This article was updated Dec. 30 to include a response from Beth Moore. Some of the Southern Baptist Convention’s white male theocrats just can’t give up hating on Beth Moore. It has been nearly three years since the popular…
Rick Warren’s letter to the SBC was BNG’s most-read opinion piece in 2023
Rick Warren’s personal appeal to Southern Baptists about his battle with the Southern Baptist Convention over church autonomy and women in ministry were the most-read Baptist News Global opinion pieces in 2023. The issue of patriarchy and women’s roles in…
On Al Mohler, Paige Patterson, Bill Clinton, Immanuel Baptist Church and Baptist polity and politics
“Local church autonomy” is a Baptist distinctive selectively used. As evidence, consider Al Mohler’s position on Immanuel Baptist Church in Little Rock, Ark., 25 years ago when then-President Bill Clinton was a member there. Mohler, relatively new as president of…
In dialogue with Doug Wilson and the ‘pop Calvinists,’ at least Wilson is consistent
Twenty-three years after John Piper called Doug Wilson an “absolute genius at sarcasm and irony,” pop Calvinists are still wringing their hands over how to respond to the conservative Reformed pastor from Moscow, Idaho. “You’re very clever, really clever. And…
Three weeks later, four SBC entities are standing by their legal brief against a sexual abuse survivor
Three weeks after the Southern Baptist Convention and three of its entities were discovered to have signed an amicus brief in Kentucky arguing against the rights of sexual abuse survivors seeking justice, nothing has changed on the legal front. Neither…
To claim the label of Christian nationalist or not?
Who is a Christian nationalist? And should some people be proud to be called such a name? I, like a majority of BNG readers, am convinced Christian nationalists are a threat to democracy. I have been listening to them make…
Where are the trustees?
I still remember sitting in the wooden chairs in Sunday school as faithful men and women taught me the word of God, from curriculum that came from the Baptist Sunday School Board, now known as Lifeway Christian Resources. I would…
As Southern Seminary honors Al Mohler’s 30th anniversary, O.S. Hawkins compares Mohler to Moses, King David, Paul and Jesus
On the occasion of Al Mohler’s 30th anniversary as president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, O.S. Hawkins compared Mohler to Moses, King David, Paul and Jesus. “When God chooses to do a work of his sovereign grace, he seems to…
It’s Al Mohler vs. Andy Stanley, part two, with Christianity Today joining the fray
“Farewell, Andy Stanley.” So seems to be the response from Al Mohler, Christianity Today, and many other evangelicals to Stanley’s defense of North Point Community Church hosting the Unconditional Conference for LGBTQ Christians and their parents. Sam Allberry, writing for Christianity Today, argues Stanley “seriously undermined”…
Criticism of Andy Stanley is rooted in father wounds
LGBTQ kids who grow up in conservative evangelical families tend to have father wounds because evangelicals view LGBTQ people as given over by God to a reprobate mind for the degrading of their bodies and therefore eternally condemned. The challenge…
When is a ‘prominent’ memorial not as ‘major’ as advertised?
A “prominent” marker on the campus of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary acknowledging the sins of the institution’s slaveholding founders is smaller than a nearby banner bearing the image of current seminary President Al Mohler, the Louisville Courier-Journal reports. The 20-by-30-inch…
The influence of celebrity culture on the court, in the church and in journalism
While the Denver Nuggets defeated the Miami Heat to win the NBA title for the first time in their 47-year history last week, Southern Baptist complementarians defeated the egalitarians to win the title of “pastor” exclusively for men for the…