More than 2,000 Southern Baptist women have signed a letter asking the trustees of a Fort Worth, Texas, seminary to take action against its embattled president after audio and video clips emerged in which he counseled physically abused women to quietly pray and described a 16-year-old’s body as “built.”
The letter does not explicitly demand a resignation, retirement or reprimand for Paige Patterson, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and one of the key leaders of the conservative resurgence in the denomination, the nation’s largest Protestant group.
But it does suggest Patterson cannot be allowed to continue to lead — a stunning development for a revered leader in the denomination and an indication of just how pervasive the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment and assault has become.
“The Southern Baptist Convention cannot allow the biblical view of leadership to be misused in such a way that a leader with an unbiblical view of authority, womanhood, and sexuality be allowed to continue in leadership,” the online letter says.
In the audio interview from the year 2000, Patterson said he never counsels divorce, since it is unbiblical. He then proceeds to tell a story of a woman who was physically abused by her husband and his recommendation that she get on her knees and pray quietly at night after her husband falls asleep.
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