Years of controversy during the Trump era have some Southern Baptists arguing that the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission is more trouble than it is worth.
The Southern Baptist Convention lost 259,090 members in 2024 — the 18th consecutive year of membership decline — according to the denomination’s Annual Church Profile report, released Wednesday.
In “Becoming the Pastor’s Wife: How Marriage Replaced Ordination as a Woman’s Path to Ministry,” Beth Allison Barr traces the history of the role, showing how it both helped and hurt women in conservative Protestant traditions.
One claim, about an allegedly defamatory tweet by another former denominational president, is still live. The SBC has spent more than $3 million in legal fees on the Hunt case.
The investigation cost the SBC's Executive Committee $2 million in legal fees and led to one former Southern Baptist seminary leader pleading guilty to lying to the FBI.
The proposed database has been derailed by denominational apathy, legal worries, and a desire to protect donations to the Southern Baptist Convention’s mission programs.
Faith groups have long received government grants to feed the hungry, respond to disasters, and assist those in need — but recent comments from Trump administration officials have cast such grants in a bad light.