The SBC is against the ordination of women. But it also affirms the autonomy of its local congregations. What does this autonomy amount to? Can a local congregation ordain a woman and still be a member of the SBC?
-FrL-
AFAIK, yes, but it won’t get invited to the better parties.
Semi-facetious answer, but I think pretty accurate, from what I’ve read.
According to this (apparently Baptist) news analysis from 2000, the Southern Baptist Convention opposed it, but did not appear to have actually ejected any of the (tiny number of) congregations who had employed a woman as senior pastor.
What that article does not actually address is the simple ordination of women. The entire context is a discussion of senior pastors which, to my outsiders view, appears to indicate that women may be ordained aslong as they do not aspire to the top job in the congregation.
This effort to provide a historical perspective says that Southern Baptists began to ordain women in 1964, although their career path following ordination has not been a clear one.
Updating this thread:
Since Baptist churches are independent, the convention can’t tell them what to do or whom to appoint as a pastor.
But the convention can decide which churches are in and which are out. And even without a formal amendment, its Executive Committee has begun telling churches with women pastors that they’re out. That included one of its largest, Saddleback Church of California.
I can’t possibly do the subject justice in a few lines, but I will mention that my fist wife attended one of the SBC seminaries while we were married and earned two Masters degrees there. This was in the early 1980s. The subject of her ordination was quite heated, especially since she was a student at a denomination seminary and not at an autonomous church.
She was very active and outspoken regarding the role of women in SBC churches and had been for some time. We had just moved from a church that had been ejected from the local Baptist association because they simply ordained a woman as a deacon. While we were at the seminary, we knew of several SBC churches that ordained women pastors and deacons. Again, this was 40 years ago. It was, and remains, a very complex and political issue for the denomination.
This is a surprise.
Next up: the vote to split the conference and expel the infidels.
Hey, it’s happened before. That’s where the SBC came from – separating from the preexisting Baptist body to oppose abolition.
Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879?
Splitter!