Pondering Westboro Baptist Church and Fred Phelps

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No Funeral For Westboro Church Founder Fred Phelps

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case on October 6, and ruled 8—1 in favor of Phelps in an opinion released on March 2, Beginning in the early s, Phelps targeted several individuals and groups in the public eye for criticism by the Westboro Baptist Church. In , they planned a protest at the funeral for the five girls murdered during the West Nickel Mines School shooting in Pennsylvania, but called it off, opting to spread their messages on a local radio station instead.

She and her children have also appeared on the Howard Stern radio show attempting to promote their agenda and church. Phelps' followers have repeatedly protested the University of Kansas School of Law 's graduation ceremonies.

In August , in the wake of the Minneapolis IW bridge collapse , Phelps and his congregation stated that they would protest at the funerals of the victims. In a statement, the church said that Minneapolis is the "land of the Sodomite damned". Shirley Phelps-Roper says that, in the late s, Fred Phelps witnessed a homosexual attempting to lure her then five-year-old son Joshua into some shrubbery.

After several complaints to the local government about the large amount of homosexual sex occurring in the park, with no resulting action, the Phelpses put up signs warning of homosexual activity. This resulted in much negative attention for the family. When the Phelpses called on local churches to speak against the activity in Gage Park, the churches also lashed out against the Phelps family, leading to the family protesting homosexuality on a regular basis.

In , Phelps and his family, along with several other local congregations, held a signature drive to bring about a vote to repeal two city ordinances that added sexual orientation to a definition of hate crimes and banned the city itself from workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation. Enough signatures were collected to bring the measure to a vote.

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In the same election, Phelps' granddaughter Jael was an unsuccessful candidate for the Topeka City Council, seeking to replace Tiffany Muller, the first openly gay member of the Council. Phelps ran in various Kansas Democratic Party primaries five times, but never won.

These included races for governor in , , and , receiving about 15 percent of the vote in Senate, Phelps received 31 percent of the vote. Phelps supported Al Gore in the Democratic Party presidential primary election.

No Funeral For Westboro Church Founder Fred Phelps

Phelps stated that he supported Gore because of these earlier comments. In Phelps opposed Clinton's and Gore's re-election because of the administration's support for gay rights ; the Westboro congregation picketed a inaugural ball. In , Phelps wrote a letter to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein , praising his regime for being "the only Muslim state that allows the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ to be freely and openly preached on the streets".

In , Phelps was convicted of disorderly conduct for verbal harassment, and received two suspended day jail sentences. Phelps' conviction for assault and battery carried a five-year prison sentence, with a mandatory 18 months to be served before he became eligible for parole. Phelps fought to be allowed to remain free until his appeals process went through.

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Days away from being arrested and sent to prison, a judge ruled that Phelps had been denied a speedy trial and that he was not required to serve any time. On February 18, , two days before the Westboro Baptist Church's first UK picket, the United Kingdom Home Office announced that Fred Phelps and Shirley Phelps-Roper would be refused entry and that "other church members could also be flagged and stopped if they tried to enter Britain". In , Phelps appeared on a first-season episode of the talk show Ricki Lake , alleging that homosexuals and "anyone who carries the AIDS virus" deserved to die.

When Phelps and his son [ who?

During a commercial break, the two were forced off the set and escorted out of the building by security. Klein on the Canadian program The Standard , he characterized his father as abusive and warned the Phelps family could turn violent. Kevin Smith produced a horror film titled Red State featuring a religious fundamentalist villain inspired by Phelps. Fred Phelps preached his final Sunday sermon on September 1, Five weeks later, sermons resumed from various members.

According to Phelps' grandson and former church member Zach Phelps-Roper, Phelps was voted out of the church after undergoing a "change of heart" regarding his religious beliefs. Zach reported that Phelps had spoken in support of the members of Equality House across the road from the church, which was regarded as "rank blasphemy" by the church.

On March 15, , Nathan Phelps , Phelps' estranged son, reported that Phelps was in very poor health and was receiving hospice care. Church spokesman Steve Drain declined to answer questions about Phelps' excommunication, and denied that the church had a single leader. Drain said that "the church of Jesus Christ doesn't have a head" and "the Lord Jesus Christ is our head". Referring to the church having a defined leader, he said that "for a very long time, we haven't been organized in the way you think".

Phelps died of natural causes shortly before midnight on March 19, Democratic primary for Governor of Kansas , Democratic primary for United States Senate , Kansas From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Meridian, Mississippi , U. Topeka, Kansas , U. Margie Marie Simms m. Baptist portal Biography portal Kansas portal Mississippi portal.

No funeral for the preacher who picketed so many. Retrieved December 11, Retrieved January 16, What led Westboro's Fred Phelps to his beliefs and actions? Retrieved March 16, Archived from the original on November 22, Archived from the original on September 27, Retrieved September 13, Archived from the original on January 1, Retrieved December 10, Archived from the original on November 30, Archived from the original on January 14, Archived from the original on July 20, Retrieved July 20, Reagan, President of the United States of America, et al Archived from the original on May 6, The New York Times.

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Retrieved March 21, Retrieved January 20, Archived from the original on December 26, An heir to hate". Retrieved July 9, Archived from the original PDF on March 27, Click here to read the whole commentary. There's only Heaven or peaceful nothingness. That's what I think. I love you forever. I'm so sorry for the harm he caused. That we all caused. But he could be so kind and wonderful.

I wish you all could have seen that, too.

I understand those who don't mourn his loss, but I'm thankful for those who see that "An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind. Love and peace to all.

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The world needs more of both. That's the part of Gramps I'll keep and share with others. Topekans had mixed reactions to the news of Phelps' passing and many flocked to the site of the church to take pictures of it and in front of the rainbow-decorated Equality House across the street. Equality House is a project by the tolerance group Planting Peace. Director of Operations Davis Hammet told 13 News the group has been in the house for a year now. Hammet said they wanted to spin a bad situation into a positive one.

The church, made up mostly of his family, rose to international notoriety with its practice of picketing funerals of fallen US troops.

He was ordained a Baptist minister, though Westboro was not attached to any mainstream denomination. Mr Phelps earned a law degree from Washburn University in , but was stripped of his licence to practise in Kansas in The Kansas Supreme Court said Mr Phelps made false statements in documents and "showed little regard" for professional ethics. Later, he and his small congregation - founded in and later dubbed "the most hated family in America" by the BBC's Louis Theroux - aimed their vitriol at many groups, including immigrants and Jews. But their signature slogan was "God hates fags".

In , Mr Phelps and his daughter were barred from entering the United Kingdom due to their anti-gay preaching. The church's actions inspired a federal law and numerous state laws limiting picketing at funerals.

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