As a pastor, I am tentatively excited about the reconciliation movement among our church leaders. It is something I have prayed for ever since my Seminary days. I only pray that the movement stays focused on spiritual reconciliation.

While we desperately need reconciliation, we need to be careful and always prayerful in that reconciliation process. At the heart of a reconciliation process is trust and fairness. Trust has been broken. Lives have been damaged in the struggle that has occurred at the national level. We have prayed that it wouldn't impact Texas. The impact is here. All I ask for now is to be treated with respect. I want my views to count and to be respected. In short, I want fairness.

As member of the E/E committee, I believe that the constitutional amendment on "Article III- Membership" is one that was prayerfully and painstakingly written to be as fair as possible to all Texas Baptists.

I am the pastor of a small Texas Baptist church. I do not believe that it is fair that under the current system of recognizing messengers a "mega-church" (having diverted most of its giving to SBC) could, in theory, give 500 dollars per year to the BGCT, and take the maximum 25 messengers (based solely on its membership) to the state convention, while my "little church" (having given in the traditional manner) give 3,000 dollars per year to the BGCT, and (based on membership) can take only 4 messengers to the state convention. My "little church" gives 500% more to our state convention than that mega-church" but gets 500% fewer messengers. That is unfair.

The Constitutional Amendment, in part, seeks to rectify this gross injustice. Any group that seeks to defeat that amendment (even under the banner of reconciliation) is not interested in fairness. If we can't start caring about each other and being fair with each other, we will never find reconciliation.

Respectfully,

Ellis Orosco

October 1998