John Pierce, Executive Editor of Baptists Today, has posted a review of Wade Burleson’s soon-to-be-released book, Hardball Religion: Feeling the Fury of Fundamentalism.
Here are a few snippets:
Conservative Southern Baptist pastor and popular blogger Wade Burleson details his recent three-year battle with fundamentalist forces within the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) in Hardball Religion: Feeling the Fury of Fundamentalism. He gives both play-by-play coverage and color commentary.
And:
While Burleson is a welcomed and needed voice in warning Baptists and others about the destructive nature of religious fundamentalism, he seems narrowly focused.
For example, he is rightfully outraged that a competent female professor at Southwestern Seminary would lose her position over gender. Yet, Burleson — and Klouda, for that matter — should have known about Patterson’s fossilized position on female subordination and not been surprised.
And did Burleson completely miss the 1994 firing of Southwestern Seminary President Russell Dilday? Or does he consider that action to be justified or somehow something other than the same fundamentalism at work that he has witnessed in recent years?
Likewise, Burleson’s concern that many good Southern Baptist missionary candidates are now being excluded from service by non-essential doctrinal restrictions is laudable. But where was his voice in 2002 when these same agenda-driven IMB trustees — with Rankin’s wimpy compliance — required the entire overseas mission force to affirm the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message?
Pierce concludes:
Burleson’s courage to stand toe-to-toe with abusive power-brokers, to expose the misuse of denominational authority and resources, and to defend those harmed by heavy-handed tactics is commendable.
Yet, for so many of us, his recent “discovery” of fundamentalism in the Southern Baptist Convention is not breaking news. It shows just how late Burleson is getting to the game.
Check out the entire book review here.
Related posts:
- Cole & Duren Review Wade Burleson’s Hardball Religion When I first surfed over to Associated Baptist Press and...
- Wade Burleson Takes On Russell Moore In his latest post, Can We All Agree to Disagree...
- A Fundamentalist Attack on Wade Burleson Wade Burleson - A Flaming Liberal? No, not quite. But...
- Wade Burleson and Religious Intolerance, Take Two Yesterday, Robert Parham of the Baptist Center for Ethics (and...
- Wade Burleson and Religious Intolerance Rev. Wade Burleson, a popular yet controversial Baptist blogger and...
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
the book will be an interesting read as a once insider fundamentalist’s account of fundamentalist leadership, to which I hope to purchase used at Amazon. and Pierce is correct about Burleson; he is late to the game of crying foul, but make no mistake about his theological leanings — the likelihood of him including or endorsing one to a leadership position in the SBC that is not an inerrantist is zero. while he will work with a non-inerrantist, to his credit, he will not promote governance responsibilities with such, however. his kinder, gentler SBC is still fundamentalist. to date, and this may change, for Burleson may have changed, my perception of Burleson is that the issue is not really about meaningful cooperation and shared governance, but that he was not welcomed as a leader among the SBC elite. to be an elite among the elite. moreover, it is not about control, rather that he has so little of it. now, this is not to suggest he was not mistreated, for it seems he was; but was said treatment not known to him and was he not in and supportive of the movement that exiled non-inerrantists from meaningful SBC participation? it went around and it came around and it hurt. did it teach?
BDW,
I reviewed the book yesterday.
http://kevinbussey.com/2009/04/16/book-review-hardball-feeling-the-fury-of-fundamentalism/