Feeling
Strains, Baptist Colleges Cut Church Ties
Posted on 07/22/2006 9:38:34 PM PDT
We recently posted an article about a Baptist Denominational split regarding Gay Pastors and Gay congregations on the West Coast. In this article deep within the bible belt we see the same thing that struck Methodist Liberal Arts Collages in the North east in the early 1970’s collages – As they became hot beds of feminism and leftist ideology – The two questions we ask is what has changed within these institutions that they have now cast of the yolk of their religious affiliation heritage? Would it not be that their faculty and board no longer feel comfortable with their former religious views? And now that these “Baptist” (in name only) Liberal Arts Collages have severed their denominational ties what do they plan to do and where do they plan to go that their former Church would not have allowed then to?
GEORGETOWN, Ky.
— The request seemed simple enough to the Rev.
Hershael W. York, then the president of the Kentucky
Baptist Convention. He asked Georgetown College, a small Baptist liberal arts
institution here, to consider hiring for its religion department someone who
would teach a literal interpretation of the Bible.
But to William
H. Crouch Jr., the president of Georgetown (Liberal
Arts Collage) , (The question of their hiring one person in its “Religion
Department” that would teach the bible as literal truth) it was
among the last straws in a struggle that had involved issues like who could be
on the board of trustees (They either wanted
unsaved wealthy or influential men and women on the board or avowed feminists
humanists atheists or homosexuals) and whether the college encouraged enough freedom of inquiry (Outside of the Christian sphere) to qualify for a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. (coveted secular worldly affiliations)
Dr.
Crouch and his trustees decided it was time to end the college’s 63-year
affiliation with the religious denomination. “From my point of view, it was about
academic freedom,’’ Dr. Crouch said. “I sat for 25 years and watched my
denomination become much more narrow and, in terms of education, much more
interested in indoctrination.’’ (The truth is that
this man and others have been listening to the siren’s song of liberal theology
for the last twenty-five years and tested and probed to try to circumvent the
“Baptist” part of their school -- they
have now only made manifest their change of heart and spirit for the whole
world to see.)
Georgetown
is among a half-dozen colleges and universities whose ties with state Baptist
conventions have been severed in the last four years, part of a broad
realignment in which more than a dozen Southern Baptist universities, including
Wake Forest and Furman, have ended affiliations over the last two decades. Georgetown’s
parting was ultimately amicable. But many have been tense, even bitter.
In Georgia and Missouri, disputes over
who controls the boards of Baptist colleges led to prolonged litigation. In Tennessee, a clash over
whether Belmont University in Nashville could appoint non-Baptists to its board
led the Tennessee Baptist Convention to vote in May to remove the entire board.
Belmont’s trustees are still running the university, and while negotiations are
continuing, the battle for control could end up in court.
“The
future of Baptist higher education has rarely been more fragile,’’ R. Kirby
Godsey, the former president of Mercer University in Macon, Ga., said in a
speech in Atlanta in June. The Georgia Baptist Convention voted last November
to sever ties with Mercer.
The issues vary
from state to state. But many Southern Baptist colleges and their state
conventions have been battling over money, control of boards of trustees,
whether the Bible must be interpreted literally, how evolution is taught, the
propriety of some books for college courses and of some plays for campus
performances and whether cultural and religious diversity should be encouraged.
At the root of
the conflicts is the question of how much the colleges should reflect the views
of their denomination. They are part of the continuing battle among Southern
Baptists for control of their church’s institutions.
More than 20
years ago, theological and cultural conservatives gained control over moderates
in the Southern Baptist
Convention, the denomination’s broadest body, (The
notion that the southern Baptist convention was “liberal” -- moderate is a
cloaked term for liberal and that this denomination was overthrown in the
1980’s by hard line conservatives is a completely amazing charge -- the denomination has been in free fall
for the last few decades. And there is serious talk that the “Independent”
Southern Baptist Convention will cease to exist within the next generation .) representing more than 16 million
worshipers. Similar shifts then occurred in many, but not all, state Baptist
conventions, which have considerable independence.
The struggle
has continued. Last month, the Southern Baptist
Convention elected a president who promised to be “a big-tent conservative”
and defeated candidates supported by the convention’s establishment. (Allowing in liberal believers to bolster their church
numbers and membership with finish them off.)
Southern
Baptist colleges are affiliated with the state conventions, and it does not make sense to many members of the conventions to
provide significant annual subsidies to Baptist colleges that they view as out
of tune with conservative positions (or rather
these schools taking non-biblical and un-scriptural liberal leaning positions) on central religious tenets, including how to
interpret the Bible. “I did feel that Georgetown was not on the same page as
most Kentucky Baptists,’’ said Dr. York, who was president of the Kentucky
Baptist Convention last year.
But
efforts to rein in what many Southern Baptists see as inappropriate departures
from religious orthodoxy have looked to many professors and college
administrators like efforts to limit (their secularist ambitions
and their secularist) academic freedom.
“The convention
itself in its national and state organizations has moved so far to the right
that previous diversity on the faculty and among the
trustees is no longer possible,’’ (Again they are
talking about diversitiy of having avowed feminists, humanists atheists
practicing homosexuals and people of diverse religious back grounds including
eastern philosophies and Islam on their faculty staff and in their boards) said Bill Leonard, dean of the Divinity
School at Wake Forest. “More theological control of
the curriculum and the faculty has been the result.’’ (This double speak here is of theological diversity
–including all religions and philosophies and their being made equal with the
words of God in the Old Testament and of Christ.)
