Credentials for women.

[Gregory Matthews]

SPECTRUM, Vol. 33, Number 4, reports that the Northern California Conference has begun to issue a gender-netural credentail to its male and female pastors. This credential simply specifies that it is a "ordained/commissioned" credential. This is similar to what the South-Eastern California Conference has issues for several years.

NOTE: The SDA Chruch ordains thier male pastors, and commissions its female pastors, in the final step of church accreditation.

I await the day when the SDA YEARBOOK gives our female pastors the same recognition that it gives to male pastors.

[Dr. Shane]

I would like to see women pastors ordained too. But I also view the church as a "we" organization and not an "I" organization. It isn't about what "I" want or believe but what "we" want or believe. Until the church decides at a General Conference Session to ordain women, I believe we need to submit to the church and "play well with others".

[Gregory Matthews]

Re: "Until the church decides at a General Conference Session to ordain women, I believe we need to submit to the church and 'play well with others'."

Shane, in this case, you should be quite happey.

No Conference has violated the decision of the General Conference on this matter.

No local congregation has ever done such.

If you think otherwise, you have simply misunderstood what has happened.

[Dr. Shane]

I don't think otherwise and I am quite happy.

[Gerr]

I seem to recall reading somewhere that the church in Washington, D.C. publicly ordained two women, and the LLU church also did the same.

Gerry

[Robert]

None of this really matters to me because neither female nor male is my pope. I go to the scripture alone. Letting someone else think for you is bad business.

Having said that I still lean a bit towards that role being for males. Why didn't Christ pick 12 women? Was Christ, by selecting all men, playing favorites? No way...that is sin! So whatever Christ's motivation it was free of bias.

[Dr. Shane]

I believe the women that have been ordained were only ordained locally. That means they can baptise, perform marriage and funeral ceromonies in that church or conference but not outside of that jurisidiction.

[Gerr]

Quote:

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Shane said:

I believe the women that have been ordained were only ordained locally. That means they can baptise, perform marriage and funeral ceromonies in that church or conference but not outside of that jurisidiction.

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[:"blue"]Ordination IS ordination!!! I hate political games, especially when played by people who claim to be followers of Christ!!! [/]

Gerry

[Gerr]

I thought you have a pope named Jack.

Gerry

[Robert]

Quote:

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Gerry Cabalo said:

I thought you have a pope named Jack.

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If it wasn’t for Jack I would probably be an atheist!

Hence, "How are men to call upon him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without a preacher? And how can men preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news!” [Romans 10:14,15]

Traditional Adventism is poison...it is subtle legalism. I believe EGW said not one in forty (2.5%) would be saved! Why?

• -BC- 3SM

  -TI- Selected Messages Book 3

  -CN- 21

  -CT- Ellen G. White Reports on the Minneapolis Conference

  -PR- 01

  -PG- 188

  The doctrine of grace and salvation through Jesus Christ is a mystery to a large share of those whose names are upon the church books. If Christ were upon the earth speaking to His people, He would reproach them for their slowness of comprehension. He would say to the slow and uncomprehending, "I have left in your possession truths which concern your salvation, of which you do not suspect the value." Oh, that it might be said of ministers who are preaching to the people and to the churches, "Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures"! (Luke 24:45). I tell you in the fear of God that up to this time, the Bible truths connected with the great plan of redemption are but feebly understood. The truth will be continually unfolding, expanding, and developing, for it is divine, like its Author.

Jack isn't my pope at all, but I am glad I came across him. I've studied it out myself....In some areas I've disagreed, but then I find myself agreeing. All in all I agree with Him almost 100%.

[Gregory Matthews]

Re: "I believe the women that have been ordained were only ordained locally. That means they can baptise, perform marriage and funeral ceromonies in that church or conference but not outside of that jurisidiction."

Shane, you have hit the nail on the head. You are correct. But, this may need further clairfication.

The local congregation only has the authority fo ordain local elders. They do not ordain SDA clergy.

Gerry has said that ordination is ordination. No, it is not. The offices to which one is ordained may differ. In SDA paractice, the office of a local elder differes from the office of a SDA minister. As I have said, local congregations in the SDA Chruch do not ordain higher than the local elder. Yes, they have ordained women as local elders for years.

Ordained local elders may, under conditions, baptize, and perform certain other functions of an ordained SDA clergyperson.

The women who function in the SDA Chruch as pastors, and are Commissioned, do not have the full functions that are granted to an ordained male clergyperson. A commissioned female pastor,because she is not ordained, cannot be elected to the position of General Conference President, and certain other functions and positions.

This became an issue during a recent high-level meeting of the Chruch. A female was elected to the posiiton of General Conference Vice-President. Following this, a formal action was takent to restrict the posiiton of President to ordained SDA clergypersons (all males).

