The University of Mary Hardin-Baylor is developing a doctor of physical therapy degree program in partnership with Baylor Scott & White Health. The collaborative partnership will give UMHB doctor of physical therapy students the opportunity to interact with physicians, therapists and nurses daily, and it will help facilitate a collaborative learning environment with health-care professionals across Central Texas. Doctor of physical therapy faculty and Baylor Scott & White faculty also will collaborate on research projects. While the program will start on the UMHB campus, the university plans to build a permanent home for the program on the Baylor Scott & White campus in Temple. UMHB anticipates a fall semester 2015 start date and is accepting applications, with the first round of conditional acceptances beginning this month. The deadline for applying to the program is March 31, 2015. The program start date is contingent on achieving candidacy status through the Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy. The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools—the university’s regional accrediting agency—also must approve the program.

Del Risco named Texas Baptist Hispanic evangelism director. Joshua del RiscoJoshua del Risco, a former Oklahoma Baptist pastor and coordinator for the North American Mission Board’s church mobilization team, was named director of Hispanic evangelism and associate director of evangelism for the Baptist General Convention of Texas, effective Nov. 3. He was pastor of Living Word Hispanic Baptist Church in Oklahoma City from 1995 to 2001. He served with NAMB in various capacities from 2001 to 2014. He and his wife, Esther, have two grown sons, Andrew and Timothy.

Baylor receives naming gift for Robbins College of Health and Human Sciences. William K. and Mary Jo Robbins, members of Tallowood Baptist Church in Houston, provided Baylor University a major gift for its newest academic unit focused on health-related education and research—the Robbins College of Health and Human Sciences. He is founder and CEO of Houston-based North American Corp. She served 27 years in the nursing profession, and she opened and managed 10 dialysis facilities in Texas. Baylor regents established the College of Health and Human Sciences last May, uniting four health-related academic units—communication sciences and disorders; family and consumer sciences; health, human performance and recreation; and the Louise Herrington School of Nursing.

Baylor adds doctoral program in environmental science. Baylor University regents approved a new Ph.D. program in environmental science, beginning in January 2015. Core specialty areas will include environmental health, environmental chemistry and toxicology. In 2014, Baylor produced 28 Ph.D. graduates in STEM—science, technology, engineering and math—fields. By 2019, the university expects it will award 44 STEM doctoral degrees.

MIDLOTHIAN—I Am Second held the premiere showing of its first 45-minute documentary at First Baptist Church in Midlothian. But unlike many of the ministry’s previous projects, the film did not feature a celebrity’s Christian testimony. Rather, it told a “story of hope” involving a 13-year-old boy who died of cancer the month before.

Many are the Wonders: The Second Story of Ethan Hallmark, focuses not only on Ethan Hallmark is prepped for a cancer treatment at Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort WorthEthan, but also on his mother, father, friends and the difference one young man’s four-year battle with stage-4 neuroblastoma had on his community.

After being contacted by a minister in Midlothian, I Am Second dispatched a staff member to see if Ethan’s story might be right for one of the five-minute videos shown at iamsecond.com. The videos follow a simple format—a camera trained on a single individual in a white chair telling his or her Christian testimony.

“We were just blown away from the manner in which God has worked through Ethan and the family over these four years. It’s been incredible how from what started out to be just a devastating situation for the family and for him, God had grown the family,” said John Humphrey, director of communications for I Am Second.

Ethan Hallmark greets teams participating in a Midlothian high school football game.“The more we delved into the story, the more layers came about. We said: ‘We have to do something different. This is not just a five-minute white-chair film. We have to tell this differently.’”

The ministry’s budget didn’t include funds for a longer film, but people from Midlothian raised the extra money needed to produce it.

The documentary pictures the Hallmark family in their home and follows Ethan to the hospital. Ethan does sit in the white chair used in other I Am Second videos, but so do his mother and father, Rachel and Matt Hallmark.

The nature of the video and the length of the relationship offered the I Am Second personnel a level of emotional intimacy that doesn’t usually occur, Humphrey said.

“We’ve gotten to know this family well. We have hurt with them, rejoiced with them, cried with them. And we don’t usually get to do that, particularly with a celebrity Second. This is probably the deepest relationship we’ve been able to establish with a family,” he said.

Ethan Hallmark with his parents.That emotional intimacy and the seriousness of the situation caused the producers to confront some hard questions during the process of making the film.

