WHEREAS, Southern Baptists have historically held a biblical view of the sanctity of life and have placed a relentless emphasis upon freedom of conscience for all, and
WHEREAS, In many places of our world today our brothers and sisters in Christ suffer religious persecution or other abridgements of the free exercise of their faith and the dictates of their conscience.
BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED, That we reaffirm our belief in the free exercise of religion as determined by a free conscience, and that we oppose any discrimination, legal or otherwise, against any individual based upon race, age, gender, or nationality, and that in reaffirming our opposition to such discrimination, we also express our opposition to all governmental efforts to define discrimination in such a way that ridiculous extremes, repugnant to the Christian faith and life, become the law of the land, such as the legalization of homosexual marriages, permitting homosexual couples to adopt children, prohibiting father-son banquets or single-sex choirs, requiring sexually integrated housing and restroom facilities, requiring governmentally financed housing to be made available to persons living in adultery or fornication, prohibiting a draft law that applies to men only, and we urge all citizens to be active in opposing the adoption of such public policies.