POPLAR BLUFF, Mo.—Carla Robinette recalled the March 14 tornado that hit Poplar Bluff, including her home. She said she experienced the event “with a lot of fear.”

“I was laying in my bed, then I heard crashing and thundering, and I just asked the Lord to help me,” she said. “He did, and I thank him every day.”

After the storm, she discovered trees down on the back of her house.

“My back porch is just demolished, fence damaged, just a lot of debris, limbs down,” she said.

Her experience was mirrored by thousands in the area after the EF3 tornado hit the Southeast Missouri town. Several tornadoes carved a trail of destruction in 27 Missouri counties, leaving 12 dead across the state, including one in Poplar Bluff.

Robinette told her story as members of the Texans on Mission Harmony-Pittsburg disaster response team cleared downed limbs and removed debris from her house and yard.

Watching the team’s efforts, she responded: “You don’t know what it means (to me). It means a whole lot. It means gratitude. It means appreciation.

“And I just thank the Lord that y’all are Texans on Mission, and that y’all are able to help do this sort of work.”

She described team members as “very nice, very polite, very friendly and very gung-ho to do their work. They love the Lord, and I appreciate that.”

Harmony-Pittsburg Unit Leader Bruce Slaven described the damage in Robinette’s neighborhood: “If you walk around this block, you’ll see a number of homes that have been damaged from the tornado, and you’ll see Texans on Mission groups from all over helping these people here in Poplar Bluff.

“Today, we’re going to be taking some limbs off this house. We’re going to be cutting them up and moving them out the front so the city can pick them up. And hopefully before the end of the day, these people will look like they just didn’t have any damage at all.

“But our first duty in this job is to tell others about Christ,” Slaven said. “These people, a lot of them, they’re sitting there—they’re hopeless. They need help, and that’s why we’re here: To help them and then to give them the hope that they can carry on with their lives.”

Steve Gilbert, who served as a chaplain with the Texans on Mission Collin County response team, agreed.

“My role as a chaplain is not as much to take care of our chainsaw team members, which I also do, and looking out for their safety, but my heart is really dedicated to helping and ministering to the homeowners—those that were affected in many ways by the tragedies that have happened.”

“With one homeowner,” Gilbert said, “I am sensing that there actually is a spiritual need there, so I always try to get inside their heart a little bit during the time I can minister (to them).

“We always present a Bible that everybody (on the team) has signed, and I usually leave a Scripture with them, and we give that as a personal presentation, just helping them understand that we do not do this for any compensation other than ministering to them and their needs,” Gilbert said.

“And we know we are at any given place on any given day because that is where God wanted us to be. That speaks to everybody’s heart, whether they are a believer or not.”

‘Phenomenal damage’

The recovery effort spans the length of the city, according to a map of the tornado’s path. Wendell Romans, Texans on Mission’s state chainsaw coordinator, called the scale of the damage and response “a huge deployment for Texans on Mission.”

“The devastation that we’re finding is so widespread that we’re going to need probably every chainsaw team we have, and we’re talking about bringing in some outside teams also. But the damage is just phenomenal.”

Romans said leadership and assessment teams were deployed to Poplar Bluff within hours of the storm. “We were contacted by Missouri (Baptist Convention) Disaster Relief to come help them with the chainsaw relief. We responded just as soon as we could and were here within probably eight hours after they contacted us.

“It was a pretty quick response because we know what it’s like to go through something like this,” he added.

“We brought everything we possibly could to this. It’s like a little city when we move in. We have our own chainsaw teams, of course, plus we have our own shower and laundry.

We have our own cooking team. We have our own electrical team. We’re pretty self-sufficient, and we have to be that way in order to do what we do. Because when a disaster hits, you never know what you’re going to get into.”

The team, which numbered more than 60 Texans on Mission by the second week, set up its response operations at Temple Baptist Church. Church member Steve Davis, who also has served as a city councilman and mayor of Poplar Bluff, shared his appreciation for the team’s response … as well as for the removal of five of his own giant trees lost in the storm.

“We weren’t injured or anything, and our house was not damaged that much either,” he said. “And praise the Lord, you guys got up here quickly to help this area, and that’s a blessing. You’re doing a wonderful job. We’re glad to have you here and we thank you, Texans on Mission.”

Editor’s Note: This story was written in the second of an estimated four weeks of response by Texans on Mission. By April 3, Texans on Mission volunteers had provided more than 814 volunteer days of work, conducted 85 chainsaw jobs and fed volunteers 1,815 meals.

The 19 million people already displaced by violence and persecution in Myanmar have been joined by another 8 million internally displaced individuals since a deadly earthquake struck on March 28, Baptist World Aid Director Marsha Scipio said.

Of the 25 Baptist churches in cities most affected by the earthquake, 15 church buildings were destroyed and the remaining 10 received significant damage, Scipio said.

Many of those churches housed people who already were displaced, Scipio added. More than 100 people sought refuge in the sanctuary of Kachin Baptist Church in Mandalay until its top floor collapsed, she said. Those individuals now are sleeping on the ground outside the church building.

She quoted the pastor of Karen Baptist Church in Sagaing, one of the churches destroyed by the earthquake, as saying: “We urgently need drinking water and electricity. Our water sources are damaged and contaminated. We have no electricity. We didn’t have light and power to charge our phones to communicate with one another.”

The earthquake killed more than 3,000 people—including at least one Baptist pastor—and injured at least 4,500 others, she noted.

Suffering compounded

Scipio presented an update on the Baptist response in Myanmar and other areas in need as part of a Baptist World Alliance Global Impact Church online briefing April 3.

The earthquake—and the 11 military airstrikes on vulnerable areas that followed, until the government agreed to a temporary ceasefire on April 2—compounded suffering in a country already in dire straits, she reported.

The “severe and swift reduction” in U.S. Agency for International Development funding already was creating challenges among BWA partners, such as a Baptist convention that ministers at a camp on the Myanmar/Thailand border housing more than 30,000 refugees, Scipio said.

“Baptist World Aid has received over $250,000 in requests from our Baptist partners working along the border and inside Myanmar, for everything from food supplies to solar panels to provide power to water pumps to bring clean water into the camps,” she said.

Identifying priority needs

Baptists within the country are responding to their neighbors in need, Scipio said.

Churches in the Myanmar Baptist Convention collected an offering in response and has a disaster relief committee assessing needs. The Kachin Baptist Convention has delivered food and provided emergency medical assistance.

In consultation with Baptists in Myanmar, Baptist World Aid and its global partners identified emergency food distribution and temporary shelter as priority needs.

Specifically, Baptist World Aid hopes to provide $625,000 to supply emergency food kits Baptists can distribute to families at 25 church-based distribution centers and $465,000 for temporary shelter packages with blankets, mats, mosquito nets and cooking utensils for 5,000 families, Scipio said.

Hungarian Baptist Aid will send two team members to Myanmar to help guide the disaster response, she added.

Scipio also reported:

—In the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, 1.2 million people have been displaced since the beginning of the year. Many of the Congolese Baptist churches have been “on the front lines,” offering shelter and meals to displaced people and serving victims of violence, she said.

Last month, Baptist World Aid sent $10,000 to Baptists in the DRC for food distribution and—with the help of another Baptist partner—sent another $30,000 last week, Scipio said. However, she added, another $33,000 still is needed to continue serving for the next month.

—In South Sudan—which recently experienced an upsurge of displaced people—USAID funding cuts are expected to affect 7.9 million people.

As NGOs that previously received aid from the United States have to lay off local workers, thousands of people in South Sudan will be left without jobs, Scipio said.

Last month, the Baptist World Alliance surveyed its global partner organizations to discover the anticipated impact of USAID cuts.

