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Narrative Summary

Interview with Jane Bechle by Jessica Loudis

Reverend Jane Bechle, originally from New York State, traveled a long way—from New York to New Jersey, Ohio, California, and Arkansas—before ending up in Missouri. Rev. Jane, the oldest of four, was raised by a Catholic mother and a Methodist father. Her religious tradition began in the Methodist church, and through her trying journey and experiences, she eventually found Unitarian Universalism.

A well-educated woman, Rev. Jane started out in college as a physical education major and was a self-described jock. On a whim, she chose to attend a Methodist college in Ohio, where she came to realize that though she was doing well in her major, she was even better in her religious studies classes. It was not until her mentor suggested she meet with a seminary recruiter that she even considered that women could be ministers, much less that she herself may be interested in that path. She ended up enrolling in a radical new program that placed an emphasis on experience and community service. During this time, she worked many hospital positions and also worked with mentally disabled children. She eventually graduated from seminary school, but looking back, she believes that she was probably the only seminary student that didn’t know if she wanted to be a minister following graduation.

When asked what kinds of strife she met in the beginning of her religious journey in the 1970s, Rev. Jane said that it was never the people, but the male ministers that took issue with her position in the church. She chalked it up to them being threatened by her success. When beginning to discuss a story about this time in her life, Jane rolls her eyes and shrugs saying, “ I was just so young and naïve then [. . . .] I said ‘Yes, sir’ and did what I was told.” She goes on to tell of a controlling, conservative head minister who watched her every move, had other ministers spying on her, and dictated how she should dress. She says that she once overheard him tell other members of the clergy, “All MY women wear skirts.” Looking back, Jane says that she knows how wrong all of those things were, and if she were not young and naïve at the time, she would have known to put a stop to it.

Other than that particular experience, Jane reassured me that her experiences with people have been fairly positive. She says that she tries very hard not to be a “warrior” about finding acceptance for female clergy, but instead she tries to educate people.

Although she is a member and minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church, she also describes herself as a spiritual agnostic. She emphasizes the values of thinking for one’s self and taking the positive aspects from every religion and leaving behind what is destructive. Rev. Jane is also an advocate of ethical eating and other environmental concerns. She hopes one day to be able to work with children and animals to some degree, and loves the idea of working with therapy animals.

When asked what her message for the younger generation would be, she said:

Even in the smallest ways, we can make the world a better place. And to do that we might have to give up some of our fears and some of our prejudices, but there’s a beauty there that you find is unbelievable. And when you go beneath the surface, we are so connected to each other that it’s beyond description, and we need to tap into that rather than our differences and when we do that we’ll make the world a better place.

Missouri State University Fall 2010 Religious Lives of Ozarks Women