The Golden Spur and the Halcyon Days of Baptist Life Dot Com

  Baptistlife dot com was my world pretty much the first decade of the 21st Century. It is still in operation and for a good 15 years was very active mostly back and forth on minutiae of the fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention. I had many names there self imposed from the Informed Gadfly to Marco but ended up by decrees of administrator William Thornton, Stephen M. Fox .

   It was founded by Bruce Gourley now a force in progressive Baptist life, David Flick of Oklahoma and a few of their friends. My Uncle Prentice was routinely taking on all. He peaked out about 2008 with anti Hillary and Obama posts and was finally dismissed from participation.

    But for a while he was  a darling of David Flick as they both took me to task on almost every post I made. Flick handed out Golden Spurs for a post he thought was exceptional. I dont think he ever gave me one though I delivered much of the news and Insight that was worthwhile there. Uncle Prentice could sneeze and Flick would Spur him

   Prentice took great delight in keeping score with his Golden spurs. But one of my favorite came from Karen Smith who I think only made three posts her entire short stay in 2008

     Her Sister was the driving force in ousting me from the Collinsville Baptist church, Jennifer Wilkins, something I recount in the U Tenn published book The Exiled Generation. My effort is titled a Churchin In Alabama.

    Karen and her sister Sheila came to my world to in their mind justify the actions of their sister for a couple months in 2008.

    What I found almost charming was her last post. There was some talk about Alabama football. She is a great fan and in the nineties would sit in the vestibule of the church and talk football with Johnny Hamiter, and the Myers brothers while the service was in session.

     It was a serious matter, moreso than I had remembered but she corrected the mostly gentlemen participants one day 15 years ago when the subject turned to Bama and SEC Football, followed by Kudos from my Dad's brother Prentice who commended her for being a hndred percent right

     Trivia: Years ago, I was at Legion Field in Birmingham the day one of TCU's football players was paralyzed for life in a game against the Crimson Tide. It was a freak accident during a tackle. The University of Alabama established a scholarship fund at TCU in his honor soon thereafter.

I believe the player you are talking about was named Kent Waldrep-