Key findings included:

• Tens of thousands of people are affected.
• Funding cuts mean the cessation of critical aid to internally displaced people and refugees.
• Partner groups are experiencing job losses and staff dismissals.
• Vulnerable people lose access to essential services, including health care, sanitation and clean water supplies.
• A resurgence of diseases and increased mortality rates are expected.
• Children, youth, the elderly and people with disabilities grow increasingly vulnerable.
• Organizations are struggling to maintain operations and are forced to reduce the scope and scale of their programs.

Both Scipio and BWA General Secretary Elijah Brown encouraged Baptists globally to “Stand in the Gap” to meet needs at a time of “rapid deceleration of government-supported humanitarian assistance” around the world.

Churches cannot replace all the funds that have been cut, but Baptists “cannot sit on the sidelines” when people are suffering, Brown said.

As part of the Stand in the Gap emphasis, Brown and Scipio urged Baptist churches to take an offering to help Baptists globally respond to people in need, either on the fifth Sunday of an upcoming month or another appropriate time.

DALLAS (BP)—Leaders of 13 Southern Baptist ethnic groups approved a joint statement on immigration seeking religious liberty protections, compassion without demonization and enforcement options including fines or other penalties in lieu of deportation.

Signers of the statement said they share the “federal government’s desire to protect citizens, promote legal immigration and refugee policies, and robustly safeguard the country’s borders.”

However, “enforcement must be accompanied with compassion that doesn’t demonize those fleeing oppression, violence, and persecution,” the statement reads.

Bruno Molina, executive director of the National Hispanic Baptist Network and a signatory, provided the statement to Baptist Press. Haitian, Hispanic, African American, Chinese, Filipino, Nigerian, Liberian, Ghanaian, Korean, Burmese, Thai and Vietnamese leaders signed the statement, Molina said.

Among the ethnic leaders who signed the statement is Jesse Rincones, executive director of Convención Bautista Hispana de Texas.

Victor Chayasirisobhon, another signatory and director of the Southern Baptist Convention Asian Collective representing all Asian fellowships in the SBC, said all groups in the collective approved the statement individually and collectively.

Sixteen leaders representing about 10,900 churches signed the statement on behalf of their groups amid immigration changes that leaders have said will heavily impact Southern Baptist Haitian and Hispanic congregations. The changes include orders that end humanitarian parole for 532,000 Haitians, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and Cubans April 24 and end Temporary Protected Status for an estimated 1.1 million others in August.

A federal judge on March 31 blocked an order that would have forced 350,000 Venezuelans to leave April 7.

Fear rising ‘among both the guilty and the innocent’

“Threats of mass deportation by the Trump administration and its lack of assurance to churches that ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents will not enter churches to carry out immigration enforcement duties has caused fear to rise among both the guilty and the innocent,” ethnic leaders wrote.

Attendance has dropped significantly, leaders said, threatening religious liberty and immigrants’ access to spiritual care in their local churches.

“While we reject and oppose criminal activity or harboring criminals, all people should have the freedom to receive spiritual care from churches within a church building in America,” the statement reads.

Ethnic leaders urged Southern Baptists “to stand firm for religious liberty and speak on behalf of the immigrant and refugee.”

“We ask that consideration be given to their paying a fine and/or other penalty in lieu of deportation,” the statement reads.

Call for advocacy and prayer

It encourages churches to advocate to government leaders for immigrants forced to return to countries from which they fled civil unrest, murder, rape, religious and political persecution, gang violence, food insecurity and other ills.

“We call on our Southern Baptist brothers and sisters to pray for the Trump administration,” ethnic leaders wrote.

“Please ask God to grant wisdom as they deal with this important and complex issue that will determine the course for many who have already experienced great atrocities in their native country, and whose deportations will cause their American-born family members who reunite with them in a foreign country to experience the same dire conditions.”

Brent Leatherwood, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, thanked the leaders for the statement.

“I am grateful these pastors and leaders have put into words the experiences that so many of our fellow Southern Baptist brothers and sisters are living through right now. The administration’s efforts to secure America’s borders and cut illegal entry into our nation represents a serious attempt to restore order for a system that, for decades, has been overwhelmed,” Leatherwood told Baptist Press.

“Moreover, many of these moves are consistent with elements of a comprehensive approach to border security and immigration reform long called for by the Southern Baptist Convention.

“Yet, as these pastors have indicated, some of these actions and public statements are raising alarm and fear among those who are here legally.”

Leatherwood referenced a statement Trump made in his first presidential term, in 2019, saying that Trump “has personally and publicly stated he wants people to come to America ‘in the largest numbers ever,’ but to do so through legal means.”

‘Care for the vulnerable with compassion’

“We agree with that objective,” Leatherwood said of the ERLC. “Fostering an environment that creates uncertainty in those who are permitted to be here is at odds with that goal.

“Given that, as I have said previously, we’d ask the administration to provide more clarity in this area, so that our pastors, churches and compassion ministries will be free to minister and proclaim the Good News of Christ’s life, death and resurrection to all.”

Keny Felix, president of the SBC National Haitian Fellowship, said in addition to the top ethnic leaders who signed the statement, several pastors affirmed it.

“As leaders within the SBC, we believe we must work collaboratively in support of our brothers, sisters and vulnerable families. It’s not just advocacy. It’s fulfilling our biblical mandate,” Felix told Baptist Press.

“To care for the most vulnerable with compassion is at the heart of God’s redemption story and also makes for strong and healthy communities.”

Steve Bezner to Baylor University’s Truett Theological Seminary as professor of pastoral ministry and theology, from Houston Northwest Baptist Church in Houston where he was senior pastor.

Andrew Brennan to First Baptist Church in Bishop as bivocational pastor.

David Foster Jr. to Texas Baptists as director of Millennial/Gen Z pastors’ network, the Pastor’s Common. He will maintain his position as groups and connections pastor at Shiloh Terrace Baptist Church in Dallas.

Wade Gates to First Baptist Church in Thorp Springs as pastor, from Granbury Baptist Church in Granbury where he served as mentoring pastor.

Josh Summerlin to Northside Baptist Church in Victoria as director of children’s ministries.

Texas Monthly recently released its annual college guide, including profiles on BGCT-related colleges, which at first glance seems to paint a troubling picture in a few of the highlighted categories.

College guides such as Texas Monthly’s are intended to help parents assess which college best suits their soon-to-graduate child. How does their information support an informed decision?

Specifically, how can Texas Baptist parents and students interpret data on Baptist General Convention of Texas-related colleges included in some of these guides to make informed decisions about the undergraduate education offered at BGCT-related universities?

Context is key

Context is key in interpreting such statistics and is necessary for college guides to provide the value to which they aim, according to several BGCT-related colleges profiled in Texas Monthly’s report.

For instance, Texas Monthly’s guide reported Wayland Baptist University has a four-year graduation rate of 9 percent.

Wayland President Donna Hedgepath said in an email: “The data referenced comes from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), which only accounts for first-time, full-time students with no prior college experience.”

While she said the university could not dispute the graduation rate reported by Texas Monthly, Hedgepath pointed out Wayland “serves a diverse range of students, including graduate students, those at external campuses, military personnel, and online learners. When considering all students, Wayland’s graduation rate is significantly higher.”

Cindy Marlow McClenagan, Wayland’s vice president of academic affairs, noted the undergraduate enrollment numbers cited in the report also bear scrutiny. She said for fall 2024, Wayland-Plainview’s full-time enrollment was 707 undergraduate students—including both first-time, full-time students and transfer students.

Additionally, 204 graduate students were associated with Wayland-Plainview in fall 2024, McClenagan noted.

In addition to Plainview, Wayland has campuses in Lubbock, San Antonio and Hawaii. To arrive near the 2,090 enrollment the college report cited for Wayland, all of the university’s combined campus enrollments for undergraduate and graduate students would have to be tallied. That still only brings enrollment up to within about 400 of the number provided by Texas Monthly, she explained.

