The feminine - how divine

I am hardly the definition of a typical christian woman. In fact, often I do not even identify with the christian culture because it feels so opposite of what Jesus taught. Despite this, I find it difficult to explore some of the deep-rooted beliefs from my past. One such belief is women in christianity. I wrestled with it. I pondered it. During this past year, my understanding of the issue has become quite different than what I grew up believing. I do not profess to be a scholar of this theology but I feel my learnings need a voice.

For most of my christian faith, I was told women could not be leaders or teachers in the church. That was a man's role and a woman should not question this set-up. If she wanted to ask a question, she should ask her husband (which leads me to a whole other topic but I will resist temptation to follow that rant). Women could not  teach men over the age of 18(?!?). Women could be administrators of churches or counsel parishioners but their title dare not have the word pastor in it. 

What I could not figure out is why God blesses women with teaching abilities, the gift of prayer and prophesy, or leadership qualities yet churches continually silences women or places them in subordinate roles by saying the Bible says women should be silent. Isn't that looking a gift horse in the mouth? Thanks God but no thanks - we, as the church, choose not to use the gifts you gave these women because they are not equal to men. 

This line of inquiry started in earnest last year when my friend was "released" from her pastoral position at a church due to the church's new mission statement which included the tenet that women could not be in positions of leadership over men. She was doing incredible work and lives were changing yet apparently without the right body parts, it just wasn't the "right" fit for the church.  

I could write a thesis on what I have discovered about women in christianity and how the repression of the church has done a disservice but not this week. My year of exploring really came home this past Easter weekend with the fact that God used women to be the first to share the news that Jesus was alive. The Marys told this marvelous news to men - their co-disciples of Christ. Why would God do that if women were not as worthy, gifted or equal to men?

I could look at the Romans 16 passage where women are listed as deacons and apostles (Phoebe & Junia [NIV])  Or the fact women can pray and prophesy in church (I Cor 15). There is a whole slew of commentary about Paul addressing a particular issue at the time in Corinth when he is speaking of women being silent.

The great thing about exploring and questioning an aspect of faith is that you usually stumble across other marvelous things - I am learning about the feminine side of God. I never heard about this before and it truly resonates with me. Centuries of patriarchal society have silences, ignored and repressed the feminine aspects of God in order to magnify the masculine virtues. But did you know...the feminine side of God is in the name of the Holy Spirit ascribed to God in the Old Testament - Elohim. It happens to be the feminine plural of Elowah. So technically, we could translate the word to Goddess. How does that sit with your christian thought?

However, it is not to say that we should now only refer to God as a she or her because God is not a gender specific. It is interesting to see people's looks when I do refer to God with a feminine pronoun. They look at me like a heretic but in fact the Godhead encompasses both male and female genders. Doesn't that truly explain Genesis 1:27 - " God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them".

Knowing God has feminine attributes has allowed me to draw nearer in a more intimate way. After spending nearly 33 years interacting with a Father God, I look forward to exploring a Mother God.