Margit Sahlin
1914-2003.
Priest, theologian, author.
Margit Sahlin was one of Sweden's first three female priests and was ordained in 1960 after the Church of Sweden opened its doors to female priests by a decision of the Church Council and a new law was passed in 1958 and came into force in 1959.
Before that, she had acquired a broad academic background and defended her doctoral thesis in Romance languages on the ecclesiastical dance and the folk dance song, La Carole médiévale et ses rapports avec l´église (The Medieval Dance and its Relations with the Church ). As early as 1940, her thesis was interdisciplinary.
Sahlin initiated the creation of the Catherine Foundation and was its director for a total of 34 years. The Foundation is described as a meeting place for dialogue between church and society.
Sahlin was secretary of the Central Council of the Church of Sweden from 1945 to 1970 and was awarded an honorary doctorate in theology in Uppsala in 1978.
In the 1970s, she was also vicar of the Engelbrekt parish in Stockholm. She pioneered the formation of diocesan women's councils around the country and their umbrella organization, the Church Women's Council (now Women in the Church of Sweden).
Among the many books Margit Sahlin has written are Evangelization (1947), Man and Woman in Christ's Church (1950), The Ministry of the Word in a Changing World (1959), Time for a Rethink (1980), With Peter (1982), What God is Like (1985), The Secret Book. Reading the Bible Today (1994) and Jesus. The Secret of God (1999).
The Margit Sahlin Academy was established in 2015 and is a platform for the exchange of views between research, society, culture and the church in the spirit of Margit Sahlin.
Burial site: 0154-0137
Image description: Margit Sahlin at her summer house in Dalarna, unknown year. Photo: Ulf Palm. [The image is cropped]
Click here for an uncropped image
