A machine-augmented survey of the SBC's convention sermons and presidential addresses
Following up on my study of the SBC’s resolutions, I decided to also track how the sermons and presidential addresses at the yearly meeting have changed over time. The Southern Baptist Historical Library and Archives has digitized a significant amount of material. With a bit of help from open source image processing software it seemed like a straightforward way to see what sort of topics leadership in the SBC has focused on.
Below are the results of my studies. If you’re curious about how the focus of the SBC’s leadership has changed over time, read on. If you prefer to have a copy to read offline you can find one here. Scroll down for the conclusions.
Background and Basic Statistics
An analysis of the Southern Baptist Convention’s presidential addresses and sermons delivered at the yearly meetings.
Analysis: 1880-1960
A machine-learning-augmented analysis of the sermons and presidential addresses preached at the Southern Baptist Convention’s yearly meeting covering 1880 to 1960.
Analysis: 1960-2019
A machine-learning-augmented analysis of the sermons and presidential addresses preached at the Southern Baptist Convention’s yearly meeting covering 1960 to 2020.
TLDR:
The public addresses at the SBC's yearly meeting provide a unique historical perspective on the priorities of the organization's leadership. Because of the availability of these documents through the SBC's Historical Library and Archives, and the powerful processing provided by open-source software, it was possible to study the evolution of language in these speeches throughout much of the SBC's history.
In this work, the sermons and presidential addresses were read from scans using Optical Character Recognition and parsed using standard data processing techniques. Topics were identified using Non-Negative Matrix Factorization following the process described in. The resulting topics were presented based on their prominence in time and large-scale changes in language were discussed.
It was found that, of the 20 meaningful topics identified, nine did not exhibit an obvious dependence on time. These broadly represent important beliefs found in in the Baptist Faith and Message, the SBC's statement of faith. For the other topics, before 1960 the sermons and addresses largely contained language concerning the nature of God and the supremacy of Christianity.
After 1960, it appears that the SBC's leadership became more focused on action. This is evidenced by an increase in language corresponding to Missions, Prayer, and the work of the Church. Additionally, there is a greater tendency to reference America during this period and to employ anecdotes, stories, and tales. Finally, it is interesting to note that during the period of the Conservative Resurgence (1980-1990) the number of references to the Bible and the SBC both increase significantly.