WACO, Texas (ABP) – Baylor University officials say a blogosphere storm over a course listing of “Homosexuality as a Gateway Drug” was blown out of proportion.

Several websites and news blogs posted screen snapshots of an online listing for a Spring 2012 independent study course reportedly intended to analyze the conservative view of homosexuality as a sociology topic.

“This is an independent study course for one undergrad who brought forward the idea to a faculty member,” Baylor director of media communications Lori Fogleman told the Baylor Lariat. “It’s not a course that is open to students.”

The Lariat story said the course title was meant to be ironic. Fogleman said after another student complained that it was offensive, the listing was changed to "Special Topics in Sociology.” By that time the original title had gone viral, however, giving unwanted publicity to a Baptist school that in the past was included on the Princeton Review’s list of most “LGBT unfriendly” schools.

Fueling the reaction was another Lariat report from March, when Baylor declined to recognize a Sexual Identity Forum to promote discussion of homosexuality and other sexual preferences. According to the story, Baylor’s Student Activities Charter Council ruled the organization’s intent “was not consistent with university policy.”

A Baylor official told the student newspaper the university was sympathetic to concerns students in the group expressed, like hate speech against openly gay students, but they must be held to the same standards as other student groups.

According to policy, Baylor grants charters to student organizations that “contribute positively to the campus, adhere to expectations for the entire Baylor community, and abide by all university policies governing both individual students and student organizations.”

Chartered groups receive benefits such as the ability to reserve campus space, advertise activities on campus and apply for funding.

Baylor’s sexual misconduct policy forbids “sexual abuse, sexual harassment, sexual assault, incest, adultery, fornication and homosexual acts.”

–Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

NACOGDOCHES—Before Christians can bridge racial barriers to work together, they first must get to know each other in worship and fellowship, panelists and speakers told an interracial gathering at the predominantly African-American Zion Hill First Baptist Church in Nacogdoches.

That congregation worked with Austin Heights Baptist Church in Nacogdoches and the Center for Ministry Effectiveness and Educational Leadership at Baylor University to sponsor the event, "No Longer Strangers: Working Across Racial Lines."

Panelists discussing how to work across racial lines are (left to right) Patrick Sanders, social services specialist with Nacogdoches Head Start; Philip Attebery, dean of Baptist Missionary Association Theological Seminary in Jacksonville; Linda Harris, director of field education with the School of Social Work at Stephen F. Austin State University; and Jay Abernathy, pastor of First Baptist Church in Palestine. (PHOTO/Julie Covington/Baylor Center for Ministry Effectiveness & Educational Leadership)

Christian unity that spans racial divides requires pastors and church leaders to lead by example by associating with brothers and sisters of other races, said James Ervin, pastor of Iron Wheel Missionary Baptist Church in Nacogdoches.

"If we never get together, we will never come together," Ervin said.

Unity means harmony, not uniformity, he emphasized. True Christian unity provides freedom for believers to think, feel, worship and serve in a variety of ways.

"It's all right to be different. There must be liberty. There is no unity where there is no freedom," Ervin said. "It's hard to run with shackles on. It's hard to lift up Jesus with handcuffs on."

Kyle Childress, pastor of Austin Heights Baptist Church, recalled wise counsel he received more than two decades ago when he asked how he as a young white minister could build relationships with African-American pastors: "Go and listen."

Show up at black ministerial alliance meetings and African-American social service groups, sit at the back and seek to be a student, not a teacher, a respected black minister told him. In time, as he listened and learned, Childress noted, he earned trust and developed deep friendships with African-American pastors.

Participating in a panel discussion, Jay Abernathy, pastor of First Baptist Church in Palestine, described an incident when he served a church in Stamford and also was on the local volunteer fire department. He remembered a Sunday afternoon when he helped put out a fire that came close to a local African-American church—an act that endeared him to the church's pastor.

"There are still fires that need to be put out," Abernathy said.

While segregationist Jim Crow laws have been overturned, their lingering legacy still influences how blacks and whites relate to each other, he asserted. "Decisions made long ago still affect us," he said.

Churches should face up to the reality of racist attitudes and deal with them honestly if they are serious about making an impact on the communities they serve, said Patrick Sanders, social services specialist with Nacogdoches Head Start.

"I can't think of a better place to start the conversation about racism than in the church," Sanders said.

But before Christians can hope to transform society, they may need to get their own houses in order, he noted. Fifty-seven years after the Supreme Court ruled "separate but equal" segregated schools unconstitutional, "Sunday school is still the most segregated school in America," he observed.

Philip Attebery, dean at Baptist Missionary Association Theological Seminary in Jacksonville, noted eight to 10 nations and about two-dozen cultures typically are represented at his school in any given semester.

"Jesus is the Lord of every single culture," he said. Focusing on Christ enables people from diverse backgrounds to overcome differences and find unity, Attebery insisted.

"It may not be natural" for people of different races and varied cultures to love each other, he acknowledged. "But there's a supernatural love we have for each other."

Failure to recognize the image of God in every person and to perpetuate racial barriers is an affront to the Creator, said Linda Harris, a Christian layperson and director of field education for the School of Social Work at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches.

"We snub God when we take what God has said is good and treat it badly," Harris said. "When we choose to deal only with our own kind rather than cross over and enjoy all God's creation, we are treating God's good creation badly."

The nearer Christians draw to Jesus in their worship, the closer they get to each other, said Joel Gregory, professor of preaching at Baylor University's Truett Theological Seminary.

