Statement from American Baptist Churches, USA

When Paige Patterson, President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and a member of the Southern Baptist Convention/Baptist World Alliance Study Committee spoke to the messengers of the Southern Baptist Convention Annual meeting in Indianapolis, Indiana, he gave several reasons for the SBC to withdraw from the Baptist World Alliance, one of which was the charge that the American Baptist Churches USA supported gay marriage and a homosexual agenda. Here is the reply from Roy Medley, general secretary of the ABC and Rich Schramm, associate general secretary for Communications.
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"Dr. Patterson's statement is completely outrageous. Nowhere, in any of the conversations with the BWA, has such an excuse ever been given. Their action to pull out was clearly and solely a response to the BWA's vote to welcome the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship into the Baptist World Alliance. That is when the issue arose, and is the substance of their action though they have consistently sought to cover it with patently untrue excuses, such as that the BWA is anti-American..."<snip>
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