Are women being treated better today?

For my father it was important to be well-informed, so he subscribed to the weekly Adventist Review and the Youth's Instructor, which came from afar to our northern European country, albeit very late. I loved reading these magazines. The reports and their authors became familiar to me through their pages. The first thing I always read was the column "Dear Miriam," in which Miriam Wood answered young people's questions. Over the course of twelve years, she wrote nearly 150 articles, each time balanced, wise, courageous, and positive. Her last contribution appeared on December 29, 1994,[1] and she looked back on 40 years of writing for her church. Miriam Wood was the popular Ann Landers for the Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) Church. She was the wife of the longtime editor-in-chief of the Adventist Review, Kenneth Wood, but her column was launched by his successor, William Johnsson. A prolific author, she published 16 books that included stories of people who gave devoted service to the SDA church. Herself a teacher, she also had good insight into all things going on in the church. I had the privilege of meeting many leaders of my church. Often they sat at our dinner table and my horizon was broadened by our conversations. Miriam Wood was one of those people, and I can remember how lively the discussion with her was.

For the consultations on the Role of Women in the Church at Camp Mohaven in 1973, Miriam Wood wrote a paper on discrimination against female employees of the SDA church.[2] She made it clear that she did not want to be considered a women's rights activist, but advocated for fair treatment and pay for women in the church. She questioned whether male leaders of the church were so insecure, mediocre, and yet so grossly convinced of their superiority that they could not accept women as equals. This attitude of male superiority has existed so long that it is considered as a divinely ordained state of affairs, she said. To prove her point, she recounted several instances in which men - respected church leaders - displayed an overbearing attitude toward women.

Wood writes of the tragedy of ignoring women's incredible reservoir of skills, talents, and willingness to serve in the face of the magnitude of the mission of the church. Even worse, these abilities are patronized and exploited. The majority of the church membership is ignored, she wrote, because they are women. As an example of the discrimination against women, she related the following story:

Due to the resignation of an employee of an institution whose work was highly qualified, very demanding, and important, the leading brethren had to find a replacement for this position. The employee in question, a woman, had toiled for years without complaint and appreciation, with poor pay. After much serious discussion, they concluded that because of the magnitude of the task, a man was needed so that the job would be done properly. Therefore, an entirely new budget was hastily created for the position that met male expectations. However, in reality, the workload of the post was so extraordinarily heavy that a redistribution of responsibilities had to be made before the brethren dared to issue a call for the post. Unfortunately, the amount of work was still too much and they could not find a man willing to accept the job. The quiet, reliable woman had really done an enormous amount of work. What was to be done? Again there were hurried, feverish deliberations. The work had to be done, and deadlines had to be met. Those in charge made the "only possible" decision. Temporarily, they said, another woman would have to be brought in. Of course, the job specifications would return to the original outlines, and, as one committee member succinctly put it, "We won't have to use the budget after all. We'll save a whole lot of money because we won't have to pay a woman what we would pay a man!"

The woman they found for the job, however, was more spirited than some of her downtrodden sisters, and quit immediately when she realized the injustice of the situation. The men marveled at her impudence and ingratitude. How they managed to solve the dilemma, was unknown to Wood when she reported the incident. She hoped, however, that they had not found another patient woman to take advantage of in the name of sacrifice.

Sacrifice is certainly part of the equation when people work for a church and devote themselves wholeheartedly to the task, regardless of financial compensation. But Wood stressed that this sacrifice should not be expected only of the women employed by the church. "A teacher, stenographer, executive secretary,  librarian - any of these professional people is entitled to compensation for the job done, at any equal rate with anyone else, regardless of sex. To fail to give female workers monetary rewards commensurate with those received by male denominational employees is to practice rank discrimination.”

As another example of unequal treatment, she reported how a very talented young woman was given a job that required her to carry a heavy load and responsibility that was not actually part of her job description. Since the man who was officially in charge of the job, without doing the work, was taking all the credit for it, the young woman turned to the decision-makers. She asked if she, who worked almost day and night, could not have the official position and receive the greater financial benefits that came with it. Her request was met with cold disbelief. "We will never," she was told firmly, "have a woman officially doing the work you are now doing." Being a spirited, emancipated soul, she soon found other employment, still in the church but in an office where she, too, was recognized for her work. Wood concluded the report by saying, "Unfortunately, those offices are few.”

Miriam Wood was not a rebel or a revolutionary. She was a child of her time who recognized that one must express oneself clearly, but also be careful with men to be heard at all. She accepted that women were not ordained and did not take up the issue. Her voice, which called out discrimination against women in the church is now silent. Others who remember that time say that in the 1970s there was an atmosphere of hope that things would get better. Now those hopes have been dashed, as women are still not treated equally with their male counterparts.

Now, you may say, such experiences are in the past. Today, women are treated better. That is true in some areas of the church. We have made progress. In Germany, there are no differences based on gender in the pay of pastors. Church leaders show appreciation for the work women do in the church. They have recognized that the church cannot do without more than half of its members. And yet, many prejudices against women still exist. Perhaps the leadership has grasped that women and men are equal, but in some congregations, women pastors still experience hurtful disrespect from church members. We see this when church members refuse to receive communion from a female pastor. We hear this when a female pastor is told that she has no business on the podium. We feel this when young female graduates, faced with difficult prospects, prefer to call themselves Bible workers and decide to forego the responsibility of being a pastor.

In an old album, I found a picture of the workers of the newly founded West Finland Conference taken in 1948. Besides the eight men (including the Union president they were nine), eleven women worked in the proclamation of the Gospel. They were called Bible workers, but they were accepted and respected everywhere just like the pastors in pastoral care and preaching. Probably their pay was not equal at that time, but all of them, men and women alike, served their church sacrificially. Twenty years later the Finland Union requested permission to ordain such women.

The ordination of women to the ministry was viewed favorably in the early days of the SDA church, although the resolution passed in 1881 was not implemented. Since that time, the pendulum has been swinging between advocacy and rejection of the ordination of women pastors by church leadership. Efforts have failed due to opposition from conservative forces. Many studies have been conducted without producing consistent results. As I show elsewhere, the problem could easily be solved by equal treatment and by eliminating the word ordination.

Miriam Wood focused on equal treatment of a different kind. She rejected the male arrogance that saw women as inferior and expressed itself in unequal pay. Likewise, she denounced women being expected to do more work than a man, with less pay. She probably never saw a woman given credit for her work by being officially appointed to a leadership position whose work she was doing anyway. Department directors are still mostly men.

Interestingly, Wood was generally loved and respected by the church, even though she addressed such uncomfortable things. Since I do not have the gift of soft words, let me just point out the tremendous increase in positions in church administration at all levels. Many full-time positions have been created that would not have even been thought of in the past. Most of these positions are filled by men. When a woman is appointed as a department director, she is often not offered a full position but is expected to do 100% work for 60% pay.

The other day, when I was compiling the statistical report of what women do in my local church, I realized that almost everything we do in the church is done by women. Some men are involved as well, and we are happy about that, but it is the women who initiate, organize, plan and execute. We do not have to compare who does more. That is not the question. We are in this effort together and should respect, encourage and support each other. That is my dream.

 

Photo: Rouhe private archive