Catherine Booth

Life

She was born Catherine Mumford on January 17, 1829, in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, England. In 1854 she joined the Methodist New Connexion, a branch of Methodism, and in 1855 she married William Booth, an evangelist of that denomination. The couple had eight children. Two of them, Bramwell Booth and Evangeline Booth, later served as General, the highest office in The Salvation Army.

In 1860 she preached her first public sermon at Bethesda Chapel in Gateshead, where her husband was minister. She went on to become a well-known preacher throughout Britain. In 1865 the couple founded The Christian Mission in the slums of East London. In 1878 the organization was renamed The Salvation Army and adopted a military-style structure. From then on her husband was called "the General," and she became known as the "Mother of The Salvation Army." She died on October 4, 1890, at the age of 61. More than 36,000 people are reported to have attended her funeral.

Ministry and Accomplishments

• Defense of women's right to preach: In 1859, in response to a minister who had criticized the preaching of Phoebe Palmer, an American Holiness movement preacher, she published the pamphlet Female Ministry: Woman's Right to Preach the Gospel. Her argument rested on two main points: women are not inferior to men in nature or morality, and Scripture provides no grounds for barring women from public ministry. She contended that 1 Corinthians 14:34, "Let your women keep silence in the churches," had been improperly applied.
• Shaping The Salvation Army: The Salvation Army treated men and women as equals, required its workers to abstain from alcohol, and raised up preachers from the working class, including those with little formal education. Her influence is regarded as significant in shaping these policies.
• Social work: She advocated total abstinence from alcohol. She called for women factory workers to receive the same wages as men, and she opened shops where the poor could buy hot soup at low cost.

Influence on the Korean Church

The Salvation Army Korea Territory is part of the international Salvation Army that she founded with her husband. The Salvation Army in Korea likewise continues the tradition of men and women officers (Salvation Army clergy) ministering together. Its relief work, widely known through the year-end red kettle campaign, also carries on the spirit of the early Salvation Army, which sought to unite evangelism with social service. The history of its introduction to Korea is covered in the article History of The Salvation Army in Korea.

Assessment

She is regarded as having opened the way for women's ministry by serving as a preacher in the nineteenth century, when women seldom had access to church pulpits. Her role as co-founder of The Salvation Army, long overshadowed by her husband's, is also receiving renewed attention. Her view of women's preaching, however, met opposition even in her own day from those who held that it violated the order established by God, and its acceptance still varies among denominations today. Denominations that ordain women regard her as a precedent for women's ministry. By contrast, denominations that do not ordain women as pastors hold that the teachings of 1 Corinthians 14:34 and 1 Timothy 2:12 remain binding today and therefore reject her interpretation of Scripture. This issue is discussed in the article Ordination of women.