Northern Baptists by the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, have in previous weeks and months enthusiastically embraced U.S. President Abraham Lincoln‘s plan to emancipate African slaves. Today, the President delivers his annual State of the Union address, in which he offers a few references to God’s blessings and speaks extensively to the…
The Alabama State Baptist Convention meets this month in Selma, “a beautiful city on the bluffs of the Alabama river.” During the conference “the principle subject, of course, was the moral culture of our soldiers,” as one participant, identified only as “N. P. Y.”, reports afterward. The same observer offers an account of the main…
White Southern Baptists continue debating what the Confederate States of America has done wrong to invoke chastisement — in the form of a drawn-out war and the hardships associated thereof — from God. The slave-based Confederacy acknowledges itself as a Christian nation: the national motto is “Deo Vindice” (Under God, Our Vindicator), while the constitution…