I don’t follow the SBC very closely .... what sort of liberal things have they been up to ?
12 How so? The organization is still strongly conservative.
Already covered by Freepers - (1) amnesty for illegal aliens, (2) and sharia law for U.S. Muslims among themselves.
Richard Land was formerly the president of The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), the moral and ethics concern entity of the Southern Baptist Convention in the U.S., a post he held from 1988 to 2013. It is arguably the denomination's committee with the highest profile on theology/policy commentary. Land retired from this position effective Oct. 23, 2013, at age 67. He is currently the president of Southern Evangelical Seminary (non-denominational) in Charlotte, NC.
Land got into hot water with the SBC on 3/31/2012 during his radio broadcast, "Richard Land Live!" Land accused the Obama administration and civil rights leaders of using the Trayvon Martin case to deliberately stir up racial tension and "gin up the black vote" for Obama in the 2012 election. His comments were criticized by several black Southern Baptist pastors, who felt they reversed a long effort by the SBC to distance itself from a past history of racism. Among those black pastors was the newly elected president of the SBC, Fred Luter (from New Orleans). Luter had earlier said on his watch that he wanted to bring more blacks into the SBC's administration.
The SBC has had an ongoing committee working to find a new name for the denomination. The church's leadership thinks "Southern" is not representative of today's church, especially with its past history over slavery prior to the Civil War.
Richard Land led the way and fought the good fight against the Boy Scouts of America in 2013 when it announced it intended to change its membership policy to admit open homosexuals. He acquitted himself with honor in that fight, which sadly, the BSA won.
The new president of the ERLC is 43 year-old Russell D. Moore. He succeeded Land. He is still new on his watch. I was not encouraged with his comments/tone regarding the BSA accepting homosexual youth as members. He came across as wishy washy. Time will tell.
Their "marketing" program has been kicked into high gear since concerns over losses in membership became front burner for them.
They elected their first black president a couple of years ago - I believe solely out of PC motives. There's absolutely nothing wrong and everything right with a qualified leader getting elected president, regardless of race, but this was just too "markety" a move to be coincidence.
They've also been kicking around the idea of re-marketing their name by removing "Southern" from it. Sniveling, cowardly, worldly compromise.