One of U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham’s final public appearances was at a Baptist church in his home state of South Carolina. On Saturday, July 4, Graham appeared at First Baptist Church of Columbia, S.C.., for the Southern Baptist congregation’s “Carolina…
What Willy Rice once knew
Newly elected Southern Baptist Convention President Willy Rice has characterized the SBC’s clergy sex abuse crisis as a “hoax” and a “snipe hunt.” Talk like that helped get Rice elected. Apparently, it was the message many Southern Baptists wanted to…
The transmogrification of the SBC: When Baptists no longer are Baptist
As the Southern Baptist Convention in its recent annual meeting has proved itself unreliably Baptist, it gives me pause to think about how quickly the transmogrification of this Baptist denomination into its ecclesiastical opposite has happened. Baptist folk often have…
SBC says it’s not possible to be gay or transgender and Christian
It is not possible to be a “gay Christian” or a “transgender Christian,” the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission says. In a new social media reel posted by the ERLC, that question is answered by RaShan Frost,…
Like SBC, Episcopal Church hopes to sell its headquarters building
The Southern Baptist Convention isn’t the only national denomination attempting to sell its headquarters building amid changing dynamics. The Episcopal Church announced June 17 that its 12-story Church Center building in New York City is on the market. Two years…
Pilate asked Jesus, ‘What is truth?’
At this year’s meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention, Al Mohler introduced an amendment to the convention’s constitution. His intent was to clarify, in the most specific terms possible, that only men may speak for God. Mohler couched his rationale…
The preachers who raised me
My home church always will feel like a home to me — not because of the building or the denomination, but because of the people. I am Baptist enough to believe the people are the church. Like so many others,…
Why I stay in the SBC as an ordained woman
That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. — 2 Corinthians 12:10 I was ordained alongside my husband on a Sunday afternoon in…
Nobody dislikes Southern Baptists more than Al Mohler
I am disappointed in Al Mohler for a great many reasons. But the Doug Wilson podcast appearance last week is an unsurprising development in a pattern of disappointments. Mohler has a proven history of disregarding the very people he is…
Marginalized leaders already are leading
As Pride Month unfolds, the Southern Baptist Convention has once again made headlines by reaffirming its opposition to women serving as pastors. At nearly the same moment, recent Department of Defense actions affecting the recognition of several religious traditions raised…
It’s bad interpretation, not the Bible, limiting female pastors
The Southern Baptist Convention’s recent vote to further restrict women from pastoral leadership has reopened a debate many Baptists thought was settled long ago. Their denial of the Holy Spirit’s gift of ministry to women equally to men is reminiscent…
Tell the stories of women in church leadership, Vanderbilt dean urges
Women have served in ministry throughout the history of the church even as their courage and tenacity have been mostly overlooked and forgotten, said theologian Yolanda Pierce, dean of the Vanderbilt University Divinity School. Therefore, it is important to begin…