David W. Key, director of Baptist Studies at the
Candler School of Theology at Emory, put it more starkly. “The real underlying issue is that fundamentalism in the Southern
Baptist form is incompatible with higher education,’’ (as well it should be) Professor Key said. “In fundamentalism,
you have all the truths. In education, you’re searching for truths.’’ (The
truth is that in education you reject all the bible has to say and you search
for something human based to worship and serve in the place of God whether
it be the God of science, the Goddess of success.)
The state
conventions do not own the colleges, but in most cases they approve trustees
and provide annual subsidies. Their power over the boards has often been at the
center of contention, with the stakes often involving academic direction.
“We don’t want
to cut our ties,’’ said R. Alton Lacey, president of Missouri Baptist
University, which has been fighting the Missouri Baptist Convention in court
since 2002 over who controls the university’s board. “We just don’t want the
conventions politicizing our boards.’’
The Georgia Baptist
Convention’s severing of ties with Mercer University followed an unsuccessful
effort by the state convention, which did not have the authority to appoint
the university’s trustees, to gain that power. Many
Baptist leaders were also troubled by a forum at Mercer on issues affecting
gay men and lesbians, (We have addressed this war and infiltration in the of all
baptist bible schools and collages by the gay community feminists humanists
atheists and communalists. These things are no accident but part of a conscious
effort to overthrow within our society all known opposition to their lifestlye
and liberal dogma and over the last three decades they appear to be winning
this war.) Dr. Godsey, the university’s former president, said.
Officials at
Georgetown had long been concerned that differences with state Baptists might
become irreconcilable. In 1987, college officials negotiated an agreement with
state Baptist leaders that allowed either side to end the affiliation, with
four years’ notice. Both sides said that they had wanted to continue the
relationship, but that the strains had recently become acute.
Georgetown
asked the Kentucky Baptist Convention two years ago to allow 25 percent of the
college’s trustees to be non-Baptist, but the proposal was rejected. Only about
half of Georgetown’s students are Baptist, and less than half of the alumni are
Baptist, Dr. Crouch, the college’s president, said.
“I
realized that our fund-raising depended on getting non-Baptists on our board,’’ Dr. Crouch
said. (we see in the end that it is all about
money.)
Then, a year
ago, the Kentucky convention turned down a nominee for Georgetown’s board for
the first time. Around the same time, Dr. York asked the college to look for a
religion professor who would teach theologically conservative positions.
“You
ought to have some professor on your faculty who believes Adam and Eve were the
first humans, that they actually existed,’’ Dr. York said.
Dr. Crouch and
Georgetown’s trustees decided it was time to exercise their escape clause. The
college and the convention wanted to avoid the kind of contention becoming
common in neighboring states.
“I think the fear
was that I was going to lead a kind of takeover,’’(They were feeling the threat that Baptist convention might
come and clean house – so to avert that they split from them.) said Dr. York, a professor and associate dean
at the Southern Baptist Theological
Seminary (But this wasn’t in just a small Liberal Arts Collage as where
the article started this was in a Baptist Theological Seminary – that no
longer wanted to teach biblical truth – but have a big tent approach to
all religion and all types of lifestyles to draw from for its potential
Pastors and Teachers) in Louisville. “But I’m only going to fight a battle that
I can win and that I want to win.’’
Kentucky
convention delegates voted overwhelmingly in November to approve a separation;
the group agreed to phase out its $1.4 million annual contribution to
Georgetown over four years, and the college became self-governing.
Dr.
Crouch noted that some Baptist universities that severed ties with state conventions
in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s have become essentially secular. He hopes that
will not happen at Georgetown. (How can it not
backslide the rest of the way like all the others, once you’ve cast aside your
safeguards and opened the floodgates wide open? What does this Dr. Crouch believe he has that these others did
not that will hold and anchor him firmly between the church and the world the
flesh and the devil?)
“We call
ourselves a Christian college grounded in (the
shifting sand of cherry picked) historic Baptist
principles,’’ he said.
Georgetown
continues to pursue serious academic ambitions, like pursuing a chapter of Phi
Beta Kappa, the college honor society. Only 270 colleges and universities (That is a lot) have Phi Beta Kappa chapters, and
there are rigorous standards for new ones. Among the most important
requirements are freedom of inquiry and expression on campus, along with
respect for religious, ethnic and racial diversity.
A Georgetown
requirement that tenured professors be Christian could pose problems with the
honor society. The college must also improve on a number of specific standards,
including increasing the number of books in its library and reducing
professors’ course loads. Phi Beta Kappa considers applications over a three-year
cycle, and Dr. Crouch hopes Georgetown will be ready to reapply in 2009.
“Phi Beta Kappa
is the gold standard,’’ said Rosemary Allen, the Georgetown provost.
Some of the few
students on campus this summer said they supported Georgetown’s decision to become
independent and to improve its academic standing, although they acknowledged
they had not followed events closely.
“It’s good to
go to a college that’s religious, but it doesn’t really matter to me,’’ said
John Sadlon, a sophomore. “What matters to me is getting my education.’’