← All the Buried Women
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- [00:04]
Beth Allison Barr
Saint Fabiola was born in the mid 4th century to a wealthy Roman family. We don't know much about her, but most of what we do know comes from a surprisingly famous source. St. Jerome. That's right, the Jerome Church father, theologian and priest who was commissioned to translate the Bible to Latin.
- [00:24]
Savannah Locke
Here's what we know about Fabiola. She married young and eventually divorced her husband, who, according to Jerome, had faults so terrible not even a prostitute or a common slave could have put up with them. She married a second time, violating church ordinances which prohibited someone from getting remarried if their first spouse was still alive. This was a pretty big deal. But Jerome's opinion fluctuated on the severity of her second marriage. At one point he wrote that it was a bad thing, but may have been done out of necessity because it was better, as the Apostle tells us, to marry than to burn. Later he wrote that Fabiola didn't realize what she was doing and that she had unwittingly exposed herself to a wound from the devil. Either way, when Fabiola's second husband died, she repented for getting remarried and devoted herself to a life of renunciation. Jerome praised her for this and wrote, who would believe that at a time when most widows, having shaken off the yoke of servitude, grow careless and allow themselves more liberty than ever, frequenting the baths, splitting through the streets, showing their harlot faces everywhere, that at this time Fabiola came to herself. Her repentance was a public ordeal and took place the day before Easter. Jerome describes it in a dramatic fashion, saying, she stood in the ranks of the penitents and exposed before bishop presbyters and people, all of whom wept when they saw her weep, her disheveled hair, pale features, soiled hands and unwashed neck. What sins would such a penance fell to purge away? What ingrained stains would such tears be unable to wash out? Needless to say, she was welcomed back into communion and hit the ground running.
- [02:26]
Beth Allison Barr
Fabiola gave her wealth away to the sick and the poor. In Rome, she founded the first Western European public hospital. Later, in Porto, she co founded the first hospice which housed travelers and took care of the sick. She reportedly spent her time walking Roman streets in search of those who were abandoned or ill, even carrying them to the hospital on her shoulders. There was no patient whose disease was too repulsive for Fabiola to tend to herself. Jerome wrote that Fabiola so wonderfully alleviated the disease of the suffering poor that many healthy people began to envy the sick. She was also well studied and familiar with Hebrew, Latin, and Greek. In 395, she traveled to Bethlehem to study the Scriptures under the direction of Jerome. Her studies ended abruptly as the Huns invaded nearby and Fabiola returned to Rome. But she and Jerome remained in correspondence as she continued her ministry at home.
- [03:27]
Savannah Locke
Fabiola died on December 27, 399, two days after Christmas. It is said that thousands of people attended her funeral, celebrating a woman whose ministry lifted up the neediest in Rome. Saint Fabiola's legacy has been carried through generations, particularly by women, through their private devotion and personal supplication. She became the patron saint of nurses, difficult marriages, divorced persons, abused spouses, and victims of unfaithful spouses. For many women, she became a symbol of hope and solidarity. She was a victim of abuse. She got divorced. She got remarried. She was widowed. She was resilient in the face of heartache, empathetic in the midst of pain. She experienced threads of a story that so many women before her experienced and so many women to come would experience. Those threads of connection, of abuse, heartache, love and pain even find their way into the story of an evangelical woman who married a Southern Baptist pastor 1500 years later. A woman who, like Fabiola, was trapped in a difficult marriage and found divorce, even as a pastor's wife, to be the only way out.
- [04:57]
Beth Allison Barr
But before we get to that, let's travel from 4th century Rome to 1984 in Kansas City, Missouri.
- [05:09]
Meredith Stone
I told my pastor, listen, it would.
- [05:11]
Savannah Locke
Be easier to be a prostitute in.
- [05:13]
Meredith Stone
This church than it is to be an ordained woman. The spirit of the Lord is upon him because God has anointed me to.
- [05:23]
Savannah Locke
Preach good news to the poor.
- [05:24]
Pamela Durso
Women deserve to know that there are places where their gifts and their ministry is valued. Ida looked at him and said, Dr.
- [05:31]
Savannah Locke
Guy, you have every right to be completely wrong.
- [05:35]
Beth Allison Barr
Created in partnership with the Bible for normal people, this is all the Buried Women, a miniseries uncovering women's stories hidden in the Southern Baptist Convention's archives.
- [05:47]
Savannah Locke
Hosted by me, Beth Allison Barr and me, Savannah Locke.
- [05:56]
Beth Allison Barr
Episode 1 George Orwell warned us about 1984. On June 12, 1984, over 17,000 messengers traveled to Kansas City, Missouri for the Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting. The Southern Baptist Convention, or SBC, is the largest Protestant denomination in North America. In 1984, at the time of the Kansas City annual meeting, it boasted a colossal 14.1 million members. Every year, the SBC meets with what they call messengers, which are basically representatives from each affiliate church, to talk about programs, policies, budgets, vote on various resolutions, and elect the following year's president. Anyone is welcome to come to the meeting, but only messengers have voting power. Here's Jimmy Draper, then president of the SBC, calling the 1984 meeting to order.
