Spokane theologians dispute Southern Baptists’ reasoning in Saddleback vote

Local religious scholars say Southern Baptists embraced the conservative side of modern social divides to reason that women shouldn’t hold pastoral roles, which led to a recent split with a California megachurch.

One Southern Baptist pastor in Spokane Valley, however, said national Southern Baptist delegates adhered to a correct reading of scripture to excommunicate Saddleback Church, a congregation of 21,000 members based in Orange County, California.

After two churches, including Saddleback, were put “in a position of disfellowship” by the Southern Baptist Convention in February due to the appointment of a woman to the position of pastor, a vote was held to reject the churches’ appeal, as well as an amendment to the faith’s document clarifying the convention’s view against female pastors.

Despite impassioned speeches by Saddleback’s founder Rick Warren and others, the vote was definitive with 89% of delegates in support of disfellowship – effective excommunication from the national organization and affiliated programs.

In the 2000 revision of the Baptist Faith and Message cited in the amendment, it states, “While men and women are both gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by scripture.”

This passage and some of its biblical basis was absent from an earlier 1963 revision that did not specify the gender of pastors that had been used to challenge the disfellowship process.

Pastor Kenny Lydick of Greenacres Baptist Church in Spokane Valley said, “The scripture is very clear,” noting that delegates were open to hearing Saddleback’s appeal before making a decision. He highlighted the Southern Baptist tenet of biblical fidelity.

Lydick said he was unconcerned with the possibility of women aspiring to ministerial roles becoming disenfranchised. He mentioned the various services that a woman can perform within a ministry, but reiterated that leadership of a congregation was exclusively the position of a male pastor.

“You can’t separate the two, the title and the work go together,” he said.

Kevin McCruden, professor of religious studies at Gonzaga University, highlighted the interpretation of women’s roles in the scripture cited by the Baptist Faith & Message, which differ in meaning and tone.

He questioned whether larger context was missing in the most specific quotes used from the Christian Standard Bible, including 1 Timothy 2:9-14, which holds the passage “I do not allow a woman to teach, or to have authority over a man; instead, she is to remain quiet,” and Ephesians 5:22-32, of which “Now as the Church submits to Christ, so also are wives to submit to their husbands in everything,” plays a prominent role.

His assessment stems from the concept that the Bible is as much a historical text as a religious one. He said many of these writings, particularly from the New Testament dictating strict roles of men and women, were unlikely to be the result of biblical figures’ personal perspectives, including Jesus and his apostles, who were considered progressive by their contemporaries. Instead, they were ways to publicly appease a Greco-Roman majority that held those patriarchal views.

“We have the counterculture perspective of Christianity interacting with the popular culture of the first century as context,” he said. “Look for the timely message, not the timeless.”

He connected this idea to the emphasis on Jesus’ suffering, a poignant memory and relatable for early Christians who suffered similar persecution.

Shannon Dunn, chair of the religious studies department at Gonzaga, cited some of the recent interactions around the Southern Baptist Convention and contrasted it with the historical nature of Baptists, who held local autonomy at the forefront of their beliefs.

She believes women in pastoral roles is a newer occurrence that can be traced to many of the social movements in the 1960s and ’70s. Its response from conservative groups has been a social and political shift as much as religious, highlighting the impact of charismatic individuals such as Jerry Falwell and recently passed Pat Robertson on Christian communities including the influential organization Moral Majority, which energized Christian communities to support political causes.

Dunn considers this amendment “more of a social barometer,” that presents the current state of the organization, particularly its uniformity of opinion which appears incongruous with the basis of Baptist values.

She challenges Lydick’s assessment on biblical texts.

“All Christians approach the Bible with a personal agenda,” she said, adding that she does not believe scripture is immutable or definitive.

“Scripture has always been mediated by other sources,” she said. “I don’t know how many people can read the original New Testament, which was written in Greek.”

Most Protestant denominations, including some individual Baptist churches, allow women to perform the role of priests or pastors. Catholics and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints do not.