Southern Baptists aim to baptize 1 MILLION new members

[Bluebear]

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - The annual meeting of Southern Baptist Convention will help kick off what may be the denomination's most ambitious outreach effort ever — baptizing 1 million new members in a year.

Headquartered in Nashville, the 16.3 million-member faith is the second-largest denomination in the United States, behind the Roman Catholic Church. Yet the number of new member baptisms has declined in each of the past five years.

"We have been playing it too close to the church," said President Bobby Welch, who will speak at the opening of the two-day convention Tuesday following a satellite address by President Bush. "Southern Baptists have to reconnect themselves with the communities and the needs of the people in the communities."...

One resolution that will likely be presented this year urges churches to investigate their local school districts to determine if they promote homosexuality, and remove their children from such schools if they do. A similar resolution failed last year.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050620/ap_on_re_us/southern_baptists

[MichiganVote]

1. Count me out

[Book Lover]

2. But what about the quality of believer?

I mean, anyone can talk themselves to being born again, right? How many of this theoretical million will be around in 2 years?

[Bluebear]

7. As long as they vote Republican, they don't care about quality.

Never have I seen more unification of church and state.

[donco6]

3. They always have these gigantic goals.

In reality, they end up baptising their children as they come of age, maybe a few "rebaptisms" of people who were baptized as infants (that doesn't count in fundieland). They'll lose members through attrition, gain some converts here and there. In the end they'll wind up about the same.

[ailsagirl]

4. Are these the people Bernie Ward was talking about Sunday?

The ones that are "urging" their members to pull their kids
out of schools that are tolerant of gays??

As Bernie Ward said, (I'm paraphrasing) "These Christians
are against tolerance."

Excuse me but didn't Jesus preach tolerance???

What a bunch of crazy idiots!! :crazy:

It's going to take years, YEARS, to undo all the damage
these bastards have brought upon our country. This is
assuming we ever get a Dem back in office. With the
voting process so corrupted, I have my doubts.
:(

[Bluebear]

8. That's them alright, n/t

[ailsagirl]

10. What a bunch of psychos

[markus]

20. They don't worship Jesus. They are idolators of the Good Book

They are living in an Old Testament parallel universe.

[TheFarseer]

5. You can add my cousin, unfortunately

He's fairly liberal and not very religious but he's marrying a very devout Baptist girl who thinks bush is God's gift, probably having kids in a few years, moving to the suburbs and buying an SUV. Can't be too long before he converts to the dark side.

[DinahMoeHum]

6. The problem with these folks is: they weren't held under long enough

during their time in the water.

:evilgrin:

[ailsagirl]

22. BWAHAHAHAHAHA

Thanks for the laugh!!
:rofl: :rofl:

[flygal]

26. Oooh - you know where you're going for that one!

You'll be in good company :toast:

[Lars39]

9. From the article....

<snip>number of new member baptisms has declined in each of the past five years.<snip>

(bolding is mine)
<snip>After he was elected president last year, the 62-year-old Welch began preparing for the baptism initiative with a bus tour of the United States and Canada to show "the convention is concerned about being involved in everybody's life."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They're going to keep pushing until we get fed up with it, folks.

[Bluebear]

11. = busybodies

[Lars39]

13. Worse than Mrs.Kravitz ever thought about being, though.

They're not interested in "obeying the laws of the land",
they want to make the laws for us to obey.

[Bluebear]

19. Abner! ABNER!!!

[AndyTiedye]

21. They Are Entirely TOO Concerned With Being Involved in Everbody's Life

They've got no business getting involved in MY life, dammit!

[MisterP]

hail President GodJesus!

[MisterP]

12. dupeykate

[Ian David]

14. Our schools are over-crowded anyway

And we don't have the resources to waste battling over whether or not a gay couple can go to the prom, or if you can have bible study in the cafeteria.

The bible-thumping fundies can take their spawn AND GO!

Good riddance.

Now we can all get on with the serious business of "fancy book learnin'."

[BamaLefty]

15. Baptism Is Beautiful

It was a wonderful and life changing experience for me.

But do they really need the President to adress them? I think not!! :grr: :eyes:

[nonconformist]

16. Cweepy. nt

[David Zephyr]

17. "The only problem with the Baptists is...

they don't keep them under water long enough" --- Molly Ivens.

[roguevalley]

18. They can aim but they will fail. They have been stagnant for YEARS.

Wonder why.

[Meeker Morgan]

23. Hmmm. Bush isn't even a member of their church.

What's up with that? Sudden conversion?

[Radical Activist]

24. I feel sorry for those living in Tennessee.

You're going to get constant harassment all year long. A lot of the south will suffer through that for the next year.

[OneBlueSky]

25. oh, goody . . . a million more Doomsday cultists . . .

just what this country needs . . .