From my post today on Moscow’s Vision 2020:
My paternal great-great grandparents, Louisa Spiller Bowles and William Henry Bowles, were both osteopathic physicians and evangelists affiliated with the Disciples of Christ denomination. While it’s more liberal now, the Disciples denomination was quite conservative Biblically, often to the point of unfortunate conclusions that kept my grandparents from attending my parents’ wedding because of my mother’s Roman Catholicism. Nonetheless, they helped pioneer the Disciples congregation in Marion, Illinois, fought valiantly for the Gospel and, because of their commitment to Christ, for the immediate, nonviolent abolition of slavery. Louisa was a pioneer in many ways, as was her daughter, my great-grandmother Hattie, also a physician and activist. I never met her, but I adored my feisty, liberal, but arreligious grandmother, who passed away in 1997 and was the wife of my beloved Papa, about whom I’ve written on my blog.
This is especially compelling to me as we remember Juneteenth and as I discover that Moscow’s favorite patriarchal pastor is writing a book called “Why Ministers Must Be Men,” which, from an excerpt I read, is a manifesto not only for manly men to keep the pulpit to themselves, but also a typically careless swipe at denominations that ordain women. Wilson doesn’t give a rip what I think, but let me assure him that ministers need not be men.
Ministers must be Godly, faithful, humble, intelligent and sensitive and, most of all, Spirit-gifted, qualities that make testicles irrelevant. The New Testament is full of examples of women in leadership, and so is the last 200 years of evangelicalism. Trust me when I say that women in the pulpit is the last thing Wilson ought to fear.