Chic Fil A alma mater cows to Super Trumpers, disinvites Bush Eulogist Jon Meacham

   Dan Cathy, the CEO of Chic Fil a is a 1975 graduate of Samford University where I think his brother, Bubba, followed the next year. Dan was in my religion class at Furman before he matriculated.

    His Father Truett, named for the greatest Baptist of the first half of the 20th Century, George W. Truett of Hayesville, NC and Baylor, was a Trustee of Mercer College in the 1980s and stood by President Kirby Godsey when he was under a merciless assault by fundamentalists.

    In March of 93 I attended an Inquisition of Samford President Tom Corts at FBC Bham, orchestrated by the Bircher Albert Lee Smith. Corts told about a thousand preachers from across the state right after the big snow storm that year, "There is no virtue in sustained denunciation."

     But with the arrival of Trump and super Trumper Baptists they claim a feather in their cap with the removal of Jon Meacham, the noted Vanderbilt historian and eulogist for Bush 41 and wife Barbara.

     Baptist News Global has a thorough report up this morning. Read it closely. Former Samford SGA President Todd Heifner, SU 91, has a testimonial up this morning at his facebook site. He didn't mince words.

     Angel Ballenger Sandlin and Emily Kirby appear to be two key people ginning up a petition to disinvite Meacham who speaks with wisdom on the soul of America. These air headed close minded fundamentalist Super Trumpers are about as intellectually curious as Tim Tebow's Eagle Forum Momma Pam.

   See Jill Lepore book These Truths for Eagle Forum in political context.

    Samford, meanwhile has embraced the super Trumper Eric Metaxas, a friend of FBC Spartanburg and Trey Gowdy's Truth for a New Generation conferences. Steve Harmon of nearby Gardner Webb Div School and his friend at Duke Curtis Freeman have the goods on Metaxas and have said so, as does Charles Marsh of the University of Virginia.

    For Samford to cow to these fundies and Chic Fil A be struck mute is very disturbing. And in the hometown of Martin Luther King Jr, and Hugo Black, Emmy Lou Harris, a school that helped shaped Wayne Flynt , a great friend of Harper Lee, and the songwriter Kate Campbell.

     Check the facebook site of Ms Sandlin. If she isnt a Q anon symp, who is. And Rick Burgess and Bubba, and the frat boys at Bama and Auburn who love the chant Lets Go Brandon.........

    Shout out to Ms Sandlin and Miss Kirby of Vestavia, the story on the politics of abortion is old and chocked full of Mendacity. Googly Stansell, Holy War, New Republic. Apparently somewhere in Covington Ga and Vestavia Hills Bammer, a preacher didn't learn that mendacity is not a Christian Virtue.

Good preaching on Shannon Ga and Textile League Baseball

   I went to Furman on a ministerial scholarship, I think the Brooks Scholarship. Paid about a third to a half of my total costs for four years. I was honest with them that at the time Church Related Vocation was a strong possibility but I was uncertain.

     It never panned out for me in a conventional sense but for many years I have been a student of good preaching. This fall as my 50th High school homecoming is three days away I have been thinking a lot about a Homecoming sermon delivered at Duke in 1967 I have in Willimon's collection of the Best sermons at Duke Chapel over 60 years. The 67 sermon invokes Thomas Wolfe haunting thoughts on October, and has a touching paragraph on a Duke Student who says he wasnt awkward at all having his Dad visit campus. He said I enjoy my father's company.

    All this on the edge of genuine sappy with the soundtrack of John Prine's late song you can find on Utube Summer's End, playing in my head for about three weeks now

    This last Sunday at the Heritage Baptist Church in Cartersville Ga, my friend Lamar Wadsworth preached a sermon, a guest in the pulpit where he is a member, that ranks among the best I have ever heard from the likes of Marney, the great Episcopalian women Fleming Rutledge and Barbara Brown Taylor, Rachel Held Evans, Frank Harrington of Peachtree Prez in Atlanta, and the Memorial eulogy of my friend Furman Chaplain Jim Pitts two weeks ago by his great friend Grady Butler.

      Lamar's masterpiece tells the story of Rudy York and his brothers of Shannon Ga and Model High School. Shannon about ten miles out toward Calhoun from Rome Ga was where my Dad's sister Virginia was valedictorian of Model High School in 1938 or so. My Dad was always talking about the great baseball players from there. Charlie Culberson of the Atlanta Braves and now Dallas Rangers, his grandfather Leon was from there and both Leon and Rudy York of the little village of Shannon were on the 46 Bosox Squad in the Series with Cards with Ted Williams and Joe Dimaggio's brother Dom on the roster.

    I didnt put anything close to the full story together till the last three years with a big chunk coming about 15 years ago with the publication of David Halberstam's Book the Teammates about the Bosox of that era.

    But what Lamar does masterfully and humbly with the York Brothers and the woman who wrote Footsteps of Jesus is beautiful preaching and storytelling behind the sacred Desk. You can check the Website of the Church or his facebook.

