“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose”, so states the Proclamation on the Family. “ALL HUMAN BEINGS—male and female—are created in the image of God. Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents.” Many feminists want to talk about her. The funny thing about this, however, is we have been told that we should not talk about Heavenly Mother.
At a recent Sunstone presentation, however, Marina N. Capella and Christian Anderson questioned whether God is really gendered at all. In their abstract, they wrote
The Mormon theology of a Heavenly Mother has been widely discussed as a transcendent and empowering doctrine, especially among Mormon feminists. While we recognize that this can be a valuable paradigm for many, this panel will discuss some of its implications. For example, what does a heterosexual god-couple imply for same-gender couples? Would feminizing some attributes through a goddess figure impair the development of those traits in men? Does eternal gender (and associated eternal attributes) abrogate hopes for egalitarian institutions?
They think that God transcends gender. Here are my notes from their presentation. They start with 5 main points, and then expand on these points.
- All essential attributes of a God are already present in the traditional godhead.
- There are many attributes important to mortal identity that are NOT important to God’s identity, including sex and gender.
- The doctrine of a Divine Feminine can have negative implications
- The concept of a post-sexual God has several positive implications.
- This argument is part of a wider cultural shift in the meaning of sex and gender.
They started off by saying that God doesn’t need to be feminine or masculine. God transcends gender. They noted that some people need a non-white God, but others are shocked by it. If God is male, women need female example. If we insist on god with parts and passions, we privilege certain a characteristics (sex) over other characteristics such as race/disability. They think some people need a multi=gendered god, a disabled god, a god with blue eyes, a god who struggles with weight. This is creating God in our own image, and they suggest a post-sexual god that can represent a full spectrum. This is better than a million gods in our own image. Many social groups shape identity. Gender is the most fundamental. There are social disadvantages of not belonging to group.
They note that there is nothing women experience that God did not. God understands the pain of birth, cramps, rape, abortion, and referenced a quote by Chieko Okazaka regarding this point. Of course there is a difference between male and female. Many people long for divine feminine, but to do so is to commit to women to be different immortal souls. This seems dangerous because we have already dismissed the concept of “separate but equal.” This shouldn’t be acceptable in heaven. Complementary roles don’t apply to God. Why does god needs woman? Vice versa? In post-family proclamation church, God can be different.
The emphasis on heavenly mother is a construct of nuclear families. There is a hyper-focus on one type of family, which is possessed by less than 50% of members, and just 2% outside of the United States. The nuclear family creates hierarchy, and pro-family messages are made at expense of other resources. We focus too much on genetic relationships, rather than all of mankind. The marginalized majority are inferior forevermore.
They reject idea that women can’t be like God the Father because of sex. We have gender baggage. One of the benefits of a post-sexual god – it makes possible of homosexual families that can adopt multiple genders. They also noted that 1% of babies born are sexually ambiguous., and in the animal kingdom, a certain species had 13 different sexes. This challenges the belief of a singular heavenly mother. In the future, humans may be able to reproduce in more than one way. It is plausible that humans may outgrow traditional reproduction. While marriage is the highest degree of exaltation, we don’t have unequal sex roles in heaven. They also noted that fertility is not requirement for temple sealing. Marriage is living a life of love.
They then gave a history of feminism. In First Wave Feminism, occuring in the 19th-20th century, feminists sought for an increase in legal protections and the right to vote. In the 1960s Second Wave Feminism lasted through 1990s and sought to remove sexual oppression. They sought for female only spaces in order to flourish. Third Wave Feminists in the 1990s to present reject categories of gender. While 2nd wave made it ok for females to enter the workforce with males, 3rd wave feminism rejects the feminine/masculine because of the extreme privileging.
They say we no longer need to think of ourselves as masculine and feminine. The Anglican Church refers to God as he or she alternatively. A gendered god is alien that none of the rest of Christianity believes. If god is male, male is god. This is a fallacy of prejudiced humans. Because of this, it is important for some to picture God as female. Because we live in gendered world, we want a female god. Some have had visions of heavenly mother. They don’t long for them but encourage exploration and encourage us to all thing of a Heavenly Other. They reject that sex is a characteristic of gods, and feel like this is a product of 1950s humans. There could be heavenly parents, but we shouldn’t worry about their sex.
