Conservatives Have Not Been Heard

An Excerpt from “A Failure to Make a Needed Course Correction: SBC 2021, Part 1” The complete article is available here.

More than 1300 Southern Baptists submitted a “Resolution on the Incompatibility of Critical Race Theory and Intersectionality with The Baptist Faith and Message” to the Resolutions Committee. Did the committee honor the requests of these hundreds of Baptists? No. It crafted a substitute resolution (Resolution 2) and offered it to the convention instead.

Resolution 2 doesn’t even mention CRT or intersectionality by name. Go to page 7 of the Tuesday, June 15, 2021 Daily Bulletin to read Resolution 2 and to pages 15-19 of the same publication to see a list of the hundreds of names of those who submitted the resolution that called out CRT by name. A distraction? Apparently a great many Southern Baptists genuinely wanted to address CRT and intersectionality (CRT/I) directly. They wanted to reject them because they are false and unbiblical ideologies. Remember that CRT/I had been specifically named and affirmed as analytical tools in Resolution 9 at the convention in Birmingham in 2019.

No one favors racism, but Southern Baptists have repeatedly passed resolutions against it and apologized for institutional racism in the denomination’s past. Kevin Apperson, pastor of North Las Vegas Baptist Church in North Las Vegas, Nevada, spoke against Resolution 2 because he objected to its not addressing by name the issues that desperately needed to be addressed. James Merritt, pastor of Cross Pointe Church in Duluth, Georgia, and chairman of the Resolutions Committee, responded in palpable anger.

This was inexcusable, especially since, as Rev. Merritt observed, the world was watching. Hear the eye-opening exchange in this clip from the convention, courtesy of Jon Harris and his podcast, Conversations That Matter.

After playing a video clip of this exchange on his podcast, Jon Harris described how disgusting, offensive, and manipulative Merritt’s response was.

Oh, the Irony!

I want to add to Jon Harris’s observations by noting the irony of what J. D. Greear said when he interrupted Merritt to rebuke messengers for their lack of respect for the one speaking. “Wait a minute, James,” said Greear. Then the SBC president told the messengers he wanted to remind them “that when one messenger is speaking, other messengers should not be shouting over the top of him. You can get to a microphone and have your turn to speak, but let’s respect one another, and honor.”

After this admonition from Greear, Merritt resumed his tirade of disrespect for Kevin Apperson and everyone else who supported what he said — and a lot of messengers did.

A great many Southern Baptists (even if they didn’t make up a majority of messengers to this convention) came to Nashville hoping the SBC would repudiate CRT and intersectionality. Ed Litton was narrowly elected president of the SBC against the backdrop of this reality. It is more than a little disappointing that Rev. Litton still believes CRT is “a distraction.”