ABC-USA Questions

[Ed Pettibone]

For years, the main groups going to the SBC from NC flew on Marse Grant's charter planes that usually left from Raleigh and Charlotte. Most of these were from churches ranging from 400 to about 1500 members, and while moderates may have predominated, there were folks on those charters from all stripes of the convention's spectrums. It was in the 1980's when M. O. Owens and others began organizing bus tours to the SBC and enlisting pastors from other churches. In NC, many of these were churches that had simply not been interested in the SBC and were certainly only miniscule supporters of the state convention and Cooperative Program. They gave designated funds to some state and SBC causes but had not given support to the main body of either convention in several years. Suddenly they were organizing efforts to get more votes to the SBC. While some smaller church pastors went, most of those boarding those bus tours from NC were from churches that had been sending no one but who suddenly sent their full complement to support Adrian Rogers. Small churches did not have the financial resources to send pastors and others. I've seen a number of their budgets from the 1970's and 1980's, and those budgets might have included $100 for the state convention but never supported trips for the SBC.

Ed: Dave, thanks for filling in some of the blanks, but when you you mention "Marse Grant's charter planes" that left from Raleigh and Charlotte, who or what was Marse Grant? Did those who utilized that mode of transportation travel free or was it sort of a co-op charter? You seem to indicate that it was first come first served is that correct? Also When "M.O. Owens" (?) and others organized tours to the SBC who footed the bill and where the buses available to to all?

And Dave you talk about (i think, Owens) and those organizing these tours enlisting pastors from other churches that had shown miniscule interest in the state convention and the cooperative program. These churches how ever did, you report, give designated funds to some state and SBC causes. Did whatever selected causes they contributed to, or did not contribute to, have anything to do with which churches where or where not recruited for these trips. If not what enticement did the organizers offer? And why did these churches give a flip about Adrian Rogers getting elected.

* Note: I am attempting to keep my personal views to a minimum. Here I may sound a bit argumentative but do not mean to be so. But when you say "Small churches did not have the financial resources to send pastors and others. I've seen a number of their budgets from the 1970's and 1980's, and those budgets might have included $100 for the state convention but never supported trips for the SBC."
I want to ask did hose churches not have the financial resources or where they simply not willing to commit resources to causes they found suspect. Also I remember that in the 70's, $100 went a lot further. In those day I was traveling full time for the State of Indiana and getting 10 cents a mile and $10.00 Per-diam for meals, plus I could be reimbursed for up to $27.50 for a hotel room. I seldom spent the full room allowance although I could have spent more, I pocketed at least a dollar a day some times three, from the per-diam, at the tops, coffee was 25 cents usually with free refills, plus I felt the 10cents a mile was generous.

And Tim you make a good point about the conservatives who served as SBC presidents prior to the resurgence and yes the power to appoint was always there but prior to to the Pressler Patterson alliance, for the most part both conservatives and moderates demonstrated an interest in promoting the Kingdom of God over personal ambition. I do not know that either group was totally altruistic but they did recognize the need for cooperation. In something of a symbiotic relationship.

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[Timothy Bonney]

And Tim you make a good point about the conservatives who served as SBC presidents prior to the resurgence and yes the power to appoint was always there but prior to to the Pressler Patterson alliance, for the most part both conservatives and moderates demonstrated an interest in promoting the Kingdom of God over personal ambition. I do not know that either group was totally altruistic but they did recognize the need for cooperation. In something of a symbiotic relationship.

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And any system can break down if the persons who are in charge have bad intentions. I'm sure when the SBC system of Presidential appointments was created no one was thinking that some future SBC President would be part of a political takeover machine.

[Dave Roberts]

For years, the main groups going to the SBC from NC flew on Marse Grant's charter planes that usually left from Raleigh and Charlotte. Most of these were from churches ranging from 400 to about 1500 members, and while moderates may have predominated, there were folks on those charters from all stripes of the convention's spectrums. It was in the 1980's when M. O. Owens and others began organizing bus tours to the SBC and enlisting pastors from other churches. In NC, many of these were churches that had simply not been interested in the SBC and were certainly only miniscule supporters of the state convention and Cooperative Program. They gave designated funds to some state and SBC causes but had not given support to the main body of either convention in several years. Suddenly they were organizing efforts to get more votes to the SBC. While some smaller church pastors went, most of those boarding those bus tours from NC were from churches that had been sending no one but who suddenly sent their full complement to support Adrian Rogers. Small churches did not have the financial resources to send pastors and others. I've seen a number of their budgets from the 1970's and 1980's, and those budgets might have included $100 for the state convention but never supported trips for the SBC.

