Demographics

Prior to 1970 all the pastors in the ELCA’s predecessor bodies were men and most of them were white, often the descendents of immigrants from northern Europe. This set of figures shows the growing number of women relative to men among ELCA clergy and provides comparisons between white clergy and ethnic-specific, the term used by the ELCA, in 1994 and 2013.

Figures 1-3 show the growing percentage of women among ELCA pastors. Figure 16 shows this year by year from 1970-2018.

The change between Figure 1 and Figure 2 is due to the steadily increasing number of women ordained between 1994 and 2013.

The difference between Figure 2 and Figure 3, both from 2013, reflects the smaller number of women who had reached the age of retirement.

Comparing Figure 5 with Figure 1 shows that in 1994 women of color were a slightly larger percentage of all clergy of color than all women were of all clergy.

Comparing Figure 4 to Figure 6 reveals that the percentage of women of color among all women increased from 1994 to 2013. 

This is consistent with Eileen Campbell-Reed’s finding that the number of white women enrolling in M.Div. programs has stabilized, between 1998 and 2017 the number of women of color doing so has continued to increase. (Learn more about Dr. Campbell-Reed’s research here).