While I was growing up I often heard people say of me, ‘he is the spit out of his father’s mouth.’ In my earliest years I took note of this expression without being aware of its figurative meaning. As I grew to understand what it meant to be the spit out of a person’s mouth I quickly found myself being able to use this same expression of others in whom I found the presence of strong family resemblances. In a much more articulate and respectful way the Christian Church throughout its two thousand year history has upheld the truth intended by this expression when speaking about the relationship that occurs between the first and second Person’s of the Trinity; Father and Son respectively. As the spit out of the Father’s mouth what does the person and mission of Jesus tell us about whom the Father is? What does it mean to call God Father in the Christian tradition? Considering the plenitude of emotions evoked in people when they hear the title ‘Father’ ascribed to the first Person of the Trinity the question often arises as to whether or not such a title should be optional in the Christian experience? These questions are going to be the guiding light of this paper.
Divine Revelation is the only language consisting of one ‘Word’. This one ‘Word’, however, when translated into human language often suffers from the ambiguity, imprecision and baggage inherent in it. So when the second Person of the Trinity entered the human scene as Jesus of Nazareth it was with human language that he had to convey the personal truth of the God that he had known from all eternity as a result of reclining in the bosom of his Father. Despite the poverty of words Jesus eagerly desired to communicate to the world the very truth of the One whom he had so lovingly called ‘Abba, Father’.
In answering the questions raised above about calling God Father it would be imprudent not to reflect upon the scriptural witness. Robert Hamerton-Kelly tells us, “compared to the eleven times God is designated ‘father’ in the Old Testament texts, the testimony of the gospels is startling: God is designated ‘father’ 170 times by Jesus, and never invoked by another name in Jesus’ prayers.” (Metz 98) The occurrences of ‘father’ in the Old Testament compared to those of the New Testament are quite significant. The use of calling God Father 170 times tells us a lot about Jesus’ relationship to God, namely that it is filial. Kelly tells us, “Abba reveals the heart of Jesus’ relationship to God, and therefore, the essence of the kingdom of God which was the subject of his preaching.” (Metz 98) At the very heart of Jesus’ life was his relationship with his God whom he called Father and this is seen in the whole of his life. It is interesting to note that in calling God Father, Jesus was voicing a child like term from his Aramaic dialect known as ‘Abba’. We often speak of Abba as meaning father but to be more “literal, Abba is better rendered as ‘Dad,’ or ‘Daddy.’” (Barr 38) Using such language to refer to his relationship with the first Person of the Trinity tells us that Jesus was either deluded for using such a radical way of relating to God or that he had a profoundly unique experience of the one whom we call God. Through faith we know that it was the uniqueness of his relationship to the first Person of the Trinity that enabled him to call upon God with such filial confidence. Kelly points out, “Jesus seems to have had a special intimacy with God, an intimacy which was focused in prayer when he called upon the almighty God, in terms of easy intimacy, called God Abba.” (Metz 99)
In calling God ‘Abba, Father’ Jesus was not only revealing something about who God is but “he was also making an implicit assertion about who he himself was and about his own peculiar relationship to God.” (Mangan 32) In revealing God as Father Jesus could not help but reveal himself in the process for as Jesus stated in John’s Gospel, ‘he who sees me sees the Father also.’ Everything that Jesus did therefore was a testimony to and revelation of the person of the Father. It is from Jesus’ own self awareness that he was able to embark upon his mission of revealing the Father. It is as ‘Son’ that Jesus reveals the Father. Jesus’ favorite use of Abba in prayer “is the key to Jesus’ authority and identity.” (Metz 98) The person and mission of Jesus are therefore in some real sense identical.
Through his many miracles of healing and through his awe inspiring preaching the focus of his ministry was always the Father. For Jesus, his Father was always the focal point. Everything that he did or said was done in reference to his Father. In making the claim that the person and mission of Jesus are identical tells us that if we want to know more about the Father then we must examine the person of Jesus. The mission of Jesus is to reveal God as Father and if Jesus’ own person and mission are identical then we must be able to extract from Jesus the truth of who the Father is.
Jesus has revealed to us who God is and he has chosen to communicate to us his own unique relationship and “since we received our knowledge of God’s fatherhood from Jesus, we must accept his interpretation, and no other, concerning the nature of that fatherhood.” (Hooft 121) Having said that we must accept the word of Jesus on what it means to call God Father there are still a number of people who may not be fully aware of what Jesus meant by calling God by such a designation. These people struggle daily with the notion of God as Father for numerous reasons. One such reason could be, they have projected on to God the shortcomings of their own fathers who have been their only experience of fatherhood. Another reason that some resist or struggle with calling God Father might be on account of the association that sometimes occurs between Father and maleness. This second reason may arise for a woman who sees this as an affront to her dignity as a female who is being subordinated to a man. This second reason may also give rise to scandal for any who see the justification for the use of Father as something, which legitimizes a patriarchal society. It is with reasons such as these that it is of the utmost importance that we clearly articulate the fatherhood of God from the perspective of Jesus who reveals such Fatherhood in its pristine form.
