as posted on wbir.com
Can anyone explain to me please, the difference between "moderate" and "southern" baptists? Thank you.
Some history to put this into context. At one point, there was some divison over slavery in the 1800's.
This current schism that eventually developed is often traced to 1979. Billy Graham was slated to the keynote speaker at the annual convention in Houston. The key players were Paul Pressler, a former judge and Baptist layman and Paige Patterson, president of Criswell Center for Biblical Studies. They held a series of meetings with other Baptists around the country before the convention. When it was all said and done, they were simply better organized and more in tune than the other Baptists who could be classified as moderates or liberals. They were able to rally a number of Baptist to attend the convention and then voted on a new board and president. Their basic argument was that the SBC was becoming too liberal politically and were discrediting the Bible by claiming it didn't mean what it said. They took offense to the notion, whether real or perceived that various pastors and laymen were interpreting the Bible to mean "anything goes" whenever it suited the situation.
Which brings us to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship founded in 1991 in response to the new direction of the SBC. The CBF contends that the SBC has become too focused on following a creed or particular clergy rather than allowing each individual to come to terms what their relationship to God, fellow believers and non-believers shall be. The CBF argues that a pastor, deacons and ministers are servants of God and are there to fullfill God's mission to their people rather than merely telling or browbeating the congregation to believe what they believe or else.
Southern and moderate Baptists believe in the Bible as the word of God and accept it in guidance of their daily lives. The differences lie in their intepretation of the role of the leadership and congregation and approach to be taken in winning people over to Christ.