A Timely Word For Today
Not only does our confession of God as Father speak against the cold and unfeeling monotheism of Islam but it also addresses an alarming need in American society: the plight of fatherlessness.
David Blankenhorn, president of the Institute for American Values describes our situation this way,
"A generation ago, an American child could reasonably expect to grow up with his or her father. Today, an American child can reasonably expect not to. Fatherlessness has now approached rough parity with fatherhood as a defining feature of American childhood.
Tonight, more than one-third of American children will go to sleep in homes in which their fathers do not live. Before they reach the age of eighteen, more than half of our nation's children are likely to spend at least a significant portion of their childhood living apart from their fathers. Never before in this country have so many children been voluntarily abandoned by their fathers. Never before have so many children grown up without knowing what it means to have a father.
Fatherlessness is the most harmful demographic trend of this generation. It is the leading cause of declining child well-being in our society. It is also the engine driving our most urgent social problems, from crime to adolescent pregnancy to child sexual abuse to domestic violence against women."
So the Fatherhood of God is a desperately needed corrective both for children who've never known a human father, and for human fathers who need to know what it means to be a father. If God is a Father, then fatherhood is one of the fundamental realities of our existence. Especially as humans bear God's image we discard fatherhood to our peril.