The Fatherhood of God as is revealed in the person and mission of Jesus Christ tells us that the fatherhood of God is not dependent upon human fatherhood for its meaning. Rather human fatherhood is dependent upon the Fatherhood of God for its true vocation. As a result of this dependency it would be right to say that those who are dissatisfied with, or who are caught up in a struggle with, calling God Father are in fact justified in their thoughts and feelings. A lot of people approach the idea of fatherhood with baggage, which conditions in turn how they approach the God whom Jesus Christ has revealed. The dissatisfaction felt by many of these people is not with the Fatherhood of God as is revealed by Jesus but rather it is with the preconceived notions of fatherhood that they carry around with them which in turn flavors their relationship with the God whom Jesus has revealed as infinite love. If we are to draw water joyfully from the wellsprings of our faith we must come to know the Father as he is and not as are others who bear the name father. God is the standard in terms of Fatherhood; all others are revelatory in so far as they follow in God’s wake. “The revelation of God’s fatherhood is inextricably bound up with the revelation of the unique sonship of Jesus. There is fatherhood because there is sonship. And there is sonship because there is, by the grace of the Spirit, communion with the unique Son. ‘And you are sons because God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying “Abba! Father”’ (Gal. 4:6). (Metz 45)
It is through the Son in the Spirit according to the words of St. Paul that we have become able to call upon God as ‘Abba, Father.’ Through the indwelling of the Spirit of God we are in the position to come to a greater clarity of what it means to call God Father. Through the indwelling Spirit we are conformed to the person of the Son and in reality we become by grace what Jesus is by nature, namely a child of God who can authentically call upon God as ‘Dad’ or ‘Daddy’. It seemed radical enough to the Jews that Jesus would call upon God, the first person of the Trinity, as Dad let alone us who have been created from the dust of the earth. Yet, this is the great pleasure of God that we would call upon him in the same filial confidence to which the prayer life of Jesus testifies. “Jesus’ filial prayer is the perfect model of prayer in the New Testament. Often done in solitude and in secret, the prayer of Jesus involves a loving adherence to the will of the Father even to the cross and an absolute confidence in being heard.” (Catechism 692) What Jesus reveals about the Father dismisses all the negative connotations that are so easily attached to fatherhood. Because Jesus reveals what God’s fatherhood means by virtue of his own person and mission it reminds us that calling God Father is still quite appropriate in today’s day and age. It does demand, however, that we who call upon God as Father should be prepared to articulate and annunciate in thought, word and deed the implications of calling God by such an intimate name.
What exactly does the person and mission of Jesus reveal about God as Father such that we should long to call upon him as such without reservations of any sort? First of all it should be stated, “in contrast with the pagan myths of the genealogies of the gods, the fatherhood of God in the biblical sense has nothing to do with the idea of generation. God is designated Father in reference to an act of election, which is inextricably bound up with his historic intervention in favor of his people. God is the father of Israel; he is not the father of men. ‘The decisively new factor here is that the election of Israel as God’s first-born has been made manifest in a historical action, the Exodus from Egypt. Combining God’s fatherhood with a historical action involves a profound revision of the concept of God as Father. The certainty that God is Father and Israel his son is grounded not in mythology but in a unique act of salvation by God, which Israel had experienced in history.” (Metz 44) This quote points out a fundamental truth to be kept in mind when talking about the fatherhood of God as it is revealed in the Biblical sense. This biblical sense states that God’s fatherhood is not in some way an explanation of the origins of creation but rather it is a lived faith experience of the people of Israel. To the Israelites God’s fatherhood was not theoretical but was fully rooted in history, their history. In the saving actions of the Exodus the Fatherhood of God is seen as expressing the concrete nature of God’s love. His fatherhood is witnessed as something real; something based in history. God as Father is seen in light of the covenant that results from the saving actions of the Exodus.
