Paige Patterson, a leader of the so-called “conservative resurgence,” more accurately the ‘fundamentalist takeover,” is feeling some heat just now for turning a blind eye to sexual and physical abuse of women.
Controversial comments about women, abuse and divorce made by a highly respected leader in the Southern Baptist Convention have put many of its leaders in a deeply uncomfortable position as some scramble to respond under pressure from Southern Baptists and other evangelicals.
An audio recording recently surfaced on which Southern Baptist leader Paige Patterson says that abused women should focus on praying and “be submissive in every way that you can” and not seek divorce.
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In the 2000 recording, Patterson tells the story of a woman who came to him about abuse, and how he counseled her to pray for God to intervene. The woman, he said, came to him later with two black eyes. “She said: ‘I hope you’re happy.’ And I said ‘Yes … I’m very happy,’ ” because her husband had heard her prayers and come to church for the first time the next day.
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Patterson’s critics list a pattern of behavior that goes back decades.
Patterson has been accused of being part of a coverup in a pending lawsuit that alleges another Southern Baptist leader, Paul Pressler, sexually abused a young man …
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In the late 1980s, when he was president of a Bible college, Patterson helped to promote preacher Darrell Gilyard even after several women confronted Patterson with charges against Gilyard of sexual abuse and misconduct, according to a 1991 Dallas Morning News report. Patterson said at the time the women lacked evidence and witnesses. Gilyard went on to serve in several churches and was arrested in Florida in 2008 for sending lewd messages to underage girls.
Paige Patterson is an exemplar for the authoritarian ignorance and subterranean malice that keeps so many educated, decent-minded adults out of church; he deserves every bit of the odium and contempt now raining down on him.
But I’m having a difficult time feeling much sympathy for those people who are shocked by the realization that Southern Baptists don’t actually believe in marriage, that they think marriage is simply a vehicle for licit sexual intercourse in order to procreate and grow the club — and the happiness and well-being of the married parties has nothing to do with anything; you’ll get your happiness in the next life, provided that you submit and obey-obey-obey.
Southern Baptists affirmatively condemn the mutual loyalty and shared ambitions that make a relationship a marriage; those are presumptions upon the absolutely sovereignty of Our Invisible Friend, who alone is worthy of your loyalty and who will tell you what are your ambitions. If the Invisible Wizard put you in an abusive marriage, well, that’s just the working-out of His Mysterious Plan.
It’s all degrading nonsense that serves only the power of the clergy, of course, and I marvel that anybody, anywhere, ever, falls for it, and it makes me happy to know the SBC is finally getting some pushback.