First Day of Spring

 

Mother Earth/Father Sky

“Lord of the springtime, Father of flower, field and fruit, smile on us in these earnest days when the work is heavy and the toil wearisome, lift up our hearts, O God, to the things worthwhile—sunshine and night, the dripping rain, the song of birds, books and music, and the voices of our friends. Lift up our hearts to these this [day] and grant us Thy peace. Amen.”

W. E. B. Du Bois (Earth Prayers from Around the World, p. 293; edited by Elizabeth Roberts and Elias Amidon, Harper San Francisco, 1991)

          This is a beautiful prayer for the first day of spring, don’t you think? And yet it is also an example of what is missing in our religious traditions—the feminine. When you think of springtime, of the flowering and fruiting of the earth, don’t you think “Mother Earth”? I do. Our Native American people do, too. They give thanks to the Great Spirit, who is characterized as masculine, and to Mother Earth. St. Francis of Assisi feminized much of creation—Brother Sun, Sister Moon. In Matthew 23:37, Jesus even refers to himself as a mother hen gathering her chicks under her wings. So, what happened?

          Leaving out the feminine aspects of our divinity seems like such a relic of the past. The burning or drowning of women who knew how to treat illnesses with herbs, who were midwives and healers, comes to mind. Unfortunately, it isn’t a relic, and it isn’t past. It is why some churches still forbid women to speak, to sit with the men in worship, to hold office, or fill the pulpit. It is why there are no women priests in the Catholic church.

          I don’t claim to know the reasons for this, except that they come from the same mindset that once prevented women from owning property and gave a woman’s inheritance to her husband upon marriage. The same unspoken rules that in many traditions still require a bride to be chosen based upon the size of her dowery. The same ones that still allow girls to be bought and sold in marriage before they even reach puberty. 

          When we leave the feminine out of the Godhead, we leave out the fecundity and fertility of creation. We leave out the nurturance, sweetness, gentleness, tenderness, and empathy. We end up with a God that is rational and logical, yes, but also who rules like the old testament god—warlike, ruthless, punishing. In the beginning, there was balance, and it is time to bring it back.

          We think these things don’t translate to our civil lives, but they do. The uptick in domestic violence, and in violence against women in general is underpinned by the belief that women are inferior and irrational and need to be controlled. We see it in the halls of power and in the streets of our cities. Most recently, in Atlanta, where women were murdered because in the mind of a deranged young man, they were a threat to his religious purity. That business from Genesis about the fall of Adam because of Eve is still resonating in the 21^st century.

          I don’t know about you, but I believe in the God of balance. The mother hen God; the one who gathers and nurtures her children and gives them good food to eat and clean water to drink. And, frankly, I believe the Father God loves and honors her, too.

                                                  In the Spirit,

                                                  Jane