Improving student success

While Wayland representatives indicated understanding the numbers requires better context, they also were clear on Wayland’s commitment to improve student success.

McClenagan said Wayland is focused on meeting student need through several key programs, including its Summer Bridge program and Title V grant, and by moving to a new form of faculty collaboration, Pioneer Pulse. The platform allows faculty to communicate student needs quickly, as soon as they learn of them, to other faculty who need the information. Better communication among faculty leads to more efficient, effective and holistic interventions, she explained.

Wendy McNeeley, assistant vice president for student success at Howard Payne University—whose four-year graduation rate was reported to be 25 percent—explained some of the ways the university is working to meet student needs and improve outcomes.

The Center for Student Success at HPU “was started as a part of our strategic plan to impact the student experience,” McNeely said.

“As we work to impact the academic needs of students as they begin their studies at HPU, one of our goals is to positively impact retention,” which she anticipates will lead to the university seeing a direct impact on graduation rates.

“We have been tracking the use by students of the center’s tutoring and coaching resources. Prior to pulling these resources together and emphasizing them and making them more visible, we recorded 89 total tutoring sessions for the 2022-2023 academic year,” she explained.

“In 2023-2024, the year we opened the center, we increased these contacts to 191 for the academic year, and this past fall semester, that number increased again to 251 contacts, with three months in the academic year remaining.”

McNeely noted: “We are pleased to see our students are using the resources more consistently. Our coaching program began in fall 2024 and is beginning to gain steam as students recognize that there are dedicated staff who want to assist them in being successful students.”

Understanding student populations

Understanding the students served by the universities profiled by Texas Monthly also gives context to the statistics, the universities who spoke with Baptist Standard agreed.

Gabriel Cortés, Hispanic education director for Texas Baptists, notes Texas’ Hispanic population reached 12 million in 2022, becoming the state’s largest demographic group (40.2 percent).

He said recent census estimates showed “49.3 percent of Texans under 18 are Hispanic, [yet] only 26 percent of Hispanics over 25 have an associate’s degree or higher.”

In creating Cortés’ position, Texas Baptists demonstrated increasing Hispanic education is a priority. Several BGCT-related universities—including Howard Payne, Houston Christian and Wayland—already meet the threshold of a 25 percent Hispanic student population to qualify as Hispanic-serving institutions, and the other schools are not far off.

Cortés educates Texas Baptists about the anticipated enrollment cliff, when the “U.S. will hit a peak of around 3.5 million high school graduates sometime near 2025.

“After that, the (traditional) college-age population is expected to shrink across the next 5 to 10 years by as much as 15 percent.”

He said Forbes reported in December 2024, Hispanic students and multiracial students are the only two demographic categories projected to increase.

And in January, NPR reported “in places where the number of high school graduates remains stable or increases, it will be largely because of one group: Hispanic students,” Cortés explained.

¡Excelencia in Education!, a Washington D.C.-based network dedicated to “accelerat(ing) Latino student success in higher education,” reports four-year graduation rates for Hispanic students in Texas across all four-year institutions is 48 percent, while white students’ four-year graduation rate in Texas is 58 percent.

“Our student retention and graduation rates compare favorably with other minority-serving institutions nationwide, especially given the unique challenges that students often face who struggle to continue due to financial difficulties,” noted Samantha Bottoms, dean of student success at Houston Christian University. HCU’s four-year graduation rates were reported as 38 percent.

Changes that lead to improvements

Among BGCT-related schools in the report, Baylor University’s four-year graduation rates were notably high among BGCT-related colleges at 70 percent.

J. Wesley Null, vice provost for undergraduate education and academic affairs at Baylor University, explained in his 14 years at Baylor, the university has made improving graduation rates a priority.

As a result, Baylor has seen rates for first-year, no-prior-college students’ four-year graduation improve from 54 percent to about 74 percent for the 2021 incoming class who will be graduating this May.

During Null’s tenure, Baylor also has seen a 10 percent jump in fall-to-fall retention for first-time freshman, from 81 percent to 91 percent with 2024 incoming freshmen.

Perhaps the most consequential change Baylor made in the last decade to see improvements in these numbers, Null said, was revising the core curriculum. The core was reduced in 2019 from between 75 and 80 hours to 50 hours now, cutting out about two semesters’ worth of coursework.

He said there were a lot of reasons to reduce the core, but prior to 2019, the last time Baylor had reduced its core was during World War II.

Additionally, Baylor has created supports for special student populations—such as first-generation college students, veterans, or high-financial-need Pell-Grant-eligible students—to better support their needs and increase retention.

The Baylor Benefits Scholarship—instituted by the board of regents—for example, covers 100 percent of tuition and fees for students whose families make $50,000 or less, Null said. Of these scholarship recipients, 99.4 percent were retained from fall 2024 to spring 2025.

The programs Baylor has implemented to meet the needs of students who aren’t doing as well are making a significant difference, Null explained.

“Scholarship based on need is a powerful tool, at these private institutions, in particular,” Null noted, when considering which among the changes Baylor has made might be strategies transferable to other BGCT-related universities.

Other BGCT-related universities with whom Baptist Standard spoke already have identified these areas as strategic and are making strides toward them.

Editor’s note: Corrections were made after publication in paragraphs eight and twelve to correct a first name and the name of the communication platform to Pioneer Pulse.

DALLAS—Lead elements of Texans on Mission disaster relief departed Dallas on April 1 to coordinate flood relief in the Rio Grande Valley after about 20 inches of rain in the region.

The disaster relief ministry is seeking more volunteers, because many volunteers are deployed elsewhere, and Texans on Mission has set up an online signup for those who would like to serve.

“With teams already serving after tornadoes in Missouri and wildfires in Oklahoma, there is a significant need” for more volunteers, said David Wells, Texans on Mission director of disaster relief.

The region in the southernmost part of Texas “received the equivalent of half a year’s rainfall in 48 hours,” Wells said.

Incident management, assessor and shower/laundry teams “deployed Tuesday morning to set the stage for flood recovery work near Weslaco and Harlingen.”

Texans on Mission will be “forming teams on site,” and they will begin serving next week, he said.

“If you have flood recovery training, we need you on the field,” Wells said. But Texans on Mission also is welcoming those who “have never been trained in flood recovery.”

Texans on Mission will teach volunteers what they need to know, and experienced volunteers will “walk alongside” those who are new.

Wells also encouraged people to gather groups of friends or others at their churches to serve.

To serve, volunteers must register at TexansOnMission.org/serve.

Volunteers can complete disaster relief orientation online in about 15 minutes to help prepare. Register here: TexansOnMission.org/disaster-relief-orientation-registration.

NASHVILLE (RNS)—A federal judge ruled against former Southern Baptist Convention President Johnny Hunt on March 31, rejecting his claims of defamation against Guidepost Solutions and nearly all the former megachurch pastor’s claims against the Southern Baptist Convention and its Executive Committee.

Judge William Campbell of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee issued an order granting summary judgment in the case, with a memorandum detailing the judge’s decision forthcoming.

“We are grateful for this decision and the forward progress in our legal process,” said Jeff Iorg, SBC Executive Committee president.

Hunt had sued Guidepost, an investigative firm, and SBC leaders for defamation and other damages after Guidepost published allegations of sexual assault against Hunt in a May 2022 report on an investigation into how SBC leaders had dealt with sexual abuse.

At issue was a 2010 incident in which Hunt allegedly kissed and fondled another pastor’s wife. Hunt, who had kept the incident secret for years, at first denied it occurred and then claimed it was consensual.

In their court filings, Hunt’s lawyers claimed Guidepost had ruined his reputation and claimed the pastor’s sins were no one else’s business.

