Episcopal Church Women

By Kristen Pratt Machado

In March, the St. Timothy’s ECW meeting focused on Chapter 27: Women Who Speak in John from Bible Women. I am grateful to the author, Lindsay Hardin Freeman and National ECW President the Rev. Deacon Nancy R. Crawford for bringing this book to my attention.

Women and their role in the church, the Bible, and in society on a whole remain a source of con­troversy. While the Episcopal Church has been or­daining women as priests since 1976 and installed its first female bishop in 2006, the Church of En­gland just recently introduced its first female bish­op with many male members of the discernment process expressing disdain for the elevation of a woman to this high post.

In truth, Episcopalians and Anglicans remain ahead of the curve. Catholicism still bars women from the priesthood, and one of the fast growing religions, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints prohibits women from leadership, recent­ly electing to excommunicate member Kate Kelly due to her efforts to provide equal opportunities for women within the Mormon church.

Evangelical Christianity has its own relationship with misogyny, with many denominations pur­porting the idea that women must submit to their husbands in order to lead Christian lives. I had a very personal experience with this idea when I tried to address an aspect of my life that remains a struggle — the fact that I don’t get much exercise. While perusing Facebook, I had seen some infor­mation about a health and fitness group located in my area that also incorporated Christian faith into the program.

The three dynamic women leading this group were, of course, extremely fit, but also seemed accessible and inspiring. The program offered healthy eating guidelines, recipes, online work­outs, and a private Facebook page where mem­bers could ask questions and the leaders would post their takes on living healthy, as well as holy lives. This sounded perfect to me.

I could do the workouts at home and I would have support from a group of women on this fitness journey. I enthusiastically paid the fee and started what I hoped would be the path to a healthier me.

And then I began noticing that some of the leaders’ posts were alluding to their husbands as the “leaders” of their families and the importance of submission.

Now these women are highly educated entrepreneurs who are clearly motivated go-get­ters. I struggled to reconcile this type of talk with the power these ladies emitted. And then one of the leaders wrote a post about how she had struggled mightily against the Christian doctrine that called for her, an accomplished businesswoman and health care provider, to submit fully to her husband. She spoke about how she real­ized that until she allowed her husband to be the sole deci­sion-maker in her family, she was not following Christ.

This line of thinking deeply disturbed me and I decided that this was not a path to health and wellness that I cared to follow.

The idea that Christianity requires the submission of women to men is, of course, not new. But I was curious about where it originated. The most in­teresting take I have come across is from Sarah Bessey, a Canadian charismatic Christian, who wrote the book Jesus Feminist (which I highly rec­ommend).

In January of 2014, Bessey wrote a blog post in response to the controversy surrounding actress Candace Cameron who included this gem in her book, Balancing It All:

My husband is a natural-born leader. I quickly learned that I had to find a way of honoring his take-charge personality and not get frustrated about his desire to have the final decision on just about everything. I am not a passive per­son, but I chose to fall into a more submissive role in our relationship because I wanted to do everything in my power to make my marriage and family work.

Mmm…this is from a woman in her 30s who has earned her own money, achieved success in the entertainment industry, and then somewhat re­tired to devote herself to motherhood and family (a noble endeavor to be sure).

Then why the need for submission? She espouses that the Bible teaches Christians that there is only one God and there can only be one leader in the family – the man.

Men submit to God, women to their husbands, which, in turn, is also submitting to God. Now, this seems like a lot of hogwash made up by men and I was inspired to read Bessey’s eloquent and in­formed writing about the topic:

The idea that a man is the head of the home has its roots in secular ancient culture, not in the Word of God or the created order of humanity. And the idea that, as a wife, I would need to ‘become passive’ or smaller or somehow less in order to make my marriage work is damaging and wrong… But don’t get me wrong: I believe in submission. I just don’t believe that our call to submission in marriage is restricted to me. I submit to my husband. And he submits to me, too. And together, we submit to Jesus.

Amen, Sarah Bessey! I highly recommend you read her remarks in their entirely on www.sarah­bessey.com. But what does this discussion mean for women of faith who refuse to buy into this pa­triarchal idea of what a relationship

“And so it begins.” This is a lovely little phrase from the movie, “About Time,” when the young couple gets married and a new life together begins.

By Nancy R. Crawford

I have thought of the phrase often during my time as president of the national ECW Board. Of course, there was THE beginning in 2012 at the commis­sioning ceremony in Indianapolis. But along the way there have been many beginnings: beginning to preside at board meetings and getting to know the other board members; beginning to address the concerns of the women of the church, and oth­ers, and develop a board response to the resig­nation of some UTO Board members; beginning to formulate a committee to study and make rec­ommendations on Resolution 101/104 on Restruc­turing; beginning to understand more fully the plight of those trapped in Human Trafficking and learning about organizations such as GEMS in New York and Rahab’s Sisters in my Diocese of Oregon; beginning to support and collaborate with Lindsay Hardin Freeman’s dream to write a book about the women who speak in the Bible; beginning to en­gage others with the President’s Blog’s bi-monthly reflections on Bible Women: All Their Words and Why They Matter; and beginning to travel as pres­ident of the Board.

