Trustees of the International Mission Board (IMB) decided not to seek the removal of one of their own for criticizing trustee actions, but they adopted new guidelines to prohibit and punish such criticism in the future.
After a closed-door executive session March 22, trustees of the Southern Baptist agency announced they had voted unanimously to rescind their January action against Oklahoma trustee Wade Burleson, who published statements on his Web log criticizing two trustee decisions from November 2005.
While the earlier action was rescinded, trustee Chairman Tom Hatley said he would continue not allowing Burleson to serve on trustee committees. The concern of trustees, he said, was that trustee relationships with Burleson would be built over a period of time and he could be brought back into committee involvement.
“As chairman, I gave the board my assurance that I would extend the exclusion of his participation in committees through the May meeting, which would allow a new process time to bring its sway over the current situation and, hopefully, to resolve it,” Hatley said.
Bill Hickman, IMB trustee and member of First Baptist Church, Ashford, in Columbia Baptist Association, said the adoption of new guidelines is “a very positive step” to prevent a situation such as the showdown with Burleson from occurring again.
The new guidelines require trustees to “refrain from public criticism” of not only trustee policies — like the November 2005 decisions defining a proper baptism and prohibiting use of a “private prayer language” by missionary candidates — but all “board-approved actions.”
Likewise the new guidelines require trustees “to refrain from speaking in disparaging terms” not only of fellow trustees but — after an amendment — also of all IMB personnel. The guidelines, which will give trustees other options besides removal for dealing with conflict among board members, were passed overwhelmingly with only three votes against — one of which was Burleson’s.
“I voted against the new policy regulations for one reason, and that was the provision that disallows any trustee to dissent publicly from board actions of any kind. … In short, this policy has two edges, and they cut both ways. My desire is to be in a Southern Baptist Convention where the edges are always soft, and dissent is allowed for the strength of our cooperative efforts in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC),” Burleson said.
Burleson, who insists he did not violate any IMB trustee policies and was never confronted with specific charges, said March 22 he will abide by the guidelines.
“I’ve said all along, the authority over trustees is guidelines,” said Burleson, pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church, Enid, Okla., who did not speak during the open portion of the trustee meeting. “I can assure them there will be no one more faithful to the new guidelines, and to hold other trustees faithful to the guidelines.”
Trustee Mike Smith, chair of the trustee orientation committee, said the guidelines, drafted jointly with the trustee administration committee, were in the works for two years, before Burleson was elected to the board.
“We knew that it would be seen as a Wade Burleson document, but that wasn’t our intention,” said Smith, director of missions for the Dogwood Trails Area in east Texas.
Hatley said the Burleson controversy and the problems it created were “a small price to pay” for the significant improvements that had resulted. Trustees have improved their accountability procedures and discovered the need for “better and faster ways to communicate with Southern Baptists,” said Hatley, pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church, Rogers, Ark.
Hatley said trustees are now more aware of the younger generation of Southern Baptist pastors and leaders who rallied to Burleson’s defense. “This high-tech generation is fearless,” he said, adding their fearlessness is often taken for insolence.
While the vote to rescind may defuse the growing controversy over the trustees’ treatment of Burleson, it may also trigger further unrest among SBC conservatives who fear the new guidelines are evidence of a conventionwide effort to silence dissent, even among loyal supporters.
Marty Duren, a Georgia pastor whose blog, sbcoutpost.blogspot.com, has followed the IMB controversy and criticized trustees, said he is doubtful the 27-year “conservative resurgence” could have succeeded if the new IMB policy had been in place in SBC agencies when moderate Baptists were in control.
Duren, pastor of New Bethany Baptist Church, Buford, Ga., was among a handful of young pastors who attended the IMB meeting in Tampa, Fla.
Several said the guidelines signal a narrowing of dissent within the SBC.
“It is unconscionable that Baptists would move away from our cherished distinctives” of individual freedom and the right of dissent, said Benjamin Cole, pastor of Parkview Baptist Church, Arlington, Texas. In January, Cole threatened to ask the SBC to remove all of the IMB trustees, saying their action against Burleson had done “irreparable harm” to Southern Baptists’ confidence in them.
While rescinding the action against Burleson was a good move, Cole said, the issue that is energizing opposition to the growing narrowness of some of the SBC’s conservative leadership “has nothing to do with Wade Burleson” but everything to do with Baptist distinctives.
The new document details rules for trustee attendance, advocacy, responsibilities, accountability and discipline. When discipline is necessary, the document says a number of options are available, including investigation, censure, suspension for a period of time or removal by the SBC, which appoints all denominational trustees.
The guidelines call on the trustees to employ biblical principles to seek resolution of individual differences that could damage trust. They are prohibited from “participation in any unauthorized caucus … on a recurring basis to advance a specific agenda.” And trustees are instructed not to share “non-public information” with anyone other than trustees and senior IMB staffers.
“[T]rustees are to speak in positive and supportive terms as they interpret and report on actions by the board, regardless of whether they personally support the action,” the document says.
Smith, introducing the document, said, “Certainly in here it’s alright to have disagreement. [But] when we leave here we ought to be positive.”
Hickman said the new policies do not prohibit trustees from working within the confines of the board to reverse actions they disagree with. “It just discourages trustees from fighting battles in the public forum,” he said.
But other trustees said they were troubled about whether the policy will prevent them from explaining their disagreement to their constituents.
“I believe my trusteeship is primarily to the Southern Baptist Convention,” said Allen McWhite, director for global missions at North Greenville College in Tigerville, S.C. Any trustee should be able to express “honest disagreement” with a board action he or she feels is “not in the best interest of the Southern Baptist constituency,” he said. “No trustee should ever be put in the position where he or she could not do that.”
Under the new policy, the “only alternative” for a trustee in that position is to resign, McWhite said. (TAB, compiled from wire services)
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