The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship has eliminated seven staff positions, according to a letter from Executive Coordinator Paul Baxley sent to governance leaders last week. It is not yet known if any of those positions were vacant and therefore how many people lost jobs.
The letter was provided to BNG by CBF spokesman Jeff Huett, chief operating officer. Further details about the positions affected will be made public in the next few days, Huett said, after those who lost jobs have had time to communicate with others on their own.
Currently, CBF lists 38 staff members on its website. Only a small number of those work at CBF’s headquarters in Decatur, Ga. Most work remotely.
Last January, 13 CBF field personnel — the group’s name for missionaries — took an early retirement incentive offered to reduce overhead. The current reduction does not affect field personnel.
In November 2020, CBF eliminated 10 staff positions as part of a staff realignment. Those layoffs were in the central staff as well and not related to field personnel.
Paul Baxley
After its founding in 1991, CBF grew rapidly as churches left the Southern Baptist Convention or became dually affiliated with the SBC and CBF. Initially, CBF took on a significant number of missionaries who fled the SBC International Mission Board rather than sign a newly revised doctrinal statement.
CBF’s initial growth was funded not only by church offerings but also by some large gifts from individuals and a series of grants from foundations. Like all U.S. religious bodies, CBF has experienced decline in membership and funding over the last 35 years. That has caused the small denomination to tighten its belt and re-evaluate budgets constantly.
“CBF’s economic realities have become more challenging alongside the financial strain facing many of our congregations,” Baxley said in the letter. “We have adjusted our budgets, discerned more focus in our ministries and new approaches to staffing to best steward the investments from the fellowship.”
The staff reduction was approved by the CBF Governing Board in early January, he said, because “we needed to reorganize and reduce the size of the CBF global staff to focus our work most on our core commitments while bringing more efficiencies to administrative areas. … The primary focus of the reduction in force is to heighten the efficiency of our administrative and operations areas.”
Employees who lost their job are “exceptionally high quality” people and their dismissal is “not at all a reflection on performance or character, but rather changing needs and economic realities,” Baxley said.