Churches Being Renamed to Escape "Baptist" Stigma

The Washington Post has an interesting column about the growing trend of some churches - within the Southern Baptisit Convention ("SBC") in particular - changing their names so as to avoid all the negative connotations that go with the "Baptist" brand: ultra conservative, gay-hating, intolerant, anti-immigrant/latino, etc. Other than the Roman Catholic Church (which isn't racist - see I said one good thing about it), no denomination in the nation seems as Hell bent to go back in time and ignore changes in the world and the advances in medical and mental health knowledge. The increasingly toxic message put out by Richard Land and other prominant Christianists in the SBC leadership is taking a toll on the denomination and those mistakenly deemed to be affiliated with it. It seems a reputation for bigotry and hatred towards others does have a price. Here are some story highlights:

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The Rev. Todd Thomason looked out at the nearly empty pews of his congregation at Baptist Temple Church last Sunday. . . . "We're probably the most progressive church in the city, but 'Baptist Temple' sounds weird, like it's charismatic and conservative," Thomason said. He worried that the word "Baptist" had become indelibly tied to the political religious right.

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Recent national surveys show that in an attempt to fill pews, a small but steadily growing number of Christian churches are changing their names and even their religious denominations. Wycoff Baptist in New Jersey became Cornerstone Christian Church. First Baptist in Concord, N.H., is now Centerpoint Church. The Reformed Church in America outside Detroit became Crosswinds Community Church. Even the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant group in the country, whose 16 million membership has declined in recent years, has hosted church-naming seminars asking the question, "To Baptist or Not to Baptist?" The convention meets this week to consider a 10-year program designed to stem the membership loss.

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"The word Baptist is such a turnoff," said David Roozen, director of the Hartford Institute for Religion Research in Connecticut, who has documented the name-changing trend. "There is a kind of national skepticism about evangelical Christianity because of the religious right and the connection to the Bush administration. You say 'Baptist' and people almost automatically think conservative."

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The Rev. Stephen Welch, executive director of Northstar Church Network, an association of Baptist churches in Northern Virginia, said few new churches have "Baptist" in their names. "I don't think it's a matter of being ashamed, but wanting to position the church where there's less confusion about who you are and who is welcome."

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But in recent years, the world has come to equate all Baptists with only the denomination's most conservative branch. "When you have to spend your time in explain-and-defend mode, saying, 'I'm not one of those Baptists,' it gets in the way of explaining who you are," said Pat Eddington, a Baptist Temple member who's been pushing for the name change.