Like many other Southern Baptists, I read with dismay of the situation that occured at First Baptist Church in Crystal Springs, Mississippi.  A black couple who had been attending the church wanted to get married.  They scheduled the ceremony and even had the rehearsal on a Thursday night, just two days before their scheduled wedding.

A group of long-term church members found out about it, and told the new pastor in no uncertain terms on Friday that blacks could not get married in that church.  The wedding had to be changed on short notice.  The pastor did the wedding, but not at his own church.

I held off on writing about this because I didn’t know what words to use to describe it.  Racist?  Obviously.  Antiquated?  Beyond any shadow of doubt.  Disgusting?  Definitely.  Unbiblical?  Absolutely.

The sad truth is that in the church world, we still have work to do to get rid of the remains of racist policies and attitudes that have plagued us for centuries.

Becuase each Baptist Church is independent, we can’t do anything about the situation in the church in Mississippi.  However, we can (and we will) make sure that racism is not a part of who we are.  Blacks are welcome.  Asians are welcome.  Hispanics are welcome.  Anyone of any race and any age and any religious background is welcome.  And we need to keep saying it until the world knows that we will no longer tolerate racism of any type in our churches!