Ed: Dave, thanks for filling in some of the blanks, but when you you mention "Marse Grant's charter planes" that left from Raleigh and Charlotte, who or what was Marse Grant? Did those who utilized that mode of transportation travel free or was it sort of a co-op charter? You seem to indicate that it was first come first served is that correct? Also When "M.O. Owens" (?) and others organized tours to the SBC who footed the bill and where the buses available to to all?

And Dave you talk about (i think, Owens) and those organizing these tours enlisting pastors from other churches that had shown miniscule interest in the state convention and the cooperative program. These churches how ever did, you report, give designated funds to some state and SBC causes. Did whatever selected causes they contributed to, or did not contribute to, have anything to do with which churches where or where not recruited for these trips. If not what enticement did the organizers offer? And why did these churches give a flip about Adrian Rogers getting elected.

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Ed, let me answer the best I can. Marse Grant was the editor of the Biblical Recorder (NC Baptist newspaper). He and his wife ran a travel agency on the side that arranged charter service and hotel packages. There were avaiklable to anyone who was willing to pay. The service was good and it was a more reasonable cost than most of us could find on our own. My wife and I flew on some of those and enjoyed the fellowship. I would guess that the average cost was about $600 per couple using double accomodations. Meals were largely on your own.

I don't have the information of M. O. Owens and Robert Tenery's tours, but they were usually bus trips paid for by the particpants or their churches. Recruitment was primarily to "support biblical inerrancy," and the trips were promoted through Tenery's publications. The costs were probably less than the charter planes, but the food costs were higher on the longer bus trips.

Paige Patterson and Judge Pressler were frequent visitors speaking at rallies to stir discontent toward the way the convention had been managed. The idea was to stir enough discontent to get pastors to go. Some obviously did who had never participated before. Many were never represented, both among those who would have supported the Takeover and those who would not have supported it. It has now been more than 30 years, and I don't have a command of all the details any more.

[Gene Scarborough]

The best summary I know is: Get a fundy mad and he will go anywhere and do as told to "correct the situation."

Get a moderate mad and he always has an autonymous discussion and runs around in some circles and then can't get quite enough in his mob to hang the rascals.

It is finished. Some of us knew the real battle was about freedom or conformity. The magic power was discovered by Criswell when he got the presidency and his hit-man Patterson put it into practice with Pressler's help and inciting the crowd with that magic "liberal" word.

Baptists were so copiously democratic that no one could conceive there was a way, much less a desire, for anyone to play Dictator. Please note, that all this came about when mega-pastors like Criswell started their "School of the . . ." and invited preachers to whoop and hoop and buy buses / or clowns / or celebrities / or weightlifters / or Simon the Magician to get together a crowd!

[Sandy]

This is going back to business most of us know well. The 1979 "surprise" was a direct result of busing messengers in from churches all around Houston. I watched them pour off the buses, vote, leave throwing ballots all over the floor. At that point the appointive powers of the President went into full bore with exclusive appointments. Previously, most presidents took recommendations from State Conventions for cooperating pastors/laypeople in that state to serve in appointed Agency and Commission Trustee positions.

I was a messenger who rode a bus to the convention hall in Houston in 1979, and I wasn't from a Houston area church at the time, I was a messenger from a church in Arizona. I rode one of several busses that transported messengers from our hotel, a Howard Johnson's on the Southwest Freeway, to the convention hall at what was the Summit (now Lakewood Church). I doubt there was anyone from a Houston area church on any of the dozens of busses that were chartered to bring messengers from a dozen different hotel locations because of the limited parking at the Summit. There were a number of Houston area churches that had bus ministries at the time, and some of them were enlisted to serve as parking shuttles as well. So of course there were messengers "pouring off the busses," but there always have been at every SBC meeting I've ever been to.

The Texas registration at the SBC in Houston in 1979 was slightly less than 1,600, not enough in any case to justify the charge of busing in enough messengers to control the convention. With 16,000 registered, it would have taken at least 8,000 to win.

The appointive powers of the President are a bottleneck to control of who gets the committee and trustee seats, but it is through the committee on nominations, which he appoints. Prior to 1979, you are exactly right that most Presidents took recommendations from the state convention leaders, who were also part of the tight, narrow little group that controlled the SBC during that time. If you look at those annuals, you will see that those individuals appointed the same people over and over and over and over. Some of them were on state convention committees and boards at the same time. You gotta wonder when some of those people had the time to pastor their churches.

But, it was the pre-1979 crowd that put that kind of power in the President's hands by changing the bylaws and making that way. If my Baptist history memory serves, I believe it was Porter Routh and Albert McClelland who helped lead out in making that change.