Besides board meetings in our eight continental prov­inces, my travels as president began in Minnesota. There was a desire to reinvigorate ECW in the diocese and the seeds were planted at St. David’s, Minnetonka. Lindsay Hardin Freeman spoke to the women gathered together and I had the pleasure of preaching and shar­ing the Good News of Episcopal women’s ministry in the church. The next trip was a very big beginning for me. It was the ECW Pilgrimage to the Holy Land and the beginning of my passport being used for something other than identification. It also began my love for the people who live in the Holy Land and who tend the land where Jesus walked. I have been fortunate to go on pil­grimage a second time with another ECW-sponsored group and meet with the Archbish­op of Jerusalem, definitely a first! My travels have included meeting at Camp Allen, Texas; attending a gathering in the Diocese of Spo­kane; leading a 2-day spiritual retreat at Kanuga, North Carolina; gain­ing new insights at women’s leadership training in Colo­rado; speaking at the Honored Women Luncheon, Dio­cese of New Jersey; and attending and speaking briefly at the Province IX Synod Meeting, Quito, Ecuador. This spring I made visits to the Diocese of East Carolina and the Diocese of Ohio and shared what to expect at the upcoming Triennial Meeting in Salt Lake City.

All along the way I have had the privilege to meet won­derful women, just like you, who are working hard for ECW, who are questioning our role in the 21st Century, and who are shining forth the light of Christ. In each of them, in each of you, I see a child of God.

And now I should say “and so it ends.” It is hard to imagine that this is really the end of my service to ECW, my love for the women of the church, my passion for the cause of social justice for women, children, and men around the world, or my con­cern for those living in Palestine and the compli­cated struggles they face. It is so difficult to imag­ine that I know it will not end, but only change.

Over the past three years the Spirit has stirred up something within me and I forever will be thankful for the opportunity to serve and to learn as presi­dent of the national ECW Board.

By Lisa Towel

The following is a greeting given by Lisa H. Towle to the House of Deputies on July 1, 2015, in Salt Lake City, shortly after she was elected President of the National ECW.

My name is Lisa Towle, I am from the Diocese of North Carolina, and a few hours ago I was com­missioned as President of the National Episco­pal Church Women. It is a great day to be an Episcopalian!

It’s a great day but joy and sadness live side-by-side in me at the moment. Joy because some 300 Episcopal Church Women found the business of our Church important enough to travel far to at­tend the ECW’s Triennial Meeting here at General Convention.

Joy because you, the Deputies, have chosen to give your time to find a better way to better our common life. Joy because standing together we all form a beloved community.

My sadness – and selfishness, I suppose – is that to do the work I’ve been called to do at the national lev­el means I must give up the ECW work I’ve done at the diocesan level for 16 years.

And, if that weren’t enough, I will lose my beloved bishop, Michael Curry, to a higher calling. Life moves on, though, and so do we, to another beginning.

In the case of Episcopal Church Women, Resolution 101/104, co-authored by me in 2012, led to – what else, we are Episcopalians after all – an ad hoc com­mittee whose work was facilitated by consultants.

They set about studying the subject of restructur­ing and recommended, via a lengthy report, ways in which the National ECW Board can help our ministry move forward in a more inclusive, “more excellent way.”

Our delegates accepted this information and, af­ter conversation and debate, gave the Board its marching orders. A large majority of delegates said, in essence, “take the recommendations of the committee, take our traditions, engage in some careful listening, and then help us, the women in parishes and missions, find a new way because it’s a new day.”

All this concern about governance and structure may not exactly be the “Dirty, Sexy Ministry” we hear about on Facebook, but it will, I believe, help get us to where we need to be. And where does our ministry need to be? Well, speaking in the broadest sense, we need to be a place that shows, with words AND actions, how we are inclusive and em­bracing of all our sisters.

We are headed in the right direction. At our Triennial Meeting just concluded, women aged 20-something to 90-something actively participated in all proceedings. It was a multi-cultural, multi-eth­nic assembly. Many of those present were newcomers to Triennial Meeting and General Convention. It was a gathering that stirred up the spirit. It was Church, in the best use of that word. Let me tell you another little story about Church, or more to the point, becoming churched. This was shared with me by a dear friend who, knowing I was preparing for events here in Salt Lake City, sought to inspire me with a daily thought or prayer or story.

Here’s the story: “Once upon a time, group of villagers decid­ed to pray for rain. On the day that had been designated for prayer, all the people of the village gathered. Only one came with an umbrella.” Now that’s faith! So I say, come, stand un­der our umbrella. It’s big enough to cover all.

Come, let’s share the faith, and help us serve God’s beloved. Come, and in the words of the ECW prayer, “join us in making Christ’s love known throughout the world.” Most importantly, come, Lord. Be among us and remain with us always.

Thank you for sharing your time and for your kind welcome.

Blessings to all.