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HENDERSONVILLE, Tenn. (ABP) -- Southern Baptist state conventions meeting around the country this fall are adjusting their finances to cope with a weakening economy.
In the opening session of the Nov. 11-12 Tennessee Baptist Convention annual meeting, Executive Director James Porch described a $1.4 million shortfall in the convention's budget.
Porch reported total receipts of $37,086,227, a 3.67 percent shortfall behind an annual budget of $38.5 million.
Porch challenged messengers returning to their homes to "examine the extravagance that we have in our own life -- the things that we can by choice limit -- and then we can sacrifice by choice even more to God."
Baptists in Georgia met Nov. 9-11 in Jonesboro with Cooperative Program receipts down more than 5 percent, from $52 million to $49 million.
"Every year, it seems like an adjustment needs to be made," Dan Spencer, pastor of First Baptist Church in Thomasville and a leader in the Georgia Baptist Convention, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "We'll have to see how it pans out and what our churches will be able to commit to."
The Florida Baptist Convention met Nov. 10-11 in Lakeland with contributions more than $562,000 behind its 2008 budget. Executive Director John Sullivan attributed the shortfall to financial difficulties in local churches and said the convention's leadership would have to face "hard decisions" about programs and staff, according to the Lakeland, Fla. Ledger.
Stephanie Murphy, who regularly attends a Southern Baptist church in Alabama, told the Anniston Star that after balancing her family checkbook, sometimes not enough is left to drop anything in the offering plate.
She said she hears from others in the church parking lot who cannot afford to give as much as they once did. "There's a lot of guilt," she said. "It's not the church's fault. They depend on donations, but with gas prices, then mortgage rates and now all the troubles on Wall Street
people are worried."
"Going to church shouldn't be stressful," she said, "but everybody's feeling it."
The pinch is also being felt at other levels of Baptist life. In October Alabama's Mobile Baptist Association approved a budget of $594,905, marking a reduction of more than $13,000 from the 2008 budget.
Thomas Wright, executive director of missions, said the association's budget and finance committee identified several economic indicators that members thought might affect income to churches, and in turn, the association. According to the Mobile Press-Register , the weeks leading up to the annual meeting proved the analysis accurate.
One state group bucking the trend, the Mississippi Baptist Convention, approved a record-setting Cooperative Program budget Oct. 28-29 in Jackson. A 2009 budget of just under $35 million represents an increase of about 2 percent, or $676,866, over 2008.
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