50 years of women Lutheran pastors: Seattle church honors trailblazer Nancy Winder
Nancy Winder, ordained at Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church in 1976, was the first woman ordained in the North Pacific District of the American Lutheran Church. A Saturday service will honor her — and the generations of women who ministered before and after ordination was possible.
By Caleb McGever | FāVS News Reporter
SEATTLE, Wash. — Seattle-based Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church will host an event on Saturday celebrating 50 years of women Lutheran pastors in the Pacific Northwest.
The Rev. Nancy Winder, the retired pastor whose ordination anniversary the event is celebrating, will speak at the event. She and other church leaders said the event will highlight other women who ministered — both before and after ordination was possible.
The event will follow the traditional Lutheran liturgy for Holy Communion with a sermon from Bishop Shelley Bryan Wee, followed by a reception, where Winder will share stories and talk with attendees.
Winder’s ordination
Winder was ordained on July 18, 1976, at Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church, making her the first woman ordained in the North Pacific District of the American Lutheran Church (ALC), which later largely merged into the modern-day Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).
She was the 14th woman ever ordained in the ALC.
Winder said that in her decades of ministry, much of it spent trailblazing the way for women pastors in her denomination, she faced “a lot of hurdles,” while also experiencing support.
“There were a lot of people who weren’t happy about what I was doing, but that didn’t have a huge effect on me and my ministry. I felt very supported all the way along the way,” Winder said.
Her first call after ordination was in 1976 at Holden Village, a remote Lutheran-owned retreat in the North Cascades visited by thousands every year.
Winder explained that the opportunity to preach at the Holden Village, which she did for two years and a half during her first call there, allowed her to demonstrate to thousands of Lutherans that a woman was equally capable of preaching.
“They saw a woman preside at the table for the first time, and then they went home to their congregation and said, ‘We can do this.’ That’s a gift that Holden gave,” she said.
The process was important because pastors ordained by the ALC had to be “called” by a congregation.
Congregations that never saw a woman pastor were unlikely to “call” one, Winder explained. When looking for an internship before her first call, she said some pastors wrote “no” on the request so hard they tore the paper.
“Because of discrimination of women in the early part of women’s ordination, it was much more difficult for women to find a place to to be called,” Bryan Wee explained.
This meant Winder’s early influence as a pastor to congregants throughout the region — which spread from her time at Holden, to invitations to preach at other churches by fellow pastors, and then to her mentorship to newly ordained men and women — played an important role paving the way for more women pastors.
Winder led a decades-long career as a parish pastor and retired from a synod staff position in 2017. During her career she did more time at Holden Village, served interims at Prince of Peace in SeaTac, Port Madison on Bainbridge Island, Wooden Cross in Woodinville and and preached for almost 30 years at Faith in Seattle.
Celebrating women who paved the way
Bryan Wee and Phinney Ridge pastor, the Rev. Kathy Ierien, who were ordained in 1993 and 2004, both credited Winder and the women of her generation for laying the foundation for women preachers in their denomination.
“Without that generation of women who were willing to to really fight for the way forward — to be ordained and to suffer much more discrimination than I have had, although I have had discrimination — we would not have the women’s voices that we have today,” Bryan Wee said.
“I’ve been ordained for 22 years now, but I know that certainly her generation of pastors paved the way for the rest of us to be able to move into ministry with fewer barriers than than she ever faced,” Ierien said.
Ierien said she worked with Winder and Bryan Wee to craft the music and texts of Saturday’s liturgy to focus on thanksgiving to God.
“It’s really about thanksgiving for God for the work of the Spirit that made the ordination of women possible. Hearts were opened and changed, and the Holy Spirit instilled courage in these women that stepped forward and said I will hear this call, I will follow,” she said.
Ierien explained that the celebration will start with a litany of Thanksgiving where attendees can name women clergy who were influential in their formation. Other parts of the liturgy will include texts that draw upon Winder’s ordination 50 years ago.
Bryan Wee explained that the event is meant to celebrate not just Winder, but also all women who ministered both before and after they were able to be ordained.
“Even though ordination began in the ELCA in 1970, that doesn’t mean that there haven’t been women ministers all along,” she said.
She continued, explaining that the event is also a broader celebration of the voices that have not always been able to speak in the church, including people of color and the LGBTQ+ community.
“Even though this is celebrating Nancy, I also want to celebrate the many diverse voices that we hear in the church today. I’m thankful that we are much more open and affirming to so many more people than we were for so long,” she said.
The 50 Years of Women Lutheran Pastors in the Pacific Northwest celebration will take place at Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church at 7500 Greenwood Avenue N in Seattle on June 13 at 11 a.m. Invitations are open to everyone.
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