Book Description

"Claiming the Call to Preach traces the history of call through the nineteenth century, at a time when the question of women's call to preach, although seemingly fixed by ecclesial authority and cultural convention, was being raised by courageous women in different settings, through different genres, and to different effect. This book recovers the neglected narrative of women's call to preach through the historical accounts and rhetorical witness of four ground-breaking women preachers: Jarena Lee, Frances Willard, Louisa Woosley, and Florence Spearing Randolph. Scholarship has been written on women who have preached in history, but not on how they managed to claim their call to preach despite the restrictions of gender inequality. This project explores the question: how did women claim their call to preach? Through feminist hermeneutics, this book examines call narratives which used rhetorical strategies to articulate effective arguments for women's call to the preaching ministry of the church. In response, these women received endorsement of their claims to pulpit places, engaged in sacred persuasive speech, and preached as ministers of the sacred office. This project examines women's call to preach-the history and theology, rhetoric and practice, struggle and success, and the necessary work of interpretation and re-interpretation through call narratives. This book concludes with practical applications for contemporary homiletics, showing how historical tradition can be re-invented in order to give women-and anyone struggling with their call to preach-rhetorical tactics and narrative scripts in order to make effective claims to preach today"--