrast to the parent-child relationship, fraternal love is primarily expressed through fairness and justice. These expressions of love are appropriate because of the equality of status between siblings. These two types of biological family relationships form a foundation for creating connotations regarding our spiritual relationships. Generosity, mercy, fairness, and justice become glorified as the primary colors of love’s refraction through the prism of our primary personal relationships. There are various words that can be used for God that have a parental connotation. For instance, Parent, Father, Mother, and Father-Mother are all parental terms. The next step is to narrow this field down by examining the second key connotation. Every human being is created through the union of two specific persons. No matter how conception occurs, the egg and sperm of two discrete individuals must be united. Of the several names for God with a parental meaning, there are only two that also connote the specific, individualized persons that create us: Mother and Father. Mother and Father are personal names because they carry a personal connotation. All the other words with a parental connotation are conceptual in nature. This category will be referred to as concept names. Only personal names clearly signify that God is a who, not an it. Concept names are not capable of connoting the quality of personal relationship associated with personal names. Saying that we love our family is different than saying that we love our mother or father. Love for family is similar to love for one's country. The love of an individual for a group is not as personal as love expressed between two people. Of course, painful past experiences with parents to some degree impedes everyone’s ability to allow the personal names for God to engender feelings of intimacy. But by refusing to allow such experiences to influence our decision about naming God, we take ourselves a step closer to leaving our family baggage behind. It's good to nurture the worthwhile experiences that a life of faith can provide. Feeling the loving presence of God is somewhere at the top of the list of worthwhile experiences. By all means, let’s encourage and nourish faith in every way consistent with love and wisdom. There is no point in opening the door to experiencing the love of God, if we’re not going to walk in. Faith is not merely a willingness to believe a good idea. More importantly it is the willingness to love God. Before faith is chosen, God is only a concept. We distance ourselves from feelings when making a reasoned decision about faith, so that wisdom is not clouded by emotion. But once our faith-journey has begun, we should make every effort to be consistent with this path by celebrating the joys of the decision. Using a personal word for God helps to get us in touch with God on an emotional level. The wide variety of ways in which the word love is used is unfortunate. We love ice cream. We love our dogs. We love a good argument or good joke, and we love it when our team wins. This word must also find a place in the expression of our highest values and most cherished relationships. The chameleon quality of the word love makes choosing a word for God that has a personal connotation all the more important. By doing so, we glorify the personal quality of our relationship with God. By valuing the connotation of personal relationship, the variety of words with a parental connotation is narrowed to two choices–Mother and Father. Fortunately, there is a third core quality to consider in choosing a name for God. Incorporating this quality narrows the field to one option. We Have FreewillLove is predicated upon freewill. Belief in freewill makes love possible. Asserting that we have freewill is our best answer to how a self can have a selfless attitude. The desire to glorify the belief that we share freewill with God is what narrows the choice down to Father. Even though men and women share equally the quality of freewill on a spiritual level, men and women are not free to make the same kinds of choices on a physical level. Fathers choose to be fathers in ways that mothers do not choose to be mothers. Simply put, a father can be a father and not know it. By having intercourse and then not sticking around to see if a child is born, a man can choose to remain ignorant about becoming a father. It is in this sense that the experience of fatherhood is a matter of freewill choice. Biology eliminates a mother’s option for knowing whether she has become a parent. Just as only women exercise maternal choices, men uniquely enjoy a freewill option about experiencing the fact of their fatherhood. Complementing this freewill choice uniquely available to fathers in their relationship to their children is the fact that children must exercise their freewill in order to experience their father as their father. Even though we can teach children to say "daddy" at a very young age, an understanding of the father's role as a co-creator is beyond their comprehension. Years after they learn to address their fathers with an appropriate name, children develop the level of sophistication necessary to appreciate the role that fathers play in procreation. Then, based upon the willingness to believe, they are able to appreciate their fathers as co-creators of their existence. Thus, it is through the willingness to believe that children begin to relate to their fathers as co-creators. In contrast, all children experience their mothers as creators, even if they are not developed enough to express this experience or appreciate it with any degree of sophistication. The development of the brain during pregnancy provides children with awareness of their mothers. A lack of sophistication and living in a womb form an enormous barrier to a developing child’s ability to articulate this experience, but the experience of one's mother on a cognitive level is nonetheless real. By giving birth and nursing their children, mothers continue to provide children with experiences of the parent-child relationship. The physical nature of this relationship provides an experiential basis of awareness of mother as creator and sustainer of life. But nature does not provide children with a cognitive experiential basis for knowledge of their father. Belief is the only foundation on which to build a cognitive awareness of a father’s creator quality. Comparing our relationship with our biological father to our spiritual father is a logical association if the goal is to glorify freewill. It is only through a willingness to believe that children have a cognitive experience of their biological father. This is true on the spiritual level as well. Our willingness to believe is the crucial factor. Additionally, biological fathers must exercise their freewill in order to experience themselves as fathers. Therefore, using the word Father for God can also carry the connotation that God chooses to be part of our lives. By redefining Father in this way–as a glorification of freewill–we can liberate the word from the critique that its use is sexist, arbitrary, or traditional. Liberation of the word Father from its masculine connotations is not only in harmony with, but also is encouraged by, the feminist critique of language. Because freewill is no more a masculine quality than a feminine quality, using Father to connote freewill does not need to carry the baggage of masculine attributes. In similar ways, we recognize qualities of motherhood that are not necessarily feminine. For instance, if a father raises a child alone, he is not necessarily considered effeminate for assuming roles more commonly associated with motherhood. Understandably, masculine connotations will to a certain degree leach onto the word Father simply because men are fathers and there is not much history of redefining the term in this way (yet). But, by refusing to allow these unintended and unnecessary connotations to trump our use of Father, we exemplify commitment to the value of being nonsexist. |
