Harris Manchester College, was established in the 18th century as a “dissenting academy”, with the principle of religious liberty, to provide higher education for non-conformists, who were denied degrees, from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge.
Gertrude von Petzold, the first female minister of religion in England or Ireland, qualified at Harris Manchester College in 1904. I am happy to be following in this proud tradition – of dissent and of women’s ministry – by training as a Unitarian minister at the same college.
Gertrude von Petzold considered that the early Christian church put women on the same spiritual level with men, but that priest-craft later reduced them to a kind of bondage, silencing their prophesy and belittling their service. She called on the church of the 20th century to return to them their right to prophesy and to minister.
As the 21st century proceeds, many of the mainstream Christian denominations accept women alongside men as ordained ministers.
So the question occurs – is there anything that a woman, can bring to ministry that a man cannot?
A difficult question to answer – many in our contemporary world recognise that attributes, which were previously considered to be either male or female, fall somewhere along a continuum between the two. Virtues traditionally conceived of as feminine, such as empathy and nurturing care are well developed in many men, while there are many women who excel in such things as technical problem solving and leadership.
Each individual minister – female or male – brings their own unique mix of strengths and weaknesses to their work.
For my part, I’m not particularly technically gifted, but I am a good leader. And, the vocation to which I feel called is church leadership and ministry; specifically, ministry in the dissenting (some would say heretical) community of the Unitarian church. I am excited and invigorated by this call to action, and therefore it is the work in which I will give of the best of myself.
There are many other women, who have great gifts and skills to bring to the task of religious and spiritual leadership and I look forward to the day when more of them are fully recognised as such leaders.
Maud Robinson.