Gerry, the offict to which one is ordained is always a factor in ordination. No local SDA congregation has the power to ordain SDA clergy. They can hold an ordination ceremoney. They can call it what they will. But, it is not that ordination, and will not be recognized as such, of a person to a position higher than that of a SDA local Elder.

[Gerr]

I am not talking about the ordination of elders by a local congregation as being on the same footing as the ordination of pastors or the clergy.

So what kind of ordination was it that took place in D.C. & LLU? Was it an ordination of pastors or not? If it was not, I stand corrected.

Gerry

[Gregory Matthews]

Gerry, my point is that a local congregation, whatever they may call it, does not have the authority to ordain higher than a local Elder. Therefore, any ordination (If not of a deacon, as some ordain female deacons.) is considered by the Chruch at large to be the ordination of a local Elder.

I have not seen the 2006 edition of the YEARBOOK. Right now I am looking at an older edition. But, the edition that I am looking at lists two catagories of SDA clergy. The first is the Ordained Ministers. The second is the Credentialed Commissioned Ministers. In the older edition that I am looking at, with two exceptions, all are females. I am uncertain as to why the two exceptions.

Anyway, this seperate listing extablishes my point that Commissioned Ministers (mainly female) are not considered to be Ordained Minsiters, regardless of what a local congregation may have done.

[Gerr]

Thanks for the information.

Gerry

[Tom Wetmore]

Here is an interesting article from Sojourners:

The real tradition of women and church leadership

by Sandra Dufield

SojoMail 1-25-2006

In claiming church tradition doesn't allow women to be ordained priests, Vatican and Catholic officials would do well to consider the history of their tradition.

According to Dorothy Irvin, a Catholic theologian and archaeologist, the traditional Christian church had women priests and the archaeological evidence of this is preserved for us to see today.

In the Church of St. Praxedis in Rome there's a mosaic depicting four women leaders. One woman, Theodora (ca. 820 A.D.), has the title Episcopa above her head, which means a bishop who is a woman.

In a cathedral at Annaba, in what is now Algeria, is a mosaic covering the tomb of a woman. Along with her name, Guilia Runa, is her title "presbiterissa," which means female priest. The same title is on women's tombs in Rome. Two read, "Veronica presbitera daughter of Josetis" and "Faustina presbitera."

Additionally, a fourth-century fresco in Rome's Catacomb of Priscilla shows a woman being ordained. She's wearing an alb under her chasuble, which is first worn at ordination. Only priests and higher church leaders could wear it. Next to her, with his right hand on her shoulder, is a bishop, identified by his chair and his pallium, also worn during ordination.

Although tradition is a key argument used to oppose women's ordination, another cites the fact the 12 disciples were all male. It contends if Christ wanted women to be church leaders, some of his twelve would have been women.

While initially convincing, the rationalization crumbles when another pivotal distinction of the day is considered: ethnicity. The disciples were also all Jewish. Does this mean when we choose church leaders today, only those with primary Jewish ancestry can be considered candidates?

Every argument the Vatican and other denominational officials give to block women's ordination can be biblically and theologically challenged. Saying "no" to women priests and pastors is nothing more than the "good old boy" system at work in a sacred institution, and remnant survivalism of the sub-Christian thought that leached into the early church influencing the way men and women were perceived.

Elements of gnostic and ancient pagan thought systems saw women as flawed, problematic, and more susceptible to malfeasance than men. The early church failed to adequately challenge and eradicate these permeating cultural distortions and in time scripture was interpreted through the contaminated lens of women's ontological inferiority.

This is reflected in the statements of great early church leaders such as Thomas Aquinas, "Woman is defective and misbegotten"; Gratian, "Woman is not made in God's image"; and St. Augustine, "What is the difference wither it is in a wife or a mother; it is still Eve the temptress that we must be aware of in any woman.... I fail to see what use women can be to man, if one excludes the function of bearing children."

While the inferiority argument is considered heretical in the church today, the unbiblical prejudicial constructs it upheld still exist. Replaced and repackaged with expressions like "equal in essence, but unequal in function" and "different roles," the dismissal and diminishment of women has a modern home in the modern church.

Very early church tradition had women serving in all areas of ministry. Women's restriction in the church did not derive from tradition, but from the gradual importation of sub-Christian thought from outside the church, into the church.

Until the Vatican and other denominational leaders acknowledge women's call to full discipleship and reinstitute the tradition of women's ordination, they will continue to perpetuate constructs of the heretical thought that diminished and dismissed half the redeemed based on an innate fleshly distinction: femaleness.

Sandra Dufield is a freelance writer living in Bridgeville, Pennsylvania.