“At each step, we were presented with all sorts of decisions—how to involve the family, how to be sensitive to their needs, how to be sensitive with the opportunity. We would ask ourselves, ‘Are we being too selfish in taking this story and using it in our movement when it is their story?’ At every step of the way as we prayed about it, we felt God urging us to go ahead but also consulted with the Hallmarks. And every step of the way, they said, ‘We just want God to use Ethan’s story,’” Humphrey recalled.

“Ethan loved God with his whole heart. The hope he had stemmed from that,” Matt Hallmark said. “He was a kid who truly lived out his faith.”

That faith was a gift from God, he added.

“It came from God. I know that’s cliché, but it’s true. It’s not because of us. We’re not special parents or anything. We’re just regular parents. But God gave him an amazing spirit,” he said.

“It would not surprise us at any point in the day to walk in and see him sitting there with his Bible, reading it. I don’t care where he’s at—at the hospital, at a soccer game, at home, at school. That’s Ethan.”

The large crowd who attended the premiere of the documentary “means Ethan’s cancer is not wasted. A lot of people get cancer. A lot of people suffer. It’s what you do with it, who’s benefitting from it,” Hallmark said.

The video proves hope is possible even in horrific circumstances, Rachel Hallmark observed.

“A lot of people would say that’s a story of despair. This poor child has only lived to the age of 13. He’s not going to get to grow up; he’s not going to get to go to high school; he’s not going to get married. I guess by worldly standards, that’s a story of despair,” she said.

Ethan Hallmark prepares for a session of chemotherapy.“Ethan never saw it that way, and surely, neither did we. Don’t get me wrong. We’re heartbroken that he is gone. We’re heartbroken that he had to spend a third of his life fighting cancer. But it ultimately is and always has been a story of hope.

“One of his pet peeves was for people to say, ‘It’s OK to be angry at God. This is a horrible disease. It’s OK to be angry every once in a while.’ He would tell me: ‘Mom, why do they say that to me? How could I be angry? I know God loves me. I don’t like this cancer. I’m upset I have to go through surgery, chemo and radiation, but I could never be angry at God.’”

Through the film, Ethan’s Christian testimony of hope will be shared long after his death, and that is important to the Hallmarks.

“It allows us to see the good even in the ashes,” Matt Hallmark said. “It’s being able to see that even though Ethan suffered, even though he died, people are still coming to know the Lord. People are still getting closer, getting intimate with God because Ethan endured.”

A former president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas and former CEO of Buckner International involuntarily has become a former senior vice president of Baylor University.

Ken Hall, who has served as senior vice president for development and strategic initiatives at Baylor since January 2013, “no longer will be serving at Baylor,” President Ken Starr announced in a letter to the university’s faculty and staff.

Hall ceased to be employed by Baylor at the conclusion of homecoming weekend, Starr wrote in a Nov. 4 letter announcing the “unfortunate news.”

No reason given

In his letter, Starr offered no reason for Hall’s dismissal. Lori Fogleman, assistant vice president for media communications at Baylor, said the university does not comment on personnel matters.

“I was notified Friday afternoon (Oct. 31) that my services no longer would be needed,” Hall said, adding he received official written notice Monday, Nov. 3, and he was terminated without cause. “It’s been a wonderful couple of years at Baylor, and I am grateful for the experience. The judge (Starr) obviously felt he needed to go in another direction.”

Hall served on the 10-member presidential search advisory committee that helped bring Starr to the university. Starr also noted Hall’s time as a BGCT-elected member of Baylor’s board of regents “where he served with great distinction” before accepting the senior vice president’s position.

“He has been a wise counselor to all his executive council colleagues, especially in regard to Texas Baptist life,” Starr wrote. “He effectively reorganized and refocused our university development office, and his energy and creativity have helped Baylor reach historic milestones in private giving. In short, Ken Hall has made a positive and enduring impact on Baylor University. For his many talents and his able service to Baylor University, we are immensely grateful.”

‘Wonderful experience’

Hall expressed appreciation to his colleagues on Baylor’s executive council and the university’s development staff.

“It’s been a wonderful experience,” Hall said. “Baylor is a great, great place doing kingdom business.”

Hall served as president and CEO of Buckner International from 1994 to 2010 and as CEO there from 2010 until his retirement in April 2012.

He was elected to a one-year term as BGCT president in 2003.

A Louisiana native, Hall earned a bachelor of science degree from the University of Texas at Tyler and master of divinity and doctor of ministry degrees from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth. He also is an honorary alumnus of Baylor’s George W. Truett Theological Seminary and received an honorary doctor of divinity degree from Dallas Baptist University.

