Faith in the voter’s booth
I was struck by the simplicity of Richard Land’s (pictured at right) message when I visited with the Southern Baptist Convention leader during his visit to Oklahoma City this week.
I interviewed Land briefly at last year’s convention annual meeting in San Antonio and had been to previous news conferences where the president of the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission held sway. I had always enjoyed talking to him because he doesn’t mince words nor does he appear to hesitate to speak exactly what’s on his mind (every reporter’s dream come true!).
So when I asked him to explain his general message to Southern Baptist these days I shouldn’t have been surprised that it was so simple and direct:
Register to vote.
Find out where you need to go vote.
Become informed about the candidates and …
Vote.
Land said that is the essence of his message — and he implores his audience of evangelicals (Land said one in three Oklahomans is a baptized member of a Southern Baptist church) to vote according to their Judeo-Christian value system.
The message is getting through, he said.
Land said Americans see the necessity of the seperation of church and state — a point emphasized by the country’s founding fathers. Americans don’t want government-sponsored faith, but they do want people of all faiths to have an opportunity to make their point in the public square, Land added.
He predicted that this will be borne out come the presidential election in November.
Meanwhile, here’s a heads up about a new prayer initiative that Land’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission is leadin.
The Nashville, Tenn.-based commission is partnering with the SBC’s North American Mission Board for a prayer initiative calling all Southern Baptists to engage in a time of prayer for personal spiritual revival and national renewal this fall.
The initiative, called the “40/40 Prayer Vigil,” will feature 40 days of prayer beginning Sept. 23 and concluding with a dedicated 40 hours of prayer that will begin at 4 p.m. Oct. 31 and end at 8 a.m. Nov. 2.
For more information, go to ilivevalues.com.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
The problem with this coverage is that the Southern Baptist’s stranglehold on Oklahomans has diminished significantly over the past two decades. More people are beginning to see through the inherent hypocrisy of this most evangelical of evangelical denominations. Many voters in Oklahoma, especially younger voters , could less what Mr. Land has to say. Southern Baptists are slowly on the road to obsolescence. So ramble on Mr. Land, but there’s really know one listening to your antiquated, out-dated message.