By RAY WADDLE
       
An observer of the religious scene once described Southern Baptists as the “hyper-Americans.” If Americans are considered patriotic, Baptists are super patriotic. If Americans read the Bible, Baptists really read it.
      
Generalizations are dangerous. There’s no one kind of Southern Baptist, but many -- back-road saints, Nashville professionals, sweet-souled tithers, anti-tax ideologues, big-steeple autocrats, fair-minded conservatives, social gospel organizers, closet segregationists, rock-n-rollers, evangelists, Texans … and ex-Baptists. If Americans are diverse, Baptists are hyper-diverse.
      
Left-of-center Baptists (led by former U.S. presidents Carter and Clinton) recently announced intentions to create an alliance of North American Baptists to rival the Nashville-centered Southern Baptist Convention – not a new denomination but an ideological, spiritual alternative. They want to rescue the word “Baptist” from negative connotations they blame on conservatives, who’ve controlled the SBC for two decades. The new group’s goal is to promote social justice, help the hungry and homeless, welcome strangers, promote religious liberty and respect diversity.
      
Scrimmages over “Baptist” really mirror a larger, contemporary clash over the meaning and destiny of another word – “religion.” Political and spiritual trends have complicated and splintered the definition of religion, and these trends have infiltrated SBC life for a generation. What does it mean to be religious?
      
The liberal side provides its answer, majoring in good deeds and hospitable theology. They’re less preoccupied with doctrinal purity, which they consider a false god, an arrogant weapon for keeping people fearful. They seek a Jesus who’s welcoming, not scary.
      
The conservative side gives its answer. They saw trouble brewing after the 1950s – feminism, abortion rights, gay rights, fuzzy multiculturalism, all birthed by liberalism. These had theological consequences – a drift away from scripture, evangelism and Christ’s divinity, also the decline of traditional public decency. Conservative social analysis triggered an anti-liberal surge in national political life. It transformed the Republican Party – and the SBC too. Conservatives emerged as brokers of assertive Christian truth, in politics and at church.
      
While Baptists debate what Baptist means, one revolutionary Baptist goes overlooked, Mount Juliet’s Will Campbell. Virtually alone among white Baptists, Campbell turned publicly against racial hatred in the 1950s. Ever since, this author/minister/farmer/dissident/native Mississippian has lambasted unexamined prejudice and sanctimonious pretense.

As he might say, he gave up the church to go into the ministry. His eight-word definition of Christianity  -- “We’re all bastards but God loves us anyway” -- means Campbell has befriended racist Kluxers as well as victims of racist or class hatred. He makes both left and right squeamish. Yet his instincts are deeply Baptist – allegiance to Bible and discipleship, upholding Jesus’ difficult ideal of love of enemy.
           
Campbell, now past 80, is a shadow figure in Baptist life and its conscience -- well known, and evaded. Baptists who would polish their public image should inject this prophet into the mix and startle the world with new dreams of Christian discipleship. If they dare.