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Jimmy Draper
The 127th session in our 139th year of the Southern Baptist Convention is officially called to order. And we welcome you to this session and thank you in advance for your participation in the various discussions and decisions of this convention. Let me just say at the very outset that the microphone on the platform is certainly available to any of you. Some have suggested that we should say, nobody comes to the microphone on the platform. We cannot do that. I would just ask that you use discretion, and we will recognize the floor microphones as readily as the microphone here. And we would request that we use the one closest to us if at all possible.
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Savannah Locke
Pay close attention to what Draper said here. It offers a clue about how tense the atmosphere was from the very start of this annual meeting. He said, quote, some have suggested that we should say nobody comes to the microphone on the platform. We cannot do that. I would just ask that you use discretion. Maybe Jimmy Draper knew that things were about to get heated because all eyes were on resolution number three on ordination and the role of women in ministry. This resolution would restrict women from pastoral functions and leadership roles entailing ordination. Why was this resolution proposed? Well, as the second wave feminist movement swept the nation in the 60s and 70s, the SBC saw a small feminist wave of their own. And we do mean small for context. In 1984, there were more than 30,000 churches in the SBC being pastored by, well, almost 30,000 men. Because of all the ordained people in the SBC, only 200 and fifty of them were women. And of those ordained women, only a handful would have held the title of pastor. The majority were chaplains for local hospitals and prisons, missionaries, or family and children's ministers at their churches.
- [09:16]
Beth Allison Barr
For many in the SBC's leadership, the movement of women seeking ordination even in small numbers, was deeply unsettling. Many saw it as a feminist agenda from the world, infiltrating God's design for men to lead and for women to submit. While the denomination has not always been as monolithically conservative as it is today, it has consistently shown resistance to women in leadership role since its founding. Even still, despite implicit and explicit obstacles, many Southern Baptist women felt called by God to lead, pastor, and preach. And so they did. The first woman to be ordained in the SBC was Addie Davis in 1964. Addie is a legendary name in Southern Baptist circles, but nobody knows her story better than Pamela Durso, president of Central Seminary in Kansas.
- [10:09]
Meredith Stone
Addie Davis was kind of a hero of mine before I knew much about her because she had been promoted by Baptist women in ministry. There were awards given in her name for preaching and Christian leadership. And so I knew her name long before I ever knew much about her. But over the years, I did research around her and also got to speak to her several times on the phone. And I've also just kind of read everything there is to read about Addie Davis. She was and grew up a Baptist in Virginia, in Covington, Virginia. Her family had long history, like her great, great, great grandfather was a traveling Baptist preacher, rode on horseback to preach at various Baptist chur. She was active in the church in Covington as a teenager, but always had this sense of calling and not really having the imagination to know what that meant for her when she played, when they played church. She was always the preacher for her with her siblings. So she had that pull toward pastoring and preaching, but never really knew what to do with it. She was the first in her family to go to college. Her family saved up money so she could go to Meredith College. And she started when she was 21 and went off to Raleigh, North Carolina, to study. And when she graduated, the first position she had out of college was at First Baptist Church, Elkin, North Carolina, and she was their education director, because this is when women were not ministers, they were directors, directors of programs. And after about four years of that, she was invited to be dean of women at Alderson Broadus College in West Virginia, where she went to serve. And it was there that she began to feel a nudge towards seminary and really wanted to go to seminary. And so she applied at Yale and at Duke, and I think she was accepted at both places. But in the midst of all of that, her father had died a few years earlier. He owned a furniture store with and worked with her mother. And by the time she was ready to go to seminary, her mother needed help with the furniture store. And so she abandoned this dream of seminary and went back to Covington, Virginia and helped run the family furniture store. But even there, if this is going to be a loophole, she found a place to serve. She served as an interim pastor of a really tiny rural church called Lone Star Baptist Church outside of Covington. Very few people, but for six months she was an interim. So it gave her a taste of what this would be be like.
- [12:51]
Savannah Locke
The story goes that while Addie was working with her mom at the furniture store and pastoring a tiny country church. Her appendix ruptured and caused a pretty serious health crisis. While she was recovering, she said, quote, if I live, I will preach the gospel. I will be a pastor. It was a major turning point. She fully recovered from her illness, and at the age of 43, she enrolled at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary with her gaze set on ordination.
- [13:23]
Meredith Stone
There's kind of this myth that she didn't know she would be the first woman to be ordained. And I probably contributed to that myth because it was the story I had always heard that she. It just happened to her, and it. And she never knew. But looking at her seminary papers, she took a class on history of Christianity and researched women's ordination. And so she wrote this paper about looking at the biblical side of ordination pro and con. And then she researched all of the different denominations, Roman Catholicisms, Lutherans, Presbyterians. And then she came around to American Baptist and Southern Baptist, and she looked at all of the local church records that she could find, but mostly associational minutes and Southern Baptist Convention records. And in that paper, in 1963, she wrote, according to records available, no woman has yet to be ordained in the Southern Baptist Convention. So she knew that should she be ordained, she would be the first. And I think that's significant. She didn't make it a spectacular event or call attention to herself, but she had done the research, and that points to who she was. She knew her place, and she knew her place in history.
