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“God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
Thai Long-Neck Women Part Of "Human Zoo" • Jewish Prayer Book Makes God Gender-Neutral

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Nariel
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
God is a woman? I wonder what her vagina smells like.
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morninggloria
09/01/09

@Nariel: A Cinnabon, probably.
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Lymed
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
When my family's synagogue hired a gay Rabbi over 10 years ago, a number of congregants quit the congregation and formed a congregation of their own. Those who didn't want to come off as homophobic claimed it wasn't because the Rabbi was gay, but because they didn't want their sons Bar Mitzvahed by a woman. The new congregation was denied membership in the Union of Reform Judaism for a number of years, but I think they were eventually allowed to join.
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Edited by Lymed at 09/01/09 4:45 PM Lymed was starred Lymed was unstarred

funnyface
09/01/09

@Lymed: Ah yes, because sexism is more acceptable than homophobia?
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Nariel
09/01/09

@funnyface: Religious people tend to ignore the existence of sexism and homophobia. They just call demeaning women and hating gay people biblical.
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Pizza!Pizza!Pizza!
09/01/09

@Nariel: 'They just call demeaning women and hating gay people biblical.'

Well, maybe not in this specific case.
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Nariel
09/01/09

@HeatherNumber1: Maybe not, I shouldn't generalize like that. It's merely my experience.
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Lymed
09/01/09

@Nariel: My family's synagogue has survived with a lesbian Rabbi with a congregation that has grown more socially conscious under her direction. We often equate religious with more conservative religious groups, but that is not always the case. Many progressive leaders in our country are religious, they just don't talk about their religion.
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Nariel
09/01/09

@Lymed: I agree, the fundamentalists tend to be the loudest.
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sportz.star
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
While I don't prefer reform services (bring back the Hebrew!) I do like the way they think!
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Lymed
09/01/09

@sportz.star: Hey, reform services I go to are about half in Hebrew. It's not all gone.
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andBegorrah
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
But She's still Black, right?
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badmutha
09/01/09

@andBegorrah: Damn straight.
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Lymed
09/01/09

@badmutha: She's not straight.
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morninggloria
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
I say, God is a sock.
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Lymed
09/01/09

@morninggloria: No, God is the conch shell. The sock is just a follower.
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Lymed
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
Reform Judaism is not fringe. There are 1.1 million Reform Jews in America.
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legs benedict
09/01/09

@Lymed: I think that Sadie was saying that Rabbi Wenig herself perhaps represents the fringe of Reform Judaism as a lesbian woman rabbi, not that Reform Judaism is "fringe."
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Lymed
09/01/09

@legs_benedict: Thanks for giving another reading. I have unfortunately heard people say reform is not really Judaism.
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legs benedict
09/01/09

@Lymed: So have I, but if memory of her other pieces on Judaism serves, I would be mighty surprised to hear Sadie say it. Or read it, as it were.
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dj_chick
09/01/09

@Lymed: I've never had anyone actually say that to my face... though I've heard it in movies and tv shows, generally coming from an Orthodox character. Then again, to the Orthodox, I'm not Jewish at all. :-/
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Lymed
09/01/09

@dj_chick: I've heard it, and I've heard it second hand from conservatives. Or not those actual words, but demeaning statements suggesting Reform traditions are not Jewish enough. I understand they are different than Conservative traditions, but I don't think one is more Jewish than the other.
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dj_chick
09/01/09

@Lymed: I will assume that I'm fortunate then... where there are so few of us, you'd think everyone would want to band together.
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GirlyQ is a manta ray
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
I don't think God has a gender, really. I think masculine and feminine are both parts of God's whole.

But, this makes me proud to be a Jew.
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funnyface
09/01/09

@GirlyQ ain't a-marchin' anymore: Yeah, I'm of the God has no one gender point of view. I mean, "So God created human beings in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them." makes pretty clear that a woman is equally an image bearer of God to a man.
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morninggloria
09/01/09

@GirlyQ ain't a-marchin' anymore: I sometimes wonder if the insistence that God is male is the logical base for the patriarchy's existence.
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MizJenkins
09/01/09

@morninggloria: The insistence that God is male or the sneaking suspicion that he isn't? My evidence points to the latter.
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BlueJeans
09/01/09

@morninggloria: I wonder which came first?
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morninggloria
09/01/09

@BlueJeans: When I was just a wee Catholic attending CCD classes on Wednesday night, I remember more than one teacher telling us that men are the heads of their family because God is a man and men are made in God's Image and women were made in the image of the dude's sexy, busty, rib.