[Nicodema]

Quote:

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Tom Wetmore said:

This is reflected in the statements of great early church leaders such as Thomas Aquinas, "Woman is defective and misbegotten"; Gratian, "Woman is not made in God's image"; and St. Augustine, "What is the difference wither it is in a wife or a mother; it is still Eve the temptress that we must be aware of in any woman.... I fail to see what use women can be to man, if one excludes the function of bearing children."

---

[unChristlike moment]

It is a darned good thing none of these "august" male personages ever stood in my presence issuing such odoriferous verbal flatulence to taint the air, else each would have immediately found himself doubled in agony in the fetal position upon the ground, clutching his groin and whimpering like a beaten cur.

[/unChristlike moment]

Seriously, the filthy sexist-pig sentiments echoed in their self-serving, self-aggrandizing pronouncements is not possibly, not probably, but DEFINITELY responsible for nearly EVERY sincere reaction of abhorrence and loathing experienced today toward even the most reasonable explanations of the male-female roles and relations spelled out in Scripture. Understood by themselves, these are not detestable as they read in scripture; rather, it is the accretion of centuries of this kind of inexcusable absolute filth overlaying and poisoning the subject which causes sensitive, intelligent people to recoil from anything that sounds (to them) like a suggestion we debase ourselves as human beings backwards in the direction of such effluvia.

Quote:

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Sandra Dufield is a freelance writer living in Bridgeville, Pennsylvania.

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Tom, while I appreciate you bringing this very informative article to our attention, I have to ask myself when, when, WHEN are we going to hear these facts expressed by noble MEN of truth in the church, so that we no longer have to endure the eternally tedious, supposed "final word" dismissal along this wise: "yeah, but what do you expect ... that article was written by a woman."

[Gregory Matthews]

Tom, how about responding to Nico with a listing of the documents that have been written by SDA male, theologians, supporting female ordination.

I ask you to do so as I believe you are probably better equiped to do so than I.

[Nicodema]

That would be interesting, yes ... however it's not only ordination I'm concerned about, nor even specifically, so much as all the blatantly vile attitudes we would NEVER tolerate if, say, someone was spewing such things about a particular ETHNIC persuasion being "inferior" and "fit for nothing but breeding" instead of about a particular gender.

Yet "we" (not all of us here obviously but "we" in the broader sense of church folk at large) tolerate that kind of abhorrent slime when it comes to denigrating women, even inventing twisted interpretations of scripture to pretend to substantiate such wanton bigotry, and this just is not right. But most of the SANER work I've seen exploring the male-female roles in scripture and the mutual submission ideas, headship ideas, etc. have been written by WOMEN. Which means it is easy for the MEN, still "ruling the roost" as it were, to just blithely dismiss it as the "cackling of discontented hens," unworthy of their attention.

I would therefore like to see articles by MEN, both SDA and other Christians as well, supporting a healthy, Godly, sane, Christian Galatians 3:28 perspective, as some of these good women have done.

[Tom Wetmore]

Quote:

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Nicodema said:

Tom, while I appreciate you bringing this very informative article to our attention, I have to ask myself when, when, WHEN are we going to hear these facts expressed by noble MEN of truth in the church, so that we no longer have to endure the eternally tedious, supposed "final word" dismissal along this wise: "yeah, but what do you expect ... that article was written by a woman."

---

Points well taken... But please note that I, being male, lend my humble masculine endorsement (for the benefit of the low-browed neandrathals of which you speak) to such female written articles by, taking them seriously, circulating them for wider exposure and comment,to invite other open-minded persons, male or female to further affirm such articles and books and confirm the facts and rational thoughts contained in them, and indeed invite those convinced of a less enlightened point of view to "put up or shut up" by way of rational and logical and bona fide scholarship to respond and refute if they can.

Your suggested reaction indeed reminds me of the early days of the civil rights movement where African Americans finally had had enough of the status quo Jim Crow and stood up for themselves. And slowly but surely, silent and afraid white Americans also did the right thing and stood up and one by one fell in step arm in arm with them on the march toward racial equality. And the response, like that which you suggested to the article, to seeing black men and women stand up and speaking out for themselves was vastly more dismissive, harsh and insulting, "Yeah, but what do you expect ... from a bunch of uppity ______, they should know their place, shut up and go sit down at the back of the bus where they belong..." Don't forget it was a women who quitely sat down at the front of the bus where she belonged and started the ball rolling. And soon men stood up and said and did what was long overdue.

There have indeed been a number of male Biblical scholars who have intelligently supported women's rights and women in church leadership and ministry. But unfortunately the vast majority of the North American Church membership and leadership, who indeed are supportive, have been unfairly cowed by the noisy minority of naysayers into silence and inaction. But I sense a spirit that is on the move, the silence is being broken... We in the Adventist Church need to stop being silent as it only gives the narrow-minded the opportunity to fill the silence with their rhetoric of the dark ages. The longer we hold to a position of inequality for women the more we sound like and look like the Catholic Church which was the focus of the article. (And I would hope that would at least stir the anti-WO Catholiphobics among us to reconsider the real source of their position...)

