NASHVILLE, TN — In a move surprising to absolutely no one who’s been paying attention, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) announced this week that it is suspending all future abuse reform initiatives in order to “channel full denominational energy” into defending itself in the defamation lawsuit filed by former SBC president Johnny Hunt.

Despite a federal judge dismissing nearly every count in Hunt’s case — leaving only a single claim involving one allegedly defamatory tweet — SBC leadership has reframed the trial as a “watershed moment in the war on Christian liberty.”

“If Johnny wins, we all lose,” SBC Executive Committee spokesperson Dane Calhoun declared at a press conference held inside a LifeWay bookstore turned legal war room.

According to internal documents leaked to The Virtue Signal, the SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force will be “mothballed indefinitely” so that all available funds and staff can be rerouted to what insiders are now calling #HuntJustice2025.

“We recognize that abuse survivors may have concerns,” Calhoun noted, “but if we don’t defeat this lawsuit about a mean tweet, we may never be able to tweet recklessly about anything again — and that’s a theological emergency.”

SBC seminaries are reportedly offering one-credit intensives on “Advanced Apologetics in Tweet Litigation,” and LifeWay is fast-tracking the release of a new devotional titled When They Slander You: Standing Firm Through Online Suffering.

Meanwhile, Christian journalist Megan Basham, author of Shepherds for Sale, weighed in on social media:

“Some are alarmed that the SBC is shifting funding from abuse reform to fight off Johnny Hunt’s lawsuit. But if you think about it logically, defending this case protects the church’s ability to tweet boldly in the face of accountability. Long-term, that’s safer for everyone involved.”

Hunt, who recently returned to preaching after what some described as a “30-minute restoration process,” maintains that the 2012 incident reported in the Guidepost investigation was “brief,” “awkward,” and “theologically irrelevant.”

He is reportedly preparing to release a new sermon series titled “From Cancelled to Called: How the Apostle Paul and I Were Both Misunderstood by Women.”

Legal analysts predict the case will be resolved by 2027, or whenever someone finds the password to the SBC’s crisis management fund.