God and Gender ~ Clark Carlton

God and Gender

   Few issues are as explosive in our society as those involving gender and religion. The Orthodox Christian addresses these issues within the framework of the Church's self-understanding as the Bride of Christ. Whether the issue at hand is "inclusive language," the role of women in the Church, or homosexual desire, the answer lies in the great mystery: Christ and the Church.
   
   The peoples of the ancient world worshiped female deities, accepted priestesses, and thought nothing of homosexual behavior. Israel, however, stood alone in rejecting all of these practices. The reason for this lies in God's revelation of Himself as being radically distinct from creation.
   
   We have said that the world was created ex nihilo. Between the being of God and the being of the world there is an irreducible gulf. The world is not God, has never been God, and will never be God. The fact that God has united creation to Himself in the Incarnation in no way destroys the distinction between the Uncreated and the created. In Christ we participate in the uncreated grace of God, becoming by that grace what He is by nature, yet we never cease being creatures; our created nature is never transformed into the divine nature.
   
   This difference between God and the world is expressed iconically by the disexuality of human nature. In the Divine Scriptures, God is always represented by the male and creation by the female. God is the Bridegroom, and the world--- or more precisely, the Church, which is the world recreated in Christ--- is the Bride.
   
   God, of course, is neither male nor female; He is beyond all such created concepts. Nevertheless, He has given us certain images and concepts whereby we have come to know Him. Though these concepts can never fully describe or define the indescribable God, we are nonetheless bound by them.
   
   It is true that the Scriptures occasionally use female imagery in regard to God. For example, Christ said of Jerusalem: O Jerusalem, Jerusalem... how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not (Matthew 23:37). This is,  however, a simile. Christ called God "Father," not "Mother." Christ is the "Son" of God, not the "Daughter" of God.
   
   The use if "inclusive" or even gender-neutral language about God is an egregious violation of the integrity of the Scriptures and of the Liturgy. To call God "Mother" is nothing less than to introduce a different god. Inclusive language blurs the distinction between the Creator and creation, elevating the creation (that is, the female) to the place of God, and thereby returning us once again to the Original Sin.
   
   From this it should be evident why it is impossible for the Church to have priestesses. The male, because he is a creature, can represent God only iconically. The female, however, is creation. The Church is essentially female. If, therefore, the priest--- who is the image of Christ the Bridegroom--- is female, then what happens to the male principle? Once again, the distinction between Creator and creation is destroyed, and a new religion is born. Actually, it is an old religion that is reborn--- the religion of pantheism, which Israel and the Church rejected.
   
   The inherent disexuality of human nature and its iconic relationship to Christ and the Church also explains the Church's attitude toward homosexual desire. Notice the context in which St. Paul addresses this issue:

      Who changed the Truth of God into the lie, and worshipped
      and served the creature more than the Creator, Who is
      blessed for ever. For this cause God gave them up
      unto vile affections: for even their women did change
      the natural use into that which is against nature: And
      likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the
      women, burned in their lust one toward another; men
      with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving
      in themselves that recompense of their error which was
      meet (Romans 1:25-27).

   For St. Paul, homosexual desire is not only a result of the Fall, it is actually paradigmatic of the Fall, much in the same way that marriage is paradigmatic of Christ's saving relationship to the Church. It is clear, therefore, that the Church cannot bless homosexual activity. Human sexuality can be rightly expressed only in Holy Matrimony or in celibacy.
 

The Faith: Understanding Orthodox Christianity, An Orthodox Catechism, Clark Carlton, Regina Orthodox Press, 1997 pp. 235-237.