International baptist perspectives on human rights

Baptist History and Heritage, Spring, 2008 by Charles W. Deweese

In 1911, during his address as BWA president, John Clifford of England described the work of the Alliance: "We have not only to contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints, and forming the old gospel and for the pure gospel, stripped free of the accretions of the ages; but if we are to be true to the earliest Christianity of all, and to the spirit and work of the creators of our Modern Baptist denomination, we must also advocate and work for the Social Gospel." (10) Continuing, Clifford wrote specifically about justice for the poor: "Poverty must be dealt with in its causes. Charity must not be accepted as a substitute for Justice.... Social misery must be extinguished; unjust laws must be repealed." (11)

Also during the 1911 Congress, Shailer Mathews, dean of the Divinity School of the University of Chicago, presented an address titled "The Sufficiency of the Gospel for the Salvation of Society" in which he pointed to "the capacity of the gospel to stir in human hearts a hatred of all injustice and to nerve them to combat every institution that countenances injustice. Whatever else the eschatological message of Christianity may involve, it never blinks the issue of the conflict between forces of oppression and forces of righteousness." (12) Proceedings for the 1911 Congress further included the paper "The Church and Social Crises," by Walter Rauschenbusch, professor at Rochester Theological Seminary and leader of the Social Gospel Movement. (13)

Human Rights Emphases in 1923-1950

Six Baptist World Congresses were held between 1923 and 1950. These were challenging years for Baptists worldwide, running from the end of World War I, extending through the Great Depression and World War II, and ending with the breakout of the Korean War. No Baptist World Congress had been held since 1911 because of World War I. The six Congresses during these years met successively in Stockholm in 1923, Toronto in 1928, Berlin in 1934, Atlanta in 1939, Copenhagen in 1947, and Cleveland in 1950. Published proceedings for these meetings focused on such themes as religious liberty, genocide, industrialism, militarism, nationalism, racism, totalitarianism, Communism, and Fascism.

Baptists viewed militarism, nationalism, and totalitarianism as special threats to human rights and religious liberty. The 1923 Congress adopted a resolution opposing religious persecution in Rumania and expressing hopes that "the Rumanian government will show itself seriously resolved to secure real religious freedom." (14) That same Congress also adopted a statement of Baptist principles that included the claim that "Religious liberty, in its broadest significance, implies the following ...: no human authority of any kind, in society at large, in church or state, has any right to repress or hinder or thwart any man or group of men in the exercise of religious belief or worship." (15)

The 1928 Congress heard two addresses on militarism. Henry Alfred Porter, pastor of the Third Baptist Church in St. Louis, asserted that "the chief business of man has been war," noted that Christianity had sometimes become militarized, and shared the results of a League of Nations study showing that World War I had cost $362 billion and 37 million lives. Porter then issued a challenge to Baptists: "Now is the time and we are the people to work for peace.... Is it not up to this world-embracing Baptist Alliance to make the promotion of universal brotherhood and international peace the foremost duty of the hour." (16)