___ Mississippi church first with woman pastor. Rivercrest Fellowship in Jackson, Miss., has become the first church affiliated with the Mississippi Baptist Convention to be led by a woman pastor. The congregation geared toward young adults commonly referred to as "Generation X" installed Carla Street as pastor Jan. 20. She had been co-pastor since starting the church in 1993 with her husband, Steve Street. He recently resigned to take another ministry position.
___ Mars Hill leaders resign. President Max Lennon and Chancellor Robert Knott resigned their positions amid faculty unrest at Mars Hill College Jan. 24. The resignations were announced in a statement from the executive committee of the college's board of trustees. Lennon, president since March 1996, has been under fire from faculty members over his leadership of the small liberal arts college in North Carolina. Areas of contention reportedly included faculty pay, hiring practices and the creation of a foundation in 1998 to raise more money for the school.
___ Oklahomans plan women's conference. First Baptist Church of Oklahoma City will host a "Women in Baptist Life" conference March 1-2 featuring Molly Marshall, Diana Garland, Mack Roark, Donna Butler, Bonnie Gerard, Gladys Lewis and Marie Davis. A similar conference last year drew 160 participants. Keynote speakers are Garland, chair of the School of Social Work at Baylor University; Marshall, professor of worship and spiritual formation at Central Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Kan.; and Roark, professor of religion at Oklahoma Baptist University. For registration information, contact Linda Hicks at (405) 232-4255 or lindahicks@fbcokc.org.
___ Southwestern offers photojournalism conference. The 10th annual photojournalism conference at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary is slated for March 1-3. Nationally renowned photojournalists Eugene Richards, Anacleto Rapping, Carol Guzy, Dan Beatty, Hillery Garrison Smith, John White, Ron Londen and Tom Kennedy will lecture on photographic techniques. For more information or to register, contact Amanda Rogers at (877) 474-4769. Registration is $125 until Feb. 15, and $135 at the door.
___ Music Workshop planned. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary will offer its 50th annual Church Music Workshop Feb. 11-14, featuring six hours of choral techniques, six hours of choral music reading and three concerts. Conference leaders include Bruce Corley, Southwestern professor of New Testament and Greek; Gordon Borror, who recently joined Southwestern's faculty as professor of church music; John Dickson, professor of conducting at Texas Tech University; Caia Kent McCullar, professor of church music education at Southwestern; Cynthia Dobrinski, a handbell composer and arranger; Joseph Martin, a composer and director of sacred publications at Shawnee Press; and Allen Pote, also a choral composer. Registration is $105. For more information, contact David Music at scmusic@swbts.edu or (817) 923-1921, ext. 3160.
___ Wedgwood victim's scholarship awarded. A scholarship estabilshed by Kathy Jo Brown-Rogers at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in memory of her late husband, Shawn, is now aiding students at the Fort Worth school. Shawn Brown was murdered by Larry Gene Ashbrook in the 1999 Wedgwood Baptist Church massacre. His widow, who has remarried, said she draws comfort from knowing her late husband's ministry continues through the scholarship.
___ Tax reform sought in Alabama. Alabama Baptists have joined an interdenominational campaign for "tax fairness" in the state. In 2000, the Alabama Baptist Convention passed a resolution citing "credible evidence that Alabama's tax structure places a disproportionate burden on the poorest of our citizens." Alabama has the lowest threshold for paying state income taxes for any of the 42 states that assess income taxes. That means Alabama requires the lowest income families of the state to pay an income tax on top of a high sales-tax rate.
___ Land sees gay roots in American Taliban. The American news media are covering up the most likely reason John Walker Lindh was driven to take up arms against his country with the Taliban of Afghanistan, according to Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. According to Land, Lindh was traumatized at age 16 when his father declared he was a homosexual and divorced his mother to move in with a male companion. This information has been suppressed by the national media because it might be damaging to "the homosexual agenda," Land charged.
___ Southwestern's accreditation reaffirmed. The accreditation of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary recently was reaffirmed by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and the Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada. Those two organizations are the primary accreditors of seminaries in the Southern United States.
The Baptist Standard
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