The moribund bureaucracy of the Southern Baptist Convention has failed, over the past five or six years, to follow directives given from the floor of the convention by the messengers to find ways to deal with the sexual abuse problem that exists among its pastors, church staff and missions personnel. The problem is larger than was originally exposed by the Abuse of Faith series in the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express News in 2019.

One good thing that happened, when an independent investigator was hired, was the resignation of a number of executive committee members who were upset about not being able to control and strong-arm the investigation. Some baggage that needed to be shed was gone as a result of that. But when it has come to really essential things that needed to be done as a result of the manner in which this scandal was handled by SBC bureaucrats, including actually giving the appearance of being Christian when it came to the known victims of abuse, nothing has happened. Victims, in fact, have been further victimized by the harsh and unforgiving manner reflected by the convention's national leadership.

The bureaucrats have, in fact, hidden behind what they claim is a core doctrinal principle of the Southern Baptist Convention and the way it is structured as a denomination, and that is the independence and autonomy of the local church. Churches affiliated with the SBC are independent and autonomous, according to the polity that has developed among Baptists, therefore, the denomination cannot assume a measure of ecclesiastical authority to put measures in place which prevent sexual predator pastors and church staff from moving to another church. And they can't seem to find a way to establish a database that will provide churches with a list of adjudicated offenders.

Messengers to this year's Southern Baptist Convention will be voting on a third proposal to change the denomination's constitution to disfellowship, a.k.a. "kick out," churches which have a female pastor, either as a senior pastor preaching from the pulpit, or on their staff in a role with the title "pastor" defining their duties. This is a blatant violation of the independence and autonomy of the local church, which, according to the Biblical interpretation of church polity Baptists have held for centuries, is not consistent scripturally.

So they won't interfere by helping churches avoid calling a sexual predator with a criminal record as their pastor, but they will tell their churches to hit the exit door if they decide to call a woman to serve as a pastor. It can't be possible to demonstrate more hypocrisy than this