It isn’t new news . . . it is old news. But it is old news that is now in the headlines.
Eighteen years ago, Paige Patterson, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, spoke to a gathering of the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood and stated that he had never counseled anyone to seek divorce, even in abusive marriages. He then told the story of woman church member who was in what he described as a bad marriage. Her husband was not “harsh or physical with her, but she felt abused.”
In a recent press release, Patterson tells the rest of the story: he “suggested to her that she kneel by the bed at night and pray for him. Because he might hear her prayer, I warned her that he could become angry over this and seek to retaliate. Subsequently, on a Sunday morning, she arrived at church with some evidence of physical abuse. She was very surprised that this had happened. But I had seen her husband come into the church and sit down at the back. I knew that God had changed this man’s heart. What he had done to his wife had brought conviction to his heart. I was happy—not that she had suffered from his anger, but that God had used her to move her husband to conviction of his sin. I knew that she was going to be happy for him also.”
This is not a new story, but the reaction has been different in 2018 than it was in 2000. The Washington Post picked up the story and ran an article, and Southern Baptist leaders have stepped up and spoken out. Ed Stetzer, who holds the Billy Graham Distinguished Chair of Church, Mission, and Evangelism at Wheaton College and is executive director of the Billy Graham Center, wrote an article published in Christianity Today yesterday in which he called for Patterson to do the right thing and retire. Wade Burleson, Southern Baptist pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Enid, Oklahoma, echoed that called for retirement in his blog.
The outrage among Southern Baptists points to the success of the #metoo movement. While it is years too late, many are now speaking out against the abuse of women in their circles. BUT even now, they fail to address what is at the very heart of the problem: blatant sexism. Many Southern Baptist leaders, both back in the 1970s and now, devalue women. They believe women are simply a means to an end–for the salvation and satisfaction of men. When a “respected,” powerful Southern Baptist seminary president condones physical abuse as acceptable when the conversion of her husband is a result, that is sexism at its ugliest. And that too is old news.
Pam Durso is executive director of Baptist Women in Ministry, Atlanta, Georgia.