The pastor of my church (who has his own blog) noted to me this morning a piece in the DMN on blogging Baptist ministers and the upcoming Southern Baptist Convention meeting: New-time religion.

It makes for an interesting companion to the pieces on the YearlyKos. Indeed, just as the Kossites are seeking to make waves within the Democratic Party, the DMN piece notes that Baptist bloggers have been seeking the same within their denomination:

Conservative Southern Baptists used to be more or less an amen corner, cheering one another on as they battled denomination moderates over such issues as women in the pulpit and whether the Bible must be taken as literally true.But a generation after conservatives began to control the Southern Baptist Convention, they are finding it harder and harder to stick together. Disputes over doctrine and power-sharing have come to the fore.

And bringing them there – with a flourish – have been a handful of youngish conservative pastors employing blogs.

Baptist bloggers have become a force in the last year, generating large numbers of hits on their Web sites as they post comments – some would say, as they air dirty laundry – about the SBC, the country’s largest Protestant denomination, with 16.3 million members.

The bloggers’ rise coincides with the first seriously contested election for the SBC presidency in more than decade. Three candidates have announced, and more could emerge before next week’s annual gathering of delegates (”messengers,” Baptists call them) in Greensboro, N.C.

“Not to be presumptuous, but I think we have helped shape the debate,” said Marty Duren, a Buford, Ga., pastor and blogger. “Issues that we began discussing as far back as last summer are now part of interviews with candidates.”

Benjamin Cole, a 30-year-old pastor at Parkview Baptist Church in Arlington, is even more of a true believer. He calls Internet communication the “Gutenberg press of the new Reformation.”

Interestingly (and not surprisingly) much of the issue at hand–at least in the newspaper story–is Convention politics…

For those interested in Baptist Blogging, Alan Cross (the aforementioned pastor of Gateway Baptist Church) is going to be live blogging from the SBC meeting in North Carolina this week.