God is not a man

Christianity has a gender problem.

The Christian faith has long privileged men, in pulpits, in homes, and in society, not because of some divine mandate, but because people decided that God is a man. Somewhere along the way, a radical movement led by a brown-skinned, gender-defying savior got hijacked by empire, and God got boxed in as a bro.

From the early church on, theology started to absorb the toxic mix of Roman power and patriarchal family structures. The language used to describe God as “Father,” “Lord,” and “King” was never neutral. It didn’t just reflect culture, it helped create it. What began as metaphor became mistaken for fact. God wasn’t just like a father, God was male. Jesus wasn’t just the Son; he became the reason only sons could lead. As a result, women were silenced, sidelined, and written out of leadership, because they were seen as further from God.

Theologians like Augustine and Aquinas taught that men were closer to reason and to God, while women were seen as clos…