Who is God the Father?
As Catholics, we profess our faith in a Triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Trinity is one God, but three distinct persons in one God. Although this is a mystery to us, we are invited to more deeply know each of these three persons.
The First Person of the Trinity is God the Father. He is the Father of Jesus and He is also Our Father. Jesus Himself taught us this. In fact, one of the revelations of Jesus’ ministry is the fact that His Father is also Our Father and He invites to come to know Our Father.
In the first book of the Old Testament (Genesis), we are introduced to a loving God who created humanity and provided for all our needs. After Adam and Eve fell from grace by their sin, God Our Father mercifully promised to send a Redeemer. In the second book of the Old Testament (Exodus), we encounter a God who has compassion for His People enslaved in Egypt and frees them from bondage. Throughout the Old Testament we read about the Israelites who continually waver between praising God and rebelling against Him. Every time they stray from their faith, He sends prophets to call them back. He is a God who loves His People.
In the New Testament, Jesus not only tells us that God loves us, but that He is Our Father. It is through Jesus that we obtain God as Father. Jesus, as the Second Person of the Trinity, was, is, and always will be the Son of the Father. When Jesus took on a human body, He became the “only begotten Son of the Father.” He is the only Son conceived by God Himself through the power of the Holy Spirit. As a human conceived in the flesh, God was His Father. He is in all aspects the Son of God.
When Jesus came into the world, He invited us to become His brothers and sisters (Mark 3:34-35[i]). He adopted us and bought us with His Blood which He shed on the cross for us. Thus, we are the adopted children of God and can now call God “Our Father.” Because Jesus wants us to truly know that God is Our Father and have a Father-child relationship with Him, He spends time teaching us about the Father.
Jesus teaches us that we can come to know Our Father in prayer. In fact, He taught us how to pray to Our Father. Jesus Himself gave us the prayer that we call “The Lord’s Prayer” or the “Our Father” (Matthew 6: 5-14). It is Jesus who has told us to call God Our Father. Jesus also called Him “Abba” which means “Daddy.” This is not a term that one uses to address a cold and distant God, but a term filled with love. “Daddy” is an intimate word that is spoken by a child who loves and trusts His Father. “Daddy” is a word that a child utters when he is snuggled securely in his father’s arms. How often we forget that Our Father said to us “I will never forget you. I have carved you on the palm of My Hand” (Isaiah 49:15 -16). Our Father truly holds us in His Hand. Jesus calls Him “Daddy” to remind us that we are the precious, beloved children of God and we will be snuggled safely in His Arms if we choose to trust Him and allow ourselves to get close to Him.
Jesus also teaches us about Our Father through parables. He shows us an example of how merciful and forgiving Our Father is in the story of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15: 11-31). The father loves his son so much that he forgives him and rejoices that his son has returned to him. The son who was seeking forgiveness was not greeted with reproach, but with forgiveness and joy. This is how Our Heavenly Father responds to us when seek forgiveness from Him.
Myths about God
God is truly Our Father. He is the perfect Father. He is strong, just, mighty, all-powerful, and all-knowing. He is also kind, merciful, gentle, generous, forgiving, and loving. Some people try to say that God is also our mother, because of these “feminine” traits. God does not have these traits because He is “our mother,” He has these traits because He is perfection. He embodies all good, noble, and worthy traits because He is God. It is incorrect to say that God is our mother. He is Our Father. We know this without doubt because Jesus told us that God is Our Father and Jesus neither lies nor withholds truth from us.
Some people may try to say that God is mother out of ignorance. They are not intentionally misleading people, they merely lack an understanding of their Catholic faith. Others do intentionally mislead people because they are trying to push their own agenda of what they want the Church to be. They sadly believe the women are regarded as second class citizens and try to establish equality by saying that God is our mother. This is a grave fallacy. The saddest part is that it destroys the intimate nature of the relationship between God and us. By creating their own version of God as father and mother, they create a nameless, faceless, cosmic being without a unique identity. No one can have an intimate relationship with a cosmic being. We therefore know that this is not the truth because Jesus Himself calls us to an intimate relationship with our “Daddy.”
God Loves All His People
God loves all His people equally. However, He created us as man and woman and gave to each of us different gifts. From the beginning, God meant us to be a community. In community we help each other, nurture each other, and grow closer to God. If He gave all gifts to every person, we would have no need for community. We would be content to be alone and would not pursue a relationship with God. God in His Graciousness, has given us weaknesses to draw us closer to Him; we need God and we know that we need Him. In His Graciousness, He has also given us each other. All the members of the community are necessary — no one is expendable.
We all have different gifts, yet each gift is as valuable as any other gift. Jesus did not look upon women as second class citizens, He saw them all as equal inheritors of the Kingdom of God. Jesus lifts up women. We see many examples of His compassion and love for women. In Luke 7:11-17, He sees a funeral procession. A widow’s only son (and thus only means of support) has died. Jesus, in His love and compassion for her, restores her son to her. In Matthew 9:20-22, a woman with faith touches His cloak and is healed. He does not rebuke her; He lovingly tells her that her faith has healed her.
God also holds up a woman to us as His perfect disciple. When Gabriel greeted Mary at the Annunciation, he said “Hail, full of grace” (Luke 1:28), thus acknowledging that she was pure and sinless. Because she was perfectly obedient to God her entire life and, because of her love for God, never sinned, she was assumed into Heaven at her death. She was crowned Queen of Heaven and Earth because of her perfect fidelity to God.
Jesus adopted us as His brothers and sisters. Because of Jesus, we can call God Our Father. Jesus also gave us Mary as our mother. From the cross, He said to her and the beloved disciple, “Woman behold your son. Son behold your mother (John 19:26-27).” He did not say “John behold your mother.” The gospel does not say Jesus addressed His mother and John. It refers to “the beloved disciple” and Jesus speaks to the “son.” This is because Jesus gave His mother to all of us. We are all the beloved disciple. We are all now the sons and daughters of Mary. Mary is our mother.
We can now see that to call God Our Father “mother” is to deny the mother that Jesus gave us. Jesus who speaks only truth and all truth has told us that God is Our Father and Mary is our mother. Jesus invites us to intimacy with Our Father through prayer and reading scripture. Jesus has revealed to us what we need to know about God; we therefore need to pick up the Bible and read it. To understand what we have read, we need to engage in prayer. Why not start with the prayer Jesus gave us?
Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Recommended Bibles:
The Holy Bible, Douay Rheims Version. Published by Tan Books and Publishes, Inc. Rockford Ill. (Translated from the Latin Vulgate, this is recognized as the “scrupulously faithful translation” ). Saint Joseph “New Catholic Edition” of the Holy Bible. Published by the Catholic Book Publishing Company, N.Y. (the Douay-Rheims bible in 20th century English — a faithful translation
[i] This passage begins with someone telling Jesus that His mother and brothers wished to speak to Him. It is very important to clarify here that “brother” means a close relative. These “brothers” were actually cousins of Jesus, but in the Aramaic language no such word exists for cousins. This is important because Mary is the Eternal Virgin. She never bore any children except Jesus who was conceived by God, thus keeping Her virginity and purity intact.
