Paralabrax maculatofasciatus
DIVERSIDAD ESPACIAL
I had this theology that i f God is calling you to do something you answer it, and how would you know i f God is calling me or not? Only I know i f God is calling me or
n o t310 Lynn
In the 1980s controversy in which women’s role in the church became the
focal point, one of the most basic questions was whether Southern Baptists recognize
the validity of a woman’s call to ministry. Who decides? Opponents argued that
women who say they are called to be pastors are violating scriptural injunctions about
women in authority or they are simply misled. Proponents of women in pastoral roles
cited supportive scripture as well as the Baptist belief in soul competency.
Historically Southern Baptists profess belief in the value and importance of
personal experience. E. Y. Mullins, early president of The Southern Baptist
Theological Seminary (1899-1928), claimed that soul competency is “the distinctive
Baptist belief.” The idea of soul competency suggests that individual human freedom
flows from the nature of God; therefore, the right of individual choice is sacred. The
insistence on “soul freedom” or “soul competency” in the Baptist tradition rests on
the conviction that the individual responds to God “personally, directly and
voluntarily.”311 This belief affirms the “centrality of the individual over the
institutional, the personal over the sacramental and the preeminence of direct access
over indirect access to God.”312
310 Lynn, interview with author, October 22, 2008.
311 Walter Shurden, The Baptist Identity: Four Fragile Freedoms, 25. 312 Ibid.
This primary tenet of Protestant/Baptist faith is contradicted, however, by the
underlying gender assumptions about soul competency,313 that women are free to
follow their calling unless the calling leads them into positions where they might
exercise authority over men. It is also contradicted by the practice of a hierarchical,
familial model of church in which men have the power and authority. Thus it is the
male prerogative to decide whether a woman is called to the ministry. In a 1987
interview with Bill Moyers, W. A. Criswell, influential pastor of First Baptist Church,
Dallas, Texas from 1944-1995, concluded that even though a woman may be
convinced she is called by God to be a pastor, “She is mistaken. God never called her.
Her own personal ambition, or longing for recognition, or a thousand other things led
her into that persuasion.”314
True to their belief in personal experience, Southern Baptist congregations
taught the women in my study to seek a “personal relationship with Jesus Christ,” and
they were guided toward conversion, baptism and church membership. Furthermore,
they were taught that if God called them into some kind of special service or vocation
they should listen and obey. “Do whatever God calls you to do” was the message the
church instilled within them. It was only when they revealed a call to be pastors,
requiring ordination, that the validity of their personal experience was challenged.
313 Eileen Campbell-Reed, “Anatomy of a Schism: How Clergywomen’s Narratives Interpret the Fracturing of the Southern Baptist Convention,” 71. Reed argues the concept of soul competency masked the racial and gendered convictions about humanity held by Southern Baptists; and the eight women ministers in her study simply ignored those gendered expectations since they were not openly acknowledged.
314 Bill Moyers, “God and Politics: The Battle for the Bible,” Show 102, December 16,1987 (New York: Public Affairs Television, Inc), in Frederick W. Schmidt, Jr., A Still Small Voice: Women, Ordination and the Church (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1996), 10-11.
Describing the fickleness of Baptist churches, one woman minister wrote: “For years
our mother has birthed us into faith, nurtured and suckled us at her breast, and then
become our very destroyer by refusing us full entrance into her life and ministry.”315
Although Baptist churches are autonomous and associate on a voluntary
basis, during the 1950s through the 1970s Southern Baptist churches were highly
organized through a national standardization of literature and missions. By the 1970s
the Sunday School Board in Nashville, Tennessee, provided an exhaustive array of
materials for purchase by local churches. Persons on vacation could visit another
Southern Baptist church and find the same Sunday school lesson being taught, the
same emphasis in missions or education. Goals for the churches were announced at
annual conventions and implemented by local pastors and church leaders.
