Ellen White's written advice to an Adventist pedophile pastor

Trigger warning: CSA. Ellen White wrote to a pedophile pastor to NOT tell the police his actions "because it would make [Adventism] look bad". SDA church has protected pedophiles ever since.

Update edit 9/22/24: Several exSDAs have correctly pointed out that the age of the “youth” SDA Pastor Wessels inappropriately touched is unknown. Therefore, my use of “pedophile” label is technically incorrect. Wessels may have been an “ephebophile”, sexually assaulting someone in their mid-to-late teens. I leave the post written as-is.

From Ellen White’s letter, one can know the person assaulted was “a youth”. Wessels knew his was behavior was wrong— he offered to publicly confess.

The Seventh-Day Adventist Church still practices not acknowledging current and past SDA sexual offenders. They still conceal Wessels’ sexual assault of a youth by referring to Ellen White’s letter as “spiritual encouragement”.

Also note: Seventh-day Adventists call themselves SDA and Adventists for short. So do my writings.

Original post: To copy and paste from r/exAdventist source, um, me. ExAdventist author and whistleblower, The Glory Whole, copied my Reddit comment onto her Instagram.

The important thing here? For Adventists, Ellen White is a prophetess. She is THE definitive proof that the Seventh-day Adventist Church is God’s Last True Church(TM). Adventists have a prophetess who enabled a pedophile pastor.

Because Adventists delete things from the internet, I archived Ellen White’s slut-shaming letter to an SDA pedophile pastor here: https://web.archive.org/web/20220120192509/https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/122.620#642

Original source here: https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/122.620

Any youth who would submit her body to be handled by a man is in no way fit for the kingdom of heaven.

She told the pedophile pastor to NOT report himself to police because it would "make the ministry look bad". And to not tell his wife either. This man had seven children. And Ellen White advised him to pray the pedophilia away. Science shows pedophiles molest again and again until stopped by an outside source.

You ask me if you shall make a public confession. I say, No. Do not dishonor the Master by making public the fact that one ministering in the Word could be guilty of such sin as you have committed. It would be a disgrace to the ministry. Do not give publicity to this matter by any means. It would do injustice to the whole cause of God. It would create impure thoughts in the minds of many even to hear these things repeated. Defile not the lips even by communicating this to your wife, to make her ashamed and bow her head in sorrow.

If one goes to the website and clicks on “Lt 106a, 1896”, a thingy pop up with more info on the letter. This letter was written to one Peter Wessels.

One can see a photo of this smug pedophile pastor right here: https://web.archive.org/web/20220812004325/https://encyclopedia.adventist.org/article?id=ACDF

One could argue his smile is a “pedosmile” a la this entirely unscientific yet still convincing site about pedophile’s smirking in mug shots. http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=spot_the_pedo

The Adventist article lauds him, states an implied miracle or two, and the only mention of church discipline is: “Pieter continued to serve the church in various responsibilities, although his ministerial license was withdrawn in 1896. Towards the end of the 1890s, he received several letters from Ellen White, who was in Australia at the time, giving him spiritual encouragement and warning him against his extreme views on faith-healing.”

Pedophilia omitted. Nope, it’s totes “spiritual encouragement”. Right.

A curious redditor asked on r/SeventhDayAdventism subreddit what was done by the Adventist church to this pedophile pastor. The post is archived here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20231011025117/https://www.reddit.com/r/SeventhDayAdventism/comments/1753pph/peter_wessels_and_egw_and_sexual_abuse_more_info/

There was one response:

“The modern witch-hunting of sexual abusers is not biblical.

“They have the right to repent.

“However it'd be wise to not give back credentials to someone with a public sin, as Paul says the elder should be exemplary.

“All things considered, of course he can repent and yes we can receive money from him. Ellen White talks even about complete unbelievers who gave money to the church. This has nothing to do with being an elder or teacher You're being carried away by your feelings”

So here we have an active Adventist calling outing pedophiles “modern witch hunt” and accusing the asker “you’re being carried away by your feelings”.

Zero concerns that a child molester, known to SDA authorities, was protected by Adventists. Zero concerns about the science that shows active pedophiles do not stop until stopped by an outside agency, and pedophiles may have up to 400 victims in a lifetime. No worries that protecting pedophiles is ongoing policy in Adventist churches, grades schools, boarding academies, and universities to this day.

Nope, just “the pedophile can repent” combined with underlying assumption that Jesusing cures pedophiles.

Any google search will find you pretty words and official policies by Adventists of “protect the children from sexual predators!”. Their actual actions, not their written public-facing policies are what must be judged. As Jesus said, “By their fruits ye shall know them”. Google “Adventist pedophile” for what the church has actually done.

A few personal experiences of the SDA church protecting pedophiles:

• Personal SDA woman friend was stalked by an SDA man. She approached me for support. I was a true believer at the time, and followed SDA protocol of report the creep to the elders. This young woman was coerced by SDA elders into a private meeting with the stalker. She was pressured to say she forgave him, and told specifically to NOT tell police as “that would hurt his career”.

• Adventist boarding academy had above stalker man volunteering to teach SDA teen girls volleyball. I informed the boarding academy of his stalking behaviors. The boarding academy chose to not tell the girls his behavior and keep this man volunteering with teen girls playing volleyball.

• An argument I wound up having with an SDA man as to whether or not a self-proclaimed repented and cured pedophile should be allowed around SDA Sabbath school children unsupervised. The SDA man insisted that one particular pastor was definitely cured from pedophilia, because pedophile said so in his testimony sermon, and it was totally fine that this pedophile pastor hung out alone in SDA Kindergarden (ages ~4-7) class.

• An age 50s male SDA grade school teacher in the SDA church I grew up in molested a young teen girl. A police report was made. Adventist leaders were notified. This man is still welcome at SDA church where he attends, is around children unsupervised.

• My now-deceased pedophile uncle, see my first post on this blog, and how the SDA church I grew up in refused to kick him out of church “because he needs Jesus” until they were threatened with legal action. My uncle was telling my preteen brother how he had to impregnate this SDA girl, sitting behind the girl at church and touching her without even asking, and showed up at her house with a box of chocolates to propose marriage to her. He was age 50s. She was 16.

• The Adventist church continues to promote pedophile-protecting Purity Culture which places the responsibility for boys’ and mens’ private sexy thoughtcrimes and inappropriate sexual behaviors on girls and women. One plain example is in Guide Breakdown 3 on this blog.