The Southern Baptist Convention will cut ties with the District of Columbia Baptist Convention unless D.C. Baptist leaders confront a member church with lesbian co-pastors, the SBC Executive Committee warned during Feb. 19-20 meetings in Nashville, Tenn.
Baptist brokenness: Reconciliation and revolution
I am sick to death of decades of our ceaseless inability to avoid personal, spiritual and communal schism in our churches and ourselves. Truth to tell, however, 2,000 years of Christian history illustrate that the same Jesus Story that unites all Christ’s church often drives it apart. I’ve often teased that “Baptists multiply by dividing.” It’s not funny anymore. Never was.
Baptist upbringing inspires sociologist’s study of SBC controversy, American faith
Growing up as a child of a Southern Baptist minister, Nancy Ammerman developed an early interest in the role congregations play in nurturing the personal faith of individuals. Now a sociologist at Boston University, Ammerman has turned the insights she gained toward a study of American religious life, including controversies that have confronted Baptists.
2017’s top religion stories are a doozy
The year 2017 may not have been the biggest ever for religion news in the U.S. or the world, but it has to be close.
Is Christian decline in U.S. prompting evangelicals to seek government endorsement? Maybe.
Eighty-three nations have an official, state-endorsed religion or give preferred treatment to one over others, according to a Pew Research Center study, which lists the United States among 106 countries that have no official or preferred faith. But is that changing? It might appear so, as the increasingly rapid descent of organized religion may be fueling some Christians’ drive to codify faith in America.
Will Sutherland Springs be a tipping point for Southern Baptists and guns?
Southern Baptist leaders have reached out in many ways to survivors of the rampage that killed 26 men, women and children last Sunday. Conspicuously absent is any suggestion that lives might have been saved by laws barring civilians from owning weapons designed to kill as many people as possible in the shortest amount of time.
Baptist historian at SBC seminary says Civil War monuments should be taken down
A Southern Baptist seminary professor says it is time for Civil War monuments erected decades after Gettysburg and Appomattox for the purpose of intimidating Southern blacks to come down. “I would advocate for the vast majority of Confederate monuments to…
Did Robert Jeffress contribute to SBC decline with pro-war, pro-Trump statement?
As Christian denominations continue their downward spiral, some experts say the rapid descent is caused by the increasing politicization of the church and the erosion of church-state separation. A Gallup poll released last month found that the percentage of American…
Clash continues two months after SBC alt-right resolution snafu
Four years ago a line in Keith Getty’s song “In Christ Alone” sparked a debate over the meaning of the atonement. In nearly two months since the Southern Baptist Convention nearly failed to pass a resolution condemning the alt-right movement,…