Commentary: Westboro Baptist’s strange notions about God

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By John Krull TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS – It seems that the family and followers of Westboro Baptist Church’s Fred Phelps want to receive greater respect and consideration than they were willing to grant others.

John Krull, publisher, TheStatehouseFile.com

John Krull, publisher, TheStatehouseFile.com

Phelps died last week.

He and Westboro Baptist achieved a dubious notoriety by showing up at the funerals of American soldiers to protest. They claimed that God was killing American soldiers out of divine displeasure over America’s tolerance of homosexuality. They would intrude on families’ wrenching and private moments of grief and hold up signs and placards that carried such consoling messages as: “God hates fags.”

Commentary button in JPG - no shadowNow, though, that Phelps is dead, his family and followers wanted to declare his funeral a protest-free zone.

In fact, Phelps’ son and a church spokesman both threatened to sue any “fags” who show up at Phelps’ funeral to protest. They said that his memorial service should be a private affair at which family and friends should be able to grieve away from prying or unsympathetic eyes.

Gee, I wonder if any of the people Phelps and his band of delusional zealots tormented over the years ever felt that way.

There are several ways to respond to Westboro Baptist’s demand for levels of courtesy, decency and mercy that they refused to show others.

The first and most obvious is to note that Phelps and his crew don’t have a monopoly on the First Amendment. The same constitutional protections that allowed Westboro Baptist devotees to give voice to their blindness and bigotry also allows others to say that they don’t like the sheer mean-spiritedness of the Phelps-guided gay bashing.

But that’s a legalistic response – not a moral one and not a religious one.

And the brutal fact is that I’m getting tired of hate-filled people using God as an excuse for the darkness in their own hearts. Someone needs to speak the truth about this Westboro Baptist’s brand of emotional terrorism.

That truth is that their tactics of tormenting grieving families and tarnishing the farewells of fallen heroes is many things.

Bigoted.

Mean.

Ugly.

Venomous.

Hateful.

But it definitely isn’t Christian.

At least their church sure doesn’t resemble the one I grew up in and their God certainly is not the one I worship.

My God doesn’t hate anyone. When people transgress – and I should emphasize here that I don’t think genuine love, gay or straight, is ever a sin – God mourns, God regrets and God weeps.

But God always loves.

That is the message and the power of Jesus’ request that God forgive those responsible for the crucifixion because they know not what they do. If God can find a way to love those who crucified Jesus, then God can find a way to love anyone.

But, then, it’s not exactly news that people can look to the Bible and find in it permission and encouragement for their own darkest impulses. People have looked to the gospels and found support for slavery, for segregation, for just about every form of bigotry and exploitation imaginable.

Still, it continues to amaze me that so many people can read the Bible and come away thinking they are being Christians by lining up with those who would crucify rather than those who are being crucified.

I want to make it clear that the Westboro Baptist folks are entitled to believe and worship as they wish, however mean-spirited and small-minded I may think their beliefs are. I would defend – and, in fact, in my years as executive director of the Indiana Civil Liberties Union, did defend – people’s rights to think and speak in as bigoted and ugly fashion as they want.

It’s a free country.

But I do wish that meager-hearted souls like the followers of Fred Phelps and Westboro Baptist Church would stop using God as the fall guy for their own bad behavior.

God deserves better.

And so do the people – all the people – God loves.

John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism, host of “No Limits” WFYI 90.1 Indianapolis and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.

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19 COMMENTS

  2. Fred Phelps lasting legacy is the widespread acceptance of gay rights. What irony.

    • Yep. The Persians assured Democracy by attacking the Greeks. The world’s sympathies were with the colonists after harsh treatment by the British. The South put Lincoln in the Pantheon of leaders and politicians.
      Racists made Jackie Robinson immortal. Ghandi kicked the British out of Indian after it finally dawned on the British the world’s sympathies were all with the Indies.

