Broken Blueprint 4H

AFTERMATH OF THE COUNCIL

COMPROMISE VOTE TRIGGERS A RUSH TO OBTAIN ACCREDITATION

The decision made at the 1935 Autumn Council was like gasoline thrown on the fire. The administrators and faculty at the various colleges said that if two could do it, all the rest should be able to also.

And that is what happened. Each college accelerated its efforts to achieve accreditation. It mattered not how much debt they piled on the institution, how many compromises they had to make, or how many worldly teachers they had to hire. Present and future teachers were rushing to the universities in order to become competent to teach in our colleges.

Emmanuel Missionary College, for example, had to tear down and rebuild nearly it entire campus, because all its buildings were constructed with wood, and the accrediting agency demanded brick. It did not achieve senior (four-year) accreditation until 1939.

Within a few years, all our colleges in America had two-year, and eventually four-year, accreditation. The rest is history. Approval from the accrediting agencies required that school libraries be enlarged with many worldly books and that nearly all the faculty be graduates of outside universities. It mattered not what a man believed or taught; as long as he had a Ph.D., he was the one hired to instruct the youth of our church.

For more on this, see E.M. Cadwallader, A History of S.D.A. Education.

In 1925, Magan wrote a friend his strategy for pushing church leaders on all levels into agreement with his objectives:

You see, my idea was to get as many of these fellows as possible familiar with our problem, and favorable to our cause, he explained. In other words, I wanted to be in a place to carry the fight to the highest quarters if it became necessary. Magan to Newton Evans, September 30, 1925.

In spite of the enthusiasm of colleges to rush into submission to worldly accreditation agencies, there was a reaction in the field to the accreditation program of the colleges (Neff, For God and CME, p. 285). Many faithful believers were deeply upset by this wholesale sellout.

1935: MAGANS AMAZING STATEMENT

It is seemingly incredible (the word fits here for it means unbelievable) to discover that, fully six months before the fateful October Autumn Council, when the Branson Report was pushed through so CME could continue as a Class A medical school--Percy Magan wrote that, with trembling, he feared that CME would have to be destroyed because of all that was happening there! Here is the statement:

I do not know what lies ahead for the school. I am praying, sometimes I think, almost night and day and spending much time on my knees in earnest supplication . .

It may be that this school [CME] will have to go down and upon its ashes God will uprear one of a sort more in harmony with His will. As I see things here, they are in a great, great peril. Pride, professionalism, and a haughty spirit have laid firm hold on some. On the other hand, a large number of the alumni [graduates] are sound, and all I can do is to contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. Gods standards for His institutions must be maintained. Magan to Leroy Edwin Froom, May 7, 1935.

Froom (1890-1974) was at that time secretary of the General Conference Ministerial Association and in frequent contact with many of our leaders.

1936: MAGAN EXPRESSES CONCERNS

All aside from the pride developing among the CME staff, Magan was also deeply concerned about how the school was locked into obedience to every whim and whisper of the AMA accrediting body. In 1936, he wrote this about the 1931 meeting:

I am generally credited, I believe, as being the one who forced the accreditation program through the Fall Council at Omaha some five years ago. At that time, after long debate, practically everyone voted for it; but now fears have arisen in the minds of many that we have gone too far.P.T. Magan, letter to Dr. Taylor, January 2, 1936.

The next year, Magan wrote another letter:

The whole question of medical education is becoming an increasingly difficult one. When a man is obliged to take at least three years of premedical college work, then four years in the medical course, then one year of internship, after which many students take one, two, and even three years of residence work in approved hospitals, it can readily be seen that the length of time required for him to complete his education is coming to be as the Irishman would expresses it, beyand [beyond] the beyant. But our necks are in the noose. P.T. Magan, letter to Professor H.J. Klooster, September 1, 1937.

1936: THE EXAMINING COMMITTEE ARRIVES

The long-awaited inspection team, Dr. H. Weiskotten and Surgeon General M.K. Ireland, arrived in Los Angeles on March 8, 1936, and immediately notified Magan that they would like to meet with him at the Biltmore Hotel. He headed to the meeting, knowing that CMEs accreditation was in jeopardy, since the 1935 Autumn Council had only given permission for two colleges (Pacific Union College and Emmanuel Missionary College) to obtain accreditation.

For four hours they fired questions at him with all the speed and precision and accuracy of machine-gun fire. Neff, For God and CME, quoting Magan letter to C.H. Watson and J.L. Shaw, March 13, 1936.

Following their departure, in September, Dr. Zapffe wrote that a very high percentage of entering freshman did not have a good academic standing (Fred Zapffe to Magan, September 23, 1936).

In October, Dr. Cutter wrote that the school was placed on probation.

