The Creed of a Wayward Son

Recently a Texan friend of mine pointed out the irony of the fact that despite my intense desire to distance myself from the Southern Baptist Convention and aspects of conservative American Evangelicalism, I would still be considered a "fundamentalist" by the likes of a person like the eminent New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman, 

I guess he is right, since no matter how one slices it and how far I attempt to distance myself from the foolish and inane aspects of American Evangelicalism, deep in my heart, I am still an orthodox Christian. That is, I still vigorously believe in the essential truths of the historic Christian faith. I still hold to creedal orthodoxy even though I am a wayward son.

While I adamantly reject much of the cooky fundamentalism of the likes of Jerry Falwell and Paige Patterson, I am still an Evangelical at heart. This is true, in the same way Protestantism in general is very broad and diverse, American Evangelicalism has a significant amount of divergence in what could be deemed right belief and practice (orthodoxy and orthopraxy).

 While many opponents of Christianity in America may want to lump all Evangelicals together, I think most Americans know that not all Evangelicals are wild-eyed snake handlers who froth at the mouth and shake and bake on the ground in mesmerized religious ecstasy. 

In the same way that not all American Evangelicals possess the shared experience of handling snakes, quaking on the ground and doing "carpet-time" as one true believer put it to me one time, not all Evangelicals share the same views on theology and cultural engagement.

I found this out the hard way while a student at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. At one time, Southwestern Seminary was a great academic institution and respected by progressive and conservative Christians alike. So much so, that Christianity Today argued in a 1990 article that based on several pertinent criterion, Southwestern Seminary was the best overall seminary in America.

However, that was before the dark time that Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and the Southern Baptist Convention finds itself in now. By the time I arrived as a non-traditional student in 2008, Southwestern Seminary and the SBC had been taken over and overrun by Paige Patterson and his merry hoards of wacko fundamentalists. Southwestern Seminary was the crown jewel in Patterson's successful but hostile overthrow of all semblance of moderation in the Southern Baptist Convention. 

One of the first things Patterson did when he came to power as the President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary was to fire Dr. Sheri Klouda and remove her from her position as a professor of Old Testament. Patterson did this on very shaky grounds, arguing that having a female Biblical language professor somehow violated the Scriptural injunction against women being positions of teaching and authority over men in the local church. I am not sure how Southwestern Seminary qualifies as a "church," but Patterson was successful in arguing his fundamentalist point in the subsequent adjudication proceedings as case reached the Texas Supreme Court in 2007.

Another thing that Paige Patterson did when he became President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas was to install a saw- dust trail type emotive Arminian revivalism as the prevailing cultural and ideological ethos over the entire campus. The school now has been reshaped into a cowboy boot wearing and gun-carrying Wild West show where every spontaneous whim and fancy of Patterson is carried out with zealous fidelity. Eventually he forcefully removed most of the Calvinist and so-called, "moderate" professors from campus because they deviated from his conception of religious orthodox fundamentalism.

I bring the lunacy of Patterson's fundamentalist reshaping of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and the visage of Jerry Falwell to make the point that not all conservative Evangelicals agree with each other. In fact, many of us disagree with each other vehemently, but still remain in the Evangelical fold.

I am an "Evangelical" in the sense that I agree with certain important doctrinal tenets of what has come to be known as "Evangelical Theology." I very much agree with the Evangelical understanding of the inspiration of the Bible championed by the Old Princeton Theological Seminary professor B.B Warfield. I very much agree with Warfield and other Protestant Evangelicals, that the Bible is inerrant, inspired, infallible and exclusively authoritative in all its parts. 

I also agree with Evangelicalism in regards to its acceptance of orthodox and creedal Trinitarian belief. That is, I agree with American Evangelicalism in its fidelity and harmony with the historic Christian church on the nature and essence of God. I believe, with other orthodox Christians that there is only one true God and in God coexists three mutually exclusive individuals,  the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19-20).

Likewise, I agree with most American Evangelicals on the primacy and necessity of saving faith in Jesus Christ. I agree with Martin Luther, John Calvin and the other magisterial Protestant Reformers that we are justified by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone.

While I agree with most Evangelicals on what should be considered "orthodox" Christian belief, I disagree vigorously how we should implement this propositional revelation into the broader society. I disagree adamantly with many Evangelicals on how to engage secular society.

Yet, my friend is substantially correct, I am an Evangelical Christian who would be considered a ideologically backward fundamentalist by people like Bart Ehrman and other opponents of Christianity in America.

If it is heretical to be an orthodox Christian to the minds of many in secular society, then so be it. I adhere to the heresy of Christian orthodoxy.