European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - October 16, 1977, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Doil Magazine if reverend Oft you Why not Call by Efthalia Walsh new York times Hile a Row Over women ordination brought dissident episcopalians to St. Louis recently talking schism for Many protestant churches the question of women clergy has become largely academic. Women Are in the pulpit now and an increasing number of them will enter the churches from the Semina Ries in the immediate future. In the last 10 years the proportion of women in protestant seminaries has jumped from 3 per cent of enrolment to 40per cent. And in just four years from 1972 to 1976, the number of women in program leading to ordination Rose from 1,077 to 3,025, an increase of 191 per cent. Roma Catholic and Reform jewish seminaries have also marked significant  United methodist seminaries in the United states together enrol a total of about 530 women in programs leading to ordination More than any other protestant denomination. The United Church of Christ however has a larger proportion 65 per cent of its seminaries enrolments in programs leading to ordination Are women As Are 54 per cent of degree Stu dents at nondenominational Union Theo logical Seminary in new York. The increased number of women in seminaries is hardly surprising. The height ened awareness of women s rights has contributed. And women Are the Backbone of the Church. As one Seminary administrator puts it when the minister Lookout on the congregation on sunday morning 75 per cent of the people there Are  another explanation for the increase number is offered by Ellis l. Larson consultant to the Episcopacy study commis Sion of the United methodist Church. He says a few years Back the easiest Way for a Black to achieve professional status was the ministry now the easiest Way fora woman is again the  although women have Long been engaged in the kinds of work the ministry involves they have been kept out of Power and out of the pulpit. An important exception was the independently run women foreign missions groups in the 19th Cen Tury. As late As 1929 More than two thirds of the missionaries of the six largest Amer ican protestant denominations were women. In 1910 a third of missionary  tors were women. The so called soft feminists belonged to the educational and socioeconomic elite of the country and operated abroad with a Freedom denied them in the . But As Molly Nash a methodist Seminary student who is both the daughter and wife of ministers explains it most of these foreign Mission boards were co opted by their male dominated churches by the 1920s and lost their  the powerful women s society for Chris Tian service now the United methodist women she says held out until 1964 when they too were absorbed by the general Church. Although roman Catholic women have been allowed some professional Church functions they have Bee largely confined to the Convent the Hospital and the schoolroom. The roman Catholic women s Ordina Tion conference charges that their Patron Saint Theresa of Viseux inspirer an forerunner of the ministry of women is portrayed by the male Hierarchy in a Way that de emphasizes her longing to be a priest and missionary and plays up he childlike virginal qualities. In most protestant seminaries today resistance to women is not evident. Women s presence is not a Public or Over tissue says j. Philip Wogaman Dean of Wesley theological Seminary a methodist school in Washington . Faculty and women at Wesley generally concur. Not Only Are women helping to keep Seminary enrolments flourishing but As a group women especially the older ones Are considered to be Superior students. At Wes Ley s 1977 commencement for example women received 50 per cent of the academic honors while making up about 17 per cent of the , however do exist within the Seminary. Deborah Toblyn a Wesley Stu Dent who serves a local congregation As assistant minister claims that being seminarian has radicalized her As a woman. She has Felt resistance from male students. They feel threatened she  of them Are bound by tradition and they Haven t worked put How they feel about women in the  the difficulties of being a seminarian seem particularly acute for older women who must often Cope with working 15 to 20hours a week at their student charge As an assistant minister while carrying a full academic Load and at the same time dealing with their children and often a husband who at Best in t quite certain Why his wife wants to be a  greatest Barrier for women however exists at the Point of hiring. Women seminarians fare better where a Bishop does the hiring As in the methodist Church than in denominations where the individual Church Calls a minister. Al though women claim that they get the worst assignments often out in the Sticks the fact is that few new graduates of either sex get Plum  the men must often serve two or three Small churches in Rural areas where the pulpit Supply is shortest. Vatican pod lorts or Mazlom of to pm has priests  must havea a Sou Al resemblance it  sunday october 16, 1977 the stars and stripes Page 9