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Local Churches Join Forces Against Alcohol Sales

4 Hudson preachers start petition drive to keep town dry
By CHRISTINE S. DIAMONDThe Lufkin Daily News
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Not everyone is popping champagne corks in celebration of Angelina County's being voted wet.
Four Hudson preachers on Wednesday kicked off their own liquor election petition.
Selling alcohol is a sin, said Bud Bonner, pastor of Bethlehem First United Methodist Church.
"I personally believe as a pastor that the sale of alcohol is wrong," Bonner said.
That's why he and Pastor Clay Harris of Mount Carmel Baptist Church, Jeff Kolk of Crossroads Baptist Church and Brian Lipscomb of Providence Baptist Church have hit the pavement with petition books in hand.
The preachers want to call an election that would make the city of Hudson dry — which, they say, Hudson voters have already expressed.
"Letters of Paul and the Methodist discipline tells me I'm supposed to practice abstinence from strong drink ...," Bonner said.
He added that in their communion services — when Christians re-enact Christ's commandment at the Last Supper, at which he took wine and bread, and told his disciples to drink his blood and eat his flesh in remembrance of him — his church uses grape juice.
If successful in garnering the 361 signatures in 60 days, the group will ask Angelina County commissioners to post it on the May 12 ballot — Hudson's scheduled city elections, said Angelina County election administrator/tax assessor Bill Shanklin.
Before they could even begin the petition process, the group had to present an application signed by 10 residents to the city of Hudson for approval, he said.
"The county has the right to charge the city of Hudson (which approved the application) for the election," Shanklin said. However, since the group opted to post the issue on the May 12 ballot, the amount would be "negligible," Shanklin said.