Despite a long criminal rap sheet, Mark Allen Green got hired
into a position of trust as a pastor for the Cowboy Church of Marshall County
in Albertville, Alabama.
The “Cowboy Church” in Albertville is shown as being
affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention.
Green’s rap sheet speaks volumes about how low the standards
are for Southern Baptist pastors – in
fact there are no denominational standards – and about the perilous lack of systemic safeguards in the largest Protestant denomination in the land.
When it comes to their clergy, the Southern Baptist
Convention engages an excess of permissiveness. So long as a man isn’t
literally sitting in prison, he can likely find a Southern Baptist pulpit to
stand in.
There is no denominational system that will stop him.
There is no denominational system that will warn people in
the pews.
When the Sand Mountain Reporter contacted Randall Stoner, the
director of missions at Marshall Baptist Association, Stoner made a short written
statement and then said, “Due to legal issues, we cannot comment any further.”
"Legal issues"? I hope so. Why? Because the Southern Baptist
Convention has shown that it will not, on its own, implement the sorts of common-place
clergy oversight mechanisms that now exist in other major faith groups. It will
take the long, dogged development of the law to eventually prod this
denomination into action.
Southern Baptist leaders candy-coat their reckless
intransigence with religious rationalization. “We believe in the autonomy of the local church,” they say . . . as
though the Bible itself somehow precluded denominational cooperation for the prevention
of clergy sex abuse.
Yet denominational entities exercise power, influence, and
authority in a wide range of other contexts. For example, the regional “director
of missions” is often the guy who helps Baptist churches with finding new
pastors and helps pastors with finding new jobs.
Recently, in a clergy sex abuse case in Florida, a jury
found liability against the statewide Florida Baptist Convention, in addition to the Lake County Baptist Association and the local church. So, Southern
Baptist denominational entities may be starting to get a little less
overconfident and a little more nervous.
I think that’s a good thing.
Besides, according to WAFF News, the Marshall Baptist
Association director of missions, Randall Stoner, "said they began dealing
with the issue” last Sunday. But, if Southern Baptist churches are so totally
and utterly autonomous and independent, as Southern Baptist officials assert,
then why is a denominational entity, the Marshall Baptist Association, “dealing
with the issue” at all?
And if this is a matter that rests wholly on the local
church’s shoulders, then why does an official for a denominational entity say
that he cannot comment due to legal issues? His own statement refusing comment
is a statement that demonstrates the cooperative alignment between the
denominational entity and the local church.
Denominational connectivity is the de facto reality of
Southern Baptist life. The local churches are not totally independent, but rather, are part of a denominational
web.
I wish I could say that the Cowboy Church’s hiring of a
career criminal as pastor was incomprehensible. But it’s not. When a denominational web is so lacking in systemic oversight mechanisms, such
stories become tragically predictable.______________________
Update 9/27/2012: A Texas grand jury declined to indict on the child sex charges. But the question remains of whether this man should have been allowed into a position of trust as a pastor when he had a multi-year, multi-county rap sheet like the one shown here. Is a religious system safe when it so easily allows for this?
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