Femingelicals of today celebrating mainline churchian feminists of yore

Their intellectual and spiritual forebears, after all…

Blah blah blah… (Hat tip: Darryl Hart):

Later came defenses of women from one of Quakerism’s founders, Margaret Fell Fox (1614–1702); Tory pamphleteer, Mary Astell (1668–1731); abolitionist Hannah More (1745–1833); and the author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797). Most of these writers acted out of a Christian impulse with the relatively unified objective of elevating women to their rightful place.

In the 18th century, the first Great Awakening brought a return to the earliest centuries’ involvement of lay people. Women’s involvement in missions sometimes included preaching, and on the frontier, Christian women experienced increased levels of autonomy. By the 19th century the pro-woman consciousness had a label: “the woman movement,” now called first-wave feminism. Male and female Bible-believers gathered at the Seneca Falls Convention, where the group drafted a declaration addressing the role of women in society.

In the half-century that followed, many believers joined the push for women’s suffrage, and dozens of foreign mission societies sent out women missionaries. The editor of The Message and Deaconess Advocate, Lucy Rider Meyer defended their role in her 1895 defense, saying, “In deaconess ranks to-day may be found physicians, editors, stenographers, teachers, nurses, book-keepers, superintendents of hospitals and orphanages… A bit of history shows that the ‘new woman’ is not an invention of the last decade but that, in the character of Hilda, Abbess of Whitby.”

This “new woman” is not an invention of second-wave feminism either. Betty Friedan did not start the “woman movement;” Christians did. Motivated by the belief that men and women were made in God’s image to “rule the earth” together, these pro-woman, pro-justice believers sought to right wrongs for those who had less social influence.

Nice of the HerWymyneutics writer to remind us, the ‘woman movement’ started out as a Christian heresy (though Friedan and other Tribe wymynfolk have done much damage from the ’60s onwards. But I digress).

Blah blah blah:

Building the Old Time Religion: Women Evangelists in the Progressive Era takes an in-depth look at the lasting impact that the ministry and achievements of 24 women have made on U.S. Christianity. These women founded educational institutions, organizations and denominations during the Progressive Era and many of their contributions remain pivotal to American society today.

They range in name from Virginia Moss, Elizabeth Baker, Mary Lee Cagle, Emma Whittemore and Martha Lee to Iva Durham Vennard, Aimee Semple McPherson, Helen Sunday, Evangeline Booth and several others. Their denominations include Methodist, Roman Catholic, Salvation Army, Assembly of God, Pentecostal, and others. Among the many institutions and churches these women founded are the Catholic Truth Guild, Apostolic Faith Mission, Door of Hope, Good Will Mission, L.I.F.E. Bible College, Angelus Temple and Beulah Heights Assembly.

According to theologian and author Priscilla Pope-Levison, the 24 women evangelists featured in Building the Old Time religion broke ground and pressed against the tide of the times to follow and fulfill the calls they felt God had placed on their lives. Pope-Levison, professor of Theology at Seattle Pacific University and an ordained United Methodist minister compresses 20 years of research into less than 200 pages and leaves no stone unturned in her effort to reveal the accomplishments, struggles and shortcomings of these “theologically conservative” Christian leaders.

Below is an edited transcript of The Christian Post’s interview with Pope-Levison. Read part one of CP’s interview with the author: ‘Building the Old Time Religion’ Explores Women Evangelists’ Monumental Impact on US Christianity.

CP: Can you name a few ways in which these women have left a lasting impact on Christianity in America? Institutions, of course are obvious. But is there anything they established that remain with us today that Christians might not be aware of?

Pope-Levison: I think they really broke the ground for women’s religious leadership within mainline Christianity in terms of mixed-gender institutions. In other words, they were among the first women in mainline Christianity to have religious authority over women and men. That to me is a legacy that paved the way for those of us today who are ordained, who are serving as pastors, theological teachers.

So, today’s ordained evangelical pastoresses celebrate the ground-breaking path blazed by ‘progressive’, mainline Protestants before them, without whom, after all, there most likely indeed wouldn’t be churches with ordained female pastors within evangelicalism. Makes sense; heresy begets more heresy, usually…