The Republican Party and The Southern Baptist Convention

[checks-n-balances]

I don't know the date of this article, but it has some INTERESING names in it from recent U.S. political history, and it helps connect the dots of the mess we're in today. It's pretty deplorable to learn that some right-wing politicians helped fundamentalists permanently take over the SBC, so it's more of a chicken-and-egg thing than I thought...

http://www.livingston.net/wilkyjr/link9.htm

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION

...The conservative image of the Republican Party has caused some Christians to consider it the one with the Christian causes. Regardless of what Democrats believe about the environment, women, race, or the economy, many Christians have written them off because of two issues. They consider Democrats unclean because of the national party’s stands on abortion and the homosexual rights movement.

...

{Historians Chandler Davidson of Rice University) claims that the resurgent Republican Party in Texas is symbolized by three key figures in its ranks. The three influential men are: H.L. Hunt, the deceased oil billionaire; J. Evetts Haley, a prominent oilman and rancher who ran for governor in 1956 on the segregationists’ platform; and W.A. Criswell, former pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas. Tracing their influence shows a web of connections with the Republican Party and several strands lead to Texas.

...

Right-wing Republican, Sen. Jesse Helms, has held a recent wide influence in Southern Baptist circles. His aides and friends have been active in the so-called "takeover" of the Southern Baptist national convention by fundamentalists. Helms was honored as "Man of the Year" by the Southern Baptist Public Affairs Committee. Nancy Schaefer, of First Baptist Atlanta and past trustee on the Christian Life Commission, gets into Baptist churches and organizes committees to promote men like Helms and Dan Quayle...

[bobbieinok]

1. when I was in the Bapt Student Union at Rice in the late 50s

there were lots of jokes about Criswell

the students in the group were very liberal theologically and had all sorts of horrendous stories about Criswell and his mega church in Dallas

one of our jokes 'Criswell wants to stand in relationship to the Southern Baptists like he THINKS the pope stands to the Roman Catholic Church'

at that time there was NO doctrinal statement that so bapts were to accept.....in fact the motto was 'no creed but the Bible'.....