No Woman Can Crack the Evangelical Bro Code

Why so many Christian institutions chew up and spit out talented female leaders.

I apologize in advance for all the stock photos. This one seemed especially pastor-y and ministry-y though.

Hello, Substack friends! It’s been three months since I last wrote here. Thanks for hanging on amid the silence. I was in Germany and Austria in late summer, then dove into a fall full of travel, speaking events, several new book manuscripts to edit, and a new season of the Saved by the City podcast. Truthfully, I do better in seasons with more structure and definable goals, so the busyness has been welcome, even if it has meant this space has been left unattended.

Due to recent travels, I’ve connected or reconnected in person with women who are in overlapping professional circles. And in our conversations, I’ve heard whispers of a familiar, tiring pattern of institutional displacement at the hands of male colleagues.

The pattern goes something like this:

1. A woman takes a job at an evangeli…