"The only way we will all be one is if we all are gazing at the glory" of God," Gregory said.

Examples in nature—such as the intertwined roots of coastal redwood that enable them to stand for centuries and the adhesive attraction of water molecules—testify to God's desire for cohesive unity, he asserted.

"If this is true in the natural world, how much more true should it be in the spiritual?" he asked.

When Jesus prayed for unity among his disciples and all those who would follow after them, he had in mind people of all nations, races and ethnic groups who would become Christians, Gregory said.

"We all are direct descendants spiritually of the eleven in that upper room, plus the Apostle Paul," he said. "We could trace our spiritual ancestry back to them."

Christians not only are united by that common spiritual ancestry, but also by the worship of the God who a Holy Trinity—three in one, Gregory noted. Christian unity has a heavenly origin, he noted.

"There is literally nothing on earth like it," he said. "We must gaze at the glory, and as we are pulled into that divine triune love, we will be pulled to one another."

NEW YORK (ABP) – Southern Baptists who question Gov. Mitt Romney’s Christianity have more in common with Mormonism than they know, Yale literary critic and author Harold Bloom opined in a New York Times commentary Nov.12.

Under an op-ed headline “Will This Election Be the Mormon Breakthrough?" Bloom agreed that Mormonism as envisioned by founding prophet Joseph Smith “was as much a departure from historical Christianity as Islam was and is.”

“But then, so in fact are most manifestations of what is now called religion in the United States, including the Southern Baptist Convention, the Assemblies of God Pentecostalists and even our mainline Protestant denominations,” Bloom continued.

Bloom revisited assertions from his influential 1992 book The American Religion: The Emergence of the Post-Christian Nation, which argued that the central religious experience on the American continent has been European Christianity in name only.

Bloom identified the Church of Jesus Christ, Latter-day Saints and the Southern Baptist Convention as the two best expressions of an American religion distinguished by an elevation of a personal and individual experience of God.

While most Baptists in the United States trace their historic roots to Europe 400 years ago, Bloom contended that Southern Baptists emerged as a distinctly American tradition in the early 20th century with theologian E.Y. Mullins, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, in his Axioms of Religion.

While Mormons believe they can become gods, Bloom said, Mullins’ teaching of soul competency places God within, where no one can come between the individual and God.

Bloom said Mormon and Southern Baptist religions are both “fundamentally experiential religions” closer to Gnosticism — an early heretical teaching that each individual possesses a divine spark and salvation consists of liberation of that divine spark from the body and culture of the day — than to historic Christianity.

“Unlike most countries, we have no overt national religion; but a partly concealed one has been developing among us for two centuries now,” Bloom wrote in The American Religion. “It is almost purely experiential, and despite its insistences [to the contrary], it is scarcely Christian in any traditional way. A religion of the self burgeons, under many names, and seeks to know its own inwardness, in isolation. What the American self has found, since about 1800, is its own freedom — from the world, from time, from other selves.”

“A religion of the self is not likely to be a religion of peace,” Bloom observed, “since the American self tends to define itself through its war against otherness.”

Referencing recent comments in the New York Times piece by First Church, Dallas, Pastor Robert Jeffress describing Mormonism as a non-Christian cult, Bloom recalled prophesying in 1992 that by 2020 Mormonism would become the dominant religion in the western United States. He said he went wrong because he did not anticipate in the last two decades “the deliberate dwindling of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints into just one more Protestant sect.” Without that change, he said, Romney and fellow Mormon Jon Huntsman could not be considered plausible candidates for president.

As for his preference, Bloom, who is Jewish, observed: “Mormonism’s best inheritance from Joseph Smith was his passion for education, hardly evident in the anti-intellectual and semi-literate Southern Baptist Convention. I wonder though which is more dangerous, a knowledge-hungry religious zealotry or a proudly stupid one? Either way we are condemned to remain a plutocracy and oligarchy. I can be forgiven for dreading a further strengthening of theocracy in that powerful brew.”

–Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

DIDCOT, England (ABP) – The Baptist Times, an award-winning newspaper published weekly for British Baptists for 156 years, will cease both print and digital editions at the end of the year.

Bill Johnston, chairman of the Baptist Times board of directors, said due to declining circulation and advertising sales, the newspaper has increasingly had to depend on subsidies from the Baptist Union of Great Britain to operate. In July the Baptist union’s trustees voted to end financial support for the newspaper next spring.

“The directors have considered a number of business options for the paper but with profound regret now conclude that it must close,” Johnston said. He expressed gratitude to the Baptist Times staff for their work and expertise to produce a weekly publication “greatly appreciated by its readership and widely respected in the Christian publishing world.”

Jonathan Edwards, general secretary of the Baptist Union of Great Britain, responded to the news with a tribute.

“The Baptist Times has occupied a huge place in the life of our union and its passing will be a matter of sadness to thousands of people,” Edwards said. “It was not only valued by Baptists in this country but also by many of our ecumenical and international partners, who often tell me of how much they appreciate it.”

Editor Mark Woods expressed gratitude for the “great privilege” of serving the Baptist Times and paid tribute to staff colleagues over the years.

“However, we have not been immune to the commercial pressures on newspapers in general or to the effect of wider issues in church life,” he said. “We accept our closure with sadness, but appreciate the care given to the decision and the pastoral care shown to the staff.”