In each local church there was also a Women’s Missionary Union (WMU)
that operated under the direction of the national headquarters in Birmingham,
Alabama. The WMU organized mission groups for the children, separating the girls
and boys when they were in middle school. Their main emphasis throughout was to
become a Christian and to know that being a Christian involves service to other
people in the name of Christ.
As Nancy Ammerman describes the organization, Girl’s Auxiliary group
leaders emphasized the memorization of scripture and daily prayer for missionaries.
Girls learned to name and locate every country in which Southern Baptists had
missionaries, as well as the locations and executives of all the denomination’s Boards.
As teenagers they participated in service projects and wrote essays on theological
315 Susan Lockwood Wright, “Inclusive Theology: The Hope of Women in the Church,” FOLIO 5, no. 3 (Winter 1987): 1-2.
topics. The girls progressed through “steps” and were recognized with church
“coronation” ceremonies, complete with long white dresses and crowns. The highest
step was to become a Queen Regent in service.316 Southern Baptist girls were “shaped
by the women’s organization that instilled piety, a desire to serve and denominational
loyalty - and they kept listening for God’s call.”317
Most of the women in this study grew up in this Southern Baptist milieu and
though each has grown theologically, all express appreciation for the churches of
their childhood. Especially for the older women who were ordained in the late 1970s
and 1980s, the church and the Woman’s Missionary Union, provided the formation
that propelled them into professional ministry or “full-time Christian service.”
Therefore, there is a disparity between the church’s theology of personal experience
and call and the Southern Baptist prohibition of women pastors.
Narratives of Call
The women in this study experienced a call to ministry in local churches
whose Baptist/evangelical theology encouraged their call. The challenges, both
internal and external, came when they identified their call to be pastors. The implicit
assumption was that the calling would not include a pastoral role that involved
ordination or becoming a deacon. When these women followed the logical
conclusions of their spiritual formation, they were in uncharted territory. Most did
not have women pastors as role models, neither did they hear in those churches
Nancy Tatom Ammermon, Baptist Battles: Social Change and Religious
Conflict in the Southern Baptist Convention (New Brunswick: Rutgers University
Press, 1990). 91. 317 Ibid.
feminist biblical interpretation that would have suggested they might rightfully claim
a calling for ministry. They faced general resistance, even when it was not specific to
them, from local and national associations.
The assurance of calling from God to be ministers and pastors is the most
important asset to women who are challenged on a daily basis. When asked how they
deal with challenges to their positions, all responded with their stories of certainty of
calling. In other words, it is essential to them that people understand that there is
something spiritual and holy at work in their lives that propels them into situations
where their identities are challenged and where it is difficult to find positions to be
pastors. When asked if they had considered joining other denominations more
receptive to women pastors, all responded that while they might have considered it
briefly, they are remain loyal to the churches that nurtured them and taught them to
trust their relationship with God. All remain Baptists, though not Southern Baptists.
Anne (ordained in 1977), Erin, Robin and Susan (each ordained in 1981),
experienced a vital church and strong women leaders. In discussing her call Anne said
that her calling was not originally to the pastorate, but it is a “calling into a
relationship with God to be lived out in the roles that the Christian church allows me
to serve. So for me, it’s all about relationship. And, I was nurtured in a Southern
Baptist church, I was brought to faith in a SBC church in rural South Carolina and the
church was extremely mission minded.”318 Anne describes being a “Sunbeam,” the
name of the mission group for young children and as a teenager in 1969 making a
public commitment during a worship service to “full time Christian service.” From a
very young age she claimed a relationship with God and willingness to serve
wherever the calling might lead her. At that time she, like many other women, did not
envision the role of pastor for herself.319
Erin grew up in a small town, nurtured in a church that taught, “God has a
plan for your life.” Erin explained, “You know you are supposed to be committed to
God’s will - 1 bought that - 1 believe it, I still believe it. You know, I surely do
understand it differently now than I did all those years ago, but I believed it. So I
have certainly had to wrestle with the Bible, yes, but I believed those things and I
moved along through Sunday school stories as a child and youth camp and all those
campfire sing-a-longs, and all those things.”320
In college Erin became involved in the Baptist Student Union, the
organization for college students, and in the fellowship and social ministry of the
I
group she found her calling as a campus minister. Yet when she requested
ordination, her home church refused. Faced with the decision of whether to reject
what she had been taught, she decided to claim her experience in church as valid in
her life. She found in the experiences in her home church to be credible and
meaningful. Even though the church could not bless her, she said, “I bless you for
having given me all that. And so I have to say that because I derived my calling from
that in part, and in part from just that experience of having been taught to listen for
