You know, the Southern Baptist denomination was specifically formed in 1845 to uphold slavery — their whole raison d’etre was to separate themselves from those namby-pamby abolitionists who would later kick their asses in the Civil War. That’s not their only issue, though. They also don’t like those uppity women.
Thousands of Southern Baptists overwhelmingly voted Wednesday to advance a formal ban on women pastors in the nation’s largest Protestant denomination, sending a clear message that men alone should preach to these conservative evangelical congregations.
The amendment would tighten existing restrictions in the Southern Baptist Convention, which already has a faith statement opposing women pastors.
Can you guess what their position on abortion might be? Or on same sex marriage.
Basically, a good rule of thumb for living a moral life is to ask a Southern Baptist their opinion, and then do the exact opposite.
Rename them the Southern Taliban.
A woman joining the Southern Baptists is like a chicken joining the Colonel Sanders restaurant corporation.
At least the Southern Baptists are following the nonavian dinosaurs into extinction.
They’ve been losing members for decades now.
They lost 390,000 members last year.
This loss is happening even though the US population is increasing.
It is a slow process but they are becoming more and more irrelevant.
White Southern Baptists have always been the most consistently racist, pro-slavery, and anti-progress of nearly all the “mainstream” Christian denominations in the USA — and they’re also the loudest and most dominant voice in our religious dialogue, whether or not they represent a majority of US Christians.
Plenty of other “mainstream” denominations are much more progressive and decent than the Southern Baptists, but when was the last time any of them took a full-throated effective public stand against the relentless hate and bigotry of our far-right churches? This says a LOT about the state of Christianity in America, and it’s not flattering at all.
PS @seversky: Perhaps a better name would be Trump Christianity.
@ ^ Raging Bee : Trumpism.
@7 Trumpology
@Raven, I don’t know why “nonavian dinosaurs” always makes me so giddy. (Perhaps its because of a life long love of dinosaurs and the knowledge that they still exist, and I currently have 2 as pets :P ).
Sorry for the derail, back to the regularly scheduled Southern Baptist bashing :D
I watched a fascinating interview with an academic who called the current US form of Christian nationalism “Imperial Christianity”, as in the Roman Empire. It’s very much a political tool more than anything else.
As Christianity warped Judaism and chanegd its rules so Trumpism wars and changes the rules of Xnity -so very, very much for the worst.
@ killyosaur : Dinosaurs rock.
I mean literally they fosils now but also metaphorically the most awesome animals our planet has seen in so many superlative respects. I love ém too. The non -avian ones especially altho’ their avian ones still around, pretty awesome too.
@ 10 ^warps not wars.
Altho’ will probly resultl in wars too.
I guess already has whilst their senile orange idol technically still lives.
I really feel we need another word for Christian. Christian implies they follow the teachings of their Christ and also puts them in the same category as people like Jimmy Carter.
I feel christianist fits better. Small c and ist or ism suffix.
And most of them are National christianist which can be shortened to Nat c’s.
@seversky #1: I’ve always been fond of the name “Yall’iban”
Raging Bee @4,
I dunno what qualifies as both full-throated and effective to you, but for instance, the largest Lutheran, Methodist and Presbyterian church bodies in the US have all ordained women for decades. And they’re pretty loud and proud about it via press releases and whatnot; the United Methodist Church just posted on FB calling out the Southern Baptists for this amendment, and pointed out that it’s currently celebrating 70 years of female clergy.
All three of those churches participate in lots of Pride marches and stuff, too. I think they make their positions pretty clear…but the SBC alone is almost as big as the three of them put together. The US contains nearly twice as many evangelical Protestants as it does mainliners, so evangelicals are gonna dominate the conversation no matter what.
OTOH, the Catholic Church is pretty consistently shitty on these issues; its official positions tend to be well to the right of its actual US membership. (And its membership throughout Western Europe and the Americas, for that matter.) Can’t hold your leaders accountable when you’re facing the dread sorcery of apostolic succession, I guess.
Prax, nice!
Does for me. It walks the walk.
The other mob doesn’t even walk the talk.
Many many branches does Protestantism have, even though it’s only a few centuries old.
#4 Raging Bee. I suspect The LDS just did. But only because they might suspect who was behind the attempt to have them shoved out of the tree house.
Pete Hegseth reclassified the religions recognised by the US military and suddenly the Mormons were not Christian.
In the news: https://www.vox.com/politics/491805/southern-baptist-convention-right-wing-drift-religious-influencers-content-creator-populist-christianity-catholic-protestant
↓ fair use extract ↓
The SBC is previewing what awaits other Christian denominations
While the SBC case is the most obvious and apparent example of a populist right-wing capture of a religious institution, it may not be the only one in the coming years. Similar cases of content creator, influencer, and social-media driven populist reclamations are likely to pop up as two broader trends pick up steam, these researchers and academics told me.
The first is the general decline of membership in institutional and mainline churches: while the SBC has seen a dramatic shrinkage in the last few years, similar dynamics are at play with all the major Christian denominations. At the same time, those who are still joining these churches, either through conversion experiences or by sticking with churches after being raised in these congregations, may have a particularly conservative, traditional, or reactionary bend.
The second is the continued democratization of takes, analysis, and loose apologetics online and in the modern era’s fractured media ecosystem, where institutional, establishment and mainstream voices struggle to compete with new age creators. Just as the advent of mass printing helped Martin Luther and other dissenters challenge the church, the internet is making it easier to locate and organize voices challenging one’s pastor or church leader today. And in many cases, these voices will sound like other popular content on the internet.
“It’s a very Christianized version of an Andrew Tate kind of message and really not just a message, but also the medium,” Perry said. “They’re influencers and they’re trying to build a platform and an audience by saying the most based and outrageous things and the kind of people they’re attracting are these disaffected young men who are angry and very online and Christian enough to say, yes, I want traditional values and this sounds like the right thing.”