Richard Land, who led the transformation of the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) ethics entity during the denomination’s conservative resurgence, has announced he will retire next year after a quarter of a century of service as its head.
Land’s retirement as president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) will be effective Oct. 23, 2013, he announced in a letter July 31 to the acting chairman of the entity’s board of trustees. His retirement is scheduled to take place 25 years from the date he assumed the ERLC’s presidency in 1988.
Land, 65, has acted as an outspoken advocate among Southern Baptists for biblical positions on such issues as the sanctity of human life, religious freedom, marriage and race relations. His staunch efforts during his tenure also have made him a leading evangelical Christian voice among social conservatives in this country’s escalating cultural battles. Time Magazine named him in 2005 as one of America’s 25 most influential evangelicals.
He received a doctor of philosophy degree from Oxford University in England, a master of theology from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and a bachelor of arts from Princeton University.
Land made it clear he is retiring only from the ERLC, “not from the ministry, or from what is popularly called the ‘culture war.’”
“When God called me into the ministry a half century ago, the burden He placed on my heart was for America,” wrote Land, who recently began his 50th year in the gospel ministry. “That call and that burning burden are still there. I believe the ‘culture war’ is a titanic struggle for our nation’s soul and as a minister of Christ’s gospel, I have no right to retire from that struggle.”
Land chose to announce his retirement nearly 15 months before its effective date to provide “plenty of time for an orderly transition for both the Commission and myself to the next phase of our respective future ministries,” he said in his letter to Richard Piles, acting chairman of the ERLC trustees.
The decision comes months after Land made controversial comments about the Trayvon Martin case that resulted in a reprimand and the loss of his radio talk show for the racial tension they caused.
But Fred Luter, who was elected in June as the SBC’s first African-American president, considers the Martin remarks a “low moment” that should not diminish Land’s commitment to racial reconciliation, especially the 1995 SBC resolution the two men worked on apologizing for Southern Baptists’ support of slavery during the Civil War era.
“Richard was very passionate in those meetings about the fact that we do not just want this to be a piece of paper, a resolution; we want it to mean something,” Luter recalled of their work together. “I will always remember him as a man who was a major voice in our convention desiring that people would be treated fairly regardless of their race.”
Bill Leonard, chair of Baptist studies at Wake Forest University Divinity School, said from a historical perspective, “the Trayvon Martin situation should not be seen as the defining moment for Land on race.”
Nonetheless, Leonard said Land’s retirement signals a changing of the guard in the nation’s largest Protestant body, which is struggling to reach nonwhites and non-Southerners as it faces a declining membership.
“You have to wonder if there is — inside the new, the younger leadership of the convention — a concern that his style of very aggressive, very public responses is something the convention wants to perpetuate,” Leonard said, adding that Land “replaced Jerry Falwell” as the media’s go-to voice for conservative evangelicals.
Piles called Land’s departure “bittersweet” and thanked Land for his “exemplary” service.
“He is to be applauded for his tireless work for racial reconciliation, the pro-life movement, and traditional marriage, just to name a few of the more well-known issues he has championed,” Piles said.
(Baptist Press, Religion News Service)
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