Hunt, the former pastor of First Baptist Church in Woodstock, Ga., and a former vice president of the SBC’s North American Mission Board, claimed Guidepost and the SBC had cost him millions, and he sought more than $75 million in damages.

All counts of defamation, emotional distress and the public disclosure of embarrassing private facts were dismissed against the SBC and the Executive Committee.

However, one claim alleging a tweet about Hunt from Texas Baptist Pastor Bart Barber, who was SBC president from 2022 to 2024, was defamatory has not been dismissed.

Hunt served from 2008 to 2010 as SBC president and remained a popular speaker before the Guidepost report. Court-ordered mediation on the case failed last fall. A trial had been scheduled this summer.

The Executive Committee has spent more than $3.1 million in legal fees related to the Hunt lawsuit and a second lawsuit related to the Guidepost report.

Last month, the SBC’s Executive Committee decided to ask the denomination for an additional $3 million for the upcoming year to cover its legal bills, including those for the Hunt suit.

In his lawsuit, Hunt alleged Guidepost Solutions acted negligently during its investigation, ignoring evidence that would have cast doubt on the allegations against him, and that Guidepost and the SBC intentionally sought to paint him in the worst light possible. Hunt also said the woman who accused him of sexual assault, known in court filings as Jane Doe, was an unreliable witness.

But Campbell ruled Hunt had provided no evidence to support his claims, while Guidepost provided substantial evidence of the thoroughness of the investigation into the allegations.

Hunt’s attorneys did not respond to a request for comment. Guidepost Solutions declined to comment.

In a 74-page opinion, Judge Campbell examines Hunt’s claims at length and rejects them. He points out that investigators spoke with a counselor who had talked with Hunt about the alleged assault and three Southern Baptist pastors who had heard of the alleged sexual encounter as well to corroborate the allegations.

The judge also recounts Hunt first denied the incident had occurred or that he had kissed or fondled Doe, made no claims that Doe was unreliable at that time or that Doe had instigated the incident. Guidepost also gave Hunt an additional two days to provide any initial information to Guidepost.

Campbell ruled Guidepost could not have ignored or withheld any evidence about the encounter because Hunt had “squandered” the opportunity to provide evidence that countered Doe’s allegation. Hunt did not acknowledge the incident until after the Guidepost report was published and has since claimed the encounter was consensual and that Doe was unreliable. His arguments did not sway Campbell.

“Hunt ignores that much of Doe’s information was independently verified by other sources whose credibility he does not challenge,” Campbell wrote

Campbell also rejected the claim the Guidepost report had caused negligent emotional distress to Hunt.

“The Court has already determined that the record does not contain evidence that any defendant acted with negligence in connection with the Report,” Campbell wrote. “Moreover, Hunt has failed to point to evidence of mental and emotional injuries as a result of any of the statements which would disable a reasonable, normally constituted person from adequately coping with the alleged mental stress.”

Campbell also wrote that one of Hunt’s claims—the assertion former SBC president Bart Barber had defamed him in a tweet—could not be decided at this time. It was unclear, he wrote, whether or not Hunt could be considered a public figure at the time or whether or not Barber tweeted in his official capacity as SBC president or not.

“This determination is subject to reconsideration upon further development of evidence and argument concerning Hunt’s status at the time of the Tweet,” the judge wrote. “Hunt has presented evidence from which a jury could conclude that Barber’s Tweet was in his capacity as SBC president. Therefore, judgment cannot be granted in favor of the SBC or the Executive Committee on this basis.”

After Campbell’s ruling, Alisa Womack, who had been known as “Jane Doe,” issued a statement, saying the ruling helped lighten the burden she had carried for years.

“Justice peeked out from behind the dark clouds, shining light on my path and propelling me forward into freedom,” she told RNS in a statement.

Womack also detailed some of her experience of being interviewed for the Guidepost investigation and then being drawn into the Hunt lawsuit, including being subpoenaed and deposed.

“In 2022, I recounted painful details I would have preferred to forget to investigators with Guidepost Solutions. I also described the years of emotional, mental and spiritual weight in the journey toward healing. Silence gave way to voice, which finally had a true hearing,” she said. “In the year following the release of the report, I was dragged into a lawsuit, not of my own making or desire.”

Womack also said she tried to protect her family’s privacy during the legal process. And she said that process has made her understand why few abuse survivors come forward.

“The risk is obvious, the chance for justice obscure,” she said.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Eight paragraphs were added April 2, one day after the article originally was posted, after RNS distributed an updated version of the article that included the quotes from the judge’s legal opinion. Subsequently, another six paragraphs were added to include the statement from Alisa Womack, previously referred to in the lawsuit as “Jane Doe.”

The humanitarian crisis caused by the earthquake in Myanmar that claimed at least 2,700 lives—and probably thousands more—is being compounded by military airstrikes on vulnerable, hard-hit communities populated by predominantly Christian Karen and Kachin ethnic groups.

The ruling military junta is “taking advantage” of the chaos and suffering caused by the natural disaster to continue its persecution of religious and ethnic minorities, said Tera Kouba, minister of international/Asian ministries at First Baptist Church in San Antonio.

Christian Solidarity Worldwide and other sources reported the military has increased airstrikes in civilian areas, including Kachin and Karen communities near the epicenter of the earthquake.

Kouba confirmed that information based on firsthand reports from trusted sources “on the ground” in Myanmar, also known as Burma. She grew up in Burma, where her father served five decades as a Karen pastor and Baptist denominational leader.

“The day the earthquake happened, they dropped bombs,” Kouba said. “Then on Sunday (March 30), it happened again.”

Tom Andrews, Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar for the United Nations, told the BBC it was “nothing short of incredible” that the Burmese military continued to “drop bombs when you are trying to rescue people” after an earthquake.

“Anyone who has influence on the military needs to step up the pressure and make it very clear that this is not acceptable,” Andrews told the BBC. “I’m calling on the junta to just stop—stop any of its military operations.”

CSW Founder Mervyn Thomas echoed that call.

“The international community must demand that Myanmar’s military State Administrative Council cease its airstrikes against civilians immediately,” Thomas said.

“It is vital to support relief and recovery efforts in Myanmar and to ensure that humanitarian assistance reaches all affected communities equitably.

“No effort must be spared to ensure that the rights and dignity of every community, regardless of faith, are upheld during this critical time, and the international community must also press the military regime to ensure that the systemic inequities that leave minority communities especially vulnerable are addressed.”

Attacks make intolerable situation worse

The attacks by the military made worse what already is an intolerable situation in much of Myanmar after the earthquake, Kouba noted.

Among others, she spoke with the director of the YMCA in Mandalay, where she worked 10 years, and with her sister, a minister who teaches at a Bible school in Mandalay.

While her sister reported being hit by some falling debris after a water tank on her roof broke, her house was declared structurally sound, and she was able to continue living there.

“Next door, her neighbor’s house is not in good condition at all,” she said.

Neither is the facility of the Mandalay Karen Baptist Church, where her father was longtime pastor. The two-story building “collapsed,” she said.

Other houses of worship also were destroyed or severely damaged by the earthquake. CSW reported St. Michael’s Catholic Parish in Mandalay and St. Joseph’s Cathedral in Taunggyi sustained significant damage.

The military’s State Administrative Council stated more than 600 Buddhist monasteries and close to 300 pagodas were affected by the earthquake.

However, CSW noted, the government failed to report 50 mosques also were damaged, including some that collapsed during Friday prayers, killing many worshippers. In Sagaing, more than 200 Muslims reportedly were killed when three of the city’s five mosques were destroyed.

“The Christian community is helping and supporting [individuals and families affected by the earthquake] as much as they can,” Kouba said.

The people in the region desperately need food, water, shelter and mosquito nets, she said. And in the weeks and months ahead, they will need trauma counseling.

“I want to go back to help,” she said.

