Southern Baptists get 1st black president

[David]

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[luknikfan]

Originally Posted by David

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Southern Baptists are in a crisis. Church growth stopped a decade ago, many younger Baptists are rejecting de riguer fundamentalism for a pentecostal faith.

Not to mention the founding of the SBC church. Issues around slavery and such.

Plus some of the fundamentalist aspects of the SBC became extreme to the point where the SBC convention issued a statement on the "sinner's prayer" and that is not a magical incantation.

Quote:
A resolution on the sinner's prayer said the prayer is "not an incantation that results in salvation merely by its recitation and should never be manipulatively employed or utilized apart from a clear articulation of the Gospel." It further said that messengers "promote any and all biblical means of urging sinners to call on the name of the Lord in a prayer of repentance and faith." This a a problem in some of the more extreme fundamentalist Baptist congregations. I don't think it is widespread but in the fundamentalist Baptist church I attended in my youth the pastor preached this and I knew from the get-go it was absurd. That pastor helped me start a long journey out of fundamentalism.

Still. the SBC is a democratic/congregational church and this convention does not hold a lot of clout. To be frank. There is no hierarchy as such and no one to say that a particular teaching in a particular congregation is heresy and that minister is out.

The new President is obviously going to reach out to blacks, Asians and Hispanics. Despite the lack of growth in the church he is supposedly into church "plantings" in "unusual" areas such as NYC.

Bottom line, the SBC will likley become less fundamentalist/more pentecostal/more inclusive over the long haul. This probably is the start of a Baptist "reformation". If for no other reason than to survive as a church.

[David]

Very sorry to see this. Maddening. When confronting straight up racism there should be no compromise. The Pastor should have held the marriage at his Church. If he was to lose his position he'd find another. Sad story.

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Baptist church in Mississippi refuses to marry black couple