Hall and his wife, Linda, have two grown children, Kevin and Kayce.

NASHVILLE, Tenn.—The nation’s slow economic recovery from a deep recession is showing up in the offering plates of Protestant churches in the United States, a recent survey by LifeWay Research reveals.

Although 56 percent of churches still report negative impact from the economy, 13 percent report a positive impact—a 4 percent jump from May 2012. Compared to the previous three years, churches are reporting less negative and more positive economic impact.

“The most recent recession revealed poor habits among Americans in terms of spending and lending,” said Scott McConnell, LifeWay Research director. “Surely churches have had to learn some of these same lessons.”

Two-thirds of the churches surveyed report meeting or exceeding their 2014 budget. Nearly half—46 percent—are matching their budget, while 22 percent say receipts exceed their budget. Meanwhile, 29 percent of churches report receipts below budget.

When compared to 2013 giving, 74 percent of Protestant churches report offerings at or above 2013, while 21 percent say receipts are lower than 2013.

The LifeWay survey also asked pastors about church size, region, pastor’s age, educational level, ethnicity and evangelical/mainline affiliation.

Larger churches still feel impact

Pastors of churches with up to 99 regularly attending worshippers are more likely to report the economy continues to have a very negative impact on their churches (9 percent). For churches with at least 100 in attendance, that response drops to about 3 percent.

Pastors in the Northeast report very negatively about the economy (10 percent), as do pastors nationwide who are 55 years or older (16 percent), and African-American pastors (12 percent).

The pastors’ education levels also gave some indication of financial health. Pastors with a master’s degree (5 percent) are less likely to select “very negatively,” compared to pastors with no college degree (10 percent).

“The current slow-growth economy does not allow individuals, businesses or churches to slip into poor financial habits that may have been present seven or eight years ago,” McConnell said. “Everyone must be innovative in how efficient and productive each of their activities is.”

Hiring decisions affected

The slow-growth economy continues to influence church hiring decisions.

“For a couple of decades, new and increased church activity could rely on additional staff and resource purchases financed by strong growth in giving,” McConnell said. “Those decades are over.”

McConnell sites the following factors that ease economic pressure:

• Unemployment has improved five years in a row.

• Social Security recipients have received cost-of-living adjustments three consecutive years.

• Real disposable personal income has grown in 2014.

“However, the employment cost index indicates that total compensation has been growing at about 2 percent a year for six years, but when adjusted for inflation, total compensation is very similar to national levels five years ago,” McConnell said.

Survey methods

LifeWay Research has conducted this survey seven times since 2009. The survey in 2012 indicated stabilized giving in many churches.

Researchers conducted the telephone survey of Protestant pastors Sept. 11-18. They drew the calling list randomly from a list of all Protestant churches in three categories based on size.

Each interview was conducted with the senior pastor, minister or priest of the church called. Researchers weighted responses to reflect the size and geographic distribution of Protestant churches. The completed sample is 1,000 phone interviews. The sample provides 95 percent confidence that the sampling error does not exceed plus or minus 3.1 percent. Margins of error are higher in sub-groups.

WACO—Many mental-health disorders first surface during adolescence, and college and youth pastors are in a good position to offer help or steer youths where they can find it. But many of those ministers feel unprepared to recognize and deal with mental illness, a Baylor University study revealed.

The study of Texas ministers—“Adolescent Mental Health: The Role of Youth and College Pastors”—is published in the journal Mental Health, Religion & Culture.

Matthew S. StanfordUnlike many senior pastors, ministers who work with young people are expected to have more extensive contact with their congregants outside of church services, researchers said. Because youth groups are smaller than the congregations themselves, a greater chance exists for deep relationships between ministers and adolescents, through one-on-one counseling, Bible-study groups, mission trips and service opportunities, said researcher Matthew S. Stanford, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Baylor University.

William Hunter, a doctoral candidate of clinical psychology at Baylor, served as co-researcher on the study, which involved 94 youth and college pastors representing churches ranging in size from 45 to 8,000 members. Churches were located in Abilene, Austin, College Station, the Dallas-Fort Worth area, Houston, Lubbock, Midland, San Antonio, the Temple-Killeen area and Waco.

The survey showed:

• 50 percent said they had received training related to mental illness, but only 26 percent reported they felt qualified to work with young people dealing with significant mental health issues.

• 78.7 percent had worked with one to 10 adolescents a year whom they knew or thought had mental health issues.

