racial reconciliation Archives - Baptist & Reflector

NO ROOM FOR RACISM IN THE CHRISTIAN HEART

September 4, 2019

By Chris Turner
cturner@tnbaptist.org

“Are you gonna let that n—r coon sit in our class?’ a boy shouted at me. ‘We can kick the crap out of this n—-r. Look, it’s 20 of us and one of her. They ain’t nothing but animals …Go back where you came from.’ ” — From Warriors Don’t Cry

I don’t recall ever reading a book as emotionally taxing as, Warriors Don’t Cry, by Melba Pattillo Beals, one of the “Little Rock Nine” who integrated Central High School in 1957. The amount of physical brutality and emotional abuse those children — children my daughter’s age — faced every day for the entire school year is incomprehensible. They endured attempted lynchings, beatings, acid in the eyes, constantly being spit on, being trapped in bathroom stalls while white students stood on toilets in adjacent stalls and rained burning paper on them, and so much more, just because they were black.

The cruelty was inhumane; it was satanic. At times, Melba’s story physically nauseated me. White parents and their children went to extremes to drive them from Central High. For example, parents employed Ku Klux Klan psychologists to coach the students on how to make life hell for Melba and her classmates. The book is a raw look at racism, prejudice and segregation in the South in the 1950s. [Read more…]

TAKING STEPS TOGETHER

August 8, 2019

Group from Maury County finds ways to promote, produce racial harmony

By David Dawson and Ashley Perham
Baptist and Reflector writers

The members of Stand Together Fellowship gather on the steps of the state capitol building in Montgomery during the group’s recent trip to Alabama. — Photo by Bridget Stuart. (For information about the ‘Justice Journey Tour’ book of photos by Bridget Stuart, contact her at 931-398-4056)

COLUMBIA — With reflective expressions and hopeful hearts, the members of Stand Together Fellowship walked across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., on the afternoon of July 10.

They moved along in mixed pairs — one white and one black — as they strode across the historic bridge that served as the starting point for the March to Montgomery in 1965. By the time they reached the other side, many in the group had wet faces, the combined result of sweat and tears on this steamy summer afternoon. [Read more…]

MEETING TO FOCUS ON ‘GOSPEL ABOVE ALL’

May 29, 2019

Baptist Press

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Keeping the focus on the “Gospel Above All” theme is Southern Baptist Convention President J.D. Greear’s main goal going into SBC’s annual meeting in Birmingham, Ala., June 11-12.

But following a year of transition among five SBC entities searching for new leadership and the convention responding to reports of sexual abuse, Greear noted there will be other issues demanding attention.

Greear, who is expected to be reelected SBC president without opposition, acknowledged that confronting sexual abuse is among them. [Read more…]

VICE PRESIDENT ADDRESSES SBC MESSENGERS IN DALLAS

June 26, 2018

Pence appearance, Greear election were among top storylines at this year’s annual meeting

Editor’s Note: Visit baptistandreflector.org for complete coverage of the SBC annual meeting.

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector
lwilkey@tnbaptist.org

Messengers at the SBC annual meeting raise their ballots while voting on one of the 20 proposed motions on June 12. — Photo by Matt Miller/Baptist Press

DALLAS — Though an attempt was made to exclude the vice president of the United States from speaking to Southern Baptist Convention messengers, Mike Pence addressed the convention in the June 13 morning session.

Pence’s appearance was one of several highlights during the annual meeting held June 12-13 in Dallas. The meeting drew 9,637 messengers, including 615 from Tennessee. Tennessee trailed only Texas (2,036) and Louisiana (718) in number of messengers. It was the largest attended convention since 2010. [Read more…]

THE PAST IS PAST: LET’S FOCUS ON THE NOW

May 16, 2018

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector

I received a press release recently from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., about an address President R. Albert Mohler made during a “Leadership Briefing” on campus. His topic: George Washington.

Mohler had several kind things to say about our nation’s first president. Then he added the “but.” He referred to the fact that Washington owned slaves and observed that his legacy “is polluted by his short-sighted views on slavery and race.” Mohler may be right, but do we need to keep dwelling on our past? It’s not news. Washington and several of our nation’s founders owned slaves. It’s documented. It was part of the culture of the country at that time.