Merritt Johnston, director of communications and media for the Baptist World Alliance, wrote in an April 1 email: “BWAid Director Marsha Scipio facilitated a global response call this morning with more than 50 leaders across Baptist aid organizations within the Baptist Forum for Aid and Development, Asia Pacific Baptist Federation, Asia Baptist Women’s Union and Myanmar convention leadership.”

BWA already had included Myanmar as one of the focus areas in its Stand in the Gap initiative, a call for Baptists globally to give and pray for suffering people at a time when humanitarian aid is being cut.

Johnston said BWA plans to compile information from the global response call and provide an “update to the global family, hopefully within the next 48 hours.”

Master of Fine Arts students from Houston Christian University collaborated with Houston muralists Bobby and Brenda Ramos to paint a new mural at the Astros Hall of Fame at Daikin Park. The work of HCU art students Hailey Harvey, Chloe Hudspeth, Lyndie Swanson and Delaney McRitchie Yohe and Professor Tiffany Bergeron, chair of HCU’s Department of Visual Arts, was unveiled on March 27, opening day of the Major League Baseball season. “This was a wonderful experience for our graduate students and such a special and memorable celebration, honoring the anniversary of the ballpark’s 25th year,” Bergeron said. In addition to a significant public exhibition of their own talents honed at HCU, these MFA Studio Art majors gained valuable techniques from the professional muralists through the design and production of the mural. “We learned so much about how to tackle a group mural of this scope, by learning what our strengths were, communicating through our processes, and being flexible with all the circumstances we were given—we truly learned how to work as one team,” Harvey reflected. The work of the HCU team and the mural’s reveal were covered in a news segment by the Houston NBC affiliate, KPRC.

From serving pancakes and driving vans on South Padre Island to touring the Stock Exchange in the heart of New York City, more than 150 Dallas Baptist University students were hard at work learning and serving across America during spring break. Sixteen students traveled to learn about leadership through the lives of the nation’s Founding Fathers in and around Washington, D.C. They visited monuments, connected with DBU alums and friends in D.C., and venturedto Colonial Williamsburg, Va. Twenty-two students journeyed to New York City to study finance, management and kinesiology. Students toured the New York Stock Exchange, talked with representatives at JP Morgan and visitedMadison Square Garden, Citi Field Stadium and Rockefeller Center. Each year, DBU partners with Swerve Church in Bushwick, Brooklyn, to serve alongside and learn from North American Mission Board church planters Danny and Melissa Torres. Students ministered to the Bushwick community, gained understanding of the transient, diverse community in Brooklyn, fostered relationships with Swerve Church leadership and members, and deepened their knowledge of urban church planting. Students painted a low-income housing unit, organized school supplies for a local elementary school, and distributed church invitations. They also engaged in meaningful conversations with residents, served pancakes and coffee outside the church, and hosted a community gathering for children and families. Other students experienced the integration of faith and learning on the Civil Rights Trip. These students at the undergraduate, graduate and doctoral level journeyed through the South (Little Rock, Ark.; Memphis, Tenn.; Birmingham, Ala.; Montgomery, Ala.; Jackson, Miss.) to study the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. Stops included the Rosa Parks Museum, the Civil Rights Memorial Museum and historic Tuskegee University. Students also visited the home of Booker T. Washington and the Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site. The DBU chapel worship team journeyed to Westcliffe, Colo., for their annual songwriting retreat. And, nearly 60 DBU students and staff members participated in Beach Reach on South Padre Island, with the Baptist Student Ministry this year.

The University of Mary Hardin-Baylor announced the development of a new anesthesiologist assistant academic program, launching in collaboration with Baylor Scott & White Health in 2026. The program will allow students to earn a Master of Science in Anesthesiology degree. Anesthesiologist assistants work under the direction of licensed anesthesiologists as part of the anesthesia care team to design and implement anesthesia care plans. UMHB will be the site of only the second anesthesiologist assistant program in Texas, and students will receive training at both UMHB and Baylor Scott & White Health facilities, enhancing educational offerings for students and building the pipeline of the healthcare workforce. UMHB’s Master of Science in Anesthesiology will be a 28-month program that hopes to admit its first cohort of 25 students in the fall of 2026. This academic program is a recent addition to the many health profession degrees offered within the university’s Mayborn College of Health Sciences. The college is comprised of three schools with a unified purpose of educating students in a rigorous academic setting. The Mayborn College of Health Sciences aims to prepare more than 1,300 undergraduate and graduate students to provide holistic healing of the mind, body and spirit of their patients.

During Howard Payne University’s spring break, several students traveled with various HPU programs. Ten HPU students and seven faculty and staff members traveled to Honduras for a mission trip, the biology department took students in the Global Studies in Biology class to London and Cambridge, and the Baptist Student Ministry took part inBeach Reach at South Padre Island. HPU teamed up with 61 Isaiah Ministries to send the group to Gracias, Honduras, and the village of Las Brisas. During the trip, students taught in the Abundant Life Christian School, led a soccer camp, worked at the Hunger Farm, shared testimonies at the local radio station and built relationships with people in Las Brisas all with one goal in mind: loving the people and sharing the gospel. The Department of Biology sent eight students and three faculty members to England. Their trip to London and Cambridge was inspired by the scientific history of the cities and the belief that experience can help students grow in their understanding of different cultures and the history of science. While on the trip, students explored the Natural History Museum, Kew Royal Botanic Gardens, Cambridge University and the Old Operating Theatre. HPU’s BSM sent two students and director Bryan Pate to Beach Reach to spread the gospel with students visiting South Padre Island for spring break. “It was an awesome experience to dive right into evangelism and the Father’s will,” said Nicole Griffin, senior psychology and Honors Academy major from Needville. “We prayed before and during, which reminded us that the Holy Spirit was the one empowering us to share the gospel.”

Wayland Baptist University’s Abraham Art Gallery is one of four galleries in the United States selected to host the American Watercolor Society 157th International Awards Exhibition. Open to the public through May 9, the exhibit features work by award-winning artists from the United States and around the world. The gallery is located on the atrium level of the J.E. and L.E. Mabee Learning Resources Center on the university’s Plainview campus. The exhibition features 40 works awarded top honors and painted with watercolor, acrylic and gouache. The range of styles includes abstract and nonrepresentational depictions of figures, still life, wildlife, architectural and industrial landscapes. Many of the works are available for sale to collectors. Catalogs of all awarded artworks for the exhibition are available at the gallery desk for a $15 donation that will go toward the Art Scholarship Fund. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Thursday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, and 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday. For more information or to schedule a group tour, call 806-291-3710.

Howard Payne University will host its annual Spring Family Reunion on April 5. The public is invited to join alumni, students and personnel for a day of fun on the campus, including music, games and food. Other events will include the dedication of the Bob Carter Athletic Park, Virtual 5K run/walk and Outdoor Vendor Market featuring handmade crafts and goods from local artisans. Admission to the event is free of charge, and no registration is necessary. The HPU Alumni Association Virtual 5K run/walk will begin at 9 a.m. at the Mabee University Center on the HPU campus. Registration is $40 per person and a portion will go to support student-focused events and scholarships. Individuals can participate from home, with other alumni and friends in their area or on the HPU campus. Registration is still open at www.hputx.edu/springfamilyreunion. The dedication of the Bob Carter Athletic Park will be held at 12:45 p.m. The new facility is home to HPU intramurals and is located across from the Doakie Day Art Center on Center Avenue. The Reunion Celebration will be from 1:30-4:30 p.m. at the Mims Auditorium Pergola and Muse Mall and Plaza. Eleven student organizations and alumni chapters will have booths with food and games for all ages. A Student Welcome and Registration Months (SWARM) event also will be held in conjunction with the spring family reunion. Incoming students who have been accepted and made a deposit to attend HPU will have the opportunity to schedule classes, map out their academic journey with academic advisors, meet other incoming students and get connected on campus. Interested students can contact the Office of Admissions at visit@hputx.edu or 325-649-8020.

