March is Women's History Month, which underscores the importance of my conversation with this month’s Soulful Revolutionary, Liz Cooledge Jenkins, and her recently released book, Nice Churchy Patriarchy: Reclaiming Women’s Humanity from Evangelicalism.
Liz and I have in common an evangelical background fraught with the kind of subtle yet pernicious sexism that consistently leaves you walking away from interactions asking, “Did that just happen because I’m a woman?” We both ultimately left behind such settings, finding a spiritual home in places clearly valuing women’s gifts and empowering women’s exercise of leadership. Liz, for her part, wrote a brilliant book about the experience.
This episode is a deep dive into the ways sexism operates in spaces that claim to be welcoming to all. We also talk about the antidotes to this “soft complementarianism”, including learning from intersectional feminism (Liz has been deeply shaped by Black feminist and LGBTQ+ writers), and nurturing the kind of countercultural communities that truly empower everyone to bring their best and fullest selves.
Liz Cooledge Jenkins is a writer, preacher, former college campus minister. She writes at the intersections of faith, feminism, and social justice, and her work can be found at places like Sojourners, The Christian Century, Christians for Social Action, and Feminism and Religion, as well as her blog lizcooledgejenkins.com. She is on Instagram as @lizcoolj and @postevangelicalprayers. Liz lives in the Seattle area with her husband and their black cat Athena.
A Soulful Revolution Podcast: Liz Cooledge Jenkins