Frank S. Page, top Southern Baptist leader, resigns

Frank S. Page, a prominent Southern Baptist leader, has resigned from his top role in the largest Protestant denomination in America because of a "morally inappropriate" relationship.

Page, the president and CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention's executive committee, stepped down Tuesday from the leadership role and retired from active ministry, according to the Baptist Press, an official publication of the Nashville-based denomination. 

Earlier in the day, Page, 65, had announced he was retiring, but acknowledged later that he needed to be more forthright on why he was leaving the post.

Frank S. Page, top Southern Baptist leader, resigns

Book documents molestation in conservative Baptist churches

Author Jeri Massi says abuse victims have been written off, discarded and even vilified in the pulpits of both Independent Baptists and the Southern Baptist Convention. Her The Big Book of Bad Baptist Preachers catalogues 100 cases of preachers and churches involved in child molestation scandals in the last 20 years.



“The sexual abuse of children is part and parcel of the cultures of the Independent Baptists and Southern Baptists,” Massi says in the book’s introduction.

When confronted by the scale of the problem, she says, Baptist leadership has “at best turned a deaf ear and at worst has countered with threats and intimidation.”

Massi says abuse victims and their advocates are routinely accused of “painting with a broad brush.” In her own Independent Fundamental Baptist tradition, she says she has been depicted as sexually promiscuous, a drug addict and a witch and had her life threatened three times.

Whistleblowers don’t fare much better in the Southern Baptist Convention, she says, quoting SBC leaders denouncing the advocacy group Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests as “opportunists motivated by personal gain” and “just as reprehensible as sex criminals.”
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Massi says the book is sadly a work in progress. She is only about a third of the way through her notes and plans to release a second volume in December adding another 60 cases she knows about, with the list growing every week.

“Sex abuse is rampant in Baptist churches,” Massi says in a page at the end of the book that includes a form for individuals who have information about a case to fill out and submit for future volumes.

“I suppose if the SBC and IFB refuse to track dangerous preachers, it is up to us to provide the record, so that children in Christianity remain safe,” she addresses readers.

Book documents molestation in conservative Baptist churches

Southern Baptists declare ‘spiritual warfare’ on Supreme Court with resolution denying marriage authority

Some of my posts are going to seem redundant and "silly" considering the opinion handed down today by SCOTUS concerning marriage equality.  But it is important to follow the mind-set as this fight is long from over.  Reich strategists are already at work trying to undermine the opinion of the Court:

Robert P. George, How Republicans Should Respond to a Supreme Court Marriage Ruling:

They should, in other words, treat it as an anti-constitutional and illegitimate ruling in which the judiciary has attempted to usurp the authority of the people and their elected representatives. They should refuse to treat and regard it as a binding and settled matter. They should challenge it legislatively and give the Supreme Court every opportunity to reverse itself—especially as new justices fill vacancies. And they should work to fill vacancies on federal courts at all levels with jurists who reject judicial usurpation and can be counted on to respect the scope and limits of their own constitutionally specified authority.

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, BREAKING—USCCB Condemns Ruling:

Regardless of what a narrow majority of the Supreme Court may declare at this moment in history, the nature of the human person and marriage remains unchanged and unchangeable. Just as Roe v. Wade did not settle the question of abortion over forty years ago, Obergefell v. Hodges does not settle the question of marriage today. Neither decision is rooted in the truth, and as a result, both will eventually fail. Today the Court is wrong again. It is profoundly immoral and unjust for the government to declare that two people of the same sex can constitute a marriage.

Mike Huckabee, Huckabee blasts SCOTUS "I will not acquiesce to an imperial court" vows to "resist and reject judicial tyranny"

"This ruling is not about marriage equality, it's about marriage redefinition. This irrational, unconstitutional rejection of the expressed will of the people in over 30 states will prove to be one of the court's most disastrous decisions, and they have had many. The only outcome worse than this flawed, failed decision would be for the President and Congress, two co-equal branches of government, to surrender in the face of this out-of-control act of unconstitutional, judicial tyranny."

"The Supreme Court can no more repeal the laws of nature and nature's God on marriage than it can the law of gravity. Under our Constitution, the court cannot write a law, even though some cowardly politicians will wave the white flag and accept it without realizing that they are failing their sworn duty to reject abuses from the court. If accepted by Congress and this President, this decision will be a serious blow to religious liberty, which is the heart of the First Amendment."

