Single Lady Missionaries
Fundamentalists would never let a woman preach in one of their churches. Some won’t even let women speak from the church platform. Yet strangely enough, women missionaries like Isabel Kuhn, Mary Slessor, and Amy Carmichael are highly praised in fundy circles.
It would seem that there is an unwritten rule that goes like this “A woman must never, never ever have spiritual authority over a man unless that man lives in a remote part of the world and has skin at least two shades darker than her own.”
It’s a fair guess that if the lady missionary in question were from Africa and her work involved instructing men in Raleigh, NC she would probably not make it into the fundamentalist hall of fame.
Posted by Darrell
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Oooo, good one.
BJU used to have female Bible Conference speakers. Bob Jones Sr.’s roots were in Southern Methodism, a denomination that was relatively open to female preachers (pastors, not so much).
For a good history of fundamentalism and women see Margaret Bendroth’s “Fundamentalism and Gender.”