NEW YORK (ABP) — A spokeswoman for Westboro Baptist Church said on national radio Jan. 17 that people should be less concerned about the group's presence near funerals of fallen soldiers than with their message that America faces God's judgment for sins including acceptance of homosexuality.
A Westboro Baptist Church protestor holds one of the group's trademark signs at an undated picket photo posted on the church website.
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Shirley Phelps-Roper, daughter of Fred Phelps, founding pastor of the independent congregation composed mostly of members of the Phelps family, responded on the Mike Gallagher Radio Show to a question about how she would feel if her son or daughter died tragically and someone showed up at the funeral carrying signs claiming that loved one is going to hell.
"I have three daughters, eight sons, 45 nieces and nephews, five grandchildren, and many more," she said. "So here is the answer: I wouldn't give a hoot about people standing out on a sidewalk. I have thought this through, and I have been asked this question a lot. First of all, if the Lord tarries until one of my parents dies I expect they better do gridlock in Kansas at that hour of day. My fuller concern is 'Why did God do this to me?'"
Interviewed for one hour by the conservative talk-show host in exchange for calling off plans to picket funerals of victims killed Jan. 8 in Tucson, Ariz., Phelps-Roper made no apology for using funerals of slain soldiers and celebrities as a venue to spread her family's unpopular message of "God hates fags."
For her, she said, it's a matter of terminology offered by her host that desperate times call for desperate measures.
"This is a nation that is in a desperate strait," she said. "Your destruction is immanent. Proverbs 1 says that wisdom is crying out in your streets, and you won't listen."
Joining Phelps-Roper from Westboro Baptist Church were daughters Megan and Rebecca. Megan, 24, responded to a question about whether it bothers her to be a part of what has been called the most hated family in America. "Jesus said if you preach my words, you are going to be hated," she said. "You're not supposed to be sad or distressed, you are supposed to leap for joy."
Rebecca, 23, a nurse, when asked why she would want to hurt grieving people by protesting at the funeral of a loved one, answered, "It is the only hope that they have."
"Their child is dead, and you can't bring them back," she said. "The only way they are not going to follow in their child's footsteps or in their soldier's footsteps is that you obey God, that you see what the world has done to you and you repent of it."
Shirley Phelps-Roper said the church isn't just concerned about homosexuality. "By the time you see a people rise up with one voice to say it's 'OK to be gay,'… they have kicked every other standard of God to the curb," she said. "We have a policy of adultery in America. Christ said if you divorce and remarry you are living in adultery."
Dinesh D'Souza, president of King's College in New York City, also participated in the discussion. "I think this is a group that is very passionate but is in some ways doing harm, because it's making Christianity look extreme, fanatical and ridiculous," D'Souza said.
Gallagher concluded, "From our perspective, you stayed out of Arizona, and that's what it was all about."
Not everyone agreed with the tradeoff, however. The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation released a statement saying, "The promotion of the Westboro Baptist Church's hateful vitriol has no place on our airwaves or at the funerals of these victims."
Megyn Kelly on Fox News challenged Gallagher with "rewarding bad behavior" by inviting members of the church to espouse their views on his radio show.
Over the weekend members of Westboro Baptist Church took their protest to the Golden Globe Awards in Hollywood. Annette Bening, who won best performance in a comedy for The Kids Are All Right, a story about a family with two children conceived by donor insemination, said the presence of the protestors made her "very sad."
"They may have had [us in mind,]" Bening told the Hollywood Reporter. "I think that gives us all the more reason to go to the Golden Globes, and for the [Hollywood Foreign Press Association] to see beyond that, [not] caught up behind the narrow mindedness."
On Jan. 19 the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit challenging a hastily adopted local ordinance intended to block Westboro Baptist Church from protesting at funerals in St. Charles, Mo.
In October the church argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that the protests are protected by the First Amendment. A ruling is expected this summer.
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Bob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press.
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