Friday, February 11, 2022

Becoming Human: My Visit to an SBC Seminary

It was an unlikely invitation. 

Would I travel to Wake Forest, NC to speak on personhood at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary? 

I, who am neither a member of the SBC nor the daughter of a member of the SBC. 

I, a woman who teaches Bible and even preaches on occasion.

It was not my first SBC connection. First, my book appeared in the book store at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, where Al Mohler is president back in early 2020. (Unexpected!) Then, the same book was a finalist for an award from Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City. (Who knew?!) The next thing I knew, Lifeway Publishing asked me to contribute to a women's study Bible. (Huh.) And then Southern invited me to present my research to their PhD students and faculty over Zoom in 2021. (!!)

And then this. A plenary address at an SBC seminary. What did I have to lose? Plenty, actually.

As I said, I'm not a member of the SBC. But I am SBC-adjacent. I'm close enough to the movement to know that all is not well. I watched Beth Moore walk away (gulp!). I watched Russell Moore make his exit (wow.). I saw the troubling statement released by the six white SBC seminary presidents on Critical Race Theory -- a statement crafted without the input of any people of color or anyone who had even studied CRT (um...). I watched talented African American leaders cut ties with the denomination. I waited on pins and needles while the delegates voted for a new president at last year's convention, and while they decided how to handle allegations of sexual abuse and how to care for survivors. I groaned a few months later when the Executive Committee waffled over whether to submit to outside investigation.

I care very much where things go in the SBC because the denomination wields enormous influence. People's faith and health are at stake. And so is the witness of the church at large.

Here was my conundrum: attending the conference would allow me to learn from the other presenters and work on issues related to my current book project and get feedback. But would taking the stage at an SBC seminary somehow align me with the denomination and its problems? Would it make me complicit? (If you think I'm overreacting, consider that the invitation was issued from a building named after Paige and Dorothy Patterson, the seminary's notorious former president and his wife.)

I concluded that I could not participate without addressing the problems as I see them. I refuse to pretend that all is well. It would be irresponsible to talk about the biblical doctrine of the image of God without pointing to the myriads of ways that evangelicals as a whole and the SBC in particular have failed to live these truths. That would compromise my integrity.

So I took a deep breath, said yes, and submitted this title:

The Rise and Fall of the Imago Dei?: Assessing Evangelical Theology and Practice

My title intentionally evoked the long-form journalistic podcast produced by Christianity Today that investigated a particularly egregious form of "evangelical" ministry with a narcissistic leader. I took my cues from Mike Cosper, who demonstrated the value of evangelical self-critique. Here is my abstract:

Evangelicals all agree that human identity and vocation are rooted in the creation accounts of Genesis, but the particulars are often a matter of debate. We’ll consider the recent work of several evangelical scholars on the imago Dei—Ryan Peterson, John Kilner, Catherine McDowell, and Richard Middleton—each of whom has clarified Old Testament teaching in profound ways. Building on their work, we will reassess the priorities of the contemporary evangelical church and suggest ways of embodying practices that align with Scripture’s clear teaching on the imago Dei.

Carmen Imes speaking at the Exploring
Personhood Conference sponsored by
the Bush Center for Faith and Culture
(Photo: Chip Hardy)
The first half of my presentation drew out insights from the four scholars named above, with a bit of extra nuance from me in the area of gender. But then came the scary part -- I addressed head on the ways that evangelicals have failed in three broad areas: sanctity of human life (ahem, after birth), partnership of men and women, and creation care.

My talk will be posted soon on the Bush Center for Faith and Culture's website, so there's no need for me to repeat the litany here. It's enough to say that I pointed to examples of racism, ableism, sexism, LGBTQ-related issues, inhospitality to singles, failure to protect and advocate for victims of abuse, and neglect of creation care. I hit all these hot topics, issued a clear call for change, and cast a vision for a different way of living out what we say we believe. With my integrity intact, the question became 'would I lose my voice?' Would this be the first and last opportunity to speak on this campus?

I've been mulling over all of this for months, reading widely, and imagining how this might go. I asked people to pray and I prayed about it myself. I sought advice and wondered if this was career suicide. In the end, I said what I felt I must be said with as much love and empathy as I could muster. One thing is true -- of all the possible reactions I imagined, a standing ovation was not one of them. Everyone clapped, and more than half a dozen stood in solidarity.

Conference Panel Discussion
(Photo: Bush Center for Faith and Culture) 
This message struck a chord with so many, who thanked me with tears in their eyes. Faculty, students, and guests alike shook my hand and new friendships were born. To be clear, the warm reception is not a sign that all is well, of course. It's a sign that the problems I listed truly are problems. On that we agree.

And this is what gives me hope.

Because agreeing on the problem is the first essential step toward finding solutions.