- [14:41]
Beth Allison Barr
Addie was a member of Watt Street Baptist Church, a historically progressive congregation, particularly as it relates to racial justice. Pastor Warren Carr agreed to license Addie to preach in 1963. The license, which was a standard fill in the blank paper, said, this is to certify Addie Davis, who has given evidence that God has called him into the gospel ministry, was licensed to preach the gospel as he may have opportunity and to exercise his gifts in the work of ministry. By Watt Street Baptist church of Durham, North Carolina, on the 13th day of March, 1963. Even progressive churches didn't have a framework for women preachers. After graduating, she looked for a church that would hire her as pastor, but she could find no Southern Baptist congregation willing to even talk to her. If she wanted to be a pastor, she had to look outside the sbc.
- [15:35]
Meredith Stone
Her college friend, Elizabeth Miller had been pastor in Vermont of First Baptist Church, Reedsboro, Vermont. And so Elizabeth said to Addie, there's now an opening at this church. You should apply at First Baptist Church, Reedsboro. So she did, and she went there, as in. In June of 1964 interviewed was a candidate for the weekend and preached. And they called her to be their pastor. She was 47 years old and her first pastorate, and then she had the need to be ordained. And this is kind of the big story of Addie's life. She wanted to be ordained by her home church, Covington Baptist Church in Virginia. And when she asked, it created a scandal. They weren't ready for that. They didn't want to, you know, be a part of ordination of a woman, even though they were the ones who loved Addie and nurtured her call and really had been a part of her faith journey. And she really wanted to be ordained by Southern Baptist Church because it was her family. It was. They had, you know, nurtured everything that she had become. But when Covington broke into scandal, she withdrew her request and went back to Watt street and asked Warren Carr to ordain her. And so that they went through the process and the ordination council, they were ordaining two candidates, a male graduate of Duke and then Addie. And he was somewhat progressive in his understanding of the virgin birth. And they struggled with his theology, but they struggled more with the fact that she was a woman. So they eventually got into some heated debates about whether to ordain Addie. And one person abstained, but it passed. And so she was voted to be ordained. And her ordination happened on August 9th in 1964, with two of her professors giving the charge and saying the prayer and then beautiful music. As was true of all of Addie's life, it was very well planned out. She was a planner and a keeper of all documents. So. So that set her off to be ready to pastor this church in Vermont. But in the meantime, the hate mail started coming in. And Warren carr got, like, 50 letters of hate mail because of Addie's ordination. And Addie got some, too, called her the child of the devil, told her to renounce her ordination. And the sad thing for me as a historian is she kept everything except the hate letters. So I have mourned that loss. She never responded to them. She said, you know, I'm not out to pick a fight. And when people say unkind things to me, I do not respond. And so she disposed of those, and they are not in her archives at all.
- [18:24]
Beth Allison Barr
After Addie Davis, seven years would pass before another woman would be ordained by the sbc. Her name was Shirley Carter. Originally from Fulton, Missouri, Shirley earned a master's degree in religious education from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. In June of 1971, she joined Cathwood Baptist Church in Columbia, S.C. where she quickly became a church clerk. Her ultimate goal, however, was to become a prison chaplain, a role that required ordination. By the fall of that year, she was ordained by Reverend Eddie Rickenbaker with minimal backlash. One newspaper said that negative responses to the service were surprisingly small.
- [19:04]
Savannah Locke
During her chaplaincy training at South Carolina State Hospital in 1970, Shirley met W. Pringle Lee, a Roman Catholic priest who was leaving the priesthood due to disagreements with the church's teachings on birth control. They fell in love while Shirley finished her training, and soon she landed a job at a nearby correctional facility with her salary paid by the South Carolina Baptist Convention and the SBC's Home Mission Board. In 1972, Shirley and Pringle married, a union that stirred some controversy within her church because he was a former priest and nearly twice her age. Their wedding was officiated by Eddie Rickenbaker, the same guy who ordained her one year before.
- [19:54]
Beth Allison Barr
Then things got complicated. Sam Covington, writer for the Charlotte observer, shared the news that Shirley and Pringle were pregnant and expecting their first child in November. According to his account, Shirley was about three months pregnant at the time of her wedding, a detail only known by a close relative. This was a problem for the board of deacons at Cathode Baptist Church. They felt that Shirley's conduct was unbecoming for a minister of the gospel, and as a result, they held a special vote regarding Shirley's ordination. She did not go to the meeting, but Pringle spoke on behalf of his wife, saying she could no longer function in an atmosphere of censure and non acceptance. Shirley, he said, wished to be relieved of her ordination as a minister. It seems she was trying to quit before her church could fire her. They took it to a vote anyways and rescinded her ordination with a vote count of 56 to 39, with five abstentions.