When you feel that the deficiencies noted by the Council have been corrected and that the school is meeting in a satisfactory manner the prevailing standards, application may be made to the Council for reconsideration with a view to restoring the school to a position of unqualified approval. William D. Cutter to Magan October 21, 1936.

Three of the several factors causing this probationary status were these: The need to greatly enlarge the library. The stopping of the students from working during their school years at CME. The reduction of freshmen enrollment to only 55 or 60 students.

This latter point meant that, for all the massive expense in yearly subsidies sent by the General Conference to Loma Linda, only a few of the young people of the church could take the medical course. But you can know that Loma Linda obeyed the boss, for they knew who it was.

1937: ELDER McELHANY SPEAKS

In 1937, an educational convention was held in North Carolina. Elder McElhany (1880-1959), General Conference president, earnestly pled with the assembled educators not to lead our youth away from the educational blueprint. Frankly, the statement was shocking in what it said:

I want to say this morning to this educational group, that we maintain our school system to train workers primarily to give voice to this great message, to the second Advent hope. Any change in that objective will be to abort the great purpose of this movement itself . .

Too many of our young people are today being led into worldly conformity by some leaders who are themselves adhering to forms of worldly amusements and pleasures. My friends, I wish our young people could be kept away from all the beach parties and nudity parades and moving picture shows and other questionable places where they ought not to go, but where they are sometimes led by their leaders. I believe it is the duty of every school board and every school faculty to take steps to change things.

Just how far can we go in this matter of worldly conformity? Let us be done with the spirit of compromise. Let us not be like those people of old who allowed their religious beliefs to be so poisoned by contacts with the world that they were unable to recognize their own Messiah when He appeared. Would the pioneers know this movement today if they would awaken? Would they recognize the movement that they started in this world and handed over to their successors? Would they really recognize it? J.L. McElhany, Review, October 14, 1937.

1935: DANIELLS WEEPS

Arthur Grosvenor Daniells had come a long way. Born in Iowa, the son of a Union Army physician who died in the Civil War, he was baptized at 10 and, due to ill health, attended Battle Creek College only one year. His future looked bleak. But later he met Ellen and James White, and helping them for one year as their secretary, was anxious to obey all the counsel they could give.

By the time he was 31, Daniells was the strong, vigorous president of the New Zealand Conference. From then on, he kept moving up. Like John Harvey Kellogg, he was solid in the Spirit of Prophecy until the turn of the century; but, like him, he began thinking he could improve on the blueprint which God, through her, was presenting to the church.

Dr. Owen S. Parrott, in his memoirs quoted earlier, had said it was Daniells, more than any other single man on a church executive level outside Loma Linda, who rammed through its accreditation.

But, just as Percy Magan later wept, so did Daniells.

In 1935, worn out with the cares of years, Daniells came to Loma Linda and gave five talks to the faculty and students.

One evening, a medical student found him walking in the hallway. Daniells was weeping. Turning to the young man, in an agony of voice Arthur said, Obey the Spirit of Prophecy. I didn't and paid the price!

A few weeks later, Daniells was diagnosed with cancer and entered the Glendale Sanitarium. Stricken with grief at the actions he had pushed forward which had been so instrumental in damaging our entire educational system, he sent out an urgent request that three men come to his room. They were G.A. Roberts, president of the California Conference; Roy Cottrell, former China missionary and currently chaplain at Glendale; and George B. Starr, a close friend of Ellen White in Australia, by that time retired. All three were faithful to the Spirit of Prophecy writings. Elder Daniells asked the three ministers to anoint him for healing.

Stepping outside the room to discuss the matter, the three said to one another, How can we pray for his healing when, for years, he has persistently gone against the Spirit of Prophecy instruction in his diet and so many other ways and has never changed?

Politely, they refused Daniells request to anoint him. He got other men to pray for him, and soon after (1935) died.

Years later, in the 1960s, the young medical student, by this time a practicing physician, related these incidents to Elder James Lee.

MORE ACCREDITATION DEMANDS

1938: DOUBLING OF CLASSES REQUIRED

In 1938, Magan contacted Dr. Cutter, secretary of the Council on Medical Education in Chicago, to inquire as to what would be involved if CME started a training program for dentists. Cutters startling reply informed Magan that, although many of the medical and dental courses in basic sciences were the same, yet Cutter said they would have to attend different classes! This would require many more teachers!

This same year, directives (actually orders) were sent to CME from Chicago to raise the entrance requirements for new students and hire full-time teachers with adequate specialized training in each of the various departments. The cost of fulfilling the second of these was destined to be immense. It also required hiring large numbers of non-Adventist teachers.

