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by rsynnott 1175 days ago
Most Christian denominations, and mainstream Islam, don't ascribe Him a gender. Catholicism is particularly explicit about this; see CCC 239: https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P17.HTM (the argument is substantially the same for most denominations). Things are a bit more complex in Judaism AIUI. Mormonism is the major exception, and considers God to be explicitly male.

Now, that's the theology, of course; if you were to poll a few thousand Catholics or Anglicans or Muslims on whether God had a gender and what it is, they'd probably say yes He does and that He's a he. Though even then it'd get messy if you poll in more detail; virtually no followers of Abrahamic religion would think of God as having _physical_ male attributes, say.

EDIT: I see you were downvoted for that. Wasn't me; it's a fair question IMO, and something that people are often unaware of.
2 comments
microtherion 1175 days ago
Very interesting link to the Catechism. I had no idea that this was the official Catholic position.

As for the male attributes, my guess would be that the majority of Christians would assume that God, being male, was equipped with an appropriately sized shlong, but did not avail Himself of it for any purpose.

To support that view, I submit that in Christian art, He generally is depicted with a sizable beard, and without functioning testicles, that beard would have to have been immaculately grown.

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rsynnott 1175 days ago
I'm not sure about that; do many Christians actually personify God? You're not really meant to.

(Back vaguely to the topic, that's a big difference for Ishtar; she would have been thought about far more in terms of being a _person_ than the Abrahamic God).

The art thing is a bit of an oddity, arguably; Christians didn't really depict God in art at all much until the Renaissance, and many Protestants in particular objected, and sometimes still object, to it. The art has no theological significance in any case (it's obviously not canonical) but yeah, it may have reinforced the idea of God as a _person_ in peoples' minds.

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knodi123 1175 days ago
catechism excerpt for people who are having trouble scanning for the relevant part-

> We ought therefore to recall that God transcends the human distinction between the sexes. He is neither man nor woman: he is God.

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