Celebrating 70 Years of Women’s Ordination

by Twyla Sales, our Lay Delegate for the East Ohio Conference

This year, we celebrate 70 years since women were granted full clergy rights in the Methodist Church by the General Conference.

In 1956, when the Methodist Church gave women full clergy rights, it was not merely an institutional change. It was an act of grace in which the church publicly recognized the callings of women whom the Holy Spirit had already called and raised up.

We are in gratitude for the leadership of women who have devoted themselves to ministry with faithfulness, sacrifice, and love. The church finally recognized those whom God had already called. The Holy Spirit had long been at work in the tears, prayers, preaching, care, and prophetic courage of women. The church simply learned to acknowledge that grace and obey that calling.

May that grace continue to bloom in the churches of Ohio, in the callings of the next generation, and in the future of a church that is more just, more compassionate, and more courageous.