For two decades, Southern Baptists have been so busy fighting about the Bible that they\u2019ve been some of the only church folks who weren\u2019t fighting about sex.<\/p>\n\n
Those days are gone. A band of conservatives recently broke away from the moderate Baptist General Convention of Texas and formed a new body called the Southern Baptists of Texas. The rebels said the BGCT wasn\u2019t tough enough on abortion and homosexuality.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got to get away from this thing of getting away from God\u2019s word,\u201d said the Rev. Miles Seaborn of Fort Worth, the group\u2019s president.<\/p>\n\n
This convention, which currently includes 183 churches, immediately proclaimed that \u201call human life is sacred, specifically life in the womb\u201d and pledged it would reject churches that condone homosexual acts or have \u201cpastors or deacons that are practicing homosexuals.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
This makes it sound like the old Texas convention, with its 5,700 churches, has openly backed abortion and gay rights. At its recent gathering, the BGCT backed laws requiring parental consent 48 hours before minors could have abortions. But it declined to vote on condemning abortion \u201cin all cases except when the mother\u2019s life is in danger\u201d and leaders ruled out of order a motion to deny funding to any Baptist medical institution proven to perform abortions. It also defeated a call to affirm the right of local churches to ordain gays and lesbians.<\/p>\n\n
Texas is one of the last fronts in the 19-year civil war in the 16-million-member Southern Baptist Convention. The Southern Baptist right \u2013 which is weak in Texas, but runs the national body \u2013 remains united on social issues and committed to \u201cbiblical inerrancy,\u201d the belief that the Bible is without errors of any kind.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cThey know who they are. They are the people who are opposed to what they see as theological liberalism and modernism,\u201d said philosopher Mike Beaty, who teaches at Baylor University in Waco, a hub for Texas moderates. \u201cBut the moderate camp includes all kinds of people with all kinds of beliefs and these people have been united more by what they\u2019re against \u2013 fundamentalism \u2013 than by what they are for.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Facing a national conservative tide, moderates have rallied around the \u201cfour fragile freedoms\u201d of Baptist life \u2013 \u201cBible freedom,\u201d the \u201csoul freedom\u201d of individuals to interpret the Bible, \u201cchurch freedom\u201d that focuses power at the local level and \u201creligious freedom\u201d that strictly separates church and state. The result is what Beaty called a \u201ctradition-less tradition\u201d that fears any effort to coerce individual believers and congregations.<\/p>\n\n
Thus, the University Baptist Church in Austin protested last spring when the BGCT said its gay-rights stands clashed with \u201cscriptural guidelines.\u201d The Rev. Larry Bethune asked: \u201cWhat could make these Baptist principalities and powers act in such an un-Baptist way, throwing aside our deepest Baptist ideals of soul freedom, liberty of conscience and local church autonomy?\u201d<\/p>\n\n
And there\u2019s another issue that won\u2019t go away \u2013 Bill Clinton. Many Southern Baptists are furious about a Newsweek article arguing that the president\u2019s moral flexibility is linked to his Baptist heritage. A key conservative, the Rev. Al Mohler of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., even said Zippergate is an \u201cindictment of the generation of moderate and liberal Baptist leaders who served as Bill Clinton\u2019s moral advisers, and are now his enablers in a lifestyle of gross immorality and irresponsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
The Texas Baptist newspaper called this \u201cdespicable demagoguery\u201d and noted that conservatives haven\u2019t drawn similar conclusions from news accounts of scandals in their own camp. Editor Toby Druin noted that \u201cthe Bible I read says, \u2018Thou shalt not commit adultery\u2019 \u201d and this sin has touched both moderates and conservatives.<\/p>\n\n
Then again, that depends on how one defines \u201csin\u201d and \u201cadultery.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Once upon a time, Southern Baptists lived in a Bible Belt that seemed isolated from most troubling trends. It was easier to stress the positive, such as evangelism and missions, when only liberal churches far away quarreled over nasty, negative issues such as abortion and sex.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cIt seemed like we could all read the Bible for ourselves and then we pretty much agreed on what it said, at least on these kinds of issues,\u201d said Beaty. \u201cIt seemed like the culture was on our side and we were speaking the same language. It was easier back then.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For two decades, Southern Baptists have been so busy fighting about the Bible that they\u2019ve been some of the only church folks who weren\u2019t fighting about sex. Those days are gone. A band of conservatives recently broke away from the moderate Baptist General Convention of Texas and formed a new body called the Southern Baptists […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":610,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n