320 Erin, interview with author, February 20, 2009.
321 During the 1960s the BSU provided a place for college students to air their doubts and work out a faith that made sense of the intellectual and social world in which they lived. “BSU students in the 1960s challenged all the assumptions under which they had been raised, and materials and leadership from Nashville offered resources for their journeys.” Nancy Tatum Ammerman, Baptist Battles, 66.
the presence of God, attune myself to God’s story in the world, all those things the
church tries to teach us.” 322
In Susan’s experience, and in Robin’s, strong women leaders played a major
role in their self-understanding and encouraged them to trust their sense of calling.
Susan was one of four children, the daughter of a Baptist minister who was pastor of
a large church for over twenty years. A year old when her father began that ministry,
Susan’s enculturation was totally Baptist. Her mother taught a Sunday school class of
over one hundred women and was a leader in the national WMU. It was “normal” for
her to see women in positions o f leadership.323
Robin’s father was also a pastor, and she describes her calling as being
“birthed in the womb” of the church that had strong women leaders. She said, “In the
sanctuary, on the main floor, it was men who were preaching and leading, but just
below was the subversive work of the women. And in the fellowship hall I
experienced as a young girl, women were preaching, teaching and leading.”324 Her
calling came in this “subterranean” level of life in the church, and from the “feeling
that when you are baptized, everybody then becomes a follower with a mandate to
spread the good news. And I believed that! No one ever preached in my church
against women being preachers, because no one ever imagined someone would.”325
But women were doing much of what preachers did, short of giving the sermon in a
Sunday service, though this work was called a devotional or testimonial, and had a
huge impact. As she described it: “I think that out of that experience in that Southern
322Erin, interview with author, February 20, 2009. 323Susan, interview with author, December 10,2008. 324Robin, interview with author, May 12, 2009.
Baptist world, I certainly had a real clear sense that God had a hand on my life and
was leading me and all I needed to do was follow that guidance, and I was real clear
about that.”326
The women ordained later, as recently as 2006, also experienced their call
within Baptist churches, but Southern Baptist churches were changing during their
childhood and had changed a great deal by the time they were in college and
seminary. The youngest women did not experience Baptist life before the
conservative/moderate controversy and before the role of women was a defining issue
for congregations. By the time they were in college and seminary new Baptist
associations like the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and the Alliance of Baptists
offered alternatives to the SBC in terms of mission support, programs and resources.
Local congregations also began to use non-denominational curriculum. The WMU
remained independent and supplied mission training and materials for both the SBC
and the newer organizations of Baptists, limiting their focus to mission education and
T77
support of missionaries.
Despite the changes in Baptist life, young women enjoyed being at church and
continued to hear the message of following God’s call in their lives. Jane, ordained in
1990, described the church as a “safe place” for her because her parents were having
1*10
marital problems. She could count on the women and men in the congregation to
love and support her. She loved church and has always felt at home there. Diane
(ordained in 2004) grew up in the church and partly because her parents divorced
™ m d.
