The Dispute: Changing the Rules

A long-running, sometimes bitter, dispute raged over the Rule excluding girls who were no longer virgins. Opponents claimed this contradicted the Christian spirit of forgiveness. The first objection came in 1878 from a member of Central Council who, when the GFS refused to change the Rule, left to form an alternative organisation. Further attacks followed in the 1890s, 1908 and 1912. In 1920 the Rule was reworded in a more positive manner, but the virginity requirement remained.

The dispute revived and in 1936, after more than sixty years, the Rule was amended to allow the readmission of ‘fallen’, but penitent, Members. The aim was to increase membership, but a former Central President and the Central Secretary immediately resigned and some Branches also broke with the Society. The amended Rules required all who joined the GFS ‘to pledge themselves, God helping them, to uphold the Christian standard of purity in heart and life.’ Some clergy had previously refused to operate the GFS in their parishes, because it did not require Members to belong to a Christian denomination, and the Society hoped the amended rule would also ‘strengthen its position as the "Handmaid of the Church".’