Carter, Clinton Seek To Bring Together Moderate Baptists

The covenant would not be not a new denomination but a coalition of four historically black Baptist churches -- including the 7.5-million-member National Baptist Convention USA and the 2.5-million-member Progressive National Baptist Convention -- and several predominantly white Baptist groups, including the 1.4-million-member American Baptist Churches USA and the 500,000-member Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.

Together, they have more than 20 million members, outnumbering the SBC, which was not invited to the Atlanta meeting.

"The elephant is no longer in the room. There's been a convergence of the rest of the Baptists in North America," said the Rev. Daniel Vestal, national coordinator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, a group of present and former Southern Baptists unhappy with the SBC's course.

"The thrust here is for a voice of Baptists that has not been heard," said the Rev. William J. Shaw, president of the Nashville-based National Baptist Convention USA. "Most of the representations of Baptists have come from the prominent television personalities, and that's okay, but they don't represent the full sweep of Baptist understanding of the faith."

Shaw said broadcast evangelists such as the Rev. Jerry Falwell and the Rev. Pat Robertson, along with the Southern Baptist Convention, have "downsized the moral message" of the Bible "so that the dominant question has to do with sexuality."

Black Baptist churches, he said, are saying that "sexuality is not the only dimension of morality. The whole business of social justice, of a fair prosecution of offenders, caring for the environment, immigration, even the morality of our foreign policy, are things that really need to be put into the debate."

Land denied that Southern Baptists care only about sexual morality, noting that the SBC was heavily involved in relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina. But he agreed that there appear to be significant disagreements between the SBC and the new coalition.

"One of the areas where we would be in significant disagreement would be our view toward Israel, as highlighted by President Carter's new book," he said, referring to "Palestine Peace Not Apartheid," published in November by Simon & Schuster. Fourteen members of an advisory panel at the Carter Center have resigned over the book's depiction of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Another difference, he said, was made clear last week when Carter spoke of sexual orientation as an "ancillary issue." "Most Southern Baptists would disagree with that," Land said. "We're not going to affirm and accept all sexual orientations."

Although the SBC was not invited to the planning meetings, Carter said he is confident that "many full-fledged Southern Baptists" will join the new covenant.

"We want our whole concept to be receptive and positive and inclusive -- and not exclusive or rejecting any Baptist," he said.