Here is a wrap up of deaths of notable Baptists reported this year by Baptist News Global.
Pastor says losing ERLC head would set back race relations
A black Southern Baptist pastor says recent talk of firing Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission head Russell Moore sends a message to ethnic minorities they are welcome in the Southern Baptist Convention only if they toe the political line. Dwight…
War on Christmas redux
While Bill O’Reilly and Fox News get much credit for seasonal claims of a “War on Christmas” waged by the secular left, a progressive blog site says the perennial cultural clash finds roots in a brand of early 20th century…
Appeals court rejects challenge to Glorieta sale
A federal appeals court has turned down an appeal by an Arkansas couple claiming wrongdoing by Southern Baptist Convention officials when they declined to renew their lease at the Glorieta Conference Center and instead sold the campus. Kirk Tompkins, who along with…
Humanists oppose evangelical gift boxes in public schools
A public-interest law firm specializing in cases involving disputes about religious expression has selected a humanist group attempting to prevent Colorado schoolchildren from being asked to put together Christmas gift boxes sponsored by an evangelical charity as winner of a…
Virgin Birth debate interrupts regular ‘War on Christmas’ program
The other war on Christmas — not the one over saying “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” — broke into a skirmish after a well-known evangelical preacher suggested he doesn’t have a problem with people who doubt the Virgin Birth. Andy Stanley,…
Sale of Baptist church benefits local charities
Three nonprofits in Pueblo, Colo., received an early Christmas gift from an American Baptist church that closed its doors in April after ministering in the community for nearly 150 years. Leaders of the American Baptist Churches of the Rocky Mountains…
SBC leader taking heat for anti-Trump rhetoric
A Southern Baptist Convention official criticized as going over the top in his criticism of presidential candidate Donald Trump and his evangelical supporters now says it’s time to move beyond election-year differences and celebrate Christmas together as one “denominational family.”…
Religious freedom bill gets Christmas upgrade
President Barack Obama signed a bill Dec. 16 updating a law passed in 2008 to promote religious freedom as an interest of United States foreign policy. The Frank R. Wolf International Religious Freedom Act passed both houses of Congress in…
Southern Baptist leaders defend Trump’s pick to lead EPA
Four dozen Southern Baptist leaders voiced support for President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency, under scrutiny for his views on climate change, in an open letter Dec. 16. The current and 12 past Southern Baptist Convention presidents,…
Religious Right criticizes Trump’s secretary of state
Conservative white evangelicals credited with helping to elect Donald Trump as president oppose his pick for secretary of state not because of his cozy ties with Russia but for his role in leading the Boy Scouts of America to drop…
Former SBC agency head says Calvinism debate goes deeper than a failure to communicate
A former Southern Baptist Convention agency head disputed the argument that tensions over Calvinism in the denomination are the result of traditionalists who criticize what they don’t understand. Richard Land, former president of the SBC Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission,…