Baptist Standard: Paul Pressler, "Resurgence Architect" Dead at 94
Baptist Standard: Southern Baptist Attorney Tweets, "Pressler is a Monster and a Predator"
Silence.
That's the response from the leadership of the Southern Baptist Convention, which bills itself as the nation's largest Evangelical denomination, when it comes to an extensive sexual abuse scandal, involving pastors of churches, and leaders of denominational entities including its seminaries, mission boards and its executive committee. A second task force in the three years since messengers demanded action made its report to the convention during its annual meeting last week in Indianapolis, essentially failing to achieve the results that had been asked for.
The general perception left with the victims of sexual abuse at the hands of abusers who were pastors and church leaders in the Southern Baptist churches they attended, is that the rhetoric from the task forces and leaders is more centered on protecting the convention's assets from lawsuits, and the cost of insurance premiums, than it is focused on any concern about the victims, or about how to set up a system which would prevent abusers from moving from one church to another, as they do now in the denomination made up of 45,000 independent, autonomous congregations. And that's a failure of spiritual discernment and will in a Christian denomination that arrogantly claims to be the proclaimer of the "clear teachings" of the Bible they claim is both inerrant and infallible.
The Southern Baptist Convention was founded in 1845, as a split from the Triennial Convention, based in Philadelphia, over the latter's opposition to slavery and its restrictions against appointing slave owners as missionaries. It was not until 1995, one hundred and fifty years after it was founded, one hundred thirty years after the abolition of slavery and the end of the Civil War, that the Southern Baptist Convention, for the first time, formally apologized to blacks for it's past support of slavery, segregation and white supremacy. A resolution passed that year was the first time the denomination acknowledged that racism had played a significant role in its history, both past and present.
I'm wondering if it is going to take that long for them to acknowledge the role they've played in a sexual abuse scandal that is as just as serious, and just as sinful.
The "holy grail" of Southern Baptist life since 1979 has been the acknowledgement that the "Conservative resurgence," a turn back toward more fundamentalist, conservative doctrine and theology in the face of accusations of "creeping liberalism", saved the Southern Baptist Convention from decline, decay and dissolution. This "resurgence" was led by two men who, out of deference for their agenda, were given an inordinate amount of power and influence well outside the boundaries of the denomination's bylaws in order to effectively bring about their claimed intentions to restore the denomination to "it's conservative roots."
But since the Conservative Resurgence began, the things that its conservative theology and doctrine were supposed to save, and help get moving forward again, particularly evangelistic activity measured by the number of baptisms happening each year, and growth in church attendance and membership, have been in a steepening decline. Even as overall church membership and attendance reached their all-time peak in 2005, the number of baptisms, representing the number of individuals who professed to having become converts to the Christian faith in Baptist churches, was in decline.
The real intentions of the resurgence's two "architects," as they were called, had little to do with restoring the SBC to its "conservative roots." Paige Patterson, who was then President of a tiny, financially strapped, broken down Bible college, Criswell College, in Dallas, wanted to be made president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, then the largest theological seminary in the world. Paul Pressler, the Texas Appeals Court judge, deacon and Sunday school teacher at Houston's First Baptist Church wanted to bring the Southern Baptist Convention into a full political alliance with the Republican party. Both achieved their personal kingdom-building goals at the expense of the SBC
The denomination's membership and attendance began a slow decline in 2006, and then a sharper, more steep drop off began in 2016, though church researchers and SBC leaders are loathe to connect this decline to the influence of far right wing extremist politics intruding into the denomination's churches. Since it's peak in 2005, the membership has declined by 3.4 million, and the attendance by 1.9 million. That's more than 20% of the total. Since 2016, the membership losses began adding up to 200,000 a year, and that turned into 450,000 by 2018. It slowed down to 250,000 this past year, while attendance rebounded by about 80,000, coming out of the pandemic. But the pre-pandemic attendance was down considerably, almost 20%, from just a decade earlier.
The idolization of the two men who helped bring about the Conservative Resurgence, the power they were allowed to have and the lack of any kind of accountability, which ultimately resulted in both of them being disgraced in some way, and eventually cut off from the denomination's fellowship, is a sign that the resurgence they led wasn't spiritually centered or focused, but it was either an exercise in personal kingdom building from the start, or it turned into one as a result of the power and influence given to these two men. There are those who know both of them personally, who will attest to the fact that their goals were personal from the outset.