• 76 percent had referred an adolescent congregant to a Christian counselor, a psychologist or a psychiatrist, but pastors who made referrals were most likely to do so to a Christian counselor.

Youth pastors ranked depression as the most prevalent mental health issue they have seen among youths, followed by pornography, grief/bereavement, anxiety, aggression/anger, sexual behavior, alcohol/drug abuse, ADHD, emotional abuse, eating disorders, stress from having a family member with a mental health issue, domestic or spousal abuse, juvenile delinquency, gender identity, sexual assault/abuse and physical abuse.

Lack of training

The study showed youth and college pastors’ most common method of intervention was to meet with the adolescent and refer the individual to a mental-health professional. While many of the pastors described using biblical counseling methods, some counseled primarily with psychological concepts, using such methods as talking through coping skills or role-playing.

The sample of youth pastors showed they believe psychological well-being affects spiritual development. But they lacked training and confidence to interact with the mental-health system, and some tensions and conflicts exist between pastors and mental-health professionals.

Unique role as gatekeeper

A youth pastor’s “unique role as gatekeeper can be improved,” and pastors are interested in knowing more about counseling, researchers said. Many are unaware of mental health professionals with whom to work and did not know what psychotherapy would entail—including time, cost and scope of services.

Researchers recommended mental health professionals working with religious youths consider the role of the youth pastor and reach out to faith communities to collaborate.

“Outreach will allow the pastor and mental health professional to gain an understanding of the other while becoming familiar with each other’s ‘language’ and view of mental health,” researchers said.

Volunteers with the Texas Baptist Men water ministry recently drilled wells and donated equipment to church leaders in Nigeria, and they laid the groundwork for drilling wells at a mountainous area in India.

Harold Patterson (center) of Northeast Texas Disaster Response explains the operation of a portable well-drilling rig to Fred Posey with Walking in Love Ministries while Phil Davenport (kneeling) and Kathy Patterson work on a well during a trip to Nigeria. (PHOTO/Courtesy of Walking in Love Ministries)Harold and Kathy Patterson from First Baptist Church in Winnsboro, directors of Northeast Texas Disaster Response, and Phil Davenport from First Baptist Church in Garland represented TBM’s water ministry on a 12-person volunteer team to Nigeria assembled by Walking in Love Ministries.

“In the process, there were a lot of decisions made for the Living Water himself,” said Mary Kay Posey, who grew up as a missionary kid in Nigeria and founded the Forney-based Walking in Love Ministries with her husband, Fred.

Other volunteers trained Nigerian church leaders in the Experiencing God discipleship curriculum and in the Royal Ambassadors missions program for boys. Three health-care specialists also taught at a nursing school.

TBM volunteers drilled wells at a seminary and a church using a small portable rig Patterson designed. They also trained local volunteers to drill a well at another church. Although the walls of one well proved unstable due to swampy conditions, two of the three wells will continue to provide clean water for up to 5,000 people, Harold Patterson said.

New Christians were baptized in a river near Eku, Nigeria, after a recent mission trip involving volunteers with Texas Baptist Men and Walking in Love Ministries. (PHOTO/Courtesy of Walking in Love Ministries)“We left the well-drilling rig there and trained a team of Nigerians how to use and maintain it,” he said. “Before we left, two chiefs came with requests for 10 more locations for the team to start drilling.”

Nine days after he returned home from the trip to Nigeria, Patterson left with another team for a water ministry project among the Tangkhul—a Mongolian people group—in Ukhrul, India.

Unfortunately, the drilling equipment TBM had shipped to India was not released from customs in New Delhi until the day before the well-drilling team returned to the United States.

However, the delay gave Patterson and Bob Young from The Heights Church in Richardson ample opportunity to spend time with Baptists in Ukhrul and build relationships with church leaders.

“The spiritual part of the trip couldn’t have been better,” Patterson said.

The TBM volunteers identified five locations for drilling, as well as local volunteers they plan to train when they return to India.

“We’re already planning another trip there when the water table is a little lower,” Patterson said.

In the meantime, TBM water ministry volunteers will travel to Nicaragua to pump out, recharge and chlorinate wells polluted by flooding. The wells serve villages where Meskito Indians live.

Pastor Randall Worley has found a way to blend his passions for preaching and painting to spread the gospel.

Worley has conducted weeklong art camps at Prairie Creek Baptist Church in Plano the last two years, with participants ranging from middle school students to adults in their 40s.

