The Bible, Gender and Church (BGC) Research Centre focuses on biblical and practical gender studies, and how these intersect and inform the lives of women and men in the contemporary church.
About the Centre
The Sophia Network’s ‘Minding the Gap’ report recently demonstrated that, although women make up 65 per cent of the church in the UK, 62 per cent of these women have experienced some form of sexism in church. More than half of the respondents also indicated that this was a problem that existed on an institutional rather than on an individual level. View the full report here. These statistics and others make it clear that research on gender, both in the Bible and the church, is sorely needed. The BGC Research Centre aims to foster research in biblical gender studies, as well as through various projects to affect change in the church and academia so that both women and men can be empowered to ‘live life to the full’.
The centre is a joint initiative between Cliff College and The University of Manchester.
Latest news from the BGC
The new Abusing God Network, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, has now launched its own website. For the latest news about research and events, please go to https://sites.manchester.ac.uk/abusinggodnetwork/
Previous Centre lectures
The BGC Centre has hosted a number of lectures covering topics including 'Preaching Problematic Texts' and 'Lies Abusers Tell; the Weaponisation of the Bible in the home.' You can watch recordings of these lectures on YouTube using the link below.
If you have any questions about the work of the Bible, Gender and Church Research Centre, please contact Dr Kirsi Cobb at k.cobb@cliffcollege.ac.uk.
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