Scott Hahn

[qfnol31]

Anyone can disagree with Scott Hahn if they like. It's not a Dogma or doctrine of the Church that the Holy Spirit is the femine part of God. It's also probably not quite contrary to the Church, if understood correctly. Make sure you understand what he's saying before you condemn what he's said.

There are very typical attributes found in females. These attributes may be most clearly expressed in the Holy Spirit. This makes sense because women are in the image and likeness of God too, so they have to be actualized in God (according to Señor Aquinas), so there would have to be a place where "feminine attributes" are found most. All Scott Hahn has said is that this person is the Holy Spirit.

[qfnol31]

[quote name='amarkich' date='Dec 1 2004, 02:19 PM'] Wow, is Scott Hahn really your uncle? I do not mean to bash him (if you are considering my comments bashing). I was just making the points that the author made [i]and substantiated with examples[/i]. I have only heard Hahn speak once, but I enjoyed it. Anyway, I think almost all of what he says is good Catholic teaching. The problem is in the few theories that he has formed based on personal interpretation of the Bible without support of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church. Apparently he is quite an insightful man if he was able to understand so many teachings of the Church by personally reading and understanding the Bible. [/quote]
Actually, my guess is that in this case he used St. Thomas.

[amarkich]

He finds no Latin Father in support of this theory and only four minute Eastern Fathers: Methodius, Ephrem, Aphrahat and Narsai. He may base some things on Saint Thomas Aquinas, but that does not mean that Aquinas agrees with the proposition that the Holy Ghost has feminine qualities.

Edit: By the way, the source for the support from the Fathers is from Robert Sungenis, Catholic Apologetics International. He cites those four Fathers as the only supporters of Hahn's theory.

Edited December 1, 2004 by amarkich

[Mateo el Feo]

Thanks for the link. Not having seen a direct quote, all I can say is the critics might be reading into the statement more than Dr. Hahn intended.

Here's my laymen's view.

There are masculine attributes associated with God. For example:

[b]First Person (Father): [/b]The world was not "borne" of God, like a child from a mother. It was created, like the role of a father. Our Lord called God "Father."

[b]Second Person (Son):[/b] Jesus revealed Himself as a man in the Incarnation.

[b]Third Person (Holy Spirit): [/b] Our Lord was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. Mary is the spouse of the Holy Spirit. This is a "masculine" role for the Holy Spirit.

In the Holy Bible, one finds feminine aspects to God, though not assigned to a particular Person of the Trinity. Seeing masculine and feminine attributes in God is pretty kosher in my book.

The danger is when we try to project a gender onto God. God is spirit: He is neither male or female.

But, it makes sense to call God by the pronoun "He," for the reasons listed above.

If I had to guess, when the Holy Bible uses feminine imagery, and two out of the three Persons of the Trinity are clearly identified with masculine attributes, it would stand to reason that the third Person of the Trinity might be used by a theologian to assign the feminine characteristics. Such logic seems a bit shaky, though, and probably could lead to a theology with too much separation between the Persons.

I'm sure some others will have a better defense of this position--I'm just a layman. Here's some more on the topic:

[url="http://www.catholic.net/Catholic Church/Periodicals/Faith/Jul-Aug99/God2.html"]http://www.catholic.net/Catholic Church/Periodicals/Fa...Aug99/God2.html[/url]

I suspect that a theologian has to have a balance in which God isn't being assigned a sex (He is spirit, and sex is a carnal trait), and the rejection of the feminist goddess theology. My experience is that orthodox Catholic theology has always looked to maintaining this balance. I suspect that Dr. Hahn's actual quote will reveal someone who is interested in maintaining this balance, despite the accusations of his detractors.

Enjoy!

[qfnol31]

[quote]He finds no Latin Father in support of this theory and only four minute Eastern Fathers: Methodius, Ephrem, Aphrahat and Narsai. He may base some things on Saint Thomas Aquinas, but that does not mean that Aquinas agrees with the proposition that the Holy Ghost has feminine attributes.[/quote]

Well, according to Aquinas, if the feminine attributes are present to women by nature, they have to be somewhere in God.

ed. to show what i'm arguing against.

Edited December 1, 2004 by qfnol31

[the lumberjack]

[quote]the Holy Spirit is the spirit of the Church, which is the bride of Christ. And since the spirit is the form of the body and the body is feminine, that would make the Holy Spirit feminine[/quote]

way to JUMP to conclusions, eh?

[Guest Aluigi]

the Holy Spirit is not feminine.

Dr. Scott Hahn is correct.

He said on the television show on EWTN, First Comes Love, that the Holy Spirit is not female, but that in the inner life of the trinity His role is parallel to the role of the mother/wife in a family.

[point5]

thank you

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='the lumberjack' date='Dec 1 2004, 03:57 PM'] didn't you click on the link I posted?

that link is from a VERY catholic site...so you know that they're not just hating on ole scottie boy... [/quote]
I read most of the link. I haven't seen any significant direct quotes of Dr. Hahn.

