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From: peterr@utcsrgv.UUCP (Peter Rowley)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: gender of God and women;  defn of chairperson
Message-ID: <5103@utcsrgv.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 30-Aug-84 03:55:04 EDT
Article-I.D.: utcsrgv.5103
Posted: Thu Aug 30 03:55:04 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 30-Aug-84 06:14:52 EDT
Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto
Lines: 17

Two short comments:

On the gender of God and what it means to women:  I am amazed by the degree
to which people can talk about abstract entities and their properties and
ignore the concrete people who are affected.  Surely a small girl sitting
in church feels more distant from a male God than does a small boy hearing
the same sermon, and feels less proud of her gender.  Perhaps attempts can
be made to reform the language, but I think it is best to treat spirituality
in a more abstract way (yes, tougher to teach to children) which avoids
personifications (and thus authority figures).

On "chairpeople":  Wm Cook says this refers to "militant feminists"?!?!?
I doubt that's what the ACM means when they list the chairpeople of
conference sessions.  And his other definitions ("chairwoman" is a wimpy
chairperson, for example) are not only ludicrous, but rather distasteful.

p. rowley, U. Toronto