Hardin-Simmons University’s summer Speech Camp is expanding, thanks to a $3,000 grant from the Community Foundation of Abilene’s Future Fund. The grant allows HSU’s Communication Sciences and Disorders Department to introduce music therapy that helps children practice speech through rhythm, pitch and song. It also funds hippotherapy that uses horseback riding to improve speech development through rhythmic movement and sensory engagement. Hippotherapy enhances speech therapy by leveraging the rhythmic, repetitive movement of a horse to stimulate neurological activity. In a single 20-minute session, a horse takes approximately 3,000 steps, providing far more sensory input than a traditional speech therapy session could achieve in the same timeframe. The heightened sensory engagement improves attention, motivation, breath control, articulation and coordination, making speech therapy significantly more effective. When treating children with multiple needs, music can support verbal communication through song-based learning, prompt timely speech with rhythmic cues, and encourage variations in volume through dynamic vocal play. These innovative approaches offer fun, hands-on ways for children across the Big Country region to develop communication skills, expanding Speech Camp’s impact. Held each summer in June, Speech Camp serves 75 to 100 elementary-aged children from Abilene and surrounding areas, many of whom otherwise would not haveaccess to speech therapy over the summer.

East Texas Baptist University welcomed Julie V. Philley, president of the University of Texas at Tyler, as speaker for its March 31 chapel service. Philley described her personal life and experiences in numerous roles as a health care professional, researcher and educator. She emphasized how her path diverged from her initial plans and stressed the importance of embracing God’s guidance and being grateful for each moment and season in life. A native of East Texas, Philley was raised in Overton. She returned to the region in 2012, serving as assistant professor of medicine at the UT Health Science Center at Tyler, where she continued research into nontuberculous mycobacterial disease and bronchiectasis. Philley reflected on 2 Thessalonians during her address, highlighting the parallels between Paul’s encouragement to persevere through confusion and trials and her own unexpected twists in her career and personal faith journey. Just as Paul reassured the church at Thessalonica that God’s plan would unfold in his perfect timing, Philley reflected on how deviations from her original plans ultimately led her to fulfilling experiences aligned with God’s purpose. Following chapel, Philley joined students, faculty and staff for a luncheon. Students interested in health care professions had the opportunity to ask questions to gain deeper insight into her career path and the broader work UT Tyler’s School of Medicine is doing to equip future healthcare professionals in the East Texas region. In August 2023, ETBU partnered with the UT Tyler School of Medicine’s Early Assurance Program, known as “Pathways to Medicine.” The initiative prepares 40 students annually from regional colleges and universities for medical careers by providing clinical exposure and developing essential study skills. Up to 15 participants are admitted into the School of Medicine, fostering a pipeline of skilled physicians dedicated to serving East Texas communities.

(RNS)—Gospel composer Andraé Crouch sang, played the piano and preached for decades—often all at once.

Ten years after his death, a new biography aims to capture both the genre-defying range of Crouch’s music, as well as his ability to build bridges through his evangelistic ministry.

Co-authored by a white former Billboard gospel music editor and a Black gospel musician, the book chronicles how Crouch’s music, rooted in the historically Black Church of God in Christ denomination, became popular among white evangelical audiences.

Soon and Very Soon: The Transformative Music and Ministry of Andraé Crouch, by Robert F. Darden and Stephen Michael Newby, is a 400-page narrative of the life of Crouch, who died in 2015 at the age of 72, that reviews more than a dozen of his albums, with popular selections such as “Jesus Is the Answer” and “Take Me Back.”

“We didn’t figure we could understand the man without doing a deep dive into the music, and we couldn’t understand the music ’til we did a deep dive into the man,” said Darden, emeritus journalism professor at Baylor University and founder of its Black Gospel Music Preservation Program, in a joint interview with Newby.

“He is so part of his music, more than anybody I’ve ever experienced through a lot of interviews.”

The authors detail the wide range of musicians the Grammy winner welcomed into his home—the place where, his twin sister and collaborator, Sandra Crouch, informed them, her brother had some 1,500 of his unheard songs on cassette tapes.

Newby, music professor and ambassador for Black gospel music preservation at Baylor in Waco, said they hoped the book would be not just be a resource for readers, “but hopefully they would still be curious and listen to this guy’s music.”

Newby, 63, a member of the National Missionary Baptist Convention of America, and Darden, 71, affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, talked with RNS about Crouch’s legacy, how he once hoped to marry another gospel music star and examples of secular artists who influenced his music.

The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Can you describe Andraé Crouch’s performances and how they seemed to be about music, but also were what you call ‘colorblind evangelism’?

Darden: Andraé could have gone the standard route of wonderful Black quartets and essentially sang to the choir, or he could roll the dice, take a chance and go out and penetrate a market, not just with the evangelical message, which is at his core, but that in Christ, there is no Black or white, Christian, Jew, male, female, slave, free. And it was one of the three driving forces, in our opinion, of his career: ecumenicalism, evangelism and eschatology.

Why do you call Andraé Crouch ‘the most musically adventuresome artist in gospel or contemporary Christian music’?

Newby: He had a theological imagination that was otherworldly. He refused to succumb himself to the ways of the world, to the standard norms and boxes that people wanted to put him in, and he decided that at the end of the day, my family looks like the family of God—diverse.

And his innovation is second to none. Everything we hear in contemporary gospel music today, we find its rootedness musically, theologically, and all of this performativity back to Andraé Crouch.

You talked about how he would secularize his gospel music in order to appeal to a wider audience. Can you give an example of a particular song that achieves that effect?

Newby (occasionally vocalizing to illustrate): If you listen to the “This Is Another Day” album. You listen to “Perfect Peace.” It’s a funk groove. There’s Clavinet (electric clavichord). You listen to it on the “Live in London” version—the tempo, it sounds like Sly and the Family Stone, it sounds like Earth, Wind & Fire.

Yet, it is the voice of God speaking directly to all creation: “I will keep you in perfect peace if you keep your mind stayed on me.” It’s an amazing theological text. It comes right out of Scripture. You hear the popping on two and four. You hear the horn lines. Nobody was doing that in church, because the Clavinet D6 as an instrument didn’t exist in the church of that day.

How successful were those efforts to do that amalgamation?

Darden: As long as he was doing it for all markets, his album sold well. He toured. He had Black and white audiences. He did venues that Christian artists—Black or white—had never done. And then he gets a chance to record for Warner Bros., a secular label, and take the music much wider from a distribution standpoint, and it flops.

The previous albums usually came out of live performance. He would stay up all night composing something and then he would introduce it to the band 30 minutes before the show. They would play part of it, and he would judge the audience response, and then go back and perfect it. And he did that for years.

He was criticized by conservative elements of the church—both Black and white. What were their main concerns?

Darden: The churches, by their nature, are traditional, conservative. And here was a young man with different musicians—male, female, Black, white—coming in giving the same message. Ain’t no difference between his lyrics, until later, than any other gospel artist, but he was playing it with instruments they weren’t used to. He was playing in keys and time signatures they were not used to.

Newby: We know with the “Don’t Give Up” album how he came in like a bulldozer, speaking about male prostitution, abortion and all of this other stuff in his music, and the church just didn’t want to deal with that. Some white people would say, “It’s too Black for me.” Some Black people would say, “It’s too white.” But, he felt like, “Well, what God is saying: It’s not about Black and white. It’s what is right.”

There’s this idea of the harmony is greater than the dissonance. It was so in Andraé’s DNA to think about the idea that God so loved the world—everybody.

The book describes how Andraé Crouch had fallen in love with Tramaine Davis, who had been singing with him in the group the Disciples, and was devastated when she announced she was leaving and marrying Walter Hawkins. How did that change him and his music?

