I remember sitting in one of my religion classes during college and realizing for the first time that I was following my calling into one of the only fields left in the US in which my gender was an issue. I mean a real, line in the sand, you’re not welcome here issue.
In college, I double-majored in Communication and Religion, and it was interesting to bounce back-and-forth between worlds. My Comm classes we full of brilliant young women who have since become leaders in their field. My religion classes harbored select individuals who still held resentment toward women in leadership.
Campbell University is ambiguously Baptist, welcoming people from the far-right and somewhat left. Of course, it was not the faculty or religious authority which stood against women; they were very supportive. Rather, it was some of my fellow students who took issue. It was my classmates from whom I received the side-long glances and patronizing comments.
Having found my way to the Methodist church I enjoy a lot more support as a woman in ministry. In fact, I will go before the Board of Ordained Ministry in March to seek approval for commissioning as a provisional Elder.
But I have become keenly aware of the way sexism still presents challenges for me. I routinely attend inter-denominational meetings in which I am the only woman in the room. I have had lay-people tell me “you’d look prettier if you smiled more.” I have felt the wrath of men who were threatened by me (I even checked with another clergywoman I trusted who reassured me that I wasn’t alone in feeling this way).
Somedays, it feels like death by a thousand cuts, but, on the bright side, I’ve become pretty good at reading between the lines of sexism dressed-up as spirituality.
The wonderful preacher Beth Moore has been attacked by the leadership of her own denomination numerous times for serving Jesus, and some men have responded with blatant, and probably jealous, put-downs.
But the comment that still hangs in my mind is one from Pastor JD Greere, pastor of Summit Chruch in Atlanta and now Presendiet of the Southen Baptist Convention. You see, Greear actually graduated from Campbell University, and many of my dear friends and classmates were passionate members of his congregation. These were the same classmates with those side-long glances and patronizing comments.
So when people like Greear attempt to offer kindly tweets saying things like “Dear @BethMooreLPM, you’re welcome in our home any time,” it’s quite easy for me to pick up on the fact he did not say “pulpit.”
There is a difference in accepting women in ministry and not accepting women in ministry. But, as someone working in the trenches, there’s an even bigger difference between accepting women in ministry and celebrating women in ministry.
Women in church leadership really do make the church better, and we should listen to them, celebrate them, not just accept them.
I have learned that the only person who gets to choose who serves Jesus is Jesus. The Holy Spirit is like an unpredictable wind, and when God calls someone our only question should be “do they have fruit?”
It is my hope that someday every who is called into ministry would be accepted and celebrated. Of course, people don’t go into the ministry to be celebrated, at least they shouldn’t. But ministry is challenging, and if our clergy are producing good fruit, then we should all be celebrating God’s glorious harvest.
Kena Hawkins Newkirk 