{"id":5018,"date":"2020-11-03T02:12:58","date_gmt":"2020-11-03T02:12:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/learn.elca.org\/jle\/?p=5018"},"modified":"2020-11-03T02:12:58","modified_gmt":"2020-11-03T02:12:58","slug":"women-preachers-an-apocalyptic-image-of-the-kingdom-of-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/learn.elca.org\/jle\/women-preachers-an-apocalyptic-image-of-the-kingdom-of-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Women Preachers: An Apocalyptic Image of the Kingdom of God"},"content":{"rendered":"

[1] Perhaps it is easy to imagine that providing a theological and scriptural rationale for women in ministry is no longer necessary.\u00a0 Perhaps it is easy to imagine that in 2020, fifty years after the Rev. Elizabeth Platz was ordained, the first female pastor in a Lutheran body in the United States and one year after the Rev. Elizabeth Eaton was overwhelmingly re-elected on the first ballot for a second term as Presiding Bishop of the ELCA, the resistance to women in ministry in\u00a0our\u00a0<\/em>church has disappeared.\u00a0 Or, at the very least, that it has gone underground.\u00a0 This would be easy to imagine, but it would not be true. \u201cWe deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.\u201d (1 John 1:8)<\/p>\n

[2] In the five years leading up to the fiftieth anniversary of women\u2019s ordination in the ELCA\u2019s predecessor bodies I interviewed eighty-five ELCA female pastors serving in congregations across the Southeast.\u00a0 It was an honor to receive their stories \u2013 stories of amazing grace and devastating heartbreak.\u00a0 By the end of that project I could see that there are concrete ways that we, as church, are called to respond to the stories of our female rostered leaders.[1]<\/a>\u00a0 One of these is that we be much more intentional regarding catechesis and hermeneutics.[2]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Lutheran Christians have tremendous theological gifts that the church and the world need us to share.\u00a0 We cannot share them if we allow ourselves to be sucked into the inertia of the communal, cultural status quo.\u00a0 In this article, I am not going to rehash the rationale in favor of women\u2019s ordination as this has been done extensively and quite well in other places.[3]<\/a>\u00a0I am, instead, going to suggest that by not faithfully teaching and living into our own theology, we enable \u2013 and perhaps even indirectly encourage – communities and individuals to continue living as less than that to which they are called. And, that we are \u2013 instead \u2013 called to be unapologetic and active witnesses for the fullness of the vision of ministry we have been given, for the sake of the world God so loves.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n

Eyes to See\u00a0<\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n

[3] Jonas is the twelve-year-old protagonist in Lois Lowry\u2019s dystopian novel,\u00a0The Giver.<\/em>[4]<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>\u00a0Jonas lives in a community that has learned to exercise rigorous control over all aspects of life \u2013 complete climate control, the suppression of hormones and emotions, immediate pain relief.\u00a0 It is a flat world with no unexpected ups and downs.\u00a0 It is also a world of gray.\u00a0 The citizens of Jonas\u2019 community have lost both the ability to see color and the memory of its existence.\u00a0 In what I think is the pivotal scene in the story, Jonas is having a conversation with a childhood friend.\u00a0 The friend is nonchalantly tossing an apple in the air and catching it.\u00a0 And something happens.\u00a0 Jonas sees something.\u00a0 He does not know what it is that he sees, he has no word for it, but the reader shortly learns that what Jonas saw is the color red.\u00a0 And once Jonas has seen red, he can never again not see it.\u00a0 His world is utterly transformed in that moment.<\/p>\n

[4]\u00a0The Giver\u00a0<\/em>is, in a real sense, an apocalyptic story.\u00a0 The apocalypse begins the moment the color red is revealed to Jonas.\u00a0 It was always there, but had been hidden and is now seen.\u00a0 Analogously, I think that the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0anniversary of women\u2019s ordination in the predecessor bodies of the ELCA is an apocalyptic opportunity for the church.\u00a0 It is not something new.\u00a0 It was not new fifty years ago.\u00a0 Women proclaiming the Gospel of Christ began on the first Easter.\u00a0 And women\u2019s ordination in the church has a long, complicated, and often ignored history.[5]<\/a>\u00a0 What we are celebrating is\u00a0not\u00a0<\/em>new.\u00a0 But it may be a new way of seeing. A way of seeing what was there all along, that having now been revealed can never again be unseen.\u00a0 Precisely because such apocalyptic moments are revelatory of the kingdom of God, this is good news.<\/p>\n

