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XII.) BJCPA
and the American Arts Alliance:
Government Funding for the
Desecration of Christ. 1.
The
issue we raised on this page of our flyer is that the BJC’s involvement with
pro-NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) groups is more than just one isolated
incident. We also raised the issue
that, according to James Dunn, “The
Baptist Joint Committee is still the only church agency that works only on
religious liberty and its essential corollary the separation of church and
state.” This being the case,
why would the BJC spend so much time and effort in defense of the arts? For years, Dunn and the BJC have hidden behind their job
assignment of religious liberty and church/state separation.
They profess to take “no position” on virtually every issue they
engage in - i.e. abortion, homosexuality, pornography and federal funding for
the arts. 2.
The
American Arts Alliance is a major organization “representing 2600 non-profit
arts institutions nationwide” (See
our flyer, p.9) Part of the AAA’s
work includes “opposing content restrictions on NEA grants” and working for
“increased funding for the arts.” The
BJC’s involvement with such an organization raises serious questions about the
church/state nature of the arts. (See
section XIII) 3.
Though
we did not publish this fact, the BJC was identified by the executive director
of the American Arts Alliance and by Robert Peck, one of the AAA conference
speakers, as a “co-sponsor” of the AAA conference.
Southern Seminary professor Bill Hendricks, a conference participant,
tried to play down the BJC’s role in the AAA conference by stating that the
BJC just rounded up participants for the conference.
These interviews were not tape recorded and could not be documented
except by my personal testimony. However,
the statements of these three individuals make it clear that the BJC was very
much involved in the AAA’s “Religion
and the Arts” conference.
4.
One
reason getting information about the AAA conference has been difficult is
because it was a “private” meeting. According
to Lee Kessler, executive director of the AAA: “It was agreed that when we had
that particular [AAA conference], that the people who participated wanted it to
be kept private and so it was kept private.”
Kessler went on to say: “We don’t have a public document on [that AAA
conference]… It was going to go
on and there was going to be additional sessions.
And what we were trying to build with the first session was a sense of
trust and because they were trying to build that sense of trust, the notion was
that there would not be a public statement as a result of the conference…
Then we were going to go on and do a whole series, but the [AAA] has been
substantially reorganized since that time and we no longer have that contract to
do it.” (Phone interview with AAA director Lee Kessler, June 26, 1996)
The
real question is, what kind of a contract did the AAA have regarding “Religion
and the Arts,” and from whom did they have it? 5.
At
the AAA conference, a Baptist minister from New York praised Andres Serrano’s
“Piss Christ,” stating that “he had seen nothing ever so beautiful as
Christ in this amber glow.”
(See our
BJC flyer for full quote, p. 9)
Our
question is - where has the BJC’s condemnation of such material been?
What about the religious liberty implications of taxing American
Christian citizens to support the desecration of our Lord and Savior?
6.
The
American Arts Alliance was also a “contributing organization” to the How to Win training manual.
(See
section IX) |