Did that make it right? No. Slavery is wrong in any era, including today when human trafficking is running amuck in our society. [Read more…]

GAINES ADDRESSES PATTERSON, RACIAL DIVERSITY, SBC

May 11, 2018

Baptist Press

Southern Baptist Convention President Steve Gaines.
-Photo by Morris Abernathy

CORDOVA — Responding to questions about his committee appointments and controversy involving a Southern Baptist seminary leader, SBC President Steve Gaines released a statement today (May 11) to Baptist Press.

Gaines, pastor of Memphis-area Bellevue Baptist Church in Cordova, Tenn., specifically addresses the controversy involving past statements by Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary President Paige Patterson on women, divorce and domestic violence. Gaines’ statement also touched on racial diversity and ways Southern Baptists can pray for the SBC leading up to its annual meeting in Dallas, June 12-13. [Read more…]

GAINES ANSWERS QUESTIONS ON SEVERAL TOUGH TOPICS

March 20, 2018

By Diana Chandler
Baptist Press

MEMPHIS — Loving your neighbor as yourself is a sure path to overcoming racial prejudice, Southern Baptist women’s minister Donna Gaines said in the March cover article of Today’s Christian Living magazine.

“When we love our neighbor, that erases racial prejudice,” Gaines said in the cover story. “If we were all actually doing that, we’d be able to turn the world upside down just like the early disciples.”

Expounding on what Jesus described as one of the two greatest commandments, the wife of Southern Baptist Convention President Steve Gaines gave an example from her own life in an interview with Baptist Press on March 21.

In 2017, she befriended a 32-year-old African American mother of eight who is now a baptized believer and every Sunday attends Bellevue Baptist Church, where Gaines’ husband is pastor. She and her ARISE2Read ministry have helped the mother find housing and secure a van large enough to transport the mother’s children ranging in age from three months to 14 years. The mother and her oldest child made professions of faith in February after Gaines began influencing their lives. [Read more…]

TENNESSEE PASTORS ‘PAID A BIG PRICE’

February 6, 2018

By David Roach
Baptist Press

Pastor Paul Turner of First Baptist Church in Clinton, Tenn., told the congregation Scripture “never compromises with sin” the week after he was beaten by segregationists.
– Screen capture from YouTube.

NASHVILLE — Striving for racial reconciliation was costly for some Southern Baptist pastors, (including two who served in Tennessee) in the 1950s through the 1970s. It cost Jack Kwok his property and Paul Turner a beating by angry segregationists.

But Kwok, who has served as executive director of the State Convention of Baptists in Ohio since 1996, says the price pastors and other ministers paid was worth the result. Today, though more progress is needed, nearly one in five Southern Baptist churches is non-Anglo, and about half of North American Mission Board church plants are predominantly non-Anglo. [Read more…]

CHANGING CULTURE PROVIDES NEW OPPORTUNITIES

January 16, 2018

By Benjie Shaw,
BCM Director, University Of Tennessee Health Science Center

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: America’s religious landscape has undergone large shifts in the last 20 years. In September, the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) released its latest study, titled “America’s Changing Religious Identity.” In short, the PRRI study discovered: [Read more…]

TBC MESSENGERS CONDUCT BUSINESS

November 20, 2017

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector

Tennessee Baptist Convention President Steve Freeman, pastor of Grace Baptist Church, Springfield, delivers the annual president’s address during the Tuesday (Nov. 14) session of Summit.
— Photo by Corinne Rochotte

HENDERSONVILLE — Messengers to the annual meeting of the Tennessee Baptist Convention overwhelmingly spoke against racism and elected David Leavell, pastor of First Baptist Church, Millington, as president.

The annual meeting, held during The Summit Nov. 12-16 at First Baptist Church, Hendersonville, drew 993 messengers from 422 churches. Attendance was down from the 1,228 who attended last year’s sessions in Sevierville but was up from the 984 who registered for the 2015 Summit in Millington. The messenger count did not include messengers from First Baptist Church, Jefferson City. Messengers voted overwhelmingly to not seat the eight messengers from First Baptist which called a woman senior pastor earlier this year (see story). [Read more…]

“Are you gonna let that n—r coon sit in our class?’ a boy shouted at me. ‘We can kick the crap out of this n—-r. Look, it’s 20 of us and one of her. They ain’t nothing but animals …Go back where you came from.’ ” — From Warriors Don’t Cry

Group from Maury County finds ways to promote, produce racial harmony

Pence appearance, Greear election were among top storylines at this year’s annual meeting

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