Southern Baptists Avert Showdown

It was like waiting for the storm that never really broke. There were distant rumbles of theological thunder before the opening of the 112th annual sessions of the Southern Baptist Convention in New Orleans’ Rivergate Center. But somehow the dark cloud of division passed over without pouring any great disharmony upon the gathering.

The controversy seemed especially evident during two days of pre-convention meetings. Prospects of a liberal-conservative showdown on several issues and the possibility of an appearance by black militant James Forman were widely discussed and were probably part of the reason for the record registration of nearly 17,000 messengers.

While most messengers were meeting in five major pre-convention conferences, two dissident groups met to discuss issues and to plan strategy for bringing their concerns to the convention floor. The E. Y. Mullins Fellowship, named after a past convention president and former head of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and composed largely of professors and pastors, expressed special concern over the doctrine of biblical authority as presented in a recent book by SBC president W. A. Criswell, Why I Preach That the Bible Is Literally True. The other group, Baptist Students Concerned, who made their first appearance by demonstrating at last year’s convention, voiced concern about a number of social problems. The groups met both jointly and in separate sessions and received considerable attention from the numerous newsmen on hand.

The Mullins group, which claims some 250 members, was especially unhappy with Sunday School Board publicity of Criswell’s book. They felt that the board implied that Criswell’s view, opposed by many in the Mullins group, was the official SBC position. The students, with thirty to sixty attending their meetings, proposed several resolutions (seeking economic aid for black Americans, implementation of the 1968 “Crisis Statement,” Southern Baptist literature reform, sex education in the church, church involvment in local issues, and greater participation in SBC planning processes at all levels by students and minority groups) to be presented to the convention.

Two major addresses delivered on the opening night of the convention set the tone for the sessions to follow. Dr. W. A. Criswell, SBC president and pastor of the 15,117-member First Baptist Church of Dallas, in speaking on the convention theme “Christ in Faith and Work,” pleaded for a balanced ministry of evangelism and social responsibility. He spoke of the Christian faith as a two-edged sword: “One is believing; the other is doing. One is evangelism; the other is ministering.” Criswell scored the New Left and called for firmness in dealing with militants.

Scott L. Tatum of Shreveport, Louisiana, emphasized that the authority of Christ supersedes the autonomy of the churches or the convention. He issued a strong call to social action but affirmed the priority of world evangelism.

The remainder of the convention found the messengers seeking to articulate and implement this balance between evangelism and social action. In addition, there was the ever present issue of biblical authority. The more liberal element emphasized the Baptist doctrine of autonomy and pushed for greater freedom to advocate the “historical-critical” approach to the Scriptures. Conservatives, on the other hand, called for tighter controls upon professors and writers of Training Union and Sunday-school literature, asking that they be required to sign statements affirming their personal belief in “the authority, the doctrinal integrity, and the infallibility of the entire Bible.”

This issue was clouded when the motion calling for tightening of control was displaced by a substitute motion instructing the convention to call to the attention of its agencies a doctrinal statement adopted in 1963 and to urge elected trustees of these agencies to make sure their programs are consistent with it. James L. Sullivan, executive secretary of the Sunday School Board, pointed out that the original motion would be impossible to implement.

Forman didn’t show up in New Orleans, and it’s just as well that he saved himself the trip. In a strongly worded statement the gathering rejected “in total the demands, principles, and methods espoused by the National Black Economic Development Council” and called its claims “outrageous.” Had Forman appeared, the messengers would have had to decide whether to hear him, and odds are that he would not have been heard.

In the same resolution in which they rejected the Black Manifesto, messengers expressed concern for social responsibility and called on individuals, churches, and institutions “to continue to work for the fullest possible freedom and fulfillment of aspirations for human dignity and personal worth for all people.” The resolution called upon all men “to work for racial justice, economic improvement, political emancipation, educational advancement, and Christian understanding among all peoples of the nation and world.” It also reaffirmed last year’s “Crisis in Our Nation” statement, which asserted the convention’s support of equal human and legal rights for all people and its refusal to be a part of racism.

The group rejected a part of the social-concern resolution that urged Southern Baptists to give continuing support to all governmental and social-service agencies working to help the needy. One messenger said the convention could not commit itself to “any hare-brained idea” that the government might come up with.

A statement by the Christian Life Commission condemning extremism on both the left and the right was received by the convention, but messengers refused to take action on specific recommendations based on the report. The strongly worded document condemned all extremism as “dangerous,” “insidious,” and “anti-Christian.”

In routine fashion the messengers approved a $27.1 million operating budget and elected Criswell to a second term as president. Criswell received token opposition from William C. Smith, Jr., a University of Richmond professor who is a leader in the E. Y. Mullins Fellowship; the final tally was 7,482 to 450.