  3. Westboro baptist church: a pretty typical representation of the modern republican party.

    • The world is not not your views or Westboro Baptist. I grew up a west-side democrat and have seen and heard far more racism from democrats than republicans. Democrats boast of their big tent, but they don’t warn you of the narrow entrance.

      The so called compassionate democrats have exchanged one hate for another hate and believe they are no longer haters.

      I think we could all stand together against Westboro and not empower Phelp’s legacy by turning on one another.

    • Ghost,
      It’s really a shame but that is the truth. Phelps outfit just took it further by showing up at those funerals. His bigotry towards gay folks was no worse than others of his mindset, he just made a bigger fool of himself and his flawed family. He was just more truthful and overt about it. His votaries in the Republican Party proper were generally too lazy or poor to make the run. They fool no one by their contrived denials of what he stood for and never miss a chance to prove it.

      Phelps’ more circumspect followers in government prefer to belch forth their agreement with him through news releases, bigoted votes, whispers in quiet rooms and hiding behind layers of aides. The tortured explanations, damage control people and the distractive next scandal are generally enough to protect their big paycheck. Their smug countenances reveal a sick enjoyment of the nods and winks from those who feel as they do. It’s a foul club they belong to.

      Good riddance to Phelps, he turns on a spit next to Falwell. It’s too bad he wasn’t the anomaly we wish he was.

      • You are absolutely right. Historically speaking, extremism that goes beyond the pale of sanity always seems to defeat its own “cause.”

  4. Can these liberal Democrats discredit themselves any more? Freaky Fred Phelps was a life-long Democrat, an ardent supporter of Al Gore in 1988, and an invited guest to Emperor Billy Jeff’s coronation in 1993.

    Freaky Fred’s natural home was, of course, the Democrat Party, so his allegiance to it was not surprising. The particular targets of Democrats’ ingrained rage and hatred vary, but whether it is the Klan against blacks and Catholics, Westboro Baptist against gays and Catholics, the Occupiers against people who work for a living, or Evansville mom’s basement dweller liberals against people who work for a living, Christians in general and Catholics in particular, heterosexuals, or those who pay their loans back, you will almost always find a Democrat connection, along with the hypocrisy, derangement, and criminality that are wired into its corrupt soul.

    One wonders why Krull didn’t mention that the ACLU actually subsidized Fred’s despicable hatred at funerals by helping with his lawsuits. Freaky Fred and most of his spawn were lawyers, easily able to defend their own cases.

  5. What a sad, sad performance by the resident liberals. Still in denial over Democrat Fred Phelps’ life-long political allegiance. Toad now characterizes Gore and Clinton as Dixiecrats, as well as the Occupiers. I thought we had it on the word of Toni Morrison that Emperor Billy Jeff Clinton, not Emperor No-Hopey, was America’s first black president. Toad also states that they are dead, demonstrating his complete disconnection from reality.

    No, the ACLU had no real reason at all to facilitate Freaky Fred’s hatemongering. The constitutional issues were clear, and the decision inevitable, as unpleasant as the results are.

    • It’s just a plain, simple fact: The overall majority younger generation of voters dismiss the GOP extreme “moral/religious” right. The do not identify with these people, roll their eyes at their moral preachings against same-sex marriage and the gays can’t go to heaven crowd. Howler is trying his best to distract from this fact w/ piecemeal history…under some impression it gives him credibility for his comments on blacks and gay culture.

      But make no mistake. He has lost the younger generation that represents the future voting class of the country.

    • Ouch. Sorry Howler. To the younger generation, you seem like some guy trying to convince them those Japs are nothing but trouble.

  6. Suuuuuuuuuuuurreeeee and in about 6 months you will be saying you were for the ACA all along.

    You have zero credibility, nada, zip, love, zippty do dah.

  7. Some truths:

    Fred Phelps was a Democrat.

    Bill Clinton is alive.

    Al Gore is alive.

    The vast majority of the Occupiers are alive, although admittedly, many of them smell worse and are less hygienic than a decomposing corpse. Come to think of it, most of the corpses are less lazy than the Occupiers, too.

    Toad is wrong.

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