The Southern Baptist Convention

[abelmain]

The Southern Baptist Convention has a website called "The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission" in which they invite people to post comments regarding today's social issues. I think it’s important for us to research these websites so that we become familiar with opposing views regarding gays. There was one thread regarding support of a marriage protection amendment. I sent the following comment:

I've searched the SBC website as well as the Historical Library and Archives website but did not find the true origin of the SBC, which I think is important in any organization. History shows that the SBC was organized largely as a result of views regarding slavery. Southerners believed that God intended for races to be separate and that the Bible condoned slavery. Those views have obviously changed and no one in the SBC will ever admit to holding these views. We look back and say "those were different times and the Bible was simply misinterpreted." Could it be that history is repeating itself? Since racism is no longer popular, could it be that the SBC has found a new victim on whom to push its ideological views? Will we look back 100 years from today and say, "those were different times and the Bible was simply misinterpreted?"

Their disclaimer states that comments will not appear immediately and are subject to editing or deletion. I’m hoping they decide to post my comment, but nothing yet.
The SBC of today has grown into a large and mostly constructive organization, except when it comes to gays. My problem with them is that they can so blindly follow the same destructive pattern that their founders did in the mid-nineteenth century. Christians who oppose of homosexuality often say “because the Bible says so,” yet this has been used for centuries by people serving their own interests.
The SBC must admit that they were wrong in their interpretation of the scriptures before and that they may be wrong today. It may not be a comfortable admission, but a truthful one nonetheless. The SBC should discontinue its negative message regarding homosexuality. To say that their current interpretation is the infallible word of God is to admit that their position on slavery and segregation was infallible as well. You can’t commit such a heinous crime against a vast population of human beings in the past and then be taken at your word today. The word of God is infallible. Unfortunately humans are fallible and continue to demonstrate this in their interpretations.

[Jamie McDaniel]

Your comments might not appear over there, but thanks for posting it here, abelmain.

The irony certainly is not lost on me. Southern Baptists champion their interpretation of scripture as being inline with the Divine, yet they are the one American denomination specifically founded on the misinterpretation of God supporting slavery.

To be sure, they weren't the only Christians who supported slavery. And with regard to being anti-GLBT today, I've noticed other denominations like to paint the Southern Baptists as the bad guys, thereby portraying themselves as "not as bad as those Southern Baptists."

Southern Baptist fundamentalists of today have finally publicly apologized for the denomination's racist past (1995). But growing up Southern Baptist and holding fundamentalist views for a time, I understand how an improper view of scripture led to the 19th century Southern Baptist's error. When studying the Bible, it is apparent to me that scripture condones slavery, if not outright sanctioning it at times. The verses that condemn the practice are few.

Southern Baptists today, protective of "inerrancy" while simultaneously wanting to distance themselves from that glaring error of interpretation by the denomination's founders, argue those verses merely sought to regulate slavery. Whereas I would say holding an improper view of scripture will lead you to repeat that error in other ways (defending segregation, limiting women's roles in ministry, advocating the death penalty, fighting against equality for gays, anti-semitic views, etc.)

All Christians do agree that the Holy Spirit continually works to free humanity. Thus shouldn't a proper view of scripture be that scripture is in service to the Spirit, not the other way around?

[Steven E. Webster]

Friends,
Check out my recent post in the thread I've started on Jack Roger's book. There I address the issue of slavery--which is an excellent analogy to the current controversy over homosexuality. Please be assured that Southern Baptists were not an aberration when they supported slavery. There is blood on the hands of Methodists (despite the fact that John Wesley was an abolitionist) and Presbyterians. All three formed "Southern" denominations to support slavery and the Southern cause. (Only the Southern Baptists maintain the term "Southern".) Leading American theologians defended slavery on scriptural grounds. Abolitionists were branded as "unscriptural."

Steven