text: That Jesus was a male human being (THAT at least we have "little choice but to accept"), and that in his ministry he presented himself as a leader or teacher around whom a group of disciples were gathered, might or might not be an example of patriarchy, I don't know. Could a woman, presenting the same "authority" as Jesus did, have gathered around herself a group of disciples, given the sexist discrimination of that culture? I don't know; many argue no woman could do that.
  
  But it certainly does look like patriarchy that the Christian idea of God as a male being has been locked in and established as the only correct way of understanding God. Were the Church Fathers (N.B.!) themselves better and more honest and clear-sighted theologians, and were they able to transcend their reliance on imagery based on human manners and relationships, reflecting the sexist discrimination of the ancient world, that masculinist hardening would not have happened.