Janice Allred was the respondent, and is the author of God the Mother and Other Theological Essays. She said Christian and Marina had raised important issues and concerns, but noted 3 important points. Jesus Christ is revelation of God to humanity, a living being, not a construct. She noted that humans do create images of God to understand God and it is good to explore conceptions of God. We need to remember that God reveals himself to us. He loves us. He dwells with us to redeem us in making us equal to each other. Jesus is in a male body, and was a resurrected male. This is not only a sign of victory over death, but an essential part of mission. It is possible to come again to participate in life of this world. Jesus represents all persons, male and female. Scriptures emphasize male and female. There is an established female partner.
Embodiment is essential. Many reject embodied God because they think it makes God limited. In order to create universe, God renounced omnipotence to create. Roles shouldn’t be fixed by gender. We need to make sure all have opportunities. Equality can only be achieved by honoring agency. God the Father and Mother fulfill all roles of Deity. Both participate in all roles of God. Gender is a complex issue. Difference feminism argued for equal rights, concerned that traditional feminist characteristics were devalued.
Janice does believe in a Heavenly Mother. Do we need god the mother? We need to open our heart to receive the gifts of the Spirit of God. If we believe she ought not to be, how can she reveal herself to us?
What are your reactions to these talks?
Wheat & Tares 
The idea that God transcends gender reminds me of Sandra Bem’s theory about the supremacy of androgyny over gender that was new and all the rage in my psychology 101 class 40 years ago when I was a freshman in college.
I’m certainly more comfortable with the Capella/Anderson view as described here.
“They think that God transcends gender”
They are wrong. Many have seen HIM and his SON.
The gnostic Gospel of Thomas says: “When you make the two into one, and when you make the inner as the outer, and the upper as the lower, and when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male shall not be male, and the female shall not be female: . . . then you will enter the kingdom.”
God, as He literally exists, would obviously incorporate all things which mortals divide into masculine or feminine.”
But God, as He exists in the hearts and minds of mortals, is not the real, independent God of the universe. Rather, He is inseparable from aspects of ourselves. Unconsciously, we see Him as we perceive our best selves, our best values. A very judgemental, obedience oriented person sees God as judgemental and obedience oriented, and this is God’s real manifestation to that person. A very forgiving merciful person sees God as merciful and forgiving and that is God’s real manifestation to that person. God is always part of Us, the divine part of us.
Those who don’t like to see gender, who aspire to genderless views will see God as genderless, and that will be God’s manifestation to them. Those who see distinct genders within themselves and others will see God in the same way. Inasmuch as Mormons emphasise gender, there is an imbalance in the correlated presentation of a very male God, without a distinct Heavenly Mother. As long as gender is important to the LDS people in their real life, Heavenly Mother will be an important aspect, one which is not as of yet adequately drawn out.
I am happy to believe in an ungendered (indeed, nonhuman) Holy Ghost. But in the context of “as God is, man may become,” I have no interest in becoming an ungendered being. And neither does my wife, regardless of how vague our notion of Heavenly Mother is.
yeah, i think this whole theological mess is caused by Mormonism’s embodied God. In traditions where God certainly is not material (because materiality is contingent, and the traditional God is non-contingent, divinely simple, etc.,) lack of gender is not a theological problem.
I think that Capella and Anderson are correct in the challenges that a gendered God raises. I mean, if God is an ascended man, then yes, we do have to not just worry about gender associations, but also racial associations, ability/disability associations, and so on.
http://www.fairmormon.org/perspectives/fair-conferences/2015-fairmormon-conference/the-mother-in-heaven-and-her-children
Provides an interesting counterpoint.
Requiring both a man and woman together to achieve godhood is equivalent to a genderless argument if you see the man and woman becoming one not just physically but also spiritually. My mind is a bit limited to really be able to grasp what that would look like. This could explain mortal women being formed from Adam’s mortal body and the description of both Adam and Eve being formed in God’s image.
