Women's Leadership in Marginal Religions: EXPLORATIONS OUTSIDE THE MAINSTREAM

Marginal religions in the United States have been supportive of women taking leadership roles at least since the nineteenth century. In Women's Leadership in Marginal Religions, historians, folklorists, and theologians explore what factors within these groups support women's religious leadership. The religions examined are Shakerism, Pentecostalism, Spiritualism, Christian Science, the Theosophical movement, New Thought, Unity, Hindu, and Buddhist groups, African-American Spiritual churches in New Orleans, the feminist spirituality movement, the Women-Church movement among Roman Catholic women, and Mormonism.
 

"Shows that 'marginal' religions emphasizing spiritual inspiration have been empowering vehicles through which many American women have expressed their authority and desire for equality." -- Amanda Porterfield, author of Female Piety in Puritan New England: The Emergence of Religious Humanism