Two counties out of marriage business for good after Supreme Court ruling

"My office discontinued issuing marriage licenses in February and I have no plans to put Pike County back into the marriage business," Allen wrote in a statement. "The policy of my office regarding marriage is no different today than it was yesterday."

Geneva County Probate Judge Fred Hamic also said he intends to permanently close the marriage license bureau in his office, if his attorneys don't object.

Both judges cited Alabama Code Section 30-1-9: "Marriage licenses may be issued by the judges of probate of the several counties."

The law says "may" instead of "shall", Hamic said, which makes a big difference. He said the law permits probate judges to opt of of isuing marriage licenses.

These are but a few reactions I have skimmed since the ruling came down, but they are not new.  If one pays close attention you will see the familiar strategy being laid out - 'Established by the State' was ambiguous in the context of the statute as whole - words and how we use them.  In other words King v. Burwell.

The Reich will be and has been planning for this day and they are lead by men like Robert P. George, Judge Tom Parker, Roy Moore et al.  They are lead by organizations such as Southern Baptist Convention:

“Southern Baptists recognize that no governing institution has the authority to countermand God’s definition of marriage,” the statement continued. “No matter how the Supreme Court rules, the Southern Baptist Convention reaffirms its unwavering commitment to its doctrinal and public beliefs concerning marriage.”

In his presidential address to the 5,000 attendees on Tuesday, SBC leader Rev. Ronnie Floyd said that it was time for Christians to declare “spiritual warfare.”

“America: We stand believing that marriage is the uniting of one man and one woman in a covenant commitment for a lifetime; we do not need to redefine what God himself has defined already,” Floyd opined. “”Now we await the outcome of the next possible Supreme Court ruling that could alter our nation’s belief and practice on traditional and biblical marriage, but also our historic commitment to religious liberty for all people.”

Southern Baptists declare ‘spiritual warfare’ on Supreme Court with resolution denying marriage authority

When in Doubt, Religify! Fear Mongering about Religious Liberty | Political Research Associates

I have been sitting on this article for almost a month now.  Not quite sure as to how to introduce it, or where exactly the issue addressed falls in the grand scheme of thing.  But Clarksom, in his initial write up, mentions two recent rulings:

The Institute draws on detailed understandings of recent Supreme Court cases as sources for this legal groundwork against the coming siege. They point particularly to the 2012 case of Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church & School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which disallowed a discrimination complaint by a teacher, declaring that her role was part of the ministry of the church, and her employer therefore was exempt from employment discrimination laws. The decision is widely seen as having opened the door to a wide range of religious exemptions from civil rights and labor laws. The Institute also points to the 2014 decision in Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. & Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp. v. Burwell, which for the first time endowed “closely held” for-profit corporations with religious rights under the First Amendment.

And, that took my mind back to something I wrote last year in regards to the Hobby Lobby ruling:

When one looks at the decision rendered by SCOTUS it has to be through the lens of the Reich's overall agenda -  starting with a "reformed" interpretation of the Free Exercise Clause or an outright repeal of the First Amendment,  continuing with the abolition of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, ending with the implementation of dominionist ideology in order to govern by theocratic control.  With the ruling in Hobby Lobby, the Reich will "now" be able to exempt themselves from any laws that they don’t like; that they find “religiously objectionable.” 

As Clarkson notes, "most of our attention is directed to larger-than-life marriage equality dramas being played out in courtrooms, legislative chambers, and major media outlets, the foundation is being laid for massive resistance to marriage equality and much more."  The faux persecution complex, the so-called fight for religious liberty, and so on.

What has gone unnoticed in all this, the Reich has realized that they are losing in the court of public opinion.  They may not admit it but as Clarkson states in his companion piece for LGBTQNation "they foresee as a long siege against conservative Christian churches, businesses, and organizations."  Hence the issue at hand:

Major Christian Right legal agencies have begun issuing manuals for conservative churches and other organizations to inoculate themselves against private lawsuits and government enforcement of civil rights laws.

The national Christian Right legal network Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF, one of the primary groups behind the legislative agenda to redefine religious freedom into an affirmative right to discriminate) joined forces with the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention to issue one such handbook, and the Texas-based Liberty Institute has issued a similar manual.