Darden: He never married. I’m not sure he ever got over it. Frankly, “Through It All” is an extraordinary hymn, but it’s also, when you know the context, a really painful love-lost song.

You cite many collaborators and fellow musicians in your book, but you focus on his twin sister, Sandra, a percussionist.

Darden: Sandra was the prototypical big sister. She was Andraé’s bodyguard, personal manager. Andraé, by all accounts, struggled in daily conversation. He said he got over his stutter, but as you listen to tapes later, he expressed himself better in song and sermon, and so Sandra shielded him from a lot of things through a good portion of their lives.

Her work with Motown very early, when she became a legitimate Motown session player, enabled him to bring in Motown musicians and producers much earlier than probably he would have, and she had a level of professionalism that she brought with that.

You note in your conclusion that Crouch was considered both the founder of contemporary gospel music and the popularizer of praise and worship music. Do those two subgenres of gospel music reflect a divide that remains?

Darden: Andraé, maybe alone, has been able to bridge that. The two things that he helped create were really different facets of the same thing, and other people go one way or the other.

Newby: Andraé never allowed the technology to hinder his creativity. But when you strip all that away and you look at the text, the melody, the harmony and the theology, I think those things make a great song.

And great songs geographically build bridges everywhere. From the north to the south to the east to the west, it forms the cross.

Crouch was always in the epicenter of what really mattered. And for Andraé, everything was so centralized at the core. Jesus Christ was at the core.

WASHINGTON (RNS)—A new report published by four prominent Catholic and evangelical organizations claims about 1 in 12 Christians in the U.S. are vulnerable to deportation or live with a family member who could be deported by President Donald Trump’s administration.

“We’re sounding the alarm that all American Christians need to be aware of what’s being proposed,” Matthew Soerens of World Relief, one of the authors of the report, said during a call with reporters on March 31.

He spoke alongside representatives from other well-known religious organizations listed as co-authors on the report: the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the National Association of Evangelicals and the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

“Our prayer with this report is that American Christians will recognize that these proposed deportations, to whatever extent they ultimately become a reality, are not just a policy issue but a dynamic that will impact us, followers of Jesus who were knit together in unity under Christ,” Soerens said.

The report, titled “One Part of the Body: The Potential Impact of Deportations on American Christian Families,” serves as both a theological and data-driven refutation of the president’s campaign pledge to enact “the largest deportation in U.S. history.”

Authors of the study said they pulled data from several sources—such as religious demographic breakdowns from Pew Research and data on immigrant populations from the immigration reform advocacy group FWD.us—to conclude there were more than 10 million Christian immigrants in the U.S. at the end of 2024 who are now vulnerable to deportation.

That number includes undocumented immigrants as well as those with legal status that could be revoked by the government—namely asylum seekers awaiting a final court proceeding, as well as people protected by programs and designations such as Temporary Protected Status, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, Deferred Enforced Departure and humanitarian parole.

Trump already made moves that could impact several of these groups. In addition to the White House press secretary declaring in January that any undocumented immigrant is seen “as a criminal” by the Trump administration, U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has reversed TPS extensions for Venezuelans and Haitians and announced termination of parole processes for several groups.

The report, which does not include legal permanent residents or green card holders in its list of people vulnerable to deportation, also notes that “nearly 7 million U.S.-citizen Christians live within the same households of those at risk of deportation.”

“Most of these U.S. citizens are spouses or minor children of the immigrant at risk of deportation,” the report adds.

‘Profound’ ramifications for U.S. churches

The report, which also includes the stories of immigrants as well as religious arguments in defense of migrants, claims 18 percent of U.S. Catholics are vulnerable to deportation or live with someone who could be deported, as well as 6 percent of evangelicals in the country and 3 percent of other Christian groups.

The authors hope the data will help fellow Christians recognize the potential impact of Trump’s proposed deportations on their communities and churches.

“If even a fraction of those vulnerable to deportation are actually deported, the ramifications are profound—for those individuals, of course, but also for their U.S.-citizen family members and, because when one part of the body suffers, every part suffers with it, for all Christians,” the report states.

Anthea Butler, a professor of religious studies at the University of Pennsylvania, said the data could function as a “massive wake-up call” for Catholic leaders, noting the report found Catholics make up 61 percent of those potentially at risk of deportation.

“For Catholic parishes, for Catholic ministries, this is a disaster,” Butler said.

Speaking to reporters on Monday, Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso confirmed the data shows “Catholics are overrepresented in those currently at risk for deportation,” adding that roughly 1 in 5 Catholics could be deported or have a family member deported under the new administration’s deportation policies.

Evangelical leaders on the call also repeatedly insisted the situation facing evangelicalism is dire.

“We want churches to grow, and … the administration’s mass deportation policies and congressional support of that would be, in fact, a church decline strategy, removing millions from active membership of churches,” Walter Kim, head of the National Association of Evangelicals, told reporters.

Myal Greene, head of World Relief, addressed his own remarks on the call to Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill, where he used to work.

“We can’t just give a blank check to this effort to carry out mass deportations and mass detentions that would separate families on a massive scale, would decimate the American church and send vulnerable people who have not broken any law into horrifying humanitarian crises,” Greene said.

Trump has faced faith-based pushback to his immigration proposals and policies ever since he first emerged as a political force in 2015, but that criticism has most often come from Mainline Protestant Christians, Jewish Americans and Muslims.

Some criticism from Trump-supporting Christians

Recent weeks have seen unusually pointed criticism emerge from within conservative Christian groups that backed the president in November.

Catholics voted 59 percent for Trump, but their leadership has issued multiple statements in support of immigrants since Trump was elected, prompting a war of words with Vice President JD Vance.

Vance accused Catholic bishops of resettling “illegal immigrants” and suggested in an interview that Catholic bishops are only supporting immigrants in order to protect their “bottom line.”

The allegation drew rebukes from leaders such as Bishop Seitz, who called the suggestion “a tremendous mischaracterization.” Even Pope Francis weighed in, with a February letter to U.S. bishops that generally criticized Trump’s immigration policies.

In addition, the Trump administration is currently embroiled in two separate immigration-related lawsuits brought by Catholic groups: One led by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which is challenging the federal government over Trump’s decision to freeze the refugee resettlement program, and a similar suit filed by Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Fort Worth, which largely oversees refugee resettlement in Texas.

Butler sees a growing tension between Catholic leadership and many of the people in their pews—a tension she believes clergy “have not really quite dealt with.”

“On one hand, you have a big, giant denomination who is going to be profoundly affected by people being renditioned—and I’m going to use the word renditioned—out of this country who are faithful and loyal Catholics,” Butler said.

“But on the other hand, you have Catholic suburbanites and others who voted for Trump who are, like, ‘OK, this is cool.’”

Evangelicals, a group long deemed crucial to Trump’s support, have been less visible in efforts to challenge Trump on immigration, but Monday’s new report points to increasing—or at least increasingly public—discontent among conservative Protestants.

In March, World Relief and other prominent evangelical groups organized a public vigil on Capitol Hill to condemn the administration’s cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development and foreign aid in general, arguing the changes will cost vulnerable people their lives.

The report organizers suggested most Christians who voted for Trump either don’t support his immigration policies or don’t fully understand the impact they could have.

Kim, head of the NAE, cited recent polling showing that less than one-fifth of evangelicals support deporting immigrants who have spouses or children who are U.S. citizens, have been in the country for 10 years or more, or who are willing to pay a fine as restitution for their violation of any immigration law.

Bishop Seitz agreed.

“The people that are being numbered among those under threat of deportation are not people who are harming our community, but rather building it up,” he said.

HIDALGO (RNS)—Every Thursday, volunteers at Border Missions, a Christian ministry, serve 350 to 400 food-insecure community members who receive a free hot meal, worship together and take groceries home.

