Ellen G. White’s View of the Role of Women in the SDA Church

Summary and Conclusions

Ellen G. White [1827-1915] lived and worked during a period of great social ferment and transition. In her day the “proper place” of women was quite generally decreed by a male-dominated society to be “in the home.” Women of that time, generally, did not distinguish themselves in positions of conspicuous public exposure. The chauvinistic spirit of the age is aptly epitomized by the cynical remark attributed to Gilbert K. Chesterton: EGWVRWSDA 11.4

“A woman speaking in public is like a dog standing on its hind legs. One is not surprised that it is done well; one is surprised that it is done at all.”

Ellen White demonstrated what a woman of intelligence, wit, courage, discretion, and determination can accomplish in lifting the burdens and improving conditions in society, the church, and the home. She was more concerned with doing right than in being popular. She stood in the forefront of reform in unpopular causes such as the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath, the feet-washing “ordinance” in celebration of the Lord’s Supper, [and] the advocacy of temperance enforced by civil/criminal statute. She did not become involved in promoting certain “secular” reforms, such as suffrage, women’s rights, etc.; and she warned the church of her day against such involvement, perhaps because, in part: EGWVRWSDA 11.5

1. She did not want to divert attention from the main work of the church, as she viewed it: the giving of the gospel to the world. EGWVRWSDA 11.6

2. The unity of the church—a very high priority with her—might be compromised (if not sundered) by unnecessary involvement in controversial issues. EGWVRWSDA 11.7

3. Recognition that all reforms come slowly in conservative institutions, including her church, and that an attempt to accomplish too much, too quickly, might create a backlash that could effectively thwart accomplishment on any front. EGWVRWSDA 11.8

4. The spirit of some feminist reformers was alien to the spirit of Christ, and this [was] inimical to fostering and developing spirituality within the church of God. EGWVRWSDA 11.9

Ellen White called for the total utilization of the full resources of her church, including the talents and abilities of its women, for the promotion of the kingdom of God on earth and the hastening of Christ’s second coming. She advocated placing women in all positions for which they might be qualified, and to which they might be called by the Lord, including pulpit ministry. Not once, however, in any of her recorded utterances did she call for ordination of women to the gospel ministry. There is no evidence that she regarded this “lack” either as a substantial deficiency or a belittling disservice to her in her work, or to other women in gospel ministry (as she did the failure of conferences to compensate with wages the women who did such work). Her silence—for she spoke neither in favor of ordination nor against—“proves” nothing conclusively beyond the fact that this subject was not one of her high-priority burdens during her ministry (which ended in 1915). EGWVRWSDA 12.1

Today the SDA Church, of which she was a co-founder, has been slow to proceed with approval of ordination of women to the gospel ministry for perhaps three reasons: EGWVRWSDA 12.2

a. Theological: Until now the church has based all precepts and practices on a clearly explicated “Thus-saith-the-Lord.” The absence in Scripture of any precedent commanding (or even permitting) ordination of women ministers gives some pause. And a decision to go ahead would signal a significant departure from previous policy based on “the-Bible-and-the-Bible-only.”

b. Historical: The lack of any Spirit of prophecy counsels authorizing ordination of women to the ministry—particularly in the absence of Scriptural warrant—doubtless has caused some hesitation.

c. Ecclesiastical: The SDA Church is a world church, and when the General Conference speaks, it speaks to the entire body of believers. In certain parts of the Third World today contemporary cultural considerations would totally preclude the wisdom of ordaining women to anything, and a decision favoring ordination of women is clearly contraindicated there. Yet, under our present polity, ordination is to a world church, not a regional body.

The Ellen G. White Estate has endeavored to follow the practice of its founder: EGWVRWSDA 12.3

a. The advocacy of placing women in all positions for which they may be qualified and to which they may be called by God, including the gospel ministry.

b. Silent neutrality regarding either advocacy or opposition to the ordination of women to gospel ministry.

Roger W. Coon
Ellen G. White Estate
General Conference of SDA
Washington, DC
June 6, 1986