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"I had to learn a whole new set of heroes when I came south," says Ted Adams, but Jim Crow never became one of them. It is on this subject that Adams' views differ most deeply from the majority of his fellow Southern Baptists. The Wor'd Alliance is on record as saying: "Discrimination and segregation ... are ethically and morally indefensible and contrary to the Gospel of Christ." But Ted Adams knows that such ringing phrases from the leadership are largely ignored by the rank and file. Like many another Southern church leader, he is careful not to push the burdened Baptist conscience too hard. "I am perfectly aware that there are complex and emotion-packed problems which must be solved as the races are integrated. My responsibility is not to dispute the fact that there are such problems. My responsibility is to preach the kind of Gospel that will bring people to a solution."
The sun shines bright on Southern Baptism. It is making the tough transition from hot-hearted particularity to large-scale stewardship, and still not losing the essence of primitive Christianity. But the transition is far from over.
Says Lawyer Justin Moore, the man who found Preacher Adams for Richmond: "Ted Adams is probably regarded by a vast majority of Southern Baptists of every political persuasion as the finest Baptist preacher in the world. But the fact remains that he could never be elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention."
* Over the centuries, many groups upheld this view (as against infant baptism, which became generally accepted in Christendom), among them the 3rd century Donatists, some of the 12th century Petrobrusians and Waldensians, the 15th century Bohemian Brethren. It was not until the Reformation that the issue really became heated, with the rise in the 16th century of the Anabaptists (literally, Re-Baptizers), a collection of sects that all opposed the baptism of infants, but that also opposed, variously, oaths, military service and the holding of public office. The sects were ruthlessly put down, but some (the Mennonites and Hutterites) regained strength in the 17th century and after. * Some of the U.S.'s better-known Baptists: Harry S. Truman, John D. Rockefeller Jr., Harold Stassen, Billy Graham, Estes Kefauver. * For its adherents' frequent reference to "the old landmarks."