Sad but necessary. Sometimes we're just forced to roll with the times. When I was a teenager I would have been ever so glad that none of my teachers then looked anything like the ones getting arrested every five minutes today. Those were good wholesome times. Sigh.
But I found this very interesting [from the SBC site]: Autonomy - We affirm the autonomy of the local church. Each church is free to determine its own membership and to set its own course under the headship of Jesus.
I take this to mean that any church can do whatever it pleases and that the 16 million members of the SBC are not held to any of the principles or resolutions of the SBC. Would you please confirm that for me? If true, then the claim that all churches under the SBC hold all the positions of the SBC is not valid.
The wording IS a little tricky but the general idea is that while the SBC does not claim authority over any church to dictate beliefs to it, if one wants to be a voting member of the SBC then one has to be in general agreement with the goals and aims of the SBC. The following is from the SBC Constitution (pdf). When you see "messenger" think "voting delegate":
So as you can see, the key phrase is "friendly cooperation with the Convention and sympathetic with its purposes and work". Off hand, I'm not aware of any church ever being thrown out over this but it could have happened. I take it to mean that if a church is right there on the main stuff and close enough on the secondary stuff (Arminians and Calvinists ARE welcome) then the church can be in. There is not any sort of litmus test on a church by church basis for agreeing to ALL of the resolutions that come out of the Conventions. It's basically the overall "friendly cooperation".
Therefore I cannot claim that all SBC churches agree on every issue on which the SBC gives a position, but I can say that there is very substantial agreement on the major issues, including social issues like homosexuality, abortion, women clergy, etc.
INDEED.
And, most of the So Baps I’ve been close to have been various degrees of Calvinist.
Therefore I cannot claim that all SBC churches agree on every issue on which the SBC gives a position, but I can say that there is very substantial agreement on the major issues, including social issues like homosexuality, abortion, women clergy, etc.
I see. So it's not quite as definite or binding as the Catechism. In the instance where a female pastor would be hired, what would the SBC do?