It was inevitable that we human beings would take the Supreme Being who is beyond any gender or category and make God into a patriarchal figure. Even worse that in giving us Mary as a motherly figure we have made most of her images as regal or aristocratic figures clad in ornate dress and sitting in a manor garden or palatial villa. We have taken the human need for a parental image in our spiritual lives and have divorced it from the human experience of most people.
Some people can connect to God as Father, especially those who had wonderful experiences of their biological or stepfathers. But for those who had no father figure or whose father was abusive to them, the image does not work. The same can also be true for a maternal image, but for most people we have some parental figure we can relate to.
People will seek out images of Father and Mother that connect to their experience and felt need: sharing a meal and listening to us talk about our day; consoling us when we are hurt and wounded; reading with us or telling stories of our family history - sharing what it means for them and for us. This is the meaning of today's feast, a meaning we hope to cultivate and nourish in this new year.
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