If you have to have a penis to be a man, than God the Father can't be male

A few days ago my spouse posted this screenshot on the Where True Love Is Facebook page. It generated a lot of discussion, including comments by a guy who had this to say:

"Well... he’s also known as GOD THE FATHER... even the Lord’s Prayer starts with Our Father... And Jesus was God manifested in flesh... As a man... and he told his disciples when they asked to see the father... Jesus replied when you see me you see the Father."

The timing was great for a conversation, because I'd been prepping a series on gender for a large United Methodist Church in St. Louis. I responded with a list of scriptures in which God self-describes as intensely female.

Then came this:

"Remember... literal and analogy..."

Apparently this dude thinks Jesus was saying God is literally male, but that God describing themself as the birth mother which created everything is mere analogy.

Conservative/fundamentalist folks conflate gender and sex, demanding that the two can't be separated. They also demand that the only way to define gender/sex is by looking at chromosomes and external sex characteristics. In other words, males have XY chromosomes and penises, females have XX chromosomes and vaginas. They claim that the only way you can be a man is for those things to be in place.

They simultaneously demand that God is male.

And they don't see the flaw in that demand.

When I asked how the Creator's being literally male manifests chromosomally or in terms of genitalia, the guy ghosted. But the conversation got me thinking.

If the measure of maleness is solely based on chromosomes and penises (as they claim), than "God the Father" cannot be male. By their own definition, God must be something other.

I wonder how many centuries it will take before we as a species are able to move fully away from the need for sex-based dominance which this kind of thinking supports.

How long, Lord? How long?