paigePaige Patterson has been relieved of his duties as president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Ft. Worth. Good move, SWBTS board of trustees. The seminary wants to “move in the direction of new leadership.” Good cover, SWBTS board of directors. But don’t worry. Patterson will be living in splendid style on campus as the President Emeritus and the “Theologian in Residence.”

Patterson needed to be put out to pasture. Several years ago he advised women to remain in abusive relationships, to pray for their abusers, to maintain their roles as dutiful wives. However, that is not the main reason he needed to go. He needed to go because he has not progressed beyond that view. He has not retracted, recanted, or amended his statements.

All of us who have been in the ministry said things earlier in our careers that we no longer believe or agree with. I said many things as a 20-something youth minister that I believed with all my heart. I advised people with all good intentions. And it was the right thing for me at that time. But “at that time” is the operative idea. Life has taught me some things, the main one being I wasn’t nearly as smart as I thought I was. I would not dream of saying some of the same things today.

Hopefully, as we mature, so does our theology and so does our counsel to others. When words from the past come back to haunt us, we need to admit that we have changed and so have our views. Doing so is not a sign of weakness or poor thinking. More often it is a sign that we weren’t infallible then, we’re not infallible now, and we’re still growing and learning.

Not only have I changed, society has changed. In this situation with Patterson, the way society views women has changed, finally. It needed to. Women should never be expected to suffer abuse in silence. That should never have been true, but for generations that was the societal norm, generally promoted by the church. Thankfully, the church has also grown up. Apparently Patterson did not get the memo.