Southern Baptists double down on decline “No one could accuse the Baptists of excessive cheeriness,” David Siders begins in his Politico report from the Southern Baptist Convention conclave in New Orleans: “We are living in dark and perilous times in America,” read the billing for a night with former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, “as our culture descends into a spiritual abyss …” It is a stark change of mood for hundreds of pastors and church members from their Trump-years triumphalism. The U.S. has been both steadily secularizing and religiously diversifying for decades. This leaves Southern Baptists, once dominant in a region of churches on every streetcorner, unsettled at their declining ability to dictate local culture. Evangelicals of whom Southern Baptists are a fraction, saw Trump, the “thrice-married former casino owner” with his “two Corinthians” pandering as an imperfect champion. At least he was pandering. “Great again” for them meant more than white dominance. He represented renewal of their religious and cultural dominance. Since then, Siders explains, all seems to have gone to Hell. The midterm elections had not produced the sweeping conservative victories Republicans promised. The overturning of Roe v. Wade, the signature accomplishment of the religious right, had become a major liability for the GOP, contributing to losses in a series of elections. In December, the Democratic president, Joe Biden, signed legislation codifying same-sex marriage into law — with the support of 39 Republicans in the House and 12 in the Senate. There was the transgender rights movement, which pastor after pastor…