How gender makes a difference

How does gender make a difference in Church leadership?

That was the question I was invited to address for the October issue of FutureFirst, a news digest for church leaders: 'providing facts for forward planning'. So how does gender make a difference?

 

 

Well, it does and it doesn't. I'm increasingly convinced that the 'men are from Mars' version of difference may have a few elements of truth - but that's all. Research suggests that women and men doing the same leadership task tend to do it in similar ways.

 

 

The differences are all about women's different experiences. For starters, it's still difficult for women to be seen as leaders in some contexts, even when the theology allows them to be. A double whammy, if you like.

 

 

The most obvious difference is that just being born female means you may not be able to be a Christian leader at all - depending on your theology or that of your church. So it's not surprising that there are fewer young women than young men in Christian leadership. So for young women, it can be a lonely place.

 

 

Then there are worrying patterns of deployment. Women are more likely to be leading rural or urban churches and less likely to be leading suburban ones. I wonder why...? OK, I do have a few ideas why that might be.

 

 

So it follows that they are less likely than men to be leading larger churches, especially evangelical ones. And also less likely to be in senior posts, though this is changing more quickly than the larger churches situation, where at my last count, there were only 4 women out of about 172 larger churches led by women.

 

 

I suppose one could also suggest that the experience of being a clergy husband is quite different from being a clergy wife. If you are anywhere near Durham on 24th Novemember, there is an event that evening on clergy spouses, led by Dr Sarah-Jane Page. See the Durham website for details: and you need to email in advance if you want to go. Sounds fascinating!

Transformations at Lambeth Palace

Well, Lambeth was not transformed on Monday!

But around 50 people attended a conference entitled Transformations: Theology and Experience of Women's Ministry.

It was a great day, with introductory addresses by Lucy Winkett, Sarah Coakley, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, time to reflect, group discussions, a keynote address by Bishop Mary Gray-Reeves (from California), and concluding comments by the Archbishop.

There were a number of highlights for me, including the address by Sarah Coakley (Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity at Cambridge). She reminded us that in the 1970s it was argued that the church would be transformed when women were ordained, because women were different.

Yes, the church has been transformed, by the 'cosmological disturbance' of women at the altar.

No, in the way expected - and I was glad to hear her knock essentialism on the head; there is still too much of it around.

She also highlighted some remaining problems, including the theological inconsistency of considering women in the episcopate separately from priesthood, as if the two can be separated, and what she called 'bureacratization', the busyness which women have to take part in to prove they can do the job as well as men. It was good to have this challenged, again from a theological perspective. Where, she asked, is prayer, presence and rest?

Groups explored a whole variety of subjects, drawing on thoughts from ordained women which had been submitted in advance. Patterns of appointment, scripture, different patterns of ministry available to women, the ordinal, liturgy and language, issues for clergy couples...

I could go on. Watch out for the production of some of the materials from the conference in due course.

Yes, it's been a while since the last blog. I'm leaving CPAS as of tomorrow, but this blog will continue...

Keeping the debate on the agenda

I've just come back from holiday to find the usual box-full of emails!

Nothing new there, but I was encouraged to find that among the boring ones were one telling me that Kate Coleman (pic above) is speaking at a LICC event in September, and one from a woman saying how helpful she'd found my book, amid the continuing confusion and controversy within the Anglican church.

First, LICC (the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity). On Monday 26th September, at 6.30pm Kate Coleman and others from her team, are leading an event: 7 Deadly Sins of Women in Leadership - an overview of the seven and an introduction to the first 'sin', 'Limiting Self-Perceptions'. You can find more about the event here.

Now to the email. The fact that all the dioceses which have voted regarding women as bishops have seen fit to vote in favour of moving ahead shows how much weight there is in support of women's leadership. But the debate continues in certain quarters of the church.

The idea that so-called subordination in the Trinity has a bearing on the leadership of women continues to be brought out as an argument against women's leadership - as if the relative positions or relationships of three persons of the godhead can say anything about the relations between men and women, or about women as leaders.

I do respect those who wish to be true to scripture, but I find it really hard to see how this obscure view of Trinitiarian doctrine can be thought clearer than all of Paul's practice and teaching.

So let's keep reading and thinking and talking: to overcome internal barriers such as 'limiting self-perception', and external barriers which continue to keep women safely in 'submission' on the sidelines rather than serving God in the spiritual battle!

In the image of God

In the Image of God is the title of a booklet recently published by the Sophia Network.

It's an 8-week course exploring what the Bible says about men and women, and is based on the course run by email last autumn. A booklet of 52 pages clearly can't go into a huge amount of detail, but I was impressed with the range and scope of the studies, and I hope it's widely read and used - see the Sophia site for details of how to buy a copy.

This resource was launched at the Sophia Network's excellent day conference last month, where Maggi Dawn, Howard Worsley and Lis Goddard spoke on different aspects of the debate about women. Lis had some extremely helpful and striking things to say about 'how to disagree agreeably', as well as providing some useful insights into the texts so often under discussion.

We need to keep discussing, and where we disagree, to do it agreeably!