1939: DEMAND FOR CME RESEARCH

The demands of the AMA on Loma Linda never ceased. In 1939, Fred Zapffe wrote CME, demanding that their teachers spend a fair amount of time doing research work. As you may know, this is the quiet scandal of every large university in America in our own era: The major professors spend their time doing research while graduate students teach classes below the doctoral level. Beginning in 1939, the AMA wanted Loma Linda to fall into line or else.

During the thirties, scientific research in the medical schools of America came into prominence, and this trend brought demands from alumni and medical-association officials for C.M.E. to advance in this field.

The thinking of this decade was summed up by Dr. Zapffe when he said: It is the function of every medical school to teach and do research, and, I may add, to care for the sick in its hospitals. A teacher who has not been bitten by the research bug is not a real teacher. He is merely a dispenser of knowledge which can be gotten by reading a textbook or the literature. He merely passes on what he has read, which is not real education at all. Such teaching is being discouraged and even condemned more and more . . There is so much that is unknown that it is not difficult to find a research problem. Neff, For God and CME, quoting Fred Zapffe letter to Magan, March 2, 1939.

Another inspection visit was made this year by the American Medical Association and the Association of American Medical Colleges. In addition to other criticisms, the inspection team was critical of the fact that Loma Linda was still on two campuses. From the early years, they had always favored a single mammoth training facility in Los Angeles.

(Twenty-three years later, in 1962, the AMA would make a major change in its requirements on this matter. The result brought additional heavy expense to Loma Linda. More on this later.)

By 1939, Percy Magan was 72 years of age. The heavy pressure of trying to keep pushing CME upward to meet AMA demands, with all the consequent problems and expense, year after year, was wearing him out.

Things are getting harder and harder, and there is no question in my mind but that we are being obliged to do things under very difficult circumstances. Magan to Sutherland, August 20, 1939.

By 1940, Percy Magan was exhausted from the continual battle, and he would lie in bed for weeks at a time. His heart was beginning to give out.

Between March and June 1942, he resigned from all his positions. On December 16, 1947, Percy Tilson Magan died of a heart attack. He was 80.

SIGNIFICANT STATEMENTS

1944: L.E. FROOM EDITORIAL

In 1944, another church leader deplored the situation of what had happened to our colleges, as a result their linkage to Loma Linda:

How dare a man contemplate (or have the temerity to present) the degree of doctor of divinity (gained in the universities of Babylon) as a credential for teaching or preaching this threefold message--the second stipulation of which is Babylon is fallen, is fallen . . Come out of her My people.

How dare we accept such a Babylonian credential in lieu of mastery of the truth? Shall a man go into Babylon to gain strength and wisdom to call men out of Babylon? To ask the question is but to disclose how far some have compromised with Babylon, as they have gone back to Babylon to drink from her wells of wisdom. Oh, for the living waters of truth fresh from the Word.

Someone needs to sound an alarm. We need to grip ourselves and halt a growing trend that, if it becomes entrenched, will bring disaster through our message. We need to give ourselves to the study of the Word until we are again known preeminently for our mastery and sound exposition of Scripture. Otherwise we shall go the way of all other religious bodies before us, who started out with a heavenly message, but who have bogged down in the morass of worldly scholarship with its erudite haziness, its loss of spiritual vision, and its blurring of truth, until its virility and its power to witness have virtually disappeared. Leroy Edwin Froom, editor, Ministry magazine, editorial, April 1944.

1959: STRATEMEYER DISCOVERS THE BLUEPRINT

What happens when a leading non-Adventist educator in America discovers the blueprint?

At a meeting of Adventist educators, Dr. Stratemeyer of the educational department of Columbia University was asked to talk to the group. To them she said, This is an amazing book! Dr. Stratemeyer exclaimed in her dignified but forceful manner, And to think that Mrs. White finished only three grades of schooling! . . If you follow her philosophy of education as outlined in this book, she continued, holding up Education, you must teach a child to know why he acts as he acts. He must learn how to think, how to reason for himself . .

Again and again Dr. Stratemeyer remarked on how remarkable it was that an unschooled woman could write as Mrs. White wrote. Current educational developments demonstrated how Mrs. White was more than fifty years ahead of her time.

The breadth and depth of its philosophy amazes me. Its concept of balanced education, harmonious development, and of thinking and acting on principles are advanced educational concepts . . It is this harmonious development that is so greatly needed, yet so greatly neglected today. I am not surprised that members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church hold the writings of Mrs. White in great respect and make them central in developing the educational programs in their schools.--Dr. Florence Stratemeyer, quoted by Raymond Moore, Review, August 6, 1959.

Oh, that we were doing that!

