The Church of England is considering scrapping centuries of religious teaching to give God gender-neutral pronouns.
The church, which is headed by King Charles III, confirmed that its Liturgical Commission has launched a special project to examine updating future teachings.
Some priests have already made such changes, trading references to “he” and “him” for simply “God” or even “they” and “them,” and rewriting the “Our Father” that starts the Lord’s Prayer to “Our Father and Mother.”
One unidentified priest defended the updated language — while conceding to the Times of London that critics “think we’re being a bit woke.”
“God is not male. Certainly not the white cis male with a beard, sitting on a cloud we seem to reduce and limit God to so often,” the Rev. Chantal Noppen also told the UK Times.
The archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, the religious head of the church, previously said that “God is not male or female” or “definable.”
“All human language about God is inadequate and to some degree metaphorical,” he said in 2018.
However, the Rev. Ian Paul, a member of the Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England, was among those decrying it as a step too far.
“If the Liturgical Commission seeks to change this, then in an important way they will be moving the doctrine of the church away from being grounded in the Scriptures,” he told the outlet.
He stressed that “male and female imagery is not interchangeable,” while also claiming that critics were misreading the teachings.
“The use of male pronouns for God should not be understood as implying that God is male — which is a heresy. God is not sexed, unlike humanity,” he stressed.
“The fact that God is called ‘Father’ can’t be substituted by ‘Mother’ without changing meaning, nor can it be gender-neutralized to ‘Parent’ without loss of meaning. Fathers and mothers are not interchangeable but relate to their offspring in different ways,” he stressed.
Prof. Helen King, the vice chairman of the synod’s gender and sexuality group, acknowledged that such “questions around gendered language and God have been around for decades, if not centuries.”
Even so, they “still have the power to bring out strong reactions,” she said.
“Clearly God is not gendered, so why do we restrict our language for God in gendered ways?” she asked.
The group Women and the Church said that “a theological misreading of God as exclusively male is a driver of much-continuing discrimination and sexism against women.”
The Rev. Miranda Threlfall-Holmes also told the UK Times that the view that “God is a man” had been used to oppose women bishops.
The plan first emerged after a female reverend asked the commission if there was an update “to develop more inclusive language” given that “many of the prayers offered for use refer to God using male pronouns.”
The commission’s vice chair, Bishop of Lichfield Michael Ipgrave, replied that it had “been exploring the use of gendered language in relation to God for several years.”
“After some dialogue … a new joint project on gendered language will begin this spring,” Ipgrave wrote in a formal reply.
A spokesman for the Church of England stressed that the debate “is nothing new.”
“Christians have recognized since ancient times that God is neither male nor female, yet the variety of ways of addressing and describing God found in scripture has not always been reflected in our worship,” the church rep said.
Still, the rep insisted that any changes would only apply to future teachings.
“There are absolutely no plans to abolish or substantially revise currently authorized liturgies, and no such changes could be made without extensive legislation,” the spokesperson said.
The Church’s Faith and Order Commission, which advises on theology, will work with the liturgical commission on looking at questions around gender terms, the spokesperson said.
With Post wires
