HELP! Defending Masculinity of God with stupid Liberal Professor!

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Ok, so currently I reading through material to be discussed at a class later this week in which the author says that Masculinity conquered “The Great Mother” and replaced it with a masculine God and now we must reclaim feminine spirituality.

Ok, at this PATHETIC school I am at, all if not most of the professor believe in calling God “she” and using he and she interchangeably. I have talked to a priest, a seminarian, and TWO people with master in theology about this so I now perfectly well why this is just a load of ****. But I am already gearing up to openly debate my professor in class about this because I am DONE sitting there and letting him flat out lie about what our church teaches.

The thing is, every time I get fired about and ready to debate him (there is one in particular at my “Catholic” school is ridiculously liberal and for lack of a better word, just stupid) I just remember he has a doctorate in theology and makes his living off of speaking and I back down. But this time I don’t want to do that.

Can anyone please give me some good arguments about this? And sources to read up on? Prayers for the courage to debate him in front of my peers and other professors (the class is taught by multiple professor so I may end up not just having to fight with one unfortunately.)

Here is what Im thinking about saying:
One, I understand that we will never be able to fully understand God
Two: Our reverence of Mary keeps feminine spirituality well alive
Three: No where is this dumb ideal in the catechism

Thats about all I got… I need a lot of help!!!
 
We call the first person in the divine Trinity Father not because of abstract philosophical reasoning, and not because of theological reasoning, and not because of empirical evidence, but simply because THAT’S what Jesus instructed us to call him.

If you want to call yourself a Christian I would think it makes sense to follow the instructions of Christ. Maybe these professors would prefer to start a new religion.
 
ronnie_bonigli said:
We call the first person in the divine Trinity Father not because of abstract philosophical reasoning, and not because of theological reasoning, and not because of empirical evidence, but simply because THAT’S what Jesus instructed us to call him.

If you want to call yourself a Christian I would think it makes sense to follow the instructions of Christ. Maybe these professors would prefer to start a new religion.
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I agree with you completely. What further evidence is necessary to convince others to call God “He?” If anyone needs another reason, there is something wrong with his reasoning, or he is just looking for an argument, and nothing you say will convince him that you are right.
 
Waiting said:
I agree with you completely. What further evidence is necessary to convince others to call God “He?” If anyone needs another reason, there is something wrong with his reasoning, or he is just looking for an argument, and nothing you say will convince him that you are right.
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You are completely right, my professors do have something wrong with their special brand of theology. The one time I confronted a professor with what you both presented, he compared me to the protestants who endorse sola scriptura. I am resigning myself to the fact that when I confront them in class, they will belittle me and make me seem wrong in every way, but I at least want to get the facts out there for the rest of the students who make the mistakes of giving them their minds blindly…
 
College_Girl said:
You are completely right, my professors do have something wrong with their special brand of theology. The one time I confronted a professor with what you both presented, he compared me to the protestants who endorse sola scriptura. I am resigning myself to the fact that when I confront them in class, they will belittle me and make me seem wrong in every way, but I at least want to get the facts out there for the rest of the students who make the mistakes of giving them their minds blindly…
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I ran into problems in college, also. I kept raising my hand to correct the professor, until he told me to put my hand down – that he was only having fun. The unsophisticated young students never protested. You could always protest to the administration, but changes from them is unlikely. There are too few Catholic colleges that are truly Catholic these days.
 
Mind my asking what College you’re talking about here? Is this actually a Catholic school? If it is maybe it’s time they change the name, right now it sounds like false advertising.
 
May I suggest taking your tuition money and enroll in a real catholic university. I don’t see the logic in spending it in a school that is bent on attacking the faith. What is the name of this school? Granted you may wish to keep your identity a secret but this a disservice to the young people on this board that may end up going to the same school unaware of its anti-catholic professors.
 
Jesus was incarnated as a man, so it is clearly appropriate to refer to Him as male. But God is neither male nor female - God is not human and transcends such labels. We commonly use masculine pronouns to refer to God for a variety of reasons - both practical and cultural, but its clear from both Scripture and Tradition that God is not either gender, and that both genders were created in God’s image. For example, some parts of the Old Testament refer to God with feminine pronouns and feminine imagery, and some Saints have referred to God as our Mother as well as our Father. I would be troubled by an assertion that God is exclusive feminine, but I don’t see anything wrong with acknowledging that God transcends gender – that is entirely consistent with Catholic theology.
 
