NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The Southern Baptist Convention's two-day "Gospel and Racial Reconciliation" gathering featured speaker after speaker proclaiming the evil of racial divisions.
Russell Moore, who helped put the event together, was blunt about why he believes racial bias is an urgent spiritual matter.
Racial divisions and hatred don't just hurt people in this world, he said in the opening presentation Thursday.
"Hatred of others sends people to hell," he said of those who hold those views.
Moore, who is white, is the president of the convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which organized the event. He said he often hears complaints from pastors that people won't attend a diverse church because they want to worship with others who are like them.
"Sure they do. And I'd like to fight and fornicate and smoke weed," Moore said to applause and laughter and shouts of appreciation that drowned out the end of his sentence.
Speakers at the event did not shy away from topics such as the recent killings of unarmed black men by police that have propelled the "black lives matter" movement.
Afshin Ziafat, an Iranian-American pastor who converted from Islam to Christianity as a young man, also urged those in attendance to pray for terrorists and members of ISIS. He even compared the Apostle Paul, before his conversion to Christianity, to Osama bin Laden, saying that Paul had hunted down and persecuted Christians.
"Before I am an American, I am a Christian," he said, echoing a theme that the commonality of being a Christian should overpower differences in race and culture.
The Rev. Tony Evans, a black pastor, author and broadcaster, put it this way: "Jesus is not asking for me to be you or you to be me, but for both of us to be like him."
Frank Page, the executive director of the Southern Baptist Convention's executive committee, praised the demographic changes the denomination has witnessed over the past couple of decades. Of the 50,000 Southern Baptist congregations, about 3,500 are black, over 3,000 more are Hispanic and 2,000 more are Asian.
"We've seen great changes, but not at every level of SBC life," said Page, noting that the denomination's leadership and much of its paid staff remains white -- including Page.
He said he encourages the denomination's nonwhite members to become more involved and seek out leadership positions. But he also said the denomination will not use a quota system to diversify the leadership.
In an interview during a break, the Rev. Fred Luter Jr., who in 2012 became the first black president of the Southern Baptist Convention, called the summit "amazing" and said he fully expects positive change to come out of it.
"I look around at all the conversations that are happening, and I think this summit will have a lasting effect for years to come," he said. "There's no way you can come to a conference like this and not be moved."
In a speech, Moore acknowledged the lack of concrete suggestions for change, saying, "We don't know how to do this. ... There's no program to get your church racially reconciled in a year." But he also told the crowd, "For people that have all the marks on our history that we have, it seems that God is working and giving us another chance to get this right."
State Desk on 03/29/2015