By Bob Allen
The last church led by a woman pastor to receive salary assistance from the Southern Baptist Convention celebrates its 30th anniversary this month with community-service projects including neighborhood landscaping with Habitat for Humanity.
Broadneck Baptist Mission in Annapolis, Md., opened its doors for the first time on Sept. 12, 1982, with 11 charter members. The small mission gained national attention in 1984 by calling as its first full-time pastor Debra Griffis-Woodberry, a graduate of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and minister of education and youth at Ridge Road Baptist Church in Raleigh, N.C.
Griffis-Woodberry was one of 11 mission pastors approved in December 1984 by the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention Home Mission Board (now known as North American Mission Board) to receive church pastoral assistance — financial aid for small or new churches with limited financial means so they can hire a full-time pastor.
The action came six months on the heels of a controversial 1984 SBC resolution against women’s ordination that declared women unfit for church leadership “because the man was first in creation and the woman was first in the Edenic fall.”
The full Home Mission Board discussed concerns about the executive committee vote for an hour at its spring board meeting in 1985 before voting 39-32 to reaffirm a previous stance that ordination is a matter for local churches to decide and not subject to review by the denomination.
That changed in 1986, when HMB directors voted overwhelmingly to bar churches that receive church-pastoral assistance benefits from using Southern Baptist money to pay the salaries of female pastors.
Though Broadneck was the only church with a woman pastor to receive aid under the program, the new policy sent a strong message to the small but growing number of women like Griffis-Woodberry who were graduating from SBC seminaries having senior pastor as a vocational goal.
In 2003, the Home Mission Board stopped endorsing women as chaplains to serve in the military or other places “where the role and function of the chaplain would be seen the same as that of a pastor,” based on the SBC’s stance against women’s ordination.
Griffis-Woodberry left Southern Baptists in 1988 to become a United Methodist, citing disagreements with policies like the HMB’s funding ban and Randall Lolley’s resignation as president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1987.
Another factor was that she didn’t see much opportunity for advancement to a larger pulpit within the SBC. Today she is an elder in the South Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church. Currently pastor of Disciples United Methodist Church in Greenville, S.C., she is also an associate with Pinnacle Leadership Associates, a life-coaching organization.
Today Broadneck Baptist Church has about 50 members and is affiliated with the District of Columbia Baptist Convention, Alliance of Baptists and American Baptist Churches USA. Four of its seven pastors (counting two interims) have been women.
The current pastor, Abby Thornton, is a native of Richmond, Va., with a master-of-divinity degree from Duke Divinity School. She came to the church in 2010.
After consideration, the Broadneck Baptist Church congregation decided to celebrate its 30th anniversary with a project that gives back to the community. The first Saturday of September church members traveled to the Brooklyn Heights area in Annapolis to assist in Habitat for Humanity’s Building on Faith initiative.
Volunteers spent the day weeding and pruning with friends at Habitat, which also celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. Afterward, the church team held a picnic supper, and the next day had services with its one-time sponsor, Heritage Baptist Church in Annapolis.
On Sept. 29, Broadneck Baptist Church is inviting the whole community to a block party with live music, a cookout and birthday cake.
“The congregation wants the community to be its guests as it gives thanks for all the blessings of 30 years of life and service,” according to a news release.