southern baptist convention

As America reels from the exposure of a massive child sexual abuse scandal in the Southern Baptist Convention, we should pause to take stock of the culpability of the broader conservative, mostly white evangelical subculture.

From sexual abuse to white nationalism, a fake rabbi, atheists behaving badly, and politicized pastries, 2018 had little going for it on the religion front.

Evangelicals—and those who are strongly invested in a “respectable” image for evangelicalism—now seem to be making a concerted effort to push back ahead of the midterm elections.

Redemption of the man who has done bad things is dependent on this principle: The men involved are not bad men at heart. They are mistaken or misled. They just didn’t realize what was wrong.

When asked to write about McCain’s religion I thought I’d review the alignment between the American military and American religions. What I found is as much about what the American public needs to hear about religion as it was about what McCain felt or thought about religion.

The #metoo and #churchtoo movements have put SBC leaders on the defensive, as earlier revelations of widespread child sexual abuse by priests did to the all-male Roman Catholic hierarchy. Yet both groups continue to deny that there could be any connection between all-male power and the sexual abuse of women and children.

Self-definition and even strident public opposition are one thing. Parsing who’s a “real” Christian and who’s not is something else.

In short, Jeff Sessions is a gutless coward, without the courage of his professed religious beliefs; without even a rudimentary moral compass beyond White America Good. Brown America Bad.

The vote to invite Pence was only 60-40, and several audience members challenged his presence. Evangelicals may be overwhelmingly Trump’s base, but not all of them.

If conservative Christians want to challenge the misogyny in their institutions, they should be applauded and supported. But their call for change will remain problematic as long as they claim Biblical inerrancy as their reason for this call.