The annual Alabama Baptist State Convention, still convened in Marion, makes certain, prior to dismissing, to reaffirm the Confederacy as God’s chosen nation. Having already claimed the Christian high ground, at the previous year’s annual meeting, in defending southern rights (i.e, white supremacy and African slavery), delegates in this session address more directly the righteousness of the Southern cause:
All the interest connected with this Convention being to a greater or less extent affected by the present unhappy condition of our country, we feel obliged as lovers of our God and of our country, to acknowledge the stress in which we now find ourselves, but above all, we do recognize the hand of God in leading us into our present condition. And on this account we do not feel the slightest disposition to depart from the position assumed by this Body at its last annual session; on the contrary, and in full view of the perilous circumstances which now surround us, we do now in humble dependence on that God in whom we have ever trusted, solemnly declare it to be our purpose to solemnly maintain that position until the light break through the darkness which now envelopes us.
We wish also, to express our gratitude to God for having given us a chief magistrate, who has, in all his official acts and proclamations, recognized the dependence we all feel on the Almighty Ruler of the Universe for success in the present struggle, as for every blessing we enjoy. And we trust our whole people will strictly observe the days appointed by civil authority for fasting and prayer, and that they will humbly approach the throne of grace, to confess their sins before God, and to supplicate blessings upon our country and our rulers, our people and our armies, and all those interests which are dearer to us than life itself: and that the Prince of Peace may gain new victories, even though we pass through scenes, in which the confused noise of warriors and garments rolled in blood, form a permanent part.
Far have these Baptists come from the days that their faith ancestors, during the founding of the new American nation, demanded that church and state be kept strictly separate. Yet for the sake of the “blessings” and “interests” (both referring to a society of white supremacy under girded by African slavery) that white Alabama Baptists – and white Southern Baptists at large – have come to identity with as God’s will for the world, they willingly forsake their own faith heritage in pursuit of a doomed effort to establish God’s reign on earth.
Source: Alabama Baptist State Convention Minutes, 1861 (link)
