Going into the 2025 Annual Southern Baptist Convention, the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission was a major fight. The organization has long been a tool of liberal elites to influence Evangelical politics in a liberal direction. Their actions include lobbying for gun control in Tennessee, supporting amnesty for illegal aliens, opposing pro-life legislation in Louisiana, and being on a milk carton when it comes to key lobbying efforts. Brent Leatherwood is the current leader who was fired and subsequently unfired last year, in a chain of events that seems related to the mounting discontent.
Willie Rice made the motion to abolish the ERLC early on, to much applause. This motion was then scheduled for a vote on Wednesday, day 2.
Willie Rice and Richard Land faced off to give speeches. Willie Rice urged people to vote in favor of the motion to abolish in order to bring about reform in the ERLC, since it would require a successful vote in 2 consecutive years to accomplish. Richard Land, ironically, appealed to the Trump Administration’s sympathies to Christians, despite being a major amnesty advocate. Additional speeches were made highlighting the egregious actions by the ERLC leadership and their financing of sonogram machines.
The result of the vote was a decisive double digit vote victory for the liberals who garnered 56.89% of the vote to the conservative 42.84.
The silver lining is that the ERLC being this divisive is bad for the optics of its existence. Since the vote was cast via ballot, the 42.84% is now a recorded minority that highlights the divisiveness of this Cooperative Program entity.
