Pastor blames 'power-hungry men' after U.S. Baptist group ousts churches with female leaders

Rev. Linda Barnes Popham says she'll keep leading her Baptist church in Kentucky so long as her congregation stands behind her.

Popham is the pastor of Fern Creek Baptist Church in Louisville, one of two churches that have been expelled from the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) because they employ women as pastors.

"Stepping aside? Oh, I offered that for the church, but the church obviously said no," Popham told As It Happens host Nil Köksal. "They had to choose between the Southern Baptist Convention and me as their pastor. They clearly, in a vote, chose me unanimously."

The SBC is the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S., with 47,000 churches and 13.7 million members. 

It expelled five churches for having female pastors in February, including Fern Creek and Saddleback Church, a megachruch based in California. 

Fern Creek and Saddleback both appealed the decision. But on Wednesday, an overwhelming majority of members voted to uphold the expulsions at an annual meeting in New Orleans. 

The SBC did not respond to a request for comment from CBC. The denomination's press arm, the Baptist Press, reported that the expelled churches were found not to be in "friendly co-operation" with the convention, which believes that scripture reserves the role of pastor for men.

Popham was at the meeting, and she made her plea to her fellow worshippers there on Tuesday.

"We believe the Bible allows women to serve in ways in which all of you do not agree but we should still be able to partner together," she told the assembled crowd. 

But the members clearly didn't agree. According to the Baptist Press, 91.85 per cent of voters opted to uphold Fern Creek's expulsion, while 88.46 per cent voted to uphold Saddleback's expulsion. 

It came as something of a shock to Popham, who has been with Fern Creek for 40 years, and served as its official pastor since 1993. 

She says the convention deemed the church to be in "friendly co-operation" as recently as 2021.

"Whatever has happened in the last two years, I attribute to deeds done in darkness and power-hungry men, people who were trying to purify the Southern Baptist Convention to their standard of purity — which doesn't match biblical standards of purity," she said.

Saddleback Church, meanwhile, had been the SBC's second-largest congregation and, until recently, was widely touted as a success story amid larger Southern Baptist membership declines.