Council Members Respond 
to "On Being Evangelical and Ecumenical"

Response from Alena Amato Ruggerio

What a delight it was to read Anne's Council Column! It took time, thought, and love to articulate these vital issues so beautifully. 

I found the article richly provocative for several related reasons: first, because it reveals the painstaking care with which the 2004 conference is being planned; second, because the conference serves as the frame through which Anne engages the questions of who we really are after nearly thirty years of biblical feminism; and finally, because when we are in dialogue about what we stand for, this organization is taking steps toward the kind of activism that will move us into the future. 

The Conference that Almost Wasn't 

I am going to be grateful for next summer's conference not just because of the provocative speakers, or the creative "path" explorations, or the stirring music. I plan to savor every minute of the 2004 gathering because I know how close it came to not happening at all. 

As the Indianapolis gang went to press with the 2002 conference program book, we wanted to include an invitation to the 2004 conference, but we could not because no one had felt the call to volunteer yet. The ensuing year has taught me much about the grinding exhaustion of overcommitment so many of us feel, so I wasn't surprised when months after the Indianapolis conference, still no one had been able to pledge to lead a committee for 2004. A few Council members discussed planning the 2004 conference by spanning our cross-country locations through e-mail and conference calls. Unfortunately, even given the wonders of technology, we knew the task would be extremely difficult. It was at this point where we pick up with Anne's story of the Spirit singing in the souls of the Los Angeles-area women, and I thrilled to see all the logistical details clicking into place once their commitment had been made to the Divine. Anne, Karen, Ann, and Margaret, when you are struggling with how to satisfy all your dreams for the next conference, please don't forget that anything you bring forth is already miraculous. 

Identity Issues 

As Anne points out in her column, the issues raised by the details of the 2004 conference at Scripps College are actually manifestations of deeper identity questions. When it comes to Christianity and feminism, EEWC has triumphed at maintaining a both/and position, rather than an either/or position. We approach evangelical and ecumenical in the same way, refusing to accept an organizational identity that is forced into one side of a false dichotomy. 

Anne's deeper question, then, seems to be, "When this sophisticated position -- both Christian and feminist, both evangelical and ecumenical -- is put into practice at our biennial conference, what should it actually look like?" I cannot wait for each member of EEWC to add her or his own answer to the conversation. In part, I'm eager to see where this self-reflexive discussion takes us because it might help to answer a related question I've been pondering this year as I've served as Coordinator: "When this sophisticated position -- both Christian and feminist, both evangelical and ecumenical -- is put into practice in political advocacy, what should it actually look like?" 

EEWC has done a wonderful job creating a community of welcome and inclusivity. But in the handful of years I've been a part of Council, I've also wanted to see our circle of sisterhood speak out for more issues informed by biblical feminism, but outside our immediate community. 

Taking Stands 

Our journalism professors teach their students that when they are preparing a news report on a controversial topic, they should include quotations from representative spokespersons on at least two sides of the issue. When the Southern Baptist Convention codified their theological statement on the submission of women, for instance, conservative Christian groups like Focus on the Family were quoted in support of the decision. But who was quoted as a representative of progressive feminist Christianity? Journalists create a "media rolodex" of experts they can contact for viewpoints on current events, and I believe it is imperative that we in the Evangelical and Ecumenical Women's Caucus add ourselves to the list so that we can reach more people with our perspectives on news items germane to biblical feminism. 

Naturally, politico-theological sound bites have their dangers. It would be difficult to explain the intricacies of biblical exegesis on The Today Show! Yet, I believe that one strategy to attract young women to EEWC is to reach them through the television programs and websites that define their reality. It is true that keeping a higher public profile would also open us to new rounds of criticism from our complementarian opponents. But if even one woman, smothered under patriarchal religion, were led by the controversy to check out our website or pick up a copy of EEWC Update, then it is my opinion that the only bad press is no press. 

I should emphasize the word "opinion." Council has been emphatic that no single person determines the direction of EEWC, and Anne's article and these printed replies are meant to be invitations to an organization-wide dialogue. I especially hope the conversation continues on the Forum section of the EEWC website. 

