Mother God: in the Arts

WELCOME TO TODAY'S WORSHIP SERVICE

May 9, 2010

Open your Bible

Light a candle

BIBLE:

Judges 5:7 (New Revised Standard Version)

(v. 7) The peasantry prospered in Israel, they grew fat on plunder, because you arose, Deborah, arose as a mother in Israel.

{read commentary on this passage from The African American Lectionary.}

It must be kept in mind that a Divine-heavenly sphere of love continually goes forth from the Lord toward all who embrace the doctrine of his church, who are obedient to the Lord, as children are to their father and mother in the world, who devote themselves to the Lord, and who wish to be fed, that is, instructed by the Lord. From this heavenly sphere a natural sphere arises, which is one of love towards infants and children. This is a most universal sphere, affecting not only humans, but also birds and beasts and even serpents; nor animate things only, but also things inanimate. But that the Lord might operate upon these even as upon spiritual things, He created a sun to be in the natural world like a father, the earth being like a mother. For the sun is like a common father and the earth like a common mother from the marriage of which all the vegetation that adorns the surface of the earth is produced. From the influx of the heavenly sphere into the natural world, come the marvelous developments of vegetation from seed to fruit, and again to new seed. It is from this also that many kinds of plants turn, as it were, their faces to the sun during the day, and turn them away when the sun sets. It is from this also that there are flowers that open at the rising of the sun and close at his setting. It is from this also that the song-birds sing sweetly at the early dawn, and likewise after they have been fed by their mother earth. Thus do all these honor their father and mother. They all bear testimony that in the natural world the Lord provides through the sun and the earth all necessities both for animate and inanimate things. (True Religion #308)

Mother God:  in the Arts

Happy Mothers' Day!  What does this day mean for you?  Perhaps it is a time to honor all the ways you have been motherly to others.  Or perhaps today you celebrate those who have mothered you.  This can be a sad day, missing mothers who have passed on, or grieving mothering you never got.  Do you ever think about divine mothering on Mother's Day?  For many people, the divine is sometimes a nurturing, mothering God.  Today, we'll look at some people who image God as a Mother --primarily through painting, poetry, and music.  Enjoy this time to experience divine love in whatever way is best for you today.

Honor your Father and your Mother

 

Elizabeth Johnson

An article about Elizabeth Johnson says:  Johnson has been fascinated by how believers view God. "This might sound a little archaic," she told Fordham Online, "but I take my cue from Thomas Aquinas-the study of God and all things in the light of God. That articulates for me what theology is about."

A sister in the Congregation of St. Joseph who hails from Brooklyn, Johnson has been president of both the Catholic Theological Society of America and the American Theological Society. Winner of the U.S. Catholic Award in 1994, she served as a member of the national Lutheran-Catholic Dialogue, a consultant to the Catholic bishops' Committee on Women in Church and Society, a theologian on the Vatican-sponsored dialogue between science and religion, and on the Vatican-sponsored study of Christ and the world religions.

She says that "stale images of God aren't working for today's seekers.  ... New ones are emerging from the experience of all God's people -- male and female."

Her ground-breaking book She Who Is, written in 1995, has become a classic.  She wrote this about her title:

In the end this exploration points toward God with the coinage SHE WHO IS, a divine title signifying the creative, relational power of a being who enlivens, suffers with, sustains, and enfolds the universe. SHE WHO IS points to holy mystery beyond all imagining who creates women as well as men to be imago Dei, the grammar of God’s self-utterance and participates in her liberating care for this conflictual world and all its cares. [p. 13]

She looks to a new society that sounds much like Swedenborg's New Jerusalem:

The goal toward which this theological effort passionately journeys is transformation into new community. Feminist liberation theology hopes so to change unjust structures of distorted symbol systems,  that a new community in church and society becomes possible, a liberating community of all women and men characterized by mutuality with each other and harmony with the earth. [p. 31].



SWEDENBORG

Although Swedenborg doesn't say a lot directly about the characteristics of God, he is clear that God is 'the essential person."  DLW 11.... "It is because God is a person that all angels and spirits are perfectly formed people."

We all have within us the potential for the union of opposites.  "When the good and the true are united in an angel or in one of us, they are not two entities but one, since the good then follows from the true and true from the good.  This union is like the one that occurs when we think what we intend and intend what we think.  Then our thought and our intention form a untity; the thought froms or presents in a form what our volition intentds, and our volition gives it its appeal."  HH 372


Arcana Coelestia (Potts) n. 725
That by "male and female" are signified truths and goods, is evident from what has been said and shown before, namely, that "man" and "male" signify truth, and "wife" and "female" good. But "male and female" are predicated of things of the understanding, and "man and wife" of things of the will, for the reason that marriage is represented by man and wife, and not so much by male and female. For truth can never of itself enter into marriage with good, but good can with truth; because there is no truth which is not produced from good and thus coupled with good. If you withdraw good from truth, nothing whatever remains but words.

Swedenborg wrote a lot about the union of opposites, including that of male and female.  Both qualities exist in all of us, and need to work in harmony.

Since we are made in the image of God, it makes sense that God also contains good and truth, female and male; as humans do.

It therefore seems a fitting exploration for Mother's Day to consider ways in which we can experience both female and male qualities in God.

IMAGES OF GOD AS MOTHER

Give yourself some special meditative time to experience God in a way that is meaningful for you.  You have several choices.  Below, is a relaxing video of music and pictures.  You can just watch this video and listen to the music.  Or you can play the music, and view the following images of the feminine divine by Sister Doris Klein.   If you prefer to read poetry, follow THIS LINK to read poetry about God as mother.

REST IN MY WINGS

RAHAMIN

Rahamin is the Hebrew word for compassion. The root word, raham, means womb. The healing mauve tones encircle darkness, in which a face is held in the compassionate and merciful hands of God. The face of God is hidden and unseen. The painful cry from within seems to echo the words of the psalmist, "When will I see the face of God?" A large tear flows from God's face to soften the darkness and mirrors a compassionate God whose tears mix with ours.


Cards: Design #024

Order cards from www.heartbeatscatalog.org

RUAH

MANTLE OF LIGHT

THE IMAGE AND LIKENESS OF GOD

THE PLACE OF SPLENDOR

ROOTED IN WISDOM:  SOPHIA

GARMENTS OF GOD

Poetry About God

You may wish to explore some poetry about God.  Some of it is about God's feminine qualities, and some of it is by women about how they experience God.  CLICK ON THIS LINK.


How do you relate to God? You might find that your concepts of God are not static, but rather fluid, and changing as you need.  Sometimes, God may be a person; at times male and at other times female.  Other days, God might be the wind, or the ocean.  Or God might the be the small child who smiles at you when you pass in the street.  God can sometimes be the beating of your heart, or the warm love that surrounds you when you have made someone else happy. 

Swedenborg encouraged us to open our hearts to the experience of God's inflowing love.  As we do this, we find that God is many different things; God is whatever we need God to be today, in this moment.


How is God for you in this moment?

In our closing song, consider the many ways you can experience the Divine.