The sexual abuse scandal in the denomination has been responsible for bringing down both resurgence leaders. One of them because in his positions of leadership, he failed to value the women who were students in the seminaries he led, and didn't take their victimization by male students seriously enough to protect them. The other, because he was alleged to have been an abuser himself, with credible accusations eventually catching up with him. I don't find this ironic at all, in a predominantly fundamentalist religious denomination where women are still considered culturally and intellectually inferior to men as a point of doctrine. Or where the fundamentalist atmosphere is so thick, that grace is always trumped by legalism.
The abuse scandal, and the manner in which it worked its way through every layer and every level of Southern Baptist life, is a heinous and grievous sin. So are attempts to downplay it, and make it look like a minor problem, coming from many of the denominations more reactionary hardliners. But it is not this sin that is the root cause of the problem.
The sin is arrogance. The fact that this has come along at a time when Southern Baptists are increasingly linking themselves blindly to one of the most morally bankrupt, corrupt, evil politicians of our time, is a sign of internal weakness that has failed to connect spiritually to God, or to the Christian gospel. The denomination, at least at the core of its leadership, has become prideful and arrogant, declaring themselves and their own interpretations of the Bible to be as inerrant and infallible as they claim the scriptures to be. But this arrogance has been exposed in its inability to confront a horrendous sin in its own camp. And there are those within the ranks of this denomination who do see it, and have called it out, and have been vindicated as a result.
The leadership of the denomination is still blind, though it has distanced itself from both of these former privileged oligarchs, who didn't have to follow the same rules everyone else did. This is a denomination which pays its bills out of the offering plates of its churches and that includes the perks and privilege expenses of these two self-proclaimed Kings of the SBC. Indulging in sin that Southern Baptists place at the top of the list of bad sins that can be committed, with leaders who knew it was happening, and said nothing, is the height of sinful arrogance.
So far, the denominational leadership has been silent. Silent when it comes to acknowledging the fact that they let these two men and the cause of the Conservative Resurgence become an idol that they worshipped. Silent in failing to call out their grievous sins when they knew all along what was happening. Silent in disavowing both men, and in expelling any church which accepted them into their membership. Silent in admitting that their cause was an arrogant one, and their claims of being the sole interpreters of the "clear teaching of scripture" was not only offensive to every sincere Christian who tries to live a Christian life guided by prayer, study of the scripture and humble submission to God, but to God himself.
Those who were in leadership and permitted this will need to come clean and be accountable, stepping down from their leadership positions as well as letting go of the de-facto power that is one of the more backward traits of Southern Baptist life. And that's why I don't think it will ever happen, and that Southern Baptists will ever see the light restored to their now darkened temple. Because there is too much arrogance and pride in the camp to admit failure, wrongdoing, or to give up even the slightest power or privilege. I'm not sure there will ever be an acknowledgement that the conservative resurgence itself is the source of many of the inherent problems leading to the decline in evangelistic activity, church planting and church growth among Southern Baptists, but there's little question, when examining the facts, that it was.
It was used to create an alliance with the secular political far right that has completely hijacked the mission and purpose of churches and denominations which once claimed to be committed to Christ alone and that has also been a key factor in the staggering membership losses experienced by Southern Baptists, though their leadership also has yet to acknowledge this fact. Supporting a political figure whose lifestyle is deliberately self-proclaimed as "worldly," who is a symbol of male dominance and misogyny and who brags about his immorality in grotesque, foul language is not the business of a Christian denomination and the fact that he has become the focal point for a majority of white Southern Baptists is blasphemy of, and an abomination before, a holy God.
The Conservative Resurgence failed to re-energize and ignite the spiritual passion behind an evangelistic revival, and instead, its leaders presided over a sharp decline in baptisms. It failed to reverse the trend in which 70% of the churches in the denomination were either plateaued or declining in membership and attendance, and it failed miserably in increasing the revenue available for its ministries, primarily its two mission boards. It has made up for that loss by pressuring and brow-beating state convention bodies to give them a larger share of their receipts which most, not all, have done, bankrupting several of them in the process.
And the Southern Baptist Convention's conservative resurgence leadership has failed to deal with a serious, clergy sexual abuse scandal among its pastors, church leaders and denominational leaders. This happened on their watch, not while the "liberals and moderates" were in charge of the camp. Nor are these the drag queens and the LGBTQ movement who are engaging in the abuse. These are pastors, church leaders and denominational employees who are hiding behind the privilege and prestige they've been given in this apostate denomination.
Until repentance occurs, there will be no absolution. Don't count on it happening any time soon. Spiritual blindness is hard to shake, especially when it is partnered with arrogance.
No comments:
Post a Comment