A resolution calling for reaffirmation of a 1940 statement that “those who for reason of religious conviction are opposed to military service should be exempted from forced military conscription” was soundly rejected. This unusual action left considerable confusion as to the present status of the 1940 declaration.

In other resolutions the messengers:

• Noted a need for greater emphasis on family life and sex education in the churches.

• Called upon the convention to provide opportunities for broader participation by young people in all levels of convention decision-making.

• Opposed appointment of a U. S. ambassador to the Vatican and reaffirmed opposition to use of public tax funds for religious functions or institutions.

• Urged government leaders to make every effort to achieve an equitable settlement of the Viet Nam conflict, and expressed support of attempts to secure fair treatment of U. S. prisoners of war in Viet Nam.

• Asked Baptists to study carefully the contemporary application of the First Amendment (a resolution that grew out of a concern to return the Bible to public schools).

• Requested more use of Baptist church educational curriculum materials.

Other motions that passed:

• Called for a thorough study to provide the basis for a change in representation for the SBC.

• Requested mobilization to halt the spread of pornography.

• Expressed the feeling that “Quest” is unsuitable as a name for the Southern Baptists’ training program (an action that will involve removing the name from materials already in process of publication).

The threatening storm of controversy never really broke, but the divisions in the SBC remain. Although some of their measures passed, the “liberals” were generally kept in check. They were not satisfied with the convention’s stand on biblical authority and promised to be back next year to try to move the SBC away from what they believe to be an antiquated view of Scripture.

The conservative “backlash” could not find a way to express itself clearly, but there was an obvious mood of resistance against those who wished to move away from the doctrine of biblical infallibility.

Although the liberals will take another crack at it next year, perhaps Criswell was right when in a press conference he said of the liberal element in the denomination, “There is no doubt that it is very small numerically. Before it gets very large my generation will have to die.”

After Bitter Debates, The Positive Thinker

The Rev. Norman Vincent Peale’s goal for this year: Bring harmony to the Reformed Church in America, which recently elected him as its president. It’s a goal that probably will take more than mere positive thinking, for seldom has a church fought more bitterly in the name of reconciliation than did the delegates to the RCA’s General Synod in New Brunswick, New Jersey, last month.

“This has been the most unusual of many unusual synods,” said the Rev. Raymond R. Van Heukelom in handing over the president’s bell to Peale. “All the tensions seem to have heaped up and come together this year.” He referred to the fact that nearly every session sparked angry debate between Eastern liberals and Midwestern (or Western) conservatives; that delegates often muttered epithets at each other; that before it was over the synod had given serious consideration to a liberal-inspired dissolution of the 385,000-member, 340-year-old church.

Sharpest clashes centered on ecumenism and church unity. First came the final report that union with the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. (Southern) had missed the necessary two-thirds majority (23 RCA classes approved; 22 disapproved) and failed. Delegates, already aware of the result, seemed to sigh in resignation or relief. But the sigh was deep, evoked from bitter feelings.

Hence: an outbreak of intense fighting and parliamentary maneuvering the next day when a committee recommended that the RCA join the Consultation on Church Union (COCU). Opponents argued that such a move would further split a badly divided church; proponents said current divisions resulted from “our unwillingness to try to love those outside our walls.” When the proposal lost (130 to 103), an Eastern pastor drew a gasp by shouting an obscenity, and the losers challenged the vote. Delegates were polled again two days later, and the proposal lost again, this time 133 to 126.

Next, in an extra Saturday-night session, delegates debated RCA membership in the National Council of Churches. The synod voted strongly to remain in the ecumenical body, but only after a long, impassioned plea by the Rev. Marion de Velder, RCA general secretary. “If we withdraw,” he warned his fellow churchmen, “I’ll not have any interest in serving this church any longer.”

Later in the session, after an Eastern minister had called for the church to rescind its widely accepted document on Christian unity “so as to overcome phoniness and hypocrisy,” the Rev. Harold J. Schut, the denomination’s immediate past president, moved that a committee be formed to draft “a plan for the orderly dissolution of the RCA.” The motion, regarded partially as shock technique, evoked the synod’s most heated debate when it came back to the floor on the final night.

“We have here a grave situation; it requires dire action,” said Schut. “We should face the fact of dissolutionment as well as unity to see what it means to live together.” In the end, however, delegates voted to set up a committee (with a $10,000 budget) that will use every means possible to bring reconciliation and then to consider the Schut alternative a year from now if healing does not come.

Social issues also served as irritants. Mildly controversial actions taken included a call for gun-control legislation, a refusal to condemn “all abortion laws,” a proposal to end discrimination in RCA business practices, endorsement of Project Equality, support of anti-poverty programs, a refusal to urge unionization of farm labor, and a call for an end to the war in Viet Nam. More controversial was a decision to oppose draft exemptions for ministerial students and clergymen.