Amanda Allchorn, head of communications at the Baptist Union of Great Britain, said the Baptist Times brand would continue in a new online service to be launched next spring. The resource, www.baptisttimes.co.uk, will be run by the communications department and offer news, commentary, features and a digest of weekly news for churches to download and print out.

A special edition in January 2012 will celebrate the Baptist Times’ history and the contribution to the Baptist denomination and the wider Christian world for more than 150 years.

The Baptists Times is independent but has had a close working relationship with the Baptist Union of Great Britain. The newspaper’s offices are in the Baptist House at Didcot in Oxfordshire.

–Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

DALLAS—William Dewey Presley, one of the most influential leaders of his generation in Baptist life, died Nov. 10 at the age of 93.

Presley helped numerous Baptist and Christian causes, including those of the Baptist Foundation of Texas, Baylor Health Care System, Baylor University, Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, Brother Bill’s Helping Hand Ministry in Dallas and the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

Among his many accomplishments, Presley was instrumental in saving Dallas Baptist University from financial trouble in the 1980s when the school didn’t have the funds to pay its faculty and staff. Presley helped connect the school with donors to keep it running.

Presley was key in the effort that moved the BGCT offices from downtown Dallas to its current location just east of downtown. In a testament to the banking leader’s financial acumen, Presley encouraged the convention to sell its old office space and used the money to build its current facilities on land that was owned by Baylor Health Care System. The current building was constructed debt free without the use of any mission money.

BGCT Executive Director Emeritus Bill Pinson praised Presley’s banking knowledge, memory, compassion and commitment to Christ. As a leading banker, Pinson believes Presley may have had as much of an impact on Dallas as any Baptist of his generation.

“Mr. Presley was without a doubt one of the most influential laypersons in Baptist life, but his impact for good extended far beyond the Baptist world,” Pinson said. “A creative, highly successful business person, a leader in civic and charitable causes, a devout leader in his church, a loving husband and father—the width and breadth of his involvement for good is breathtaking. Above all, he was a devout follower of Jesus Christ who wanted more than anything to be a faithful servant of his Lord in all areas of life.” 

Presley, who received the Texas Baptist Elder Statesman Award, was a member of Park Cities Baptist Church in Dallas where he taught the men’s Sunday School class for 50 years as well as holding other leadership roles such as chairman of the deacons.

Titles and accolades tell only part of Presley’s story, however, Pinson said. There are an untold number of moments where Presley simply was the presence of Christ where it was often needed most.

“On a personal note, Mr. Presley was my friend, mentor, and example. He chaired the search committee that recommended me in 1982 as executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas and then, as he had done with my predecessor James Landes, continued serving in the efforts of the convention with his extraordinary wisdom, integrity, and understanding of the world in which we live and serve. Unquestionably, the Lord Jesus will welcome him to heaven:  ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’”

Memorial gifts may be sent to: Baylor Health Care System Foundation c/o Gil D. Taylor IV Memorial 3600 Gaston Ave., Ste. 100 Dallas, 75246; Brother Bill's Helping Hand P.O. Box 565846 Dallas, 75356; Baylor University School of Social Work, One Bear Pl. #97320 Waco, 76798.

Mason to chair CBF search committee. George Mason, pastor of Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas, has been named chair of a nine-member search committee to find a new Cooperative Baptist Fellowship executive coordinator. The committee, named by CBF officers, will seek a replacement for Daniel Vestal, who retires as executive coordinator June 30, 2012. Serving with Mason are: Jack Glasgow, senior pastor of Zebulon Baptist Church, Zebulon, N.C., and former national moderator of CBF; Wendell Griffen, pastor of New Millennium Church, Little Rock, Ark., and a former Arkansas Court of Appeals judge; LeAnn Gunter Johns, of Macon, Ga., former church staff member at churches in Georgia and California and current steering committee member of Baptist Women in Ministry of Georgia; Cynthia Holmes, attorney in St. Louis, Mo., and former national moderator of CBF; Kyle Reese, senior pastor of Hendricks Avenue Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Fla.; Artemia Tamayo, church administrator of Memorial Baptist Church, Arlington, Va.; Tony Vincent, minister of Christian education at Trinity Baptist Church, Seneca, S.C.; and Joy Yee, pastor of Nineteenth Avenue Baptist Church in San Francisco, Calif., and former national CBF moderator. Nominations for the executive coordinator can be sent to CBFsearchcommittee@gmail.com.

CBF gifts fall short. The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship ended its fiscal year $2.1 million short of its 2010-2011 budget goal of $14.5 million in total revenues, controller Larry Hurst reported to the CBF Coordinating Council. Anticipating a shortfall, Hurst said, staff limited expenditures to 85 percent of budgeted amounts. The finance committee proposed a $12.3 million budget for 2012-13, the same bottom line in the current 2011-2012 spending plan. Staff will develop next year's budget proposal for review by the finance committee and vote by the council in February. Undesignated revenues in 2010-2011 totaled $6.8 million, 18 percent below budget projections of $8.25 million, Hurst said. The offering for global missions took in $4.6 million, 16 percent short of an offering goal of $5.5 million. That was after CBF leaders held conference calls and meetings with more than 100 pastors and 155 individual donors as part of a "Keeping the Promises" campaign to ensure the global missions offering raised enough money to keep current fully funded missionaries on the field.

