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    Southern Baptist Reform Bloggers Call it a Day

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    The bloggers are widely credited with electing South Carolina pastor Frank Page as SBC president in 2006. They used the election to broaden participation in the denomination beyond the entrenched conservative leaders, who themselves rose to power on a reform agenda almost three decades ago.

    After Page was re-elected June 12, the young reformers’ candidate for first vice president was defeated. But they achieved their second big victory a day later by getting denominational approval for a statement declaring the SBC’s revised doctrinal statement—the 2000 “Baptist Faith & Message”—“is sufficient in its current form to guide trustees in their establishment of policies and practices of entities of the convention.”

    That edict, designed to halt the “narrowing of parameters” that has pushed some charismatics, Calvinists and other minorities to the SBC’s margins, may not have its intended effect—several SBC agency presidents immediately said the “Baptist Faith & Message” is a “minimal” statement, not an “exhaustive” one.

    But the bloggers insist they won that battle and are not leaving the fight discouraged.

    “I am abandoning no effort to which I have committed myself for the sake of reforming and refocusing the Southern Baptist Convention,” Cole told Associated Baptist Press after announcing his change of focus on his blog (http://www.baptistblog.wordpress.com).

    “I am shifting to new methods,” said Cole, a pastor in Arlington, Texas, whose attacks on Paige Patterson, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, have shocked even his supporters. … “[N]o agenda for reform will succeed if bridges are burned at every turn. I have become a polarizing figure, and I knew that was an unavoidable consequence of raising the concerns that I have in the manner that I chose.”

    More here... HT:  ABP and the Dallas News Religion Blog

    Any thoughts?

    The most prominent Baptist bloggers who led a two-year revolt against the Southern Baptist Convention establishment have abandoned their Internet-fueled campaign, but they insist they will continue the crusade for more openness in the SBC with other methods. Marty Duren, Benjamin Cole and several other young voices in the denomination announced this week that they won't be blogging about SBC issues anymore. Bloggers have been successful at guiding conversation," Duren wrote on http://www.sbcoutpost.com June 14, one day after the annual SBC meeting. "But for lasting change to take place, it must move into larger realms with more participants at more levels." But Wade Burleson, whose dispute with fellow trustees of the SBC International Mission Board in 2005 became a rallying cry for the online revolution, says he will continue to blog, even "redoubling" his efforts, for the sake of the missionaries.

    Comments

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    1. Tony Kummer on Wed, June 20, 2007

      Good thing we are starting 20+ new SBC blogs every day. I think these guys were only the start. They made their points and now are moving on. But many - many - many more people have points to make.

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