A.W. SPALDING WRITES

W.E. Straw, in his review of our educational work, quotes a letter of A.W. Spalding to a vice president of the General Conference:

I have had the privilege of long connection with and experience in and out of our schools; and I have, through all this half century and more, been a student of the educational principles and structure and processes which God has given through the instrumentality of Ellen G. White. I have perceived in her writings not merely aphoristic maxims to grace dissertations on religion and learning; but rather a deeply conceived, well integrated system of education, embracing philosophy, range, form, content, method, and above all, spirit. These writings constitute a blueprint which, alas, our history shows has been little read, less understood, not at all comprehended.

We need now to begin all over again. Reforms must be entered into with heart and soul and will     . . If there is not in some respects an education of an altogether different character from that which has been carried on in some of our schools, we need not to have gone to the expense of purchasing lands and erecting school buildings. --A.W. Spalding, quoted in W.E. Straw, Rural Sociology and Adventist Education History, 1961.

1956: THE SECRET GC QUESTIONNAIRE

During part of the time that the present writer attended our Seminary (located at that time in northwest Washington, D.C., next to the General Conference and the Review, he worked as a night janitor at our world headquarters. One night, in the winter of 1956-1957, the present writer was emptying waste baskets on one floor of the building, when he found a note on top of one basket: Burn this.

The request was redundant since all the paper was dumped into the outside incinerator, along with scrap paper from the Seminary and Review, and burned the next morning. But the urgency of the note attracted my attention, so I pulled everything out of the waste basket and briefly examined it.

There before me was a stack of sheets, perhaps 3 inches thick. They were questionnaires. Burn it was the request. Apparently, it was a secret poll, for I never later read about it in the Review, or heard anything relating to it at the Seminary. The stapled, 8 x 11 sheets (about 100 of them) had probably been sent to a variety of church leaders throughout the world field. Each questionnaire consisted of about three pages of typewritten, single column, questions, with a triple space after each question for a brief, handwritten reply. Every questionnaire had handwritten replies to every question; all were unsigned.

The point of the questions was this: Should we keep CME (it would be several years before its name was changed to LLU)? Should we continue to support it? Is the money spent on it worth the cost? If you are in a mission field, is your area being helped by Loma Linda or its graduates?

I spent about half an hour looking at the questionnaires, and then hauled the lot to the incinerator. Because the answers were all about the same, I saw no reason to read them all. I did not see one positive statement on any that I examined. The consensus was that we should stop subsidizing Loma Linda and, if necessary, just close it down. Some were adamant that this be done. Other replies agonized over the matter, yet felt the situation was apparently hopeless.

Back in those days, one of the 52 world offerings each year went to the support of Loma Linda; this is a lot of money! We now have the World Budget; and a percentage of all the offerings (and part of the tithe) is sent to keep Loma Linda afloat and help pay the salaries of its Adventist and non-Adventist workers and chaplains. Obviously, a large percentage of church offerings, from around the world, are earmarked each year for Loma Linda.

We are still supporting Loma Linda; so, apparently, the brethren decided it was best to just burn the questionnaires. Perhaps too many influential people, including physicians, would be upset if the annual funding stopped.

1961 STATEMENT BY W.E. STRAW

Practical is a key word. What happens when governmental leaders see the results of our adherence to the blueprint? Walter E. Straw (1880-1962) wrote:

When I was in Africa trying to carry out that system, perhaps in only a partial way, the government of Rhodesia appointed a committee to inspect the schools in that territory. When they came to Solusi Mission and observed the work and classes in agriculture, sewing, and construction, the chairman of the committee said, That is just what the natives need; why cant the other missions do that? I replied, Because theyve got a Liberal Arts education, and our men got practical work in school. Then he said, You ought to go and show the others how to do it the way it ought to be done. W.E. Straw, Rural Sociology and Adventist Education History, 1961 [Straw spent 52 years in Adventist educational work].

1961-1964 EVENTS

1961: CME BECOMES A UNIVERSITY

On July 1, 1961, the name College of Medical Evangelists was dropped, and the school became Loma Linda University. The disliked word, Evangelists, had been eliminated and the wonderful word, University, had been added. We had arrived!

But what an arrival it was. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, there had been, what was called, the red herring crisis in California State universities, primarily centered at Berkeley. A major crusade had been made to get rid of Communist sympathizers from the faculties of State-approved universities. In strong reaction to this, the State Legislature enacted a law that, henceforth, it would be illegal to discipline or fire any employee of a California university, because of his beliefs or affiliations.

With full knowledge of the implications of that earlier law, the administrators of CME were still determined to gain university status for the school. The honor and prestige it would bring to the institution was considered well-worth the danger.

