[The story so far: In the large monkey tree outside my window in Mpima Seminary Zambia, feminist monkesses (simians, not nuns) voiced grievances whilst their male folk (‘monks’) slept off the effects of their Sunday beer pot. Abbess Bess, the last to speak, caused great excitement when she said she’d prefer to use the phrase “God became one of US” rather than “God became man”].
Chief Kolwe never really trusted women, least of all his clever consort, Conniecubina, so he always slept with one eye and both ears open. He thumped his chest and proclaimed, “Ladies, I’m shocked, that’s heresy, you’re going too far.” Abbess Bess reiterated that what she wanted was a different emphasis such as you find in John’s Gospel, where John begins with the Word and continues with many genderless images for the Saviour: Light, Way, Truth, Life and, note well, he said ‘the Word became Flesh’.
Ruby excitedly broke in, “Even in the synoptics, the Baptist called Jesus the ‘Lamb of God’ not the Ram of God. And if anyone deserved the title ‘Beloved Disciple’ surely it was Mary Magdalene”.
“Wake Abbot Capo” ordered Kolbe aware that he was getting out of his depth. Capo too felt threatened, but resorted to the Church History lessons he’d overheard in the seminary. Stroking his Capuchin beard he said, “There is certainly evidence that Jesus was a man, contemporary historians, Josephus a Jew and Tacitus a Roman bore witness to that. Incontrovertible.”
Wife-battered Aba, who looked forward to a better life after this one surprisingly spoke up, “Our lives on earth are short-lived, I’m looking forward to our real home in heaven where there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage.”
Phil O’Sophy strongly batting for an ongoing genderless saving event said, “Spirits, angels, and all creatures in the mind of God before birth or after death are probably genderless. Gender is not the issue, Love is. ‘God is Love’ said St John and in his account of Jesus’s last discourse with his followers Jesus assures them of his continued presence in his, genderless, Spirit.
The monks groaned, they felt outdone. Kolbe made a last gambit for male supremacy, “You won’t find much evidence for what ye are claiming in the Bible!” “O no?” queried, Philo, “Who wrote the Bible? All males except for two in the Old Testament and not one in the New Testament! Of course they support the male view. Even Mary, the Mother of God, was hardly quoted and she quite obviously had a lot to say.”
At that Kolbe climbed down from his high throne. Fuming and frustrated he fired his last salvo, “You’re all wrong. Anyway, I thought this is supposed to be an Ecological forum not a theological one”.
Sweetly Mother Bess smiled at him, “It’s all One my dear Father monk, we and everything in this Universe are all united in the one love of God. The new Theology is necessarily ecological and Ecology is necessarily theological.”