Today was Trinity Sunday, and for the first Sunday in pride month, Pastor Robyn gave a homily on the diverse language about God in the bible and early church literature, making the case that the expression of the trinity in both representation and reality is
genderly diverse and, in my words,
queer.
Despite God — as the
ground of being — not having a sex or gender, modern western language about God throughout literature and liturgy focuses almost exclusively on the masculine and, in the process, makes the feminine subordinate, which has had the unfortunate effect of supporting patriarchal theology and social relations. The default, of course, has been to gender God as male, but the language used to talk about God varies from the masculine to the feminine and even plural/gender neutral, thus our theology of God, Truth, Nature, Ultimate Reality, etc., should reflect that.
For example, beyond being spoken of using masculine pronouns and as a father, God is also described as a woman in labor (
Isaiah 42:14), a nursing mother (
Isaiah 49:15), a comforting mother (
Isaiah 66:13), a mother bear (
Hosea 13:8), a mother bird sheltering her children (
Ruth 2:12), etc., and in the story of creation creates humanity male and female in their (plural) image (
Gen 1:26-27). The Hebrew words for the wisdom (
chokmah) and spirit (
ruach) of God are feminine, while the Greek word for spirit (
pneuma) is neutral. Jesus compares himself to a mother hen (
Mt 23:37), and many early church leaders spoke of God and Jesus in more than masculine terms. An early liturgical work, Odes of Solomon, portrays God as the mother of believers (and all of humanity), nurturing them with holy milk (
8:17). Clement of Alexandria writes of Jesus, "The Word [Christ] is all to the child, both father and mother and tutor and nurse" (
The Instructor). John Chrysostom's Christ says, "Be thou in need of nothing, I will be even a servant, for I came to minister, not to be ministered unto; I am friend, and member, and head, and brother, and sister, and mother; I am all; only cling thou closely to me" (
Homilies on Matthew, 76).
Anselm,
Bernard of Clairvaux, and
Julian of Norwich, among others, also compare Jesus to a mother.
All of this serves to highlight that the imagery and understanding of God historically transcends the simplistic and patriarchal presentation we're often presented with, illustrating that God both transcends gender while simultaneously encompassing all modes of gender. And our understanding should, too. The trinity represents the relational and diverse nature of reality; and to more clearly perceive that reality, we must love and accept it in all its multiplicity because
love is our first principle.
Richard Rohr has often described the trinity as a
circular dance and the
deepest flow of life, and that each 'person' of the trinity relates by "living in an eternal self-emptying (kenosis), which allows each of them to let go completely and give themselves to the other. They are simultaneously loving and totally loveable, one to another." And that love is the very nature and shape of divine being: "This deep flow is then the pattern of the whole universe, and any idea of God’s 'wrath' or of God withholding what is an infinitely outflowing love is theologically impossible. Love is the very pattern with which we start and the goal toward which we move. It gives energy to the entire universe, from orbiting protons and neutrons to the social and sexual life of species, to the planets and stars. We were indeed created in communion, by communion, and for communion (Genesis 1:26 calls it being 'created in the image and likeness of God')."
The universe is alive with love, and any theology expressing its nature can't limit our understanding or our expression of love without doing violence to nature itself.
