SPARTANBURG, S.C. -- A dispute over baptism practices is causing division among several South Carolina churches and their local Baptist associations.

Fernwood Baptist Church in Spartanburg, S.C., might be ousted from its association for accepting members who have not been baptized by immersion, according to the Associated Baptist Press.

Similar disputes during the past three years have resulted in splits between two South Carolina Baptist churches and their local associations.

Since 1990, the 500-member Fernwood Baptist Church has accepted 27 Christians into membership who were baptized in other denominations. The previous baptisms didn't involve total immersion, according to the report. Randall Wright, the church's pastor for 18 years, said the practice only became an issue in October.

In a letter to Wright, the Spartanburg County Baptist Network, an association of Baptist churches, claimed that while a believer's baptism is not a requirement for salvation, it is a distinctive practice observed by Baptists and is a non-negotiable doctrine.

"Our very name as Baptists draws from our insistence on a believer's baptism," according to the letter. "When our churches receive members by letter, they need to be confident that transfer members have been immersed as believers."

Wright disagreed. In a letter to the Fernwood congregation, he said: "To use Christian baptism as a membership requirement or initiation ritual into a particular expression of the Body of Christ - in this case a Baptist church - weakens the significance of baptism as a symbol to celebrate one's faith in Christ. To use Christian baptism as such an administrative, clerical or technical requirement is to abuse this beautiful symbol."

Earlier this year, First Baptist Church of Greenville was declared out of compliance with the Greenville Baptist Association for accepting members who had previously made professions of Christian faith in other denominations. Boulevard Baptist Church in Anderson was expelled from Sauluda Baptist Association in 2000 in a baptism dispute. Two other South Carolina churches were dismissed from their associations in the 1970s for the same thing, according to the report.