For the first time in more than 160 years, Baptists in North America will have a major convocation next month and differences of race, politics, or legalistic interpretations of the Scriptures will not threaten their unity, said former President Jimmy Carter earlier this week.
Some 20,000 Baptists are expected to join a historic effort, called the New Baptist Covenant, aimed at dispelling an image of division among Baptist groups and in hopes of emerging with a new Baptist voice. The meeting is scheduled for January 30-February 1 in Atlanta.
"One of the basic premises will be that the doors will be open to all Baptists who choose to share this long-awaited experience," said Carter, who spearheaded the initiative, in a statement this week in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Leaders from more than 30 Baptist organisations will be gathering under the theme "Unity in Christ" but notably absent from the convocation will be leaders from the largest Baptist group in America - the Southern Baptist Convention.
Conservative Southern Baptist leaders have been critical of the list of speakers lined up for the New Baptist Covenant celebration. Along with Carter, former president Bill Clinton, Nobel Peace Prize winner and former vice president Al Gore, US Senators Lindsey Graham and Charles Grassley, and Children's Defense Fund founder Marian Wright Edelman are among those scheduled to speak at the meeting.
Southern Baptist Convention president Frank Page said he would not take part in a "smokescreen leftwing liberal agenda" and others have alleged there are political overtones, considering the line-up of speakers and the timing of the event - which takes place during the US presidential election year.
Rising Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee withdrew his participation from the convocation in May and commented last week that being president would be "a heck of a lot easier job than getting all the Baptists to agree on everything".
At the time of his decision to withdraw from the meeting, he said it would be best for him not to participate and to "not appear to be giving approval to what could be a political, rather than spiritual agenda", he told Florida Baptist Witness.
