There Goes the Neighborhood

The other day my husband ran into acquaintances of his at a Congregational Event. They live not far from our neighborhood and attend a church that we are well acquainted with. In passing, they mentioned that they like his congregation, and if it were a little closer, they might consider going there. Then they mentioned that they are currently looking around for a new church.

It surprised me to hear this; they've been pretty involved throughout the years. They've been without a pastor and in interim lately as well.

Then it occurred to me.

I remembered that their congregation just called a new senior pastor: a woman.

I read the church newsletter relating the credentials of their new pastor, and was very impressed. She is definitely what you might call "Above Average."

Now I don't know for sure that this is the reason this family is "church-shopping." But it seemed like odd timing to me. It also got me thinking about the gifts that women clergy bring to congregations and the pitfalls and the prejudices they face.

One prejudice: a clergy (male) friend said to me once: "Most churches still want a man."

I think there is a stereotype of a "successful", growing congregation, and part of the stereotype is that this kind of congregation will have a particular kind of leader at the helm. That leader will be strong, visionary, attractive and male. I suspect that there are a few people out there who think that having a woman as lead pastor would be a sure sign of decline. "There goes the neighborhood." "They're moving in and taking over." "We'll never be the same."

It reminds me of what someone said after I arrived at my first congregation: they realized that the pastor before me was probably their "last normal pastor" (married man with children).

We've been really looking at, and talking about, and working on the racism in our churches and in our communities. But I don't want us to think that sexism is gone, conquered, all fixed. It's not.

There goes the neighborhood.

Regarding Whether We Have "Done our Homework"

There has been a lot of hand-wringing in the ELCA these last few months regarding the decisions about gay and lesbian clergy that we made last summer. Was this a top-down decision orchestrated by a few elites? Or was there actually too much lay involvement? Are certain Lutheran Theologies which focus on radical grace suspect (on one site, Gerhard Forde was mentioned, although he would certainly have been against these changes). Or perhaps, this was a slippery slope made inevitable by the fact that we did not really "do our homework" before ordaining women back in the early 1970s.


So. Some people are pretty sure that the decisions made to ordain women really were decisions based on theological and biblical studies. Others suspect that cultural and political feminism played a part. Well. It's true, political and cultural forces like feminism probably did influence the decision to have the discussion in the first place. Cultural forces, like it or not, do affect our faith. It also happens the other way around. Faith influences culture as well. We don't exist in a vacuum.


I happen to think that we did do our homework before ordaining women. I talked to professors at my seminary who read the scriptures and actually changed their minds about women clergy.


But here's the thing we don't like to admit: people often don't change their minds because of political forces, and they don't change their minds because we "did our homework" and now have the right theological justification for our position. They change their minds for Another Reason, and we can't stop it from happening.


I heard Garrison Keillor on the radio from Lake Wobegon recently. He was telling a story about a small mythical town somewhere in the Middle of Minnesota where they would not have woman pastor; they had never had a woman pastor, and they knew it was Wrong.


Until, somehow, it happened. And, he said (something like this) "they knew it was against the Word of God, but... the hell with it. She baptized their babies, and she visited them in the hospital, and she taught their children, and she preached the gospel. They liked her."


(apologies to G. Keillor for not having the means to get thie quotation exactly right. I heard it on the radio.)


But, that's the way it happens, most of the time: not by some insidious cultural force and not by "doing our homework" (or not), but by the experiencing of knowing a pastor who is a woman, or a gay or lesbian Christian, someone we love and respect. It's having a gay son or daughter, a close friend, a colleague. A retired pastor friend of mine surprised me recently by welcoming these changes; knowing his piety, I would not have suspected his views. Lately I learned that one of his children is a partnered lesbian. The woman from my congregation who went to the Churchwide Assembly voted for the changes simply because, as she said, she knew gay and lesbian people. I also suspect the people from our congregation have no idea which way she voted. (Neither did I. While debriefing the experience with her, I just came out and asked her.)


I'm not sure yet how to end this essay. All I know so far is that faithfulness requires honesty: honesty about our theology and what the scripture says; and honesty about who we are and our own stories, our own experiences.

Since I'm not sure yet how to end this essay, I think I'll leave it unfinished for now. I'll leave it unfinished, but with a commitment to remain in conversation, to keep hearing the scriptures, to keep hearing stories.

Unworthy Servant

A long while ago, at the time I was first wrestling with the thought of becoming a pastor, a friend of mine told me, "Well, even if you are a defective pastor {because of being a woman}, your ministry will still be good." My friend had grown up in the Missouri Synod, had made his way to the ALC (American Lutheran Church), and was slowly inching his way toward the idea that it might be kind of sort of okay for women to be pastors. He read the scripture in a certain way, and in that way of reading it was clear that women were not to teach or hold authority over men. But if I were to become a pastor, have no fear! My sacraments would still be good. The Donatists had declared that the sacraments of clergy who were sinful were ineffective. But the Donatists had been declared heretics. Hence, even if I sinned by becoming a pastor, I wouldn't be leading my flock astray.

You can't imagine how relieved I felt.

Ok, not really. It was an odd feeling, actually; I can't quite describe how I felt, hearing him talk about me in this way, this man who was my friend. I mean, I know I'm simul justus et peccator, both saint and sinner, but he seemed to be talking about me as defective in a different way than he was.

As a woman, I smart a little when I hear the conservatives rail about the "re-interpretation of Scripture" to allow for gay and lesbian clergy. I know that scripture has been re-interpreted to allow for me to be a pastor. And I know, some people say it's different: but it's not different in every way. If it is indeed wrong for a woman to preach or be in authority over a man, I am in unrepentant sin every day of my life (maybe not on my day off). If ELCA women clergy ever forget this perspective, now that women have been able to be ordained for almost 40 years, all you have to do is google women clergy, and you can find out the perspectives you have been missing. I hope you find it edifying.

I don't claim to have all the answers for the ELCA at this time; for some reason, I'm able to put myself in the shoes of other Christians who at some time or another (even right now) have been considered defective because of what they do or who they are. Like the Syro-phoenician woman, I'm even willing to claim the title: Okay, so I'm a dog. Throw me a few crumbs.

Book #13: The Cape Ann

Book #13 for me was our March book group offering The Cape Ann. Although this book has been around for many years, and has been well-regarded, I had never read it. Our book group read another, shorter book by Faith Sullivan several years ago, one called What a Woman Must Do.

Like last month's book, Little Heathens, this novel is set in the Great Depression. But while there are moments of simple pleasure in The Cape Ann, the book most clearly depicts the grim reality of how desperate that time was for many people. The young heroine, Lark, at times seemed to me almost a little too wise beyond her years; other times her words and thoughts were pitch perfect.

The common thread between The Cape Ann and What a Woman Must Do is the theme of a strong woman, doing what is hard but necessary. Lark's mother is portrayed as a larger-than-life character: smart, strong, resourceful, and compassionate: she won't give up her dreams. Many heart-breaking events happen in the course of this story. In our meeting last night, we were struck by the absence of strong male characters (although we all liked Father Delias, when he forgave Lark's sins, but not when he refused to bury Hilly.)

Here is my favorite quotation from the book:
After Lark's confession: "When I thrust aside the curtain and left, my feet were as weightless as I imagined Fred Astaire's to be. I floated down the aisle in a gauzy haze of light and lightness. In my life I had never felt such disencumbrance. If I lifted my arms, I would float up to the dark beams and along the ceiling, and my new innocence would hold me aloft. This was how angels felt."