Does our both/and identity lead directly to social justice activism? Is there any recently newsworthy issue we all agree is worth standing up for? Anne writes persuasively about preserving the diversity within our organization. We all come to biblical feminism from different backgrounds, and our dedication to tolerance means that EEWC does not have any official lines to toe on divisive topics like pornography, abortion, and warfare. But I am looking forward to our finding together the next social justice cause that seems to flow naturally from the statement of faith we already accept -- Christian and feminist, evangelical and ecumenical. I am filled with hope that the Divine could use our collective advocacy to draw new people into this passionate community of biblical feminists.

EEWC Council member Alena Amato Ruggerio is EEWC's Coordinator (2003). She is an assistant professor of communication and a Women's Studies Associate at Southern Oregon University in Ashland, Oregon.

Response from Jeanne Hanson, EEWC Central Office Manager

Thank you, Anne, for this wonderful article. I am rather speechless to express how important and helpful it is. It is an excellent example/application/representation of who we are -- open, honest, vulnerable, intelligent, loving, learning, inclusive, stretching -- and all the while with our feet on the ground and our eyes focused on our purpose and mission!

Response from Linda Bieze

Anne Eggebroten has given us a thorough introduction to how the "evangelical" aspect of EEWC resembles and, notably, differs from the broader world of evangelicalism. By telling us about all the considerations that go into planning a biennial conference for EEWC, she has illustrated the difficult path that evangelical feminists must walk to be true to both parts of the name "evangelical feminist." 

As a feminist and Christian in the Reformed tradition, I have never been comfortable with the name "evangelical." Churches in the Reformed tradition follow the teachings of such theologians as John Calvin and John Knox. They include Presbyterian churches, the Reformed Church in America, and the Christian Reformed Church in North America, of which I am a member. I became active in EEWC soon after it added "ecumenical" to its name because that name change assured me that the group did not share the narrow focus I had come to identify with evangelicalism -- what Anne describes as the third trait of an evangelical EEWC conference, "bringing the good news of God's salvation to those who haven't heard it." 

Please don't misunderstand me. I believe that every child of God is called to bring God's good news to others. But as a Reformed believer, I understand that such evangelism is only a part of the believer's calling. Yes, people must be born again. But all of God's creation must also be born again and liberated through the good news of God's inclusive love. That is the Reformed view that I hold, and I think it places me closer to the "ecumenical" side of EEWC. 

I have loved every EEWC conference I have attended, for at each one I hear again the "old, old story" of Jesus' inclusive love for people. But I long to see EEWC take more action to redeem and transform all of God's creation. Where were EEWC sisters and brothers during the protests last year of the pending unilateral U.S. war on Iraq? Where were we when thousands of Roman Catholics needed words and acts of healing after a handful of clergy had abused them? Where are we when the Episcopal Church in the U.S. is torn apart by the appointment of an openly gay bishop? Where are we at the sad and ironic moment when a "pro-life" murderer is put to death in Florida? Where are we when thousands of working poor in America cannot afford decent housing and health care? Where are we while AIDS kills thousands in Africa, and U.S. drug companies refuse to provide the medication that can save them at a price they can afford? 

Thirty years ago, the Evangelical Women's Caucus was born at a meeting of a group called Evangelicals for Social Action. In the intervening decades, though, evangelicals seem to have exchanged social action for generally conservative political action. And wishing to distance itself from this, perhaps, EEWC seems to have lost sight of our call to social action. Jesus' own brother James had to remind the early Church that they, too, were called to action as well as to telling others about God's good news. "What good is it, my brothers and sisters," he wrote, "if you say you have faith but do not have good works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,' and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?" (James 2: 14-16, NRSV). 

The Reformed tradition that I follow tries to answer this call to action, as well as the call to proclaim the good news of God's salvation. I would like to see EEWC become more "Reformed" in this sense in order to redeem all of God's creation through acts of God's inclusive love.

Linda Bieze, who is Coordinator Emerita of EEWC, recently moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she works as an editor for Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

Response from Nancy Hardesty 

The 2004 Conference Committee is putting together an exciting time for us all. For the past thirty years EEWC conferences have inspired, nourished, and challenged us time and again. This next meeting is guaranteed to do the same. 

But from the beginning, we have wrestled with issues of identity and theology. At the very first EWC conference in Washington, D.C., even before I gave my presentation, I was asked: "Please define 'evangelical' for us." 

