Study Reports Gender Gap in Clergy Pay, Appointments

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Female clergy still lag behind their male counterparts when it comes to pay and appointments to senior posts, according to a national study to be published this year.

Even figuring in work experience and years since ordination, women made an average of $5,000 less in salary and benefits than men, according to the study by researchers at the Hartford Seminary.

“The stained-glass ceiling is being permeated, but it is still in place,” said the Rev. Jann Cather Weaver, associate dean of students at Yale Divinity School.

The study also found that men are more likely to get senior posts and sole appointments. Women who landed such positions were more likely to do so in small, rural churches.

The study compared male and female clergy in 15 Protestant denominations. It will be published under the title “An Uphill Calling: Clergy Women and Men in the Contemporary Protestant Church.”

Although nearly half the candidates for ministry at the country’s leading theological institutions are female, women still have not entered the field as rapidly as other professions, the study found.