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Moore seems to be growing up. I don't think Land ever did.

Sounds like repentance (CBF), socialization with the marginalized (Phelps*, Joel that is), and the simple life (Berry).

*Now Fred Phelps, that would be too “marginalized”.

Hmm, Ed, guess you and Russ Moore still aren't BFFs.

Note that he admits to not having the right attitude, but not that his facts were wrong or that his writing was unethical. I wonder if that will prompt an acknowledgement from CBF or ABP that they, too, didn't have a good attitude when writing about the SBC. There was some pretty caustic stuff that came out of there for a while, even after they acknowledged that they had to develop an identity beyond just being critics of the SBC.

Actually, it was a rather significant apology and ackowledgment of earlier, errant attitudes. Perhaps my mod/lib friends have good reason to be underwhelmed but it looks better to receive the half-a-loaf graciously.

Timothy, surely there is some line you would draw whereupon you would vote to kick some church out of your group. If not then you have no core beliefs worth standing for.

Well, whether its tit for tat, or a response to something of more substance, to be critical of the "attitude" and the approach of those involved with the conservative resurgence, if it was wrong, then it seems that responding in kind would be too. But that kind of hypocrisy was rampant in the SBC prior to the conservatives coming along. And if you think that sort of thing wasn't going on in the SBC prior to the conservative resurgence, you're naive. Moore's theology reflected that of the people in the pews who make up the SBC and all of its various parts, a fact that has been confirmed a thousand times, on every level of convention organization from the local church to the national convention. At any rate, whether moderates accept his apology, or remain critical and bitter, will make little difference. The SBC is well beyond the point of acknowledging, or responding to, the criticism of the few remaining moderates.

Moore came to Bama in early 90s or so and among others he through aspersions on was the novelist Vicki Covington. She once had a column in the Bham News that praised my Dad's first Cousin Max Helton, Nascar Chaplain and his remarks at the funeral of Davey Allison, I think it was.

Then with the support of an "ethicist" like Moore who had a position at Southern Seminary, Covington became part of the Bircher Albert Lee Smith's Inquisition of Samford President Tom Corts at FBC Bham in 1993.
I was there and witnessed the whole deal.

I'm glad Moore may be on the road to recovery but all this smacks me a little of W.A. Criswell's response to Stewart Newman in the famous letter of 68 Curtis Freeman of Duke analyzed so beautifully a few years ago in the Ignorant from the Neck Up Piece or some such.

If the John Birchification, the salafistication, the TeaPartyization of an entire denomination was what it took to get Russ Moore adjusted to begin to repent, to Damascus Road, well it seems like a large price to pay. Somebody it seems on his pilgrimage coulda pointed out George Curley Wallace as an analogy. Its not like there weren't examples all around.

And then to award this felow with his glorified position as chief ethicist for the SBC. Well it smacks of Connors Line in the Road to Perdition: "It's All so Fbombin hysterical!"

I'm not saying they didn't exist, but taken in context it could be interesting to review a few