And most controversial of all was the debate over whether the General Synod should take possession of the draft cards of five RCA war-resisters. Supporters of the five said the church would fail to “put its actions where its mouth was” if it refused to become a repository for the boys’ cards. But after two hours of debate and some legal advice that such an act would involve the church in a crime, the synod refused to accept the cards, though it asserted that “the church has a responsibility to share in whatever way it can in the agony which these individual decisions involve.”

Paradoxically, another social issue—the demands of black militant James Forman—proved to be one of the few healing salves of the sessions. Forman, dressed in wrinkled dark-blue trousers and an open-necked powder-blue shirt, won long applause after an opening-night appearance. He demanded a complete list of the RCA fiscal portfolio, aid in developing a black printing plant, and an assurance of good faith in implementing the goals of his Black Manifesto (see May 23 issue, page 29). He was challenged, however, by the Rev. Levin West, a black RCA minister from New Brunswick. Said West: “You are attempting to strike a blow, not at the church, but at the democratic process. You have fooled no one.”

A committee appointed to study the demands said that God had used Forman to show the Church its false pride and its sins against America’s minority groups, but it categorically rejected his “ideology, plans, and tactics.”

At the same time, the committee recommended what was perhaps the most significant racial action of any church this year: establishment of a policy-making black caucus (Black Council for the Program of General Synod) within the RCA. The council would assume all church decision-making power in areas affecting minority groups, working with a $100,000 grant from the General Synod. A black elder called the move “the thing the black man has been looking for for the last 100 years.” The report passed with no dissent and much rejoicing.

In other action, the General Synod:

• Voted, surprisingly without debate, to initiate merger talks with the smaller, conservative Christian Reformed Church, which shuns COCU as well as the National and World Councils of Churches.

• Approved constitutional changes that would allow women to become deacons, elders, and ministers in the male-dominated church. Two-thirds of the classes must approve the move for it to take effect.

• Took note of the fact that giving for benevolences had decreased for the third consecutive year.

Another action expected to aid reconciliation was the election of Peale as president. In his acceptance remarks, he told the delegates that “if the church became a really praying church, we’d rise above all this and fuse to a great flaming, enthusiastic body in Christ.” Dr. Lester J. Kuyper, professor at Western Theological Seminary (Holland, Michigan) and new RCA vice-president, told the final session: “The stance I’d like to take this year is beneath the cross. As I look at those with whom I disagree I say, ‘My good brother, you and I are here before the cross; I don’t say you’re wrong and I’m right, but I see us both as forgiven sinners.’ Then we’ll turn and bow in recognition of one another.”

JAMES HUFFMAN

THE BEST MEDICINE?

One of America’s best-known pastors (Marble Collegiate Church in New York) … A best-selling author (The Power of Positive Thinking) … Friend of a President (Richard M. Nixon) … Prominent editor (Guideposts) … “Poppsychologist.” That’s the Rev. Norman Vincent Peale. And now he has become president of a badly split denomination—the Reformed Church in America.

How does he plan to bridge the church’s chasms?

If his performance at the RCA General Synod offers a clue, the short, mildly stocky, 71-year-old minister will make good use of at least three aspects of his personality: humility, humor, and humanity.

Humility. On accepting the new office he quipped that though he knew some delegates felt uneasy about his election, none felt quite so much so as he. He won enthusiastic response, while presiding one evening, when a delegate rose to dispute the chair and apologized for “being discourteous.” “Don’t worry about that; you can treat the chair just as discourteously as you like,” replied Peale, grinning—and he seemed to mean it.

Humor. Presiding over an evening session, he fractured most of Robert’s rules, sparking what one minister called a “laugh-in tonic” in the process. A delegate called for a point of order and Peale barked, “I’ve already got one over there.” A New Jersey minister could not remember the argument that had brought him to his feet and the chairman replied, “I can only say, ‘Praise the Lord.’ ” The audience burst into laughter over a Peale quip and he immediately scolded: “There’s too much levity in the house.” At another point he noted: “If, after I pass out of this world, I get to a place where I have to raise money all through eternity, I’ll know exactly where I am.”

Humanity. Asked how he hoped to heal the church, Peale told of being assigned to a Methodist charge where the congregation was “divided down the center.” “I’ll do what I did there,” he said. “I’ll just preach love. If we could just Jet love loose in our church it would heal our factions.” At the synod’s closing session be told of an old judge who proposed tearing apart the wedding picture of a couple seeking divorce. “Can you imagine taking a pair of scissors and cutting down through the Reformed Church in America?” he demanded of a rapt audience. “Sure, we have differences; that’s as it should be. So let’s Jet the better elements of our natures take over—and not cut the picture apart.”

Who knows what the combined powers of God’s spirit and positive thinking may accomplish?

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