Examines the politics of female clergy and the broader issue of the political mobilization of professionals.

Women clergy now account for approximately 10 percent of religious leaders in the United States. As their numbers grow, so too does their political influence. This book examines the effects of gender, professional experience, and religious belief on the political attitudes and activism of clergywomen. Based on qualitative analysis of interviews with 54 women ministers and rabbis in four different American cities (Washington, D.C., Milwaukee, Omaha, and...

If there is a "culture war" taking place in the United States, one of the most interesting, if under-the-radar, battlegrounds is in local school board elections. Rarely does the pitch of this battle reach national attention, as it did in Kansas when the state school board--led by several outspoken conservative Christians--voted to delete evolution from the state's science curriculum and its standardized tests in August 1999. That action rattled not only the educational and scientific communities, but concerned citizens around the nation as well.

While the movement of the Christian...