Evangelical Feminism: A New Path to Liberalism?

13: EXPERIENCE TRUMPS SCRIPTURE 125

for men and women to share equally in eldership and pastoral leader-
ship roles, then at some point in the last two thousand years, and espe-
cially today, would we not expect to see a remarkable blessing of God
on some churches that have an equal number of men and women as
elders and that share the main Bible teaching responsibilities equally
between men and women pastors? If this is God’s ideal, then why have
we not seen a pattern of God’s evident blessing on such churches, among
the millions of churches that have existed in the last two thousand years?
Liberal denominations that ordain women pastors have continually
declined in membership and income. Historian Ruth Tucker summarizes
this trend:

The role of women in the church in the twentieth century will per-

plex future historians.... Those historians who dig deeper will dis-

cover that the mainline churches that were offering women the

greatest opportunities were simultaneously declining in membership

and influence. Some of these churches, which once had stood firm on

the historic orthodox faith, were becoming too sophisticated to take

the Bible at face value. The gains that have been made, then, are

mixed at best.^12

Tucker’s assessment can be supported by observing the membership
trends in the large liberal denominations that have been the strongest
proponents of women’s ordination:^13

(^12) Tucker, Women in the Maze, 184. Additional information on the decline of liberal
Protestant churches and the rapid increase of conservative, Bible-believing churches is found
in Dave Shiflett, Exodus: Why Americans Are Fleeing Liberal Churches for Conservative
Christianity (New York: Sentinel, 2005) (his summary statistics on denominations are on xiii-
xiv). Among conservative denominations that do not ordain women, Shiflett documents some
remarkable growth in the last ten years: for example, the Southern Baptist Convention grew
5 percent, the Presbyterian Church in America grew 42.4 percent, the Christian and
Missionary Alliance grew 21.8 percent, and the Evangelical Free Church grew 57.2 percent
(xiv; however, Shiflett also notes an 18.5 percent increase in the Assemblies of God, which
does ordain women).
(^13) The information in this chart was compiled for me by my teaching assistants Travis
Buchanan and Steve Eriksson from Martin B. Bradley et al., Churches and Church
Membership in the United States, 1990 (Atlanta: Glenmary Research Center, 1992); and Dale
E. Jones et al., Religious Congregations and Membership in the United States, 2000
(Nashville: Glenmary Research Center, 2002); and from reference material compiled by Justin
Taylor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis (now of Good News Publishers, Crossway
Books and Bibles, Wheaton, Illinois). Numbers for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America use the combined totals for the American Lutheran Church and the Lutheran Church
of America for 1971 and 1980.