Lenore Volz

Lenore Volz (16 March 1913 – 26 September 2009) was a German Protestant theologian and one of the first women in Württemberg to work as a church minister. She was chair of the Women Theologians' Convent of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Württemberg.

Early life Lenore Volz was born in Waiblingen, a short distance from Stuttgart, Her mother, born Amalie Sixt, was an education pioneer who founded the first Lutheran "Mothers' School" ("Mütterschule") in Württemberg in 1928/29 and again, in the context of post-Nazi reconstruction, in 1945 "because there was literally nothing" ("weil es buchstäblich nichts gab"). Children's services and work with women's and girls' groups were more typical of the "women's work" assigned to her, along with visiting of the elderly and sick. After the minister at the hospital was called up to serve the military she also took on hospital pastoral care. Presentations and discussions took place which raised the matter up the church agenda.

In December 1961 Volz held a church-theological working session in the deanery at Bad Cannstatt during the course of which she gave a presentation under the title, "Has the time not come to update the 1948 Law on women theologians?" (""Ist die Theologinnen-Ordnung von 1948 revisionsbedürftig?"). The question set a stone rolling. Over the next few years she devoted herself to the issue of equal rights for women theologians. Working with the "Women Theologians' Convent" ("Konvent evangelischer Theologinnen"), of which she became president in 1965, she published in 1967 "Women in the pulpits? A burning question for our church" (""Frauen auf der Kanzel? Eine brennende Frage unserer Kirchen""). This study became the template for a new "Law on the service of women theologians" ("Gesetz über den Dienst der Theologinnen"). After a deeply felt and moving debate it was adopted by the synod on 15 November 1968. The ordination of women was a reality. As Volz noted in her biography, women pastors were now permitted almost the same rights as male pastors.

By this time Lenore Volz was already 55, and instead of remaining in the mainstream church ministry she became a hospital pastor, and worked on ideas for another great reform, this time to put pastoral care in hospitals on a new footing. She retired ten years later, in 1978. That was also the year in which further adjustments were made as a result of which men and women working in parish ministry finally received completely equal status and treatment from the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Württemberg. Even after her retirement she remained an active presence in evangelical church politics.