On February 21, 2023, it was reported that the Southern Baptist Convention decided to expel five churches because they have female pastors.  One of the expelled churches is the very prominent Saddleback Church, based in Southern California, which is led by Rick Warren, author of one of the best-selling books of all time, “The Purpose Driven Life.”  On June 14, at the denomination’s convention held in New Orleans, the Southern Baptists confirmed the expulsion and, as reported by Jonathan Merritt in Religion News Service, amended their constitution to have “only men as any kind of pastor or elder as qualified by Scripture.”

Observers are surprised by the timing of this latest move considering that the Southern Baptists are still struggling to recover from a major scandal in which a horrific history of sexual abuse against women was revealed.

It seems to me that the tolerance for sexual abuse of women and the refusal to have women in positions of leadership both represent an inclination to treat women as inferior to men.  This prejudicial attitude is justified by questionable doctrinal positions held by the more conservative members of the denomination.  Therefore, I will review both situations in this article even though I had previously been reluctant to discuss the scandal, not wanting to appear overly judgmental toward a denomination I have criticized on various occasions.

After more than 15 years of stonewalling, a third-party investigation of the responses by the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention to sexual abuse accusations led to a 288-report released in May, 2022.  Kate Shellnutt, who wrote about the scandal in Christianity Today, started her article by summarizing the magnitude of the wrongdoing:

“Armed with a secret list of more than 700 abusive pastors, Southern Baptist leaders chose to protect the denomination from lawsuits rather than protect the people in their churches from further abuse.

Survivors, advocates, and some Southern Baptists themselves spent more than 15 years calling for ways to keep sexual predators from moving quietly from one flock to another. The men who controlled the Executive Committee (EC)—which runs day-to-day operations of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC)—knew the scope of the problem. But, working closely with their lawyers, they maligned the people who wanted to do something about abuse and repeatedly rejected pleas for help and reform.”

The report particularly blamed the three past presidents of the EC, Ronnie Floyd, Frank Page, and Morris Chapman, for refusing to take action because they wanted to avoid potential legal liability.  In so doing, these leaders showed no concern for the plight of the victims.  Shellnutt provides some examples showing what victims went through:

“Survivors, in turn, described the soul-crushing effects of not only their abuse, but the stonewalling, insulting responses from leaders at the EC for 15-plus years.

Christa Brown, a longtime advocate who experienced sexual abuse by her pastor at 16, said her ‘countless encounters with Baptist leaders’ who shunned and disbelieved her ‘left a legacy of hate’ and communicated ‘you are a creature void of any value—you don’t matter.’ As a result, she said, instead of her faith providing solace, her faith has become ‘neurologically networked with a nightmare.’ She referred to it as ‘soul murder.’

Another victim, Debbie Vasquez, was repeatedly sexually assaulted by an SBC pastor starting at the age of 14. When one assault led to her pregnancy, she was forced to apologize in front of the church but forbidden to mention the father. The pastor went on to serve at another Southern Baptist church, and when Vasquez reached out to the EC, her entreaties were ignored and evaded for years until a Houston Chronicle investigation three years ago.”

Also noteworthy is the story of a former president, pastor Johnny Hunt, who sexually assaulted the wife of a younger pastor in 2010.  He then used his influence to keep the couple from pursuing the matter in order to avoid a negative impact on the over 40,000 churches he represented.

Considering that there were 700 predators being moved around between congregations, the scale of the problem is clear.  But it was not enough to silence the victims.  Some in leadership positions responded to complaints by declaring that the accusers were led by the devil.  Augie Boto, the EC general counsel who advised the three former presidents mentioned above, wrote the following in an email:

“This whole thing should be seen for what it is. It is a satanic scheme to completely distract us from evangelism. It is not the gospel. It is not even a part of the gospel. It is a misdirection play. Yes, Christa Brown and Rachael Denhollander have succumbed to an availability heuristic because of their victimizations. They have gone to the SBC looking for sexual abuse, and of course, they found it. Their outcries have certainly caused an availability cascade. … But they are not to blame. This is the devil being temporarily successful.”

Now that everything has been disclosed, it is safe to say that Satan, if involved, would have been on the side of the leaders rather than the victims.  Sadly, this ability to distort reality and misuse church doctrine to protect the interests of individuals or church establishment seems characteristic of ultraconservative denominations such as SBC.  It is directly linked to the very foundation of a denomination that misused the Bible to justify slavery, as I discussed in another post.  It explains why Christian nationalists have thrown their full support behind Donald Trump in spite of his immoral conduct.  It also explains why far-right Christians, today, are immersed in a world where facts no longer matter.

Shellnutt also notes how SBC leaders took advantage of the autonomy of the churches in its membership to avoid responsibility:

“The Southern Baptist Convention proudly says it’s a group of autonomous churches. They join together for mission work, fellowship, and training, but the convention has no hierarchy. It doesn’t ordain or appoint pastors, nor does it hold authority over the 47,000 churches that have chosen to affirm its faith statements and give to its Cooperative Program.

