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NEW ORLEANS?New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (NOBTS) trustees voted April 14 to ask Southern Baptist Convention messengers meeting in 2005 in Nashville to settle a long and exhausting debate over language declaring the SBC the sole member of the seminary.
By a vote of 33 to 6 with one new trustee abstaining, the NOBTS board voted to present two alternatives from which messengers can choose next year. One option would utilize the “sole member” language preferred by the SBC Executive Committee. Option two would be alternative language still to be written that would confirm the Southern Baptist Convention as the school’s rightful owner.
The discussion on sole membership was the focus of the evening plenary session during its quarterly meeting while other actions relating to the budget, new faculty and a Cooperative Program emphasis were covered during the longer afternoon session.
According to an Executive Committee spokesman, sole membership is a legal mechanism that allows a parent organization to establish its ownership (as sole member of the corporation) of a subordinate entity while setting limitations to the parent entity’s control, thereby limiting the legal liability of the parent for the subsidiary. All SBC entities cooperated by amending their charters with the exception of NOBTS which expressed concern over a change in the level of SBC control and the increase in fiduciary ascending liability.
Although the board intended to draft alternative language to be considered in the recent spring meeting, that effort was sidelined at the request of an EC staffer who said he was seeking a more harmonious private dialogue than a public debate over technical legalities might afford. Several NOBTS trustees said they were caught off guard by a recent EC resolution asking New Orleans Seminary to comply with their request.
EC chairman Gary Smith, pastor of Fielder Road Baptist Church in Arlington, explained at the Feb. 16 meeting that several of the EC members who had been involved in the discussion over sole membership would rotate off the Executive Committee in June. “Those of us who have helped orchestrate this discussion will kind of move off the scene,” he stated, noting that the current officers were more knowledgeable of the issues than those to be elected next. “We thought the way to put it to bed is to have a good discussion.”
NOBTS trustees attending that EC meeting expressed disappointment at the way Smith moderated the meeting. Trustee Don Davidson of Danville, Va., said, “The moderator who began by saying he would be very fair was not fair throughout the entire presentation.” He compared the approach of EC members with NOBTS to their handling of another “big issue that night?the Baptist World Alliance vote.” He elaborated, stating, “There was no real openness to listen to any other side.”
Kelley speculated that most EC members had never heard anything about sole membership until that meeting. Noting the contrast, he recounted the process NOBTS trustees followed in studying the charter change for several years. “This board does a good job of having to make decisions. You stay focused on issues, everyone gets a hearing and you never try to shut down discussion before it’s through,” he added.
“We picked up a lot of heat at the meeting,” acknowledged trustee chairman Tommy French of Baton Rouge, La. “Many of those folks are my friends so I’m not going to become their enemy,” he told fellow trustees. “I am not going to conduct myself in a way others have conducted themselves, so let us not as a board develop friction between us and the Executive Committee.”
French restated the board’s responsibility to look after the interests of the Southern Baptist Convention, adding that the Executive Committee has a similar task. “They have one opinion and we have an opinion. We’re Baptists. It’s a wonder we don’t have three opinions. Let them do their work and then the Southern Baptist Convention will settle the matter. We’ll still be friends, still work together for the Kingdom of God, this institution and this great denomination.”
Kelley outlined three options that the board might consider in response to the EC resolution:
Delay a further decision until next year so that NOBTS trustees could determine whether there is a better alternative to sole membership for a Louisiana SBC entity.
Ask this year’s messengers to pick from two amendments pre-approved by the board?one of them would be sole membership in some form and the other would be “our best alternative to sole membership.”
Accept the EC recommendation or some variation at the spring meeting, laying aside all objections.
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