Exploratory Essay On Father Son

Biblically speaking, is “Father-Son” language strictly metaphorical, as Carr suggests? Or do these terms convey something essential about God? If the latter, can one speak equally of God as “Friend”?
For me personally I do not feel that it is metaphorical. There are other words that God could have chosen that would allow for the same message to be conveyed in scriptures without the gender assignments. Nowhere in the entire Bible does it refer to God by anything other than a male. I take the use of the term as Him being the creator (and thus spiritual father) of all things, much the same as He is Jesus father because he begot him. The term "friend" does not equally confer the authority God has over all of us as our creator/father.

Carr identifies patterns of “low self-esteem, passivity, and irresponsibility” as quintessential expressions of
I spent much of my life being told that I wasn't good enough and eventually bought into that lie. The gender of God had no impact on this, the cause of my self-esteem issues was of earthly nature caused primarily by bullying. I feel the same could be said of most of these patterns. I do not personally feel that God being more or less feminine would have an impact. I would be curious to see if there were higher instances of these patterns in a religion such as Hinduism that do have goddesses as well as gods. Personally I do not feel it would have an impact. As for patriarchy in the church, it has been much the same in the church as it has been in the culture for much of history. I do feel that it is accurate to attribute this to human sin, if you look at cultures devoid of Christian religion in most cases the male is still the primary holder of power. This was not something that originated in the church, it is something that has been engrained within human