NOBTS working on SBC ‘sole membership’

NASHVILLE — New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (NOBTS) attorney Don M. Richard issued a letter to Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) attorneys Nov. 10, providing documentation about sole membership language approved by seminary trustees during a closed executive session Oct. 13.

Previously, the exact nature of the actions taken in the closed session was unclear, even though the trustees publicly released two motions that they had approved. The news is significant because it signals NOBTS compliance with the request by SBC messengers at the 2004 annual meeting that the seminary adopt sole membership at its October 2004 meeting by amending the seminary’s charter.

The letter addressed to SBC attorney Jim Guenther also indicated trustees had lost interest in offering alternatives. Seminary President Chuck Kelley previously had stated that other options would be placed before messengers next June. “When the trustees of NOBTS met in executive session and voted on this matter all of the trustees had before them several proposed charter amendments,” Richard wrote. “All proposed charter amendments were rejected with the exception of the proposed charter amendment sent to the seminary by the Executive Committee of the SBC several years ago.”

Richard noted that the seminary also intends to repeat previously expressed concerns, about polity and Louisiana law, when the amended charter is presented for consideration at the 2005 SBC annual meeting in Nashville.