In revealing the Father, Jesus builds upon the Old Testament notion of God as the one who is personally involved in the lives of his people. The Israelite people had rejected the notion of God’s fatherhood as being something defined in relation to a female deity. Jesus affirms this by clarifying that the fatherhood of God is independent of all creation as regards its’ meaning. For Jesus, God’s fatherhood is dependent upon the eternal relationship that exists between them and as a result of the great love at work within the Trinity there is a freedom to that love, which seeks to expand its outreach into the experience of time and space so as to incorporate humanity. “In Jesus, God has been revealed as a Father who loves, and who desires to reconcile all human beings to the divine self.” (Barr 19) This love is seen time and time again in parables in which Jesus shows God as the Father who goes above and beyond the demands of mercy to invite and welcome his children back into the circle of his love. This is seen most beautifully in the parable of the forgiving Father that Luke has preserved for us in his gospel. This love of the Father is also testified to by the plenitude of miracles and healings, which Jesus does as a testimony to the Father’s desire that not one of those whom he has entrusted to Christ should be lost. “Jesus’ communication with his Father has the nature of a close personal relationship based on complete confidence. All that he says and does is a manifestation of the Father’s gracious will.” (Hooft 120) This filial attitude that Jesus has toward the Father especially in prayer paints a portrait that invites all the baptized to approach him with the same confidence and hopeful expectation that Jesus did.
Just as the Israelites came to understand the fatherhood of God in terms of his salvific activity in their lives through the concrete experience of the Exodus, so too did Jesus offer all believers the opportunity to experience the universal salvific activity of God through the life, death and resurrection of his Son on the Cross. The Paschal mystery is the supreme example and demonstration of the Father’s love for the world. The Father is the artist par excellence who has painted the full extent of his great love on the canvas of the cross of his Son. Christianity speaks of the paschal mystery as the Passover of the Lord, which alludes to the momentous event of the Exodus in which God intervened in the lives of his people as ‘Father.’ God’s intervention in the life of the world as Father has reached a climax in the paschal mystery of Christ. Through baptism we receive the gift of the Spirit who conforms us to Christ in whom we contemplate fully the face of the Father. Where as in the Old Testament God’s intervention as Father is something external in the sense of deliverance from physical bondage, in the New Testament God’s intervention as Father is experienced as personal because there is internal deliverance from bondage to sin and this deliverance is achieved through the person of Jesus Christ who lives in the Christian by his Spirit. God as Father in the biblical account is bound up with the theme of covenant.
Through the person of Jesus Christ, the fatherhood of God not only takes on concrete expression but it also is seen to have a human face. As we read and reflect upon the human face of God in the person of Jesus of Nazareth we encounter the fullness of love, compassion, empathy, understanding, mercy, healing, forgiveness, faithfulness and patience. All of these qualities which we see in Jesus are not only qualities that he possesses but rather they are the very essence of who he is and who the Father is who sent him to reveal the great covenantal love of God for the world. This covenantal love of God is the initiative of a loving Father who invites his creation to be become his sons and daughters in a committed relationship.
“One of the most tragic aspects of our time is that masses of people now have as their one principle ‘I do not want to be committed.’ In rejecting commitment, these people are thrown back on to the meager resources of their own ego. Their great need is to discover that there is a commitment to the Father we come to know through Christ Jesus.” (Hooft 152) Reflecting upon such a reality we can not help but wonder why there would be such a resistance to commitment but if our reflection bears any fruit it will at least remind us that “if the model of father used for God, therefore, continues to be largely paternalistic and authoritarian, there will be many today who will reject it, not only because it is downgrading of women but because this model breeds infantilism and the kind of submission which degrades rather than up-builds.” (Mangan 16) People today want authenticity, they no longer accept authority for authority sake and this while being perceived by many as a challenge to modern existing structures of such a kind is also an invitation to explore that vast array of color and meaning that underlies our society and Church so that it may better express the truth of the divine as well as the needs of men and women. If people find themselves struggling with calling God Father then that struggle must be honored in keeping with the pastoral heart of Christ. The heart of the Father lovingly demands such an outreach on the part of those who have a clear unimpeded understanding of God’s fatherhood. The conversion call of the Gospel challenges us at each leg of the journey to reappraise how we are living out the exalted message of the gospel and commit ourselves to seeking the grace to realign with the Gospel in its unadulterated beauty.
