Joe Sneed, a teacher at a Christian school in Rockwall, Texas, wanted one Southern Baptist agency to apologize to another.
Sneed, who attended the annual Southern Baptist Convention held June 11-12 in Indianapolis, made a motion asking for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention to apologize to the Executive Committee, the arm of the denomination that runs it.
Sneed said the Southern Baptist Convention investigated allegations from the former head of the ERLC that the Executive Committee covered up sexual abuse and found no wrongdoing by the Executive Committee.
Sneed, a member of First Baptist Church in Rockwall, wanted a formal apology to the Executive Committee.
“The way that the ERLC brought up these charges against the Executive Committee, you realize that they were baseless, and they were politically motivated, I believe,” said Sneed, reached by AL.com.
The cost of investigations ran up to about $14 million, Sneed said. “That’s money that comes from tithes and offerings,” he said.
In 2022, the Executive Committee offered a public apology and a confidential monetary settlement to sexual abuse survivor Jennifer Lyell, who was mischaracterized by the denomination’s in-house news service when she decided to go public with her story in March 2019.
Sneed said he wasn’t saying that sexual abuse hasn’t happened, only that the Executive Committee was unfairly maligned. He was also critical of proposals for a database of pastors accused of sexual misconduct.
“I further move that the Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force’s proposal for a national database of pastors who have been accused of wrongdoing but have been convicted of nothing be abandoned because it violates the scriptural principle found in 1 Timothy 5:19 and opens up the SBC to be sued for millions of more dollars,” Sneed had said in his motion.
The Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force was disbanded in June. The $250,000 in funding allotted to the task force now goes to the ERLC for future sexual abuse reform efforts.
The ERLC board, meeting this week in Nashville, declined to take action on Sneed’s motion. It vowed continued vigilance against sexual abuse.
“Sexual abuse is an affront to the cause of Christ, especially when it takes place within the church,” board members of the ERLC wrote in response to Sneed’s motion.
“The ERLC will continue to serve churches regarding this issue and call on them and others to take this grave issue seriously as we care for victims of abuse and provide a witness to a watching world that the Lord calls us to this ministry of reconciliation.”
Theologian Russell Moore, former head of the ERLC, resigned in 2021 after accusing the Executive Committee of mishandling sexual abuse allegations.
“It slandered a lot of guys,” Sneed said of allegations against the Executive Committee. “It hurt a lot of people’s reputations, some of whom I knew, good men, godly men. I think they owed an apology to the Executive Committee.”
Moore, who was president of the ERLC from 2013-2021, notably clashed with other Southern Baptist leaders during the 2016 presidential campaign when he spoke out against Donald Trump and said it was “illogical” for evangelical Christians to support Trump.
“To back Mr. Trump, these voters must repudiate everything they believe,” Moore said in a September 2106 op-ed column in the New York Times.
More than 100 churches threatened to withdraw funding, and Moore apologized for criticizing those who voted for Trump.
But tensions between Moore and other Southern Baptist leaders continued. Moore is now editor-in-chief of Christianity Today.
The ERLC has remained embattled since Moore’s departure. At the June meeting in Indianapolis, an effort to shut down the ERLC failed.
The motion to close the ERLC didn’t receive a two-thirds vote of messengers that would have sent it for a final vote at next year’s convention. But the threat of a shutdown of the agency has prompted the ERLC to self-evaluate its role speaking out on behalf of the denomination.
The trustees this week approved a statement supporting the work of ERLC President Brent Leatherwood, but urged staff “to be cautious when addressing controversial political issues.”
Leatherwood said the staff will use advocacy guidelines to determine how to speak to issues, starting with the question: “Is this an issue for which we have a biblical basis to speak?”
Although he wanted the ERLC to apologize, Sneed said he’s at least glad he was heard by the ERLC board of trustees.
“Honestly, I wasn’t even sure they’d take it up for consideration, but they did,” Sneed said.
