Southern Baptist Convention Votes to Condemn Abortion Pills

On Tuesday, America’s largest Protestant denomination (numbering 12.7 million members in 2024) reaffirmed its adherence to biblically informed positions on abortion, marriage, religious liberty, pornography, and predatory gambling. In a series of resolutions, the 2025 Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) approved “a slate of resolutions that were both clearly worded and incredibly timely,” said David Closson, director of FRC’s Center for Biblical Worldview, who attended the convention as a messenger on behalf of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, D.C.

Closson was encouraged by the widespread unity among the convention’s 10,000-odd messengers on a resolution “On Restoring Moral Clarity through God’s Design for Gender, Marriage, and the Family.” The resolution extolled God’s design for marriage as a one-man, one-woman union and called for the overturn of the Supreme Court’s 2015 Obergefell decision and an end to legal recognition of same-sex marriage.

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“Although this is a divisive issue in the broader culture, the resolution received what appeared to be unanimous support from the thousands of messengers present,” Closson told The Washington Stand. The mainstream media also noted this unity, with CBS News recording that “there was no debate on the marriage resolution.”

As usual, reporters from mainstream media outlets roamed the convention like photographers on a jungle safari — thrilled by the exoticism, if not always fully comprehending what they see.

“Of course, the outside media is shocked that the Southern Baptist Convention would call for the overturning of Obergefell,” said Dr. Andrew Walker, a professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary who chaired the Resolutions Committee. “But this is not a controversial issue. … It’s an issue of consensus. It’s an issue of conviction. … This is because we are a convention, thankfully, that is firmly planted on Scripture as the authoritative word of God.”

In USA Today, one observer wrote that “the predominant group of evangelical Christians continues to move sharply to the right.”

But the SBC did no such thing. Aside from the inaccuracy of reducing theological ethics to a two-dimensional political spectrum, the SBC did not move at all. The SBC simply re-confirmed the same position on sexual ethics that faithful Christians have held for centuries.

“I’m encouraged by this because the Southern Baptists have had some difficulty in the last few years, and this would suggest to me that maybe they have rediscovered their prophetic voice. And when I say that, that means declaring the word of God, regardless of what the culture says,” said Family Research Council President Tony Perkins.

Admittedly, the SBC — considered strictly as institution — has wavered and erred. For instance, its participating churches once endorsed slavery, a stance the SBC repudiated and apologized for in 1995. In the mid-1900s, theological liberalism seeped into participating churches, which threatened to undermine the convention’s positions on key gospel truths. In cases such as these, the SBC followed American culture rather than the word of God, failing to speak with moral clarity to a culture headed in the wrong direction.

But the turning point for the SBC came at the 1985 convention — which, the Associated Press noted, was also held in Dallas, exactly 40 years ago. There, a record-shattering number of church messengers resoundingly defeated the convention’s theological drift and reaffirmed the authority of God’s word. This bold stance helped the SBC evade the steady decline of the once-dominant mainline denominations, which have allowed far more liberal theology into their ranks.

The point is, the SBC’s theological revival was no mere “conservative coup,” or “hard right-turn,” or any other political metaphor. The SBC simply committed itself to what the Bible says and to what Christians have believed for nearly 2,000 years, and they have stuck to that commitment ever since — far longer than the current cultural quicksand.

Rep. Mark Harris (R-N.C.) praised SBC President Clint Pressley’s message to the convention, “challenging the people to hold fast to their convictions,” he said on “Washington Watch.”

“That’s one of the things that that Southern Baptists sort of staked out years ago … in the Baptist Faith and Message 2000: that we, as a convention, believe that the Bible is inerrant, infallible word of God,” said Harris. “If you stick with that as your foundation, then you’re going to be in a much stronger position than trying to figure out everything on your own.”

Because of this common biblical foundation, SBC messengers overwhelmingly agree on hot-button ethical issues in our culture. For instance, the practically unanimous adoption of a resolution reaffirming biblical marriage, including opposition to same-sex marriage, presents a sharp contrast to the culture, with 64% of Americans viewing same-sex relations as morally acceptable, according to a Gallup poll conducted in May.

This biblical foundation for ethics also enables the SBC to speak with a more-or-less united voice on emerging issues, such as chemical abortion. For the first time this year, the SBC adopted a resolution focused specifically on the evils of chemical abortion, which Closson authored and advocated for.

“This is another one of these areas where I think Southern Baptists are remarkably united. There is no floor debate on this type of question when it’s put before the convention,” said Walker on “Washington Watch.” “The types of debates that Southern Baptists are having are, I think, marginal debates on the edges of things. We’re not having these debates about fundamental creation order issues.”

“The tragic reality is that abortions have actually increased since Roe v. Wade was overturned, largely due to the rise of chemical abortion. It is estimated that 63% of all abortions are now carried out through the two-pill chemical abortion regimen first approved in 2000 during the waning months of the Clinton administration,” Closson said. “As the FDA and policymakers review the approval of chemical abortion drugs, Southern Baptists have sent a powerful message: the nation’s largest Protestant denomination wants to immediately revoke the approval of mifepristone and urges Congress and state legislatures to pass laws banning the manufacture, sale, and distribution of chemical abortion drugs.”

“In some of the conversations I’ve been having with reporters,” related Walker, “they’ve been asking me, do we feel like this is an imposition on secular society? … And I have tried to reiterate to these journalists that there are areas where I think we can have some reasonable disagreements,” but “we really can’t have room for debate on these fundamental issues like: What is a man? What is a woman? What is marriage? What is family?”

“Christians believe that obviously the Bible is authoritative, but that biblical moral claims are not moral claims relevant just to Christians,” he continued. “They are moral claims relevant to the entire world. And these are moral claims that we believe are grounded in truth. They’re grounded in human flourishing, and they’re ultimately grounded in the common good.”

With American culture drifting ever further from the moral anchor of God’s word, Christians must constantly exert themselves to swim against the current. Sometimes that makes them a target. Sometimes that requires them to navigate new challenges. But always they can have confidence that they are firmly planted on the truth, even as they speak with moral clarity into a culture adrift.

LifeNews Note: Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand, contributing both news and commentary from a biblical worldview. Originally published by The Washington Stand.

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