DENVER (ABP) — American Baptists are a step closer to a long-anticipated showdown over homosexuality and diversity after completing their biennial meeting July 4.
The denomination's General Board, meeting prior to the larger convocation in Denver, accepted the first reading of a petition from one of the denomination's regional groups that calls for amendments to documents designed to more clearly state American Baptists' opposition to homosexuality.
At least three regional groups of ABC churches have threatened to withhold contributions to the national denomination or leave altogether if their concerns over homosexuality were not addressed by the end of the biennial, which took place July 1-4. Conservative leaders, such as the American Baptist Evangelicals, were not immediately available for comment after the meeting.
Regional fellowships are the channel through which local churches relate to the national body, which counts 1.5 million members in 5,836 churches. In recent years, several gay-friendly churches have been expelled from those regional bodies. The ABC General Board changed the denomination's rules in 1999 to allow churches to join regions outside of their geographical area if the region is willing to accept them.
As a result, many pro-gay ABC churches have joined more progressive regional associations — such as several in the Northeast.
The Indiana-Kentucky region initiated the petition to change those rules back, as well as to amend a denominational identity statement to read that American Baptists are a people “who submit to the teaching of Scripture that God's design for sexual intimacy places it within the context of marriage between one man and one woman, and acknowledge that the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with biblical teaching.”
The petition notes the ABC General Board's 1992 approval of a resolution that declares homosexual practice “incompatible with biblical teaching” but says that subsequent actions by denominational leaders have not sent as clear an anti-homosexuality message.
The denomination has presented “an inconsistent and confusing message to the world about what American Baptists profess to believe and what is actually practiced,” the petition reads.
It and another petition expressing concern over the unity in the denomination will receive a second reading at the November meeting of the General Board. If passed, it effectively would create a mechanism for expelling many gay-friendly churches from the ABC.
During his address to about 2,000 delegates to the biennial July 1, ABC General Secretary Roy Medley pleaded for unity in the ethnically, geographically and theologically diverse denomination.
“We stand at a crossroads,” he said, according to the American Baptist News Service. “In our world, the path of radical discipleship — the path of radical love — is the road less taken. We dare not choose another. We dare not choose the wrong road … the road that leads to separation. That choice will certainly unite you with like-minded people, but will give you small souls, and make you comfortable Christians.”