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Women and Gender in Religion

Four nuns seated in pews in a church. Photo by wikicommons

Has Religion Shaped Our Understanding of Gender?

January 19, 2021
Ann Braude, director of the Women's Studies in Religion Program at Harvard Divinity School discusses the history of women and religion and how religion has defined gender roles.
Women's Ordination

Women's Ordination Conference Surveys Catholic Women in Lay Ministry

August 19, 2020
"I think it's because they want that professional degree, and they want the respect that should come with that," said Patricia Simpson, counselor to Roman Catholic Students and Instructor in Ministry Studies at HDS. "I think they want to be able to state that they've prepared academically to the same level as ... the men being ordained."
Women's History Month

Quiz: Women's History and Religion

March 1, 2020

Who was arrested for trying to secure the vote for women? What percentage of the world's Hindu population is women? Who escaped slavery then became involved in moral reform and abolitionist work?

In honor of Women's History Month, test your knowledge of some religious aspects of how women have shaped world history. (Originally published in 2018)... Read more about Quiz: Women's History and Religion

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Video: The Kingdom of Holy Women: Pentecostalism, Sex and Women’s Bodies in an African Church

April 3, 2019

Damaris S. Parsitau, 2018-19 WSRP Visiting Associate Professor, delivers the lecture “The Kingdom of Holy Women: Pentecostalism, Sex and Women’s Bodies in an African Church,” which is based on five years of ethnographic research carried out at the Ministry of Repentance and Holiness, a new and controversial Pentecostal church based in Kenya.... Read more about Video: The Kingdom of Holy Women: Pentecostalism, Sex and Women’s Bodies in an African Church

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Video: Promoting the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals

March 14, 2019

Dr. Alaa Murabit discusses the promotion of the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), at Harvard Divinity School, highlighting the intersection between women's leadership, religion, and sustainable development. She will present unique examples of women's religious leadership to advance human rights, societal development, and peacebuilding and explore the importance of leveraging religious scholarship.... Read more about Video: Promoting the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals

Righard Bergh / Wikipedia Commons

How Dead Spirits Helped Women Find Their Voices

January 2, 2019
Ann Braude, director of the Women's Studies in Religion Program at HDS, discusses the Spiritualism movement in America during the nineteenth century, and how it helped bring women—and reformist ideas—into the public sphere.

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