Feature:

The stained glass ceiling

There may have been some progress for women leaders, but many of them are still struggling to fulfil their calling

Three summers ago, a talk at Soul Survivor ended with hundreds of women coming forward, many of them weeping. They were responding to an invitation from director Mike Pilavachi to come forward if they felt they had been denied leadership or felt stuck and disempowered simply for being a woman. To the men watching, Pilavachi said, ‘You may be wondering what’s going on, but remember, you have no idea what these women have been through.’

The following morning, the mood at the leaders meeting was sombre. Maggie Ellis, now a Christianity columnist, summed it up. ‘I thought we’d come a lot further than that,’ she said.

Since then, Soul Survivor has made a point of including teaching seminars on the role of women at all their conferences. Pilavachi’s colleague, Ali Martin, who regularly speaks at Soul Survivor, says, ‘We realised that men and women needed a firm biblical foundation, and not just modelling, before they release women into leadership.’

So what about the rest of the UK church scene? Women have been ordained in Baptist churches since the 1920s, the Methodist Church since 1974 and the Church of England for 18 years. Did these decisions herald a new era for leading women? Some would say they did. But many others claim that little has really changed, and that the church has a long journey out of the cultural dark ages before women are given the opportunities they enjoy in the secular workplace.

There are few issues more prickly than women in leadership. This article is not intended to restart the debate about the interpretation of scripture. Rather, in the context of those churches and denominations who have decreed that women can teach and lead mixed congregations, to look at how successful they have been.

A mixed picture

The picture of how UK women are faring as preachers and church or para church leaders is very mixed. For some, like Ali Martin, leadership came easily. Taking seminars at Soul Survivor evolved gradually into a more upfront preaching role. ‘I tried not to shove the door or sell myself,’ she says. ‘But I was fortunate. Mike [Pilavachi] was a wonderful mentor – he opened them [the doors] for me.’

Fellow Soul Survivor speaker, Ness Wilson, who has led Open Heaven in Loughborough, a Pioneer Network church of 250 people, since she was only 22 and single, says she too grew naturally into leadership. ‘I was part of the original church planting team when the leadership team agreed I should lead it. The only opposition I encountered was at my first local ministers’ fraternal. I was the only woman there and asked to leave, because, “This is a meeting for your minister, my dear.”’

Women are now vicars of some of the largest Anglican churches – including Rosalyn Murphy at St Thomas’ in Blackpool which has a congregation of 670, and Dianna Gwilliams at St Barnabas’, Dulwich with 470 attenders. Figures for the Church of England show that in 2006 42% of students at theological colleges were female. More women were ordained than men – though many into unpaid posts. The forecast is that by 2010 18% of all full-time vicars will be women. And evidence shows that churches led by women grow at exactly the same rate as churches led by men.

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