Nearly 40 percent of ministerial students enrolled at 14 theological schools identified as ministry partners with CBF were women, higher than the national average of members of the Association of Theological Schools.

Women are making slow but steady progress into ministry positions in Baptist churches, according to a report released June 22 by Baptist Women in Ministry.

The fourth State of Women in Baptist Life report by the 28-year-old advocacy and support organization said the ranks of ordained Baptist women have grown by an average of 64 each year so far in the 21st century. Based on that pace and previous reports, the report estimates conservatively that 2,200 Baptist women have been ordained to the gospel ministry since 1964.

In 2010, 53 ordinations of women ministers were reported by Baptist churches, mostly in a constellation of progressive Baptist organizations including the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Alliance of Baptists and state Baptist organizations like the Baptist General Association of Virginia and the Baptist General Convention of Texas. The largest Baptist body in the United States, the Southern Baptist Convention, officially discourages women’s ordination.

Baptist Women in Ministry released its first State of Women in Baptist Life report in 2005 to provide a measurable means to analyze trends within Baptist life with regard to women ministers. Baptist churches are autonomous, making it hard to collect accurate statistics, so the report relies on self-reported information gathered through e-mails, phone calls, Facebook, Baptist newspapers and websites to compare data from year to year.

In the six years since the first report, the number of ordinations of women per year has been constant, a higher percentage of women are serving as pastors and co-pastors, the percentages of women missionaries has held steady, the numbers of women chaplains and pastoral counselors has increased and the enrollment of women in Baptist theological institutions has shown a slight increase.

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