March 11, 2002
BGCT 'manufacturing a crisis,' IMB leader says
___By Mark Wingfield
___Managing Editor
___RICHMOND, Va.--Texas Baptists are "manufacturing a crisis where none exists," according to an International Mission Board vice president.
___Larry Cox, IMB vice president for mobilization, made the charge in response to a Feb. 26 vote of the Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board. That vote created a transition fund for IMB missionaries who are released or resign because they refuse to sign an affirmation of the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message as required by IMB President Jerry Rankin.
___Rankin recently wrote to IMB missionaries around the world, asking them to sign a statement indicating their agreement with the controversial 2000 Baptist Faith & Message crafted by SBC leadership but rejected by the BGCT and labeled by many an un-Baptist creed.
___Missionaries who do not agree with every part of the SBC's faith statement will be allowed to note areas of disagreement and then will be "counseled" by regional leadership, Rankin has said. While Rankin has not publicly said what will happen to missionaries who do not sign, numerous reports from missionaries on the field indicate they perceive the mandate as threatening their employment.
___More than 60 IMB missionary couples already have indicated to a BGCT missions study committee that they will not sign the faith statement and fear for their jobs. Excerpts from some of their comments were read to Executive Board members Feb. 26.
___However, the IMB's Cox insisted in a Feb. 28 Baptist Press article written by an IMB staff member that "activists" in the BGCT have whipped up "false accusations" of creedalism to further an anti-SBC agenda.
___"We regret that activists in the Baptist General Convention of Texas have chosen to misrepresent what is happening between Southern Baptist missionaries and their leadership," Cox said. "They are manufacturing a crisis where none exists.
___"These activists are falsely saying that missionaries are being forced to change their beliefs to conform to a document they do not agree with. They claim missionaries are 'under attack' by their own leadership. They claim Jerry Rankin has broken a promise to missionaries and that they are 'for the first time' being required to affirm a 'man-made' doctrinal statement rather than the Bible.
___"None of those accusations is true," Cox said. "It is compelling rhetoric used by people who already are willing to believe the worst about Southern Baptists today."
___Cox issued his response through the SBC's Baptist Press one day after the deadline for the Baptist Standard's print edition. Baptist Standard editors made multiple calls to IMB officials immediately after the Executive Board vote and for two days prior to the paper's print deadline, seeking a response to the BGCT board's action. An IMB spokeswoman said the mission board's leaders were too busy appointing new missionaries to respond to the Standard's request.
___However, the IMB story distributed through Baptist Press criticized the Standard for not publishing in its print edition an editorial piece written by Rankin. That piece is posted on the Standard's website.
___"Pointing a finger at the Standard for not telling the IMB's side of the story is a dog that won't hunt," responded Standard Editor Marv Knox. "We have run multiple stories in recent weeks, quoting Jerry Rankin extensively. The editorial piece we have been criticized for not publishing came too late for our weekly deadline and did not contain substantial commentary that had not been reported previously.
___"IMB officials deliberately chose not to respond to our request for comment to the BGCT Executive Board's action in time for inclusion in our March 4 issue," Knox added. "Unlike some other Baptist news organizations, the Standard works diligently to tell both sides of the story. We can only do that, however, when both sides cooperate in the news-gathering process."
___Cox asserted in the BP story that the IMB's current request for missionaries to affirm the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message is not different than what the mission board has practiced for decades. Rankin's request of missionaries is not a reversal of IMB policy, he said.
___"Requiring missionaries to affirm the Baptist Faith & Message has been the board's practice for decades, even under the administration of Keith Parks," Cox said. Parks, who served as president of the SBC's overseas missions board from 1980 to 1992, is chairman of the subcommittee that brought the recommendation to the BGCT Executive Board.
___"Keith Parks all of a sudden claims to see creedalism in Jerry Rankin's request, but he himself also required missionaries to affirm support for the Baptist Faith & Message when he led the board. The BGCT Executive Board claims to see creedalism in Jerry Rankin's actions, even though that group itself voted to affirm the Baptist Faith and Message when it was revised in 1963."
___In his presentation to the Executive Board, Parks anticipated this criticism and explained that despite what IMB officials say, their current practices are different than what the mission board required in the past.
___Previously, SBC missionaries were asked in the interview process if they were in "substantial agreement" with the 1963 Baptist Faith & Message.
___Parks and other BGCT leaders repeatedly have noted that a major difference is the content of the SBC's faith statement. The 2000 Baptist Faith & Message calls itself an "instrument of doctrinal accountability." It does not include a statement from the 1963 version that Jesus Christ is the criterion by which the Bible should be interpreted. SBC leaders said the statement was removed because it gave too much latitude for liberal interpretations of the Bible. The 2000 Baptist Faith & Message also declares that wives must "graciously submit" to their husbands and that churches may not ordain women as pastors.
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