Most of CCD is blocked from memory, to be honest.
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BlueJeans
09/01/09

@morninggloria: I must have much more progressive CCD teachers (Baltimore Catholic Kennedy Democrats tend that way, I suppose). Although my strongest memory is of setting the fire alarm with burning papers with our sins written on them because our teacher misinterpreted the lesson plan, mostly our teachers were competent enough to tell us that we could say "God" instead of "He" at mass, since God didn't have a gender.

Surprisingly, I didn't get the "God is a man" bullshit until my (all-girls) Catholic school, when a dropped-out seminarian teaching senior Religion blustered on about how offensive the "God doesn't have a gender" stuff was to him. Between that and his misinterpretations on the Church position on the death penalty, I snapped one day and brought him in thirty pages of excerpts from canon and papal encyclicals. Thereafter, we just watched movies every day in religion class.

Larger point: maybe since most of human history has been determined by who has the bigger gun/stick/rock/fist, and people thought of gods as physical/active powers, men decided god = masculine force?
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Pizza!Pizza!Pizza!
09/01/09

@funnyface: Well, except for all the 'he' stuff.
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badmutha
09/01/09

In reply to “God Is A Woman And She Is Growing Older”
When will all of the religions of the world understand that being gay isn't a choice and therefore should not be condemned as a sin? It is how God made some people.
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willwriteforfood
09/01/09

@badmutha: When people stop thinking they can speak for God.
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schweppes
09/01/09

@badmutha: You know, every time I hear that line of thought, it always rubs me the TINIEST bit the wrong way. I'm behind the sentiment, but the fact that the thing that is keeping homosexuals from sinning is the fact that they were born that way seems like it's almost presuming that there's something to apologize/explain about being gay. Being gay isn't a sin because there's nothing immoral about a consenting adult choosing to be romantically and sexually involved with another consenting adult. For instance, we might find down the line that people are born with a predilicition for violence - it would still make violence wrong and wouldn't affect the morality of homosexuality.
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badmutha
09/01/09

@willwriteforfood: Well if that isn't the damn truth.
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badmutha
09/01/09

@schweppes: I see what you are saying. I think it can get very complex if you want to argue the positions. Man obviously does have a predilection for violence, but that violence usually hurts another person. Homosexuality doesn't hurt anyone.
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nagumi
09/01/09

@schweppes: Even if gay was a choice, it wouldn't be a sin, yes?
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schweppes
09/01/09

@badmutha: There are sins (e.g. coveting your neighbor's wife) that don't harm anyone else. I don't know, it just seems like saying things like "It doesn't hurt anyone" or "They are born that way" is what throws the conversation into a tailspin of arguing about whether someone really IS gay or how someone being gay hurts some Utah 5-year-old 2000 miles away. It's like, no.... trying to explain why being gay isn't a sin is just as ridiculous as trying to explain why being straight, dying your hair red, and being left handed aren't sins.
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schweppes
09/01/09

@nagumi: Yes, if being gay were a choice, it wouldn't be a sin. In my opinion. Which is always right.
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Pizza!Pizza!Pizza!
09/01/09

@schweppes: I'm the same way when people talk about 'tolerance.' As if that's the best you can do, to simply tolerate someone homosexual or with different colored skin.
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Her Grace
09/01/09

@nagumi: For some of us, it is a choice. Those of us who are bisexual have the explicit option to act upon our homosexual or heterosexual urges--or both--and effectively do have some choice in the matter of the people we have sex with. We can no more control who we fall in love with than anyone else, and it would certainly break my heart to not be with my girlfriend, but I could have a sexually fulfilled life with a man and quite possibly an emotionally fulfilled one, as well (I can't say for sure, as I have no intention of ever breaking up with my girl). But my decision to date my girlfriend, when I have a legit option to see men, can rightly be construed as a choice.

The notion of sin is silly anyway. Ethics must come from within, not an outside source.
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