TMC said:
Jesus was incarnated as a man, so it is clearly appropriate to refer to Him as male. But God is neither male nor female - God is not human and transcends such labels. We commonly use masculine pronouns to refer to God for a variety of reasons - both practical and cultural, but its clear from both Scripture and Tradition that God is not either gender, and that both genders were created in God’s image. For example, some parts of the Old Testament refer to God with feminine pronouns and feminine imagery, and some Saints have referred to God as our Mother as well as our Father. I would be troubled by an assertion that God is exclusive feminine, but I don’t see anything wrong with acknowledging that God transcends gender – that is entirely consistent with Catholic theology.
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God does not have a body and is not a literal physical male, but throughout the Gospels Jesus is calling him “Father”, that is why we call God Father.

Father forgive them for they know not what they do
 
ronnie_bonigli said:
God does not have a body and is not a literal physical male, but throughout the Gospels Jesus is calling him “Father”, that is why we call God Father.

Father forgive them for they know not what they do
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Yes, but the Church teaches that God is neither male nor female, and God is referred to as each in different parts of Scripture.

Here is what the catechism says about God’s gender:
239 By calling God “Father”, the language of faith indicates two main things: that God is the first origin of everything and transcendent authority; and that he is at the same time goodness and loving care for all his children. God’s parental tenderness can also be expressed by the image of motherhood,62 which emphasizes God’s immanence, the intimacy between Creator and creature. the language of faith thus draws on the human experience of parents, who are in a way the first representatives of God for man. But this experience also tells us that human parents are fallible and can disfigure the face of fatherhood and motherhood. We ought therefore to recall that God transcends the human distinction between the sexes. He is neither man nor woman: he is God. He also transcends human fatherhood and motherhood, although he is their origin and standard:63 no one is father as God is Father.
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vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P17.HTM
 
TMC said:
Yes, but the Church teaches that God is neither male nor female, and God is referred to as each in different parts of Scripture.

Here is what the catechism says about God’s gender:

vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P17.HTM
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What’s with the “Yes, but”? I said the first person in the Holy Trinity does not have a body (as well as the second and third persons, except that the second person also took a human nature with a body, which he has still), but God is pure spirit, and has attributes which are like a mother or a father. But throughout the Gospels up to and including where he taught the “Our Father” Jesus taught that we were to call God our Father. Why is this so difficult? If you’re going to ignore the dozens of clear statements of Jesus in the Gospels where do you draw the line? That maybe we should call God our “Daughter” or Buddha or Krishna? No, we call The first person Father because as CHRISTians we do as Christ did and told us to do.
 
Califman831 said:
May I suggest taking your tuition money and enroll in a real catholic university. I don’t see the logic in spending it in a school that is bent on attacking the faith. What is the name of this school? Granted you may wish to keep your identity a secret but this a disservice to the young people on this board that may end up going to the same school unaware of its anti-catholic professors.
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I go to St. Edwards in Austin. I committed to coming here due to money issues before I knew exactly how bad it was. But I once I got here I was making plans to transfer within the first month of school. So a transfer is in the works and don’t worry, I’ve been planning on writing an entire review and posting it for everyone to see when I have some free time.
 
College_Girl said:
I go to St. Edwards in Austin. I committed to coming here due to money issues before I knew exactly how bad it was. But I once I got here I was making plans to transfer within the first month of school. So a transfer is in the works and don’t worry, I’ve been planning on writing an entire review and posting it for everyone to see when I have some free time.
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Maybe you should consider Boston College, two years ago they placed crucifixes in every classroom in the college and really annoyed the liberal professors 😉

catholicnewsagency.com/news/boston_college_attracts_praise_and_hostility_for_placing_crucifixes_in_classrooms/
 
We refer to the first person of the Trinity as “Our Father” because that’s what Jesus called him, and it’s the way He taught us to pray. And we don’t dare to call Jesus mistaken. Unless perhaps, we are theology professors.
 
TMC said:
Yes, but the Church teaches that God is neither male nor female, and God is referred to as each in different parts of Scripture.

