A coalition of campus organizations at Baylor College is sponsoring a pro-LGBTQ+ Christian event to counter a Turning Point USA (TPUSA) rally at the Texas Baptist college on the same day.

Earlier this month, the school administration approved a request from host organizations Baylor Democrats, Hearts for the Homeless, Students Demand Action, Texas Rising, and the campus’s chapter of the NAACP to hold the “All Our Neighbors” event, according to Baptist News Global.

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As the outlet reports, the decision to greenlight the event came in the wake of backlash to the TPUSA rally. The Southern Poverty Law Center has noted that the conservative youth organization, founded by the late Christian nationalist activist Charlie Kirk and now led by his widow, Erika Kirk, employs a strategy of “sowing and exploiting fear that white Christian supremacy is under attack by nefarious actors, including immigrants, the LGBTQ+ community and civil rights activists.”

Baptist News Global (BNG) was among those who criticized the college, which describes same-sex relations as sinful in its Statement on Human Sexuality, for hosting TPUSA’s April 22 stop on its “This Is the Turning Point” tour. In a March 15 editorial, BNG executive director and publisher Mark Wingfield accused the college of hosting bigotry on campus while denying a platform to LGBTQ+ Christians. Wingfield described the speakers scheduled for the TPUSA event – including Erika Kirk, Donald Trump Jr., Trump administration border czar Tom Homan, and far-right influencer Benny Johnson – as “an all-star cast of far-right MAGA loyalists” who are “actively working to undermine public and private higher education to implement far-right indoctrination.”

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JW LaStrape, president of the Baylor College Democrats, told campus student newspaper the Baylor Lariat that it’s important for the All Our Neighbors event to “take place at the time that Turning Point USA is on campus to provide an alternate sanctuary and focus for students, faculty and staff.”

Reportedly scheduled to speak at the event are Human Rights Campaign president Kelley Robinson, Interfaith Alliance president and Baptist minister Paul Raushenbush, and Greg Garrett, a Baylor faculty member who is on TPUSA’s “Professor Watch List.” The last time the college hosted openly gay speakers was in 2019, when Gay Christian Network founder Justin Lee and former Texas Rep. Glen Maxey (D), the first openly gay member of the state’s Legislature, both spoke on campus, according to the Lariat.

In a statement to the campus newspaper about the All Our Neighbors event, Baylor spokesperson Lori Fogleman said the college “is committed to ensuring open dialogue and the robust exchange of ideas and perspectives.”

“We hold this commitment along with an obligation to provide a safe and nurturing educational environment within a caring Christian community,” Fogleman said. “The University worked with the student organizations to align the event with institutional policies and procedures.”

Following initial reporting on the pro-LGBTQ+ event, the Baptist General Convention of Texas (BGCT) released an April 10 statement saying it was “hearing strong concerns from members of the Texas Baptists family” and that it is “working with university leadership to gather additional information, convey the seriousness of the concerns being shared, and consider an appropriate course of action.”

Christina Crenshaw, a Baylor alum and adjunct lecturer, wrote in an April 12 X post that a Christian university like Baylor should not be “a neutral marketplace of ideas.” She voiced her concerns about “internal voices shaping the soul of the university,” BNG reports.

“The underlying concern here is this: How does Baylor plan to continue down this ‘debate’ journey without losing its doctrinal touchstone?” Crenshaw wrote.

But another Baylor alum, Good Faith Media senior editor Craig Nash, wrote in a Friday editorial that BGCT’s statement appears to confirm “widespread suspicion that people closely aligned with both Baylor and [BGCT] have been working behind the scenes to slow down and reverse any movement toward LGBTQ inclusion at the university.”

“The Texas Baptist denomination has given its flagship university the gift of opportunity,” Nash wrote. “Institutions like Baylor have often struggled to answer whether academic freedom can exist alongside a particular expression of Christian commitment. And now, perhaps more clearly than ever, they have the chance to answer that question right out in the open.”

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