We began as the Evangelical Women's Caucus (EWC) because we emerged as an interest group within Evangelicals for Social Action. And some of us do have evangelical roots. I have been saved, sanctified, and baptized twice (the second by immersion, of course). I spent my teen years in the Christian and Missionary Alliance. Every day in high school I carried my red Youth for Christ Bible atop my books. I have a degree from Wheaton College (Illinois) I have lectured at Gordon and Fuller seminaries, Wheaton College, and a number of other fine evangelical schools. 

EWC never left evangelicalism, but even as we began, evangelicalism was leaving us. Leaders of ESA and other "evangelical" organizations began to deny women authority over their own bodies. They denied human rights to gay people. They continue to resist religious freedom for those of other faiths. For most Americans these days "evangelicalism" has been defined by people who in the dark of night install granite monuments to their own religion in courthouses and pray for Divine removal of Supreme Court judges with whom they disagree. Far too often evangelicalism appears to be simply a clique of the self-righteous. 

Within EEWC some of us also have ecumenical roots, coming from a range of denominations and theological traditions, both mainline and beyond. For nearly thirty years I was a faithful Episcopalian (I was initially drawn by the denomination's positive work in the civil rights movement and after their recent actions I am seriously thinking of returning). For about fifteen years I was a devoted member of a Metropolitan Community Church. I teach World Religions and participate in the local interfaith organization. 

In far too many cases, those who cling to the label "evangelical" do so simply to assert spiritual superiority over others, taking blatant pride in some mistaken perception that they are holier than others, their theology the only orthodoxy. From a historical perspective this is absurd. Virtually none of what "evangelicals" preach or practice would be recognizable to the 2000-year-old truly Orthodox Church. Indeed, virtually none of what they preach and practice would be recognizable to any Christian before 1800. Revivalism (the idea that one can and should "make a decision" for Christ and that preaching should be focused on persuading people to do that) was invented in the 1830s by Charles Grandison Finney. Dispensational premillennialism with its "any-moment Rapture" was invented in the 1840s by John Nelson Darby. The plenary verbal inspiration of the Bible and the notion that the Bible is "inerrant in the original autographs" were invented by Princeton theologians around 1880. The "substitutionary" view of the atonement is only one of about a half-dozen theories about its meaning that theologians down through the centuries have proposed. Neglect of the sacraments would appall most of history's Christians. 

Besides, "evangelicalism," as the term is commonly understood today, is largely a media-created mishmash of organizations that historically have had quite distinct and conflicting viewpoints: Holiness people, Pentecostals, fundamentalists, neo-fundamentalists, neo-evangelicals, and charismatics. Each of these groups differ significantly in their theological definitions of Christianity. 

Personally, I am content to affirm that I am a Christian, one who subscribes to the Nicene Creed, recognizing that even that describes only the beliefs of most but not all Christians. "I believe in God," Yahweh, El Shaddai, Pantocrator, the Almighty. I affirm the Trinity, not as a biblical doctrine, but as the faith of the Christian church. I affirm the church's definition of Christ as fully human and fully divine. For me, the specifics of theology are far less important than the core of the Jewish tradition that Jesus reaffirmed, the first and second Great Commandments: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10: 27; see Mark 12:29-31; Matt. 22:37-38; Deut. 6:4-5; Lev. 19:18). 

I find guidance for living out those commands in Scripture. Having taught New Testament to college students for more than a decade now, I still believe (as Letha and I believed when we wrote and revised All We're Meant to Be) that a close and faithful reading of the biblical text does reveal good news for women. And despite the clarity so many people seem to find in English texts presumably condemning homosexuality, I still find a more positive message in God's word. I continually remind my students to read the text. I find that most of the people who loudly proclaim that they take the Bible literally only take literally their own biased interpretations of the English text. They don't explore the whole Bible, and they are totally uncritical of their own modern cultural perspectives. 

EEWC remains one of those rare places where women of all faith perspectives can come together and explore these issues together. It is also a place where we can sing and dance, weep and rage, laugh and play, and support one another in our struggles to grow in God's grace.

A coordinator emerita of EEWC, Nancy Hardesty is professor of religion at Clemson University in Clemson, SC. She has just finished a book for Hendrickson Publishers titled Faith Cure: Divine Healing in the Early Holiness and Pentecostal Movements. She will be speaking on Saturday night during next June's conference. Among her other books are Inclusive Language in the Church; Women Called to Witness; and, with Letha Dawson Scanzoni, All We're Meant to Be: Biblical Feminism for Today.

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 © 2003 Evangelical and Ecumenical Women's Caucus