These stories are adapted from the book Safe Church: How To Guard Against Sexism & Abuse in Christian Communities by Dr. Andrew Bauman. Art is done by Her Cherch. You can follow her work here, and check out HerCherch’s merch at the Bare Marriage store!
Here’s Dr. Andrew Bauman writing today!
Well, of course church is safe, right?
I would have thought the Church was a safe place, too, until the results came in from my research of over 2,800 women who worked in the church.
I have compiled these results in my new book, Safe Church: How to Guard Against Sexism & Abuse in Christian Communities. The courageous women from the study have been on the front lines of Christian ministry:
- 26% had been in ministry between 16 and 25 years
- nearly 16% had been in ministry for over 25 years
- and the rest have been working in the church between 1 and 15 years.
These women know the church inside and out and can teach us something new if we listen to their experiences.
Here are a few of the most significant statistical takeaways from this 5-year research project.
One of the biggest takeaways from over 2,800 women was that:
1. 82% of respondents agreed that sexism plays a role in church
Similarly, Kelley said she was made to wear dresses at church.
She shared,
“I have a big butt, so I would always wear huge skirts to cover my butt because I didn’t want men to lust after me.”
Beth was also criticized for her choice of clothing.
“Women could not wear tank tops… I remember working at Vacation Bible School, and it was like nine thousand degrees in this little country bumpkin church, and they [said], ‘She cannot be on stage. She has a sleeveless shirt on.’”
I was shocked that the number was so high, but I am not a woman, and I have not lived a lifetime of this behavior being my norm.
I began reading the courageous stories that they shared. Stories like Hannah, who worked on her church staff as a worship leader, heard all-male church staff members joking that they could increase church attendance if they required women to wear white T-shirts to get baptized. (Of course, she didn’t think it was a joke.)
What do you think she felt in her body after hearing that?
What did she think about her breasts? Her worth? Imagine how small, invisible, and objectified she must have felt.
Rose also shared her belief that the church placed the responsibility on women “for having bodies rather than holding men accountable for perverse thoughts.” Numerous participants admitted they felt “shamed” for having a female body and that an “unfair responsibility” was imposed upon them by men in church leadership positions.
These women felt the weight of the male gaze and the responsibility of male integrity was put squarely on their shoulders; this is a form of abusive behavior and speaks to a pornified church environment that is not safe for women.
But that wasn’t my only revelation in this study. Another discovery was:
2. 77.9 percent of women felt that opportunities in ministry had been limited due to their gender.
Gail shared in the questionnaire about her experience with her limited opportunity to be hired as the worship leader of her church. She said,
“I was kept from being hired as a worship leader, although I had been “filling in” for the role for over a year, had a degree in music, and more than a decade of experience. I couldn’t be hired because I was a woman, even though leadership agreed I was doing an exemplary and exceptionally qualified job. The man hired in my place was a far less capable musician, administrator, and music director.”
Gail’s experience is not isolated and is a form of intuitional gaslighting and objectification. The church is “using her” for her skills and giftedness yet has no plans of compensating her. They continued to use her until they found an average male replacement, and the pain of that experience, Gail will never forget.
Heather experienced this painful statistic when she answered,
“I got a master’s of Divinity degree from Harvard, and I still could not find a church in my denomination to hire me because I was a woman, so I changed denominations to find a job.”
We have amputated half of the body of Christ because many men are insecure and are more committed to patriarchy than a correct understanding of God’s word.
Another disturbing finding in my Safe Church research was that:
3. 62% would not be surprised if they heard a sexist joke in church
These so-called jokes against women are normalized by men in power, which increases their occurrence and acceptance.
One woman wrote that:
“sexist jokes that were very inappropriate (and sexual) were prevalent. When I asked if [the male leaders] would tell less of them, I was told that ‘men will be men,’ and if I wanted to succeed in a man’s profession, I needed to be okay with it.”
When women spoke up against the sexist jokes, they were gaslit and mansplained and told to be quiet and loosen up. Being told it’s “just a joke,” is another way to silence women’s experience and continue a normative culture of objectification, all the while cursing women’s sacred intuition in favor of insecure male-centered sexism and abuse.
Another startling finding was that,
4. 35% of women who worked in the church answered that they had experienced sexual misconduct/harassment or responded that it was “complicated” rather than saying no
Rebecca said her parents forced her and her sisters to wear a wetsuit-style bathing suit, called “modesty swimsuits,” when they went swimming. Rebecca covered her skin from torso to neck.
She said one of her father’s friends commented that he was “thankful [he] could go swimming with [his] family because [he] did not have to worry about lusting because of how the girls dressed. She would be praised for her modesty and for protecting her “Brother in Christ.” Rebecca was a teenager, which made her dad’s friend a potential pedophile and a danger that he had sexualized children. Yet it was normalized as a conversation about “modesty” of Rebecca and her sisters rather than sexual perversion and pornified thinking of this adult man.
Jackie also shared her story. She was in her late teens, and her abuser was in his forties and was previously her science teacher at her Christian school and a spiritual leader in the community. He raped her multiple times.
Jackie’s Pastor said both parties were wrong and she was “a tempter.” She said:
“the church leadership made me make a formal apology to [my abuser’s] wife less than twenty-four hours after they got me away from him and then to his daughter the next day. Can you believe that?!”
We can not dismiss Jackie and Rebecca’s stories as just merely rare one-off experiences; roughly 35% of over 2,800 women, that is, 981 women, said yes or answered “it’s complicated” if they had been sexually harassed as they worked in the church. From my research, we can also observe that years of experience and sexual victimization are firmly related, meaning the more experience you have in the church, the more likely you are to be victimized.
