by Sandy » Sat Dec 31, 2016 11:15 am
It's hard to get away from the political element of a discussion like this.
Yeah, Jim, there are a lot of things about Bill Leonard that leave him open to criticism, though in your unrelated and disconnected rant, you didn't point to anything specific regarding Leonard, aside from the fact that your entire rant is a fantasy without a single credible, supportable fact.
It's hard for Christian leaders to admit they've failed. I know many of the moderate Baptist leaders like Leonard are very frustrated with the way things turned out, not only in the SBC, but with their own initiatives that have struggled to survive and gather resources. Leonard did an excellent job of analyzing the SBC during and after the conservative resurgence in God's Last and Only Hope, but like most Moderate Baptist leaders, they over-estimated the inclination of Baptists to look at principle, and underestimated the influence of conservative evangelical media personalities who weren't Southern Baptists on the thinking of the people in the pews. Once there was a clear separation, they leaned a little too far to the left theologically and socially, and got caught between positions on social issues.
Leonard nailed this.
There's going to be a lot of fallout from the complete abandonment of values and principles required for the level of Evangelical support for Trump. It's already happening. People are going to seek a real church instead of a political action committee, or a collection plate for already fabulously rich "preachers" and "leaders." This could be an opportunity, for both moderate Baptists, and for declining mainline denominations, if they want it. If you took the name of the author off of this piece, and eliminated the pre-disposed bias like Jim's post characterizes, you'd find few Christians who would disagree with Leonard's thesis.
BTW, the Mormons are already positioning themselves to avoid fallout from support for Trump. At least one of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir members resigned rather than participate in the inauguration, and there's a petition that thousands of church members are signing to ask church authorities to cancel the choir's appearance.