More about Southern Baptist Convention Churches and Racism

by Charles S. Oaxpatu

The Southern Baptist Convention churches and the racism that exists among church members are in the news again. You may read all about it by clicking on the following safe link:

Southern Baptists Confront the Church’s History of Racism and Slaveholding. For Some Members, It’s Not Enough.

I was a member of a large Southern Baptist Convention church here in East Tennessee in the middle and late 1980s. Best I can recall, its membership was white as the driven snow, and the subject of racism never came up in any church context I can now recall. I might have seen one or two black people sitting among the congregation members at 11:00 a.m. one or two Sunday mornings, but that was about it. Furthermore, the two largest African-American neighborhoods in our town were located within a fairly short walking distance of our SBC church. Does all of that tell you anything? It tells me something. African-American people were out of the sight and out of the minds of the 2,000 white people who attended my church.

East Tennessee voluntarily sided with Abraham Lincoln and the Union during the American Civil War because most of the steep local topography was unsuitable for plantation agriculture and the large African-American slave populations required to conduct it. Intuitively, because of that, one would think that racist feelings toward African-Americans would be minimal among local white populations. That is not the case. If anything, racism is far worse in East Tennessee than in the other two major divisions of Tennessee.

A proudly told oral folklore tradition in Loudon County, the next county south from mine, says that only a small number of African-American people lived in that county circa 1900, shortly before Lenoir City, Tennessee, was established in 1908. According to the oral legend, local government officials (and others no doubt) approached the members of the small African-American community and flat-out told them that they wanted Loudon County to be an all-white, “nigger-free” county. The African-American population received an ultimatum declaring that all African-Americans should be gone from the county by a certain specified date——or else. If you know anything about southern history and Jim Crow, you know what was meant by that “or else.” Supposedly, according to this item of folklore, all of the emotionally beaten-down African-American citizens moved dutifully out of the county, leaving the white population with exactly what it had demanded.

Loudon County has always been predominantly Southern Baptist and other stripes of baptist—–and it still is. When I became familiar with Loudon County in 1978, one of the first things I noticed was the racism that still exists among the Southern Baptist locals. In particular, in the 1980s, I recall one middle-aged Southern Baptist gentleman who would grab my right arm at Christmas parties, pull me aside from the other guests, and whisper these words into my ear:

I bet The University of Tennessee VOLS might finally win a football game if they could find a way to get rid of those ‘damned niggers’ on the team.

Just to underline these unkind and unjust racist words, 16 years later, a VOLS football team won the 1998 NCAA Division I-A National Championship in college football in a game against Florida State University. The VOLS team was led by an African-American quarterback (Tee Martin) and numerous other star-quality African-American players such as Jamal Lewis, Peerless Price, Deon Grant, Billy Ratliff, and Al Wilson. The stadium in Glendale, Arizona, was filled with many white Southern Baptists from all across Tennessee and northern Florida where—–in my opinion—–God might have given his first mystical answer to Southern Baptist racism with a single play from an African-American quarterback to an African-American wide receiver. You may see that now famous play by clicking here and turning your sound volume high:

 

 

The leadership of the SBC likes to talk about overcoming the racism in its churches, but it only takes baby steps toward doing anything about it. As the old saying goes:

Talk is cheap.

Everyone in the SBC knows what the real problem is with racism in its churches and why that racism continues.

Each SBC church is basically an independent entity that owns its church building and the land it is built upon. The SBC churches are only loosely associated with their mother organization in Nashville through various educational, monetary giving, and missions programs. If a Southern Baptist congregation becomes unhappy with the SBC leadership, all it has to do is say:

Bye-Bye! We like our racism, and we are pulling our church out of the SBC forever. Ultimately, you have no real control over us and what we do.

Unlike the Roman Catholic Church or The United Methodist Church, the SBC leadership cannot rule its member churches with an iron fist. Consequently, the SBC leadership is reduced to begging and cajoling with its member churches, all the while worried about losing churches and the all important money they send to the SBC to support various programs and activities. Pressing too hard on a controversial issue like racism might cause the flight of multiple churches. What if all of them were to leave the SBC? Heaven forbid that this should ever happen in a time when annual new baptisms are still nosediving like they have been for many consecutive years in Southern Baptist churches.

I strongly suspect racism will continue on happily in SBC churches with predominantly white members. It is good that the SBC leaders see racism as a problem, and it is equally good that they would like to reform this aspect of their churches. Sadly, I think all we can expect is more years and decades to pass by with the SBC leadership talking about reform on racism but never making anything truly significant happen to end racism in its churches. Getting the job done will require establishing more control over local Southern Baptist churches, acquiring real punitive power over those churches, and acquiring a willingness to bust heads in those churches to purge the racism.

What do I mean by “bust heads”? I am talking about comprehensively identifying and permanently expelling racist leaders, pastors, deacons, missionaries, and members from all Southern Baptist management organizations, seminaries, programs, missions, and churches. Then make all prospective new SBC employees and church members aware of the fact that the SBC does not tolerate racism or ethnic prejudice in any of its churches or organizations. Make it abundantly clear to new SBC employees and church members that any expressions of racism or ethnic prejudice will result in immediate and permanent expulsion from the SBC and/or the church.

Southern Baptists are more than happy to publicly fire vitriol and venom at the Roman Catholic Church for not punishing its pedophile priests and Sunday school workers. When are the SBC leaders going to turn that same passion for action against the similar workers of racist and ethnic iniquity in their own churches? I think the American people as a whole would like an answer to that question.

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