[Dave Roberts]

That was in the SBC Constitution that I had to read for extra credit for some class in seminary. Frankly, it was a boring document. So the appointive powers of the president predate 1969 when I read it, as best I remember. '

[Gene Scarborough]

Sandy---I am amazed that we view the same event from such different eyes!

I have no clue when Presidential appointment to the Committee on Committees came into existence. I can assure you it was a "way to get things going" over a "way to get things controlled." The entire success of the "Golden 50's" was based on finding ways to involve more people in Mission Giving. The result was magnificent growth.

The whole purpose of 1979 and some 10 years it took to lead up to it was simple: CONTROL.

Where, once, Baptists made sure no one told the local church what to do, instantly the only way to CR success was people taking orders and doing as told. A curtain quickly grew over appointments and major decisions, If you were in the right group you got your way and hoped to rise. It was crystal clear things had changed. The only question was how long the exit would take.

It is now 30 years post-takeover. Finances are sputtering. Boards and Agencies are drawing in their belts. Virtually nothing new has been done except to promote your buddies and build a fancy memorial at Alpharetta with a new name and concept surrounding it from the old Home MIssion Board.

I sure love old Richard Land splitting his britches as folks SBC seem to be running out of embarassments to engender!

[Neil Heath]

As for getting smaller church pastors to attend conventions, here in Ga. I understand from a reliable source that many small church pastors were told that only if they brought their church's full complement of messengers to the annual meeting to support the cause, they would be put on committees, boards, etc. No doubt the recognition that they existed at all meant a great deal to them.

[Ed Pettibone]

That was in the SBC Constitution that I had to read for extra credit for some class in seminary. Frankly, it was a boring document. So the appointive powers of the president predate 1969 when I read it, as best I remember. '

Ed: Dave like you I can not pinpoint when this power was made available to the Convention President but according to Paul Pressler in his true confession titled A Hill On Which to Die it was a well established process when Bill Powell carefully detailed it for him in 1975 while driving from a meeting of the Baptist Faith and Fellowship Meeting in Lenori City, TN to the SBC meeting in Atlanta. William "Bill" Powell was the head of the BF&NF at that time.

Pressler writes;

Here is how it works: The convention president appoints the Committee on Committees in "conference with the vice-presidents," according to section 21 of the SBC bylaws. "Conference" was not defined. Therefor it was assumed that the president had the right to exercise this power
to appoint the committee and then share what he had done (or was going to do) with the vice-presidents and consider their suggestions. We also assumed that the president had no obligation to consider their suggestions. We thus adopted a very narrow interpretation of "conference." There was never any official definition.

After chiding the "liberals" for not having the Executive committee define "conference" in their favor, Pressler acknowledges

"Had any official definition of of conference existed that gave equal voice to each of the vice presidents along with the president, the conservative movement would have been stopped. The liberal-backed candidates frequently won vice-presidential elections after 1979, though conservatives won the presidency."

** Note throughout "A Hill" the Judge is quite loose in his use of the terms conservative and liberal.

[Timothy Bonney]

Ed I'd never heard this statement about the meaning of "conference." Wow, what a tactical error on the part of moderates. I can't imagine a definition of "conference" where the meaning is that the presiding officers makes all the decisions. That should have been officially defined!

[Gene Scarborough]

The core of the entire issue is "you can't legislate morality."

To take a losly knit theological group whose basic purpose was missions sending, and turn it into a lock-step theological group around a fake concept of Inerrancy was totally immoral, in my view.

The reason there were not all the "details" of Presidential appointive powers spelled out is that Southern Baptists never really thought this could happen. The strength of AUTONOMY had aways protected them in the past. The could cooperate without being subsurvient to any masters of a denominational hierarchy. Everything the Roman Catholic hierarchy was, Baptists tried to be the opposite. Even Methodist hierarchy was not acceptable to me as the son of a Baptist preacher.

Upon looking back, I was exposed to the wrath of a few in a church if I crossed them. Every "successful" classmate of mine was lucky enough not to get a troubled church or to get out before the ax fell on his neck. Even with that, I have had quite a few classmates in the last 15 years approaching retirement who took it early----we all know why! No system is perfect.

[Timothy Bonney]

The reason there were not all the "details" of Presidential appointive powers spelled out is that Southern Baptists never really thought this could happen. The strength of AUTONOMY had aways protected them in the past.

I would agree that it is quite likely that no one expect the system to be abused as it was. Unfortunately, as I've seen in church bylaws, protections are often only enacted after the system has been misused or not at all.

Autonomy is a buffer for the local Baptist congregation but it offers no protection for a takeover of the denomination itself. And eventually when the denomination controls theological education and all the denominations resources it will effect the local churches anyway. As you've indicated in your post also local church autonomy offers no protection for clergy. You are on your own.