As a result, from 1961 onward, it is impossible for LLU to reprimand or fire any worker or teacher because he is an atheist, Roman Catholic, or whatever, or because he openly expresses those views.

This danger is no little matter. A friend of the present author, from college days, attended Brigham Young University in the late 1960s and graduated with a doctorate in Speech Pathology. Immediately, LLU called him to come and set up a Department of Speech Pathology. Arriving, he found himself handed the assignment of putting together a faculty. He was told he could get them from anywhere.

So he contacted his former teachers at Brigham Young University--all of them Latter Day Saints. After packing the entire department with Mormons, a couple years later he became deeply upset by the unceasing rivalries, political maneuverings, and jostling for position at LLU. So he quit and moved to northern California. It is very likely that, from that day to this, the Speech Pathology Department is managed and filled with Mormons. And, in accordance with the State red herring law, they have full right to share their faith, on the side, with their students.

The school had eliminated evangelists from its name. The next year, 1962, it took the word from the banner head of its periodical. It had been called The Medical Evangelists since 1908. In its place the journal was given a very professional sounding name: Scope. W.A. Branson, who uttered warnings in 1935, died this year at the age of 74.

1962: AMA ORDERS SINGLE CAMPUS

In 1962, the AMA switched from its earlier position and totally refused to let LLU teach its students on both the Los Angeles and Loma Linda campus. It now wanted LLU to unite all its teaching facilities on one campus, which should be Loma Linda. That reversal cost another immense outlay of money to greatly expand the facilities of the School of Medicine and the School of Nursing. The very large 516-bed Loma Linda Medical Center had to be constructed.

Begun in 1964 and completed in 1977, that Medical Center had 546 beds, 656,000 square feet of floor space (a little over 15 acres), housing clinical, hospital, research and educational programs. In addition, there was a four-level, 80,000-square-foot research wing with 46 laboratory areas used by researchers in the School of Medicine. Three circular, seven-story towers, built in a cloverleaf formation form the dominant architectural feature. It also has over 50 classrooms and conference rooms and two amphitheaters. Seventeen surgical facilities are in the Center.

Among a variety of very expensive gadgets, the Medical Center houses two cancer-killing machines: One is the eight-tone cobalt therapy machine, which shoots a beam of radiation from a cobolt-60 source into the patient. The machine is so deadly that it is located 30 feet below the hospitals main entrance.

The second is the Betatron, which emits a beam of either X-rays or electrons, as required. This six-ton, 25-million-volt Batatron produces X-rays that are 20 times the energy output of the cobalt beam.

The Chaplains Service, includes salaried chaplains who are Adventist, Roman Catholic, Muslim, and other faiths. The Interfaith Chapel is located near the main entrance, and open at all times for prayer and meditation.

As you may know, in 1984, Loma Linda shocked the nation by placing the heart from a live baboon into a human being. Medical ethicists all over the world questioned the morality of that event. But Loma Linda was happy: It brought our church to the attention of the world. In 1988, another storm of protest from ethicists arose, when Loma Linda took the heart of a living anencephalic baby and put it into another living baby. In regard to medical ethics, Loma Linda has a reputation for being very daring.

BY 1962: NO MORE NUTRITION CLASSES

Adele Davis was a well-known nutrition consultant, who had many important contacts in the medical world. She dared to tell the truth about drugs and some natural remedies, which many of her physician friends had to be quiet about, lest they lose their licenses to practice.

In 1962, in a widely circulated appeal because the FDA was trying to push legislation through Congress placing all nutritional supplements on a prescription basis, Adele Davis said that there was not one medical school in America which taught even one class in nutrition. By that, she may have meant even one required class. So that eliminates another important part of the blueprint from the Loma Linda training course.

(Hydrotherapy, natural remedies were also eliminated from our church papers and heath journals by the 1950s, apparently to please the AMA so it would not be offended and revoke CMEs accreditation.)

BY 1964: OBJECTIVE TO INSTILL PRIDE

In the late summer and fall of 1964, the present writer lived not far from Loma Linda while preparing a newspaper tabloid edition of sizeable portions of Great Controversy. While in that area, he and his family had opportunity to make a number of important contacts, including a young couple that was unusual. Although in his fourth year of training in the medical course, the family was solid in its belief in the Spirit of Prophecy.

He explained to this writer that he knew of hardly anyone else in his class who was dedicated to the Spirit of Prophecy.

He also mentioned that it was the objective of the school to instill professional pride in the future physicians during their fourth year of medicine. For some reason, the staff was deeply concerned that this be done. They wanted their students to graduate with an attitude of professional pride that would be a credit to the university.

It is a well-known, frequently mentioned fact that for many years, upon graduation, medical students at Loma Linda have had a higher rate of leaving their wives--who have worked and put them through school--than graduates of any other medical school in the nation.

