None of them thought of herself as heroic. Each
She even preached at the funeral of two women whom no Christian pastor in Strasbourg would bury because they supported believers’ baptism rather than infant baptism. Fast forward to 2011, when
the magazine of the Women of the ELCA changed its name from Lutheran Woman Today to Gather. Why? Te organization’s leadership learned that other Christian women were also reading and benefiting from the magazine, especially those in churches that are full communion partners of the ELCA and don’t have women’s magazines of their own. Gather, together with its tagline “For faith and action,” would have pleased Schütz Zell. But pastors’ wives weren’t the
only women who contributed to the Reformation. Argula von Grumbach was a strong advocate for reform based on her study of the Scriptures. Astonishingly for the time, her par- ents had given von Grumbach her own copy of the Bible when she was 10. Her first publication was a letter in defense of a university student who had been imprisoned for pos- sessing illegal pamphlets promoting Reformation theology.
was simply living out her faith as she felt called to do, within her own circumstances.
A woman from a noble family,
von Grumbach attended several imperial assemblies at which the cause of reformation was discussed. She was a prominent enough figure that when Luther mentioned her in letters to other reformers, he used only her first name. Unlike the two Katharinas, von Grumbach didn’t have a supportive husband. In fact, he lost his position as a government official because he couldn’t keep his wife quiet. But his disapproval of her activities didn’t stop her. We can praise women like these
as exceptional figures, but none of them thought of herself as heroic. Each was simply living out her faith as she felt called to do, within her own circumstances.
Strong leaders in the present How does this legacy of strong women of the Reformation live itself out today? Faith continues to empower women leaders around the world. Paulina Hlawiczka, a pastor who
serves two congregations of the Lutheran Church in Great Britain, said in her native Poland, Katie Luther is used as an example against women’s ordination. “Why don’t you marry a pastor?” she was told. Convinced that God was calling her to be a pastor rather than to marry one, Hlawiczka needed to leave Poland to be ordained. Today she prays and works for change in her home country and church. German Chancellor Angela
Paulina Hlawiczka is pastor of two congrega- tions of the Lutheran Church in Great Britain, but works for reform in her home country, Poland, where women can’t be ordained.
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www.thelutheran.org
Julinda Sipayung is a pastor from Indonesia who attended the ELCA’s International Women Leaders seminars.
Merkel, whom Forbes has ranked the most powerful woman in the world for nine of the last 10 years, is also a Lutheran. She was raised as a pastor’s daughter in the former East Germany, where being a Christian typically had educational and politi- cal disadvantages. As a teen she chose to be confirmed despite the social pressure in East Germany to go through the alternative commu- nist “youth dedication” rite instead. Merkel doesn’t speak much about
her faith in public, but it clearly moti- vates her. In response to questions from a theology student on a blog in November 2012, she wrote: “I am a member of the Evangelical Church. I believe in God, and religion is also my constant companion and has been for the whole of my life.” Merkel described belief as a
framework for her life and how she sees the world. “We as Christians should above all not be afraid of standing up for our beliefs,” she said. In a very different part of the
world, Liberian Lutheran Leymah Gbowee was one of three women awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011 “for their nonviolent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights to full participation in peace-building work.” In 2003, Gbowee organized a
group of Christian women—and then built a coalition with Muslim
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