Why Subscribe to FireFall?
A new Monday newsletter that amplifies resources by and about women in church leadership and pastoral ministry
While I’ll share new content through Bread for Shepherds at some point, right now I invite you to subscribe to FireFall, a weekly ecumenical newsletter of curated resources by, about, and for women in church leadership and ministry fresh in your inbox on Mondays.
There are several reasons why you might ask why FireFall, so I’ll answer below.
There are already many resourcing hubs for women in ministry and church leadership. Why this?
While it’s true there are already fantastic resources (many of which I’ll link to) through excellent websites like CBE, Wesleyan Holiness Women Clergy, Missio Alliance, The Junia Project, The Sacred Alliance, Propel Women, Lead Boldly, and many more linked on the homepage, there are actually a number of resources scattered across the internet that it took me hours of research using multiple search engines and keywords to stumble upon.
FireFall doesn’t need to be the destination; it can be like a roundabout - a traffic circle funneling readers to helpful resources. No full-time pastor has the time to comb through this many links and resources unless you’re stuck in traction for six months using eye-tracking software to search Google.
As I note in an upcoming newsletter, part of the purpose of FireFall is amplifying over algorithms by linking and directing traffic to a variety of online resources. Here’s what I mean:
While sorting resources, I arm-wrestled a search engine displaying complementarian summarized search results for certain key words. Machine learning (“AI”) scrapes the internet for a kind of aggregated, summarized response.
That program received my key word search and showed me a search summary representing a theological position I do not hold, because it showed me a summary of what it found. I spent ten minutes giving it feedback to “teach” it there is not just one Christian point of view on how to interpret the Apostle Paul.
Linking to great resources and directing online traffic to them helps them rank higher in search results. We really do have the power to amplify each others’ voices.
And amplifying resources and the voices of women in ministry is important in part because women get cited less (see here, here, and here) and for better or worse, publishing contracts and keynote gigs often require online platform engagement benchmarks.
So:
Great resources shouldn’t get lost in search engine ranking, especially with machine learning changes.
Many great resources for women in ministry are tucked away in denominational or higher education institution silos - not just denominational websites, but sometimes, say, a random PDF stuck on a district website (yes, that’s an actual example).
While women are busy trying to just do the ministry, some online resources have changed a lot in the past five, ten, or fifteen years. There are a lot of historical digitized archives online now that weren’t when I was in seminary twenty years ago.
If you’re in ministry and getting a degree at the same time, you’re swamped. As a bona fide nerd, I had to almost physically wrestle myself away from browsing digitized old books listing Methodist pastors in Australia 150 years ago (yes, I browsed just long enough to find a woman’s name!). There’s a lot of research fodder ready to be integrated into research papers, theses, or dissertations.
So FireFall isn’t associated with just one denomination, and there’s no need to replace the great resources already available. Instead, the purpose is to amplify current and hidden voices and resources across denominational lines and search engine chasms.
Ministry isn’t always easy and it’s not always easy as a woman, but I have a lot of colleagues who are women in ministry and my male colleagues generally respect my leadership. Why this?
Can I be honest? This is something the Holy Spirit convicted me about. After growing up in a denomination I was very thankful for, that taught me as a kid and invested in me as a college student, but that was officially welcoming to women in ministry but presented many practical difficulties - I stumbled into a denomination with far fewer challenges for women in ministry.
Yes, there were other challenges, but I got to shift gears, and I didn’t have to be the first - when I finally stepped into the pulpit ten years after college, I was the third woman to pastor a small rural church.
I was so relieved I didn’t really want to think about the challenges in the rearview mirror. I still remember a sense of awe when I went to an annual gathering and registered for the clergywomen’s lunch. I couldn’t believe how many women were in the room. There were women at all levels of leadership, and had been for decades. I saw a parallel universe - how it can be.
Then about a year ago, I started working on a project with a pastor in a denomination struggling to practice its values about women in church leadership. I thought I’d seen and heard everything, but repeatedly, my mouth hung open. I was deeply grieved.
For years, my unconscious response had been, “thank goodness I’m not in that anymore.”
But my sisters were still in this.
Isolation, depression, fielding jaw-dropping comments and challenges. High rates of attrition. And it’s not okay.
So if you’re a woman in ministry and you’re affirmed in community, calling, and leadership, that is wonderful, and I thank God for it.
At the same time, I issue a gentle challenge to store up that Ignatian season of consolation and share it with your sisters in the shadows of a season of desolation. They need to know there’s hope and possibility and a place for them and that they’re seen.
And that’s really “why FireFall?” - because of 1 Kings.
Long before it fell on the women and men gathered in the upper room at Pentecost: “Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.” (I Kings 18:38)
Later, God pours out his Spirit on his sons and daughters, the fire of Pentecost burning, and everyone hears in their own language.
What follows the epic showdown and fire fall in 1 Kings?
“The angel of the Lord came back a second time and touched him and said, “Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.” (1 Kings 19:7)
“And the word of the Lord came to him: ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’” (1 Kings 19:9)
[insert Elijah pouring out a lot of heartache and isolation]
“…after the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah? (1 Kings 19:12-13)
[insert Elijah pouring out a lot of heartache and isolation]
“…and I alone am left…” (1 Kings 19:14b)
The fire of 1 Kings is the fire of Acts 2. Yet being anointed does not preclude the desire to hide in a cave and pull your cloak over your face sometimes.
When we feel isolated, what does God say? “Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal…” (1 Kings 19:18)
Across denominations, the Holy Spirit broods.
There are many things out of my power to fix or change; but I can pray, and I can amplify women who need to hear each others’ voices calling out through the dark, like the women stunned by an earthquake in a cemetery one morning on the first day of the week, dumbfounded by a shining angel, bewildered by the contours of a tomb with no body:
“are you there?”
“I’m here.”
Sisters, we’re here.
Someone’s asking if you’re here. We’re checking on you.
Are you here?
Okay.
Let’s go. We’ve got good news to share with others.
And we’re not leaving you behind.