That lack of oversight means that when something goes wrong at an SBC church or entity, the EC can claim it’s not to blame; the churches are independent. The legal counsel argued that the more denominational leaders directed churches to deal with abuse, the more it would assume liability for mistakes and mishandling.”

In other words, it was wise to tolerate wrongdoing in the churches in order to avoid SBC liability.  Is that how Christians are supposed to operate?  In fact, we will see later that this autonomy guideline becomes less important when it is no longer aligned with the priorities of the dominant, highly conservative wing of the denomination.

Once it becomes clear that the leaders of the denomination are inclined to twist the facts to safeguard their interests, it also becomes advisable not to assume that their theological pronouncements are sound.  In particular, their recent decisions to exclude women from pastoral positions can only be understood as a drive to cement their patriarchal approach to church life.

On June 14, 2000, the Southern Baptists’ statement of faith was debated at the SBC Convention held in Orlando, Florida, and a revision was overwhelmingly approved.  An article by Norm Miller in BaptistPress summarizes the debate.  Miller notes that the decision about women as pastors was approved with very little discussion:

“For all the articles regarding women pastors published by both secular and religious publications in the weeks preceding the annual convention, the only mention of such was Rogers’ reference to the subject in citing the revised statement: ‘The convention has spoken clearly its conviction that while both men and women are gifted and called for ministry, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.’”

This revised statement implies that there are verses in Scripture that support the practice of reserving pastoral positions for men, and such verses should be accepted as authoritative.  It is therefore easy to see that acceptance of the statement depended greatly on acceptance of other changes adopted at the Convention about Scripture interpretation.  Miller reports the words of Adrian Rogers, the chairman of the Baptist Faith and Message Study Committee, who introduced the revised document:

“’We have sought to clarify the intention of both previous editions [1925 and 1963] of the Baptist Faith and Message,’ said the pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church in Cordova, Tenn. ‘We have made the total truthfulness and trustworthiness of the Bible even more explicit. And we point to Jesus Christ as the focus of divine revelation.’

Rogers said the committee removed the statement identifying Jesus Christ as ‘The criterion by which the Bible is to be interpreted’ because it has been subject to misunderstanding. Jesus Christ cannot be divided from the biblical revelation that is testimony to him.

We must not claim a knowledge of Christ that is independent of Scripture or in any way in opposition to Scripture.”

This simply means that knowledge of the divine, as revealed by Jesus himself, cannot correct or invalidate any other knowledge found in the Bible.  It is consistent with the belief in biblical inerrancy according to which all utterances in the Bible are from God and, therefore, equally authoritative.  In reality, as I have said before, this belief is wrong since anybody can see that biblical revelation is progressive in the sense that new revelations appear in time, and some of them clearly correct older ones.  For example, Jesus, who is described in the New Testament as the fullness of divine revelation, rejects the death penalty (John 8:2-10) and various forms of retaliation prescribed by the Law of Moses (Matthew 5:38-41).  The belief in biblical inerrancy would lead to the absurd conclusion that both Jesus and the Law of Moses are right on those issues.

But this emphasis on inerrancy was made clear during the debate by Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Ky.  Miller relays Mohler’s response to an objection that was raised by participants:

“’Ladies and gentlemen, this is what it all comes down to,’ Mohler responded. ‘The issue is whether or not the Bible is the Word of God or whether it is merely a record of God’s Word,’ he said over applause. ‘The Bible is not merely a record, it is the revelation of God.’

‘It is always a triumphant moment when this convention states clearly its belief that the Bible is the inerrant, infallible Word of God. It would be a tremendous tragedy for in this moment Southern Baptists to step back and say something inadequate about Scripture and send a very mixed signal about our most basic belief,’ continued Mohler, who was referred to in a June 13 news conference as the ‘Thomas Jefferson of the document’ by SBC President-elect James Merritt.’”

Also noteworthy is the fact that some opponents of the changes raised their concern that SBC was trying to impose certain beliefs on all adherent churches, thereby violating the idea of autonomy.  Members of the Study Committee who defended the changes assured the audience that the amended document was merely a statement of belief and was not a binding or governing document on Southern Baptist churches and their members.

In 2000, SBC leaders who pushed for the revised statement of faith noted that the new statement on female pastors would have a negligible effect since there were a total of 35 churches, out of the 45,000-plus SBC churches, with female pastors.  In 2023, it is estimated that there are more than 1800 female pastors serving in 1225 churches out the 47,000-plus SBC churches.  This is clearly an alarming situation for those who truly believe that the statement issued in 2000 is important, so important that ideas of church autonomy become irrelevant.

One of the churches that were expelled in February, in addition to Saddleback Church and three other churches, is Fern Creek Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky.  A New York Times article by Elizabeth Dias and Ruth Graham describes the female pastor’s reaction to the expulsion:

“The letter in October came as a shock to Linda Barnes Popham, who had been the pastor of Fern Creek Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky., for 30 years, the first woman to lead her congregation. She had served in ministry even longer, since she started as a pianist at age 16.

