“Let me say, yes we’ve lost these members. But again, we’ve gained back nearly half the ones we’ve lost. Maybe forty percent at this point,” explained Mason. “So yes, our numbers have declined in attendance. But I would remind us all numbers are declining in American Christianity all across the board. Year by year churches are all struggling with their attendance and their participation.”

In November 2016, a prominent Dallas-area Baptist church cast a 577-367 vote to extend full membership to homosexually active people, including leadership ordination and marriage officiation. “Open to all, closed to none,” is now Wilshire Baptist Church’s proud slogan.

It’s been one year since the church’s controversial vote made headlines. What’s happened at Wilshire Baptist Church since then? To find out, the Institute on Religion and Democracy conducted a phone interview with Wilshire Baptist’s Senior Pastor George Mason.

Some church members have left, while others have joined. But Mason insists Wilshire continues to be a fruitful and orthodox church, depending on how you define fruitful and orthodox.

Moving towards LGBTQ affirmation

My first question was: how did a Texas Baptist church start out examining the same-sex dilemma facing the Church and then move to full affirmation of homosexually active behavior?

Long before Wilshire’s congregation voted or even considered a proposal on same-sex behavior, the church conducted a 14-month study to closely examine LGBTQ issues. The study was conducted by 19 church-elected representatives as part of an “Inclusion and Diversity Study Group.”

“This was sort of a way of helping the congregation hear about the Biblical [sic] and science and experience and different ways of looking at the issue that the study group was wrestling with,” said Pastor George Mason.

Upon completion of the study and before any proposal was made, the group presented their findings during a two-hour long seminar. (You can watch the entire seminar on YouTube here.)

“From that point, there were also roundtable discussions that we had where people had five opportunities to come and draw a number and randomly be placed at a table with others in the congregation who wanted to talk about their experience with this, their point of view, their way of thinking about it, just listening to one another and share,” explained Mason.

Next, the study group came to its conclusion, with the majority advocating full LGBTQ affirmation and a minority dissenting. Each presented their reports to the congregation. The church would soon vote on the majority’s recommendations.

“There was a church-wide meeting in which the recommendation was presented and we spent about two hours hearing from people in the congregation for or against the motion. And then after that, we voted,” explained Mason.

In fact, Wilshire’s congregants voted over two Sundays to be sure all members had the chance to cast their ballots. “Interestingly, it was the Sunday before the national election and the Sunday after, so there was a lot going on,” added Mason.

A total of 944 Wilshire members voted, with 577 in favor of full LGBTQ affirmation.

Losses versus gains

Fallout from the vote is what Mason calls “the biggest misjudgment of my ministry.”

Clarifying, Mason explained he was shocked by “the consequence of the number of people for whom this would be a decision they could no longer remain in the church.”

“So my miscalculation was that I knew that there would be a lot of people who would vote ‘no’ on this. What I didn’t know was they would leave over it,” admitted Mason.

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