Here is what the catechism says about God’s gender:

vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P17.HTM
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This. The problem here is really with the professors in question. Everyone, I thought, who has a Catholic view of things is well aware that when we speak of God as “he” we don’t think God the Father is an actual male physical entity walking around in the clouds. This is childish stuff on the professors’ part. It’s like a petulant 10 year old calling God “she” just to see if it gets a rise out of people. It’s a silly debate to begin with.
 
College_Girl said:
Ok, so currently I reading through material to be discussed at a class later this week in which the author says that Masculinity conquered “The Great Mother” and replaced it with a masculine God and now we must reclaim feminine spirituality…
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As others have stated, the main reason to refer to the First Person of the Trinity as “Father” is because he told us to.

Having said that, the male imagery associated with God has a symbolic value that can be helpful with our spiritual understanding of our relationship with him. In the spiritual order of things, God the Father sends grace, humans receive it, and the result is life (note that the simplest definition of grace is a participation in the divine life of the Holy Trinity).

This sort of thing is mirrored in the natural order of things. In terms of procreation, the male gives, the female receives, and the result is biological life.

With this spiritual and natural imagery in mind, it makes sense to see how the Bible, throughout the Old and New Testament, refers to our relationship with God as a type of wedding. God is the groom, and we are all collectively the bride.
 
College_Girl said:
Here is what Im thinking about saying:
One, I understand that we will never be able to fully understand God
Two: Our reverence of Mary keeps feminine spirituality well alive
Three: No where is this dumb ideal in the catechism

Thats about all I got… I need a lot of help!!!
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Yep, ya do. First off, since that idea is ancient and didn’t come from the catechism to begin with, using that as a basis for your argument will backfire on you. Second, historians and theologians do talk about the masculine and feminine aspects of God and worship. It’s just done, because of historical paradigms. Third, ascribing masculinity to God is a convention of the culture that the OT came from. Patriarchal culture=patriarchal God. Fourth, it is only in the lower mystical revelations and expositions that God is referred to as a person, even a Divine one. Fifth, don’t bring Mary into it as you might light the fuse to a bomb you don’t want to go off in your face. Sixth, you are absolutely right: there is no way to know God by thinking, so it may not be such a sweat to get worked up over as to ascribing a gender to Deity.

Good luck!
 
I would say something like…
  1. Jesus was a Man
  2. Jesus called God Father
  3. yet He wasn’t exactly known for following cultural norms
  4. so it’s not like He said it out of some cultural bias (I know it sounds ridiculous even thinking that Jesus could have had a cultural bias, but it sounds like your class is so liberal that they might not realize this) - rather, He was telling the truth.
  5. If people want a feminine side of the Church, - have a devotion to Mary (though we should keep in mind that some people who are very liberal in this way start believing that Mary is a goddess and go against Church teachings there too:( )
I’m a university student too and I know exactly what you mean about liberal classes and professors… I’ve had many.
 
Hi collegegirl,

i have just recently had the same experience at a Catholic University. Remember that these professors have probably been giving this course (or one like it) for many years and are well ahead of most objections you might bring up. If you do rock him with some comment he’ll just be stronger the next time around in a couple of years when someone else goes down the same road.

A lot of this rubbish seems to be as a result of past arguments with the Church in the 1960’s and now these dissaffected pseudo Catholics just intend on causing as much trouble as possible while staying officially inside the Catholic Church.

In my personal opinion these people are simply not Catholic but if you state this opinion openly you are accused of not being charitable and being non inclusive whether in class, on message boards or in university essay writings. But the truth is that they are not Catholic and this common opinion should be able to be freely expressed and not suppressed.

Perhaps we should also write down all the nonsense these psuedo-theologians say in class and then quote them in a letter to the local (hopefully faithful) Bishop. In fact that is what i fully intend to do. We have a great and faithful Bishop. If the Bishop also is not so interested, i’d suggest going over his head if you don’t get anywhere.

Also notice that when it says masculinity conquered the Feminine God it subtlely takes the connection of God through Christian Revelation away and puts in its place the idea that human society (in this case masculine society) is soley responsible for any ideas we have of God. This of course supports the idea that there is no God except that which we create in our minds. It is non Catholic - and this is obvious and should be expressed (note to CAF moderator).
 
My Catholic bishop once lead a prayer group to say a prayer twice, once with the male pronoun for God, and once with the female.
 
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