So now the real work begins. Now we must invest our energies into the work of listening to new voices, reexamining how we do things, building new alliances, and prayerfully finding new ways forward. Change takes time, but the road is not so lonely as it seemed.

This conference taught me something about human personhood that was not on the stated agenda: Caricatures are difficult to maintain in person. I'm under no illusion that 48 hours on campus gave me an accurate picture of the SBC as a whole, or even SEBTS in particular. But it reminded me of the value of embodied community and courageous conversations. It showed me that the loudest voices on Twitter do not always (or even usually?) represent the majority. I found far more allies than I dared to hope. I'm relieved that a bridge has been built, rather than burned.

As we learned from Dr. Justin Barrett, compared to animals, humans are immensely social creatures capable of shared attention, mental space, expertise, and cooperation across a remarkably large group of unrelated humans. I saw this in action at Southeastern. 

Father John Behr and Dr. Jeff Schloss both talked about the telos of love, helping us think about the uniquely human capability of self-sacrifice for another. According to Behr, it is in laying down our lives for another that we truly become human. I felt this in the way people thanked me for saying hard things, and in the way Dr. John Hammett offered loving pushback to each of us.

If Behr is right, then all of us who participated in this exchange became a bit more human this week.

For that I am profoundly grateful.

28 comments:

  1. Dr. Imes, I’m looking forward to hearing this lecture. I took Theology II from Dr. Peterson in my first semester and was introduced to theological anthropology. It has launched me on a journey to learn more, especially in light of where we are culturally. (It seems all my papers some how end up discussing the image of God.) Thank you for your courage to speak out.

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    1. Thanks for your comment, and blessings on your studies!

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  2. Oh this was so good to read as the first thing I see on my feed today! Amen on all the points you brought up and for the importance of facing the implications of speaking! I think all have benefited from the humility all at that conference have shown. It is only when we lower our heads can we properly know where to put our hands to the plow and be the change.

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  3. Who else was on the program? I look forward to listening to your presentation.

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    1. John Behr, Justin Barrett, Jeff Schloss, Amy Beverage Peeler, and John Hammett. (Marc Cortez was unable to come.)

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  4. Thank you for doing this! Looking forward to watching!

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  5. I am grateful that SEBTS extended an invitation to you and even more grateful that you were gracious to accept. Thank you for your courage in calling out where doctrine does not line up with actual practice in the SBC. I was greatly encouraged by the response from my fellow students and from the faculty present to your loving rebuke. I enjoyed meeting you and greatly appreciate the time you took to speak with me and other attendees. I can't wait for your upcoming book and pray that the Lord blesses your work and ministry. Thank you!

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    1. It was great to meet you, Trey! Blessings on your studies and as you work together for a different kind of future!

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  6. I'm grateful that not only did you have this opportunity but that you demonstrated the courage of your convictions in addressing several elephants in the room. Just being there and presenting gave your listeners permission to think beyond the boundaries of what's deemed acceptable within the SBC, and perhaps you've planted some seeds not only of compassion and concern but of what it means to be faithful to the Gospel in our day and time. Well done, Carmen. I can't wait until your address is posted so that I can listen.

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  7. I have so much respect and appreciation for you and your work. So glad you were extended an opportunity SETS to participate in the Conference.

    But this piece however, comes across as a little condescending and selfrighteous. Though I am sure that was not intended.

    SBC (which I am not a part of by the way) is large and not a monolith by any means. JD Greer was a recent president and you and he would probably align in most respects. But because of its size it is an easy target.

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    1. Thank you for your comment! SEBTS was most gracious and hospitable to me. I meant no disrespect. I was honored by the invitation, but concerned about abuses and marginalization of women and minorities in the SBC. My expressions of surprise were to make the point that you made, too, namely that the voices I see on Twitter do not represent the whole. Greer has done a lot of good for the SBC, as has Lytton, Aiken, and others. I was pleasantly surprised to see how many people at SEBTS shared my concerns as well as the vision I expressed for a different kind of future together.

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  8. Your courage and strong ezer presence is inspiring. May ears hear and hearts soften.

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  9. Way to go! I was surprised when I heard that you spoke there. This is so cool and I can't wait to watch the event.

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  10. Well done! I look forward to hearing/reading the entire talk.

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  11. Dr. Imes, I was raised as a Southern Baptist, baptized at 11. I dissociated from my home church at age 13. In the 59 years since then, there has been other "listening to new voices". And nothing changes. Misogyny, sex abuse, racism, homophobia, and political partisanship taint the SBC. Conservative Christians disgraced the mission of the Church by enthusiastically supporting a politician who is a narcissistic sociopath, sexual abuser, business fraud, bigot, constant liar, and violator of his sworn oath of office.

