Thank You, Rachel Held Evans, For Helping Me Find My Voice

If it weren’t for Rachel Held Evans, you wouldn’t be reading this right now.

That’s because I wouldn’t have begun this blog. I wouldn’t be writing about tough subjects of faith. And there are many, many others who wouldn’t have had the courage to speak, either.

Many people are writing tributes to Evans after she passed away on 4 May. But I’m adding mine, too, because it’s not an exaggeration that my writing and faith wouldn’t have been the same without her.

Whether implicitly or explicitly, Evans encouraged countless people to write, speak and deepen their theological knowledge. She helped me understand what it means to be a Proverbs 31 woman and a person with questions. And her life and writing gave me the courage to write my own tough questions and my own ideas, right here on this blog.

You didn’t need to agree with her on everything to be inspired by her.

I knew she’d had an influence on my work. But it wasn’t until her passing last week that it really hit me how much her presence had shaped me and my writing.

Rachel Held Evans paved the way for women bloggers like me to speak in a space that’s dominated by men.

I’ve never thought of myself as someone who fits the “Christian woman” mould. And when I began this blog, I felt like there was no category I fit into.

Fact was, I was a woman barely out of my twenties, without a formal theology degree. Most of the writers I wanted to emulate were men, trained as pastors or theological academics, with at least ten years on me.

Other Christian woman bloggers seemed to write devotions or personal reflections. Me, I liked thinking about ideas and taking controversial issues by the horns – but what other Christian woman did that? And who was I to do that? Surely, the internet would eat me alive.

But then I discovered Rachel Held Evans and her work – and something clicked.

Here was a Christian woman writer like I’d never seen. She engaged in rigorous theological debates. She believed that processing doubt was healthy, and that questioning could strengthen your faith. Her belief was that her mind – as well as her heart – was made to know God.

As Katelyn Beaty observed, in a Christian blogosphere that was full of pastors talking about important issues on one hand, and Christian women writing “encouragement” on the other, Evans was a game changer.

It made her a formidable force, and was even described as “saying the things the pastors can’t”. Not exactly your docile female.

She wanted honest conversation.

Evans didn’t think Christians needed to be uniform in every aspect of thought.

So, around her, there grew a community that was a haven – a safe place for doubts and questions. Evans was a welcome relief as a figure who recognised that life can’t always be reduced to a Sunday School answer. Sometimes, it’s difficult and messy.

As Cristina Rosetti wrote on Twitter,

Rachel Held Evans taught the beauty of a messy and complicated faith. She showed us how to hold multiple perspectives in tension. She made people feel safe to talk about doubt.

In a time when we’re more likely to shut each other down, Evans was there to expand the conversation.

She believed our faith is robust enough to withstand questioning.

It’s my heartfelt belief that the Christian faith can stand up to intellectual scrutiny.

That’s why it didn’t bother me – and in fact I admired it – that Evans asked questions, even the tough ones. Even the ones that made people condemn her or wish she would go away.

She inspired similar inquiry in others, too, and some of the conclusions she came to frightened people. They thought Evans would encourage people away from the church.

But ironically, Evans’s presence often meant Christians were able to hold onto faith, even when they were deeply disillusioned or hurt by the church and its gatekeepers.

The outpouring of grief from people across races, sexualities and faiths is evidence of Evans’s ability to unite people. This was a community of outcasts from evangelicalism who still wanted to know God.

She had a heart for outcasts.

We’re in a polarised time when it’s second nature to see the other side as a threat. Christians do it, too.

Not Evans. She wanted to build relationships across all lines. She used her platform to help outsiders and down-and-outs to be heard. And even if you didn’t agree with all the theological lines she drew, she was always compassionate. As she said,

God has a really bad habit of using people we don’t approve of… What makes the gospel offensive is not who it keeps out, but who it lets in.

She was bold.

Her interest was in asking the real and genuine questions of her heart. As Evans wrote in her book A Year of Biblical Womanhood,

I’m the sort of person who likes to identify the things that most terrify and intrigue me in the world and plunge headlong into them like Alice down the rabbit hole.

It’s another thing she and I have in common.

Inhabiting the space that Rachel did would have been tough. Others attacked her, misrepresented her, or called her a heretic. She wasn’t perfect, but she wasn’t pretending to be. She made it okay to wrestle, to question and to be a misfit for the status quo.

That didn’t always make her popular. But it did make her real.

And for that honesty and bravery, I thank her from the bottom of my heart.