While preaching through the Old Testament book of Jonah, Randall Worley, pastor of Prairie Creek Baptist Church in Plano, took the wood from pallets and nailed it to plywood and then painted scenes from the book on his newly created rough-hewn canvas. (PHOTOS/George Henson)“I wanted to teach something about art in terms of technique. I’m interested in more than the ‘paint-what-you-feel’ approach that for most people just turns out to be a big mess. I want to teach techniques and concepts that can actually improve skill level. So, I try to think of that, but I also try to think of some way the project can build the church and benefit the church,” he explained.

In the first camp, Worley taught color theory, and participants painted tiles to create a multi-paneled mural of Jesus interacting with children.

“I thought we could use something that would decorate and communicate that we love our children and Jesus does, too,” Worley said.

This year, the camp focused on design. Around the theme “Portraits of Grace,” participants took photographs they then used as the basis of pencil-drawn portraits of individuals who demonstrated different aspects of the “multifaceted glory of God.” Those portraits now adorn a wall at Prairie Creek Church.

One of the winners of an art contest sponsored by Prairie Creek Baptist Church in Plano. The church also held an art contest this year to go along with Worley’s sermon series titled “The Death of God”—based on Mark 14-16—that included several entries from artists outside the church. The church paid $1,500 for the winning entry, which included the church retaining the piece for display. Any artist whose work did not win first prize was allowed to sell it to anyone interested in buying it.

Worley hopes it will become an annual event.

He wanted more than some really fine art. He provided the notes for his 11 sermons to the artists, so they would have a good biblical foundation as the inspiration for the pieces.

“I’m always thinking of ways for us to connect with our community,” he said. “As I thought about my passions and what I bring to table, I thought one of the ways we can connect with the community is through the arts.

“Most churches don’t make that a point of priority, so I thought maybe that was a point of connection we could build on. Being an artist, I knew that I would have loved to have something like an art show that I could have participated in.”

Art has been a key component of his life as long as he can remember.

Another winning entry of an art contest sponsored by Prairie Creek Baptist Church in Plano.“I was always good at art from a very young age, and something I just really enjoyed doing,” Worley recalled.

As a teenager, he thought art would be his vocation.

“But when God called me, that took me a different direction,” he said. “I was 15 when God called me to preach, and it was definitely not something I felt equipped to do. So the struggle was not that I was giving up art, but that I just didn’t feel I was capable of preaching.”

While he knew he eventually would go to seminary to prepare for ministry, he pursued an undergraduate fine arts degree in painting. His father, a missionary in Spain, always encouraged his children to use all their talents for the glory of God, and so Worley felt it was important to develop his skills as an artist as well.

“This church, when I got here, had so many undecorated walls that I felt there was a lot I could do here,” he said with a smile.

Worley’s artistic influence also is felt on a more frequent basis through other avenues.

“Since I’ve been here, I’ve designed our bulletin covers to go along with the sermons I’m preaching, as well as any posters,” he explained.

One section of a mural depicting Jesus interacting with children, created by art camp participants.He also uses art as a backdrop for his sermons. While preaching through the book of Jonah, he took the wood from pallets and nailed it to plywood and then painted scenes from the book on his newly created rough-hewn canvas.

“I’ve always felt we as evangelicals tend to neglect the visual arts. I think we’re pretty good at using music in worship, but maybe as a response to the excesses of iconography and the idolatry that is often attached to that—where the artwork becomes the object of worship—we go to the opposite extreme and don’t hardly use it at all,” Worley said.

“I think it is important to use all that we have to glorify God. Art is a medium of communication. Like you can preach a sermon, you can create artwork that is thought-provoking and challenging and communicates a message.”

Bob Sexton to Liberty Baptist Church in Hawkins as pastor.

Charles Covin to First Baptist Church in Brenham as music pastor from First Baptist Church in Edna.

Rob Norris to First Baptist Church in Springlake as pastor.

Dustin Slaton to Green Acres Baptist Church, South Campus, in Tyler as campus pastor.

Rodney Wallace to Happy Union Baptist Church in Plainview as associate pastor, where he was minister to students.

Sarah Wallace to Happy Union Baptist Church in Plainview as minister to students.

Katie Rose Bonner of Lytle and Caitlin Wood of Miles were crowned Howard Payne University’s homecoming queen and princess, respectively. Bonner also serves as student body president. Wood counts Baptist Student Ministry among her activities.

