Loma Linda Messages

W. C. White to J. A. Burden, Aug. 6, 1909

Hinsdale, Ill., Aug. 6, 1909.

Elder John A. Burden, Loma Linda, Calif.

Dear Brother Burden:—

For several days I have been planning to write you regarding the medical work in Southern California, and especially the educational work at Loma Linda. LLM 416.2

No doubt you have received from Washington a copy of the resolutions adopted by the members of the General Conference Committee in a meeting held about the 22nd of July. With this I send you another copy. These resolutions were adopted about a week after quite a lengthy discussion in the General Conference Committee, in which were considered the advantages and disadvantages of various plans and propositions which you have made regarding the work at Loma Linda. LLM 416.3

From these resolutions you will see that the members of the General Conference Committee who were then in Washington were heartily in favor of the development of the Loma Linda Sanitarium and School and that they advised that it be helped by the Union Conference. I was very glad indeed when they adopted these resolutions. LLM 416.4

You will also see that our brethren have some fears and misgivings regarding your taking the first steps toward the establishment of a medical college and they wish you to look this matter square in the face and secure carefully prepared statements as to what will be required in the matter of additional faculty, additional facilities and additional expense. LLM 416.5

It seems to me that this counsel is wise and I am hoping that at your Los Angeles campmeeting you will be able to present to the brethren in a strong way the changes of the Loma Linda school for medical evangelists as a place to train workers for these (742) foreign fields which can use nurses with superior qualifications who are also evangelists. LLM 416.6

There are fields like Great Britain and continental Europe which require physicians who have graduated from colleges having high reputation, and I have suggested to our brethren that we depend principally upon the Missionary Seminary and Union College for the students to pursue medical studies in these superior medical colleges, while Loma Linda be encouraged to give its principal energies to the development of workers for those mission fields which have a more open door. LLM 417.1

I am hoping that you will see your way to secure the presentation of the Loma Linda school to our people in all the conferences of the Pacific Coast and in the Mississippi Valley as a school for the training of medical evangelists who will go abroad with credentials from their conferences to work as medical missionary evangelists but who will stand before the world legally as nurses, not carrying any form of a physician's title. If you do this I think you will soon have the hearty support of many who are now questioning the wisdom of your plans. LLM 417.2

Personally I am still in favor of so strengthening our medical course that those who wish to do so can secure some credit in ordinary regular medical schools, but I cannot say much regarding this as yet because so many of my brethren are opposed to this, fearing that it will lead students to enter medical schools and accept diplomas that would not be acceptable in British and European countries. LLM 417.3

Now regarding finances, this is not a time for undertaking large movements. This is not a time to go to our people for the raising of large sums for home work, this is not a time to move rapidly. This is not a favorable time for any one individual to show great persistency in carrying out plans that (743) are favored by a few and that are feared by many. This is a good time to move cautiously, to speak moderately and to wait patiently for the Lord to open the way. I am earnestly hoping that you will not make a great issue of this matter at the Los Angeles campmeeting. I am hoping that you will see your way to arrange for a conference with the Union Conference Committee, with the leading medical men and with mother, in connection with the Northern California campmeeting, and that as a result of this council we can send forward to our brethren in Washington some proposals regarding the future development of the work at Loma Linda which will meet with their approval. LLM 417.4

What mother has written to you about going forward with the work at Loma Linda I have understood to refer to the carrying out successfully of plans already introduced and underway, and I think it would be a sad mistake for you to take this counsel as meaning that you are to plunge hastily into new plans and large expenditures. LLM 417.5

You will be pleased to learn that the Lord has greatly blessed mother in her work. This afternoon we go to the Elgin, Ill., camp-meeting, next week to Madison, Wis., then to Nevada, Iowa, then to Boulder, Colo., and then home. LLM 418.1

Yours very truly,
W. C. White.

PW-WCW

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