Joseph Smith’s vision of gendered beings in the celestial kingdom (different members of his family) and the description of the Patriarchs and their wives sitting as Gods already definitely supports the view of gendered post-resurrection beings. Resurrected beings John the Baptist and others restoring keys, Christ and the Father in different visions (Christ himself referred to as Son), visions of prophets throughout scripture describing heavenly beings as predominantly men all support a gendered argument. A weak argument to fight this view would be that mortal beings could only understand heavenly beings as male, or that they may not have had the same degree of respect if they viewed heavenly beings as female (given the culture of the time and the only recorded visions being from males scripturally).
To summarize, there are a few arguments to suppor a genderless or combined gender God, but overall there’s more support for gendered God(s).
To be honest, a genderless or combined-gender God choosing to depict Himself as male makes me a bit uncomfortable. It would support an argument that appearing as male is ideal, and that Adam was a whole being prior to the creation of Eve. That the image of a woman is ultimately unnecessary and undesirable. I’d rather view Heavenly Mother as a distinct perfected being unseen by mortal men than see myself as effectively disappearing into a genderless God who prefers to take the image of my husband when showing Himself to His children.
“Requiring both a man and woman together to achieve godhood is equivalent to a genderless argument if you see the man and woman becoming one not just physically but also spiritually.”
we are commanded to be one, and I suppose HF/HM are . . . so to me God is both of them existing together. However that works.
The reason why so many people seek a Heavenly mother is because we have lost the feminine divine. This masculine all-powerful, all-knowing, all-seeing God we have is fine; but there is more. People are looking for more God. Sometimes that’s through looking for the feminine divine we lack, sometimes that through seeing the genderless god, sometimes it’s thinking that our concepts now are severely limited by human understanding and we see basically what we can comprehend (thus creating God in our image). I guess I somewhat am a part of all three groups.
p.s. I liked Nate’s comment.
Some well-reasoned arguments going both ways in the responses and even within Heretic’s OP, though I take SERIOUS issue with the smarmy statement about the “hyper” focus on the ‘traditional’ nuclear family. My response would be, like the great General and leader Joshua declared (“Choose Ye this day…, Joshua 24:15), though with a considerable less imperative, as for MY house, we will live IAW the Proclamation on the Family, which IS canonized scripture. If you wish to disregard the PotF and ridicule it or the body of the Church that chooses to likewise live IAW with it, you’re free to do so, and I respect said right…but you do it at your considerable spiritual peril.
Nate wrote: “As long as gender is important to the LDS people in their real life, Heavenly Mother will be an important aspect, one which is not as of yet adequately drawn out.” Like many things, though the existence of Heavenly Mother is a reasonable inference, we don’t discuss Her due to respect (you don’t want to get on the bad side of Her Husband and/or Son, or the rest of the whole “Famm-Damily”, now, do ya?) and also b/c there is much about Eternal mysteries that hasn’t been revealed and likely won’t in the near future. Until we get down pat what’s already been revealed, we as a Church don’t have any business demanding further revelation, especially to merely satisfy curiosity.
I would like it if more were known about Heavenly Mother, simply for the collective sisters’ sake(s). As a PH holder, I have the role model of the Savior (“what manner of men ought ye to be”, III Nephi 27:27) as a MANLY model to live up to (which, of course, I fall well short of on a daily basis). Now certainly the Sisters also look to the Savior, but they (with the possible exception of a few of the female posters on this forum, and I would that I were ENTIRELY speaking in jest…), they’re not looking to become better MEN. If I had to script this out, maybe there’d been some form of “Jedi Wonder Twins”, Luke and Leia, so the girls would have their “Girl Power” role model…it’s work for me, my daughters, nieces, grand-daughters, and so on.
Douglas, the PotF is scripturally based and official doctrine (has weight of FP and Q12 who officially declare doctrine). While it may fall under a broad category of scripture (inspired writings of prophets), it is NOT canonized scripture. That would require not just presentation by leaders, but an official sustaining vote by members to include it in the standard works (like OD1 and OD2).
There is adequate justification for the divine feminine within Christianity. There is the divine Shekinah in the Old Testament, described as female. There is also the Gnostic concept of Sophia – the divine feminine. I even maintain along with Lance Owens – who spoke at Sunstone many years ago – that Mormonism is a Gnostic religion. Unfortunately, us Mormons have no understanding of what the divine feminine means b/c we are not allowed to discuss it and GAs don’t talk about it or teach anything about her. Now why is that? What’s the big problem in all this?
