CBF Coordinator Daniel Vestal wrote an open letter asking Roger Moran, a businessman in Winfield, Mo., to stop distributing the materials. It also asked Moran, who was recently elected to the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) Executive Committee, to "apologize publicly" for his actions and "seek reconciliation" with "Christian brothers and sisters."

Moran said he would retract the material if it were shown to be inaccurate. "If I have wronged somebody, if I have said something that's wrong factually, I have an obligation to make it right, but I would like a list of factual errors," he said in a telephone interview with Associated Baptist Press.

Moran says he started the Missouri Baptist Laymen's Association (MBLA) in 1991 to combat liberalism in the Missouri Baptist Convention (MBC). The group published a 16-page newsletter in April 1999 with a lead article titled, "The CBF circle of friends: Religious voices advocate homosexuality."

The article details suggested links between CBF partner organizations and groups that support gay rights, abortion on demand and pornography. It also quotes CBF-friendly individuals, churches and organizations with pro-gay views and questions why the Fellowship has not taken a strong stance against homosexuality.

Vestal's open letter follows a series of private correspondence between himself and Moran.

Vestal asked Moran in a March 11 letter to stop making statements tying CBF leaders to liberal organizations that, among other things, tolerate the homosexual lifestyle.

Moran responded with a letter April 30 in which he said, "Though we have never charged CBF as an institution with promoting a gay/lesbian agenda, we did raise several questions that we believe deserve an honest answer." Moran then enumerated 15 instances in which CBF leaders/members were in some way associated with pro-homosexual forces.

Sandwiched between their exchange was an unusual letter from Vestal to Moran's pastor, Gary Taylor, of First Baptist Church, O'Fallon, Mo., asking him to intervene in the escalating dispute.

Vestal's public letter denounces Moran's "unwarranted attacks" on CBF. The Fellowship also has produced a seven-minute video and a pamphlet featuring Vestal's response to specific allegations.

In an interview with the Recorder just after his address to the CBF General Assembly on June 24, Vestal said he was trying to reach people in a Christ-like way. When asked if he thought the CBF response had resulted in its desired effect, he said, "It's too soon to tell."

Vestal said earlier that CBF, like several other well-known Christian groups, does not make official pronouncements on homosexuality or other issues that are outside its stated mission.

"The repeated insinuation and insult contained in your materials is that the real mission of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship is to promote the gay-lesbian lifestyle, abortion on demand and even child pornography," Vestal wrote in his open letter to Moran. "You constantly suggest that CBF has ulterior motives and hidden agendas of all kinds, rather than the one we boldly declare in our mission statement.

"These tactics are misguided, harmful and wrong," Vestal continued. "I appeal to you now, as I have done previously in private, to stop," he wrote. "I urge you to put an end to these attacks, to apologize publicly for the harm you have done and to seek reconciliation with these Christian brothers and sisters."

Moran said he believes his information is factual and in context. "You want an apology for what, beliefs that I hold very dearly?" he asked.

Adding he has never said the Fellowship has a pro-gay agenda, Moran said he believes there are "fundamental differences" between moderate leaders of the CBF and conservatives who support the Southern Baptist Convention.

"My intention is to try to win those folks who are in the middle," he said.

Vestal also disputed Moran's "bold statement that liberalism has found a place within CBF."

"That simply is not true," Vestal responded in his open letter. "What is true is that there are Baptist Christians who have found a place of ministry and fellowship in CBF whom you would call liberal."

Vestal said there are many other CBF supporters whom Moran "would call conservative" and many others in-between. "For you, this kind of diversity around a common mission is seen as a weakness. I see it as a God-given strength."

Moran's critics dismiss his methods as guilt by association. He said he believes, however, that CBF leaders have a pattern of "systematically" aligning themselves with liberals and in opposition to conservative groups.

"It's not guilt by association but guilt by whom you choose to align with and whom you choose to condemn," he said.

While Moran insists his group's sole interest is in electing conservatives in Missouri, his material has a wider circulation. The Baptist General Convention in Texas established a special committee in February to defend the state Convention against "slanderous" allegations that selected moderate leaders support homosexual rights and abortion on demand.

Moran said his materials have been circulated in other states but he didn't distribute them. "We have made our materials available to anybody that wants to use them," he said.

The Conservative Record, the newsletter of Conservative Carolina Baptists, published lengthy articles earlier this year it said links the CBF to the homosexual agenda.

In an editor's note at the beginning of an article it published in May, the Record thanks the MBLA for researching and presenting information that was adapted into the Record's article.

CBF leaders, including Vestal, denied the charges.

In an interview with Baptist Press, Moran said the disagreement between the MBLA and Vestal is indicative of the intensifying battle that is bubbling to the surface in various state conventions between liberals and some moderates in the CBF and people loyal to the SBC.

"Neither I nor the MBLA are on a crusade against the CBF," Moran said. "The CBF or those sympathetic to the CBF were rapidly taking control of the Missouri Baptist Convention to the point that conservative leaders of the MBC were beginning the process of pulling out of the state convention. We were on the same path as Virginia and Texas."

Conservatives in Virginia split from the state convention in 1997 over what they viewed as a liberal drift, while conservatives in Texas formed their own convention in 1998 after the Baptist General Convention of Texas revamped the way it does mission work, distancing itself from the SBC.

"The CBF is attempting to take back on the state convention level what it lost on the national level," Moran said. "They can't get the churches to fund them directly. ... They are trying to steer the state conventions toward the CBF and away from the SBC."

Many church members are not yet aware of what is taking place, Moran said, "and what is at stake."

After the publication of Moran's charges against CBF, conservatives in Missouri were successful in electing a full slate of conservative officers in last November's state convention elections.