What is Project Violet?

 

Project Violet is named after Violet Hedger, the first Baptist woman to be college trained for ordination.

Project Violet has investigated women’s experiences in ministry whilst developing women ministers. The project has helped us understand more fully the theological, missional, and structural obstacles women ministers face in the Baptist community in Great Britain and identify ways forward.

Participants have been engaged in research and supported in asking questions and seeking answers. They have been accompanied through the project so that their own voice as an advocate for change has developed.

Project Violet is about partnership and has involved our Baptist colleges, Associations and churches as it pursues its agenda of Gender Justice. The project will lead to theological and practical conclusions which will be made available on this website on 2 May 2024.
 

Dr Helen Cameron		The Revd Jane Day
Helen is Research Fellow in Baptist Studies at Regent’s Park College, Oxford Co-leader and Principal Investigator for Project Violet		Jane is the Centenary Development Enabler for Baptists Together and Tutor at Regent’s Park College, Oxford Co-leader for Project Violet

 

	Angie Bryant

Project Approach

We are intentionally taking a variety of approaches including:

• Engaging with those who shape women's experience of ministry to explain the project to them and invite them to support it.
• Inviting all women ministers to contribute a written reflection of their experience and the questions that matter to them.
• Identifying and accompanying three groups of co-researchers to investigate a questions that arises from their ministry and experience.  This phase and the next are based on a participatory approach to research called Theological Action Research.
• Mobilising a group of women theologians to reflect with co-researchers and discern insights for theology and practice.
• Taking the findings of the research back to the stakeholders for them to discern how their practice might develop and to seek the mind of Christ.
• Disseminating what we have learned in the Baptist community and beyond. 

Women in Ministry - the Statistics

We have compiled a selection of statistics from our database showing the number of women and men in various roles within Baptists Together. Click here to download a PowerPoint with charts representing these figures.