N.M. Baptists affirm Glorieta. New Mexico Baptists overwhelmingly passed a resolution urging the Southern Baptist Convention and LifeWay Christian Resources to ensure that Glorieta Conference Center continues its ministry to Southern Baptists "well into the future or until Jesus returns." The resolution, adopted at the state convention's annual meeting at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Farmington, N.M., was in response to LifeWay's recent announcement that Glorieta's operations were being scaled back and that trustees were seeking "viable options" for disposition of the property, including sale.

Georgia university workers must take the pledge. Shorter University has adopted a new faith statement that affirms biblical inerrancy, and the school is requiring faculty and staff to sign a lifestyle pledge that rejects homosexuality and forbids the use of alcoholic beverages in public. The mandatory "personal lifestyle statement" asks employees to agree to "be loyal to the mission of Shorter University as a Christ-centered institution affiliated with the Georgia Baptist Convention" and pledge not to use or sell illegal drugs. The pledge includes the statement: "I reject as acceptable all sexual activity not in agreement with the Bible, including, but not limited to, premarital sex, adultery and homosexuality." The statement about alcohol does not require that employees be teetotalers, but it forbids use of alcoholic beverages in the presence of students or in public settings like restaurants, concerts or sporting events. Employees must not attend any university-sponsored event if they have consumed alcohol in the last six hours and pledge not to "promote or encourage the use of alcohol." 

Chinese honor Baptist missionary. An American Baptist missionary was the only foreigner among more than 30 recipients of a charity award granted recently by the government of Jiangsu Province, China. Chosen from nearly 1,000 nominees, recipients of the first-ever Jiangsu Charity Award presented in the ancient capital city of Nanjing included Judy Sutterlin, an American Baptist International Ministries missionary in the People's Republic of China appointed in 1995. The award, designed to recognize the role played by charity and philanthropy in improving people's lives and promoting social harmony, recognized Sutterlin as a "most caring and benevolent model" for service. Sutterlin, who teaches at Nanjing Union Theological Seminary, was nominated by the Amity Foundation, an International Ministries partner created at the initiative of Chinese Christians in 1985. The Amity Foundation is overseen by the China Christian Council, an umbrella organization for China's Protestant churches and member of the World Council of Churches.

DALLAS—More than 300 friends honored the contributions of longtime anti-gambling activist and Texas Baptist lobbyist Weston Ware and paid tribute to the legacy of Christian ethicist T.B. Maston during a Nov. 4 banquet at Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas.

Weston Ware, retired director of citizenship and public policy with the Texas Baptist Christian Life Commission, with Javier Elizondo, executive vice president and provost at Baptist University of the Americas. (David Clanton Photo)

Ware, retired director of citizenship and public policy with the Texas Baptist Christian Life Commission, received the T.B. Maston Christian Ethics Award from the Maston Foundation.

In presenting the award, Bill Pinson, who was both a student and later a colleague of Maston, noted Ware's contributions as a leader of the Peace Corps and VISTA, as a veteran denominational worker and as a faithful member of Cliff Temple Baptist Church in Dallas.

Being named as "one of Maston's boys"—a doctoral student of the pioneering professor who taught Christian ethics at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary 40 years—is one of the highest honors imaginable, Ware noted.

The banquet featured presentations by several of Maston's students—Pinson, executive director emeritus of the Baptist General Convention of Texas; James Dunn, former executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and professor at Wake Forest University's Divinity School; and Jimmy Allen, former president of the Southern Baptist Radio and Television Commission.

Keynote speaker Javier Elizondo, executive vice president and provost at Baptist University of the Américas, noted Maston—along with Clarence Jordan, founder of the interracial Koinonia farm in Georgia—represented "a Baptist strand I could be proud to be part of" as a Hispanic Christian.

Jordan embodied the prophetic tradition of boldly and bluntly speaking truth to power, and Maston set the example of a gentle teacher whose probing questions and "simple acts of goodness" inspired his students, Elizondo said.

Although Elizondo studied at Southwestern Seminary after Maston retired, he noted how the influential professor continued to make an impact through those who had been his students, such as his teacher, Bill Tillman, who went on to become the first person to occupy the T.B. Maston Chair of Christian Ethics at Hardin-Simmons University.

"The second-generation—'Maston's boys'—were like second-hand smoke," he said. Just as second-hand tobacco smoke presents a pervasive and powerful threat to do harm, Maston's students permeated Baptist life and followed their teacher's admonition to "do good."

"By knowing the Maston boys, I could tell Dr. Maston had been with Jesus," Elizondo said.

A music and missions effort between Texas Baptists and Ukrainian Christians recently took a different tone.

The Breakthrough Band—a group of Texas Baptist music ministers and Singing Men of Texas members—brought its brand of contemporary worship music to the Ukraine during eight October concerts across the country.

Members of the Breakthrough Band—a group composed of Texas Baptist music ministers who are part of the Singing Men of Texas—performed eight concerts last month in the Ukraine.

An intentional spin-off from the large Singing Men of Texas choir that last performed traditional Christian music in the Ukraine, the band sought to reach out to younger Ukrainians. More than 1,900 professions of faith in Christ were recorded during the concert tour.

"God moved in mighty ways during our Ukraine Breakthrough tour," said Michael Bridges, worship leader at First Baptist Church in Sunnyvale and member of the Breakthrough Band.

"We found the people of that great country open to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our style of music was exactly what the high school and college-age Ukrainians needed. I was so taken by their questions after the concerts. God moved many road blocks and allowed us to see his glory."