Their complaint is that Dr. Hahn is arguing "the Holy Spirit being the "feminine dimension of God." I just don't see this term "feminine dimension of God" as equal to the heresy of assigning a female gender to God.

With no knowledge of the details, I can only conclude what I wrote above. He isn't trying to make the Holy Spirit into a female. He's simply reviewing historical documents.

The [i]ad hominem [/i](i.e. "the burden of proof is certainly on Hahn, but he has utterly failed to reach that benchmark.") rings hollow, because it seems to infer that Dr. Hahn is trying to prove a female goddess. He isn't.

I really think this isn't much more than a misunderstanding among theologians.

[cmotherofpirl]

New Oxford Review is heading off the deep end of the dock

[Brother Adam]

Thank you for those who have been clearing this up. That is correct that Hahn does not assign the female gender to the Holy Spirit. His writings in "first comes love" are well within the doctrinal teaching of the Church. As cmom said he makes an oath of fidelity to the Church every fall in the opening mass here at Franciscan.

Everyone has to have someone to bash I suppose. I also agree this was all based on emotional argument and not intellectual arguement.

[popestpiusx]

There are some circular arguments going on here. The statements must be weighed on thier own. What oath's are taken, or what schools he has gone to or who has invited him to speak or what, if any) problems New Oxford Review may or may not have, are all quite irrelevant. The statements themselves must be looked at and only then can any judgement be made. I have personally heard some of these statements. However, I don't have anything in print right now to make a case either way. When I heard the statements I knew next to nothing about theology. Did they bother me? Yes. But I need to go back and look at what he is saying, now that I can do so with a better theological foundation. So I am not judging in either direction at tis point.

[Guest Aluigi]

Jesus compared God to a mother hen... oh my.. blasphemy?

no.

God is masculine because that's how He revealed Himself, it is heresy to claim otherwise.
The family is parallel to God. There are paralells that can be drawn between the earthly family and the Inner Life of the Trinity. The Holy Spirit, in this figurative paralell, corresponds to the woman in a family.

[EcceNovaFacioOmni]

lumberjack,
CatholicIntl.com is not a "very Catholic" website. Sungenis is quite on the edge of dissent.

[Dave]

There was a link to Catholic Apologetics International earlier in this thread that had some anti-Scott Hahn material on it. Robert Sungenis, who heads that up, has become an ultratraditionalist and thus would be called "phishy" if he were to come here.

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='the lumberjack' date='Dec 1 2004, 04:33 PM'][quote]the Holy Spirit is the spirit of the Church, which is the bride of Christ. And since the spirit is the form of the body and the body is feminine, that would make the Holy Spirit feminine[/quote]
way to JUMP to conclusions, eh?[/quote]
I could only find this statement on someone's blog. Here's the google result:

[url="http://www.google.com/search?q=%22that+would+make+the+Holy+Spirit+feminine%22&hl=en&lr=&fiddler=0"]http://www.google.com/search?q=%22that+wou...en&lr=&fiddler=0[/url]

So again, it seems as if the quote is not directly taken from Dr. Hahn.

[Guest Eremite]

Here's what Dr. Hahn said in his book, "First Comes Love":

"By divine actions that are bridal and maternal, we may come to discern a divine
bridal-maternity in the Holy Spirit! It is in the relations of the human family that the life of the Trinity is reflected more truly and fully than anywhere else in the natural order. In other words, the analogy of bridal-motherhood is relational and familial, not physical or sexual (much less political)."

Note that he calls it an ANALOGY of "bridal-motherhood". God's creation reflects God; he does not reflect his creation. Hahn is saying that the human elemtn of "bridal-motherhood" reflects an element of the Holy Spirit (as opposed to the Holy Spirit reflecting that element). He expliclity states this analogy is "relational and familial, NOT physical or sexual (much less political." Hahn is pointing out the obvious, what the Saints have always understood.

ST.CATHERINE OF SIENA (DOCTOR):
"The Holy Spirit becomes for the people who abandons themselves to Providence a
mother who feeds them from the breast of divine charity" (Dialogues)

ST. MAXIMILIAN KOLBE (MARTYR):
"They share a single motherhood: the divine Maternity of love"

ST. EDITH STEIN (MARTYR, PHILOSOPHER):
"In this womanhood devoted to the service of love, is there really a divine image? Indeed, yes such love is properly the attribute of the Holy Spirit. Thus we can see the prototype of the feminine being in the Spirit of God poured over all creatures. It finds its perfect image in the purest Virgin who is the bride of God and mother of all mankind."

This is not to mention all the Patristic sources, particularly Syrian, that uphold Hahn's words.

[Brother Adam]

Thank you. I was going to post that later tonight.

[Oik]

I'm not a hanvert.

I heart Scott Hahn books!

[Socrates]

Until someone can give a direct source and quote of what Scott Hahn supposedly said, this "debate" is meaningless, no more than gossip.