[Gene Scarborough]

Ain't it a MESS, Tim!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kinda like the US Constitution---constantly under assault and subject to vast interpretation when our forefathers really just wanted to be free and enjoy the "inalienable right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness!"

As long as Native Americans and slaves were without souls, their consciences didn't bother them very much.

[Timothy Bonney]

Ain't it a MESS, Tim!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In general anything run by people is a mess. I remember a friend of mine who is a teacher saying one day "teaching would be so easy if it weren't for the children."

[Gene Scarborough]

Kinda like old George Bush said: "Running America would be so easy---if it were a Dictatorship---AND I was the Dictator!"

[Sandy]

The reason there were not all the "details" of Presidential appointive powers spelled out is that Southern Baptists never really thought this could happen.

The reason not all the details were spelled out is that a very narrow and exclusive group of people controlled the SBC through the officer appointment process, and they never thought that anyone would challenge who the good ole boys named to the committee, or that any opposition would develop that could bring enough messengers to a convention to change anything.

[Dave Roberts]

The reason there were not all the "details" of Presidential appointive powers spelled out is that Southern Baptists never really thought this could happen.

The reason not all the details were spelled out is that a very narrow and exclusive group of people controlled the SBC through the officer appointment process, and they never thought that anyone would challenge who the good ole boys named to the committee, or that any opposition would develop that could bring enough messengers to a convention to change anything.

Sandy, I am pleased that you know the full motivation of people who wrote those bylaws, most of whom were probably dead before you were born. That makes you clairvoyant on those in the past. I am impressed .

[Gene Scarborough]

My father was a life-long Baptist. He was born and reared in the Danielsville, Ga, area just east of Athens in the Moon's Grove community and church. That was about as rural Southern Baptist as you could get. When he felt his call to preach and announced his intent to go to Mercer for a good education, the little ladies came imporing him not to get an education since it would "ruin him."

That was the most typical type of Southern Baptist taking place in the early 1900's.

At Mercer, he was nicknamed "Socrates" because he wasn't buying the pre- / a- / whatever-mellineal view that was in vogue. There were many who insisted the Bible was "literal" on all matters. So much anger and theological difference went on that only AUTONOMY could keep it together.

What Sandy conjects as a "good old boy" system is partly true and it was based around each Seminary. There, so much difference existed there could be no "evil few" running the show. The focus in the 50-60's was so much on growth and expansion that "control" was on the back burner.

Then along came a few large churches like Dallas First and the School of the Prophets, Jacksonville First with it's similar school, Orlando First, etc. When Criswell was elected President, he could not force a change to conservatism. However, he did discover the "magic power" of the Persident's appointment of members to the Committee on Committees. It officially stated, "in consultation with Convention Officers." That was another proof that the SBC was purposely formatted to spread power and involve the most pastors and laypeople possible. The average large church pastor promoted a goal of 50% of total budget to missions. Presidents were elected based on mission giving and speaking ability. Heads of Boards and Agencies were administrators rather than dictators. I knew most of them because my dad introduced me. We lived in Atlanta and he worked for the HMB so I knew those people in the Spring Street Headquarters and they knew me. It was never in my modus operandus (or my father) to "use" any connections for promotion.

Then came airport meetings, political planning, getting out the vote in 1979 leading to some 15 years of constant turmoil. The only way such could happen was with the connections and politics Sandy ascribes to the former leadership, now gone. Whatever "good old boy" politics went on was a REACTION to the moves and ways of Conservative Resurgeance. Previously, is was a "get along and go along mentality." The natural theological divide--which was not that broad--turned into a chasm.

I was at SEBTS 1967-70 and it was far from "liberal." Sadly, that was the divisive term applied and the magic word was "inerrant." It was a made up divide concocted in Texas and forced on us in Houston and forward.

This is my personal witness from being Baptist in my mother's womb, having an active preacher father who was the Associate Director of MIssions for the Atlanta Association and first Director of Juvenile Rehabilitation for the HMB.

I think Sandy is over-doing the conjecture about pre-1979 SBC activity and politics. By putting the source of the battle on "moderates" he does not have to admit the awful name-calling and refusal to cooperate by those who run it now. There is no doubt it is different. I don't see it being anywhere near as effective. I think we grew to critical mass and the explosion was generated by the Pressler / Patterson political machine plus the hubris of those wanting the positions they now have---accompanied by scandal after scandal in Boards and Agencies being run by CEO's as opposed to servants of the denomination. In the 50-60's there was no problem with line item showing of executive income. Now it is buried DEEP.

We are veering off the topic back to the old problems. However, there are new people here now and it needs to be restated and left to another day. ABC-USA is far from the split in the SBC---I sure hope!!!