This is not a good time for church leadership.
Today’s church-leader-gone-sour story is the ouster of Paige Patterson as president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, because of assorted sexist comments he has made over the years–to say nothing of a letter of protest against him signed by several thousand Southern Baptist women (https://www.dallasnews.com/life/faith/2018/05/24/trustees-meet-fort-worth-seminary-new-accusations-southern-baptist-leader-surface), reports The Dallas Morning News.
In 2000 he is alleged to have advised an abused wife to pray for her husband and, well, stick it out. When he next saw her, she had two black eyes.
In 2003 he allegedly advised a female student who was raped by a male student to forgive her attacker and not report it to the police. In the Bible, and until recent years in most Western countries, rape was a capital offense.
Throughout the years Paige made a number of comments which he now admits were “insensitive” and “hurtful” to women. One wonders what he was thinking when he made them.
So the board of trustees voted him out as president, then turned around and made him President Emeritus of the seminary and voted to allow him and his wife to continue to live in its $2.5 million Baptist Heritage Center.
“Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head,” Jesus once said (Luke 9:58). What’s wrong with this picture?
You’d think a seminary president would know that there is nothing in the Bible giving husbands any warrant to abuse their wives, let alone allow a rapist to go scot-free. God is love, God is forgiveness, but God’s word is also a word of law. It seems to be getting hard to find a church leader who stands up for God’s laws.
And we will search the Scriptures in vain for any apostle who lives in a mansion.