February 18, 2002
SBC official defends Chapman's letter to Texas churches
___By Mark Wingfield
___Managing Editor
___NASHVILLE, Tenn.--Southern Baptist Convention leader Morris Chapman did not mislead Texas Baptists in a letter he recently mailed statewide, according to David Hankins, vice president for Cooperative Program with the SBC Executive Committee.
___On an SBC website, Hankins posted a three-page response to a Feb. 4 editorial by Baptist Standard Editor Marv Knox. The editorial claimed the letter from Chapman, president of the SBC Executive Committee, misled Texas Baptist church leaders about giving options through the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
___"If anyone regularly misleads readers, refuses to tell the whole story and takes sides in Texas, it is the Baptist Standard and Marv Knox," Hankins wrote. "The current editorial is just the latest example."
___Hankins admonished Knox to "make a straightforward declaration of his views to the Baptist public on this matter of SBC support from Texas churches. He has a strong affinity for the left-leaning CBF and a strong dislike of the SBC and has admitted as much. He ought to further admit that, if he had his way, churches in Texas wouldn't give any support to the SBC."
Read the entire text of David Hankins' statement here.
___Further, Hankins called the BGCT an "unfaithful partner" with the SBC because the BGCT promotes an Adopted Budget that distributes national money differently than the SBC desires.
___The work of the BGCT Seminary Study Committee that in 2000 recommended some of those funding changes was a "sham report" and a "slipshod report," Hankins charges in his rebuttal.
___In the Baptist Standard editorial, Knox chastised Chapman for not telling the whole truth about the amount of money the BGCT still forwards to the SBC and the SBC seminaries. Knox specifically cited $9 million to be sent through the BGCT to the SBC International Mission Board this year.
___Hankins' response: "You talk about having your facts wrong! The BGCT does not give one red cent to the mission board or to the SBC. The SBC gets its money the same place the BGCT does--from the churches."
___Even though the IMB is fully funded in the BGCT's Adopted Budget, Hankins insists the BGCT should get no credit for this. "The churches are being very faithful to SBC ministries, but no thanks to the BGCT," he declares.
___In another section of his document, Hankins acknowledges that the BGCT has not reduced its funding for the IMB. But he predicts cuts in IMB funding are on Knox's editorial agenda.
___"Knox's anti-SBC, pro-CBF buddy David Currie is already making noises about how Baptists may want to reconsider their support of IMB," Hankins asserts. "Although Knox is defensive about the BGCT and its IMB support, I predict that is the next step in their budget-cutting plans."
___Also, Hankins says, if it appears that Chapman is favoring the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention over the BGCT, "some might think there is a reason to take sides."
___Hankins' rebuttal to the Standard editorial was not sent to Knox but was posted on an SBC website and was the focus of a Feb. 8 story in Baptist Press, published by the SBC Executive Committee.
___That same issue of BP carried a story praising the SBTC for its faithful relationship to the SBC. Chapman and other SBC officials were quoted on comments they made at an SBTC luncheon.
___Chapman explained that the SBC no longer is dependent upon news distributed by "state convention instruments" but has direct access to Southern Baptists via the Internet.
___With daily Baptist Press postings on the Internet, "you can read it as quickly as the religion editor of the New York Times and Time magazine," Chapman said. "That makes all the difference in the world in having an opportunity to get our perspective on the news to all Southern Baptists."
___In January alone, 638,875 people viewed one or more pages of the denominational websites maintained by the SBC Executive Committee, Chapman said.
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