SBC reassert opposition to LGBTQ+ rights, seek repeal of historic same-sex marriage ruling
DALLAS − The Southern Baptist Convention passed a resolution supporting a concerted effort to reverse Obergefell v. Hodges as the historic U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage approaches its 10-year anniversary.
The June 10 vote by the nation's largest Protestant denomination at its annual legislative assembly in Dallas is another step in the evangelical Christian group's focus on opposing LGBTQ+ rights. That intensified focus is a shift from abortion, which was long the fixation of SBC resolutions prior to the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
The 2022 overturning of Roe emboldened many within the Nashville-based SBC to then hope for the same with the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage.
Resolutions are non-binding statements expressing the convention's views on social and cultural issues. Other resolutions at past SBC annual meetings have reasserted Southern Baptist opposition to LGBTQ+ rights, though this year's resolution was the most forceful articulation of their rebuke of the Supreme Court precedent protecting same-sex marriage.
'Legal rulings like Obergefell v. Hodges and policies that deny the biological reality of male and female are legal fictions, undermine the truth of God's design, and lead to social confusion and injustice,' the resolution said.
Southern Baptist delegates, called messengers, overwhelmingly approved the measure.
Whether the latest vote will move the needle on gay marriage remains to be seen. Last year, the SBC passed a resolution condemning the use of in-vitro fertilization, only to see President Donald Trump sign an executive order earlier this year seeking to protect IVF access and reduce its out-of-pocket and health plan costs.
Reversing the Obergefell ruling is one of numerous issues related to sex, gender and marriage encompassed by the resolution. Among other things, the resolution affirms that there are only two genders, defines marriage as between a man and a woman, says families are designed for procreation and that human life is sacred 'from conception to natural death.'
A strongly traditionalist voice in the SBC, Denny Burk, proposed the language in the resolution that messengers ultimately approved. Burk is the president of Louisville-based Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, an advocacy group that was behind two well-known, cross-evangelical statements opposing LGBTQ+ rights. The first statement was the Danvers Statement in 1987 and the second was the Nashville Statement in 2017.
'It is sinful to approve of homosexual immorality or transgenderism and that such approval constitutes an essential departure from Christian faithfulness and witness,' the Nashville Statement said, which stirred widespread local controversy upon ratification. 'Approval of homosexual immorality or transgenderism is a matter of moral indifference about which otherwise faithful Christians should agree to disagree.'
The new resolution approved by the SBC is another iteration of the Nashville Statement, but more forcefully attacks the U.S. jurisprudence protecting the LGBTQ+ rights that evangelicals oppose.
Liam Adams covers religion for The Tennessean, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at ladams@tennessean.com or on social media @liamsadams.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Southern Baptists call for repeal of historic same-sex marriage ruling
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