#NeverthelessShePreached: WOMEN’S PREACHING AND RELIGIOUS AUTHORIT Y Dr. Ashley Dreff Assistant Professor of Religion
If you’ve paid attention to social media
over the past two years, you may
have picked up on a newly prominent conversation regarding women’s religious authority — at least new, in terms of the “Twitter-sphere” as #ChurchToo, #NeverthelessShePreached and #NotGoingHome were top trending hashtags all seeking to support women preachers. As an American Religious Historian who focuses on the role of women, gender and sexuality within American constructs of Christianity, the question of women’s religious authority is not new to me. From Anne Hutchinson (1630s), to Jarena Lee (1810s), to Anna Howard Shaw (1910s) and to Beth Moore (2019), women’s authority to preach has been consistently and constantly questioned throughout American history. (It should be noted that this conversation extends beyond American Christianities to encompass all of Christian history and is not limited to the Christian faith.) Preaching for the purposes of this article (and my research at large) is defined as speaking with religious authority or interpreting theological texts aloud to groups of people; it is not limited to only those who are ordained or 14
The Lighted Lamp | Fall 2020
