One easy way to create fog is to bring together clashing fronts of lawyers and theologians.

The soup got thick this week in Wilmington, Del., site of the heresy trial of Bishop Walter Righter, who stands accused of violating his vows by ordaining a noncelibate gay man.

While homosexual issues took center stage, this complex trial pivots on another question: Does the Episcopal Church have a doctrine that says sex outside of marriage is sin? Today, this question leads directly to another: Will the Episcopal Church change its rites to allow same-sex marriages?

A verdict is probably weeks away. A conviction is almost unthinkable since at least four of the nine bishops on the court have performed or openly endorsed ordinations such as the one Righter performed.

The church establishment, led by Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning, backs the gay cause and Righter recently added evidence of this fact. At the time he performed the controversial 1990 ordination of Barry Stopfel, Righter already was retired and assisting Newark Bishop John "Jack" Spong, the Episcopal left's clearest voice. Why did Righter perform the rite?

"Jack and the presiding bishop agreed it was better for Jack not to ordain Barry ... because (Spong) was a lightning rod for controversy, and I was kind of a safe person from Iowa," Righter told Religion News Service.

For years, Nashville has sort of played for Southern Baptists the role that Rome plays for Roman Catholics.

The pastor of Nashville's 175-year-old First Baptist Church doesn't just lead a tall-steeple church – he fills a symbolic role in America's largest non-Catholic flock. So it raised eyebrows at Nashville's "Baptist Vatican" when the news spread that the Rev. Dan Francis was leaving his 2,400-member church to start a mission.

"The senior pastor of a First Baptist church isn't supposed to go build a new church from scratch," he admitted.

That wasn't all. This suburban mission in booming Brentwood will be "seeker-friendly," using interactive media, pop music, film and drama. And while the mission committee hasn't chosen a name, it has decided that the sign out front will not say "Baptist."

"That was never an issue," said Francis. "We're just not going to put words like `Southern Baptist' in our name. We don't want to set up that kind of denominational barrier. That would only keep us from reaching unchurched people."

As the late Southern humorist Grady Nutt always said, you know you're in Baptist country when the preachers pronounce "dance" with four syllables – as in "daaah-E-unce-uh!"

Nutt was a graduate of Baylor University, so he knew all about hot-button issues in the Bible Belt. It seems like every few years, journalists can count on the world's largest Southern Baptist university to make headlines linked to drinking, dancing, sex or all of the above.

Naturally, a recent chapel announcement that Baylor would begin holding on-campus dances was big news. The ban was mostly symbolic, since students have for years danced at university-approved "functions" elsewhere in Waco, Texas. Still, conservative critics cited the decision as new evidence of moral decay.

It's sad, even tragic, that these issues get so much ink, said philosopher David Solomon, a 1964 Baylor graduate who teaches at Notre Dame University. While some folks yelp about dancing, Baylor's leaders have for years been engaged in a high-stakes debate about a serious issue – what it means to be a "Baptist," or even a "Christian," university. Similar arguments rage behind the scenes on hundreds of campuses.

The agenda for next week's Promise Keepers clergy conference ends with a tiny note saying the "schedule is subject to change."

That's interesting, since the agenda for the Atlanta gathering is sketchy to begin with. It opens with a Tuesday session on "Hope for the Church," ends with "Renewing Our Call" on Thursday and, in between, leaves organizers lots of room to maneuver. The program doesn't even nail down who speaks when.

Strangest of all, Wednesday night is wide open. This is not standard operating procedure when a group expects to draw more than 40,000 men into the expensive confines of the Georgia Dome.

Perhaps there will be a bonus session on a topic that emerges early in the conference, said the Rev. Dale Schlafer, who leads the surging movement's work with clergy. Then again, something more volatile may happen, something along the lines of the dusk-to-dawn marathons of confession and repentance that swept many college and seminary campuses last year.

"I'm not trying to evade the question, but we just don't know," he said. "We've been trying to picture what we could do with 40,000 guys in a dome. How can we let pastors say what they need to say? How can we handle this in a responsible way?"