The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 99, July 1995 - April, 1996 Page: 35
626 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The Meaning of Participation
numbers than men."3 The ratio of women to men joining the church was
in contrast to the population ratio. In 1839, out of 2,073 Houston resi-
dents, only 453 were female, a ratio of nearly 5 to 1. By 186o, the city's
ratio had improved to 1.2 to 1 but men still outnumbered women.4
Part of the reason for greater women's participation is the isolation
women suffered in the South. Even in urban settings like Houston,
women were isolated within their homes by societal expectations and
their internalized commitment to their private sphere of domesticity.
While men had opportunities (and requirements) to socialize or other-
wise meet in groups, such as work, civic organizations, and recreational
activities, women had few to none. From Belton to San Antonio, Texas
women often lamented to their diaries about the "severe social depriva-
tion" and "often f[ou]nd its monotony hard to endure."s5 Some mem-
bers of Houston churches did live miles away from any church or
society, but even those women who resided in town needed a rationale
to gather with others while still conforming to their ideals of woman-
hood.36 By their dedication to piety, women could not only justify but
find social approval for joining a church. Organized religion offered so-
ciety and companionship, and broke the monotony of home life."7
Churches drew women with the promise of society and taught that
they should be submissive; but in actuality, merely joining a church was
an act of independence for women. To join the First Presbyterian
Church, a woman "presented herself for examination" to the Session,
the (all-male) governing body of the church.38 This unique opportunity
to come before a group of men gave women the authority to explain
" Membership Records, First Presbyterian Records.
34 I do not know whether the 1839 figure included black residents. Hogan, The Texas Republic,
92. In 1860 the ratio ofjust white men to white women was higher than the total population: 1.4
to 1 (2,176 white males to 1,592 white females). Harris County as a whole, from which the
church membership was probably drawn, also had a higher ratio of men to women than the city.
United States Bureau of the Census, Population of the United States in i86o . .. The Eighth Census
(Washington: Government Printing Office, 1864).
" Andreadis, "True Womanhood Revisited," 184 (1st quotation), 186 (2nd quotation). For
some women, "only religion and its language comfort" them when they feel sharply the with-
drawal of/from society (p. 193). See also Scott, The Southern Lady, 42; Catherine Clinton, The
Plantation Mistress- Woman's World an the Old South (New York: Pantheon Books, 1982), 164-179;
Sparks also found in Mississippi that women complained of "loneliness and isolation," and that
"only religious services broke [their] routine." See On Jordan's Stormy Banks, 42 (quotations), 43.
56 Parish Register, 184os-1874, in Christ Church Records.
37 Barbara J. MacHaffie, Her Story: Women in Christian Tradition (Philadelphia: Fortress Press,
1986), 99; Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, "Religion in the Lives of Slaveholding Women of the Ante-
bellum South" In That Gentle Strength: Histoncal Perspectives on Women in Christianity, ed. Lynda L.
Coon, Katherine J. Haldane, and Elisabeth W. Sommer (Charlottesville: University Press of Vir-
ginia, 1990), 213.
" Session Minutes, Apr. 25, 1859, in First Presbyterian Records.1995
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 99, July 1995 - April, 1996, periodical, 1996; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101217/m1/63/: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.