A group calling itself Godly America sent out a press release through Christian Newswire on Monday calling attention to a Southern Baptist pastor who “has submitted a resolution against social justice” to be considered at the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Dallas in June.
Godly America, “a ministry to remind Christians of their rich heritage and history as Americans, and to call America back to the Judeao-Christian [sic] principles on which America is founded,” seems to consist of said pastor, Grady Arnold.
"If Southern Baptists in the heartland knew the extent that social justice was being promoted in the Convention, they would be aghast,” says Arnold in the press release. “Southern Baptists need to know that their cooperative program dollars are going to an agenda they don't agree with."
Arnold’s resolution says that social justice activism—also appearing under such lables as eco-justice, economic justice, racial justice, and global justice—"should be considered evil.”
Arnold’s concerns about social justice are nothing new. A few years ago, we noted that the Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America and the anti-environmentalist Cornwall Alliance had published a booklet called “Social Justice: How Good Intentions Undermine Justice and Gospel.”
Arnold’s resolution notes that back in 2010, Glenn Beck told people to “run away” from churches that teach social justice. Arnold’s website suggests that he may have been taking some heat from fellow Southern Baptists for referencing Beck, a Mormon, in a Southern Baptist resolution. (As we’ve been reminded this week, many Baptists, like Trump’s adviser Robert Jeffress, do not consider Mormons Christians.) Arnold responds to his critics by saying that “being an unbeliever does not disqualify you from seeing any objective truth. He draws an analogy, saying it would be foolish for Christians to ignore a warning about a comet headed toward earth simply because it was discovered by atheist astrophysicist Neil Degrasse Tyson.
Here’s the full text of Arnold’s resolution, which he posted on his blog on May 2:
Against the Anti-Gospel of the Social Justice Movement
Submitted by messenger Grady Arnold
Whereas the social justice movement and worldview are being promoted worldwide, and is being presented using various labels such as eco-justice, economic justice, racial justice, and global justice to name a few, and
Whereas social justice by definition is based on anti-biblical and destructive concepts of Marxist ideology, and among other things is interested in redistributing wealth, opportunity, and privileges within society, and
Whereas social justice activism should be considered evil in that it is a vehicle to promote abortion, homosexuality, gender confusion, and a host of other ideas that are at antithetical to the gospel, the Christian worldview, and of God’s call to holiness (1 Peter 1:16), and
Whereas social justice is now being promoted and enforced by governments worldwide, with Canada being one example that as of 2011 developed Social Justice Tribunals, and is seeking to enforce Bill C-16, a bill passed in 2017 that in application sees it as a hate crime to use the wrong gender pronoun to describe an individual, and
Whereas social justice is deceptive, in that well-meaning Christians become unwittingly drawn into to such ideology under the false assumption that social justice equates to standing up for people’s rights and compassion, and
Whereas social justice is based on Marxism and Postmodernism, and should be opposed because of its antibiblical stance and worldview, but still Christians are attempting to blend social justice with Christianity, however they must realize that to accept social justice ideology is to invite liberal theology and liberation theology into our churches, schools, and institutions, and
Whereas authoritative voices have warned against such, for example on the May 2010 “Glenn Beck Program” when Jerry Falwell Jr., declared that social justice was “insidious,” and Glenn Beck warned of a “perversion of the gospel” and called on Christians to “run as fast as you can” away from churches who start teaching social justice because of the toxic nature of social justice, and
Whereas social justice is showing it’s true colors at George Washington University and other campuses in 2018 where they are holding classes and seminars seeking to combat “Christian Privilege,” and attacking Christianity for it’s prominence in society using the social justice ethic, wherein the seminar at GWU students are taught “American Christians receive things they don’t deserve and are not worthy of getting,” and
Whereas Southern Baptists ought to be further be warned by the example of the Methodist and Episcopal denominations that have already embraced the social justice movement, and instead of growing in number, these same denominations continue to lose membership at an alarmingly fast rate, and
Whereas we have a present crisis point in the Southern Baptist Convention, in that the same social justice has been recently defended and promoted by Russel Moore of the ERLC within the Southern Baptist Convention, with Dr. Moore writing multiple articles and hosting events promoting social justice, and
Whereas the social justice agenda in the Southern Baptist Convention has become pervasive in some seminaries and state conventions, even to the point that it is an apparently an unwritten rule not to speak against the social justice movement, or one’s job or position will be in jeopardy, and
Whereas we are repeatedly warned in Scripture concerning such error and being deceived, with Ephesians 5:6, Hebrews 13:9 and Colossians 2:8, and 1 Timothy 4:1 being just a few of these warnings, and
Whereas social justice and Christian ethics are clearly antithetical to each other in areas of tolerance, sexuality, gender, human life beginning at conception, and in general the role of a believer and the purpose for doing good works being to give glory to God, and
Whereas another place that social justice differs from the New Testament, is that social justice expresses compassion for certain groups they deem as “victims” while hating those with whom they disagree, rather than following the command of Christ to love everyone, and especially our enemies (Matt 5:44), and
Whereas social justice warriors routinely shut down speech that they disagree with, often with violence as part of their “social justice”, instead of “seeking to live at peace with all men” (Romans 12:18) and
Whereas social justice destroys people’s lives by having them to think of themselves as victims and take note of the most minor offenses and magnify them, and to note every disagreement or slight as a “micro aggression” and to complain rather than to obey scripture and to “count it all joy,” (James 1:2) and
Whereas true Christian theology builds people up to be resilient in the face of trials, but social justice seeks to stoke discontentment (1 Corinthians 10:10; Hebrews 13:5), and
Whereas our own denomination must reject social justice in it’s entirely, and
Whereas biblical doctrine and the Christian ethic must be chosen over social justice, then be it
RESOLVED, That the messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention, meeting in Dallas, Texas, June 12–13, 2018, decry and reject the terms and framework of social justice as insufficient to adequately reflect the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Christian worldview; and be it further
RESOLVED That the entries of the Southern Baptist Convention be encouraged to avoid the terms “social justice” and social justice warrior” when referring to Christian ethics or activism and that the Holy Scriptures be used as a guide without mimicking the verbiage of the antichristian social justice movement, and be it
RESOLVED That all SBC Colleges and Universities be encouraged to review their teaching programs with special attention given to Humanities Departments to ensure that Marxist based social justice is not being taught in our colleges, universities, and seminaries, and be it
RESOLVED, That we encourage churches in preaching, teaching, and in discipleship to address the issues of racial reconciliation, poverty, the environment, sexual and gender issues, immigration, and education from a Christian worldview and reject the ideological underpinnings and verbiage of the social justice movement.
