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Kansas church brings face of hatred to disrupt funeral
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Sunday, February 03, 2008
VANDALIA — Hundreds came to mourn, but four came to mock. In the name of a religion based in love, they traveled from Kansas to preach their sermon of hate.
I have written about these people before, but those were second-hand accounts, based on wire stories about other demonstrations in other cities. This time they were here, in my community, and I went to hear for myself what, in God's name, these people could be thinking.
Extras
Shirley Phelps-Roper is 50-years-old. She's an attorney. The daughter of the founder of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan. Since the onset of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, she and other members of the small, mostly inbred congregation have demonstrated at military funerals, proclaiming the deaths were God's punishment for America's "acceptance" of homosexuality.
On Saturday morning, they stood on the sidewalk in front of a Burger King parking lot. On the other side of East National Road, 100 yards to the east, cars streamed into the parking lot of St. Christopher Catholic Church, carrying those who came in tribute to murdered Marine Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach.
Yellow police tape and dozens of police officers separated the four picketers from hundreds of American flag-waving counter-demonstrators who lined both sides of the street. During the group's 40-minute demonstration there were occasional chants of "U.S.A. ... U.S.A." from the crowd. Occasional shouts of "whore" were directed at Phelps-Roper.
"Do you have any urge to just go over and punch them?" I asked a camo-wearing Army sergeant who had driven from Detroit to support for the Lauterbach family.
"Oh, yeah," he replied.
Phelps-Roper wore a purple hoodie. On the front was written "GOD HATES FAGS.COM." On the back was "GOD HATES AMERICA.COM." The messages on the signs she held declared "AMERICA IS DOOMED," "GOD IS YOUR ENEMY" and "SEMPER FI RAPISTS." She was surrounded by a sister, a nephew and her 16-year-old son.
"We're the A-team," she said laughing, able to find humor while, 100 yards away, another family grieved.
In previous demonstrations, the target has been homosexuality. But the group's hatred knows no limits. It also has included Catholics, Jews, Mormons, Muslims and Amish. They have reviled everyone from Ronald Reagan to Mr. Rogers to leprechauns.
This time the message was custom-made and directed at the Marine Corps.
"The Marines killed her," Phelps-Roper shouted, alluding to Maria Lauterbach's alleged rape and suspected murder by a fellow Marine. "First they raped her, then they killed her."
"What do you hope to accomplish here?" I asked, when she had finished her rant.
"To deliver these words ... the curse of God is upon you ... it's a great blessing if the word of God is in the ground ... we're living in the last days of all."
"If you could meet the Lauterbach family right now, what would you say to them?" I asked her.
I can't, I won't, repeat her response. It was too hateful. Too hurtful. They were the words of someone totally lacking in compassion. Someone with no heart. No humanity.
There are some, I'm sure, who will say I shouldn't have been there at all. Perhaps, as one of the Vandalia cops told me, "If you ignore them, then they'll go away."
But it seemed important to see, first-hand, the face of hatred.
Now I have.
And it was ugly. Just righteously ugly.
Contact this writer at 225-2439 or
dlstewart@DaytonDailyNews.com.
