Southern Baptists’ focus on LV concerns other religious groups

Stacy J. Willis

Wednesday, Dec. 1, 1999 | 11:07 a.m.

As Las Vegas prepares to receive the attention of the nation's Southern Baptists in 2001, the city also is readying for controversy.

Las Vegas has been selected as one of two "Strategic Focus" cities in 2001, meaning more than 1,000 Southern Baptist evangelists and $2.5 million will be sent here to spread the be-a-Baptist message.

But the group has not received a warm welcome in other cities.

Last week in Chicago, which was chosen as a Southern Baptist focus city for 2000, an interfaith group of 39 religious leaders wrote a letter to the Southern Baptist Convention asking them to reconsider their decision to target their community.

"While we are confident that your volunteers would come with entirely peaceful intentions, a campaign of the nature and scope you envision could contribute to a climate conducive to hate crimes," said a letter from the Council of Religious Leaders of Metropolitan Chicago.

Their concerns are rooted in a controversy over the Southern Baptists' recent publication of prayer guides that suggest members of Jewish and Hindu faiths are somehow lacking in spiritual validity.

The most recent such guide says, among other things, that Hindus have "darkness in their hearts that no lamp can dispel."

Hindus in Boston and Houston responded in November with anti-Southern Baptist protests.

In September, Anti-Defamation League National Director Abraham Foxman called the guides "arrogant" and "offensive" on CBS' "This Morning."

Still, the president of the Nevada Baptist Convention -- the state chapter of the Southern Baptist Convention -- said he does not expect the controversy to affect Las Vegas.

"It's misunderstanding and miscommunication. We simply want everyone to know about God's love, including Jews and Hindus and everyone else," said the Rev. Russ Daines, chapter president and pastor of El Camino Baptist Church in Las Vegas. "All people have darkness in their hearts until they receive Jesus Christ."

But local Jews and Hindus are concerned that the Southern Baptists' focus on Las Vegas will disrupt an otherwise friendly interfaith community.

"There has been a tremendous amount of ecumenical fellowship here. But we've never been confronted with anything like this here in Las Vegas," said Rabbi Mel Hecht of Temple Beth Am and a member of the National Conference of Christians and Jews Interfaith Council in Las Vegas.

"When it manifests here, it will become a whole different ball game. If the Baptist community of Las Vegas wants to make evangelizing an issue, they will have the wrath of the Jewish community and other faith communities as well," Hecht said.

The Nashville, Tenn.-based Southern Baptist Convention is the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S. with nearly 16 million members and 40,000 churches. There are 101 Southern Baptist Churches in the Las Vegas Valley.

The Strategic Focus Initiative is a new plan aimed at spreading the faith in cities outside the southeast, where the church is most prominent.

"The SBC decided that if we're going to make a difference in the U.S., we need to focus on the big cities by pouring cash and volunteers into those cities two at a time," Harry Watson, director of missions for the Southern Nevada Baptist Association, told the Sun in March after the city selections were finalized. Chicago and Phoenix were selected as target cities for the year 2000. Las Vegas and Boston were selected for 2001.

Planning is already under way on the 2001 missionary campaign, which has been dubbed "Loving Las Vegas."

Along with other missionary activities, local Southern Baptists expect to devote their resources toward distributing videos about Jesus, hosting block parties, sponsoring booths at sporting events, collecting and distributing food to the hungry and creating a counseling program for troubled Las Vegans.

"We're going to train volunteer counselors to help people who have drug issues or divorce issues -- there are tens of thousands of people out there who just need someone to talk to," said the Rev. Tommy Starkes, Southern Baptist pastor of Tropicana Christian Fellowship and a member of the Loving Las Vegas planning committee.

"It will be pastoral counseling that may eventually lead to a witness (evangelizing) -- but it won't be forced on them," Starkes said.

"At the end of all of this, we'd like to have a city where people turn to their faith community for their needs," said Starkes, who envisions the year as one devoted to "ecumenical" efforts. "We have sought to enlist other Protestants in it -- we see it as being a Christian event, much larger than just the Southern Baptists."

But Starkes said that he opposes the practice of focusing conversion efforts on certain faith groups such as Hindus or Jews.

"I haven't seen the prayer guides, and I do not like it when certain groups are pinpointed," Starkes said.

He said churches that fall under the Southern Baptist umbrella maintain a significant amount of autonomy, and that Las Vegas churches are not forced to use the prayer guides.

"We here in the West are less connected with what is going on in Nashville than some of the churches in Georgia or North Carolina," he said. "We have a history of independence, and we don't do everything that Nashville says to do."

Instead of certain faith groups, he said, they are planning on focusing on certain other demographics, such as the Spanish-speaking community because of its population increase in the area.

"But here again, we're pinpointing, and I don't want to do that," he said. "We believe all persons are in need of the gospel."

And it is that belief -- that Christians have a corner on truth -- that Hecht finds most offensive.

"What I object to is the presumption that salvation is only achievable through one group's beliefs," said Hecth. "Any religion that feels it can only maintain itself by empire-building is not a faith any reasonable person would follow. And the Baptists are guilty of that. They have a conscious campaign to convert people, which can certainly be offensive." There are more than 75,000 Jewish people and 200 Hindu families in Las Vegas. The first Hindu temple in the area is currently under construction in Summerlin.

Bhadu Joshi, a member of the Las Vegas Hindu community, said he thinks Southern Baptists have crossed the line between sharing their faith and aggressively seeking to build their numbers.

"I don't see anything wrong with the concept that whatever you know truly, what you believe, is what you tell people, but only as long as it is done on a philosophical basis between people. When you use money or force or enticement, it is not right," Joshi said. "If you are trying to increase your flock of sheep, that is not right. Spending so many millions to do this, as they are doing, is wrong."

Las Vegas also is home to a large Mormon population -- some 78,000 according to a local spokesman. Last year Baptists drew headlines by holding their convention in Salt Lake City, Utah, the home of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Although both groups are known for proselytizing, they do not consider themselves to be allies.

"We have similarities, and we have differences. They do not consider us to be Christians, but we are," said Will Stoddard, spokesman for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Las Vegas.

"When they came to Salt Lake, (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) President (Gordon B.) Hinckley welcomed them and asked us to be accommodating. I expect that we would do the same thing here," said Stoddard.

"In Clark County, insofar as I'm aware, we've gotten along well with them, and we believe we will continue to do so. It is our desire to respect the beliefs of others -- but we hope the Baptists will do the same."