ABSTRACT
The roles of women in global Pentecostalism are varied and, in some places, hotly debated. In this chapter, the author uses Gerard's accounts of her experiences to consider three things. First, in a section on preaching, she revisits gendered debates about the appropriateness of women as ordained ministers and the roles that men occupied as gatekeepers to determine which preachers should be welcomed into the preaching guild. Second, the author explores how the exercise of spiritual gifts within Pentecostal ministry circles is gendered and how Gerard questioned male measures of success. Finally, she considers politics and governance with attention to the gendered issues of leadership on local church boards and within denominational structures. All of these issues continue to surface in various iterations among Canadian and American Pentecostals and, by considering the case of Bernice Gerard, we can ponder how her experiences resonate with or differ from those of Pentecostals in other times and places.
