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This page last updated 3 November 2014  

Letters to AO

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Letters from the week of 27 October to 2 November 2014

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Of gender, language, and God

You have good instincts if you shudder when you hear 'creator, redeemer, sanctified' for the Trinity. That formula was banned years ago by the Standing Liturgical Commission as inadequate, as it reduces the Triune God to a set of functions or modes of being. In fact, it is called the 'modalist' heresy.

I recommend David Cunnigham's 'These Three Are One' as a good exploration of alternate trinitarian formulæ.

Pierre Whalon
Convocation of Episcopal Churches in Europe
Paris, France. Province II
bishop@tec-europe.org
29 September 2014

 

Interesting article, nice and concise. I'd like to add that general studies on the feminine aspect of God have been around since the 1960s, and in scholarly circles since the late 1890s! Building on Elizabeth Cady Stanton's The Woman's Bible of the late 1800s, feminist theologians like Rosemary Ruether, Mary Daly, etc. examined the Bible and ancient church literature to re-claim the roles of women and the feminine aspect of God. These studies were crucial in the ordination of women debates and various denominations' passage of canonical measures for women's ordination. Ruether herself and her book Woman-Church encouraged my writing of She Who Prays: A Woman's Interfaith Prayer Book,if anyone would like prayers with a variety of images of God.

To be honest my shock with this article was that there's still anyone in the ACC who would be surprised that God has masculine, feminine, neutral, and indescribably amazing asp ects. I wonder if the article is implying that more rectors than our own at St Martin's regularly use "Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer" in lieu of Father, Son & Holy Spirit. That is interesting indeed.

The article could be a good conversation starter.

Jane Richardson Jensen
St Martin's
Calgary, AB
30 October 2014

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Earlier letters

We launched our 'Letters to AO' section on 11 May 2003. All published letters are in our archives.

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