MORE STATEMENTS

1965: STATEMENT BY DR. NAHM

Dr. Nahm was the non-Adventist president of the University of Missouri. He commented on the fact that students who graduate from modern colleges and universities have not received the traits of character needed to make a success in life and help other people.

Interesting studies are now being made in a number of places on qualities which make for a success in job and other life situations as distinguished from those which make for success in the usual classroom situation.

A study made by Price, Taylor, and others on performance of physicians points to the need, in educating physicians, to focus on qualities other than those which grades reflect--qualities of character and personality, of ability to establish satisfactory relationships with people, and a dedication and integrity. In a recent report . .

Tayor and others point out that, at present, suitable habits of learning are not implemented in the school setting to assure their continued functioning when persons leave the school setting . .

Good grade getting and requirements for degrees often force the student to subordinate himself to the teacher in such a way that independent thinking and action--very important on-the-job qualities--do not become developed habits.--Dr. Nahm, University of Missouri, American Journal of Nursing, June 1965, p. 98.

1967: STATEMENT BY LeFEVRE

This is another statement by a discerning non-Adventist educator. Dean Robert LeFevre, addressing a faculty-student meeting, said this:

As long as we have a situation in this country where an elite can control the intellectual input of its citizens, we will have a situation of regulation and brain control that can and will destroy initiative, individuality, creativity--indeed the freedom of man.--Robert LeFevre, Rampart College Newsletter, Larkspur, California, November 1967.

LeFevres school had decided to not initiate a graduate school program. Later in his address, LeFevre quoted a statement by G.L. Pearson of Brigham Young University:

The colleges and universities of America are held in a rigid liberal straitjacket by accrediting teams . . The idea that you must be accredited is a fiction. Ibid.

1975: STATEMENT BY GERALD FORD

The president of the United States made this insightful observation at a university graduation:

Why cant the universities of America open their doors to working men and women, not only as students but also as teachers? Practical problem solvers can contribute much to education, whether or not they hold degrees. The fact of the matter is that education is being strangled--by degrees.--President Gerald Ford, Ohio State University, Summer 1975.

STATEMENT BY NAOMI JOAN WHITE

If the following teacher was a Christian, we are sure she later wished she had taught her students about Jesus Christ. If she was not a Christian, she at least probably wished, as part of historical literature class, they had them memorize the Ten Commandments.

I have taught in high school for ten years. During that time I have given assignments among others to a murderer, an evangelist, a pugilist, a thief, and an imbecile.

The murderer was a quiet little boy who sat on the front seat and regarded me with pale blue eyes; the evangelist, easily the most popular boy in the school, had the lead in the junior play; the pugilist lounged by the window and let loose at intervals a raucous laugh that startled even the geraniums; the thief was a gay-hearted lothario with a song on his lips; and the imbecile, a soft-eyed little animal seeking the shadows. [A lothario is a seducer.]

The murderer awaits death in the state penitentiary; the evangelist has lain a year now in the village churchyard; the pugilist lost an eye in a brawl in Hong Kong; the thief, by standing on tiptoe can see the windows of my room from the county jail; and the once gentle-eyed little moron beats his head against a padded wall in the state asylum.

All these pupils once sat in my room and looked at me gravely across worn brown desks.

I must have been a great help to those pupils--I taught them the rhyming scheme of the Elizabethan sonnet and how to diagram a complex sentence.--Naomi Joan White, Tindall Collection.

EVENTS FROM 1977 TO 1990

1977: VETERANS HOSPITAL BUILT

On September 25, 1977, a massive 500-bed Veterans Hospital was dedicated in Loma Linda. The hospital is located on a 34-acre site, approximately one-half mile east of LLU. It serves over 300,000 veterans. The world not only dictates how Loma Linda operates; it had moved into Loma Linda. And the university helped the new arrivals to move in.

This hospital would not have been erected here except for the interest of the University and the Loma Linda community. Loma Linda [University] has given us the land on which to erect our structure.--John D. Chase, M.D., chief medical director for the Veterans Administration, address at the LLU School of Medicine commencement service on May 29, 1977; entire address printed in University Scope, Summer 1977.

During the dedication ceremonies of this gigantic hospital, United States Senator Alan Cranston told the audience of 4,500:

The structure you see here today is not only the most modern veterans hospital in America, but one of the most sophisticated hospitals . . in the world.--Sun Telegram, September 26, 1977.