But now, she read in the letter, officials of the Southern Baptist Convention had received a complaint about her church being led by a woman. The denomination was investigating, it said.

She replied at length, listing her qualifications and her church’s interpretation of the Bible that affirmed her eligibility to lead. Church deacons, including men, rallied to her defense.”

The article provides an explanation for the new drive against churches with female pastors:

“The right wing of the Southern Baptists, the largest Protestant denomination in America, is now — like conservatives more broadly — cracking down on what it sees as dangerous liberal drift. Most people in the denomination have long believed that the office of head pastor should be reserved for men. But an ultraconservative faction with a loud online presence is going further, pressing for ideological purity and arguing that female pastors are a precursor to acceptance of homosexuality and sexual immorality.”

But theological and biblical considerations are not the only ones driving the movement.  There is an important political element involved:

“The fight over the place of women in the church, long contentious, has been escalating as American evangelicalism increasingly fuses with Republican politics and a vocal ultraconservative minority pushes for power.

The crackdown comes at a moment when the country is broadly re-examining women’s rights, a year after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. For the Southern Baptists, it also comes as victims’ advocates continue to press the denomination to take action after devastating reports of sexual abuse of women and children, and are met with resistance from some men in the organization.”

Dias and Graham note that “Membership in Southern Baptist Convention churches has been declining for more than a decade, though with more than 13 million members, it remains the largest Protestant denomination in the United States.”

The SBC ultraconservatives blame the decline on the liberal drift mentioned above, and see the issue of female leadership and LGBTQ issues as interconnected pieces associated with that liberal drift.  But observers such as Jonathan Merritt disagree:

“The move is baffling given the shambled state of the denomination, which has been steadily hemorrhaging members since 2007. Last year alone, the SBC reported 416 fewer churches and shed nearly 500,000 members — the largest single drop in 100 years. The SBC’s public image has been severely tarnished by a clergy sex abuse scandal bungled and mishandled by leaders at numerous stages. It’s difficult to imagine a worse possible time for the denomination to wage a war to narrow denominational borders and tighten standards for membership.”

In addition to the sexual abuse scandal, Merritt blames the Southern Baptists’ political positions and attitudes towards non-whites:

“Members have fled the SBC, too, because of its perpetually aggrieved and bitterly divided politics. While the denomination has been entangled with Republicanism for decades, many Southern Baptists have been disoriented by some of their leaders’ full-throated support of former President Donald Trump, who quite evidently embodies so much that the denomination morally opposes. This partisan turn cost them the allegiance of Beth Moore, the denomination’s most popular Bible study teacher, and Russell Moore, the prominent former head of the SBC’s political arm.

Then there are the recent debates on race. The denomination, overwhelmingly white and founded on tolerance for slavery, opposes any suggestion that institutional and systemic racism even exists. After the six SBC seminary presidents, all white men, released a sweeping statement in November 2020 condemning so-called critical race theory as ‘antithetical to the Bible,’ many prominent Black pastors, including Charlie Dates of Chicago, publicly broke with the SBC.”

The amendment under consideration in 2023 differed from the change made in 2000 in that it was now going to infringe on church autonomy by stating that churches with female pastors could not be SBC members.  That is why pastors Warren and Barnes Popham, in their appeals to the Convention, focused on a defense of church autonomy, perhaps not realizing that the overwhelming majority of convention voters had long moved past such considerations.  Interestingly, Barnes Popham also tried to make an argument based on the teaching of Jesus but was interrupted.  As reported by Dias and Graham,

“Officials cut her microphone when she went past her three-minute time limit. No one heard the words of Jesus she planned to quote next: ‘Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You have neglected the more important matters.’”

In that New Testament passage (Matthew 23:23), Jesus questions the priorities of his adversaries who often neglect the more important matters of the law, which he lists as justice, mercy and faithfulness.  The word justice refers to the fact that the well-being of all humans is important to God, which implies that he is against those who use their power to take everything for themselves, leaving nothing for the weak and defenseless.  Justice is about acting justly, so that nobody is taken advantage of.  Additinally, since God is merciful by nature, he expects humans to be merciful towards each other as well.  Ironically, Albert Mohler, in his rebuttal, sounded like the Pharisees and teachers of the law, declaring that the issue came down to “doctrine and order.”  Does the teaching of Jesus matter at all?  Apparently not: the overwhelming majority rewarded Mohler with great applause.

New Testament teaching emphasizes God’s grace, love of God and love of neighbor, and deemphasizes the Law of Moses (law and order).  It is astonishing that conservative Christians enthusiastically declare their thankfulness for God’s grace, but choose to cling to notions of law and order, thereby ignoring the theological progression that is an obvious part of the biblical narrative.  Their justification for that approach: Biblical inerrancy, a made-up concept.

In the last section of my post “Why Are there still Questions about Women in Christian Congregations?”, I provided an overview of my thoughts on how the Christian Bible deals with the issue of female leadership.  I will therefore not dive into the matter here, and readers are encouraged to read the post if they are interested.