I’m sorry Douglas, I cannot go with the standard Mormon cliché that says we don’t discuss Heavenly Mother out of respect. Nonsense! That is a copout. We have revelation for everything else all the way down to how long the sleeves should be on a woman’s garment. But yet we cannot talk about Heavenly Mother or the divine feminine?!
So what is this – my Heavenly Mother can birth my spiritual soul but I’m not allowed to discuss her, speak with her, or learn about her? So much for the nuclear family the Proclamation on the Family talks about when one half of your heavenly parents are in the closet.
The article says that we are told not to talk about Heavenly Mother. That is news to me since there are numerous references to her over the years. We are told to not pray to her by some leaders but I am unaware of being told not to talk about her. That comment needs to be referenced to be taken seriously.
Mike, there may not be an explicit ‘do-not-speak-of-her’ mandate, but when have we ever had a general conference address, or talks in Sacrament meeting, or Sunday School/Relief Society/Priesthood lessons specifically and exclusively about Her, other than a brief footnote? How ironic that the YW theme excludes Her, especially considering the focus on divine nature. Are there any Primary songs with even a hint of a divine Mother? I think the silence, unfortunately, speaks volumes.
In the Gospel Topics essay about Becoming Like God, there is only one short paragraph referencing O My Father, then a footnote referring to an article claiming there are lots of references. Too bad none of that material made it into the essay.
Mike, I’d like to ask you to do an experiment and report back the results.
(1) start your prayer at church addressing “Heavenly Mother”
(2) plan lesson at Priesthood, Relief Society, or Sunday School where you talk about Heavenly Mother for the entire hour.
(3) Make a comment in one of the classes stating “I heard Asherah is the Hebrew name for Heavenly Mother”
Then come back here and tell me what happened.
Douglas,
“We don’t discuss Her due to respect.” So are we disrespecting Heavenly Father or Jesus when we discuss them? Do you have a wife or children? Do you instruct your children not to speak about (or to) their mother out of respect for her? Do you mediate all interactions between your wife and children?
The authors of this Sunstone presentation remind me of what Gary Wills wrote about Fawn Bridie in the New York Review of Books:
“Two vast things, each wondrous in itself, combine to make this book a prodigy—the author’s industry, and her ignorance. One can only be so intricately wrong by deep study and long effort, enough to make Ms. Brodie the fasting hermit and very saint of ignorance. The result has an eerie perfection, as if all the world’s greatest builders had agreed to rear, with infinite skill, the world’s ugliest building.”
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1974/apr/18/uncle-thomass-cabin/
Marina N. Capella and Christian Anderson seem to share Ms. Brodie’s ignorance, but — alas — lack her industry. To wit:
“The emphasis on [H]eavenly [M]other is a construct of nuclear
families.”
What emphasis?
And nuclear families have been the norm since Homo sapiens started walking upright. The great diversity of human religions arising from these nuclear families have been quite diverse. Their contention that Heavenly Mother “is a construct of nuclear families” is bunk.
“…and in the animal kingdom, a certain species had 13 different sexes.”
This would be fascinating if it were true. But it isn’t. They’re apparently talking about slime molds, which:
1- Are not animals, and,
2- Do not have 13 different sexes, though there are urban legends that suggest so.
Slime molds have extremely complicated reproductive lives, which include cross-species mating; they provide an extremely poor metaphor for human reproduction.
http://www.mycologia.org/content/96/1/36.full.pdf+html
If they want to worship a god made by their own hands, fine. But their ideas are miles away from Mormonism, and the facts they cite to support their ideas almost all false.
Sunstone clearly needs help in the quality control department.
Be careful of feminism. They want to pray to heavenly parents when we are commanded to pray to the Father in the name of the Son.
Jonathan, it sounds like you need to check your facts in the quality control department. “And nuclear families have been the norm since Homo sapiens started walking upright.”
Uhhh, polygamy was the norm when homo sapiens started walking upright. This is not a nuclear family. If you’re going to rant, at least get your facts straight.