[5] Iris Murdoch makes the claim that we can only act in the world we can see.[6]<\/a>\u00a0On the one hand, this seems a bit obvious.\u00a0 On the other hand, this makes clear how important right vision really is.\u00a0 Think, for example, of the ways in which we view the late toddler stage of child development–the stage of differentiation and self-assertion.\u00a0 If we see (and describe) this as the \u201cterrible twos\u201d and if we \u201csee\u201d the child as someone whose will needs to be broken, we will act in certain, predictable ways towards the small children in our world.[7]<\/a>\u00a0 If, on the other hand, we \u201csee\u201d the same child as someone exploring the world, full of awe and wonder absorbing all that is around them, we will act in completely different, though equally predictable, ways towards the small children in our world.[8]<\/a>\u00a0How we see and describe the world is what gives shape to and makes sense of our behavior in the world.\u00a0 And though our own experiences with small children play some role in how we define the child\u2019s attitude, ours is largely a definition we receive \u2013 through the teachings \u2013 by and from those around us. \u00a0And thus this definition will shape our experiences far more than the other way around.<\/p>\n

[6] So, the words we say matter.\u00a0 The way we describe the world, in a very literal sense, creates that world. Our theology is the way the church describes and thus sees the world.\u00a0 Lutherans have done the serious and faith-filled theological work that has led us to see the world as one in which God calls both woman and men into public ministry.\u00a0 And, Lutherans have already decided that women in ministry\u00a0is\u00a0<\/em>a theological claim that rightly describes the world God so loves.\u00a0 We \u2013 as the ELCA \u2013 are of one mind regarding this claim.\u00a0 To be an ELCA Lutheran is to proclaim that calls to ministry come from God, through the church, and are in no way dependent upon gender.\u00a0 Period.[9]<\/a><\/p>\n

[7] As I was interviewing bishops (all were male at the time within the area of my research) for my work on the 50th<\/sup>\u00a0anniversary, several of them told me that they do, regularly in fact, have congregations refuse to interview female pastors.\u00a0 And most of the bishops acknowledged that, though they struggled with this, they have allowed congregations who so choose to elect\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0to interview women.\u00a0 In part, this allowance was made to avoid setting anyone, especially first call candidates, up for failure.\u00a0 As one bishop said, \u201cWhy would I subject anyone to what I know will be a confrontational relationship?\u201d But that our church continues \u2013 by practice\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>by polity \u2013 to allow congregations to refuse to even consider qualified candidates on the basis of gender and gender alone, \u201cbecause we just aren\u2019t ready\u201d is theologically misguided and morally bankrupt.[10]<\/a><\/p>\n

[8] We \u2013 the church in all of its expressions \u2013\u00a0 are not called to enable a congregation\u2019s limited view of the world, not to live into the limitedness of the view they already have, but to help them imagine and see the world the way it really is \u2013 one in which God calls men\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>women into service in God\u2019s church. Once we have had the eyes to see the color red, we cannot, in good conscious, pretend we still live in a monochromatic world of shades of gray, for the sake of those who choose not to see the color red.\u00a0\u00a0 Now that we have seen God\u2019s calling of women into the work of ministry in God\u2019s church, we can never again see a world in which we allow exclusion, even implicitly, on the basis of gender. As such we bear witness to God\u2019s calling of women into fulltime public ministry \u2013 as the\u00a0Evangelical<\/em>\u00a0Lutheran Church in America – to the entire world, including to our Lutheran brothers and sisters who have not yet accepted the ordination of women.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God is Not a Boy\u2019s Name<\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n

