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By Bobby Ross Jr. | Religion Unplugged
In the hallways of the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Orlando, Florida, this week, at least one kid was spotted wearing Mickey Mouse ears.
No one seemed to mind — or notice, according to the Godbeat colleague who told me about it.
What a difference nearly three decades makes.
In 1997, Southern Baptists launched a high-profile boycott of the Walt Disney Co. over what church leaders called the company’s “anti-Christian and anti-family direction.” The action lasted eight years, ending in 2005.
In 2010 — the last time before this week that the SBC conducted its annual meeting in the home city of Walt Disney World — the past boycott remained fresh in many people’s minds.
But as Southern Baptists gathered Tuesday and Wednesday in the Theme Park Capital of the World, the previous controversy seemed long forgotten. Wiley Drake, the pastor who championed the boycott, died earlier this year at age 82.
The only Disney mention I noticed in news coverage of the 2026 meeting was longtime Alabama religion writer Greg Garrison’s note that “many Southern Baptist families will make a vacation of it.”
And the official SBC meeting app even listed available theme park discounts, including one for Walt Disney World.
This column appears in the online magazine Religion Unplugged.
Photo by Roy Burroughs, Baptist Press
Faith. Family. Fastballs. 