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The Baptist State Convention of North Carolina recently decided to remove a Baptist missions group from a list of giving options.

Delegates to the state convention said they had theological differences with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.

“We were saddened that it happened because of the message it sends to the unchurched community and other Christians out there: That Baptists can’t get along,” CBF spokesman Lance Wallace said.

The state convention’s executive director-treasurer, Milton Hollifield, wrote an open letter to N.C. Baptists after the convention:
“I am disappointed that the rhetoric emerging from both perspectives during the discussion on the convention floor and in subsequent conversations may have rendered our corporate Christian witness as something not honoring to the Lord Jesus.”

The CBF, based in Atlanta, was formed as an alternative to the conservative Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville, with which the state convention closely aligns itself.

The net result of the state convention’s action means that delegates who want to support CBF must now write a check directly to CBF, and not to the state convention.

“It was not so much as them snubbing us as it was them thumbing their nose at churches in North Carolina,” Wallace said. “Now, what the state of North Carolina’s convention has said is, 'We don’t want to serve those churches. We don’t want to make it convenient for them.’”

The measure, which passed by fewer than 100 votes, was more symbolic than anything else.

It was the moderates who lobbied to include the CBF as a giving option for the state group; some did not want to financially support the SBC because the group would not appoint moderates to committees.

Many moderate pastors in the convention have severed their emotional and participatory ties to the state convention in recent years, although they remain loyal to Baptist institutions such as colleges and disaster relief organizations.

The sticking point among delegates continues to be what the association of churches stands for by its relative support of the two organizations.

The CBF, for example, is willing to work with churches that put openly gay Christians into leadership positions. Last year, the state Baptist group decided to dissociate with member churches that affirm gays or lesbians.

The Southern Baptist Convention supports biblical inerrancy, while the CBF does not do so directly. The CBF leaves such policies to the discretion of individual churches.

What’s interesting is that as a corporate organization, CBF is fairly conservative. It has a policy, for example, that it will not hire practicing homosexuals and that money will not flow to groups that affirm homosexuality. Some of its churches hold dear to biblical inerrancy; others do not.

But it holds true, Wallace said, to Baptist autonomy.

“That is not a fellowship-wide litmus test,” Wallace said. “As a fellowship that’s not something we are called to do. As Baptists, it’s our responsibility as local churches to sort through these issues for ourselves. It’s really anti-Baptist to dictate positions from a national organization.”

Contact Nancy H. McLaughlin at 373-7049 or nancy.mclaughlin@news-record.com