June 7, 2018
Nancy Hastings Sehested is speaking out as Southern Baptist women rise up against the oppression inflicted on them since 1987.
In her open letter to ousted seminary president Paige Patterson, posted on June 1 on the Baptist News Global website, she writes:
“We now have something in common. We were both ousted. Mine happened so long ago that you may not remember me. It was 30 years ago. I was among the first casualties of the war against women in pastoral positions in the Southern Baptist Convention.”
Nancy has been a friend of CFT for a long time. She preached at our 2006 conference in Charlotte, North Carolina. See Reta Halteman Finger’s review of her husband Ken’s book, In the Land of the Living: Prayers Personal and Public, here on the CFT website.
There’s great new hashtag material in Sehested’s letter.
#InterpretationMatters Sehested writes that misuse of the Bible led the SBC to the “subjugation of women, a belief that leads to the tragic consequences of the abuse of power by men. Interpretation matters.”
#BattlefortheBible She calls this famous battle launched in 1977 “a war in which the Bible never asked to be a weapon.”
#AncientSin She calls out the “ancient sin of patriarchy.”
#JOM She invites Paige and others to “the joy of mutuality.”
#SOSAM She names “the sin of sexism and misogyny.” As we know from feminist history, having a name for something—like sexual harassment—is half the battle.
#Repent She challenges Paige “to invite the whole convention to repentance” during the upcoming Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting, June 12–13, 2018, in Dallas.
Read “An open letter to Paige Patterson” on the Baptist News Global website.
