Women’s History Month is upon us and we’re taking the opportunity to highlight some of the excellent articles we have produced that focus on women and their impactful work.
Here is a list of insightful and inspiring articles and interviews Faithfully Magazine has published involving women.
Rebecca Protten: How A Formerly Enslaved Woman Impacted Christianity
Rebecca Freundlich Protten (1718-80) is viewed as an anomaly of sorts and a pioneer for her work in evangelizing and caring for enslaved Africans under the Moravian Church in the West Indies during the 18th century.
It is suspected that Protten had been kidnapped as a child from Antigua and sold into slavery on the island of St. Thomas, a Danish colony at the time. Continue reading
Nancy Wang Yuen, Author of ‘Reel Inequality,’ on Media’s Diversity Problem
Nancy Wang Yuen remembers watching as a child the popular sitcom “Three’s Company,” set in Los Angeles, California. Los Angeles was home for Yuen in the 1980s, too, but the sitcom’s White cast did not represent her lived experience in the culturally-rich city.
“Even though my neighborhood was racially and ethnically diverse when I was growing up, the world looked completely [W]hite on television,” wrote Yuen in her book, Reel Inequality: Hollywood Actors and Racism. “I absorbed a very narrow vision of U.S. culture. All throughout my childhood, I did not see myself represented in film and television beyond the occasional cringe-worthy Asian nerd or massage parlor worker.” Continue reading
Maria Stewart: Black Feminist-Abolitionist Propelled By Faith
Nearly two centuries before Rep.-elect Ayanna Pressley became Massachusetts’ first Black woman elected to the U.S. Congress in November, Maria Stewart took the stage of Franklin Hall in Boston in 1833. The mixed crowd shifted in disapproval; the older men had already expressed their scorn at her reproach. Yet, the main objection might have come from the elite circle of other women who found this extraordinary African-American woman stretched too far beyond the bounds of accepted true womanhood. Continue reading
Hyepin Im: Connecting Korean-American Churches To Do Good
Churches are called to meet more than the spiritual needs of the communities they inhabit, according to Hyepin Im, founder and president of Faith and Community Empowerment (www.facela.org). “Jesus’ ministry was always holistic. Faith communities—whether they acknowledge it or not—are holistic ministries. They end up having to meet physical, mental, and emotional needs along with spiritual needs. If we’re in holistic ministries anyway, we might as well do it as best as possible,” Im said. Continue reading
How Jesus Embraced And Elevated Women
The following post examines how Jesus interacted with women in comparison to how social and cultural norms suggested he should treat them. Although Jesus followed many religious, legal, and cultural norms of his time, the Bible shows that he was counter-cultural in his embrace of women. Continue reading
How Black Women Preachers Spoke Truth To Power
Each semester I greet the students who file into my preaching class at Howard University with a standard talk. The talk is not an overview of the basics–techniques of sermon preparation or sermon delivery, as one might expect. Outlining the basics is not particularly difficult.
The greatest challenge, in fact, is helping learners to stretch their theology: namely, how they perceive who God is and convey what God is like in their sermons. This becomes particularly important for African-American preachers, especially African-American women preachers, because most come from church contexts that overuse exclusively masculine language for God and humanity. Continue reading
‘Hermanas’ Authors Talk Embracing Their Identities As Latinas And Leaders
The day after their book, Hermanas: Deepening Our Identity and Growing Our Influence launched, Faithfully Magazine spoke with authors Natalia Kohn Rivera, Noemi Vega Quiñones, and Kristy Garza Robinson about their journeys as Latinas and leaders and why Hermanas (“sisters” in Spanish) is the leadership book they all wanted but never had. Continue reading
