Beliefwatch: God's Girls

Newsweek
July 3-10, 2006

When Nevada Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori this month became the head of the U.S. Episcopal Church, she wasn't just the first presiding bishop of that faith-she became the first woman in American history elected to lead a major Christian denomination. Although there have been influential religious women in the past, like the 1920s evangelist Amy Semple McPherson and modern-day megapreacher Joyce Meyer, only two other American women have reached the pinnacle of a religion's organizational chart: Mary Baker Eddy, who founded Christian Science in 1879, and Ellen White, who helped to found the Seventh-day Adventist Church in 1863. So what, if anything, does Jefferts Schori's election mean for women seeking a similar path?