[9] A friend of mine, a female Presbyterian (USA) pastor recently gave me a small framed picture for my office that says \u201cGod is not a boy\u2019s name.\u201d\u00a0 This picture sits on the shelf directly behind my desk, inviting discussion with students and with colleagues, many of whom find it off-putting.\u00a0 But, Christian theology teaches \u2013 and has always taught \u2013 that God is beyond gender, neither male nor female.\u00a0 Moreover, studies show that the exclusive use of masculine imagery for God and for the divine stunts the theological development and limits the theological imagination of religious communities and individuals.<\/p>\n

[10] Studies suggest that the experience of women in ministry, in positions of authority within the church, have a significant formational influence on the implicit theology of congregants.[11]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Having female role models in positions of religious authority positively shapes an individual\u2019s sense of self (this is especially, but not exclusively, true for women) and seeing women engaged in active public ministry shapes the way we understand the character of \u2013 and thus relate to \u2013 God.\u00a0 In fact, having a single female religious authority \u2013 just one \u2013 changes a congregation\u2019s image of God.\u00a0 One.\u00a0 That is all it takes to help us see that God is beyond male and female.\u00a0 And seeing a God that is beyond male and female is critical for a cultural that has \u2013 both explicitly and, more importantly, implicitly \u2013 assigned particular characteristics to masculinity and femininity such that the masculine is associated with the authoritative, powerful, and dominating, whereas the feminine is associated with that which is nurturing, supportive, and submissive.\u00a0 Using exclusively masculine language and imagery for God given our cultural (truncated and toxic) notions of masculinity renders us an authoritarian, \u201cDon\u2019t make me come down there\u201d God. Female role models in positions of religious authority help us \u2013 and our congregations \u2013 develop a theological sense of a less authoritarian God, a God of and in community, a God of gentle compassion \u2013 a God who reflects back to us traits we have associated with both the masculine and the feminine. This more nuanced understanding of the nature of God then reflects back on humanity as those created in God\u2019s image and challenges these often toxic notions we have of gender\/sexuality allowing us to see that we are all, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, called to reflect the love and compassion we witness and experience in the triune God who is beyond gender.<\/p>\n

[11] This is particularly important when we think about long-range catechesis.\u00a0 Studies suggest that our image of God is more-or-less set in early childhood.\u00a0 Most adults today, despite 50 years now of women\u2019s ordination, had exclusively male religious authority figures well into adulthood.\u00a0 But, for today\u2019s children this is not the case.\u00a0 Several female pastors in my study \u2013 including Presiding Bishop Eaton \u2013 shared stories of having children in a congregation they had served express surprise when seeing a male pastor for the first time: \u201cI didn\u2019t know boys could be pastors!\u201d<\/p>\n

[12] While we are not in danger of throwing out male clergy and masculine images of God, these children\u2019s words show how quickly human minds create a normative view.\u00a0\u00a0 Thus, this means that holding up both men and women in congregational settings as equally gifted and called into the ministry will have a long-term impact not only on the health and vitality of the church as an institution but also on the spiritual well-being of the next generation of the body of Christ (which is my primary concern).\u00a0 Having masculine and feminine images of God helps us grow into a both\/and relationship with the God who is beyond any notions of gender we may have, and help us develop into our full selves in God\u2019s image as well.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Justice and Peace in All the Earth<\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n

[13] Another way of getting at this is to see that having women in ministry is great pastoral care.\u00a0 Both women and men benefit from having female as well as male pastoral care givers.\u00a0 But the reason it is good pastoral care is\u00a0not\u00a0<\/em>because it is an emotive good, it is\u00a0not\u00a0<\/em>because female pastors are more nurturing, but because it is a theological good.\u00a0 And good theology is the best form of pastoral care.\u00a0 Good theology helps us grow into our baptismal callings.\u00a0 Embracing \u2013 as opposed to accepting \u2013 an equal place for women in ministry is an integral part of us, as church, striving for justice and peace in all the earth.[12]<\/a><\/p>\n

