MSNBC.com:

After Falwell, evangelicals at crossroads

Movement in state of transition; faces schism between old, new generation

Rev. Frank S. Page, left, stands with President George Bush and Page’s wife Dayle in October 2006. Page was elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest evangelical denomination.

If the Rev. Jerry Falwell personified the Christian right in the past, then the Rev. Frank S. Page may represent its future.

From his Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Va., where his funeral will be held Tuesday, Falwell gave evangelicals a strong political voice. But it was often the voice of a sure and angry prophet, as when he blamed the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, in part on “the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians,” or described warnings about global warming as “Satan’s attempt” to turn the church’s attention from evangelism to environmentalism.

Page, 54, was chosen last year as president of the 16 million-member Southern Baptist Convention, Falwell’s denomination and the country’s largest evangelical one, in an election that he saw as a mandate for change.

“I would not use the word ‘moderate,’ because in our milieu that often means liberal. But it’s a shift toward a more centrist, kinder, less harsh style of leadership,” Page said. “In the past, Baptists were very well known for what we’re against. . . . Instead of the caricature of an angry, narrow-minded, Bible-beating preacher, we wanted someone who could speak to normal people.”

Quite the photo above, huh? What ’separation’ was that, again?

“…more centrist, kinder, less harsh style of leadership.” I’ll believe it when I see it.

Note to Rev. Page: JESUS WAS A LIBERAL!