© 2012 Larry Mullins
© 2012 The Urantia Book Fellowship
| Religion of Experience vs Religion of Authority | Volume 12, Number 1, 2012 (Summer) — Index | Cosmology in the Light of The Urantia Book |
Lena C. Sadler, 1875 - 939, was a physician, surgeon, obstetrician, lecturer and author, and a healer in women’s health issues. Before studying medicine, she was a public school teacher and afterwards a trained nurse. For twenty years Lena and her husband, William Sadler, worked in rescue mission work for the Seventh-day Adventist Missions in Chicago and San Francisco. Lena concentrated on ministering to women detained in the Chicago jails.
Later in life Lena became a leading activist who lectured and diligently worked toward recognizing the contributions of women as professionals in the medical and scientific fields. She was an associate professor of Physiologic Therapeutics in the Post Graduate Medical School of Chicago, an associate director of the Chicago Institute of Physiologic Therapeutics, a fellow of the American Medical Association, and a specialist in diseases of women and children.
Most Urantians know “Dr. Lena” only as the wife of Dr. William Sadler. But she was much more than that. Dr. Lena was a protagonist at virtually every critical turning point in the revelatory process. Many Urantian historians believe she was a destiny reservist who, generally behind the scenes, inspired, drove, and motivated her husband and the other humans involved in receiving the revelation. We are told in the Urantia Papers that “. . .reservists of destiny have seldom been emblazoned on the pages of human history” on our planet. [UB 114:7.9] And so it was with Dr. Lena Sadler.
Dr. Lena died in 1939 after a long and courageous battle with breast cancer. The process of receiving the Urantia Papers was nearly completed. For about three decades she had quietly helped propel the process.
Even avid detractors and critics of Dr. William Sadler acknowledge his wife’s noble character and spiritual fragrance. Some make the bizarre assertion that William Sadler, a successful and renowned medical doctor and psychiatrist, wrote the Urantia Papers. They offer no plausible motive. Surely Lena Sadler, also a successful and esteemed medical doctor, would never collaborate in, or even sanction, an elaborate and senseless charade.
Lena Sadler was a great Urantian. Her significance, like that of many extraordinary women, has never been adequately acknowledged. For the first forty-five years of her life she could not vote because women had not yet been granted suffrage. She achieved her education and became a medical doctor when it was almost unheard of for females. Dr. Lena served humanity in the shadow of her famous husband, and when he doubted and faltered, she remained steadfast. Perhaps of all the Urantia pioneers, we owe Dr. Lena Sadler the most profound debt of gratitude.
¶ References
- Article obtained from The Fellowship site
| Religion of Experience vs Religion of Authority | Volume 12, Number 1, 2012 (Summer) — Index | Cosmology in the Light of The Urantia Book |