These stories are disturbing and humbling.
I hope they propel us to change the system from which many of us (especially men) have benefitted. But, similar to the sweet liquid of Ethylene glycol, hierarchical norms in the church are killing us and keeping us from knowing God more fully. As men, we first like power and control, which makes us feel strong. Still, we slowly realize we are not meant for the isolation of power or the perpetration of the abuse.
I genuinely believe that we are all made in the image of God, and by not hearing and empowering women’s voices, we are missing out on knowing our creator more fully. Remembering Luke’s words in Act 2:18, “I will even pour out my Spirit on my servants in those days, both men and women, and they will prophesy,” or the Apostle Paul who writes, “There is no Jew or Greek, slave or free, male and female; since you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:28).
We are one in Christ Jesus; God’s spirit is on us equally, and it’s time we start living out our faith and following God’s glorious desire for a Safe Church.
Do you see yourself in these findings? What’s your church story? Let’s talk in the comments!
Sadly I am not in the least surprised by these stats. Have personally experienced sexism in church spaces since childhood. Fortunately I have not been harassed or assaulted in church myself, but I personally know women who have been.
One of the insidious things about this is the way women can internalize the sexist messages and become perpetrators themselves. For example-when I was young my mom stopped wearing sleeveless dresses to church because another woman complained. As an adult in another church, I had a pastor’s wife shut down my questions in a marriage seminar by making a sexualized joke about my visibly pregnant body. In front of most of the other adults in the congregation, no less.
I absolutely think men need to take the lead in combating this crap, if only because many men won’t listen to women on the subject. But I think we have to acknowledge that sometimes we women don’t listen to other women either. Internalized misogyny is a real thing.
Many men don’t understand that the purpose of a workplace is to advance the goals of the company, non-profit, church, etc., rather than to be a stage for their egos.
(This also happens with women, just in more specific areas.)
How do sexist jokes advance the mission? How they hurt it (lost talent, lack of professionalism leading to lack of credibility, distraction from the mission) is obvious.
Even in the south, modern workplaces don’t put up with that crap. Maybe these men need to learn basic professional norms.
When I was reading this I cam away thinking that we have to stop letting the “its only a joke” slide. It can be both a joke and mean-spirited or both a joke and not funny. If a comedian tells an unfunny joke in their set we blame them, not the audience which is why comedians workshop their material before using it and change whatever isn’t landing.
I vote whenever we hear a sexist joke we just respond with “oh I’m sure that was a joke, but it was a bad one, you should work on your material” and walk away.
Also as a barbie-shaped teenager in the throws of purity culture back in the early 00’s I feel the swimsuit/clothes one. I finally started shopping in the boys section because I couldn’t find a thing in the girls section that would be sufficiently “modest”
Yeah I tried shopping in the boys section too then I was accused of being a lesbian and told to “dress like a woman and stop looking so frumpy” you can’t win with these people!
You really can’t and that is kind of the point. I was never hassled to this extent (probably because I had no
curves as a teenager), but I remember feeling so uncomfortable in my skin as an adolescent. Of course adolescence is uncomfortable in general, but specifically uncomfortable because it just felt like there was no acceptable way to just exist as a female.
I worked years ago as one of fewer than 10 females alongside about 160 males in a non-church-related job. There were some sexist jokes there over the course of a few years, but not nearly as many as I experienced in less than one year at an evangelical church, mostly by male staffers. I also experienced some of the kindest and most healthily-protective men in the non-church space. Kind and healthy men were almost non-existant in the church space.
Once I wore a short sleeved top to church with a ‘v’ in back that went deeper than most shirts but was still well-above my bra, and a female that I considered a friend loudly mocked my “showing so much skin.”
Another time, a married male staffer honestly and kindly complimented my appearance but felt he had to profusely explain that he was *not* hitting on me. I know he meant it non-sexually and sincerely but the fact that he felt he had to so thoroughly explain the compliement tainted it.
This post was so good. I felt validated and seen. I have been sent home to change when I was watching the kids during women’s visitation. I had on a loose fitting tie dye jumper down to my knees. It was modest but not officially a skirt or culottes. It was humiliating. I really thought about not coming back to church after that but we were leaders there.
I dealt with the music ministry sexism as well. I was allowed to play the piano for congregational singing or sing a solo, but not allowed to do the arm waving conducting stuff for congregational singing. The men that could not hold a tune in a bucket were chosen instead of me because I am a female. It was insane. I could stand up and give a testimony or tell my story of salvation, but I could not teach a mixed class that had men or teenage boys in it.
We took a missions trip to Puerto Rico when I was in college. It was so hot and humid and barely a working air conditioner in the van going up windy mountains. We stopped at a beautiful waterfall. The guys were allowed to go swimming while the girls could only stick our feet in the water. They didn’t want wet women in the van. Same for when we saw the Mediterranean ocean. I thought I was going to have heat stroke.
I was tired of the preachers and the pastors majoring on modesty on women for their sermons. One visiting preacher mentioned that just because he has snow on his head, doesn’t mean he doesn’t have fire his his loins. Yes, thanks for reminding us of your sex drive and perpetual lust for women that you choose to flaunt.
The church isn’t going to change unless we hold them accountable for this treatment of women.
Absolutely, Diana! (Oh, and that not swimming thing would have driven me crazy! I hate being hot).
Also have you noticed that all these CHRISTIAN men pack their brains below their belt? They’re almost OCD on it to the point of being male nymphomaniacs.
Where’s the Companionship in that?
There can be NO Companionship with a sex object.
There can be NO Companionship with a super-spiritual Jack Chick tract.