- [20:53]
Savannah Locke
Because she was no longer ordained, Shirley had to resign from her chaplaincy role at the prison. Speaking to the Pica Daily Call, she decried the vote, saying the withdrawal of her ordination was grossly unfair. According to this article, she reported knowledge of several men who, as Baptist pastors, were involved in adultery and merely had been forced to move to new positions or churches. She felt that there was a difference in her treatment simply because she was a woman. She went on to say that she and Pringle felt they hadn't done anything wrong in the sight of God, only in the sight of society, and maintained that other factors were behind the church's action, namely that her husband was a former priest and devout Catholic and that the church was still edgy about a woman in ministry.
- [21:44]
Beth Allison Barr
Although Addie Davis left the SBC to find a church she could pastor and Shirley Carter's ordination was revoked because she was three months pregnant at her wedding, a small wave of women followed in their footsteps and pursued ordination. In 1972, for example, 66 year old Reverend Dr. Drusiller Fordham would make history as the first woman to serve as senior pastor of a Southern Baptist church. She was also the first ordained black woman in the sbc. Fordham's church, Christ Temple Baptist in New York, was welcomed into the full fellowship of the association after a year long trial period. Ken Lyle, executive director of the regional association at the time, said this about Drusiller, she was a very humble servant of Jesus. The association did not have a problem with Christ Temple becoming part of our fellowship. We held to the principle of the autonomy of the local church in the matter of who was called as pastor. Some of the other African American pastors male did express some reservations, however, but no anger or rebellion on their part either. Reverend Fordham graduated from our seminary extension program a good student eager to learn all the days of her life. She was a gentle, loving leader, a dear friend, my mentor regarding small churches in Harlem and many other valuable lessons regarding ministry in the city.
- [23:10]
Savannah Locke
For years, Drusiller Fordham was the only woman senior pastor of an SBC church. And as you can tell from Ken Lyle's comments, nobody was too upset about it. In fact, while there are hundreds of articles about Addie Davis in the SBC's archives and on the Internet, there are just a handful about Drusilla Fordham. Even though she was the first female senior pastor in the sbc. Don't you think that would be a bigger deal? We honestly don't have enough data to know with certainty why Drusiller is not that big of a deal in the SBC's history or archives, for good or for bad. By the way, many of the folks we interviewed for the series who support women in ministry had not heard of her or knew very little about her. Why is this? Well, here's our working theory and it starts with the origins of the SBC. Let's take a break from the 1970s and travel back to the 1840s.
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Dr. Jamar Tisby
The Southern Baptist Convention. Truly the Southern part means pro slavery in its origins.
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Savannah Locke
This is Dr. Jamar Tisby, historian, speaker and New York Times bestselling author of the Color of Compromise and most recently the Spirit of Justice, explaining how the SBC came to be.
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Dr. Jamar Tisby
So of course we know that the denomination split between north and south in 1845. I'd like to remind people what the specific issue was because I think that's so important to understanding the kind of blindness or deliberate ignorance that a lot of white Baptists had. So it was, it was specifically over the issue of whether a person could be a missionary and be a slaveholder. Could they be, you know, in general a member in good standing, but specifically someone charged in commission to go out and spread the gospel. And of course this was often in lands far flung from the United States where the majority of the population would likely be black or brown people, people of color. You have this call from God that you understand to go tell other people groups about Jesus. Meanwhile, you're enslaving at home the very people who look just like the folks you're, you're trying to share Jesus with, right? So the, the sort of dichotomy there, the, the, the confounding contradiction of wanting to tell people who don't look like you about Jesus while enslaving people who don't look like you. That was the specific issue. And so of course that leads to this intense racial division that really in many ways persists up to today.
- [26:18]
Beth Allison Barr
Because of its genesis in history, the SBC has been a predominantly white institution made up of predominantly white churches. This makes sense, right? Why would a black Christian in the south want to join a church belonging to a denomination designed to defend the rights of slaveholders?
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Dr. Jamar Tisby
The reason why there is a black church is because of racism in the white church, which for a lot of people is like, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's a lot. But really, when you look at the history, of course, why are black separate black churches, separate black denominations, separate black conventions forming? It's not because they were having these deep intractable debates about the divinity, dignity of Jesus or the nature of the Trinity or something along those lines. It was simply because black people didn't want to be treated as second class citizens in the household of God.
- [27:07]
Beth Allison Barr
Southern Baptist seminaries were segregated until 1951. That same year, two black churches joined the Southern Baptist Convention for the first time. This started a slow but steady move of black and brown churches affiliating, or more commonly dual affiliating with the sbc. The SBC often supported these churches financially, designating them as SBC mission churches. This support could include physical resources, funding and even buildings. And this wasn't just happening in the 50s.
