Richard Land loses show, keeps his leadership job
A top Southern Baptist official who was accused of plagiarism in a radio segment claiming that civil rights leaders and President Obama used the Trayvon Martin case to stir racial tensions has lost his weekly call-in program but can keep his main job, a church panel has announced.
Richard Land, the influential head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission and the denomination’s top policy spokesman, was rebuked for racial insensitivity and for not attributing the source of his radio commentaries after a review by ERLC trustees.
The controversy over Land’s explosive remarks in a March 31 radio program was especially awkward as Southern Baptists were expected to elect an African-American pastor, Fred Luter, as the denomination’s first black president this month.
