God is love - a Lenten series 3 relationship

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The church speaks of God the father, God the son, and God the holy spirit. The Nicene creed, recited by the church around the world since the 4th century, affirms the Son, Jesus, as eternally begotten of the Father, but not made. But why this family metaphor without mention of a mother? In the past, I've thought of the Holy Spirit as a mother, and the trinity as a family, but I'm realizing there is deeper wisdom in not using the nuclear family as the metaphor for the Trinity. In our modern time, we associate marriage with romance. Certainly romantic love is beautiful and affectionate. However, not all cultures, nor have all ages viewed a wife as an equal partner, but more often property, or a means to procreate and preserve a family line. Duty replaces love in these cultures. But I think the love of a parent for a child is a more accessible metaphor across ages and cultures. I believe the image of mother and child love is more believable than father and son because the expectations of the latter are lower.
Attu mother and child

Jesus is the one of a kind icon of God. Only Jesus represents God to us perfectly. And God loves Jesus and Jesus loves God the father, not as married lovers, but in the form of relationship all of us have experienced to different degrees of imperfection.

Bruce Lee and son
Not all have been married, but all of us have been born. All of us have parents. Somehow, we know what good and bad parental love are. When it's bad we long for better. God and Jesus offer the ideal model of love, mutually sacrificial and ego-less, truly a miracle.

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