MH: “Uhhh, polygamy was the norm when homo sapiens started walking upright. This is not a nuclear family. If you’re going to rant, at least get your facts straight.”
Not what my anthropology texts tell me, though I could easily be mistaken.
Other than deviating from opinions you approve of, how do you define “rant”?
In any case, MH, Marina N. Capella and Christian Anderson do not demonstrate, or even argue, but merely assert that “the emphasis on [H]eavenly [M]other is a construct of nuclear families”.
There is no “emphasis” to “construct”, for one thing: Heavenly Mother is rarely even mentioned.
If you define the “nuclear family” as husband + wife + kids, then this is normative for almost every human society, the (almost) sole exception being elites in societies that have adopted agriculture.
These societies run the gamut of religions and pantheons, from animism, to pantheism, to monotheism, to atheism. The idea that Mother in Heaven is the imaginary friend of the nuclear family is not just wholly unsupported by the evidence, but flatly contradicted.
A post from Young Mormon Feminists speculates that Jesus may have been agendered, not identifying as either male or female and thereby representing non-binary gender in the Godhead. This also doesn’t preclude him from being sexually attracted to Mary Magdalene since there is so much speculation that the two married in their life times, but being agendered and uncoupled may help LGBT individuals in this life see themselves in the eternities. Understanding how our LBGT brothers and sisters fit in the eternities is arguably the most important contribution the current seers and revelators could bring to the earth.
Comment 20 is a rant.
Let me pull out my bible for a minute a list a few non-nuclear patriarchs: Abraham, Jacob/Israel, Moses, Solomon, David, Saul, but I guess you’re calling them crawling homo sapiens? Or are these nuclear families. Not to mention Brigham Young’s 50 wives, Joseph’s 30 wives, and all the other pioneer polygamists.
I don’t need an anthropology degree to know this.
It also seems the Proclamation on the Family shows the ideal is a nuclear family, not a polygamist family. Do you need an anthropology degree to assert that too?
Jonathan even if nuclear families have been the norm, the Heavenly Mother archetype HAS been present in nearly every religion, in the form of divine feminine, fertility, harvest and wisdom goddesses, and Her presence is directly due to the balanced presence of the feminine in the family. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, the lack of divine feminine is probably due to its overly partriatchal and authoritarian cultures, although even there, in the Catholic Church, Mary serves not only as Divine Mother of the Son, but His mystical bride as well.
Brother of Bared wrote (and Pete,#19, made fairly much the same point): I’m sorry Douglas, I cannot go with the standard Mormon cliché that says we don’t discuss Heavenly Mother out of respect. Nonsense! That is a copout. We have revelation for everything else all the way down to how long the sleeves should be on a woman’s garment. But yet we cannot talk about Heavenly Mother or the divine feminine?!
I share this observation as well. I suppose it’s not so much that, oh, hush our little ol’ mouths, we can’t speak of our Heavenly Mother, for fear that the Lord is gonna be angry and hurl calamity and judgments upon us! Though I acknowledge that HM is NOT ‘official’ doctrine, her existence seems so self-evident that I accept it as fact, but leave the details to further revelation if and when it comes in my lifetime. Probably the ‘respect’ part is that in so many ways, (wo)men regularly blaspheme and otherwise show great disrespect for our Lord, and He ‘tolerates’ it due to his Infinite Mercy but, being a MAN of parts and passions, would be inclined to be less ‘forgiving’ for slurs to His Etnernal Bride. At least so goes the theory. Yet, methinks that HM didn’t get to be what She is due to being the quiet “Hidden One”, dutifully walking two steps behind and one step to the right of her Mate. No, I’m fairly sure that HM can take care of Herself!
What’s probably getting “lost in the sauce” is the eternal nature not only of individual gender, but the family itself. We don’t sing “Families can be together FOREVER” just b/c it so sweet and cute when the Primary children get up on the rostrum. Gender and Familial relationships are an inherent part of not only who we are now but of what we have the ability to become. Hence why (1) I’m certain of the existence of HM, and (2) I’m content to wait for the specifics when (S)He decides it’s necessary to be divulged.
