By Bob Allen The Southern Baptist Convention has condemned acts of abuse or bullying against people who identify as a gender different than the one assigned at birth but said the transgender experience is not supported by Scripture. In a…
Southern Baptists say Holy Writ, not Hollywood, proves heaven is for real
By Bob Allen The Southern Baptist Convention passed a resolution June 10 warning against books and movies suggesting that near-death experiences prove the existence of heaven or hell. A resolution on “the sufficiency of Scripture regarding the afterlife” says many…
SBC clarifies ‘friendly cooperation,’ updates criteria for church affiliation
By Bob Allen Messengers to the June 10-11 SBC annual meeting in Baltimore approved without discussion changes to the SBC constitution defining what it means to be “in friendly cooperation” with the convention — the language used for congregations that qualify…
Motion asks SBC to discipline gay-affirming pastor
By Bob Allen A former Southern Baptist Convention vice president asked new officers to consider discipline against a California congregation that recently broke ranks with the denomination’s view that all homosexual behavior is a sin. Wiley Drake, pastor of First…
Ronnie Floyd elected SBC president
By Bob Allen An Arkansas pastor with a long record of denominational service has been elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention. Messengers to the June 10-11 SBC annual meeting chose Ronnie Floyd, 27-year pastor of Cross Church, formerly known…
Anne Neil, advocate for women ministers, dies at 94
By Robert Dilday Anne T. Neil, a former Baptist missionary whose advocacy for women ministers led to her own ordination to the ministry at age 80, died June 8 in Raleigh, N.C. She was 94. Neil’s passion for gender parity…
New Baptist Covenant signals resurgence of reconciliation movement, Mandela colleague says
By Jeff Brumley Allan Boesak is a native South African and Reformed Church pastor and theologian who worked shoulder to shoulder with Nelson Mandela and others to defeat apartheid. He is a passionate advocate of the reconciliation and ecumenical movements…
Washington’s Amy Butler elected pastor at Riverside Church in New York
By Robert Dilday Amy Butler, a Baptist pastor in Washington nominated April 27 to fill the pulpit of the prominent Riverside Church in New York City, was elected June 8 as the 84-year-old congregation’s first woman pastor. Butler, 44, who…
Muslim prisoners have right to religious grooming practice, says BJC
By Cherilyn Crowe A prisoner has the right to exercise his religious belief by adhering to certain religious grooming standards, according to a brief filed at the U.S. Supreme Court and signed by the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty….
‘Traditional’ Southern Baptists counter Calvinism
Move over TULIP. Another flower is blooming this week in Baltimore. New Calvinists are more Calvinist than Calvin was, Christian apologist Norman Geisler said June 7 at the inaugural meeting of a group formed to balance various Southern Baptist fellowships…
Churches being pushed to see selves as guests in own communities
By Jeff Brumley At Grace and Main in Danville, Va., organizers have ceded much of their power to the people they came to serve. “A lot of our leadership is made up of those who are or were hungry, impoverished…
At SBC’s annual meeting, sobering report, possible change in representation top agenda
By Robert Dilday Southern Baptists are heading to Baltimore next week, where they may consider a significant change in how churches qualify for representation in the national denomination, while grappling with a sobering report of declining baptisms and membership. Several…