>William Fagal, Director
>Ellen G. White Estate Branch Office
>Andrews University
>Berrien Springs, MI 49104-1400 USA
>Phone: 616 471-3209
>FAX: 616 471-6166
>Website: www.WhiteEstate.org or www.egwestate.andrews.edu
>E-mail: [email protected]
>
>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>
>Beginning in 1871 the church issued Mrs. White the credentials of an
>ordained minister. Was she therefore ordained? No. How do we know?
>>From two lines of evidence, one coming from some of the credentials
>and the other from Mrs. White herself.
>
>On at least one of the credentials we have for her, the word "ordained"
>has been carefully struck out, while on others it has not. The difference
>apparently does not indicate a change of status. The word "ordained"
>stands unstruck on her credentials from 1883 and 1887, but it is struck
>out on her 1885 credentials, the one in between the other two.
>
>In 1909 Mrs. White filled out a General Conference "Biographical
>Information Blank" in her own handwriting. Item 19 asks, "If ordained,
>state when, where, and by whom." On the answer line Mrs. White simply
>inscribed an X. She did the same for Item 26, which asks, "if remarried,
>give date, and to whom." Just as the X for the latter question indicated
>that she had never remarried, the X for Item 19 indicates that she had
>never been ordained.
>
>So why did the church give her the credentials of an ordained minister?
>Well, what other credentials did they have that they could give her? The
>church has never had "prophetic" or "messenger" credentials, so apparently
>the church gave her its highest credentials without an ordination ceremony
>having been carried out. We can see the awkwardness of the situation in
>the fact that sometimes they crossed out the word "ordained"--they
>recognized that these credentials were not a perfect fit. But in fact she
>needed no church credentials. For more than 25 years prior to 1871 she
>functioned without them.
>
>By the way, Arthur White included the information about the Biographical
>Information Blank in an article that Spectrum published back in the spring
>of 1972 (Spectrum, Vol. 4, No. 2, p. 8), so Ellen G. White's own testimony
>that she had not been ordained has been available for nearly 30 years. (I
>also included it in a two-part series I wrote for Ministry Magazine in the
>late 1980s.) Within the Ellen G. White Estate, to my knowledge all have
>agreed that Ellen G. White had not been ordained, irrespective of any view
>they might hold on whether ordination for women is appropriate. The three
>documents the White Estate keeps in print to send to people who have
>questions on related issues today all say the same thing on this point:
>Mrs. White herself was never ordained.
>
>I hope this is helpful. Thank you for writing, and God bless.
>
>--------
>William Fagal, Director
>Ellen G. White Estate Branch Office
>Andrews University
>Berrien Springs, MI 49104-1400 USA
>Phone: 616 471-3209
>FAX: 616 471-6166
>Website: www.WhiteEstate.org or www.egwestate.andrews.edu
>E-mail: [email protected]