The city of Houston has managed to unite Baptists divided on other issues to speak with one voice on an application of their shared belief in religious freedom -- that the government should not subpoena sermons.
Baptists on both sides of a divide from the days of the conservative resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) urged Houston Mayor Annise Parker in a letter Thursday (Oct. 16) to concede that the city's subpoenas of sermons and other pastoral communications were wrong and will not be repeated. In a suit against the city, lawyers for Parker's administration have issued broad subpoenas to four pastors and a ministry leader who oppose the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, known as HERO among the homosexual-transgender ordinance's supporters.
City Attorney Dave Feldman, in another development, struck the word "sermons" from the subpoenas today (Oct. 17). But attorneys for the...
