Mother Jesus

by Elizabeth Kaeton

In June of this year, the Episcopal Church elected a new Presiding Bishop. And life has never been more interesting.

Her name is Katharine Jefferts Schori. In fact, she is the first woman in our history to hold the highest position in our ecclesiastical system. She's also the first woman to be elected Primate (of a total of thirty-eight Primates) in the 77 million member worldwide Anglican Communion.

The conservatives, neopuritan evangelicals, and those of our members who consider themselves 'biblically orthodox' were, of course, desperate to find something against her, something other than that she's a woman. They were positively euphoric with her first convention sermon, which they proclaimed flat-out heresy. As time has passed, many remain in a seeming state of near apoplexy about it.

Here, in part, is what she said, "Our mother Jesus gives birth to a new creation and you and I are His children. If we're going to keep on growing into Christ-images for the world around us, we're going to have to give up fear."

Yes, that's right. She said, "mother Jesus."

The outcry has ranged from the anticipated hand-wringing about "liberal revisionism" to the predictable laments about "radical feminism," "Gnosticism," and to the outrageous claim that she had created a "transgender Jesus." Make no mistake: these otherwise intelligent, well-educated, pious, and dedicated Christians are dead-serious. Apparently, misogyny can destroy brain cells.

Never mind that scripture, psalms, and the historical tradition of the church hold a rich treasury of feminine images for God and Jesus. Julian of Norwich, the great English mystic of the 14th century, wrote this: "A mother can give her child milk to suck, but our precious mother, Jesus, can feed us with himself. He does so most courteously and most tenderly, with the Blessed Sacrament, which is the precious food of true life."

The great theologian Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury in the years 1093 to 1109, prayed these words: "Jesus, as a mother you gather your people to you; you are gentle with us as a mother with her children. Often you weep over our sins and our pride; tenderly you draw us from hatred to judgment."

Or, these traditional words: "And thou, sweet Jesus Lord, art thou not also a mother? Truly, thou art a mother, the mother of all mothers, who tasted death in thy desire to give life to thy children." (Ed note: cf Mt 23.37; Lk 13.34 )

Clearly, Bishop Katharine, as she is affectionately known, is standing in the footsteps of giant figures of church history and is neither the heretic nor blind innovator her detractors would make of her. Neither was she being intentionally provocative, or, as one wag complained, "politically maladroit."

When asked why she chose this particular phrase, she replied, "It was very deliberate and conscious. I was wrestling with the image of blood on the cross, the image of labor. It is medieval imagery actually, Julian of Norwich. It seemed appropriate to the text and the hard work we are trying to do in this place."

These are interesting times, indeed. Life in the "Age of Terrorism" seems to leave little room for mystery. We want our God, like our borders, secure and fixed. We want Jesus on the cross -- not resurrected from the empty tomb. We want the comfort of the "faith of our fathers," not the challenge of discerning the face of the Divine Feminine.

Bishop Katharine is right. If we are going to have any hope of bringing peace and reconciliation into this world, we're going to have to give up fear. That's going to take the kind of courage women throughout the ages have had to claim, who know what it is to shed blood in order to bring new life into the world.

Actually, I find the words with which Bishop Katharine ended her sermon, images of the work of the human enterprise, infinitely more challenging than anything she could have said about the image of God:

"Our invitation, both in the last work of this Convention, and as we go out into the world, is to lay down our fear and love the world. Lay down our sword and shield, and seek out the image of God's beloved in the people we find it hardest to love. Lay down our narrow self-interest, and heal the hurting and fill the hungry and set the prisoners free. Lay down our need for power and control, and bow to the image of God's beloved in the weakest, the poorest, and the most excluded.

"We children can continue to squabble over the inheritance. Or we can claim our name and heritage as God's beloveds and share that name, beloved, with the whole world."

Somebody in the church say, "Amen."

[The Covenant Journal, Number 24, March 2007]

The Revd Elizabeth Kaeton is rector of St Paul Church, Chatham, NJ