No More Baptist Political Blogs
For the past year or so, I have been entertained by the world of the Southern Baptist blogosphere. It seems like blogs touting all sorts of Southern Baptist movements are popping up. Much of my interest was environmental - I was intrigued by the growing discord among the fundamentalists. Now that the evil liberals were vanquished, they had no one to fight. And as predicted, they began to fight among themselves. Much of my interest was personal - what better combines my backgrounds in journalism, theology and political science like a good Baptist brawl.
On one side, you had the fundamentalist establishment. This group included loyal lieutenants of the Fudamentalist Takeover as well as those who "worshipped" Paige Patterson and Adrian Rogers. On the other side, you had the disgruntled fundamentalists. This group is more high profile in the blogosphere and the hardest to nail down. Some of its leaders include:
- Their pope is Wade Burleson, a pastor in Oklahoma and IMB trustee whose loyalty and like of IMB President Jerry Rankin thrust him into this role. Burleson has good fundamentalist credentials - he led the Oklahoma takeover, and now that victory is one, wants to be seen as an irenic fundamentalist. Admittedly, I have not verified with him, but a professor told me during one of the early CBF/moderate meetings in Oklahoma, Burleson traveled to it and nailed "95 [Fundamentalist] Thesis" to the meeting room door. Burleson may be legitimately reformed (little r), more loyal to Rankin than Patterson, or is a la Mohler sniffing a new breeze in the air and wants to be in front of it.
- Their Cardinal Ratzinger is Ben Cole, by far the most entertaining of the neo-fundamentalists. Cole is a small-church pastor in the Dallas area and a former stoog of Paige Patterson. When he did not get the plum assignment he wanted, Cole turned sychophant to serpent and began casting his venom and Patterson and airing their dirtly laundry. Cole fancies himself as the intellectual leader of the movement although I am not sure anyone follows him ... he tends to be myopic and venomous, which makes him so entertaining.
- And "The Others." Like those who live on the other side of SBC Life, these guys are "small-time" preachers who never captured to love and patronage of the Fundamentalist Establishment. Some of them are sharp guys starting to realize the emperor has no clothes, and others fall into different sorts ...
While I hope you can tell from the little above why this has been so much fun, I have to quit. It is as addicting as nicotine; but I must stop. It is extinguishing my spirit. I can see why the Southern Baptist Convention is halfing in size (although they'll never admit it and voted down a real count last summer, there is no way the SBC is anywhere near its advertised 16 million members; 10 million would be generous). These people are power hungry, toxic spirits. It do not think it is their fault - this is the culture that reared them. They do not know how to be Baptist without building political coalitions and fighting.
Burleson and Cole advertised how they drove around Texas building support for their cause. My question: WHO IS PASTORING YOUR CHURCH WHILE YOU'RE OUT PLAYING POLITICS? For people who claim to have so much faith and belive the Bible so much, few act like it. To me, all this politicing seems to deny much power for the Holy Spirit. But that seems to be Baptist life - lots of talk about faith, but just in case the Lord does not agree with us, we better do all we can to make our agenda happen.
Cole posted a note about a meeting he had with Joel Gregory, who advised him to focus on the local church. I think everyone in the SBC should take that advice. I am going to and hope to leave the Southern Baptist Blogosphere. What is important is not what Paige Patterson or Al Mohler think or what some other yahoos think but what is the call of Christ on our lives.
posted by Evangelical Orthodoxy @ 9:52 AM
10 Comments:
I enjoyed your little blog. You've pretty much pegged Wade, Ben, and Jeremy. :)
What I want to know is what you meant when you referred to me, "This guy lived in the real world for years and still thinks this way"?
Waiting to hear,
Les
Praise the Lord I am overseas and do not have to personally endure all of your (American SBC) non-sense personally! How about if everyone would quit blogging for one day and go spend that day telling someone about Jesus instead of complaining about how bad everyone else is? Evangelism as a lifestyle; hmmm. What an idea.
God help us.
Myself included in the "everyone quit blogging for a day".
OK, it is pretty much the end of the business day for me on this side of the world. I found a young woman who doesn't know Jesus. She has been fed some bull all of her life that God doesn't exist. I shared what God has done with me through Jesus and how He has changed my life. I am sorry to say that she didn't accept the Lord, but she is one step closer.
Since I am in a high security area, let's call her "Lucy". Please pray that God would draw Lucy to Himself and that she would come to know His saving grace through a personal relationship with Jesus.
good thoughts. the outline of players and positions was helpful, but I'm glad that you won't be continiuing the blog purusal. I think you're right--it will be better for your spirit.
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Les, my personal experience has led me to think - rightly or wrongly - that most hardline fundamentalists have not spent much time outside the Baptist bubble. I am surprised that someone who was a professional for so long as you would be such a hardliner.
Please forgive me for "picking on" you, but your discussion with Wade made you a good fundamentalist foil for those guys! :) I hope you did not take offense.
EO,
Thanks for the explanation. No, I haven't taken offense. :) I was just wondering about your perspective.
I'm not sure that your description of "hardliner" is accurate though. I take "hardliner" to mean that one's views will never change. I used to be an Arminian but now I am solidly Calvinist. I just don't want to go back to the 1970s politically.
Thanks for letting me comment.
Les
I appreciate your graciousness and kindness, which means a lot. Terms like "hardliner" are pejorative; I did not mean it that way as much as supportive of the Fundamentalist Establishment ... I just gleaned that reality from your posts about Wade. I do appreciate your responses and perspective. Independent of whether the "Burleson Faction" is correct or not, it does seem like just one political movement giving way to another, which is disappointing. I think the next big Civil War will be the Arminian-Calvinist battle, which might really get bloody in the likes not seen since the 1980s.
You are right on. While the personal comments about the men might be too much, it seems that the SBC is in the initial phases of dying from irrelevancy and these folks exemplify the causes. How can we invite sinners to repentance in one moment, and castigate one another the next? There is a great deal of sinning by the convention leadership that is chalked up to correcting one another's orthodoxy. I fear that Ben Cole has learned a terrible lesson of over-argessiveness from Paige Patterson. Where is the charity in our convention? Would Jesus be pleased at the way our convention politicos spend their time, C.P. money, and political clout? The WHOLE problem gets back to the focus of Patterson's conserative resurgence. While setting his sights on control, he confused religious orthodoxy and rhetoric for personal control as though he had the corner on truth becasue of his supposed literal hermeneutic. Durring his prolonged campaign, our convention lost the prime objective of every christian--evangelism. Bobby Welch's worthy efforts to rally our convention to evangelsim were largely ignored because we have forgotten how to exalt God at our own personal expense, and we have been keeping our eyes on one another and not on HIm. It seemes that most of our movers and shakers want to share too much in God's glory by "owning truth." Please don't think this is about baptism numbers; I'm referring to the character trait of personal invisibility for the sake of exaulting God. Politicians all share one thing in common: the spotlight always seems to be on them. I wish I could not see Patterson because the cross was in the way. May that be said of me as well.
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