(RNS) — The world’s largest Baptist university became the center of a culture-war clash this week as it celebrated, then rejected, a $643,401 grant awarded to fund research on the “exclusion of LGBTQIA+ individuals and women within congregations.”
After days of online backlash from conservative Christian leaders, the president of Baylor University, a private, Christian school in Waco, Texas, announced Wednesday (July 9) that the grant acceptance would be rescinded.
Baylor University in Waco, Texas. Photo courtesy of Baylor University/Matthew Minard
“(O)ur concerns did not center on the research itself, but rather on the activities that followed as part of the grant,” wrote university President Linda Livingstone in a letter announcing the decision. “Specifically, the work extended into advocacy for perspectives on human sexuality that are inconsistent with Baylor’s institutional policies, including our Statement on Human Sexuality.”
The Eula Mae and John Baugh Foundation, which awarded the grant and has been funding work at Baylor for over 40 years, attributed the decision to an “online campaign of fear and misinformation.”
“We believe this is following a pressure campaign from groups with a political agenda, which has been very public,” the foundation’s board of trustees said in a statement. “This not only abandons this research project, but Baylor’s own faculty and the churches this research could serve.”
When contacted for comment, both Baylor and the foundation directed RNS to their respective statements.
The study in question aimed to research how women and LGBTQ individuals experience institutional betrayal within faith communities, according to a now-deleted June 30 press release from Baylor’s Center for Church and Community Impact. It would have recruited 50 university students to participate in confidential surveys, interviews, and focus groups and used the information to create congregational training resources on “inclusivity and institutional courage.”
As media outlets shared news of the grant, several conservative Christian leaders took to social media to condemn the move, calling it as a sign of Baylor’s wavering values. On July 2, Anglican priest and podcaster the Rev. Matt Kennedy wrote on X, “It’s much better to send your child to a secular university, hostile to the faith, than to a ‘Christian’ university like Baylor.”
The Rev. Denny Burk, president of the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood and a professor at Boyce College, a Southern Baptist school in Louisville, Kentucky, said on X that Baylor had been “moving away from Christian faithfulness for decades,” and it’s “still sad to watch another nail in the coffin of a once great Christian university.”
Others, such as Greg Garrett, a Baylor English professor and the Carole Ann McDaniel Hanks Chair of Literature & Culture, expressed gratitude for the grant.
Then, Baylor reversed course. The president’s announcement Wednesday said Jon Singletary, dean of Baylor’s school of social work, and Baylor professor Gaynor Yancey “voluntarily offered” to rescind acceptance of the grant on behalf of Baylor’s school of social work. The announcement reiterated Baylor’s commitment to being a loving community for all, including LGBTQ students, while affirming its belief that human sexuality is “a gift from God, expressed through purity in singleness and fidelity in marriage between a man and a woman.”
Livingstone also acknowledged the situation caused “concern and confusion” for the Baylor community and partners, and she called it a “learning opportunity for many involved.”
That learning opportunity may have cost the university future funding from the Eula Mae and John Baugh Foundation, which is named after a Texas family who were major donors to Baylor and prioritizes funding progressive nonprofit organizations. (Disclosure: Religion News Service has previously received support from the Baugh Foundation, and Word&Way currently receives support from the Baugh Foundation.)
“We continue to support partners who have the courage to listen to voices from the margins and who are dedicated to building a more just and welcoming world,” the foundation’s board wrote in its Wednesday statement. “We regret that Baylor has chosen not to be such a partner.”
