Liam Adams | Nashville Tennessean
KEY POINTS
- In June, the SBC upheld the ouster of Fern Creek Baptist Church in Kentucky and Saddleback Church in California for having women pastors.
- At its state convention meeting this month, Kentucky Baptist Convention disfellowshipped Fern Creek. Other state conventions debated policy changes either affirming or restricting women in ministry.
- Debate in the SBC is creating greater need for spaces for conservative Baptist churches that differ from SBC on women pastors issue.
Even after the Southern Baptist Convention fully ousted Fern Creek Baptist Church six months ago, pastor Linda Barnes Popham was hopeful up until this month that her Louisville church could preserve part of its Southern Baptist identity.
But then the Kentucky Baptist Convention disfellowshipped Fern Creek from the state convention.
“We said today, ‘we’re done,’” Popham said in a Nov. 14 interview. “We’re tired from this. In one sense, it was relief we don’t have to deal with this any longer.”
Fern Creek and Saddleback Church, the Southern California megachurch founded by celebrity pastor Rick Warren, were early experiments in a battle over the terms by which the Nashville-based SBC affiliates with churches. The dispute centers around women pastors, but it has broader implications for Southern Baptist identity.
The decision in Kentucky and in other state conventions recently showed the debate has intensified since the 2023 SBC annual meeting in June. It also foreshadows a scenario more churches could face depending on how strict the SBC becomes. The SBC is the nation’s largest Protestant denomination.
“An ambiguous process could cause future division in our convention,” Kentucky pastor Nick Sandefur said at the Kentucky Baptist Convention’s meeting, speaking against a recommendation to disfellowship Fern Creek. “This as an infringement upon local autonomy.”
Sandefur, who is also a member of the SBC Executive Committee, an administrative body at the national level, said during a debate on the floor that his church and Popham’s disagree over certain doctrine but both are allowed to partner with the Kentucky Baptist Convention.
Fern Creek holds to the 1963 version of the Baptist Faith & Message, or Southern Baptists’ doctrinal statements, instead of the more generally accepted 2000 version. The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 — the basis for the SBC’s decision to oust Fern Creek and Saddleback — says the title of pastor is limited to men.
But the Kentucky Baptist Convention constitution doesn’t limit the churches it partners with according to a certain version of the Baptist Faith & Message.
“We hold to shared convictions, and we have every right to expect defined convictions to be shared at the local church level,” Sandefur said at the Kentucky Baptist Convention meeting. “But we must establish what are essential convictions if we are going to use them as fellowship determiners.”
That same day, Nov. 14, the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention delayed implementing policy guidance aimed at further restricting affiliation to churches that only use the title of “pastor” for men.
“If we’re not careful, our zeal could lead us to cut off our convention of churches in ways we do not perceive or understand right now,” said Texas pastor Joshua Crutchfield during a debate on the floor, who spoke for delaying the policy guidance.
At the California Southern Baptist Convention meeting in late October, leaders shared that Saddleback voluntary withdrew from the state convention.
Fern Creek backstory:
With ouster of churches, SBC faces existential debate related to women pastors. Why now?
‘A new beginning’
Legislative intricacies will have a profound effect on churches’ sense of belonging.
Popham originally thought it was likely for Fern Creek to stay in the Kentucky Baptist Convention for constitutional reasons. Also, the church continued its active involvement with Kentucky Baptist ministries, including summer camp, children’s choir, and women’s ministry.
Fern Creek’s ouster from the state convention “was personal because of all the deep relationships I have with Kentucky Baptist folks,” Popham said in an interview. “Instead of broadening the stakes, they have just tried to shrink this tent into only a few people.”
At the national level, the SBC Cooperation Group is evaluating the denomination’s standards and procedures for including and excluding churches. The cooperation group will present at the 2024 SBC annual meeting in Indianapolis, which is also when the convention will vote a second and final time on a measure that would enshrine a ban on women pastors.
Amid uncertainty about how far the SBC will go, Baptist Women in Ministry, a nonprofit that advocates for women in ministry within various Baptist denominations, including the SBC, has campaigned for more inclusive positions and policies at the state level.
That campaign led to the Baptist General Association of Virginia approving a task force to study how the state convention can affirm and elevate women in ministry. Similar advocacy led the Baptist General Convention of Texas and General Baptist State Convention of North Carolina to approve non-binding declarations affirming women in ministry.
“After the pain that has been caused by the SBC, congregations and women in ministry deserve to know that there are Baptist spaces where they are valued,” Meredith Stone, executive director of Baptist Women in Ministry, said in a news release.
For all three of the state conventions where Baptist Women in Ministry found success, there are more conservative counterparts with which most Southern Baptist churches in those states are affiliated with.
The changes which Baptist Women in Ministry is advocating for seem even more necessary to pastors like Popham, who’s not entirely sure about what’s next for Fern Creek.
“There are so many more of us than I thought. And I believe there are great opportunities for us to partner,” Popham said. “We’re choosing to look at this as a new beginning.”
Liam Adams covers religion for The Tennessean. Reach him at ladams@tennessean.com or on Twitter @liamsadams.