    My personal emphasis is on science. I have been a strong science advocate since before baptism. The SBC, and all conservative Christianity, is hostile to secular knowledge of Nature. Biblical literalists - creationists - contradict virtually all fields of science. They advocate absurdities, such as God manipulating natural fundamental constants to create a false appearance of great age of the Universe. A significant number (about 10% of the many I have encountered) insist that Earth is a flat planet. They attribute scientific knowledge to a demonic conspiracy to hide God's role in Nature.

    And for 2 years, we have seen Christians vociferously deny medical reality, and overtly refuse to act with compassion for others, in their opposition to COVID-19 vaccination, masking, etc. Had religious leaders guided Christians to make responsible choices, hundreds of thousands of Americans would have been spared death, and far more would not be suffering long-term debilitation.

    This is unnecessary. God's glory is revealed by science, even by secular science.

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    1. Thanks for sharing your perspective. I'm under no illusion that things will change overnight. I addressed politics in my talk, and I agree with you that hostility to science is a real problem in conservative evangelicalism. We've seen many consequences of that during this pandemic. You'll be happy to hear, though, that the focus of this conference at an SBC seminary was on interdisciplinary engagement with science. Alongside me on the platform were an evolutionary biologist and an evolutionary psychologist. The faculty with whom I engaged at SEBTS are not flat earth or even young earth creationists. You and I are not alone in seeing the need for change.

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    2. I appreciate the thrust of the gentleman's thoughts about religion and science in many ways. I have never been Baptist; likely dont well appreciate many of the SBC dynamics as well as he does; though have a, perhaps peripheral, awareness of the issues among that that fellowship as they have been well publicized.

      I am not sure I could well define what he describes as 'conservative' Christianity. But for the first 60 years of my life I attended congregations that I think even Baptists might find conservative. And, indeed, have been both horrified and perplexed by a large swath of evangelical Christianity's views in the most recent election cycles.

      I would not, however, overgeneralize from the specific issues addressed in his well formed comments about the relationship between conservative Christianity and science. My father, for example, was for decades a Sunday School teacher, deacon then elder in that fellowship of my first 6 decades. He also had 3 Bachelor of Science degrees in engineering: chemical, petroleum and natural gas. In graduate school he attended Einstein's lectures. He retired after 30+ years employment as an engineer with specialty in fluid dynamics. Drilled wells, laid pipelines and built refineries world wide. He was steeped in science. And taught me that most of the people of science he worked with were people of faith.

      I dont know if conservative Christianity, broadly speaking, is hostile to science. Some is. But I know not all is. And 'conservatism' is hardily unique to religion. See, for example, in Thorwald's 'Century of the Surgeon' the struggle Lister went through to convince physicians to wash their hands before surgery. Or, as found in 'Quantum: Einstein, Bohr and the Great Debate about the Nature of Reality' by Kumar, the drama which played out at the fifth Solvay conference on "Electrons and Photons" in 1927 as Bohr sided with Ehrenfest against Einstein. "I laugh only at their naivete" Einstein is quoted to have said.

      And Max Plank is quoted as "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it' (Kumar, Ch.1). Alas, narrowness and résistance to progress is found in science as well as religion.

      I was well taught from childhood by a man of great faith as well as scientific sophistication there was no necessary conflict between 'science and religion'. There need be no 'sides' as one can be in both worlds. That is probably why I grew up to earn a doctorate in clinical psychology yet am a member of an evangelicals church.

      The supposed conflicts are, in my view, well earned. But done so by mutual misunderstanding of the issues at hand. In "Teaching About Evolution and the Nature of Science" the National Academy of Science expresses it well: 'At the root of the apparent conflict between some religions and evolution is a misunderstanding of the critical difference between religious and scientific ways of knowing. Religions and science answer different questions about the world."

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    3. Thanks, Billy, for weighing in on this conversation. We had several scientists who spoke at the conference -- all men of faith. It's becoming clearer to me that the perceived hostility between science and religion often does not reflect the lived experience of so many Christians who are scientists. 'Science for the Church' is one organization actively equipping churches to engage the scientists in their congregations: https://scienceforthechurch.org/about/.

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  12. Carmen, Mike and I read your post with great interest. We are thankful that you accepted the invitation for all the reasons you articulated that persuaded you to do so. And I so resonate with what you have written here: "It reminded me of the value of embodied community and courageous conversations. It showed me that the loudest voices on Twitter do not always (or even usually?) represent the majority. I found far more allies than I dared to hope. I'm relieved that a bridge has been built, rather than burned." AMEN!

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  13. Reading this brings tears to the eyes. This is what scholarship should be about; good scholarship makes good thinking and good thinking cannot help but ripple outwards into human life with good and with potentially dangerous results. // So glad you didn't come to Southern. As it is only two hours from my house, I'd have been sore disappointed to have missed an opportunity to say hello.

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    1. Thanks for your note! I'm praying for a significant ripple that contributes to God's glory and human flourishing!

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