Tempered Radicals: Black Women's Leadership in the Church and Community

The Challenge of Women's Leadership Women have been under-represented in positions of leadership in most arenas, including corporate, education, government and non-profit sector around globe. This under-representation has been described as glass ceiling; a term coined by Wall Street Journal to denote apparent barriers that prevent women from advancing to top of corporate hierarchies (Weiss 1999). The subject of women and leadership has received a lot of attention, particularly in last two decades after area of study was initiated by Rosabeth Moss Kanter in her incisive book about and women in corporate America (Kanter 1977, 1997). In religious sector, issue of ordination of women has divided many churches and resulted in many conflicts. Most mainline protestant denominations in United States (US) did not begin to ordain women until women's voices were initially heard following on heels of American civil rights movement, as women demanded equality of access. As Sullins (2000) found out, whereas some protestant denominations had in theory accepted ordination of women as biblical and acceptable, it took several decades before theory matched their practice both in US and other parts of world. There is, moreover, a disparity between formal acceptance and actual status of women clergy in those denominations that ordain women. Empirical findings suggest that the more responsible, prestigious, and superordinate church positions in virtually every female-ordaining denomination fall disproportionately to men (Sullins 2000, 244). This phenomenon is referred to as stained glass ceiling: those apparent barriers that keep women from attaining positions of authority within religious institutions, subordinating women to lower levels and/or smaller, financially strapped congregations (Williams-Gegner, Gramby-Sobukwe and Ngunjiri 2010). Carroll and Washington (2006) indicated that, whereas Black women in U.S. make up a large majority of Black church membership (up to 70%), they are only a tiny minority among its recognized spiritual leaders. The Black church lags far behind mainline protestant denominations in both formally ordaining as well as recognizing spiritual authority of women in their ranks. 11% of those self-identifying as clergy in 1990 census were women; however, in Black church, only about 3% of clergy were women. Yet, women have played important roles in providing leadership for Black church throughout its history, as evidenced by lives and stories of phenomenal Black women, many who provided leadership without becoming formally ordained and/or recognized (Carpenter 2001). Tempered Radicalism Intersectionality is interpretive framework undergirding exploration of Black women's experiences within Black church who, because of their gender, race, and other social identity markers, find themselves at odds with dominant culture. An intersectional paradigm indicates that intersections of race and gender, sexuality and social class, shape Black women's and other minority groups' experiences within US (Collins 1996, 2009; Crenshaw, 1991). As Alston (2005, p. 677) argued, this concept helps to account for complexity of Black woman's lived experiences, recognizing that race, class, and gender are markers of power creating intersecting lines or axes used to reinforce power relations and forms of oppression. Collins argued that Black women in US have historically produced knowledge, but that knowledge is subjugated in academy. Black feminist thought, an intersectional and critical theory, aims at exposing and dislodging injustices faced by African Americans in US, and increasingly, it is being extended to look at Black women's experiences globally (Collins 2009). We uncover historical, social and cultural factors that, combined, form 'matrix of domination' (Collins 2009, 21) affecting Black women's experiences in church and limiting their access to pulpit. …