Editor's Comments
I suspect that the most important item in this issue of Baptist Freedom is the insert in the middle. The Roger Williams Fellowship has joined with the Alliance of Baptists and the Baptist Joint Committee to sponsor a Baptist Freedom in the 21st Century: Engaging a Postmodern Culture. (Tuesday evening, October 8th to Wednesday noon, October 10th at the First Baptist Church of Washington DC) featuring Doug Marlette author of the syndicated cartoon, Kudzu. I believe that this will be an important and historic event. You should plan on attending. Make your room reservation and registration now!
In a sense, this issue is about the friction between the modern and the post-modern world. Theological Liberalism arose in effort to reconcile the methods and findings modern science with the historic message of Christian Faith. Baptist freedom is rooted in the belief that faith has nothing to fear from open discussion and enquiry as God will reveal his truth in the process.
We are involved in a battle for the souls and minds of people around the world. There are those that are trying to turn the clock back by purifying Baptist denominations rather than finding what the gospel is for a post-modern world. Mark Theodoropoulos in his ³A non-conciliatory note on the conflict within the ABC-USA² takes on this issue. Mark is a member of the First Baptist Church of Berkeley California. The note was written at the 2001 ABC-USA Biennial in Providence has been circulated on various internet list-servers prior to this publication.
The importance of freedom from fear is discussed in an opinion piece by Brent Grant, a Baptist layman from Pennsylvania. It reminds us that faith flourishes best in an atmosphere of freedom and calls the Roger Williams Fellowship to follow the vision of working to guarantee religious freedom for everyone.
Shortly after 9/11, Thomas L. Friedman wrote a column in the New York Times (The Real War) in which he stated that this is not a war against terrorism; it is a war against religious totalitarianism. ³World War III is a battle against religious totalitarianism, a view of the world that my faith must reign supreme and can be affirmed and held passionately only if all others are negated....The opposite of religious totalitarianism is an ideology of pluralism ‹ an ideology that embraces religious diversity and the idea that my faith can be nurtured without claiming exclusive truth. America is the Mecca of that ideology, and that is what bin Laden hates and that is why America had to be destroyed."
One of the things you can say for American Christians. We are fighting 20th Century battles. In Eastern Europe and the Middle East, they are still fighting the Crusades. That history is spilling over into this country in the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The rest of the world has very long historical memories and those religious conflicts affect us. Decisions made now may either bring people together or create wars four hundred years from now. It is now the time to set a Christian agenda for a post-modern world built upon the sound foundation of the Baptist tradition of soul freedom.
W. Hugh Tucker, editor