Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic Westboro Baptist Church protests

I was going to call this thread 'God hates Sweden', but that is not a very nice name for a thread, so I settled for this one instead. Members of Westboro Baptist Church are at it again. Swedish newspapers report that yesterday, people from this church were protesting outside Sweden's embassy in Washington, carrying placards saying 'The King of Sweden is evil' and 'God hates Sweden'. I could find no pictures of this particular demonstration and these particular placards, so I'm posting links to two other demonstrations by the Westboro Baptist Church instead.

Westboro Baptist Church protest number one

Westboro Baptist Church protest number two

So why am I posting this in the first place? Just to point out that religion can be a dangerous thing, which can be used to spread hate. I'm certainly not saying that Westboro Baptist Church should not have the right to demonstrate. They must have that right, because that it what it means to live in a democracy. But I hope that as many people as possible will say that Westboro Baptist Church is hateful, and that religion shouldn't be anything like what that church is preaching.

Ann

What in God's name are they protesting about Sweden, Ann? I haven't heard about this. And isn't that the church that has a bunch of nutballs in it?

Edit: I just looked them up on Wiki, and this does appear to be the one I spoke of.

Wiki said this: While its members identify themselves as Baptists, WBC is an independent church and is not affiliated with any known Baptist conventions or associations. The church describes itself as following Primitive Baptist and Calvinist principles, though mainstream Primitive Baptists condemn Westboro Baptist Church and Phelps. The views that distinguish Westboro Baptist Church are views that most Baptists and Calvinists do not recognize, and do not consider to be in any way characteristically Baptist or Calvinistic.

I know lots and lots of Baptists (and for that matter I was raised as a Baptist), and these people shouldn't be calling themselves Baptists because it's an insult to real Baptists. Also, please know that most Americans think these people are crazy.

Oh, and here's the Wiki article . I didn't read all of it, but I must warn anyone who looks at this article - there is one picture that I found very disturbing, and as far as I'm concerned Wiki needs to delete it.

Without trying to start a debate on religion, I have to disagree with this statement. Religion itself cannot be held responsible for the spread of hate rather for me it is the individual and how that individual interprets what they are reading. Jesus taught us to love one another even if they are our enemy.

EDIT: Most of my friends are Baptists and I know they don't think that way.

I wholeheartedly agree with this, Crazy Babe.

I absolutely agree, Crazy Babe. But I do think that some very hateful people get too much respect when they cloak their hate in the guise of religion. And they can do that because religions enjoy a lot of legal protection in society.

Thanks, Nancy, for explaining to me that the Westboro Baptist Church members aren't really Baptists. Believe me, I've never thought for a moment that these Westboro people represent some sort of mainstream Baptism. Most certainly they don't!

Anyway, why do the Westboro people hate Sweden? Okay, I'll try to explain. In 2003, a Swedish pastor named Åke Green said in a sermon in his church that homosexual people are a cancer on the body of society. Some people who heard this took offense and reported it to the police. The national prosecutor of Sweden took the case to court, calling it a hate crime. The case went through several courts in Sweden, but finally the High Court of Sweden ruled that Åke Green had been within his rights to preach in his own church according what he saw as the tenets of his religion. Åke Green was cleared of all charges.



Pastor Åke Green.

The Westboro Baptist Church members heard about this case and started a campaign against Sweden, calling us a nation of sinners and fag-lovers. In 2006, there was a monstrous tsunami hitting several countries in Asia, among them Thailand. Thailand happens to be the favorite tourist destination for Swedes, and since the tsunami hit during Christmastime when most Swedes are on holiday, tens of thousands of Swedes were in fact in Thailand on the day of the tsunami. About 500 Swedes were killed. The Westboro Baptist Church celebrated, thanking God for the tsunami.

Last summer, I visisted a church in Malmö to listen to a concert, and since I got to the church rather early, I strolled around in the churchyard, looking at the graves. Among the graves there was a memorial, full of sand, shells and pieces of flotsam. There were also a few small plastic toys, the kind that children bring to the beach to play with. I read the inscription on the memorial. It had been erected in memory of a young father and his two small boys who were drowned by the tsunami in Thailand. I found myself choking up. And when I read that those Westboro people had protested outside the Swedish embassy again, I remembered that memorial in a churchyard in Malmö and I just asked myself: How can people be so full of hate that they celebrate the deaths of little children in the name of God?

Ann

The thing of it is, is that in the US, Pastor Green would have been allowed to say this without getting in trouble. Oh, depending on the person, folks would have been mad. The freedom of speech in the US is also what allows crazies like the Westboro Church (notice I left out Baptist) to say what they say. And our freedom of speech also allows a 'preacher' stand in the pulpit and say, "Goddamn America." (I'm sure that's been discussed in other threads, but I haven't read through all of them.)

And these Westboro folks that were rejoicing over Swedes dying in the tsunami will one day face God's wratch. Please know that this is not typical of America.