Jonathan, I don’t know what anthropology texts you’ve been reading, but learning about patrilineal vs. matrilineal societies and the (dozens of) different types of marriage/kinship systems therein are required of anyone studying socio-cultural Anthropology. Adults + children is the norm for humanity. The relationship between the adults and the children and the relationships among the adults themselves are highly variable across different cultures.
Definitely an interesting experience to sit in a small BYU anthropology class and discuss historical Mormon polygamy as just one of dozens of different marriage systems across cultures.
Well, if somebody said it at Sunstone, then it MUST be true. /sarcasm
Srsly, though, I read something interesting on this topic by William Dever who wrote “Did God Have a Wife?” He did archaeological digs on ancient Hebrew towns and found widespread worship of Astarte and Asherah (both female gods) prior to the OT crackdown by monolatrous priests. One of the going theories is that in trying to move their society from polytheism to monotheism, they merged the qualities of their male gods with the qualities of the female gods (the God’s female consort). Yahweh was the most male/female mixed God, a byproduct of mixing the qualities of El with the qualities of Asherah. Many have called Jesus “feminine” in how he is described in the NT, especially in contrast to the hot-headed God of the OT.
I cover some of this information here: http://www.wheatandtares.org/10529/the-plan-of-asherah/
I guess Christ referring to God in the masculine isn’t sufficient.
Margaret Baker (the non-Mormon Christian speaker in the FairMormon link) has written quite a bit about the pre-Josiah worship of Yahweh and Asherah. She is currently a favorite among those of the FARMS (or what used to be FARMS) community. She’s stated that the beginning of the Book of Mormon has retained many of these emphases on the female aspect of deity. Dan Peterson took up the topic in his “Nephi and his Asherah” article years ago. Baker also describes Israelite temple rites as including Asherah.
There is quite a bit of archaeological evidence that Israel combined Yahweh worship with the Canaanite aspects of Baal and his consort, Asherah. Most of the references to “groves” in the OT are related to worship of Asherah. The post-Josiah reformers definitely viewed Asherah worship as abomination, so supporters of Asherah theories claim they skewed biblical writings against Asherah worship. The OT prophets often talk about the meshing of Canaanite and Israelite worship as inappropriate.
Not totally sold on Baker’s theories, though they are worth looking into. She relates worship of Asherah, Queen of Heaven, to later reverence for Mary in the Catholic tradition. Many in the feminist community see Lady Wisdom in Proverbs as a reference to Heavenly Mother/Asherah. That is a theory I definitely take issue with.
Interesting that in societies that had a pantheon of Gods and Goddesses that not only gender but also sexuality (at times, very OVERT sexuality) was accepted as the ‘norm’. More of that “Ancient Astronauts” guff, perhaps? When Capt. James Tiberius Kirk asks “God” (Star Trek V) what “He” needs with a spaceship (the Enterprise-A), the being could have easily retorted, “The same as you, James Tiberius Kirk…to chase alien women!!”
IDIAT,
“I guess Christ referring to God in the masculine isn’t sufficient.”
Most of the time I am told that anytime the words he, his, him, man, or men are used in the scriptures it applies to humankind (including women). Unless of course there is any whiff of a priesthood reference and then it magically only means men. People do this with God as well. Him must mean only male when referring to God, but when referring to His people, it means male and female, except when it doesn’t.
Let’s be a little consistent about this. If He and Him can only be interpreted has referring to male, then I guess 98% of the scriptures don’t really apply to me.
Don’t know whether anyone mentined this…but “Elohim” is plural.
#35 – yes, it’s true that Elohim is plural. I’m fairly sure that it’s an expression of grandeur, and NOT b/c our HF suffers from multiple personality disorder. But, even with His Son, Jesus Christ, ALSO being a “God”, and IAW Joseph Smith’s King Follet discourse that one may suppose that our HF also has a Father, and so on and so forth (but only HF and JC pertain to US), so the use of “Elohim” rather than “Eloi” is proper…see Mark 15:34.
There’s already been enough internet chit-chat about “Heavenly Mother” without bringing “Heavenly Grandpa” or Uncle, or whatever part of the whole Famm-Damily, into the discussion.