Baptist Professor Offers Her Version of Dismissal
By Greg Horton

Reprinted with permission of EthicsDaily.com

(RNS) A female professor of Hebrew denied tenure at a Southern Baptist seminary says she was told by the seminary president that her gender was the reason for her dismissal.

Sheri Klouda, who is now at Taylor University in Indiana, was denied tenure at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas.

Oklahoma pastor and blogger Wade Burleson, writing Jan. 17 on his personal blog, accused Southwestern President Paige Patterson of gender discrimination. The next day, T. Van McClain, chair of the seminary’s board of trustees, released a statement in which he said Burleson’s blog entry was “filled with inaccuracies.”

Klouda has since agreed with Burleson’s version of events. “I suppose there could be inaccuracies in the entry, but with regard to me and what happened at Southwestern, Wade’s version of events is accurate,” Klouda said.

Klouda said that 10 days after Patterson became seminary president in 2003, he assured her that her job was safe. “He made some pretty grim statements in press conferences following his appointment,” Klouda said, “but he told me in a meeting that I would not lose my job because of my gender.”

On June 7, 2004, Klouda said, she was told by a school administrator that Patterson would not recommend her for tenure.

“It’s no secret that the issue was my gender,” Klouda said. “When I wasn’t assigned any classes for the fall semester of 2006, Patterson encouraged me to tell my students that the decision was based on his views and convictions about women teaching men. He believes the local church is a paradigm for the school, and in the local church, women may not be in leadership.”

Klouda said she did not grant permission for Burleson to post the information on his blog, believing it “wasn’t the best place to address this issue.”

McClain refused to comment directly, citing the confidentiality of personnel matters. However, in a written statement, he said Burleson’s blog was inaccurate in saying Klouda had been approved unanimously by the trustees, or that trustees were not fully informed about Patterson’s decision.

February 2007