At the conference I also found out more about the resources being produced by Restored, to help churches to understand more about domestic violence, and to help young people avoid getting into abusive relationships. I'm impressed that they are not just dealing with the results of violence but trying to stimulate wider thinking about relationships generally. It's also got an international dimension. Take a look!

Changing Minds

How do people change their minds? It's an interesting question. When people hold particular views, often for a long time, what prompts them to reconsider?

I've been thinking about this in the light of a recent book called How I Changed my Mind about Women in Leadership, where 27 people who have changed their minds explain why they've done so.

I guess I've always thought that those who argue that the Bible prevents women from holding certain leadership roles in the Church do so out of theological conviction. If others could put a sufficiently good theological argument, they'd change their minds. And that is what they say, too.

But I suspect it's a little more complex than that. While we think that our positions on all sorts of issues are well thought out and rational, we are complex beings, and experience has to play a part as well.

Non-theological reasons for the positions people hold include the 'fear' factor that keeps people from thinking outside the box, and male leaders who assert their views as if they are the word of God. It's not all about objective biblical interpretation.

When it comes to experience, the Bible shows that the Apostle Peter needed the experience of a dream to realise that the gospel was for Gentiles as well as for Jews. Moses needed to experience God's power before he was willing to carry out the task God had given him. We are whole people, with minds, bodies and emotions. In my experience (!), it has often been the experience of women leaders, or the realisation that the practical outworking of their position is so arbitrary, that has prompted people to reconsider their interpretation of Scripture.

You can read a review of How I Changed my Mind about Women in Leadership on the Sophia Network website.

Is there a connection?

Is there a connection between male authority and domestic violence?

I was reminded of this question in a recent email from CBE but it's long been in my mind. When I was researching for a booklet on a Christian response to domestic violence, one of the few publications on the subject was entitled Battered into Submission - which I suppose says it all.

It's a disturbing but important question. I'm sure that those who defend the idea today that God has established different 'roles' for men and women would not condone male violence against women, but it's a connection that has often been made.

Last year there was a conference in the USA aimed at addressing the problem of male violence in Christian homes. It took place on the 162nd anniversary of a conference held in same place, Seneca Falls, where a group of men and women met to demand equality as a way of protecting women and children from abuse in the home and society. So much for those who see 'feminism' and the need to solve the problem of domestic violence as modern issues!

The recent convention continued to draw a direct link between male authority and domestic violence. Women are told to be 'submissive', but for some men are never submissive enough - and this is held to justify their violence.

I'm still shocked just reading about this, despite having worked on the Women's Aid helpline and heard women screaming and crying into the telephone. That was bad enough, but the idea that God's demanding of different 'roles' for men and women can for some justify violence I find horrifying.

It was good to be reminded that back in the nineteenth century it was Christian women like Josephine Butler and Katherine Bushnell who were at the forefront of addressing social issues faced by women and children, and making people aware that it was the social devaluing of women led to male dominance and female submission - which in turn led to both prostitution and the abuse of women.

Bushnell, who was a scholar and missionary, wrote regarding abuse that 'the social evil would never be got rid of so long as the subordination of woman to man was taught within the body of Christians...'

Her book God's Word to Women, one hundred Bible studies on 'women's place in the divine economy', was published in 1921 - and the reprint (available online) is still worth reading!

We need such courageous people in our own day (women and men) who will make this connection, and help Christians once again to be at the forefront of countering social evils and ending the great 'battle of the sexes', to restore the harmony and partnership which we see in Eden.

Women in Mind

I have an almost constant sense of deja vu.

That is to say, I have been here before. The Church has been here before.

Whether it is the latest speaker who thinks women should stick to homemaking and having babies, men and women who think women are differently constituted and therefore can't or should not be leaders, or Christians who believe that arguments for women's leadership are new, when one can document them from the time of the early Church, and campaigning and debate started in the Anglican Church in 1930: we have been here before!

Because we have been here before, I become frustrated when it seems that the same arguments seem to go round and round, while all the while there is an increasing amount of scholarship - on both 'sides' of the biblical argument, it must be said, but most of the weight of argument, including a number of scholars who have changed their minds, on the side of those who believe that the biblical case for women leaders in the Church is very strong.

There is debate among younger Christians, influenced by certain US speakers.

There is debate among Anglican women wondering if God is calling them to ordination or to another form of authorised leadership.

There is debate for Anglicans on General Synod because there are decisions to be made about women in the episcopate (women bishops).

And there is debate in many parishes, certainly in every diocese, because those making the decision want to know what is the mind of the wider Church.

So because we are here again, a reminder about useful resources.

The biblical issues about women as leaders are addressed in the book Growing Women Leaders. This book also looks at women leaders in the Bible and through 2000 years of Church history. To buy a copy, click here.

And if you want a good discussion in your church about what the Bible says, why not download the Women in Mind resource: 3-session courses for groups who want to look at what the Bible says about women in ministry. These are FREE to download from the CPAS website: just click here.

I've been encouraged that nearly 1500 people have downloaded one or other of these courses over the past year. If you've used one of them, please let me know, as I would love to refine the courses further, and to encourage others. You can email me at rward@cpas.org.uk.