Southern Baptists elect 1st black president
Rev. Fred Luter, pastor of the Franklin Ave. Baptist Church, delivers a sermon during Sunday Services at the Church in New Orleans, June 3, 2012. / AP Photo/Gerald Herbert
Updated 4:33 PM ET PM
(AP) NEW ORLEANS - The Southern Baptist Convention voted Tuesday to elect its first African-American president in one of its biggest steps yet to reconcile the 167-year-old denomination's racial past and appeal to a more diverse group of believers.
The Rev. Fred Luter Jr. was unopposed in being elected by thousands of enthusiastic delegates on Tuesday at the annual meeting of the nation's largest Protestant denomination in his hometown of New Orleans.
Pastor David Crosby of First Baptist New Orleans nominated Luter, calling him a "fire-breathing, miracle-working pastor" who "would likely be a candidate for sainthood if he were Catholic."
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Crosby recalled how Luter built the Franklin Avenue Baptist Church from a tiny congregation to a megachurch of nearly 8,000 before the buildings were destroyed by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
Members of Luter's mostly black church came to worship at Crosby's mostly white church, and the pastors worked together for 2 1/2 years as Luter rebuilt Franklin Avenue. Today, with a Sunday attendance of 5,000, Luter's church is once again the largest Southern Baptist church for attendance in the state.
"Fred Luter is the only megachurch pastor I know who had to do it twice," Crosby said.
The historic election comes as the denomination tries to expand its appeal beyond its traditional white Southern base. Membership and baptisms have been generally declining in recent years.
The Nashville, Tenn.-based denomination was formed before the Civil War in a split with northern Baptists over slavery and had reputation over much of the last century for supporting segregation.
Seventeen years ago, Luter was one of the authors of an SBC resolution that apologized to African-Americans for its past support of racism and resolved to strive for racial reconciliation.
Since that gesture, the denomination has grown its non-white congregations from only 5 percent in 1990 to 20 percent in 2010. But its leadership has not diversified as rapidly as membership.
Also on Tuesday, delegates planned to vote on whether to adopt an optional alternative name, Great Commission Baptists.
The "Great Commission" refers to Matthew 28:16-20, in which Jesus instructs his disciples at Galilee to go forth and make disciples of all nations.
Fearing the Southern Baptist name carried negative associations for many outsiders, current SBC President Bryant Wright formed a study committee last year to consider a change. While the committee deemed a full and official name change to be too difficult and expensive, it suggested the alternative name as an option.
While Southern Baptists have been publicly united in their support for Luter, the alternative name faces opposition from some members who are proud of the denomination's association with conservative theology and politics.
The notion of changing the Southern Baptist name is not new: It was first proposed in 1903 and has been unsuccessfully brought up more than a dozen times since. Even if the compromise alternative is approved, it is unlikely to put the issue to rest for good.
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"I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any Church that I know of. My own mind is my own Church. Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all." Thomas Jefferson
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GREAT quote. Not against god, just against man's urge to box him up for sale like a fast food happy meal.
Do you realize that the only reason you are able to say your piece is due to the very type of people you deride as insane, because they "believe in something with absolutely no evidence whatsoever". Who do you think wrote the Constitution, a bunch of atheists? The very laws that assure us our freedoms were based on Christian values and Hebrew law
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WRONG!!!!
"Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one half the world fools and the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and error all over the earth." -- Thomas Jefferson
"The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion" -Treaty of Tripoli, America's first treaty.
"What has been Christianity's fruits? Superstition, bigotry, and persecution." James Madison
"The United States of America should have a foundation free from the influence of clergy." --George Washington
"I have examined all the known superstitions of the world, and I do not find in our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology." -- Thomas Jefferson
"I looked around for God's judgments, but saw no signs of them." Ben Franklin
"All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit." -- Thomas Paine
"Revealed religion has no weight with me." Benjamin Franklin
"I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any Church that I know of. My own mind is my own Church. Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all." Thomas Jefferson
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires."
--Susan B. Anthony
Regardless, those are not my quotes.
To say that Southern Baptists are insane is quite a statement, given that there are millions of them
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Even a few billion people believing something doesn't make it true, and it's pretty insane to believe in something with absolutely no evidence whatsoever.
I know that a lot of people hear the word "Baptist" and think they're all alike, but they most assuredly are not.
Let's change that!