Sunday, November 11, 2007

A Sunday Observation

One of today's lessons was on women in the church. We discussed the different roles for women and men. I was thinking about the language we use to describe our roles. In particular, I was thinking about the differences between the usage of the term "to father" and "to mother". The former implies imparting a genetic inheritance whereas the latter conveys hope for nuture and watchful care.

Does this illustrate the differences in our expectations for parents?

I hope not.

2 comments:

Oliver said...

I hopes of furthering the conversation, how about throwing "to parent" into the mix. For me, to parent refers to discipline and temporal needs.

Jared said...

Oliver, I agree with your definition but I am not sure how it relates to this post. I guess I hope that parents parent. But if parents parent, what do we mean when we say that mothers mother and fathers father? And why does it mean such different things?