The tour is the latest effort in an initiative between the Singing Men of Texas, Michael Gott International, the Baptist General Convention of Texas and Ukrainian Christians. The Singing Men of Texas pledged to focus their international mission efforts through 2012 on the Ukraine. In addition to a 2010 choir tour and the Breakthrough Band's recent trip, another two choir trips are planned for 2012. Funds given to missions through the Texas Baptist Cooperative Program help finance the trips.

During the concert tour, the Breakthrough Band proclaimed God's love and freedom found through a relationship with Jesus Christ. Sean Mitchell, contemporary worship leader at First Baptist Church in Garland, shared his testimony through video of God's ability to change lives. The need for a personal relationship with Jesus resonated with a young audience of Ukrainians who are searching for meaningful relationships, band members said.

Gott shared an evangelistic message translated into Russian.

"Not only did the tour yield a great harvest, it encouraged the Christians that we connected with. The Christians we met and served were grateful for our being there and overwhelmed that we would come such a great distance to share our music with them. A mission trip such as this can be a life-changing experience," said Steve Colburn, Singing Men of Texas member, worship leader and band member from Corsicana.

"I wholeheartedly recommend anyone who desires a deeper relationship with God, to experience a mission endeavor such as this. Ukraine is ripe for the harvest. Thank the Lord for those whose can now claim him as their Lord and Savior."

DURHAM, N.C. (ABP)—About one in five American Protestant churches is independent of any de-nomination, and about one in five Protestants attends those independent churches, Duke sociologist Mark Chaves reports in his new book, American Religion: Contemporary Trends.  

Chaves, professor of sociology, religion, and divinity at Duke University in Durham, N.C., and director of the National Congregations Study, said the number of Protestants attending independent churches increased from 14 percent in 1989 to 19 percent in 2006.

Mark Chaves

"If the unaffiliated congregations were all in one denomination, they would constitute the second-largest in number of participants (behind only the Roman Catholic Church) and the largest number of congregations," Chaves writes.

"Although most Protestant churches are denominational, a noticeable and growing minority are not formally affiliated with any denomination."

Chaves says an increase of 5 percentage points in the number of people attending independent churches may not seem like much, but he noted growth occurred over a period of just eight years. Those numbers probably understate the cultural significance of the trend, because denominational affiliations seem to be decreasingly important to congregations and their members even when they do exist, he added.

Nearly two-thirds of Protestant megachurches formally belong to a denomination, Chaves said, but many downplay those connections. Even though the annual income of denominationally affiliated congregations increased faster than inflation between 1998 and 2006 in real dollars, the amount of money those congregations passed on to their denominational offices declined from about 5 percent of their income in 1998 to 4 percent in 2006.

While some congregations re-duced contributions to a denomination to protest its policies or priorities, Chaves said, decline in denominational giving is "a longer-term trend driven mainly by the rising costs of running a local congregation."

Chaves devotes one chapter in the book to the so-called "mainline decline." He notes the percentage of Americans affiliated with theologically more liberal mainline denominations has declined steadily since 1972, while the percentage of people in more conservative evangelical congregations increased slightly until the 1990s and has remained stable since then. By 2008, twice as many people claimed affiliation with conservative de-nominations as with theologically more liberal ones—28 percent compared to 14 percent.

While "one of the best-known religious trends of the last several decades," Chaves contends the decline of liberal Protestantism "often is misunderstood."

"It is commonly believed that this trend is the result of people fleeing liberal de-nominations for more conservative churches, but this is not what happened," Chaves writes. "Indeed the flow of people from more liberal to more conservative denominations started to slow exactly when conservative churches made their greatest gains relative to liberal denominations."

Among people born before 1950 and raised in a mainline denomination, 16 percent shifted to a more conservative denomination as adults. But beginning with those born in the 1960s, more raised in a mainline church became religiously unaffiliated than became evangelical.

"The most important trend is not an increased flow from liberal to conservative churches," he writes. "Rather the most important change is decreased flow of people in the other direction. In the not-too-distant past, conservative denominations lost many more people to liberal denominations than they do now."

Upward social mobility was a big reason people formerly flocked to the mainline churches, Chaves said. Among upwardly mobile people who were raised as conservative Protestants, 28 percent of those born before 1931 switched to a more liberal denomination as an adult.

Chaves noted women in conservative evangelical churches tend on average to bear one more child than their liberal Protestant counterparts. While that may not seem significant, over the course of several generations, the impact multiplies.

As denominations lose members or resources, Chaves said, cuts to national and regional staffs often follow, resulting in a weakened denominational infrastructure. Many people don't seem bothered by that, perhaps because they think of waste and inefficiency in denominational agencies, they disapprove with some of the initiatives pursued by denominational agencies or they think congregations can find materials and services that denominational agencies traditionally provided somewhere else.

Given that, it may be surprising how often congregations turn to their denomination for help and resources. One congregation in four received some sort of direct help, expertise or service from a denomination in the last year, Chaves noted.

More than 90 percent of the outside help congregations received on personnel or staff issues came from denominational sources, Chaves reported. Only on building and facilities issues did a majority of the consulting help used by congregations come from other than a denominational source.

DALLAS—Dallas Baptist University honored Norm Miller, Interstate Batteries chairman, with the 2011 Russell H. Perry Free Enterprise Award during the annual award dinner, Nov. 7 at the Anatole Hotel in Dallas.