One of the men is 87-year-old Francisco “Panchito” Ramirez Guajardo, who discovered Border Missions on one of his daily visits to lay flowers at the grave of his wife of 47 years at the cemetery next door.

Like many who first come to Border Missions for a meal, Ramirez then began to volunteer, and he has brought his adult children and neighbors.

“I love them all as if they’re my family,” said Ramirez of the community who have supported him in his grief.

In Hidalgo County, where the 26.9 percent of people living in poverty is more than twice the national average of 11.1 percent, Christian faith binds communities together as they serve one another and advocate for better resources.

Quoting Jesus’ teaching that “it is more blessed to give than receive,” Mario Ramirez, the operations manager at Border Missions, who is no relation to Francisco, told RNS, “Being able to serve and help other people fills us with energy and makes our lives very joyful.”

Border Missions makes a significant impact in low-resource communities in Texas, but the vast majority of Thursday participants actually cross the border from Reynosa, Mexico, to join what the participants view as “their church.”

Founded nearly seven decades ago

Midwestern evangelicals Harold and Katherine Morgan decided to found Border Missions in 1956, after a successful tent revival in what is still a traditionally Catholic area.

“Mrs. Morgan never asked what kind of religion you are. She always believed in God, and that the God she has is the same one everyone has,” said Lydia Weaver, whose mother was among the first Reynosa residents to adopt Border Missions as her church. Lydia Weaver has been attending since she was 2 years old.

Weaver called it “a miracle” that nearly 70 years later. Morgan’s great-granddaughter, Megan Gonzalez, a Catholic convert, is extending that legacy as co-director with her husband.

Gonzalez said her faith has grown as she stepped into the role, trusting God to work out the details. On the days that the donated food that fills their warehouse gets low, she picks up the phone and starts calling companies, relying on God’s favor, she said, adding, “We’ve never not had enough.”

With all that is “freely given” to Border Missions, “we give with no requirements, no expectations,” Gonzalez said.

“This is God’s grace. He’s given us this to bless you and to know that he still cares about you and loves you,” she said.

80 ministries help feed people in the Valley

Gonzalez, pushing her son Jack in a stroller as she tours the facility, said, throughout the rest of the week, some 80 registered ministries also rely on Border Missions to feed their communities throughout the Rio Grande Valley.

One of them, the House of Love and Justice, is led by Caly Fernandez, a grandmother of four and a Presbyterian with a long career in public health. The daughter of a doctor, Fernandez is passionate about bridging health care disparities in the Rio Grande Valley.

Recently, she said, she has been grounding her work in the writing of B. Hunter Farrell, director of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary’s World Mission Initiative, on co-development, which rejects the idea that the powerful “givers” grant life-giving aid to needy “receivers.” Rather, Farrell wrote, “there are only human beings desperately in need of God’s grace in Christ.”

Fernandez explains: “I don’t want to go in and do things for you. I want us to work together, and I want us to collaborate and use our God-given gifts to help in the community.”

While she has worked on both sides of the border, as executive director of the House of Love and Justice, Fernandez focuses on Hidalgo County’s colonias, neighborhoods originally settled by low-income Latinos that often lacked basic services such as running water or sewers. Fernandez says the county contains 947 colonias, with 11 experiencing extreme poverty.

Twice a month, Fernandez takes produce to three of those 11, working together with community health workers from Texas A&M University’s Colonias Program.

As the produce is distributed, they talk with families about their other needs and coordinate services alongside other partners, which have included women’s hygiene supplies, classes in fertility awareness, water purification and garbage disposal and recycling, know-your-rights training for migrants, and advance planning for children if parents are deported, as well as material support and social services for one family that already has been separated.

In the coming months, Fernandez plans to provide mental health first aid, a space for women to gather for Bible study and fellowship, women’s leadership training, summer vacation Bible study and gardening classes for the youth.

She’s also advocating for a planned county public transportation pilot program to be implemented and joining groups trying to preserve SNAP nutritional assistance.

Because so many families with mixed immigration statuses inhabit the colonias, Fernandez worries families may begin to increasingly avoid medical care and is exploring how to meet that need, possibly through specialized medical missions.

Not all communities in need defined as colonias

Her dream is to build a community center in La Piñata, where well-built homes stand next to ramshackle trailers, and stray dogs roam mostly unlit streets. But with $80,000 needed just to buy the land for the site she has picked out, the dream feels out of reach.

La Piñata, founded in 1993, is not technically a colonia. The government narrowly defines colonias as communities within 150 miles of the border developed before 1990 that have poor-quality housing and infrastructure. Starting in 1990, Texas developers were required to install water and wastewater services in new subdivisions.

But Noah Durst, an associate professor of urban and regional planning at Michigan State University, said millions of subdivision lots on the urban fringe throughout the United States may not officially be colonias, like La Piñata, but have comparably poor conditions because of similar building practices.

In such places, a developer sells empty lots with minimal infrastructure, often financing the sale at high interest rates, with a contract or deed that allows prompt repossession of the property.

Fernandez thinks it would make a huge difference for the nearby city of Donna to annex La Piñata, which would give residents access to city services like animal control, police and street lights.

Empowering communities to change their circumstances

Eddie Anaya, a Catholic lawyer and lifelong resident of a colonia called Las Milpas, got involved as a young man with Valley Interfaith, an affiliate of the West/Southwest Industrial Areas Foundation, because his Mexican immigrant mother, Carmen Anaya, was one of its co-founders. When he was growing up, Anaya said Las Milpas had no water, sewers, street paving or lighting or police force.

Anaya chauffeured his mother around the state and interpreted for her at meetings with other Texas IAF affiliates as they championed 1989 state legislation that provided funding for water and wastewater infrastructure, which Anaya said stimulated other improvements in the community.

In Las Milpas, where the Catholic Church is the center of community life, Anaya said, conversations after Mass shaped a political agenda for the whole community through Valley Interfaith and backed by the Diocese of Brownsville.

“ When you organize around Scripture and put it into action, that not only strengthens the community, but also makes people understand the gospel much better,” Anaya said.

They also learn that as a community they have the power to change their circumstances.

 “Really the main objective of the organization is to teach people to do for themselves—to educate them to fight for their issues,” Anaya said.

The story Anaya tells of Las Milpas is a prime example. Anaya’s mother and other allies wanted Las Milpas to be its own city, but in 1987 the nearby city of Pharr annexed Las Milpas.

It took decades of organizing for Las Milpas residents to transform Pharr’s political culture to get the kind of respect—and the infrastructure—that truly made them feel like part of the city.

In 2015, Valley Interfaith pushed the city further, adopting a six-point plan for Las Milpas, calling for a bridge to link the neighborhood to a park, funding for workforce development, building a library and recreation center, curtailing predatory lending, more bus service and paving more neighborhood streets.

With an election coming up, the group invited city commissioner candidates to an accountability session at St. Francis Xavier Cabrini Catholic Church to commit to work with them.

When two candidates didn’t show up, Anaya and other leaders launched an intense get-out-the-vote campaign, with a youth contingent registering more than 500 voters after Mass. Those two candidates ended up losing by fewer than 50 votes each. Less than a year after the accountability session, Pharr broke ground on a library in Las Milpas.

Pope Francis has met three times with leaders of Industrial Areas Foundation groups, including a delegation from Valley Interfaith in 2022. Anaya was there to witness the pope applaud the group for living the gospel by “walking with” suffering people.

The recognition has inspired them, but there is much work still to do.

Delfina Villarreal, a resident in a colonia south of McAllen, told RNS communities there are still struggling to secure drainage for flooding and sidewalks, but they hope faith-based organizing and getting out the vote will make all the difference.

“Here we are all working for each other,” Villarreal said.