The ADF and Southern Baptist handbook (titled, “Protecting Your Ministry from Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Lawsuits: A Legal Guide for Southern Baptist and Evangelical Churches, Schools, and Ministries”) anticipates needing to “engage a hostile social and political culture… amid the gathering spiritual darkness.”

The Liberty Institute sees it as “not a matter of if but when religious institutions will be faced with damaging, anti-religious legal attacks.”  To prepare, the Institute advises institutions from churches and synagogues to fraternities and for-profit corporations to “religify.”  [Emphases in the original.]

Both manuals urge religification by revising all of their institutional documents, from employee job descriptions to facility rental agreements. Workers and volunteers are reclassified under a broad redefinition of “ministry”; and institutional functions are cast specifically in terms of religious doctrine. The goal is to be seen by the courts as qualifying for broad “ministerial exemptions” from the law in as many ways as possible.

As I mentioned last July, Hobby Lobby was a test and as the Rev. Terry Fox declared, in regards to what has now amounted to a renewed push for state RFRAs, "We are not going to let it die. We are very committed. The Body of Christ is a powerful movement when it comes together."

And just as Fox asserted, "These manuals demonstrate that Christian Right leaders of the culture war intend to fight LGBTQ Rights and marriage equality in the states, in the towns and cities, and in many kinds of institutions, no matter what the federal government and the courts may say."

When in Doubt, Religify! Fear Mongering about Religious Liberty | Political Research Associates

Southern Baptist Minister Explains Why He Changed His Mind On Homosexuality | ThinkProgress

A story such as this is important, very important. As part of the LGBT (and atheist community), the more of us that realize what is at stake and refuse to remain silent in the face of Christian privilege and religiously-motivated bigotry, the harder it will be for anyone to silence us. Bigotry becomes much harder to maintain when it is exposed for what it is.

As Hemant Mehta concludes in his writeup concerning this story, "Cortez is just a symbol of what’s to come. Denominations that have long been against equal rights will start to come around, one pastor at a time, until they have no choice but to come around on the issue or risk being left in the dust."
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The pastor of a Southern Baptist church in Los Angeles, California announced last month that he is now “gay affirming” and has accepted his son’s homosexuality, a declaration that is causing a rift in his local congregation and sparking controversy within the Southern Baptist Convention.

In an hour-long sermon released on YouTube and a letter submitted to John Shore’s Patheos blog, Danny Cortez, pastor of New Heart Community Church, told his congregants that after a “15-year journey,” he has shifted away from his negative stance on homosexuality and is now accepting of LGBT people.

“In August of 2013, on a sunny day at the beach, I realized I no longer believed in the traditional [church] teachings regarding homosexuality,” Cortez said in his letter. “And it was especially the testimony of my gay friends that helped me to see how they have been marginalized that my eyes became open to the injustice that the church has wrought.”

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,,,in a rare move for a SBC church, Cortez’s congregation did not vote to expel him from the pulpit after he declaredurch — that is, a worship community where members “agree to disagree and not cast judgment on one another” on the topic of homosexuality. Although some members plan to split off from the churc his gay-affirming stance, but chose instead to keep him as their pastor and become a “Third Way” chh on June 8th, Cortez will remain head of New Harmony Community Church as it embraces a live-and-let-live approach “in the same way that our church holds different positions on the issue of divorce and remarriage.”

Southern Baptist Minister Explains Why He Changed His Mind On Homosexuality | ThinkProgress

Richard Land Says ‘Dirty Little Secret’ Of Gay Males Is That Most Were Molested

When you’re Richard Land, a representative of the Southern Baptist Convention, and you are losing the “culture wars,” and badly, I suppose lying doesn’t bother you if you feel like it’s helping your lost cause. That’s just what Land did when he claimed on Washington Watch that the “dirty little secret” of gay males is that most of us were molested as children:

Land, lifting from the anti-gay myth that gay adults abuse children at high rates and “recruit” them into homosexuality, charged that “the dirty little secret that nobody wants to talk about is that a high percentage of adult male homosexuals in America were sexually molested when they were children.”

Land’s claim contradicts findings of the American Psychological Association, which notes that “no specific psychosocial or family dynamic cause for homosexuality has been identified, including histories of childhood sexual abuse. Sexual abuse does not appear to be more prevalent in children who grow up to identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual, than in children who identify as heterosexual.”

Richard Land Says ‘Dirty Little Secret’ Of Gay Males Is That Most Were Molested