Established in 1988, the gala dinner honors leaders whose lives are testimonies of achievements in free enterprise and service to the community. The event is named in memory of Dallas business leader and philanthropist Russell H. Perry. Over the past 24 years, the dinner has raised more than $3.5 million in scholarship funds for nearly 1,525 DBU students.

Miller began his career with Interstate Batteries shortly after graduating from North Texas State University in 1962. In the past 48 years, he has moved through the ranks of Interstate—from his father's Tennessee distributorship, to the national field sales team at Dallas corporate headquarters, and on to the helm of Interstate's executive manage-ment team.

He assumed the president and chairman roles in 1978 after working 16 years under his mentor and company founder John Searcy. Since then, Interstate has grown to become the top-ranked replacement battery company in North America with 200,000 dealers across the United States and in Canada.

Additionally, Miller led the company in founding the Interstate Batteries Great American Race in 1983, which has become the world's richest old car race and America's premier vintage car event.

In 1989, he pioneered Interstate's entry into NASCAR. Teaming up with Joe Gibbs Racing in 1992, Interstate won the Daytona 500 in 1993 and the prestigious Winston Cup Cham-pionship in 2000.

Miller was recognized by DBU for his strong Christian leadership at Interstate Batteries as well as in the community. He serves as a board member for Dallas Theological Seminary and is a founding team member of I Am Second.

He and his wife, Anne, have two children, Tracy and Scott; five grandchildren; and one great-grandson.

Past recipients of the Russell H. Perry Free Enterprise Award include Wright Lassiter (2010), Tom Leppert (2009), Drayton McLane Jr. (2008), Andy and Joan Horner (2007), David Dean (2006), Pete Schenkel (2005); Noble Hurley (2004), the Weir Furniture family (2003), George A. Shafer (2002), Mary C. Crowley (2001), Erle Nye (2000), Ross Perot Jr. (1999), Jim L. Turner (1998), Rodger Meier (1997), Forrest Smith (1996), Lonnie "Bo" Pilgrim (1995), Bob Minyard, Liz Minyard, Gretchen Minyard Williams, J.L. Sonny Williams (1994), Boone Powell Sr. and Boone Powell Jr. (1993), Kenneth H. Cooper (1992), Tom Landry (1991), Maurice and Ebby Halliday Acers (1990), Trammell Crow (1989) and John M. Stemmons Sr. (1988).

Mention "cooperation" and many Baptists think of the Cooperative Program, the Southern Baptist Convention's unified giving plan.

But Baptists may have forgotten that instead of money, cooperation historically grew around accomplishing kingdom work together—primarily missions—when churches realized they could do more working together than they could on their own.

The idea that believers voluntarily could cooperate set Baptists apart, but it took decades for the concept to develop and to be used extensively among churches and other Baptist entities. That process took time because of Baptists' distinctive beliefs and history, said Bill Pinson, Baptist General Convention of Texas executive director emeritus, in a series of Baptist distinctives articles.

Objections to cooperation

Some objected to cooperative effort because the Bible, they said, makes no provision for any organization except the local church. But other Baptists cited passages such as Acts 15:2, 2 Corinthians 8-9, Galatians 1:2 and 2:1-10 and Revelation 1-3 as the basis for voluntary cooperation.

The strongly held belief in the autonomy of the local church caused others to resist the cooperative movement. Many feared organizations outside the local body would attempt to exercise control over the churches. Those who pushed cooperation overcame this objection by stressing its voluntary nature.

The Pennsylvania Association, formed in 1707, became the first formal outgrowth of the voluntary cooperative effort in America. Organized after the English model, it existed for fellowship and discussion of church issues.

Cooperation in diversity

Diversity and competition were additional problems the concept faced. Much of the diversity among Baptists—at least 50 groups and subgroups exist in the United States today—grew out of two distinctly Baptist principles—religious freedom, with its emphasis on soul competency and the congregational form of governance closely tied to it.

Diversity and competition "still keep some churches from cooperating with each other. However, many churches are willing to cooperate voluntarily, as long as basic convictions are not compromised, for the advancement of evangelism, missions, education and benevolence," Pinson wrote.

But diversity often did—and still does—stand in the way. Albert W. Wardin Jr., a retired history professor at Belmont University, noted theological and cultural differences often have disrupted cooperative attempts.

Theological differences around issues of Calvinism, Arminianism (free will) and fundamentalism (moderate and militant) have disrupted cooperation.

"Moderate fundamentalists will cooperate with evangelicals of like faith, but militant fundamentalists refuse cooperation with evangelicals who, in turn, may cooperate with theological liberals," Wardin wrote in Doing Diversity Baptist Style: Documents for Faith and Witness.

Cultural and ethnicity issues surfaced when Southern Baptists split with Northern Baptists, now known as American Baptist Churches-USA. Wardin asserts the initial split between the two was cultural, not theological. Northern Baptists objected to slavery, while Southern Baptists "defended" the South's "way of life." The Southern Baptist Convention declared the approach to missions caused the split.

A collaborative approach

Several factors challenge Baptists' traditional cooperative efforts, Pinson believes. Denominations are seen as relics and Baptist distinctives as irrelevant, with some Baptists preferring to cooperate through affinity groups. The rise of megachurches that can fund their own efforts and don't need the help associations or conventions can provide also disrupts cooperation.

Denominational conflict and pressure to conform to demonstrate "cooperation" also are factors.

