| abstract |
Many African-American women today find it difficult to rise to positions of
senior leadership within US Pentecostal churches and ministry fellowships. Pentecostal
clergymen with the power to select individuals for leadership roles typically favor men
over women when making leadership selections, even though there are female candidates
equally as trained and qualified as their male counterparts to occupy these positions. As a
result, African-American women who seek to occupy higher levels of leadership in the
church tend to feel that there are limits to how far they can go in executing the call of
God on their lives. Although women have protested such practices and argued for equal
consideration over the years, the predominantly male leadership that maintains decision-
making power in the Pentecostal church has met their protests with resistance rather than
receptivity. This resistance has resulted in strained relationships between men and women
in the African-American Pentecostal church and produced a constituency of female
leaders who experience feelings of frustration, resentment, isolation and loneliness.
The goal of this thesis is to address the issue of why African-American women
continue to be disregarded for senior-level leadership positions in the Pentecostal church.
This thesis is driven by two primary questions: If women served as pastors and bishops
during the nascent stage of the Pentecostal movement, why are they unable to occupy the
same positions today? Why is there a decline of African-American females in those roles
today? This project utilizes biblical texts and extra-biblical and historical documents that
highlight female leadership throughout history to argue that women should be permitted
to participate equally with their male counterparts as leaders in the Pentecostal church.
The findings of the research suggest that women are relegated to lower-level
positions in the Pentecostal church as a result of attitudes grounded in misogyny and
sexism. The thesis offers a theological rationale for Bishops and other leaders in the
Pentecostal Church to overcome these persistent attitudes and remove the stained-glass
ceiling hindering the advancement of African-American women. Recommendations are
offered to help African-American Pentecostal fellowships create initiatives to promote
women to senior leadership positions.
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