- [27:40]
Dr. Jamar Tisby
The broader majority of white SBC leadership is Trying to claim credit for diversity that they don't really experience and they don't have a hand in on a personal level. So they'll count these mission churches, which means they financially support black pastors and churches, Latino, other racial and ethnic minority groups. And they're part of the sbc, which, by the way, you can be part of multiple denominations, especially in Baptist polity. So you might have a black church that's part of the sbc, but also part of the National Baptist Convention or some other tradition. Right. So they're claiming these churches for the purposes of demographic data to show that, see, we're not racist. Look at all of this diversity we have. But the reality is these are separate congregations and there's. There's no meaningful, oftentimes racial integration or contact even. These are separate churches. They're still all white churches. And they're. They're claiming these mission churches, which are predominantly people of color. And this has a long history of, I think, along modern history, if you will. If we look at the ways that institutions, in general, we call them pwi, is predominantly white, institutions count. Diversity is really interesting because in order to make themselves look better and inflate the numbers, they will create all kinds of categories of diversity and lump them all in. So when you're talking about racial and ethnic diversity at, say, a college or university, they'll say, you know, 22% of our undergraduate student body are people of color. Well, yeah, but that's everyone that's Latino, that's Asian, that's black. And then when you break it down, especially when you look at the black white divide, you're still seeing, like, single digits of African American students or constituents in these places. So we have to be, as critical analysts really careful about parsing the data and what it actually means about true racial reconciliation, understanding racial responsiveness. Because you can claim all kinds of numbers, you can claim all kinds of bodies within the larger group and still not have any real shift or change because of that diversity.
- [30:12]
Savannah Locke
Here's where we circle back to our theory about Drusilla Fordham. Her black church in Harlem was dual affiliated, first with Progressive Baptists and then with Southern Baptists. In Ken Lyle's commentary on her church joining the sbc, he praised Drusiller for her work in the city. The only interview we found with her was published in the SBC's Home Mission Board magazine as part of a 1972 series called beyond the Barriers. Drusiller Fordham's name sits at the top of page 42 with a simple title pastor. The first sentence under her name says Drusiller Fordham, described by a co worker as a very gentle person and a genuine Christian, doesn't seem to be the least bit intimidated by any opposition she might receive as the first woman pastor of a Southern Baptist church. Later in the article, she said, I never fear anything, I just go ahead and do it. People will say what they want to say, they have the right to, but it doesn't matter. We're living in the now age. The article also mentions she sought affiliation with the SBC through a program called Chance Central Harlem association of Neighborhood Churches Endeavors, which was supported by the sbc.
- [31:41]
Beth Allison Barr
Drusiller Fordham clearly didn't fly under the radar as the first woman senior pastor of an SBC church because she was unremarkable. Instead, our guess is that the SBC viewed her church as a mission church and they were less concerned about a black church having a woman pastor than they would have been if someone like Addie Davis, for example, had gone on to pastor a predominantly white Southern Baptist church. We touched on this briefly with another historian, Barry Hankins, who you'll meet in a later episode. He shared a story from his time teaching in Pineville, Louisiana in the late 1990s. At the time, a story circulated dating back to the late 70s or 80s about one of the major Southern Baptist churches nearby. According to the story, when several black individuals asked to join the local SBC church, the pastor took them on a nice trip to the mission church down on 3rd street in Pineville and told them you'd be more comfortable here, berry said. This was common during the Civil Rights movement. Many black activists attended churches in an effort to worship, only to be ushered out. First Baptist Church of Jackson, Mississippi, for example, was a prominent church led by a well regarded pastor and statesman. Yet black individuals were either physically barred from entering or forcibly removed from the sanctuary when they attempted to worship.
- [33:05]
Savannah Locke
This shows how separate and segregated mission churches could be in the sbc and why it is not far fetched to hypothesize that Drusilla's impact as the first senior woman pastor in the SBC is not as documented or celebrated or even condemned. Because she and her church were black, because her church was seen as a mission church. Yet her legacy is there, even if the records are sparse. Recognized as a pastor in the SBC's own archives, she was a trailblazer in this wave of women who pursued ordination in a denomination that did not make room for their calling.
- [33:48]
Beth Allison Barr
Here's a quick advertisement from our sponsor.
- [33:51]
Savannah Locke
Brazos Press how did the role of the Pastor's Wife come to be in Becoming the Pastor's How Marriage Replaced Ordination as a Woman's Path to Ministry? Beth Allison Barr takes you on a journey revealing little known stories of women throughout church history. Drawing from her 25 years of personal experience as a pastor's wife and her expertise as a historian, Barr explores how the role of the pastor's wife has evolved and grown over time. She uncovers the surprising history of women's ordination and how its decline intersects with the rise of the pastor's wife. Through personal anecdotes and historical analysis, Barr helps the church understand the origins and implications of this unique role. Pete Enns, host of the Bible for Normal People, endorsed the book, calling it an amazing book that exposes the gray's disenfranchisement of women to the Gospel ministry and sets the record straight for all to see. Published by Brazos Press. You can pre order Becoming the Pastor's Wife wherever books, ebooks or audiobooks are sold.
- [35:02]
Beth Allison Barr
By the end of the 1970s, scholars Leon Macbeth and Helen Lee Turner identified 58 women ordained by Southern Baptist congregations. It was at this time that Southern Baptists organized a number of national gatherings focused on the role of women in the church. A group called Women in Ministry SBC was formed, now called Baptist Women in Ministry, and had their first meeting in 1983. Attended by 75 people. Women in Ministry created a purpose statement to provide support for the women whose call from God defines her vocation as that of minister and to encourage and affirm her call to be a servant of God. To learn more about this wave of women seeking ordination and how the SPC responded, we talked to Meredith Stone, Executive Director of Baptist Women in Ministry.
