BGCT EXECUTIVE BOARD REFUSED TO CUT BAYLOR FUNDING

In what seems to have become an annual affair, another effort is being made to cut BGCT funding to Baylor University.

John Brunson, laymen from First Baptist Church, Houston, moved that the budget be amended to delete some $3.1 million of the $4,054,000 designated for Baylor University in the 1995 budget and redistribute it to the State Missions Commission (25 percent), Department of Student Ministry (25 percent) and the other educational institutions (50 percent).

The motion was defeated by the BGCT Executive Board and received only 20 supportive votes.

Texas Baptists can expect this issue to be raised once again on the floor of the annual meeting in Amarillo.

This editor does not hold a Baylor degree. I am a graduate of Howard Payne, and hold Masters and Doctor’s degrees from Southwestern Seminary. But I believe in Baylor (as I do all our Texas Baptist-related universities) and the job they are doing educating our young adults. This is an issue that should be dropped.

In making the motion, Brunson pointed out that Texas Baptists had no influence on or control of Baylor, unlike the Home Mission Board which also received around $4 million last year.

I found myself wondering how much influence “traditional” Texas Baptists have on the Home Mission Board? My impression is that we have a great deal less influence on the HMB than we have on Baylor University which is remaining in the mainstream of Texas Baptist life.

September 1994