I. The Reported Facts

The Christian Renewal, in its December 16, 1985 issue, published a portion of a preaching evaluation form usually distributed, collected, and processed by the Field Office of Calvin Theological Seminary. This evaluation form revealed that a female Calvin Theological Seminary student preached in the morning worship service at the Ann Arbor Chapel (CRC) on June 9, 1985. This student also preached on at least two other occasions: once at Judson Baptist, Kalamazoo on June 23, and then again at Servants Community Reformed, Grand Rapids, on July 21.

II. The School Policy

In 1974 the Board of Trustees of Calvin College and Seminary had a policy to “include women (M. Div.) students in field work other than exhorting.” It was because this formulation was subject to differing interpretations that the Board began work on a new policy. The Board adopted the following policy governing women M. Div. students at Calvin Seminary. The policy is given in its entirety in the Acts of Synod 1985, Report 5, p. 143. Let me restate portions for you:

1 . Calvin Seminary will admit women to its M. Div. program.

Grounds:

a. As an educational institution Calvin Theological seminary has a mission which is broader than preparing men for Christian Reformed Ministry.

b. Even though theM. Div. degree program is “primarily for persons wishing to prepare themselves for the ordained ministry,” admission to and/or graduation from the program does not require that the student will be or intends to be ordained.

2 . Calvin Seminary will not require exhorting (understood as the explanation and application of Scripture at an official worship service) in its requirements for the M. Div. degree for women students.

Grounds:

a. As a seminary of the Christian Reformed Church, the school must be consistent with the position of the church which has not opened the office of minister of the Word to women.

b. The Synod of 1976 permitted “the seminary to waive the requirement of exhorting in field education for women students enrolled in the M. Div. program.”

3. Calvin Seminary will not solicit, promote, or provide opportunities for exhorting by its women M. Div. students; nor will it place its women M. Div. students in field education assignments without the clear understanding that exhorting is not required or expected. Grounds: same as 2 above.

4. Calvin Seminary will promote , evaluate, and credit all fieldwork by women M. Div. students other than exhorting, including public teaching and speaking in places such as rest homes, chapels, retreats, and other such nonofficial worship settings.

III. Reflections on the Issues Involved

A. Calvin Theological Seminary: Educational or Ecclesiastical?

Although C.T.S. is an educational institution, the M. Div. program is designed to prepare for the official church ministry. In the very interest of being consistent, we must distinguish between the “broader mission” of the seminary, and the “specific purpose and nature of theM. Div. degree.”

B. Will M. Div. Graduates be Ordained?

Who can say? Is it likely? Yes. To use a far fetched analogy: you don’t go through medical school to become a bird-watcher. Classes and presbyteries both require and recognize the M. Div. degree as the academic degree in preparation for ordained ministry.

Examination and ordination are based upon the possession of this degree. Will the present policy continue to allow women to prepare for the ministry in the Christian Reformed Church and then take their degree to another denomination which will examine and ordain them? In other words, if it is biblically wrong for women to be preachers in the CRC isn’t it just as wrong for us to train them to be ministers in other denominations?

It is sheer hypocrisy for us to knowingly allow such to be the case. There is obviously a woman currently enrolled in theM. Div. program at C.T.S . whose intent is to be ordained. Otherwise, why would she be preaching?

C. Let’s be Consistent!

The wording of ground 2a does not accurately express a scriptural ground for not requiring women to exhort or the seminary not arranging for such opportunities. We are not the church “which has not opened the office of minister of the Word to women,” but we are the church which permits “males who meet the biblical requirements . . . to be ordained to the office of . . . minister of the Word.” We want a stop sign here, not a yield sign. We should, as loyal and patient members of the Christian Reformed Church, expect all institutions and policies to be consistent with the biblical pattern as interpreted by Synod and ordered by the Church Order. This policy should not even hint at being a “wait until the springtime comes” statement. We are biblical, and we should be anxious to promote obedience to God’s Word and to the Lordship of Christ in the Church.

D . Be Forthright!

Did the Field Office solicit, promote, or provide opportunities for women to exhort? The evaluation form seems to indicate that the field office did at least have knowledge of this female seminary student’s preaching activities, of her breaches of Board policy, and did process her evaluation form along with male M. Div. students.

Point 3 of the policy states that Calvin seminary will not place its women M. Div. students in F. E. assignments without the clear understanding that “exhorting is not required or expected.” (Should it not state “with the understanding that exhorting is prohibited!” to make the policy clear)?

IV. Suggested Correction:

A . Rewrite the policy to remove any ambiguities and insist that it be followed. B. Refuse women admission to theM. Div. program at Calvin Theological Seminary.

The M. Div. degree program is primarily designed to prepare for ordination to the churches’ official ministry. Consistency demands that the churches’ institution to train ministers not give that training to those whom the churches declare are ineligible to become ministers.

C . The Board be authorized to consider establishing a separate program and degree for women that would give them the equivalent academic training, but would not be designated to prepare them for ecclesiastical ordination.

There is a precedent for such a procedure. The January 31 Calvinist Contact published an RES report that Westminster Theological Seminary’s Board on Nov. 15, 1985 announced that because “Westminster is opposed to ordaining women to the Gospel ministry, the Board declines to admit women to a single-track M. Div.” program. However, recognizing the seminary’s responsibility to train women for non–ordained ministry positions , the Board instructed the faculty to develop an alternative “General Ministries” track in theM. Div. to which women would be admitted.

Stephen M. Arrick is the pastor of the Calvary C.R. Church at Lowell, Michigan.