[14] No one has a \u201cright\u201d to ordination.\u00a0 Ordination \u2013 whether to Word and Sacrament or Word and Service \u2013 is a calling from God, mediated by and through the church.\u00a0 It is a privilege and a responsibility; it is never a given.\u00a0 However, the reality is that the church has historically (and in many cases continues today) ruled out the very possibility that God might be calling a person into ordained ministry by virtue of socially-prescribed notions of worthiness (gender, race, sexual orientation).\u00a0 When this happens, whether as an imbedded institutional practice or as something we merely tolerate, suggesting, \u201cthat\u2019s just the way it is,\u201d we actively and intentionally perpetuate injustice.\u00a0 We are called – by God, through our baptisms \u2013 and we have affirmed, in our Affirmation of Baptism liturgy \u2013 that we are to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.<\/p>\n

[15] \u201cIn all the earth\u201d is an admittedly tall order.\u00a0 One very concrete way we can begin to strive for justice in all the earth is to insist on justice in our own congregations.\u00a0 This means being willing to set standards for call committees and congregational councils that honor both our Lutheran theology and our polity. \u00a0It means shaping a polity that reflects our theology, which requires more intentional theological education for all. \u00a0And, it means being willing to call out injustice, misogyny and bigotry every single time it occurs \u2013 not for the sake of laying blame but as a means of mutual accountability and an invitation to live into the grace-filled Gospel we proclaim.<\/p>\n

[16] One of my favorite moments from my interviews with female clergy was when one of the pastors was telling me a story about the men in her home congregation who had told her she could not possibly be called into full\u00a0time ministry interrupted her own story; she looked squarely at me and said, \u201cI. Call. Bullshit.\u201d[13]<\/a>\u00a0 In the moment I found this really funny, but upon later reflection I realized this was perhaps the most Lutheran of responses.\u00a0 Martin Luther said that we are called to be theologians of the cross and that theologians of the cross call a thing what it is.<\/p>\n

