Seven Short Essays on Religion

1. Gender is an issue with reference to the relationship between god and women, who constitute over half the population and yet who may feel they are neglected given the tendency to see human beings in male terms. Women are to be included in the family of God's children, but from the beginning of the Church they have been given secondary status. They are vitally important in terms of the transmission of life and values. This can be a conflict for the individual woman, however, aware as she is of the duality of her role as mother and wife, of giver of life and caregiver to life as well as of one with a subordinate role to the male. The duality can be difficult to reconcile. The ancient idea of the Mother as Creator gives away over time to the idea of Mother as recipient of the Father's power and as protector of the creation of the Father, but the Mother's role is so central and essential that there is still some sense of her as giver of life, creator of life, and as having more directly to do with the creation and giving of life than does the Father. In human terms, we are left with a Mother doing all the work and the Father taking all the bows, and on a spiritual and social level this becomes ingrained as something almost questionable in the tradition as it is in life.

The question of the goodness of God in the face of starvation, economic exploitation, and political disenfranchisement raises the issue of how a benevolent God can allow such things to be. This tests t

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ve for the poor and oppressed minorities" (Sobrino 503). Thus God defines the meaning of liberation and points to the rightness of liberation. Without God, liberation is only another form of social organization rather than the a right that has been thwarted by certain forms of social organization. Belief in God involves a human seeking for and responding to what is experienced as holy. This raises the issue of what is meant by the holy. It is easy to find synonyms for the holy--transcendence, sacred, and ultimate. The holy is usually personified as a being with personal name and personal attributes, and the name and attributes differ from one religion to another. The holy can be conceived of as an impersonal process, state of being, liberating ruth, or power. The idea that the holy is ultimate refers to something that is both primary and absolute. It is primary in that nothing greater than the ultimate either exists of can be conceived. the holy is thus incomparable and stands as the ultimate reality and the ultimate value rather than being merely greater or more real. An ultimate value is primary rather than secondary or instrumental. It is the highest value and not a means to another end. Thus the attainment of the

Category: Philosophy - S