1985: NEW AGE SEMINARS AT LLU

In March 1985, the Loma Linda Medical Center sponsored the New Age Thinking Seminars at the school, under the direction of non-Adventist Lou Tice. Those who attended were told they needed to harness their spirit power, and be constructive wizards. You know, I have the power invested in me, Tice said; You can have it too! The sessions ran from April through May, and provided those enrolled with 20 hours of nursing credit at LLU. Tice even spoke in the pulpit during Sabbath morning church service, advertising his wares (The New Age Seminars at Loma Linda [WM107]).

BY 1986: HYDROTHERAPY IS GONE

With the passing of time, the AMA became increasingly embarrassed by the existence of hydrotherapy treatments. They were simply too effective in the healing of a variety of diseases. If people learned about them, the use of drug medications would be greatly reduced, and the AMA would not receive its kick-backs from the drug cartels.

Over the years, the name of the process was changed to physiotherapy, and hydrotherapy was banned by the AMA from the required medical training. It was only approved as a non-medical aid in helping rehabilitation patients learn how to use their limbs again. At Loma Linda, it was located in the School of Physical Therapy. It was down-graded, in 1966, to a section of the newly formed School of Allied Health Professions.

In 1986, in the process of writing his Water Therapy Manual, the present writer phoned Loma Linda University and asked for the Physiotherapy Department. Upon inquiry, he learned there was no longer any instruction in hydrotherapy in the entire university! Placing another call, he spoke with the LLU Book Store, and was told that Abbotts important hydrotherapy book was no longer printed, neither by the denomination nor by LLU, and it did not have a hydrotherapy book on the premises--and had not sold one in years.

Fortunately, the present writer already had a personal copy of Abbotts book, plus several others, including Kelloggs mammoth book on the subject. You can purchase a copy of our very complete Water Therapy Manual from the publisher of this book.

You may have wondered why our denominational publishing houses never--never--print books or magazine articles recommending hydrotherapy, natural remedies, or even vitamins. Unfortunately, they are also locked into the system. If they did otherwise, Loma Linda's accreditation rating could be downgraded. There is no other explanation for this strange silence, which has continued since the 1950s.

Our concern here has primarily been the terrible cost in diluted teachings and resultant lowered standards. But constantly trying to meet accreditation demands and paying teachers to get their doctorates has also cost the church a lot of money. But the excuse given for the high tuition costs is sophisticated instruction and modernization.

Why does Christian college education cost so much? Because . . the degree of sophistication required in education today makes costs increase.The Bottom Line on the Cost of Christian Education, in La Sierra Today, Fall 1978.

1984: ANIMAL HEART INTO A HUMAN BABY

An international storm of protest, from physicians throughout the world, arose when Loma Linda put the heart of a baboon into a human child on October 26, 1984. The following article appeared in far-off Laconia, New Hampshire, and is representative of press reports around the world:

The operation fails to meet the basic requirements of experimental operations established for the world at the Nuremburg [war crimes] trials in 1945-1946 . . Dr. Donald Carey raised the question that the Loma Linda University Medical Center review committee, charged with assessing whether or not the operation should be approved, could have been pressured by a desire to gain national recognition. Before this operation, no one ever heard of them before, he said.--Lakes Region Trader, November 28, 1984.

It is of interest that a human heart could have been transplanted into the infant with hypoplastic left heart syndrome (anonymously known as Baby Fae), but Bailey decided to use an ape heart instead.

One of the largest newspapers on the West Coast, the Los Angeles Times, in discussing the matter, significantly noted that part of the reason Loma Linda does such strange things is because their reporter was told, by the 1980s

For the first time in Adventism's history, a whole generation of scholars with doctorates from secular universities became active in church institutions.--Adventists See No Conflict of Belief in Baby Fae Case, Los Angeles Times, November 10, 1984.

Well, that is telling it plainly! A significant part of the problem is the doctorates from secular universities.

The article added that there were so many halfway evolutionists among Adventists now, that their physicians did not mind putting ape hearts in human beings!

A creationism vs. evolution debate has come into the open recently in the churchan indication in one sense of how medical training could proceed on a pragmatic level while religious ideology remained in the hands of pastors and church theologians.

I would say a majority of Adventist scientists would have difficulty accepting at face value the church's traditional seven-day Creation occurring 6,000 years ago, said James Walters, assistant professor of Christian Ethics at Loma Linda University.--Ibid.

1988: HARVESTING LIVE ORGANS

But a little over three years later, medical ethicists were once again shocked. The January 1996 issue of Rutherford, the journal of the Rutherford Institute, included an article which discussed how the Chinese eat babies and Loma Linda Medical Center harvests organs from living babies--which, in the process, kills them. Percy Magan would never have believed it (Harvesting Organs [WM839].

One of the most controversial programs of the 1980s was that of Loma Linda University Medical Center, which chose to harvest the organs of [live] infants with some or most of their brains missing.