- [35:54]
Pamela Durso
My name is Meredith Stone and I serve as Executive Director for Baptist Women in Ministry. We're a nationwide organization that exists to support and advocate for women in ministry in Baptist life.
- [36:05]
Beth Allison Barr
We asked Meredith to help us understand what the atmosphere was like for women leading up to the 1984 convention with Jimmy Draper.
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Pamela Durso
What happens between 1979 and 1983 is that the women who were serving in ministry, women who were seeking to serve in ministry, began to have a lot more connections and conversations with one another. They began building community and realizing that there was a need for organizing. I think of three precipitating events in 1982 that led to the organizing in 1983 of the group that became Baptist Women in Ministry. One was the Sarah Frances Anders paper given at the WMU dinner.
- [36:48]
Beth Allison Barr
Here Meredith is referring to a 1982 Women in Ministry dinner, when sociologist Sarah Francis Anders presented a paper on the status of women in ministry. And she concluded by calling for the formation of a network of fellowship and support for Baptist women ministers. It is a landmark moment in history for many women in the SBC.
- [37:08]
Pamela Durso
The second was in 1982. The Christian Life Commission put together a task force to study how the convention should move forward with supporting women in ministry. And the task force, again, you can find the archival evidence of the task force and the recommendations that they put forth, which had to do with educating people about how the Bible can be interpreted to support women in ministry, about the opportunities that women in ministry had. The third event was in 1982. There was also a conference that was called Theology as a Verb. And there was a working group that was studying women in ministry and thinking about steps that should be taken next. And in their documents, in the minutes of everything that was said, you can see they have a step by step plan. And the first step of organizing to try and move things forward was to gather a group of 15 to 20 women in ministry, or people who supported women in ministry in early 1983, just before the Christian Life Commission conference. So they get together, it's 33 women. They sit around, they tell their stories, which for a lot of these women, they have never sat in a room with this many other women in ministry and felt that sense of solidarity of like, we have the same story. I'm not alone in this. And that binds them together. And then In June of 1983, they have their first public meeting the day before the SBC annual meeting. And part of this first gathering, first public gathering of Southern Baptist women in ministry, is that behind the scenes, they're having a lot of conversations. The gathering is supported by the WMU and it's supported by the Christian Life Commission. The Christian Life Commission even has a staff member that is assigned to help this group. She did all the planning, took the minutes. There was support. But as they're having these conversations and trying to think about how can we get greater support, they were having conversations about what a resolution could look like in support of women in ministry. And so in the archives, I've seen drafts of potential resolutions that they could submit to the Resolution Committee in hopes that it would move forward eventually. At that 83 SBC annual meeting in Pittsburgh, a resolution is put forward. It's different from what it looked like in their stages, but the Resolution Committee did put it forward. And it talks about women having fair wages in agencies, organizations, churches, institutions and encouraging these churches and organizations to explore giving women more opportunities.
- [39:49]
Savannah Locke
If you're not familiar with the sbc, you might be confused by some of this language. Here. Meredith is describing how the newly formed Women in Ministry group was organizing together to draft and present a resolution at the 1983 Annual Conference Conference with all of the SBC's messengers. Why a resolution? Do they hold any power? Not exactly. The SBC's website says a resolution has traditionally been defined as an expression of opinion or concern as compared to a motion which calls for action. A resolution is not used to direct an entity of the Southern Baptist Convention to specific action other than to communicate the opinion or concern expressed. Resolutions are passed during the annual convention meeting. If you just went off this definition, a resolution is essentially powerless. It is just an expression of opinion that is voted on and passed or rejected by the majority. In practice, though, resolutions hold more power than the SBC lets on. In that definition, resolutions are signals of where the SBC is and where it is going. They are not powerless, and it's important to pay attention to them.
- [41:08]
Beth Allison Barr
This is why Women in Ministry wanted to propose a resolution in 1983 to support women in leadership. The resolution called for fairer pay for women serving in SBC churches, organizations and agencies, as well as greater support for women pursuing leadership roles. If this resolution passed at the denomination's annual meeting, it would signal the SBC's potential willingness to accept women as leaders, preachers and pastors. Let's listen to meredith describe the 1983 resolution in support of Women in Ministry and the surprising amendment that was proposed to soften it.
- [41:48]
Pamela Durso
So this resolution gets put forward and as it does, someone wants to, you know, give an amendment for this. We want to soften it a little bit. So an amendment was put forward to change this resolution a little bit by Joyce Rogers, who is the wife of Pastor Adrian Rogers, a very well known famous pastor at the time of Bellevue Baptist Church. And so her amendment would add a statement at the end that said this resolution should not be interpreted as endorsing the ordination of women. So here it is, this positive statement, as she says, you know what? I'm going to try to help things out and make sure nobody thinks we're actually supporting women. The amendment goes to a vote and it loses by 57 votes out of almost 4,000 votes cast. The amendment loses from being added by 57 votes. So the positive resolution remains and it passes through. So there in 83, you have this moment of like Southern Baptist Women in Ministry is organizing a positive resolution has passed, maybe there's some momentum that's being gained and I cannot help but think that that was seen as a threat to those in power. So the very next year, then you could imagine what they're going to do. They're going to make sure that what was in the amendment is passed and well known that we do not support the ordination of women.