Scott Duvall, professor of New Testament at Ouachita Baptist University and resident fellow at B.H. Carroll Theological Institute, recently had a book on Revelation published as a part of the Teach the Text Commentary Series.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BNG)—The goal of ministry to gays and lesbians isn’t to make them heterosexual but to make them holy, three speakers told a Southern Baptist Convention-sponsored conference on the gospel and homosexuality.

Rosaria Champagne Butterfield, a former college English professor who described her journey from a liberal, lesbian feminist to a full-time mother and pastor’s wife in her 2013 book Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert, addressed the Oct. 27-29 conference on “The Gospel, Homosexuality and the Future of Marriage.”

The Bible’s understanding of sexuality is “the best-kept secret on the planet, sadly even among Christians,” she insisted.

Not everyone designed for marriage

“When we as Christians call one another to sexual holiness, we are not saying that the answer is heterosexual marriage,” Butterfield said. “We acknowledge that marriage is God’s design, but we acknowledge that not everyone is designed for marriage.”

Christopher YuanChristopher Yuan, co-author of his own prodigal son-type memoir titled Out of a Far Country: A Gay Son’s Journey to God. A Broken Mother’s Search for Hope, recounted bad choices that landed him in prison on drug charges and a diagnosis of HIV-positive. After accepting Christ through reading the Bible in prison, he said, his transformation began slowly with his deliverance from drugs.

“The last thing that I was holding on to that I didn’t want to let go was my sexual identity, my sexuality,” he said. “As I read the Bible, it was so clear to me that God loved me unconditionally, and I also came across some passages in the Bible that seemed condemning of that core part of who I thought I was, my sexuality.

“So I went to the prison chaplain, asking his opinion, and to my surprise the chaplain told me that the Bible does not condemn homosexuality. He gave me a book explaining that view.”

Yuan said he took the book “in much curiosity” and in hope of finding biblical justification for celebrating his same-sex orientation.

“From a human perspective, I had every reason in the world to accept what that book was claiming, to justify the way I had lived, but God’s indwelling Holy Spirit convicted me that those assertions just did not line up with the word of God,” Yuan said. “I couldn’t even finish that book, and I gave it back to the chaplain.”

Turning to the Bible

Yuan then turned to the Bible, figuring if there were questions and debate about the six passages most frequently used to condemn homosexuality there must also be passages that would seem to bless a monogamous gay relationship.

“I read it cover-to-cover several times. I couldn’t find anything,” he said.

“So, a decision had to be made—either abandon God and pursue a gay relationship by allowing my desire for a relationship to dictate how I lived, or abandon pursuing a monogamous gay relationship by delivering myself from my desires and my sexuality and live as a follower of Jesus Christ. My decision was clear and obvious. I chose God.”

“I realized my sexuality shouldn’t be the core of who I was,” Yuan continued. “I told myself before that God loved unconditionally, but he doesn’t want me to change. But I realize now after reading the Bible that unconditional love is not the same thing as unconditional approval of my behavior.

“My identity should not be grounded only in my sexuality. My identity is not gay, homosexual or even heterosexual for that matter. But my sole identity as a child of the living God must be in Jesus Christ alone.”

Butterfield, a former tenured professor of English at Syracuse University, lived in a series of monogamous lesbian relationships before she converted to Christianity in 1999. She made that decision after reading the Bible cover-to-cover for a book project critiquing the Religious Right.

From a literary perspective, Butterfield said “it was hermeneutically shocking” to discover a unified message throughout Scripture “that God deals differently with people when people deal differently with God.”

“I was blown away by the democratization of original sin and the free gift of the gospel,” she said.” And most of all, my total undoing was to realize that I had thought I was on the side of righteousness and goodness and kindness and compassion, and it was my total undoing to realize that not only was it Jesus I had been persecuting the whole time, but it was my Jesus, my prophet, my priest, my savior, my king and my friend.”

When Christians talk about chastity or dealing with sexual temptation, they don’t mean repression or slapping people on the wrist, Butterfield said.

“We’re talking about acknowledging and loving the image of God in someone else deeply enough to be sacrificial with what he wants,” she said.

Christianity not a ‘quick fix for homosexuality’

Christianity isn’t a quick fix to homosexuality or any other temptation, she said. To this day, she said, she prays daily, “Lord, how has original sin distorted me, and how is indwelling sin manipulating me?”

“I’m no different now than then,” she said. “You’re no different than I am. These are our questions, and if we could share those instead of pretending we’re all cleaned up, we might have a powerful witness for what the gospel can do in a sexually broken world.”

