The 3 - February 26, 2023

This week's edition of The 3, featuring three stories of relevance to the Christian community, has more developments regarding the issue of malpractice in the area of gender treatments and surgeries, with the AG of one state looking into events at a hospital and lawmakers in another trying to prevent these incidences from occurring. Also, a Jacksonville, FL ordinance is being challenged because of the possibility of silencing a faith-based bookstore owner from sharing her faith with customers.  And, the leadership board of the Southern Baptist Convention has made some decisions in areas of abuse and women in church leadership.

MO officials to look into operation of gender clinic, TN legislators vote on bill to ban gender treatments and surgeries

Not only are state legislators attempting to restrict harmful surgeries and treatments that claim to alter a minor child's biological sex, but the activity and irresponsibility of gender clinics are being exposed.

Liberty Counsel reports on its website that:

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey announced that his office has launched a multi-agency investigation into the Washington University Pediatric Transgender Center at St. Louis Children’s Hospital after a former employee went public and accused the hospital of lying to parents and harming hundreds of children with puberty blockers and mutilating surgeries.

Bailey is quoted as saying, “We have received disturbing allegations that individuals at the Transgender Center at St. Louis Children’s Hospital have been harming hundreds of children each year, including by using experimental drugs on them. We take this evidence seriously and are thoroughly investigating to make sure children are not harmed by individuals who may be more concerned with a radical social agenda than the health of children..."

Meanwhile, another state has taken up the cause of minor children who are in harm's way through treatments and surgeries that claim to help a child change his or her gender.  The Tennessean that the Tennessee House of Representatives has voted to pass a bill to that effect, stating:

The bill prohibits children from receiving puberty blockers, hormone therapies or surgical procedures.

People who received the treatments as minors would also be able to sue parents, guardians and physicians for authorizing the care under a statute of limitations under the legislation.

The article also notes, "If it becomes law, the bill would officially take effect this summer and give existing patients until March 31, 2024, to cease treatment..." The bill now goes to Governor Bill Lee, who has indicated, according to the article, "he is 'supportive' of the bill's content."

FL SOGI law forces Christian bookstore owner to stay silent about faith

Over the past few years, municipalities have passed ordinances that would offer special status to individuals based on sexual orientation and gender identity, or SOGI.  Opponents of these laws have expressed concern that they could pose a threat to people of faith who do not agree with the gay lifestyle.

Case in point has occurred in Jacksonville, FL, which has a Human Rights Ordinance on the books. The Alliance Defending Freedom website reports that the ordinance "forbids communications that could lead someone to feel “unwelcome” based on various protected traits."

That would include a Catholic who runs a Catholic bookstore, and ADF has gone to court to protect the owner's right to discuss faith principles in the store she owns, the Queen of Angels Catholic Bookstore. The owner is Christine DeTrude, and the ADF website states that...

...The bookstore serves all customers and gladly sells its products to anybody but DeTrude and her bookstore staff cannot speak messages that violate their faith. Thus, they affirm that men and women are different and cannot use pronouns or titles that don’t align with a customer’s sex. DeTrude also wants to explain this policy and her Catholic beliefs about gender and sexuality in her store and on the store’s website.

But, this would violate the HRO and result in punishment for the store, so ADF has filed a lawsuit against that ordinance in federal court. ADF Legal Counsel Rachel Csutoros is quoted as saying, “Christie, owner of Queen of Angels Catholic Bookstore, gladly serves everyone, but she can’t speak messages that go against her religious beliefs. Yet Jacksonville is illegally mandating Queen of Angels abandon its religious beliefs—the very faith that motivates the store to open its doors to customers every day.”

SBC governing body partners with gay-affirming organization to run abuse response, questions loss of operating dollars

There are a significant number of members of the Southern Baptist Convention who believe that the denomination as a whole has drifted from its Biblical foundations.  There are also leaders of the SBC that believe that everything is OK, except for one area - sexual abuse.  And, efforts to combat the heinous activity of sexual abuse on a national level, rather than at the local church level have led to some unfortunate consequences.  

Some of those consequences emerged from the latest 2-day meeting of the SBC Executive Committee.  According to The Baptist Paper: 

“The (investment funds) have been cut in half,” said EC member Monte Shinkle of Missouri. “We dropped $6 million this past year. We have $6 million left … it doesn’t look good.”

Mike Bianchi, interim chief financial officer, noted the EC received an unqualified opinion (which is good) on its 2022 audit report, but the auditors emphasized “the sexual abuse issues, the DOJ investigation and the deteriorating liability of the EC” as concerns.

The current pace is “unsustainable,” Bianchi said, noting options such as liquidating assets (including the EC building), changing financial arrangements, obtaining other financing, etc., were discussed with the auditors.

Furthermore, the organization hired by the original Sexual Abuse Task Force, which was empaneled almost two years ago, Guidepost Solutions, has been facing it own share of criticism.  Its support of the LGBTQ agenda, tweeted out last June and reinforced now as details are emerging about causes to which it has contributed, has been facing criticism. Georgia's Christian Index states:

The SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force recommended using New York-based Guidepost Solutions to establish and maintain a database of pastors who have been “credibly accused” of sexual abuse at an estimated cost of between $1.5 million and $2 million.

"Credibly accused" is a term that has raised some concerns.  Writing last year for The Federalist, attorneys Jon Whitehead and Joshua Abbatoy wrote, regarding the original task force's recommendations: "...there was...widespread criticism of the recommendations as not biblical, not Baptist, and not just." They wrote:

Guidepost proposed that the SBC should maintain an “offender information system,” a public list of those “credibly accused” of sexual abuse and those who “aided and abetted” them. As Matthew Schmitz noted in the Wall Street Journal, this standard “trample[s] the rights of the accused.”

And, those seeking to expose the SBC as rife with abuse have now exposed it to an investigation by the Department of Justice.  Ideally, the national organization should be empowering local churches to deal with unfortunate charges of abuse in their congregations, not accepting liability for what may have transpired.  

And, the attempt to paint the entire denomination of millions as being insensitive and misogynistic due to the sins of less than a thousand men across the country has been characterized as being unfair, and is being used to divide believers and to undermine the Baptist Faith and Message position, based on 1st Timothy chapter 2, about women in leadership. The EC this past week determined that five churches were "not in friendly cooperation with the Convention," according to The Christian Index. 

Saddleback Church was one of the five; until recently, it has been pastored by Rick Warren...the article says:

The Executive Committee said the action was taken becasue Stacie Wood, wife of Saddleback’s current lead pastor Andy Wood, is “functioning in the office of pastor.”

But the controversy began in 2021, when Warren ordained three women as associate pastors, prompting discussions within the denomination about possibly expelling the megachurch.

Warren retired last year after 42 years at Saddleback. He made an emotional speech in June 2022 at the Southern Baptists’ annual convention in Anaheim, Calif., standing by his ordination of women. He told delegates who debated the issue, “We have to decide if we will treat each other as allies or adversaries.”

These churches can appeal the decision.  Saddleback was being considered for this distinction last year, but the Credentials Committee had said that the BF&M was not clear on women in pastoral leadership.