CBF membership influenced BWA decision, Rankin says

From wire reports

RICHMOND, Va. - The Baptist World Alliance's (BWA) decision to accept the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) into BWA membership influenced a recommendation that the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) withdraw from the BWA, an SBC leader said.

Jerry Rankin, president of the SBC's International Mission Board (IMB), told IMB trustees that the CBF issue influenced the decision since letting CBF have BWA membership in effect endorsed a schism among Southern Baptists. Rankin, who served on the study committee making the recommendation, said during a Feb. 2 IMB trustee meeting in Richmond, Va., that giving CBF membership in BWA was "in violation of established processes and bylaws."

Rankin's comments were the first known public admission by an SBC leader that the CBF issue played a part in a recommendation by a study committee that the SBC pull out of the BWA. A committee report does not mention the CBF issue, but instead says the BWA is becoming increasingly liberal.

The SBC has become increasingly conservative since 1979, which is seen as the beginning of what supporters call the "conservative resurgence" and critics call the "fundamentalist takeover."

The SBC Executive Committee is scheduled to consider the recommendation to leave BWA at a meeting in Nashville, Tenn. on Feb. 17. If approved there, it would go to messengers to the SBC annual meeting in June for final approval.

Rankin also said the proposed withdrawal of the Southern Baptist Convention from the Baptist World Alliance is not expected to affect the ministries of Southern Baptist missionaries or the IMB's partnerships with Baptist unions around the world.

While some Baptist unions may be reluctant to continue cooperation in mission efforts because of the decision, IMB leaders do not anticipate the decision having any impact on the work of missionaries, he said. IMB missionaries sometimes work in cooperation with local Baptist unions, but not always.

While the BWA emphasizes unity in diversity, Southern Baptists feel there must be parameters in terms of theology and doctrine in order to have an authentic basis of fellowship, Rankin said.

He also said he does not anticipate that Southern Baptists will attempt to form an alternate organization, as the study committee's report implied, but will seek opportunities for training, spiritual nurture and missions advance through global and regional conferences and events in partnership with likeminded Baptists.