Jackie Hill Perry, a Christian rapper who credits her faith for helping her to resist lust for other women and now is married and eight months pregnant, said during a panel discussion she doesn’t care much for people with same-sex attraction who agree homosexual activity is a sin and remain celibate self-identifying as a “gay Christian.”

“I don’t like it,” she said. “It’s like, ‘I’m a blaspheming Christian.’”

“I don’t know how one title that represents that I glorify God can be coupled with a title of sin that God hates,” Perry said. “It’s just weird. I feel like I would want to be titled in a way that truly represents that God gets all the glory in my life.”

NASHVILLE (BP) —The crisis in marriage preceded the rapid rise of legalized same-sex unions, and the church faces a daunting challenge in addressing it, speakers told 1,300 participants at a Southern Baptist conference on the issue.

Southern Baptist and other Christian leaders addressed a gamut of related issues at the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission’s national conference, “The Gospel, Homosexuality and the Future of Marriage.”

Heterosexuals, not gays, started the erosion of traditional marriage, Al Mohler told conference participants. (ERLC Image)A capacity crowd gathered at the Opryland Resort and Conference Center in Nashville at a time when court rulings have cleared the way for the legalization of gay marriage in 35 states, the percentage of never-married Americans is at a record high, cohabitation has become the default position of many adults and divorce remains a problem in the culture and church.

The crisis regarding the biblical, traditional definition of marriage as a permanent union of a man and a woman began “with the heterosexual subversion of marriage,” said Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theologial Seminary.

“The divorce revolution has done far more harm to marriage than same-sex marriage will ever do,” Mohler said.

Heterosexuals “showed how to destroy marriage by making it a tentative, hypothetical union for so long as it may last, turning it only into a contract” that produced a “consumer good,” he said.

“By the time the moral revolution on same-sex relations arrived on the scene, most of the moral revolution had already happened,” he said.

The church now is in a position of being “a moral minority,” Mohler said.

“We are accustomed to ministry from the top side in the culture, not from the underside,” he said. “We are accustomed to speaking from a position of strength and respect and credibility. And now we are going to be facing the reality that we are already, in much of America, speaking from a position of a loss of credibility.”

Other speakers pointed to the victory of romantic love over all other forms of love in the American mind as a major reason for the marriage crisis.

“I think we as a culture have already redefined marriage to a large extent,” said Trevin Wax, managing editor of The Gospel Project at LifeWay Christian Resources and a popular blogger.

The culture moved away from a “common-good” understanding of marriage to the view of the institution as a romantic, sexual relationship between two consenting adults who want to commit to one another and have the government’s approval, he said.

During the same panel discussion on millennials and marriage, cultural commentator John Stonestreet, a fellow of the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview, asserted: “Same-sex marriage is not the root of any problems. It’s the fruit of missing what the point of marriage actually is. It’s time to rebuild marriage. Stop talking about defending it and start rebuilding.”

Sherif Girgis, who cowrote a book arguing for the traditional view of marriage, said cultural indicators demonstrate why the issue is so important.

A matter of social justice

“Every aspect of the common good depends on a strong marriage. This is Matthew 25 stuff,” Girgis said, referring to Jesus’ words about ministry to the “least of these” in his teaching on the final judgment.

“It is a matter of social justice. That’s why your congregation should care about it. That’s why we can’t give this up or think that it’s just a matter for the church. We owe it to the least of these to make sure that, wherever possible, our culture gives them the best shot at being reared by the love of the man and woman who gave them life.”

Other speakers encouraged conference participants to think and act biblically toward those with whom they differ on issues related to sexual morality.

“We need to recognize that even though we disagree with the gay rights movement on many things, including sexual morality, including the definition of marriage, there are some human dignity issues involved,” ERLC President Russell Moore said.

“And we also need to recognize that we have gay and lesbian persons created in the image of God who are treated with indignity and really with evil and wickedness in many places in the world.”

‘Tone’ has hurt witness

Kevin Ezell, president of Southern Baptists’ North American Mission Board, said during a panel discussion, “The one thing that’s hurt our witness most is the tone” with which it has been conducted. That has “brought on some of the condemnation not on what we’ve said,” but how it has been said, he told the audience.

Glenn Stanton, director for global family formation studies at Focus on the Family, urged conference participants to develop genuine friendships with people who disagree with them.

“The great divider between us and them—and I hate to use that term …—is not sexuality,” Stanton said. “The great equalizer is our sin. The great equalizer is our need for repentance and new life in Christ.”

