Russell Dilday is a modern day Baptist hero who has been through the fires of persecution. However, instead of destroying him, these fires refined in him an incandescent faith. And that faith now shapes his perspective as he provides an explanation for what happened during those pivotal days, what we learned from that experience, and what we lost in it.
—Brian L. Harbour
Pastor, First Baptist Church
Former Chairman of the Executive Board of the Baptist General Convention of Texas
This volume is typical Dilday--tough-minded, tender-hearted, accurate and honest. I worked with him as a colleague for a time and came to know him as a gentleman and a scholar. Russell's book is a must-read for anyone who cares about what happens when a seminary is "highjacked" by an alien vision.
—W. Randall Lolley, Raleigh, NC
Former President, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary
Wake Forest, NC
Russell Dilday writes the truth. He lived these experiences. Many still do not want to acknowledge the truth of how evil the Fundamentalist movement in the Southern Baptist Convention was and is, but denying reality is not healthy or Christian. There was nothing "Godly" about the movement, it's goals or tactics. This book should be read and pondered and then persons should respond with a commitment to restore the integrity of the Baptist witness in the 21st Century.
—Dr. David R. Currie
Executive Director
Texas Baptists Committed
Russell Dilday was at the center of the firestorm created by the fundamentalist takeover of the major institutions of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination – the Southern Baptist Convention. The history of that takeover is a sobering and important example of how power can be exercised and used at the hands of fundamentalist leaders convinced that their way – and no other – is the right way. Dr. Dilday’s columns provide an invaluable historic record of that period of time, and his own efforts to defend the principles of Christian commitment, scholarship and mutual understanding at Southwestern Baptist seminary.
—Frank Newport
President of Gallup Poll, Princeton, NJ
Dilday loved and gave himself to the Southwestern dream. Great progress was in place when this intrigue surfaced and took him and that progress down. The student reaction told it all. Few men could take on the heavy handedness Dilday experienced and still keep a Christ-like spirit in place as did he. In this volume, he reflects insightfully and without bitterness on those dark days.
—Jess Fletcher
Former Vice President
of the SBC Foreign Mission Board
and author of "The Sesquicentennial History of the SBC."
