Thread by @jrwhitehead

I have stirred up a hornets nest. lol. Much to write in the coming days.

But it’s important to note this thread confirms I was not exaggerating the SBC’s claim. As a Baptist, you’re being asked to accept that if you cooperate with the SBC, its leaders can lie about local pastors and members, and decide to give no justice.

Indeed, it can lie about the justice it would give you.

You can’t even contract for them to not defame you. This is a long way from “no law…prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

My basic position is that Baptist cooperation is internecine cooperation. When different churches cooperate, they do not yield to the impositions of the other, other than by normal human agreements (contract).

The SBC is imposing legal disabilities on members of cooperating bodies, solely by a claimed implication. The law can’t give them that right, without violating the establishment clause.

Of course, these powers were a matter of great debate in Baptist history. And it was settled by 1928 that NAMB should never “allocate funds or to divert funds from any object included in a state budget.”

I take it that current leaders think it’s better to ask forgiveness than ask permission to bulldoze the monuments.

johnstonsarchive.net/baptist/docrel…

Even more explicitly, the SBC’s assertion here is inconsistent with its former statements on local churches. It is denying Garner his own rights of autonomy and self-determination.