Friendship “is not a means to an end,” he said. “It is an end in itself. And as those relationships develop, then we can share the truth about our life, and it comes up naturally.”

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (RNS)—Southern Baptist leader Russell Moore denounced reparative therapy, saying the controversial treatment that attempts to change a person’s sexual orientation has been “severely counterproductive.”

Faithful Christian living demands obedience to biblical teaching, not automatic release from same-sex attraction, said Moore, president of Southern Baptists’ Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Russell Moore interviews Rosaria Butterfield at the ERLC conference on “The Gospel, Homosexuality and the Future of Marriage.” (ERLC Image)He spoke to a group of journalists covering the ERLC’s national conference, “The Gospel, Homosexuality and the Future of Marriage.”

“The utopian idea if you come to Christ and if you go through our program, you’re going to be immediately set free from attraction or anything you’re struggling with, I don’t think that’s a Christian idea,” Moore said. “Faithfulness to Christ means obedience to Christ. It does not necessarily mean that someone’s attractions are going to change.”

Evangelicals had an “inadequate view” of what same-sex attraction looks like, Moore said.

“The Bible doesn’t promise us freedom from temptation,” he said. “The Bible promises us the power of the Spirit to walk through temptation.”

Moore gave similar remarks to an audience of 1,300 people at the conference. The same morning, the conference featured three speakers who once considered themselves gay or lesbian.

Moore joins a chorus of psychologists and religious leaders who have departed from the once-popular therapy.

In 2009, the American Psychological Association adopted a resolution urging mental health professionals to avoid reparative therapy. Since then, California and New Jersey have passed laws banning conversion therapy for minors, and several other states have considered similar measures.

Earlier this year, the 50,000-member American Association of Christian Counselors amended its code of ethics eliminating reparative therapy and encouraging celibacy instead.

Traditional marriage advocate Sherif Girgis. (ERLC Image)John Paulk, a former spokesman for the ex-gay movement, apologized in 2013 for the reparative therapy he used to promote. Earlier this year, Yvette Schneider, who formerly worked for groups such as the Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America and Exodus International, published a “coming out” interview calling for bans on reparative therapy. In addition, nine former ex-gay leaders have denounced conversion therapy.

“There were utopian ideas about reparative therapy that frankly weren’t unique to evangelicalism,” Moore said. “That was something that came along in the 1970s and 1980s about the power of psychotherapy to do all sorts of things that we have a more nuanced views about now.”

Some pastors, like John Piper, a respected Minneapolis preacher and author, still encourage the possibility of change for those who have same-sex attractions.

Exodus International, one of the most prominent ex-gay ministries shut down in 2013. While other ex-gay groups such as Restored Hope Network still exist, many religious leaders are now encouraging people with same-sex attraction to consider celibacy.

“The idea that one is simply the sum of one’s sexual identity is something that is psychologically harmful ultimately,” Moore said. “And I think also we have a situation where gay and lesbian people have been treated really, really badly.”

The ERLC is working with parents of those who are gay and lesbian, Moore said.

“The response is not shunning, putting them out on the street,” he said. “The answer is loving your child.”

Moody Bible Institute professor Christopher Yuan. (ERLC Image)For years, gay evangelicals had three options—leave the faith, ignore their sexuality or try to change. But as groups such as Exodus became unpopular, a growing number of celibate gay Christians have sought to be true to both their sexuality and their faith.

A newer question among some Christians is whether those with same-sex attraction should self-identify as gay.

In his address, traditional marriage advocate Sherif Girgis plugged the website Spiritual Friendship, intended for Catholics and Protestants who identify as gay and celibate. Some Christians are debating whether identifying as gay or having a same-sex orientation is itself unbiblical.

“It’s not the way I would articulate it, because I think it puts on an appendage to a Christian identity,” Moore said. “So, I don’t see them as enemies who are trying to be destructive. I just don’t think it’s the best way to approach it.”

Rosaria Butterfield, a former lesbian who rejects the “ex-gay” label and the movement behind it, said Christians should not use “gay” as a descriptive adjective. Moore interviewed Butterfield, whose address at Wheaton College generated protests earlier this year, during the conference.

“There is no shame in repentance, because it simply proves that God was right all along,” Butterfield told Moore.

Another conference speaker and Moody Bible Institute professor Christopher Yuan teaches a more traditional message of celibacy for those who, like him, are attracted to the same sex. He shuns labels, but he believes more younger Christians are self-identifying as gay and celibate.

“I’m kind of label-less,” Yuan said before his address. “I think I’m a dying breed, though.”