The harvesting did, of course, cause the death of such infants; but, since these infants did not in Loma Linda's opinion qualify for personhood, their organs were considered fair game. In 1988, the university gave up the program--but not for moral reasons: The transplants didn't work.--Rutherford, January 1996.

These were anencephalic babies, kept alive till LLU surgeons decided to kill them and get their organs. Here are excerpts from three articles in 1988 regarding what Loma Linda was doing:

The large majority of physicians and medical ethicists firmly--and rightly--oppose prematurely ending the anencephalics life in order to use its organs.--Christianity Today, March 18, 1988.

The surgeons at Loma Linda are not merely content to use as organ donors anencephalic victims of a fatal auto accident, a typical scenario for most other kinds of organ donations. Led by Leonard Bailey, M.D., who has gained national attention by implanting the heart of a baboon called Goobers into the chest of a baby named Fae, these physicians would use respirators to artificially maintain the lives of anencephalic newborns for the express purpose of waiting to declare the infants brain-dead and then using them as organ donors.

There is something chilling about the doings at this medical center . . Loma Linda was going to maintain these infants as living organ supply-lockers . . The disturbing part of the latest news from Loma Linda, as with the Baby Fae affair, is not so much what is being done, but rather how it is being done. Once again, physicians at that medical center have decided not to wait for the outcome of a national ethical debate and are instead charging headlong into their vision of the future--into . . bioemporium . .

We are seeing them [the babies] being regarded as particularly convenient forms of organic repair kits.--Health, March 1988 [italics theirs].

It is to no ones benefit, especially those in need of organs, that transplant specialists appear to be manipulating brain death criteria in order to secure a steadier supply of infant organs.--Manipulating Death, Commonweal, January 15, 1988.

1990: MAJORITY OF CME STUDENTS ARE NOT ADVENTISTS

According to a report, leaked in 1992, most of the students now attending Loma Linda University are non-Adventists! Did we go through all this misery--diluting all our colleges and universities with doctoral professors trained in outside schools--just to help non-Adventists become nurses, dentists, and medical doctors?

The problem is the extremely high expenses. The accreditation agencies have placed so many requirements on the school for so many decades, which increase every year--that few can any longer afford to attend Loma Linda.

A percentage of the World Budget (the offerings we place in the basket each Sabbath), plus charges to students, must meet those heavy expenses.

The tuition and other charges are so high that only non-Adventists, and the wealthiest among us, are able to afford to send their sons and daughters through the school (Our Emerging Non-Adventist Medical School [WM427-428].

The percentage of non-Adventists steadily increased all through the 1980s. As of the end of the 1990 school year, the School of Medicine was the only one of the five that had a majority of Adventist students. Here are the figures:

Allied Health: 1985-1986: 122 SDA, 81 non-SDA

            1989-1990: 122 SDA, 128 non-SDA.

Dentistry: 1985-1986: 65 SDA, 14 non-SDA

            1989-1990: 32 SDA, 47 non-SDA.

Medicine: 1985-1986: 128 SDA, 12 non-SDA

            1989-1990: 103 SDA, 26 non-SDA.

Nursing: 1985-1986: 119 SDA, 21 non-SDA

                    1989-1990: 23 SDA, 83 non-SDA.

Public Health: 1985-1986: 127 SDA, 60 non-SDA

                    1989-1990: 41 SDA, 68 non-SDA.

The totals: By 1990, Loma Linda University had 321 Adventists and 352 non-Adventists in its five schools.

1915 STATEMENT BY PERCY MAGAN

In order to help us better see the picture of what we have lost, let us return to 1915, only nine months after Percy Magan graduated from Vanderbilt Medical School in Nashville, Tennessee. In that year, he wrote the following letter to W.C. White:

Brother White, my old teachers in Vanderbilt, men who have been physicians for years, are coming to me [at Madison] with their own personal cases and asking me to prescribe for them for the ills of their bodies, which they know they have brought upon themselves by their own bad habits of living.

I have had some three different cases of this kind already. When I remonstrate with them and tell them how little I know, and that they, having been my teachers, how reticent I feel about saying anything; they frankly tell me that they know we have the light on these lines far in excess of theirs.--Magan to W.C. White, March 3, 1915.

How much have we lost? It cannot be measured. What we lost in the passing years, not even our learned professors at Loma Linda today have the slightest inkling. They don't even have hydrotherapy books in their student bookstore anymore. The last class in hydrotherapy was stopped in the 1970s. Instead, the students are taught how to work with drugs, saws, knives, electrical equipment, and radiation machines.

How kind it was that God laid Ellen White to rest in 1915, so she did not have to see what followed.