Adventism & Women's

Ordination

by Nic Samojluk

I grew up in South America where machismo is quite predominant in society. In spite of this, I believe that our ministerial ordination practices should be gender blind and neutral. If the Lord calls women for church service in that capacity, who are we to abort that call?

I do not think that this issue will split the church, provided we do it without imposing women's ordination on the rest of Adventism. If we do, it will fail like Bushs's decision to impose democracy on Iraq.

It will take an unusual amount of courage to implement such a monumental change, but doing what is right has never been easy. Think about how hard it was to do away with the old denominational practice of compensating women signicantly less for the same type of work and responsibility.

I remember how a colleague of mine complained that her salary at an SDA institution was 60 percent of that of her male counterparts for the same type of work. She was told that the church paid men more because they were the main providers for their families.

-"That's precisely why I need to be paid as my male counterparts are. I am the main breadwinner in my family," she argued.

-"Sorry, but we can't alter the church's policy," was the answer she got.

When a few decades ago a woman employed by the Pacific Press decided to do something about this inequality and appealed to a governmental agency, the church exerted all its power in an attempt to keep our loyal women subjugated under this unfair renumerating policy.

Will the church this time do what is right? I do not know, but the climate is changing, and perhaps the new leaders might muster the courage to do what is right.

One way of accomplishing the main objective of treating all church workers equally regarless of gender would be to drop entirely the term "ordination," which has no biblical basis, and call the ritual by another name, be it "commissioning," "appointment," "assignment," or any other term that would tend to soften the chance of being perceived as an outright rebellion against the rest of Adventism.

Free Mailing List Club!

 

If you would like to be on our SDA Forum Mailing List, please take a minute to sign up today and join hundreds of others who have done already so. It is free, and you will have the choice of unsuscribing at will. We do not share, nor do we sell your E-mail to others.