- [43:25]
Beth Allison Barr
Like Meredith said, the 1983 resolution on women was surprisingly open. The statement emphasizes that men and women bear the image of God. It quotes Galatians 3:28 which says there is neither male nor female for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. The closing sections say that for women who work outside the home, we urge all employers, including those Southern Baptist churches, institutions and agencies which employ women, to seek fairness for women in compensation, benefits and opportunities for advancement. Then it closes with we encourage all Southern Baptists to continue to explore further opportunities of service for Baptist women to ensure maximum, maximum utilization of all God called servants of our Lord Jesus Christ.
- [44:15]
Savannah Locke
While the amendment put forward by Joyce Rogers to soften its language and ensure this was not seen as a support for women's ordination failed, the resolution itself passed. This was a huge win for Southern Baptist women in ministry, but for those who were against women's ordination, it was a threat, one that deserved retaliation the following year. Which brings us back to where we began with Jimmy Draper and resolution number three on ordination and the role of women in ministry. This was proposed in direct retaliation to the 1983 resolution supporting women in ministry. Here's Meredith explaining what it said.
- [45:01]
Pamela Durso
The 1984 resolution, it said, you know wonderful nice things about women and you know they're great and they help us in so many ways. But because men were first in creation, then women were first in the Edenic fall. And because women were first in the Edenic fall, then that is why Paul says that women cannot serve as pastors or leaders. So the very end of the resolution says that the ordination of women is not supported.
- [45:35]
Savannah Locke
The resolution exists in full on the SBC's website, but here are some direct quotes worth noting. It starts on a good note, emphasizing that women have worth and can be filled with the Holy Spirit. Quote, the New Testament emphasizes the equal dignity of men and women and that the Holy Spirit was at Pentecost divinely outpoured on men and women alike. Then they point to 1 Corinthians to say women cannot have authority over men. The Scriptures teach that women are not in public worship to assume a role of authority over men, lest confusion reign in the local church Then things get really interesting. They look to Paul's words in Titus and one Timothy to say women can't be ordained because women were. Well, listen for yourself. While Paul commends women and men alike in other roles of ministry and service, he excludes women from pastoral leadership to preserve a submission God requires because the man was first in creation and the woman was first in the Edenic fall.
- [46:48]
Beth Allison Barr
That's right, because Eve was deceived by a serpent in Genesis 3 and ate fruit before Adam. The SPC claims that Paul claims that women are clearly and biblically excluded from pastoral leadership. Rather than relying on quote, emotional factors, this resolution reminds the SBC of the final authority of Scripture in matters of faith and conduct claiming to use Scripture as its sole authority. The resolution closes with this quote we encourage the service of women in all aspects of church life and work other than pastoral functions and leadership roles entailing ordination. Now that you have context for what resolution number three says, here's audio from the 1984 convention when it was presented.
- [47:35]
Jimmy Draper
Coming to present resolution number three, Dr. Carl F.H.
- [47:40]
Beth Allison Barr
Henry after being presented by Dr. Carl F.H. henry, Jimmy Draper held the messengers to a strict eight minute time limit to debate the resolution on the ordination of women, something he notably did not enforce with other resolutions. You can watch the whole thing yourself online, but most of the eight minutes were used up in procedural back and forths, not actual debate. The one exception was when Reverend Dwayne dehoney from Louisville, Kentucky got up to.
- [48:09]
Jimmy Draper
Speak institutional point that is involved here on page 169 of your book of reports. Turn to Article 4 and you'll find a very clear statement that says this Convention does not claim and never will attempt to exercise any authority over any other Baptist body, including the local church. See it there. Underscore that local church friends that pledge was it was made in 1845 when we were constituted as a Convention. It has served us 139 years as a guideline and this discussion and this resolution is therefore not germane to the business of this Convention as stated by our Constitution.
- [49:04]
Savannah Locke
Reverend Dahoney claimed that the resolution prohibiting women's ordination was unconstitutional because it took away autonomy from local churches by telling them to exclude certain people from ministry. For him, the issue of women in ministry was better left to be discerned by local churches, not something the SBC should dictate. This view was apparently shared by others as he received applause during his short speech. After he spoke, another person stood up and asked for a time extension to allow for debate this was voted on by the messengers and rejected. Another two minutes gone. And just like that, eight minutes flew by as resolution number three went to a vote. It passed with 4,793 votes in favor and 3,460 votes against. During the vote, a swell of noise rose up as thousands of messengers began to speak to one another, some of whom were presumably frustrated by the proceedings and lack of honest discussion. One man moderating the vote went up to the main microphone and said this.
- [50:14]
Jimmy Draper
Let me remind the convention once again that when we adopt a resolution, it's merely a statement of opinion of the convention meeting at that particular time. Resolution number four, Mr. Frank Ingram, will present it.