    And for me it is telling that among his congregation is Randy Branch, the brother of Taylor Branch,  the Pulitzer Prize winning author of the Civil Rights Era .

    Some of us are talking about a collection of Baptist sermons from preachers of high and low estate of the era of the mid to late 20th Century. I have two stories ready to go and you can rest assured Lamar's great effort will shine through our collection. You'll want a copy if we put it together.

Jim Pitts caught the Morning Train, a Modest Proposal for his Legacy and Baptist Identity at Furman

     I was on campus at 3pm October 3 for the Memorial service of Furman chaplain Jim Pitts. I think the math was Pitts was a force, an influencer of varying degrees and capacities formally and informally for all but eight years since he set foot on the downtown campus the fall of 1956 till he caught the Morning Train January of this year.

    He was honored in Grand Style Sunday with a good 170 folks in attendance. As I told his former assistant Chaplain Vic Greene, not quite Tunky Riley's numbers but numbers to his satisfaction we have to believe. A Grand program with several presenters of the best of Furman's historic Baptist tradition, and the music was exquisite High Church Tradition. Richard himself would be proud.

     There is a book out on Pitts. Helen Lee Turner and Sam Britt make the offering I want to focus on. They touch on a theme dear to Pitts heart since the official break with SC Baptists in 1992, one Which Pitts affirmed as did a weeping Richard Furman the V saw as necessary.

   So get up to speed with a read of their effort in the Smyth and Helwys Walk With Me, and for any of you with which this proposal may resonate, Jeff Rogers lecture in the collection What Really Matters on Furman and Baptist Identity.

    I think Furman should immediately pursue a course in Baptist History and Influence in America, to be taught every three years so every generation forthcoming will know something deeper of the riches of the best of the Baptist vision and tradition in America, and especially the South; and how it shaped Furman for its first 150 years.

    I dont think Furman should ever be like it was when I was there, 50 percent South Carolina Baptists. Cause its a different kind of Baptists for one and the state didnt go trump without a lot of Babdissed votes. But a third New Jersey secularists is a little bit of a seesaw in the other direction. Nor should it be a mid range safety net for Atlanta and Hoover or Mtn Brk or Franklin Tn Preppies. I know some of those people and many of them make a contribution, like Jon Meacham for instance. But a lot are just gamers, real estate agents and gentrifiers in transition where they can drink a little and Momma is satisfied they are relatively safe.

   Of course Furman is producing its share of outstanding grads of virtue and the Furman magazine finds and spotlights every one of them four times a year. But the salt is lacking and folks like Helen Lee and Sam think at the cost of Furman Identity.

    So every three years go deep with Baptists history and thought and influence. Bring Randall Balmer and Bill Leonard and and Mark Noll, Nathan Hatch, Anthea Butler to campus. Coordinate with Olli to make their lectures and conversations open to Furman's aging population. Have a syllabus that spotlights with participation from the Religion, History and Political science department the work of Stewart A Newman, a Mentor to Pitts and James Dunn and a friend of LD Johnson. Spotlight the legacy of Marshall Frady as the son of a Baptist minister and great friend of Jesse Jackson. Talk about Pitts grand friendship with Grady Butler who was in Jail with ML King in Atlanta in 1960 when JFK called and as Butler said Sunday, King reported to his eleven jail mates the Cause had taken on "new significance"

    Make sure every student that wants to know, even the ones from New Jersey and a few scalawags from Hoover, know about Will D Campbell and why he has a plaza now in his honor at Ole Miss where Arch Manning will establish a new dynasty with Lane Kiffin to a frowning Nick Saban in about three years.

    Balmer's has written a book about the religious political pilgrimage of Jimmy Carter, the man who with Martin England and Jim Pitts had lunch in Charleston in 74 for Baptist layman of the year presentation. And Balmer latest book Bad Faith has a lot of print about abortion and race politics and Bob Jones. If nothing else bring Balmer to town so Jane Robelot will have somebody new to talk to beside her lifelong friend, Trey Gowdy. Will hopefully widen her perspective a little.

    Carlyle Marney and why in 1956 Stewart Newman stood up against Strom Thurmond in 1956 in Columbia SC and said: WA Criswell doesnt speak for me.

     Furman has had in the classroom just since I was there the CEO of Chic Fil A, the nephew of Lester Maddox, the daughter of Nixon's strategist and Lee Atwater.

   It would be a Helluva a course. I should be invited for at least one day to talk about how it all played out in Gaffney, if not to present at least a free lunch in the dining hall for the after effect conversation.

    It is my understand President Davis was a GA Queen Regent coming of Age in New Orleans. Let her come to class to testify for a day to the coeds from New Jersey just What it Means. Furman still has it's Baptist Story to Tell to the Nations. So as Pitts tributes makes clear, would be a gross failure of Furman even thirty years after the SC SBC break to leave that to chance. Let's codify, even offer the first course next fall.

    As Butler said Sunday: "Jim Pitts caught the morning train." Furman is much less than if it lets that be the final word and strays Further from the best of a grand history.

   Here is the link to the poem:  https://genius.com/Precious-bryant-morning-train-lyrics