^77 •
Elizabeth H. Flowers, Into the Pulpit: Southern Baptist Women and Power
Since World War II, 46-47.
when she was eleven, the church was her “family.”329 Rachel (ordained in 1995)
sensed a call to ministry when she was in the sixth grade, and she was faithful to that
call throughout high school and college, planning to attend The Southern Baptist
Theological Seminary in Louisville. As she made her plans to go to Louisville,
however, Southern was becoming a hostile place for women. After pursuing another
career for a couple of years, Rachel went to the Candler School of Theology
(Methodist) in Atlanta.330
Five of the women in my study did not become Southern Baptists until their
teenage years. In Terry’s life the Roman Catholic Church was a “wonderful place.”331
She memorized the Mass as a child and would come home, put her pink blanket
around her shoulders as vestments and recite (at age five) the Mass as if a priest.
When her family moved and her parents stopped going to worship, she began
attending a Southern Baptist church where she was baptized as a teenager - without
her parents’ knowledge. Twenty years later she experienced her call to ministry as a
second career in a Baptist church - a very conservative congregation that nevertheless
recognized and affirmed her gifts for ministry.
Jessica did not attend church regularly as a child, though she did attend the
Baptist Vacation Bible School. She did not join the church until as a teenager she
began to attend student-led Bible studies and then became a Christian during a
worship service. Sharon grew up in a Catholic home, though her father was Baptist.
She joined a Baptist church when she was a freshman in college. Connie, whose
329 Diane, interview with author, January 9,2009. 330 Rachel, interview with author, January 30, 2009. 331 Terry, interview with author, February 10,2009.
father was in the military, always attended a Baptist church with her mother, though it
was not always a Southern Baptist congregation. In college, she was part of a
Southern Baptist church youth group, and it was there that she made a commitment to
ministry. Lynn grew up in a conservative church, but did not become Southern
Baptist until in college at Baylor University.
In summary, these churches nurtured their children and youth, taught them
Christian values and formed them into individuals committed to service. Comfortable
in southern culture with defined roles for men and women, church members did not
deal with the inherent contradictions of their expectations for women until the logical
outcomes of their training were evidenced in the movement to pastoral ministry. And,
women who were rejected sometimes by their own churches and officially by the
larger denomination remained appreciative of the Southern Baptists who nurtured
them.
It is difficult for those not reared in the Southern Baptist tradition to fully
understand that loyalty and sense of identity. Susan M. Shaw, bom in Georgia in
1960, describes her upbringing in a Southern Baptist church as being “bom not so
much into a church or a denomination as into an identity.”332 She was “raised
right,”333 learning the cultural and religious behaviors befitting a southern girl. Those
who lived in the south where Baptists reigned share a “cultural ethnicity” that
outsiders will never fully share.334
332 Susan M. Shaw, God Speaks to Us, Too: Southern Baptist Women on
Church, Home and Society, 8.
333 Ibid., 25.
334 Barry Hankins, Uneasy in Babylon: Southern Baptist Conservatives and
Called to Be Pastors
Anne’s story illustrates the development o f her calling as well as the dilemma
o f local churches that believed in the validity of individual spiritual experience, and
yet did not know what to do with women pastors. Anne grew up thinking that she
had a very special relationship with God. When she was a senior in high school she
made a public commitment to “full time Christian service,” thinking the only option
for her was to be a missionary, probably to Africa. Had she been a man, at that point
she would have been shepherded through the licensing procedure in order to begin the
journey to ordination, but that did not happen for her. She went to a Baptist college
and on to Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest when she
graduated in 1978 with a Masters of Divinity degree that included courses in with
Greek and Hebrew. She began part-time work as a minister of youth and children in a
small church. When the pastor became very ill, the church invited Anne to “speak”
on Sundays in his absence. This turned out to be her chance to prove her ability as a
preacher.
Changes in the worship bulletin documented her progression from youth and
children’s minister to pastor in the minds of the congregation. The first Sunday the
printed order of worship read, “Speaker, Anne Cross.” The second week was the
same. The third and fourth week’s bulletin read “Morning Message, Anne Cross.
But on the fifth and sixth weeks the words in the bulletin were “Sermon, Anne
Cross.”
After her sixth week, the congregation wanted to ordain her. On her last
returned to the building to make sure all the lights were turned off and doors were