[17] Thanks be to God, we have, for nearly fifty years now, seen the gift that women in ministry offer to the church and to the world that God so loves.\u00a0 We cannot unsee this gift.\u00a0 The gift of these women in stoles and clerics bear witness to all of the world this bigger, more grace-filled image of the kingdom of God now.\u00a0 This is not only true within dominations like the ELCA that\u00a0work\u00a0to\u00a0honor women in ministry, but just as importantly for those that do not.\u00a0 Close to one quarter of the women I interviewed did not grow up in church bodies that ordained women.\u00a0 Each of these women shared the moment they described the moment they first saw a\u00a0women\u00a0in the pulpit as both an \u201ca-ha\u201d and serious cognitive dissonance.\u00a0 They recall the moment that the world became brighter and more colorful, because they now had a name, a conceptual framework, for this call they had been hearing but could not previously see. As we move beyond the fiftieth anniversary, towards the sixtieth, we are being called \u2013 invited \u2013 to live into the fullness of this vision, sharing it with those around us through faithful, thoughtful catechesis.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Notes:<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a>\u00a0Women are not a homogenous group and I cannot refer to the \u201cexperiences of women\u201d in a monolithic way.\u00a0 However, with eighty-five interviews, there is enough data to suggest some significant commonalities for\u00a0most\u00a0<\/em>women in public ministry. And, though my research included women of color \u2013 both black and Latina \u2013 as well as members of the LGBTQIA+ community, because these communities are so under-represented in the ELCA, I was unable to speak to the issue of intersectionality and maintain confidentiality at the same time.\u00a0 Anecdotally I can say that, unsurprisingly, women in ministry who are members of additional marginalized communities carry an even greater burden than do white women in ministry.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[2]<\/a>\u00a0The other two concrete steps the church\u2013 primarily via the Conference of Bishops \u2013 can take involve assuring equitable candidacy processes and a significantly more meaningful and robust candidacy process.\u00a0 The bishops of Region 9 (with significant work done by a group of female Assistants to the Bishop, Dr. Mary Streufert from the Office of the Presiding Bishop, and myself) have drafted and signed a Relational Agreement that addresses Candidacy, Call Process and Boundary Training that strives to create a permanent change in our ecclesial landscape in this regard.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[3]<\/a>\u00a0See, for example: Richard By. Hays,\u00a0New Testament Ethics: The Story Retold.\u00a0<\/em>J.J. Thiessen Lecture Series.\u00a0 (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2018, reprint); John R.\u00a0Summe, \u201cHistorical Document: Some Thoughts on the Ordination of Women and the Lutheran Confessions,\u201d (Journal of Lutheran Ethics, 12\/01\/2009); Karen\u00a0Bloomquist, \u201cOrdaining Women Goes to the Heart of the Gospel\u201d (Journal of Lutheran Ethics, 03\/01\/2016).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[4]<\/a>\u00a0Lowry, Lois.\u00a0\u00a0The Giver.\u00a0<\/em>(NY: Houghton Mifflin, 1993).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[5]<\/a>\u00a0Gary Macy,\u00a0The Hidden History of Women\u2019s Ordination: Female Clergy in the Medieval West.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>(NY: Oxford University Press, 2008) and Benjamin R. Knoll and Cammie Jo Bolin.\u00a0\u00a0She Preached the Word: Women\u2019s Ordination in Modern America.\u00a0<\/em>(NY: Oxford University Press, 2018).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[6]<\/a>\u00a0Iris Murdoch,\u00a0The Sovereignty of Good\u00a0<\/em>(NY: Rutledge and Kegan Paul, 1970).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[7]<\/a>\u00a0For example, recently \u2013 just within the past few years \u2013 there have been a number of reported cases of parents using a \u201cbiblical\u201d child-training book who have, in fact, beaten their children to death with plumbing supply tools \u2013 essentially with flexible\u00a0pvc\u00a0pipes. The book promises that most children can be \u201cbrought into complete and joyous subjection after just 3 days.\u201d\u00a0 The principles in the book are, according to the author, guidelines for physical discipline of children beginning as young at 6 months old and \u2013 in the author\u2019s\u00a0words\u00a0 \u2013\u00a0are based on principles the Amish use for training stubborn mules. All concerns about what constitutes appropriate training for animals \u2013 even the most stubborn of mules \u2013 aside, that children are presumed, from early infancy, to be, well, mule-headed and therefore in need of severe physical punishment in order to be \u201cbrought into complete and joyous subjection\u201d suggests that the assumption that children are, first and foremost, willfully sinful from the get-go is alive and well today. The book is\u00a0To Train Up a Child<\/em>, by Michael and Debbi\u00a0Perle.\u00a0 Self-published by No Greater Joy Ministries in 1994.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[8]<\/a>\u00a0For example, Maria Montessori taught that children possess absorbent minds and tender spirits and that the primary role of adults vis-\u00e0-vis children was to provide a rich environment for the child to flourish and to follow the child\u2019s natural (by which she meant God-given) interests and capacities.\u00a0 See, Marie Montessori,\u00a0The Absorbent Mind.\u00a0<\/em>(Radford, VA: Wilder Publications, 2007, reprint).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[9]<\/a>\u00a0Unlike our \u201cfour options\u201d stance regarding same sex relationships which states that the church is\u00a0not\u00a0<\/em>of one mind on this issue.\u00a0 See \u201cHuman Sexuality: Gift and Trust\u201d\u00a0https:\/\/www.elca.org\/Faith\/Faith-and-Society\/Social-Statements\/Human-Sexuality<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[10]<\/a>\u00a0The interesting mixture of congregational and episcopal polity that is the ELCA leaves the decision of whether or not to extend a call to any given rostered leader to the congregations.\u00a0 The church, represented by the synodical bishop\u2019s office, however has a responsibility to train congregational call committees and can, in fact, insist on equitable practices.\u00a0 The Region 9 Bishops\u2019 Relational Agreement, mentioned above in note 2, does precisely this.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[11]<\/a>\u00a0See Knoll and Bolin, She Preached the Word,\u00a0<\/em>chapter 7.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[12]<\/a>\u00a0See the promises made in the \u201cAffirmation of Baptism\u201d liturgy in the\u00a0Evangelical Lutheran Worship.\u00a0<\/em>(Minneapolis: Augsburg, 2006) 236.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[13]<\/a>\u00a0Mindy Makant,\u00a0Holy Mischief: In Honor and Celebration of Women in Ministry.\u00a0<\/em>(Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2019) 116.<\/p>\n

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