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What does God look like? Study reaches remarkable conclusion

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Does God have a face like us?

What does God look like? A study from UNC Chapel Hill asked 511 Americans what they think God looks like. The answer may surprise you. 

What does God look like? A study offers one opinion.

What does God look like? A study offers one opinion.

Highlights

By Marshall Connolly (Catholic Online)
Catholic Online (https://www.catholic.org)
6/13/2018 (6 years ago)

Published in Living Faith

Keywords: God, face, look catechism

LOS ANGELES, CA (California Network) - What does God look like? A study from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill reveals what Americans think. 

Most of us are accustomed to seeing God int he form of an ancient figure with a long flowing, white beard. But that's not what the participants in the study imagined. The study gave participants many pairs of faces to look at and asked them to choose which face looked more like God in each pair. 

From these choices, composite faces were created that looked like a police mugshot. Researchers were surprised by the final images. According to the composites, God was a young man. 

There were differences between different groups of people. People tended to see God as matching their race. And liberals often saw God as having more feminine features and has appearing to be more loving. Whereas conservatives tended to see a more masculine God that appeared powerful. 

The exercise is interesting, but ultimately God has no face. Some Christians believe God has a body and a face, but the Catechism teaches that God is a spirit and has no flesh and bone. 

The result: liberal participants preferred the face on the left and conservatives the one on the right. According to the Catechism, both are wrong.

The result: liberal participants preferred the face on the left and conservatives the one on the right. According to the Catechism, both are wrong.


While we are created in the image of God, that does not mean God has a physical appearance like us. 

Instead, if we want to see the face of God it would be better for us to look upon our neighbors and world with love. When seen through such eyes, every face is the face of God. 

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