Source: The New York Times
On December 4, 1999, The New York Times published an article on the recent tensions between the SBC and many Jewish organizations around the country. The proposal to send 100,000 Baptists to the Chicago area next summer for the purpose of seeking converts prompted Yechiel Eckstein, a prominent Chicago rabbi involved in interfaith relations between Christians and Jews, to state that the SBC has "clearly crossed the line, from general evangelizing and witnessing - which I strongly affirm - and breached the trust by proselytizing and targeting the Jewish community." SBC president Paige Patterson replied that, "Southern Baptists are targeting nobody specifically...Our expressed mandate from Jesus is to take the gospel to the whole world. Jewish people are part of that world."