But Bill Leonard, a professor of church history at Wake Forest University School of Divinity, believes Baptists can form new organizational relationships based on collaboration. "Twenty-first century 'concerns' suggest, perhaps demand, that multiple Baptist groups extend their collaborative ministries while pursuing more formal institutional connections," he wrote in an opinion article for Associated Baptist Press.

"Denominational realities compel consideration of a more integrative associationalism between such Baptist communions as the ABC/USA, the Progressive National Baptist Convention, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, the Lott Carey Missionary Convention and the Alliance of Baptists."

He pointed out the New Baptist Covenant effort has helped foster that type of cooperation. "But without more substantive denominational affiliations, that may be too little too late."

"Are we missing the big picture?"

That's the question some Christian leaders are asking as America's centuries-old denominational patterns unravel, while denominational distinctions seem as entrenched—and unbridgeable—as ever.

In a post-denominational society, can churches retain theological integrity and still find common ground with people who hold differing beliefs?

"Christians today are falling into the trap of tribalism," said Jonathan Merritt, creative director at Cross Pointe Church, a Southern Baptist congregation in suburban Atlanta. "Not only are we part of the Baptist tribe, but also the Southern Baptist Convention tribe, the Reformed and non-Reformed tribe, the traditional and contemporary tribe.

"I love my heritage, but ultimately I'm looking for ways to build the kingdom" of God, said Merritt, a 28-year-old activist who has led some Southern Baptists across denominational lines to address environmental issues. "Most young Christians want to be part of the Jesus tribe. That paradigm is shaping the way we should answer this question and the way a lot of young Christians answer this question."

Some Christians insist the question—and the answer—is broader and compels them to partner with other faith traditions.

"The world's brokenness means people of faith must collaborate, and we have learned that goodwill Baptists can work with other faiths and Christian traditions to advance the common good," said Robert Parham, executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics in Nashville, Tenn.

"We readily work with others out of faithfulness to Jesus' great commandment to love our neighbor. Loving neighbors means seeking their welfare, advancing the common good. While we might disagree with other faith expressions over the divinity of Jesus, interpreting the Bible, the meaning of baptism and the practices of the church, we refuse to let those issues become stumbling blocks keeping us from loving our neighbor."

Worries that interdenominational and interfaith cooperation will dilute theological integrity aren't new. Some 19th-century Baptists insisted on the exclusive validity of Baptist churches.

But their 21st-century descendants find the questions less clear-cut and endlessly vexing: Can an evangelical Christian vote for a Mormon presidential candidate? Can Baptists join Muslims and Hindus at a worldwide Catholic-convened day of prayer for peace? Where are the boundaries—if any?

Social ministries and disaster relief

Partnering to meet human needs, especially following a natural disaster, presents the fewest dilemmas, some Christian relief workers insist.

"Disaster response and hunger relief are areas in which Baptists are involved where we can set aside differences to meet needs of victims and hurting people," said Dean Miller, who coordinates disaster relief for the Baptist General Association of Virginia.

"When people are hungry or need a tree cut off the roof of their houses, nothing about translations of the Bible or the meaning of baptism comes into play at all. That's true not just among Baptists but among all religious groups and non-religious groups."

Miller could think of no circumstance that would prevent the BGAV from cooperating in disaster response with any group—and that includes a rival state convention, the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia.

"We have a great relationship with the SBCV in disaster relief," said Miller—no small feat in the tortured post-conflict environment of Baptists in the American South.

When disasters occur in Texas, disaster relief units both from Texas Baptist Men and the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention may be on the scene. Likewise, after TBM begins to wrap up its work in providing emergency food service and other ministry as a first-responder, the Baptist General Convention of Texas offers ongoing disaster response to help with recovery and rebuilding.

Further complicating matters, TBM is affiliated with the BGCT and receives no financial support from the SBTC. However, some of its lay leaders are members of SBTC congregations, and their churches sometimes work closely with the men's missions organization.

By the early 1990s, years of theological disputes among Southern Baptist Convention churches had propelled many moderates and progressives out of the national denomination and into new organizations like the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and the Alliance of Baptists.

Conflict eventually filtered into the SBC's state affiliates, sometimes with opposite results—in Texas and Virginia, ultra-conservatives left older, moderate state conventions to form new right-leaning ones. In Missouri, where conservatives prevailed, moderates formed an alternative network of churches. For Baptists in those states, overcoming bitter memories and continuing suspicions is nearly as challenging as setting aside doctrinal distinctions.

But at least in relief ministries, said Miller, focusing on "the big picture" has resulted in amiable collaboration.

"Since I've been state coordinator, the BGAV and the SBCV have shared responsibility in disaster relief in a variety of ways," he said, including following a spate of tornadoes in Southwest Virginia last spring and Hurricane Irene last August.

It's trickier, Miller concedes, when immediate responses transition into more explicitly evangelistic efforts.

"In a longer-term response that might include a strategy of church planting or evangelism, there's potential for conflict," he said. "If a (Christian relief) organization chose to bring its faith issues earlier in the process, it might cause us to re-evaluate how we work with them.

"That's not to say we aren't motivated by our faith from the outset of disaster responses. When we hand out food, we want to take opportunities to share Christ, but we don't staple a gospel tract on the food. If we were asked to do so, we'd say no."

Mission engagement

Cooperating across denominational boundaries in evangelism is more difficult, mission strategists insist, and some missionary-sending organizations carefully demarcate the frontiers.

