Belmont University, embroiled in a lawsuit with the Tennessee Baptist Convention, has further angered some convention leaders by appointing non-Baptists to its board of trustees.
The Nashville school announced, via a Dec. 21 press release, that eight new trustees had agreed to join its board in January. While all are members of Protestant churches, only two belong to Baptist congregations—and only one of those belongs to a TBC-affiliated church.
“This is the first class of trustees elected to office under Belmont's plan to broaden representation on its board to include persons who are members of a diversity of Christian churches,” the statement said. “Many of these individuals have been long-time, active supporters of the university.”
But the convention's newly elected president denounced the decision. “Having non-Baptists on the board is something I personally would not be willing to accept and I believe most Tennessee Baptists would not accept,” said Ron Stewart, according to the Nashville Tennessean newspaper. “For 50 years, it has been a Baptist school, and now they're moving away from that Baptist foundation,” he added. Stewart is pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Knoxville.
Belmont leaders amended the school's charter in 2005 to allow the board to become self-perpetuating. Messengers to the TBC's annual meeting had elected Belmont trustees since 1951. That year, the convention took control of a struggling junior college called Belmont-Ward School for Women and expanded it into a Baptist coeducational institution.
Prior to amending the charter, Belmont officials indicated to TBC officials their desire to gain some representation on the school's board from outside the convention. Trustees proposed that they begin electing their own successors, that the school be allowed to draw up to 40 percent of its trustees from Christians of non-Baptist traditions, and that all TBC-contributed funds would go exclusively to fund scholarships for students from Tennessee Baptist churches.
According to Belmont, the majority of its approximately 4,500 students are not members of Baptist churches.
While the TBC Executive Board's education committee approved the covenant, a divided board rejected it. Officials from the convention and the university jointly crafted a new agreement agreeable to both groups.
But messengers rejected that offer after school officials discovered a 1951 document detailing an agreement between the university and the convention. The agreement contained a “reverter clause” indicating that, if Belmont should “for any reason pass from Baptist control, or the control, ownership, supervision or right to elect the trustees … be lost to the Tennessee Baptist Convention, then any and all of said property and funds shall be repaid or restored … to the Executive Board of the convention.”
Belmont officials have insisted the obscure document is a “historical artifact” superseded by more recent contracts. They indicate the school is not owned by the convention and has the right to amend its charter without convention approval.
But lawyers for the convention have said the old agreement remains in legal effect.
TBC officials caught Belmont leaders off-guard in September by filing a lawsuit against the school. Citing the reverter clause, it asks for Belmont to return more than $50 million the convention has given to the school since the two institutions became affiliated. That suit is now pending.
Belmont trustees declined further financial contributions from the convention after moving to appoint their own successors. The TBC had been supplying approximately 3 percent of the school's annual budget.
Belmont officials have said the school's growth, denominationally diverse student body and increasingly prominent reputation necessitate the inclusion of trustees from other Christian traditions. The university's music and business schools have become particularly renowned in recent years.
Among the eight new trustees are leaders from Nashville's business community and a prominent musician. New trustee CeCe Winans, a gospel and contemporary Christian music star, is a member of a non-denominational church. Nashville publisher T.B. Boyd is a member of an African-American Baptist church not affiliated with the TBC. Other new trustees belong to Presbyterian and Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) congregations in the Nashville area.