God could be mentioned ‘genderless’ during Church of England homilies. Breaking with centuries of tradition, the bishops have announced that they will launch a major “gender language project”.
With this, priests could stop using the masculine pronoun He when they refer to God in some sentences, or they could even remove the famous expression “Our Father” at the beginning of the sentence.
However, such a radical rewrite would have to be agreed to by the entire governing body of the Churchthe General Synod, and would be fiercely resisted by traditionalists.
The Rev. Joanna Stobart, vicar of the Guildford (Surrey) diocese, said some clerics want to refer to God without saying He, particularly in the prayers of forgiveness for sins. Reverend Michael Ipgrave said: “We have been exploring the use of gender language in relation to God for several years., in collaboration with the Faith and Order Commission. A new joint project on gender language will start this spring.”
The proposal was welcomed by a group campaigning for “gender justice” in the Church of England.. Women and the Church said: “WATCH welcomes the start of another project in the Church of England to watch the development of more inclusive language in liturgy.”
But a member of the Synod, the Rev. Dr. Ian Paul, said: “The fact that God is called Father cannot be substituted for Mother without changing the meaning, nor can it be neutralized in gender to Father without loss of meaning. According to him, the terms Father and Mother they are not replaceable, but relate to their children in different ways. (YO)
Source: Eluniverso
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