Why is it more fitting to call God the first Person of the Trinity as ‘Father’ and the second Person as ‘Son,’ rather than as mother and daughter?
“It is more consistent to call the supreme Spirit Father than mother, for this reason, that the first and principal cause of offspring is always in the father. For, if the maternal cause is ever in some waypreceded by the paternal, it is exceedingly inconsistent that the name mother should be attached to that parent with which, for the generation of offspring, no other cause is associated and which no other precedes. It is, therefore, most true that the supreme Spirit is Father of His offspring. But, if the son is always more like the father than is the daughter, while nothing is more like the supreme Father than His offspring; then it is most true that this offspring is not a daughter but a Son” (Anselm of Canterbury, Monologium).
