A word about …: Claiming our equality: Equal pay for women ministers

On January 12, 2016, the Religious News Service published an article titled: “Gender pay gap among clergy worse than national average.” ¹ The Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2015 collected information about clergy pay for the first time, and when researchers analyzed the data, they discovered that clergywomen earn 76 cents for each dollar earned by clergymen. Women ministers are paid 76 cents for every dollar their male counterparts earn. Meanwhile, the national pay gap for women as a whole is shrinking. The national average pay for women is now 83 cents on the dollar, which is considerably better than it was ten or fifteen years ago. But for clergywomen … 76 cents! Tobin Grant, who wrote the Religious News Service article, expressed a bit of shock at these numbers, noting that most clergy have credentialing and educational requirements, which actually should encourage churches to offer similar pay for similar work.

Another report, “Equal Pay Day,” was released on April 4, 2017. In the United States, given the pay disparity between men and women, April 4 has been set aside as the symbolic day on which women begin to earn their annual salaries as opposed to January 1, the day on which men begin to earn their salaries. To call attention to the wage gaps within the church, MinistryPay.com, owned and produced by the National Association of Church Business Administration and powered by enetrix, a Gallup Company, released a report on April 4. That report noted that among senior pastors, men earn an average salary and housing allowance of $121,400, whereas women senior pastors earn an average of $108,400, or 89 percent of what their male counterparts earn. Male church administrators earn an average salary and housing allowance of $77,600, whereas female church administrators only earn $64,700, or 83 percent. ²

Although the percentages reported by MinistryPay.com are much higher and hopeful than those of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the bottom-line reality is that women ministers are paid significantly less than their male counterparts. While there are many complexities involved in the pay disparity, we cannot overlook the economic injustice present in our churches.

Another reality of gendered pay disparity is the fact that women of color in ministry encounter an even bleaker outlook with regard to salaries and benefits. Many black women ministers who serve churches work long hours at the beck and call of their pastors. They are often given titles, but many of them receive no compensation at all—nothing. Latina ministers, who have established churches and are busy preaching, leading, and teaching, likewise are not paid or are paid very little, and they struggle to even be recognized as ministers. Too often, their culture does not value their calling and gifts.

In my work as an advocate for women ministers, the story about clergywomen and the pay gap is big news—not good news, but big news. I often counsel with and coach women as they talk with search committees and then negotiate for a fair salary and benefits. Some churches have stepped up and are working toward equal pay, but there are still too many women ministers who have to fight for fair compensation.

As I have pondered this dilemma, I also have given thought to solutions—solutions that go beyond salary packages. Here are some proposals. Women ministers need to step forward. They need to advocate for themselves and participate in the process of negotiating. Women need to know their economic realities, crunch their personal numbers, and have a solid awareness of cost of living in their area and their own future financial needs. Then women ministers need to ask for a fair and equitable salary package, one that will allow them to serve without being burdened by fear or anxiety. Women ministers have to share in this process and take responsibility for their part of the negotiations. Women must also advocate for one another and stand with their sisters in this work toward pay equality. Women ministers need to call on churches to be just with salaries and benefits, and that means that women will need to be prophetic in their speaking, preaching, and writing, even if they fear that it might cost them a ministry position or a pay check.

For true change to come, and for there to be economic equality in our churches, however, male ministers have a major role to play. I do not write this lightly. Equal pay for women ministers will require sacrifice on the part of men. Male ministers need to talk with one another and admit to each other that pay scales are unjust. Male ministers need to address the issue with their church leaders, including their personnel and finance committee members. Male ministers need to take the lead in shedding light on how their church is doing when it comes to equal pay. In the end, to achieve economic equality in the church, male pastors and leaders must advocate for equitable salaries and benefits for the women on their staffs—even if it might mean taking a pay cut to make that happen, and some men may be even feel called to sacrifice financial security by advocating for a woman to serve in a ministry role rather than accepting that position themselves. After all, in order for a woman to receive equal pay, she must first have a ministry position.

In addition to working toward fairness in salaries, male ministers can step up in other ways to bring parity in the church. Other opportunities in this work for justice include male ministers turning down board appointments or committee assignments and asking instead that a young woman be appointed in their place. Male pastors also can step down from their pulpits on a regular basis so that women new to preaching have a place to develop their preaching skills.

Working for equality requires something of us all. It requires some to step down. It requires others to step up, to speak up, and to speak out. Equality in the church requires us to change the way we have always related to one another as women and men and to live into our equality, to claim our equality—the equality of both women and men. We must work together to make equality a reality.

Sarah Grimke, an outspoken abolitionist and tireless advocate of women’s rights, began in 1837 writing letters to friends, to ministers, and to her fellow abolitionists. The letters were published as Letters on the Equality of the Sexes and the Condition of Woman. Sarah spoke clearly and strongly to the injustices of her day, but she saved some of her strongest words for those who wanted to quiet her voice, who wanted her to stop with all the talk about women’s rights. In her first letter, she wrote these memorable words: “I ask no favors for my sex. I surrender not our claim to equality. All I ask of our brethren, is that they will take their feet from off our necks, and permit us to stand upright on that ground which God designed us to occupy.” ³

May we all be committed to work with courage until equality is a reality in our churches.