Loking at both photos and their website, I have no idea what they are on about. It seems to me that they are making themselves judge, jury and executioner on all issues.

Whatever it is they are teaching it certainly contradicts everything Jesus has taught. I'm certainly not impressed by people like this church (and I use church in a very loose way).

These people don't represent Christianity in any way in much the same way the men responsible for the Bali bombings don't represent Islam.

These people are just a group of nutcases using the name of church. If they knew something about God, they would never say "God hates...". God loves this world and he wishes all people repent their wrong ways.

"This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth." 1 Timothy 2:3-4

... "He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." II Peter 3:9

Jesus asked God to forgive even those who crucified Him. There never was hate in His heart, just love for this world and all humankind.

These nuts are wrongly using God's name and hiding behind a church's plate to spread their personal hate. Baptists have nothing to do with this madhouse. My husband was raised Baptist and they're a respectable and ethical church, that follows Jesus's teachings and preaches God's love. God has no pleasure in the death of anyone.

"For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign LORD. Repent and live!" Ezekiel 18:32

When people are hateful, everything can be used to spread their feeling, church's names, political parties, non-governmental organizations, websites, songs, books and so on. It's very biased to use the actions of a deranged group to say that "religion can be a dangerous thing, which can be used to spread hate." These psychos AREN'T representative of Christian churches or any true church and it's a sin and a shame that they use God's name to mask their intentions.

Thank you very much for your comments. I completely agree that these Westboro people are in absolutely no way representative or either Baptists or any other kind of Christians or Americans.

But for all of that I feel good that you call these Westboro people nutjobs, so I want to thank you for that!

Ann

Gosh, Ann, it's good to know you don't harbor any anti-religious biases... :rolleyes: Some time back, Terry and I thought maybe you did, but I see we were quite wrong.

PJ

While I still believe that Ann allows her past negative experiences with hyper-religious people to cloud her objectivity at times, I can't get too upset with her on this issue. The wackos at Westboro are a shame to the name of Jesus. They do indeed teach that America is being punished by God for any number of "offenses" they will gleefully name. And they also insult both believers and non-believers with their hateful attitudes and condemnation. I don't blame her for being upset because her country is being slandered.

Jesus is not pleased with these people. He never calls His followers to club people over the head with their sins. He calls us to inform, to teach, to make disciples, but most of all, He calls us to love others.

That love has nothing to do with feelings and everything to do with how we treat people. I believe that homosexuality is a sin, but I also believe that unrestrained anger is a sin. I also believe that nothing good can come from the Westboro wackos protesting at the funerals of fallen American soldiers and blaming everything from AIDS to crib death to the economy to the price of tea in China on homosexuals. When the Lord does judge the living and the dead, the people who have participated in these protests and who have not repented of their actions will feel His wrath, not His approval.

I can definitely see this. Religion, however, is an excuse, a shield, but definitely not the reason. After all, look at the Crusades, the Inquisition, Al-Queda, each committing violence in the name of religion. These sects should in no way be allowed to reflect the religion itself, and yet it happens so often. After all, look at how many people are scared of Muslims now, even though it's just one small sect.

One of my favorite movies, Dogma, addresses it nicely:

The WBC really is a fanatical group filled with stupid people. They, along with all of those other extremists, take what they want out of the Bible to fulfill their own agenda, and toss away the rest. They always seem to forget the love one another message, and "Judge not lest ye be judged". I think they're going to get a rude awakening in the afterlife. Too bad it won't help them out in this life.

For the record, I and most Christians I know do not believe that the Westboro Baptists Church group are real Christians. I believe they are a cult that have greatly twisted the teachings of Christianity to fit their hateful agenda.

I could go on but I have a lot of passionate feelings about this group and what they say they stand for and I'm just going to end up angry if I say anymore.

In other news, one of the best stories I have heard out of this group is Patriot Guard Riders ( http://www.patriotguard.org/ ). These guys go to each funeral and shield the family from these horrible protesters. People like these are real heroes.

You make a very good point here Karen. My boss says the same thing about the suicide attacks that are supposedly done in God's name in the Middle East. These people are going to realise that when the Lord returns to judge the living and the dead they won't be seated with Him in eternity.

And I have to say, for the record, that I've never come across any Christians who are even remotely like the Westboro people - not even remotely. And even though I have read about all kinds of wackos, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, what have you, I still think the Westboro group are a curiosity all of their own. (And to be still more specific, yes, there have been other groups who have been even more hateful, not least a number of Islamist terrorists, but the Westboro people still have a style all of their own.)

I must also say, for the record, that I most certainly realize that religion is not the root cause of evil in the world. If it was, people like Hitler and Stalin would not have been evil at all, because neither of them was religious.



Hitler, a nice guy whose decency can be proved by the fact that he didn't go to church? No, I don't think so.

Ann