Ministers and Ordination
Jehovah's Witnesses consider as "ministers" all adherents who have been approved to engage in formal evangelizing. Witnesses consider their baptisms to be ordinations; unbaptized publishers are considered "regular ministers" whereas baptized publishers are considered "ordained ministers". Witnesses recognize that many government and administrative precedents for ministers are not intended to include all active adherents. For example, only elders assert ecclesiastical privilege and confessional privilege.
Only males may be appointed as elders and ministerial servants (their term for deacons), and only baptized males may officiate at weddings, funerals, and baptisms. A female Witness minister may only lead congregational prayer and teaching in unusual circumstances, and must wear a head covering while doing so. Outside the congregation, a female minister also wears a head covering when she leads spiritual teaching in the presence of her husband, according to the Christian complementarian view. Female headcovering is not required for other forms of teaching, or when participating in congregation meetings being led by another. Some courts and government agencies have recognized that full-time Jehovah's Witnesses appointees, such as "pioneers" and those in the faith's religious order, qualify for ministerial exemptions regardless of gender.
Read more about this topic: Jehovah's Witnesses Practices
Famous quotes containing the words ministers and/or ordination:
“... the black girls didn’t get these pills because their black ministers were up on the pulpit saying that birth control pills were black genocide. What I’m saying is that black men have exploited black women.... They didn’t want them to have any choice about their reproductive health. And if you can’t control your reproduction, you can’t control your life.”
—Joycelyn Elders (b. 1933)
“Two clergymen disputing whether ordination would be valid without the imposition of both hands, the more formal one said, “Do you think the Holy Dove could fly down with only one wing?””
—Horace Walpole (1717–1797)