A few weeks ago, I talked about a claim that we should call God “they” since “He” isn’t inclusive enough. A tweet by the Religious News Service recently doubled down on this idea, asserting that Christian churches “lack consensus” about God’s pronouns. Lacks consensus? That’s a strange statement. That only makes sense if 99.99% of all Christian churches, in all times and places throughout history, don’t count as a consensus.
If you go around the world and ask Christians from all cultures and all denominations, you’ll encounter a lot of different ideas about a lot of other things. Roman Catholics disagree with Presbyterians about church structure, and Anglicans argue with Baptists about baptism. Not only that, but you’ll find a delightful degree of diversity when it comes to the way they sing God’s praises.
But, for all the glorious variety of Christ’s Church down through the ages, pretty much the only place you’ll get “God is they” theology is in the culturally narrow confines of the wealthy West. For all the disputes Christians have had, the core of the Gospel teaching, including God’s pronouns, has remained unchanged since the Apostles.
BreakPoint