The real beauty of the fatherhood of God is that it initiates a relationship built upon unconditional love. It is informed by an attitude of generosity, which seeks to initiate and offer all that God is to his creation. This initiation on the part of God is seen in its definitive expression in the person and mission of Jesus Christ. “As the total self-expression of the Father eternally, the Son Incarnate has the task or the mission, therefore, to represent or express the paternity of the Father in the world. This fatherhood of the first Person, the Origin, is absolute, self-giving Love in an initiating and generative mode; He is Father by actively giving himself away to the Son and to the Spirit.” (Pesarchick 192) This selfless giving of himself to the Son and to the Spirit is ours through the lived faith experience of the New Covenant celebrated daily in the Eucharist. Jesus fulfills this task not only in the act of preaching, teaching and healing but also in the very symbol of the nuptial meaning of the body. In the infinite plan of God the sexual complementarity of male and female was ordered toward expressing the whole order of creation, redemption and sanctification. To say that God expresses his fatherly covenantal love in the sexuality complementarity of man and woman we must always remember and clearly confess that, “in no way is God in man’s image. He is neither man nor woman. God is pure spirit in which there is no place for the difference between the sexes. But the respective ‘perfections’ of man and woman reflect something of the infinite perfection of God: those of a mother and those of a father and husband.” (Catechism 105) Recognizing that God is pure spirit who is neither man nor woman we must also recognize and fully acknowledge that the second Person of the Trinity in order to proclaim the great love of the Father for the world by redeeming it from sin had to become human and more specifically male. The mission of Christ was not merely to deliver fallen humanity from sin but rather and more importantly it was to manifest and proclaim the love of the One who has initiated this great act of love. For Jesus, the salvation of the world depended more upon coming to know and love God as Father then simply being delivered from bondage to sin. An aspect of proclaiming the Father’s love within the limits of human understanding and reason meant that Christ would use sense perceptible realities so as to lead humanity to the contemplation of the higher spiritual realties. Humanity is fundamentally a sacramental people whether explicitly or implicitly professed and as such Christ’s choice of maleness in becoming human was not deference to the patriarchal society of his day but rather maleness had been endowed with a nuptial meaning by the Creator that allowed Jesus to further explain the person of the Father. “The maleness of Christ is intrinsically connected to the mission of Christ in his revelation of the unseen Father. The revelatory significance of the male Incarnate Son lies in his task to make present the invisible Father.” (Pesarchick 194) To say that maleness has been endowed with a nuptial meaning that expresses the covenantal love of the Father does not mean that Maleness is God. It is important in this regard to point out that there is a difference between masculine personality and male anatomy. Both men and women have differing degrees of both masculine and feminine personality but yet each bear uniquely a male or female anatomy. So to complement this it can be said that, “despite the fact that all creation, both male and female, is completely receptive and responsive vis a vis God (and therefore analogously feminine), nonetheless, the male mirrors, in a receptive or representational manner, the initiating fecundity or active action of God. Given this, in making present the Father, the Trinitarian Origin of the initiating, actively fruitful love, the Son is incarnate as a male human being. The maleness of the Incarnate Son facilitates his mission to reveal the Father.” (Pesarchick 194) On some level then it can be said that when we dismiss the maleness of Christ as being incidental we also dismiss in some sense the Father whom he has revealed.
The appropriateness of calling God Father rests solely upon the revelation given us in the person and mission of Jesus. When we understand the Fatherhood of God in terms of divine revelation we will begin to experience a joy in calling upon God as Jesus did when he cried out, ‘Abba, Father’. We must always be on the safeguard against understanding the Fatherhood of God in terms of human fatherhood. Human fatherhood rather should take its cue from the One whom Jesus has revealed. As Church and as a society we would do the gospel and humanity respectively an injustice if we didn’t take the time to appraise the elements of patriarchy within both the religious and secular realms and strive to rid them of anything that hinders people from coming to accept and appreciate the spiritual truth that fatherhood is intended to teach.
At the end of the day we may struggle with the concept of God’s fatherhood as a result of a number of issues but may we have the consciousness to rejoice in the relationship with God that we have as a result of the person and mission of Christ.
Bibliography
Barr, Robert R. God, the Father of Mercy. New York, New York. Crossroad Publishing Company: 1998
Galot, Jean Abba Father: We Long To See Your Face. Staten Island, New York. Society of St. Paul: 1992
Mangan, Celine Can We Still Call God “Father”? Dublin, Ireland. Dominican Publications: 1984
Metz, Johannes-Baptist Concilium: God As Father? New York, New York. The Seabury Press: 1981
Pesarchick, Robert A. The Trinitarian Foundation of Human Sexuality As Revealed By Christ According to Hans Urs Von Balthasar. Rome, Italy. Gregorian University Press: 2000
Visser’t Hooft, W.A. The Fatherhood of God in an Age of Emancipation. Geneva, Switzerland. World Council of Churches: 1982
The Fatherhood of God
Abba, Father
Submitted to: Dr. J. Dool
Submitted by: Philip Melvin
Submitted on: April 9, 2008
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