Black women are valuable and important partners in ministry.
Black women in ministry are more powerful than you realize. We have been fighting and working hard for centuries to do the preaching, ministering, and leading God has called us to do. We have done this within our own churches, and we have created other spaces that allow us to utilize our gifts and talents when our churches do not. We too are called by God.
Furthermore, as marginalized voices within the church, we bring a different perspective. We understand how race, gender, and religion intersect in important ways, and some of us are aware of the ways other identities can intersect with those and their impact. We see the Hagars and the Jaels and the Rahabs—the women that are often overlooked. For those of us who have done the work of unpacking the negative perceptions about our gender that we may have internalized, we know how to talk about women in a healthy way that doesn’t further patriarchy, sexism, and abuse.
All in ministry need a good Black woman on their team. I’m not talking about a Black woman to do your work for you behind the scenes, but a Black woman whom you can respect and value and whom you are willing to let exercise her gifts without fearing she’s going to try and take your job or your pulpit. For those of us who consider ourselves womanists, all people benefit from our leadership and our work in ministry because we are “committed to survival and wholeness of entire people, male and female,” to quote Alice Walker. Thus, womanists, specifically, in ministry are good for the entire body of Christ, and Black women in ministry more broadly can have a powerful impact on church communities.