I couldn’t help but be excited.
The new church we were attending had a women’s group. To my great delight, I had to work to find out it was a women’s group: the informational blurbs were not plastered with roses and flowers, the topics of meetings were not “hospitality” and “building a better marriage” or “Mom life,” nothing was cutesy or ridiculous. At first glance, I thought it was a book club.
It had been so long since I’ve had the opportunity to really build relationships with other Christian women. Over time I’ve taken an ad hoc approach, befriending women of faith in various contexts—but this fellowship group seemed more holistic, embedded with the culture of the church. I was hopeful.
And then I read the meeting time:
Mondays 9-11am.
I cannot tell you how many times this has happened. At every single church I’ve been to – and I have been to a fair few – the opportunities for women to fellowship together are always scheduled during the work week, and always during working hours. Every. Single. Time.
I found it more bewildering because the church is quite egalitarian. I would expect something like this from a different sort of church—one, perhaps, that considers women’s primary sphere to be the home and that would frown on the concept of a professional woman generally. But this church ordains women, for heaven’s sake! Surely the church knows some women—a lot of women—work? Surely it understands the concept of working hours? Surely it knows that for working women, taking off a few hours a week every week in the name of fellowship really isn’t manageable?
What is going on here?
It boggles my mind that the only thing standing between me and fellowship with other Christian women over the past five years has been my job. And yet every study I’ve ever tried to attend has been mid-late-morning, or right after lunch, or at 2pm. I am even more boggled that it seems to have occurred to absolutely no one that this might be an issue. Do working women just not attend these events? Is there not a substantial population of working women at this church? Are all the women retired, or stay-at-home-mothers, or freelancers not subject to the demands of a typical workday?
Adding insult to indignity is that, at every church I’ve been, men’s fellowship is inevitably scheduled on a Saturday morning. Pancakes with Jesus! Come on the weekend! Why? Because men work.
And look, I get it. Maybe, at my church—at all these other churches—the majority of women in the fellowship are retired, or mothers who want to meet during school hours, or freelancers, or free spirits who are not subject to the whims of a corporate overlord at 10am. It’s not wrong to want to build these things to work for, and meet the needs of, the majority of people.
But then we always have to reckon with the group set aside.
I’ve often struggled, as a professional woman, in the church. In long-ago days, and at far more conservative churches, the fact that I worked was met with bemusement and a raised eyebrow: accepted, but only so long as I was still “running the home.” I have been asked, in various ways, if my job is the reason I never had children. I sometimes long for a Bible study curriculum that addresses how to deal with obstinate colleagues, or how to lead humbly and well – that meets me in my own circumstances. But I’ve learned to live with it all, and I have long grown accustomed to activities and events simply not being built with someone like me in mind.
I’m fortunate that these things don’t make me wonder if the church is for me, if Jesus is for me. I know He is. And I know and love His church, and I have had wonderful experiences and assurances that do not leave me with doubt. Yet I grapple with this lingering frustration, and I wonder about the women who aren’t like me: the women who work, and come to church hoping for something, but who quickly find their lives and schedules simply aren’t compatible with so much of what is offered.
It’s a small thing, until it isn’t.
It doesn’t really matter, until it does.
If you ask me what I wish for, it isn’t for churches to start spinning out a million Bible studies or groups to meet every single scheduling need. That would be silly, and a waste of resources. Rather, what I hope for is simple acknowledgement. Schedule the Bible study at 9am, by all means—but include a note in that ad that, periodically, the group meets at 5pm just to welcome any new women who can’t make the time. Or let the women who can’t attend know what their other options are. Failing that, reach out to the professional women in your congregation and, if they’re seeking fellowship, invite them for dinner or to coffee.
See them. Meet them. Find them where they are.
We can’t schedule a Bible study, an event, or an engagement activity that meets the needs of everyone. But we can find small ways, even as we move forward in practicality, to let people know that they’re on our minds, that they matter, and that in a thousand ways large and small we can bring them close to us.
Real fellowship is worth that effort.
Samaritan's Song 