Southern Baptists elect a black president
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once said that 11 a.m. on a Sunday is “the most segregated hour of the week,” and even with an African American in the White House, that critique is still a sad reality in many Baptist churches.
But history was made this week in New Orleans when a 55-year-old African American preacher was elected unanimously to lead the 16 million-member Southern Baptist Convention, which was founded in 1845 by Baptists who were defenders of slavery.
Although the Southern Baptist Convention remains a predominantly white organization of 45,000 congregations, the election of Fred Luter Jr. to a one-year term as president sparked hopes among Baptists in more progressive circles that diversity would trickle down through the leadership ranks.
Luter has long had a prominent national presence in faith circles, rising from a street-corner preacher with a few dozen followers two decades ago to lead a congregation of more than 5,000 members as senior pastor of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church in his hometown of New Orleans.
“This is humongous as far as the Southern Baptist Convention is concerned,” said the Rev. Patrick J. Walker, pastor of the New Macedonia Baptist Church in Washington and president of the Missionary Baptist Ministers Conference of Washington D.C. and Vicinity. “He is going to bring the Southern Baptist and historic African American organizations to the table.”
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