An Alabama Baptist church has been ejected from its local association for hiring a female associate pastor—which may be a first of sorts.
The Mobile Baptist Association voted Oct. 19 to withdraw fellowship from Hillcrest Baptist Church in Mobile. Associational leaders cited the church's July decision to call Ellen Guice Sims to the associate position, saying the congregation had violated the association's policy of adherence to the 2000 version of the Southern Baptist Convention's Baptist Faith and Message confessional statement.
That document, in its article on the nature of the church, states: “While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.”
Messengers to the association's annual meeting voted 204-44 to oust Hillcrest.
The revision to the SBC doctrinal statement proved controversial at the time, mainly because of the ban on female pastors. But even some of the supporters of the revision say the ban applies only to senior pastors.
The doctrinal statement is not binding for local congregations—there are between 50 and 100 SBC-affiliated congregations with female pastors and many more with ordained women in other staff positions. But many Southern Baptist-affiliated state conventions and local associations have adopted the revised Baptist Faith and Message as their doctrinal guideline.
Hillcrest's ouster apparently is the first time the doctrinal statement has been cited to exclude a church for having an ordained woman in a staff position other than pastor.
Associated Baptist Press