- [50:29]
Beth Allison Barr
There it is again. Resolutions are merely a statement of opinion, everyone. If you disagree, don't sweat it. It's not that big of a deal. But one has to wonder if this resolution really wasn't that consequential, why stifle the debate? Why even respond to the 1983 resolution in favor of women in ministry with a 1984 resolution so clearly against it? If resolutions are just simple, harmless opinions, why did people complain about the 8 minute time limit? Why did this interaction between Jimmy Draper and two messengers happen next?
- [51:05]
Jimmy Draper
We decided to limit debate of the recommendation to eight minutes.
- [51:12]
Beth Allison Barr
This is a messenger on the floor speaking directly to Jimmy Draper on stage.
- [51:18]
Jimmy Draper
I call the point that we did not debate the recommendation, but rather whether the recommendation was in order.
- [51:29]
Beth Allison Barr
This messenger is speaking to Draper in front of 17,000 people saying they did not have adequate debate. They only debated the logistics. Here's how Draper responded, which led directly into a second conflict with another messenger on stage.
- [51:45]
Jimmy Draper
The ruling of the chair is that that's part of the time allotted, and you knew that going in and that that's the decision you made. And it took the time of the body. Thank you. All right, resolution number four is before us. Microphone five. You have something to say about resolution number four? Yes, I have a point of personal privilege. I wish to state now my church will not be found. My name is Kenneth Burke, East Washington Heights Baptist Church. All right. Point of personal privilege. My church. Church will not be bound by any action of this convention condemning the ordination of women as deacons.
- [52:23]
Savannah Locke
We have.
- [52:24]
Jimmy Draper
You're out of order. And we will not be found by. You're out of order. We know that you're not telling us anything. We don't know you had a chance to vote. Now, folks, we're going to deal with the issues before us, and I will not tolerate any more reaching back into these other things. Resolution number four.
- [52:49]
Savannah Locke
As you can tell, Jimmy Draper was frustrated by the messengers who kept bringing up resolution number three. He said he wouldn't tolerate reaching back into old matters and insisted they move on to resolution number four. As we created this miniseries, we heard multiple testimonies of women and men whose microphones were actually muted at this convention. If they brought up the issue of women's ordination behind the scenes, similar interactions were happening, like this one between Jimmy Draper and Pastor Susan Lockwood Wright.
- [53:20]
Pamela Durso
Great story that we learned as we were doing some research came from one of the women who was at that 84 convention, Pastor Susan Lockwood Wright. She had preached at the Southern Baptist Women in Ministry gathering the day before this resolution is put forward. She's the pastor of Cornell Baptist Church in Chicago, Illinois, at the time. Small congregation, but just is doing amazing. Graduate of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. And when the resolution is put forward, she felt compelled to speak against it.
- [53:55]
Meredith Stone
As you might imagine.
- [53:57]
Pamela Durso
And so she goes up to the microphone. It's her turn to speak, but her microphone gets shut off, and they call for a vote. So she never got to speak against it. So some folks who were standing behind her in line told her, hey, you could try to appeal this and go up and get a statement made from the stage. So she goes to the stage and she says, I want to appeal to President Jimmy Draper to be able to make a statement against this resolution. I feel like a pastor, a female serving as a pastor, should be heard from on this resolution. And he tells her, you know, let me get. Come back and meet me up here a little bit later this afternoon. I need to think about it and pray about it. So she goes back, she meets him at the appointed time, and he says to her, you know, I've thought about this, I've prayed about it, and I'm not going to let you make a statement because you women got your way last year. If that is not evidence that what happened in 84 was backlash to the rise that had been happening in 1983, I don't know what is.
- [55:07]
Beth Allison Barr
We reached out to Jimmy Draper and asked if he remembered this conversation with Susan Lockwood Wright. He thanked us for the question and said the SBC convention is not a time for anyone to stand up and make a speech about anything they're interested in. If Susan wanted to make a speech, she could have made a motion, but she chose not to do that. He said around that time, he also had to rule Adrian Rogers out of order for something he was wanting to do as well. Draper admitted he didn't remember that specific time very well, but that's typically how he would have handled things.
- [55:40]
Savannah Locke
Resolutions, even ones that are apparently just opinion, have have consequences. And in 1984, the SBC made it clear where a woman's place was in their denomination.
- [55:54]
Beth Allison Barr
Next time, we're going to talk to a real woman who was ordained by the SBC in the early 80s and how months after moving across the country to plant a church with her husband, she would receive a phone call with news that would change her family's life. But I'm be from the Church of Celebrity all the Buried Women is hosted and written by Beth Allison Barr and Savannah Locke. It was edited by Savannah Locke and the music was done by Todd Locke. The song you hear in the intro and outro is called Jaded by, you guessed it, Savannah Lock. And for more detailed credits, be sure to check out the show notes. We're so thankful to everyone who worked behind the scenes to make this possible. We reached out to the sbc, Paige Patterson, Daryl Gilliard, Tommy Gilmore, and the Council for National Policy for comment and did not hear back.
- [57:00]
Savannah Locke
What.