When God calls, should women answer?

The Rev. Renee Willingham says she'll keep on preaching, even if the Southern Baptist Convention votes this week to remove women from the pulpit.

By TWILA DECKER

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 11, 2000

[Times photo: Dirk Shadd] The Rev. Renee Willingham, associate pastor at First Baptist Church of St. Petersburg, joins with youngsters in singing.

ST. PETERSBURG -- For many in the Southern Baptist denomination, the Rev. Renee Willingham is an anomaly they are praying will go away. She is an ordained female preacher.

Willingham says she got her calling when she graduated from high school in the small, heavily Baptist town of Greer, S.C. The first woman ordained in her childhood church, she has been following her calling ever since.

Now 33, she is the associate pastor at First Baptist of St. Petersburg. She is in charge of the youth ministry and delivers the sermons when her pastor is out of town.

"I have lived with this controversy for 11 years," says Willingham, one of an estimated 100 ordained female Southern Baptist preachers. "I deal with it by knowing I am only in control of how I listen to the call from God."

But leaders of the largest Protestant denomination, especially the conservatives who have gained control of the organization over the past two decades, believe the Bible doesn't call for women to preach.

At its annual gathering in Orlando this week, the Southern Baptist Convention is considering spelling out just that in its official document, the Baptist Faith and Message.

[Times photo: Dirk Shadd] The Rev. Walter Draughon reinforces his associate pastor’s intentions regarding the possible exclusion of women: “What we try to do around here is read and interpret the Scripture for ourselves.”

A committee is recommending that it declare, "the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture."

It is recommending several other controversial changes to the document, including stating its opposition to homosexuality as a form of immorality, in the same category as adultery and pornography.

Though the Faith and Message statement represents the official stance of the denomination, it is not binding.

Baptist churches are autonomous, which means each interprets the Scripture on its own. Some who disagree with the conservative leadership have started their own denomination within the Southern Baptist Convention, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.

Many expect the group, which counts 1,800 of the Southern Baptist Convention's 40,000 churches as members, including First Baptist of St. Petersburg, will one day sever all ties with the Southern Baptist Convention. The president of the convention has predicted that 1,500 churches will leave the convention over its stance on women pastors.

Willingham's pastor, Walter Draughon, says if the statement about limiting the ordination to men is passed, his church will do the same thing it did in 1998, when the South Baptist Convention decreed at its annual meeting that wives are to "submit graciously to the servant leadership" of their husbands.

"We will ignore it. They will affect us in absolutely no way," said Draughon, who does not believe the Bible forbids women from preaching. "What we try to do around here is read and interpret the Scripture for ourselves."

Although the issue of women pastors will be the most controversial topic during this week's two-day gathering, the group's presence in Orlando -- home of Walt Disney World -- is also expected to draw protests from gays and lesbians.

The Southern Baptist Convention has been boycotting Walt Disney Co. Inc. since 1997, in part because it extended its health insurance benefits to the partners of gays and lesbians.

A few hundred gay and lesbian demonstrators are expected to gather in front of the Orange County Convention Center to express their concerns about the Southern Baptist position on homosexuality.

About 10,000 representatives of churches from around the nation are expected to decide Wednesday whether to accept the proposed changes.

If the committee's recommendations are followed, it will be the first time in 37 years that the Faith and Message statement has been rewritten. The document was drafted in 1925, then rewritten in 1963.

R. Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., says the issue of banning women preachers shouldn't be nearly as controversial as some are making it out to be.

Mohler, who served on the committee that drafted the proposed changes, says the fact that most Southern Baptists believe only men should serve as pastors is hardly groundbreaking.

There are fewer than 100 Southern Baptist female pastors nationwide. He said many of the harshest critics of the plan have men as pastors.

"There are many in the moderate wing of the Southern Baptist Convention who are up in arms over this proposal," Mohler said. "But I am not aware of a single leader in the moderate wing whose pastor is a woman.

"The reality is the vast majority of Southern Baptists believe pastor responsibility -- whatever the title -- is restricted to men by Scripture."

But Robert Parham, executive director of the Nashville-based Baptist Center for Ethics, doesn't see it that way. He says that if the leadership keeps making such backward statements about women, there will be an exodus of churches from the Southern Baptist Convention.

"Southern Baptist fundamentalists see American culture as hostile to their world view," Parham said. "Their response to that perceived hostility is to adopt a statement which rigidly clarifies what it means to be pure Christians."

He says the fundamentalists' leaders pick and choose the parts of the Bible they want to interpret literally and ignore the parts that don't suit them.

"In the same text they are using to try to say that a woman can't be pastor, there is language that a woman is to adorn herself in modest apparel -- not with braided hair, or gold or pearls or costly attire," Parham said. "Why is it they say the Bible says a woman can't be pastor but they ignore text in terms of how their own wives should dress?"

Draughon, pastor of First Baptist, which has about 2,000 members, says he won't go to the meeting in Orlando.

Instead, he'll likely spend his time preparing to do exactly what many gathering in the convention oppose -- ordaining women. Today, his church will vote on whether to elect three female deacons.

It would be the first time females serve as deacons there. If the women are chosen, Draughon would ordain them. It would be his first time ordaining women, but it doesn't bother him. He believes the Bible says that men and women are equal.

Despite frustrations with the leadership of the denomination, Draughon and Willingham say they aren't considering leaving it behind.

Willingham, who has been flooded with e-mails of support since the proposed revisions were announced, says she will continue to follow what she believes is God's plan for her -- regardless of what the Southern Baptist leaders say about it.

"God didn't call me to fight a denomination," she said. "He called me to serve St. Petersburg."

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