Featured Fundamentalist Baptist John Roach Straton

to get back on track,

Christabel Pankhurst: Fundamentalism and Feminism in Coalition

p. 100
"Straton was the pre-eminent fundamentalist in the northeastern part of the United States in the 1920s. In 1922, he founded the Fundamentalist League of Greater New York. Straton was also a principal supporter of Christabel Pankhurst and he frequently relinquished his pulpit at Calvary Baptist Church in order that his large congregation might benefit from her ministry."

p. 101
"Pankhurst was one of the main speakers at the annual conference of the World's Christian Fundamentals Association when it met in Philadelphia in May 1931....Other speakers at the 1931 annual conference included H. A. Ironside, W B. Riley, Will H. Houghton, Lewis Sperry Chafer, J. Oliver Buswell....On the first full day of the conference, Pankhurst was given the choicest spot on the programme: she was the last evening speaker (having already spoken in the afternoon as well), sharing the platform with Will H. Houghton"

[Will H. Houghton was Straton's successor at Calvary Baptist Church]

p. 100
"The third annual Fundamentalist Rally and Prophetic Conference...held at a Baptist church in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in September 1932...was sponsored by...the Interstate Evangelistic Association....beside the prominent place offered to Pankhurst — the speakers...included Howard C. Fulton, Will H. Houghton, and Cortland Myers. Fulton, a minister in Chicago, that very same year would chair a separatistic meeting that created...the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches"

 

I just finished reading this book mentioned One In Hope and Doctrine. I was somewhat surprised to read what it had to say about Amy Lee Stockton. We were members of a GARBC church for many years, and had guests such as Paul Tassell and officers from ABWE speak from our pulpit. We had female missionaries speak also on Sunday. Overall though I have not studied the issue of women pastors, I don't want to say that much about it but is there a difference between a local church pastor and a visiting evangelists?

 

"Sir, a woman preaching is like a dog walking on its hinder legs. It is not done well, but you are surprised to see it done at all."
[Dr. Samuel Johnson, 1709-1784. English writer and lexicographer]

 

They both preach.

Amy Lee Stockton had the endorsement of G. Campbell Morgan:



She was preaching in Kingsburg, California's "Little Sweden".
Hence the notice: "All services conducted to be conducted in the English language."

 

One of the earliest churches to welcome Amy Lee Stockton was Hamilton Square Baptist Church of San Francisco, California:

[1913]

 

Dr. Straton was an incredible man, and he is the only one of the four "Prima Donnas of Fundamentalism" to not have his story told in print. He was a pioneer in the very earliest days of the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy, yet his untimely death left his monumental legacy to be forgotten.

• Mercer University
• Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
• Additional graduate studies at the University of Chicago and the Boston School of Oratory
• Shurtleff College (where he earned a Doctor of Divinity)
• Second Baptist Church, Chicago, Illinois (1905-1908)
• Immanuel-Seventh Baptist Church, Baltimore, Maryland (1908-1913)
• First Baptist Church, Norfolk, Virginia (1914-1917)
• Calvary Baptist Church, New York, New York (1918-1929)

Under his leadership, Calvary was the first church to operate a radio station, a technology which was then only in its infancy. The man was a visionary, and he was not afraid to involve his congregation directly in the affairs of the world. Shortly before he died, Straton led Calvary in purchasing a luxurious hotel building in downtown New York City. Had he lived, Straton's plan was to use the upper stories of the hotel as a hybrid business and ministry under the direct control of the church, renting out rooms to tourists to Manhattan while providing housing to those who needed it. The revenue generated from the partial hotel would have been used to pay the loan on the building off years in advance, freeing the church to continue to expand its ministry throughout Gotham.

His papers are housed at the American Baptist Historical Society on the campus of Mercer University. Someone really needs to access those files and tell his story to the world.

 

When you endorse women preachers using terms of denigrating those who hold the office of preaching is male only, then it is you who have moved away from fellowship.