A. In the past I have accepted the traditional
explanation, that it was a legal matter, and referred to that as recently as
the 13th
of this month. I think Dan Wimberly’s explanation in Frontier Religion: Elder Daniel Parker - His
Religious and Political Life moves the discussion and explanation
in the right direction.
“Although organized in Illinois, the Pilgrim
Church became the first formally organized Baptist Church in Texas. Family
legend reports that Parker organized the church in Illinois because the Mexican
government had denied him permission to form a Baptist Church in Texas. To
circumvent this prohibition, his family believed that Parker sought permission
from Stephen F. Austin to import a Baptist congregation. Accordingly, Austin
granted approval to Daniel.
“There may be a germ of truth in the tradition,
but its total veracity is dubious. A more plausible reason for forming the
church in Illinois related to Baptist ecclesial practice. In 1832 Parker
realized that Baptist churches did not exist in Texas, and very few Baptist
ministers lived there. Parker firmly believed that members of the
organizational presbyteries had to be doctrinally sound. If not, then the
credentials of the congregation and the baptisms of those immersed under its
authority stood in doubt. With this in mind, Parker likely reasoned that it
would be difficult to assemble an organizational presbytery of like faith and
order in Texas. Furthermore, there are no documents which indicate that Parker
directly sought or received permission from Austin.”[i]
For the family tradition, Wimberly cites an article written by Ben J. Parker in 1935, “Early Times in Texas and History of the Parker Family.” This tradition is widespread, and
obviously earlier than 1935. The Handbook of Texas Online puts
it this way: “[Parker] realized that a Baptist church could not be organized in
Texas without breaking Mexican law.”[ii] J.
M. Carroll references the idea when he writes, “During Daniel Parker’s visit to
Texas in 1832, he construed the Mexican Colonization laws as forbidding the organizing of any other than a Catholic
Church in Texas, but not as prohibiting
the immigration of one into the state, so he returned to Illinois, selected his
followers, organized them into a church, and then proceeded by wagons, holding
services as they journeyed to Texas.”[iii]
A footnote in “The
Records of an Early Texas Baptist Church. I. 1833-1847” claims, “In
1832 Mr. Parker visited Texas. According to his construction of the Mexican
law, it forbade the organization of a Protestant church in Texas, but not the
immigration of such a church already organized. He, therefore, organized the ‘Pilgrim’
church in Illinois, and then the membership moved to Texas, retaining their
organization.”[iv]
Perhaps Parker was trying to skirt the colonization
law of Mexico. However, it is questionable whether starting a Baptist church in
Texas would have been any more illegal
than just having one in Texas, where Roman Catholicism was the official
religion. Wimberly’s suggestion has a great deal of merit. Whatever else one
might think of Daniel Parker, he was a stickler for church authority. This is obvious
in the early minutes of Pilgrim Church during Daniel’s lifetime. He likely
would have found few if any Baptist preachers in Texas that he considered his
faith and order, and would not have been able to organize a church suitably
without them. In contrast, in Illinois a presbytery consisting of eight men
from four different churches organized the Pilgrim Church.[v]
[i] Frontier Religion: Elder Daniel Parker, Dan B. Wimberly, 2015, p.
130)
[ii] Handbook’s source apparently is Robert
A. Baker’s The Blossoming Desert: A
Concise History of Texas Baptists.
[iv] The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical
Association, Volume XI, No. 2, October 1907, pages 87-88; I have not found
an earlier reference. Z. N. Morrell does not mention it in Flowers and Fruits From the Wilderness,
or if he did, I missed it.
[v] The preamble to the
constitution of Pilgrim Church includes “that god has his church or kingdom now
set up in the world Who being all taught of the Lord speak the same thing—and
also believing that every attempt to unite in union the advocates of any, or
all the various contradictory spirits or principles, are but stratigems of the
enemey and markes of hypocrisy.” This indicates Parker would not have welcomed
any presbytery of varying faith and order. Also, the record include “...at the
request and in the Presence of the regular Baptist Church at Lamalt Crawford
County State of Illinois...Constitute the foregoing named brethren and sisters,
in a church Capacaty...” All this indicates a very orderly progression in
organizing the Pilgrim Church.
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