Almost 5,000 overseas missionaries of the SBC's International Mission Board follow a policy of five "concentric circles" defining cooperation with other faith groups.

"IMB missionaries do not enter into strategic relationships randomly but with church-planting movement intentionality and in accord with the biblical principles of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message," notes the policy adopted by IMB trustees.

"Because our relationships have this intentionality they have different guidelines depending on the purpose we are pursuing."

The Baptist Faith and Messageis the SBC's statement of faith, most recently revised in 2000.

From broadest to narrowest, the five levels:

• Aim to "gain a presence or access to a … population segment." At this level "creativity and flexibility are essential in associating with cultural programs, educational institutions, business forums or whatever can open the door to deeper levels of relationships."

• Seek to "minister to specific needs," including disaster relief and social development. This can be accomplished only with "organizations that have a Christian identity and are motivated by spiritual principles."

• Share the Christian gospel only in collaboration with those "whose commitment is to New Testament evangelism and who present personal repentance and faith in Jesus Christ as the only way to salvation."

• Start new congregations only with organizations whose definition of "church" is consistent with the Baptist Faith and Message, which calls it "an autonomous local congregation of baptized believers, associated by covenant in the faith and fellowship of the gospel; observing the two ordinances of Christ, governed by his laws, exercising the gifts, rights, and privileges invested in them by his word, and seeking to extend the gospel to the ends of the earth."

• Influence the "ongoing shape of Baptist work and identity, even after the missionary is no longer present, through theological education and ministerial training. Seldom, if ever, would we engage in strategic relationships … at this level."

The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship's 160-plus mission workers also draw distinctions in collaborative activities, but without a formal policy.

"We do not have official guidelines that we have established for partnerships with other religious groups," said Rob Nash, the CBF's coordinator of global missions.

"Generally, we make decisions about partnership based upon mutually shared goals and vision and upon relationships of trust that are built over time. We have a process in place for establishing full-fledged partnerships and/or memoranda of understanding that ensures that we have exit strategies and other mechanisms in place so that the nature of the relationship is clear."

The CBF partners with a variety of Baptists around the world, Nash said, but "we have never limited ourselves to these Baptist relationships. Our field personnel have partnered with organizations even beyond the Christian faith when global disasters and other kinds of social ministry have made it helpful to do so in order to meet the needs of a community."

"Obviously, with any partner we do our homework to ensure that the organization has a good reputation and that its approach to ministry and service is in harmony with our own basic mission and vision," he added. "This ensures that the partner is focused upon a sustainable assets-based approach to community development and that we do not sacrifice our own theological and missiological commitments."

Theological education

Although educating Baptist ministers remains largely denominationally focused, collaborative models are emerging in places. Baptist communities at Methodist-affiliated Duke Divinity School in Durham, N.C., and the Disciples of Christ's Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth maintain "theological and multicultural diversity of students and faculty to be an important context for coming to a clear understanding of individual faith and practice," according to administrators.

Wake Forest University's School of Divinity, while highlighting its Baptist heritage, is "intentionally ecumenical."

"The divinity school's roots in Baptist traditions are deep and strong, and these roots enable the divinity school to ground its present story in the lived experience of preceding generations who strived to be a sign of God's justice and hope in the world," said Gail O'Day, dean of the Winston-Salem, N.C., school, in a message on its webpage.

"The divinity school's mission to be an ecumenical learning community, in service to the ecumenical family of churches, means that students from a wide range of Christian traditions contribute fully to the rich fabric of our communal life."

By contrast, the six seminaries owned and operated by the SBC maintain a distinct Baptist identity, typically restricting faculty to members of Baptist churches.

"It depends on what type of education church leadership wants to pursue," said Merritt, who earned degrees from both Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., and the Methodist-affiliated Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta.

"There's a confessional approach and a contextual ap-proach."

Although Merritt believes cooperative initiatives such as church planting should be limited to Christians whose views are compatible—"I don't see it as being exclusionary; it's just pragmatic"—varied views in seminary communities can be spiritually rewarding, he noted.

"I love, within the range of orthodox Christian belief, when there's room for a lot of viewpoints to be presented in theological education," he said.

"If we are confident that what we believe is true and right and biblical, then we shouldn't be afraid to have it presented alongside other views in a theological education setting."

Social justice

Religious disagreement is no obstacle to collaboration in efforts to achieve a just society, said Parham of the Baptist Center for Ethics, which has developed resources to assist Christians in the effort.

One of the BCE's documentaries "shows that each (Abrahamic) tradition sees its text as sacred and that each text calls readers to do justice," he said.

"Jews, Muslims and Christians will not prioritize the sacredness of another faith's primary text. But that disagreement does not negate the common agreement to seek justice, to care for the vulnerable, to protect orphans and the elderly."

An immigration documentary explores a shared belief among Baptists and Catholics—who "have a long, contentious history over matters of doctrine"—that "Jesus calls us to welcome the stranger," Parham said.

Merritt also advocates a Christian commitment to the "common good" that can cross denominational lines while retaining faith integrity.

"Christianity is not something you do but who you are," he said. "It's impossible to lay that aside to do a particular kind of work. Partnerships have to allow space for those who follow Jesus to conduct that work within that context."

But he detects a "shift in young people from culture-war Christianity to incarnational Christianity."

"As I rediscover the Jesus of the Bible, he didn't begin with a six-point platform but came to live among human beings and heal and weep. That's the model for us as we move forward."