Timeline: The Road to Ordination

November 09, 2014 ∙ by Anonymous ∙ in Columbia Union News, This Month's Issue

Adventists have studied women’s ordination for 130 years. See our interactive timeline here!

Article by Celeste Blyden Ryan/ Image from ANN

1880s: A number of women served as pastors in the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Between 1872 and 1945, at least 16 women carried ministerial licenses.

1881: At the GC Session on December 5, a motion was made to ordain women to gospel ministry. "Resolved, That females possessing the necessary qualifications to fill that position, may, with perfect propriety, be set apart by ordination to the work of the Christian ministry." It was reported in Review and Herald, Dec. 20, 1881, but the item was referred to the GC Committee.

1895: In a July 9 Review and Herald article, Ellen White wrote that some women should be set apart for service in the church by “prayer and laying on of hands.”

1950: On May 3, GC officers discussed ordination. "A. V. Olson explained statement from the pen of Sister White, as found in the Review and Herald of July 9, 1895, has been understood by some to provide for the ordination of certain sisters in church service. After some discussion, it was ‘Agreed, To recommend to the General Conference Committee following the session that a small committee be appointed to study and report on this question’” (Minutes, GC Officers Meeting, May 3, 1950).

1970: On June 5, GC officers discussed role of women and agreed to appoint "an adequate committee to consider this large topic … and to submit a report for consideration at the 1970 Autumn Council” (Minutes, GC Officers Meeting, June 5, 1970).

1973: Requests from two overseas divisions for further study, the rediscovery of Ellen White’s 1895 quotes on ordaining women, and the employment of several women as pastors at Adventist churches led the church to establish two study committees. In July the GC Committee established an ad hoc committee to study the role of women in the church and ordination.

In September the Council on the Role of Women in the Seventh-day Adventist Church met. Known as the “Mohaven Committee” because they convened at Ohio Conference’s Camp Mohaven in Danville, the group consisted of 13 men and 14 women who published 29 “Mohaven Papers” and recommended that women be ordained as local church elders and that those with theological training be employed as associates in pastoral care. The group also proposed that a pilot program be developed to lead to ordination by 1975.

1973: In October the Annual Council voted to accept the Mohaven Committee’s report, that “continued study be given to the theological soundness of the election of women to local church offices which require ordination” and “that in areas receptive to such action, there be continued recognition of the appropriateness of appointing women to pastoral evangelistic work.”

1974: A year later at Annual Council attendees voted to continue studying the theological issues, saying, “The time is not ripe nor opportune” to ordain women to gospel ministry.

1975: At March’s Spring Meeting, leaders recommended that the church stop granting women ministerial licenses (after 100 years) and instead grant missionary licenses. They also encouraged women to become Bible workers and assistant pastors and voted to permit ordination of deaconesses (reaffirmed in 1985 and 2010) and women elders (reaffirmed in 1984) with discretion.

1977: General Conference president Robert H. Pierson alerted Spring Meeting attendees that the role of women was under continuing study and a report would be given at the 1977 Annual Council. However, after a poll of the world field yielded negative response, it was deleted from the agenda.

1979: Annual Council voted 10 ministerial internships for women pastors and Bible instructors in North America.

1980: As the fifth priority in his keynote address at GC Session, new GC president Neal C. Wilson stated that “The church must find ways to organize and utilize the vast potential represented by our talented, consecrated women. I am not only urging that women be represented in the administrative structure of the church, but also that we harness the energies and talents of all the women so as to better accomplish the task of finishing the work assigned by our Lord.”

1984: Early in the year, three Potomac Conference women pastors, ordained as elders, held baptisms with the approval of the Columbia Union Conference. This swiftly brought ordination to the forefront again, and GC officers urged conference and union leaders to table further plans until they could convene a worldwide Biblical Research Institute study commission with representation from each division.

Although a 1979 action allowed non-ordained men to baptize, the 1984 Annual Council defeated the Potomac and Columbia Union request to allow women to baptize candidates in their own local churches with conference authorization. They did, however, reaffirm a 1975 decision to approve women elders to be ordained. In action 272-84GN (also noted in the GC Working Policy as BA 60 10) they voted “to advise each division that it is free to make provision as it may deem necessary for the election and ordination of women as local church elders.”*

1985: After weighing a proposal to ordain women pastors to the gospel ministry, GC delegates in New Orleans voted instead to study it further, reform ordination practices for men and provide “affirmative action” by placing qualified women in leadership roles that do not require ordination.

1988: At a May meeting, NAD leaders called for an end to discriminatory policies affecting Adventist women in ministry. During the meeting in Loma Linda, Calif., they voted unanimously their objection to the current discrepancies in how the church treats men and women who have the same training and qualifications. Soon after, the Potomac Conference voted to cease discriminating against women in ministry and permit them, along with un-ordained males, to baptize and perform marriages in the local church.

1989: GC Annual Council delegates vote 187-97 in favor of accepting a two-pronged recommendation from a Cohutta Springs, Calif., Commission on the Role of Women in the Church—rejecting women’s ordination, but permitting qualified women to baptize and perform marriages.

1990: At GC Session in Indianapolis, delegates vote 1,173 to 377 to accept the 1989 commission and Annual Council’s recommendations that women not be ordained at this time. At Annual Council that October, they voted to authorize women to serve as pastors and authorized them to perform baptisms and marriages in some divisions.*

1995: Delegates to the GC Session in Utrecht, voted 1,481 to 673 to deny an NAD request to allow divisions to individually decide whether women should be ordained to the gospel ministry.

2010: At the GC Session in Atlanta, delegates reaffirmed their 1985 decision to allow ordination of deaconesses. They also voted to ask world leaders to study a theology of ordination scheduled to be completed by the 2014 Annual Council.

July 2010: At the 59th GC Session, Ray Hartwell, Pennsylvania Conference president, suggests that the church study and establish a theology of ordination. Leaders promise to address it during the quinquennium ending in 2015.

September 2011: The church votes to establish the TOSC that will “involve all world divisions” to meet January 2013-June 2014.

January 2012: North American Division leaders ask unions to find ways to affirm women in ministry.

March 2012: The Columbia Union Executive Committee establishes an ad hoc committee to study ways to affirm women in ministry.

April 2012: The North German Union approves ordination of women to the gospel ministry.

May 17, 2012: The Columbia Union Executive Committee votes to call a special constituency meeting.

July 29, 2012: At the Columbia Union’s historic constituency session, delegates approve ordination without regard to gender by a vote of 209 in favor, 51 opposed and 9 abstained, a ratio of 4 to 1.

August 2012: The Pacific Union Conference votes ordination without regard to gender by a margin of 79 percent to 21 percent.

2013: Each of the 13 divisions of the worldwide church conduct a study of the theology of ordination and its practice in regard to women pastors and issue a recommendation.

October 14, 2014: Delegates to the GC Annual Council vote to propose a question for delegates at the 2015 GC Session.

Read and share these articles from the November Visitor!

Timeline: The Road to Ordination

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