Church

On Sunday, First Baptist Church of North Tulsa’s current sanctuary throbbed with a high-decibel service as six congregations gathered to mark the centennial of the Tulsa Race Massacre and to honor the persistence of the Black church tradition in Greenwood.

Just two days after Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, accused former President Paige Patterson of theft, Patterson preached at First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, a Southern Baptist megachurch led by Robert Jeffress. Patterson claimed a “lynch mob” was trying to get him.

Three years after trustees at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary fired Paige Patterson as president, the school alleges Patterson and his wife Dorothy took items from the SWBTS and improperly contacted SWBTS donors to shift funding to the Pattersons’ personal nonprofit.

A cultural clash pitting religious beliefs against gay rights has jeopardized Kentucky’s long-running relationship with a foster care and adoption agency affiliated with the Baptist church that serves some of the state’s most vulnerable children.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s newest guidance about masks was about individuals; its advice for “communities of faith” has not been updated since Feb. 19 and currently does not mention singing.

Southern Baptists love three things: Jesus, the Bible, and a good fight. The first two have led Southern Baptists to send missionaries all over the world, build colleges and hospitals, plant thousands of churches, and develop one of the largest disaster relief networks. Their fights often overshadow everything else. 

The chair of Southwest Baptist University’s Board of Trustees sent a message to faculty about the ongoing conflict over control and theology. But the statement from Eddie Bumpers to “provide a greater level of clarity” actually included significant inaccuracies.

Russell Moore, the embattled Southern Baptist ethicist and “Never Trumper,” is resigning as president of his denomination’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Moore will be joining the staff of Christianity Today as a public theologian.

Over the past two years, James Lindsay has been on a crusade against what he sees as a ‘woke’ invasion of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination. And some Southern Baptist leaders are embracing the work of the atheist hoaxer and former massage therapist,

The next decisions impacting Southwest Baptist University won’t be made in closed trustee meetings or Missouri Baptist Convention sessions. Now the faculty, students, alumni, and trustees await decision from two non-Baptist groups that could determine the future of the school.