Tom

PS Gregory, I am somewhat handicapped since I am on a borrowed computer, so I can't offer up the requested resources right now. Later...

[Nicodema]

Tom, I appreciate your response, and of COURSE I appreciate your "masculine endorsement" as well as your action in [:"blue"]"taking them seriously, circulating them for wider exposure and comment,to invite other open-minded persons, male or female to further affirm such articles and books and confirm the facts and rational thoughts contained in them, and indeed invite those convinced of a less enlightened point of view to "put up or shut up" by way of rational and logical and bona fide scholarship to respond and refute if they can."[/] Most heartily and most definitely! I never meant to imply that ALL men would react with dismissal -- if it came out sounding that way I do apologize! -- I was thinking only of those who believe their tenuous "status quo" is threatened by a more enlightened, realistic view of women (and thus act accordingly).

AND I would hasten to add, it's not just menfolk who respond that way; some women do, too, because they have been convinced that they must accept discriminatory views toward themselves in order to be a woman of God or to please God. (In which case they might dismiss by saying, "oh she's just a liberal/feminist/'restless modern Eve' who can't accept her Biblical 'duty') How tragic!

I very much appreciate your comments above too!

Blessed Sabbath,

Nico

[Dr. Shane]

Quote:

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Tom, I appreciate your response, and of COURSE I appreciate your "masculine endorsement"

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What about my "masculine endorsement"?

[archierieus]

To say that this is a hot-button issue would, no doubt, be a bit of an understatement. If, however, one were to dispassionately sift through the available evidence, it would be interesting to see what would result. I can't say that I have done that, to any significant degree. All I know for sure is that there are different positions, whose adherents all claim Scriptural authority. Fascinating!

Dave

[Nicodema]

Quote:

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Shane said:

Quote:

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Tom, I appreciate your response, and of COURSE I appreciate your "masculine endorsement"

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What about my "masculine endorsement"?

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Well SUUUUURRRRRE, Shane! If you're offering it, I'll take it and appreciate it!

The more the merrier!

[Nicodema]

Hey check out what I found in Education tonight. It pays to read that SS Lesson!

Quote:

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by Ellen G. White:

Since both men and women have a part in home-making, boys as well as girls should gain a knowledge of household duties. To make a bed and put a room in order, to wash dishes, to prepare a meal, to wash and repair his own clothing, is a training that need not make any boy less manly; it will make him happier and more useful. And if girls, in turn, could learn to harness and drive a horse, and to use the saw and the hammer, as well as the rake and the hoe, they would be better fitted to meet the emergencies of life.

---

-- Education, p. 216-217.

Woot for Sister White!!!

[Gregory Matthews]

Nico, a personal story on this:

At one stage in the life of my sister (18 months younger) and I, our parents decided that we would be in charge of the Sunday dinner. One week I would be in charge, and my sister would assist, and the next she would be in charge, and I would assist.

Within my mother's guidelines, the one in charge would planthe meal. My parents would purchase the required food, and we would fix it. So, if we waned aritchokes, they bought them.

In those days, it was not a time to purchase a lot of ready-made food. If we wanted a cake, or a pie, we made it from scratch. That included making the pie-crust. During those times, we sometiems baked our own bread, and from scratch.

This background was of great help to me at a much later stage in my life when I became a single parent, wiht minor children living with me. I fixed meals, and sometimes baked fresh bread. Yet I remember another chaplain friend who had,once, to care for children while his wife was in the hospital. He simply took them to McDonalds every day.

During the time I was cooking (My wife deos it now, and don't anyone tell me that I need to give her time off and a cooked meal occasionally.) I had a collection of recepie books. The church I attended had a weekly pot-lick, and I fixed every Sabbath stuf to bring.

NOTE: I even occasionally fixed Kimchi for the Korean people who attended. But, that required several weeks of preparation. On the Sabbaths that I brought it, the entire chruch knew it was in the kitchen, from the beginning of Sabbath-school to the end of chruch. <img src="/ubbtreads/images/graemlins/coolhello.gif" alt="" />

NOTE: I once gave thought to fixing an onion pie, and taking it to pot-luck. But, I never got around to doing so. I have a book on making pies. There was a basic recepie taht I coudl ahve adapted to develop an onion pie. As one who likes peanut-butter and onion sandwiches, I thought about it, but I never did it.

On several Sabbaths I did fix Guyeere (I don't know how to spell it.) cheese soup. But it was more often baked main dishes. Sometiems it was pies, fresh baked bread, and even on occasion something to drink as in some mixed combintaion of mixed fruit juices.

Oh, well.