Richmond Seminary

by   T.C. Pinckney                                                                                                                                   Vol. IV, No. 8, November 1991

This article addresses two votes messengers will have to make in Salem on Tuesday, 12 November. Both votes pertain to the Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond (BTSR). The first to face messengers will be a resolution of affirmation for BTSR as recommended by the denominational relations committee. Chairman Ray Spence will bring that report at 9:45 a.m. Tuesday.

The resolution would have Virginia Baptists encourage (1) BTSR leaders and (2) Virginia Baptist churches to support the BTSR through prayer, "by endorsing it as an appropriate place for ministerial candidates to study," and by establishing internships for BTSR students. It also would have messengers authorize the state treasurer to receive and disburse designated funds from churches and individuals to BTSR.

You will want to review the points made below, but right now just note that Southern Baptists have six fine seminaries. We do not need another. Of course, if liberals want a seminary where professors teach that the Bible contains errors, they have every right to send their money to it directly. But it is a very different matter for the BGAV to officially endorse a seminary which is an agency of obvious rebellion against the direction the SBC has take for the last 13 years.

Come and vote against this resolution.

The second vote regarding the Richmond seminary will concern a new line item of $25,000 to be given to the Baptist Seminary at Richmond (BTSR). This line item will be found in the proposed 1992 BGAV budget Section C, World Mission Causes.

Arguments in favor were presented to the General Board by the chairman of the BGAV budget committee, Ernest J. Boyd: (1) With the decrease in enrollment at Southeastern Seminary, Virginia Baptists need BTSR to provide quality education to future church leaders in Virginia. (2) 18 of the 31 students in the first BTSR class are from Virginia. (3) "It is more likely that the Keesee Foundation will grant loans to Virginia Baptist students [at BTSR] if we include at least some funds in our budget for the school. These funds are currently available for church vocation volunteers from Virginia and North Carolina who attend Southern Baptist seminaries." (4) Letters were received by the budget committee from a number of churches asking that BTSR be placed in the budget. (5) "The 50% designated portion of World Mission Causes acknowledges the local church's right to choose alternative giving." (6) Only churches giving through the Virginia Plan would be contributing to BTSR.

Those arguments are considerably less than convincing. (1) Enrollment at Southeastern Seminary clearly has nothing to do with the establishment or support for BTSR. What is at issue is Southeastern's theological stance. Those who do not believe the Bible is God's perfect, infallible, inerrant Word do not want Virginia students to attend a seminary where their faith will be strengthened, but rather one where it is attacked and dissipated. (2) That there are Virginian students in BTSR's first class is of little, if any, bearing upon messengers' decision whether to fund BTSR. Those students can go to any of five other SBC seminaries if they choose not to attend Southeastern. (3) Keesee Foundation funding is a critical concern of those who want the liberal seminary in Richmond to succeed. Keesee has a huge endowment and provides funds to large numbers of students attending Southern Baptist supported seminaries. Any funding by the BGAV for BTSR would presumably qualify the school for Keesee money because such funding would qualify as Southern Baptist support. (4) One must wonder whether the budget committee would have recommended a line item for the inerrantist and independent Mid-America Seminary had "a number of churches" requested it. Such a comparison shows the speciousness of this reason. (5) The committee's fifth reason does not even apply to the issue. It simply repeats the fact that Virginia churches may choose alternative giving. That is not a reason to fund BTSR. (6) The committee's last "reason" is true but again has no bearing upon the issue.

There is only one reason for the existence of the Richmond seminary: those who support it believe the Bible has errors and adamantly oppose the conservative direction of Southeastern Seminary.

Everyone, conservative or moderate, agrees that any Virginia church or individual has the right to contribute their own money to any cause they wish. The question is not whether such donations may be made, but rather the route they follow. Any church or individual may send contributions directly to BTSR and so exercise their full freedom of conscience.

But it is another thing altogether for the BGAV to place BTSR in its budget and so give official approval to a school specifically created to draw students and funds from our six Cooperative Program funded seminaries. When conservatives established Mid-America Seminary some years ago, they did not seek state convention funding. They used their own money and contributed directly, not through their state conventions. Why should not BTSR supporters do the same?

Southern Baptists love their six fine seminaries. We do not wish our state convention to help establish a competing school. We do not want our state to participate in an attack on our seminaries.

The Banner urges every reader to come to Salem Tuesday, 12 November, and vote against funding the seminary in Richmond. (And stay through adjournment Wednesday to oppose the constitutional amendment Wednesday morning and to help elect officers Wednesday afternoon.)