What We Believe(Baptists are Divers People)

Also see The Baptists? Who are they? Baptists are Bible People Baptists are Church People Baptists are Gospel People Baptists are Irish People What we Believe

While holding a common evangelical faith their central doctrine of freedom of conscience has distanced them from an imposed uniformity. Through the centuries they have been variously assessed by commentators. A Cork writer in 1737 described them as "an inoffensive people who had never had power to do mischief.... the peculiarity of their dipping (ensures) they never will". Nearly 100 years later Dublin, church members were noted as being "remarkable for their sobriety, practical good sense and submission to the civil magistrates".

In social and political matters there has been considerable diversity. Some churches exclude members from secret societies. As far back as 1838 Thomas Berry, pastor of the church at Abbeyleix, reported that the town had one of the largest Orange Lodges in the country and expressed satisfaction that "one or two of the churches have ceased meeting in the Lodge".

At Tobermore, Co. Derry several church members were disciplined for Orange sympathies, one of their number being reprimanded for "watching an Orange parade".

An influential Ulster Baptist church leader and Member of Parliament, R.C. Glendenning, was even more magnanimous: "I have no cause for thinking that the granting of a measure of self-government to Ireland would be followed by any attempt on the part of Roman Catholics to persecute their Protestant fellow-countrymen. I have a lively hope that only a brief experience of the new regime will be required to convince the thinking and observant men of the Orange democracy that the fears with which their leaders filled their minds were entirely groundless... In the blending of thought and effort in the noble task of legislating for the good of their native land, Catholics and Protestants will get to know each other better, and in the fuller knowledge and clearer light, old misunderstandings and estrangements will be removed, suspicion and mistrust will disappear... and mutual respect and goodwill will mark the relationship of Irishmen in the new era".

Contemporary Baptists hold a variety of political opinions and endeavour to promote mutual respect. The primary commitment to the coming of a future Kingdom - which, as Jesus said, is not of this world - allows for a healthy pluralism in secondary matters of personal preference and individual conscience.

For most of the contint in the "What we believe" section, we are indebted to Robert Dunlop, for many years pastor of Brannockstown Baptist Church, Co. Kildare.