(ABP) — Many of my friends and ministerial colleagues recently returned from the Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant in Atlanta full of enthusiasm. I myself have yet to feel much excitement.
Not that I'm not happy to see African-American Baptists and Anglo Baptists coming together and standing together; I certainly am. Such a reunion is long overdue. Not that I object to the Covenant's platform of “seeking peace with justice, bringing good news to the poor, respecting diversity, welcoming the stranger, and setting the captive free,” because I wholeheartedly believe in those biblical imperatives.
I'm just not convinced there is much that is new about the Baptist dimension of this Covenant (at least not yet).
The event's website billed it as “an unprecedented demonstration of Baptist unity” to reaffirm traditional Baptist values. Jimmy Carter and other organizers have also expressed a desire for the Covenant to provide an alternative Baptist witness to the theological and political agenda of the Southern Baptist Convention, which has come to define Baptists' public image. Heaven knows we Baptists need another voice in the public square loud enough to demonstrate that not all of us take our cues from the Jerry Falwells and James Dobsons of the world.
Nonetheless, distinctions are made by practice more than by rhetoric — and so far the New Baptist Covenant has been largely about rhetoric.
Two groups were notably absent from the event's official roster: the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists and the Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America. Both organizations accept homosexuals and advocate for gay rights within Baptist life. As Associated Baptist Press reported, in July 2007 Alan Stanford, the general secretary of the North American Baptist Fellowship, forbade both gay-friendly groups from participating in the Covenant celebration in an official capacity. He said the decision was made out of concern that their presence would “change the terms of the meeting [and] that might cause an already fragile coalition to unravel.”
Lest we forget, this sort of top-down exclusionary action is precisely why many of the ex-Southern Baptists who are championing the New Baptist Covenant are ex-Southern Baptists. They cried “foul!” when the leaders of the so-called “conservative resurgence” seized the reins of power within the SBC and then circled the wagons, forcing out all who wouldn't accept their narrow ideology.
For these same Baptists to turn around now and disenfranchise other Baptists in much the same way (if not on the same scale) is the height of biblical hypocrisy. How can we say with any integrity that we're coming together to take a stand for social justice when, as Ken Pennings of the AWAB correctly observed, “the very people in American society being scapegoated and marginalized the most … are not invited to participate?”
Two of the historic Baptist principles that the New Baptist Covenant should reaffirm are liberty of conscience and the freedom to interpret Scripture for oneself under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Members of AWAB and the Peace Fellowship believe, based on their reading of Scripture and the guidance of their consciences, that homosexuals can and should be accepted fully as disciples of Christ.
Other Baptists, also based on their reading of Scripture and the guidance of their consciences, do not. If the architects of the New Baptist Covenant truly believe in freedom, then all that should matter is whether or not AWAB and the Peace Fellowship can affirm the platform of the Covenant itself.
If homosexuality is not part of the Covenant agenda, then positions on homosexuality ought to be irrelevant to anyone's ability to participate in Covenant activities. Otherwise, what we're left with is yet another gathering of Baptists defined more by partisan politics than unity in Christ — and we've already seen what that yields. Jesus warned his disciples about putting new wine in old wineskins.
The predominance of politicians taking part in the Covenant celebration also calls the exclusion of AWAB and the Peace Fellowship into question — especially in an election year, especially when one of the keynote speakers is the husband of a presidential candidate, especially since civil rights for homosexuals was a contentious and pivotal issue in 2004.
I don't often agree with Richard Land (in fact, this is almost certainly the first time), but he is right in asserting that the political affiliations of the Covenant's chief standard-bearers are not beyond suspicion. If we non-/ex-Southern Baptists are going to faithfully challenge those who have given their riches to the worship of a golden elephant, setting up a golden donkey is not the answer. Becoming an alternative witness involves more than recasting and repackaging what the other side has to offer.
Jimmy Allen asked NBC attendees whether the event would be “a moment” or become “a movement.” I think the answer to that question will be determined by how much sway old models and old temptations are allowed to have. Covenants are not “fragile coalitions.” They are tenacious relationships rooted in our life with God. When we Baptists arrive at a place where we can commit ourselves to “seeking peace with justice, bringing good news to the poor, respecting diversity, welcoming the stranger, and setting the captive free,” without exception and regardless of what else we might agree or disagree about, that will be a truly “unprecedented demonstration of Baptist unity” and something worth celebrating.
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— Todd Thomason is pastor of Baptist Temple Church in Alexandria, Va.