Vicious Kansas Gay-Bashers Finally Find a Friend
, a Kansas-based group notorious for turning tragedies into gay-bashing opportunities, is pretty much universally reviled. Even an Arizona-based Ku Klux Klan group forcefully (if ungrammatically) rejected the group in a 鈥渄isclaimer鈥� published on its website. 鈥淭he Ku Klux Klan, LLC, has not or EVER will have ANY connection with The 鈥榃estboro Baptist Church,鈥欌�� it said. 鈥淲e absolutely repudiate their activities.鈥�
Not the Dove World Outreach Center, a Gainesville, Fla., church that has used similar tactics to attack both and . 鈥淲e support Westboro who [sic] came to Gainesville because of its 鈥楪ay鈥� reputation,鈥� the church states on its website.
In fact, Dove became virtually the only group in the history of Westboro鈥檚 anti-gay and anti-Jewish campaigning to join forces with the Topeka, Kan., church. Dove enthusiastically took part in Westboro鈥檚 Sunday protest against Gainesville鈥檚 tolerance of homosexuality. About 30 members of Dove World Outreach Center joined fewer than 10 Westboro representatives outside Trinity United Methodist Church in Gainesville, . Many of the Dove protesters wore their signature 鈥淚slam is of the Devil鈥� T-shirts 鈥� a message they鈥檝e also promoted on signs outside the church.
The Independent Florida Alligator, the University of Florida鈥檚 student newspaper, that Dove and Westboro members sang variations of 鈥淭his Land is Your Land鈥� (鈥淭his Land is Going Straight to Hell鈥�), 鈥淚鈥檓 Proud to Be an American鈥� (鈥淚鈥檓 Ashamed to Be an American鈥�) and 鈥淕od Bless America鈥� (鈥淕od Hates America鈥�), among other tunes. 鈥淚 think their church is willing to stand up for what the whole Bible says,鈥� Dove pastor Wayne Sapp said in a shot by the Alligator. 鈥淢ost churches like to preach part of the Bible. Westboro Baptist Church talks about these are things we need to turn away from: accepting homosexuality, accepting perversion, accepting adultery, accepting that that鈥檚 just how people are. That鈥檚 not the truth.鈥�
But Dove, like Westboro, goes beyond asserting that the Bible condemns homosexuality. In March, it erected a sign outside the church that proclaimed 鈥淣o Homo Mayor鈥� 鈥� a reference to Gainesville City Commissioner Craig Lowe, who was running for mayor. (Lowe, now mayor-elect, spoke to dozens of people at a counter-protest in downtown Gainesville on Sunday.) The church later changed the sign to 鈥淣o Homo鈥� after Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, a Washington D.C.-based advocacy organization, complained to the Internal Revenue Service that Dove was violating the ban on political campaigning for tax-exempt groups.
For its part, Westboro 鈥� which has pilloried soldiers killed in Iraq, schoolchildren killed in bus crashes, Nobel Peace Prize laureates and others for supposedly tolerating homosexuality 鈥� is heading to Colorado tomorrow to continue its picketing. This time, presumably, it won鈥檛 have any help.
