Concerning pronouns. The Xxxxxx Xxxxxxxx edition of Vatican II documents uses ‘inclusive language.’ The English translations of other Vatican documents and of Xxxx Xxxx XX’s Theology of the Body use masculine pronouns as the default when referring to the human person. While this thesis aims to redirect attention towards the female, specifically maternal, body, I have not followed a practice of substituting feminine for masculine pronouns. The primary reason for not doing so has been to avoid ambiguity of reference and confusion in meaning. To use she when meaning he and she would cloud meaning in a thesis that often makes reference to the female alone. Where no such misunderstanding is likely, I have, on occasion, used the feminine generically of the human. More often, I have used s/he when referring to both women and men. I have retained the use of mankind although more often using human or humankind. Usage of the one or the other may be governed by how the rhythm of the sentence reads. As far as possible, I have tried to avoid using personal pronouns of God. Where this is not possible, I have retained the classical usage of masculine pronouns and differentiated talk of the divine persons as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. As much is said concerning creation, God the Father is quite often referred to as Creator. The intention is to maintain continuity with the orthodox tradition. The principle underlying this is that metaphors shape meaning. Substitutions for the familial terms, such as Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer, focus on the divine roles but lose the internal relationality of the Persons. It also risks, as noted by Xxxxx Xxxxxx Xxxxxxx, ‘collpase into trithesim.’1 Female substitutions for male terms would alter what is being claimed of God and run into difficulties with the manhood of Xxxxxx if one aims to retain a coherent account between the earthly crucified- resurrected sexed male body of Xxxxx and that same body, now ascended. 1 Xxxxx Xxxxxx Xxxxxxx, "Trinity and Feminism," in The Cambridge Companion to Feminist Theology, ed. Xxxxx Xxxxx Xxxxxxx (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 142.
