Anti-Gay Group Plans To Protest Soldier's Funeral

TURLOCK, CALIFORNIA - Protesters happy that soldier Chad Gonsalves was killed in Afghanistan earlier this month will picket his Turlock funeral Monday, as a second group tries to shield their message from service-goers.
The Westboro Baptist Church, led by Rev. Fred Phelps, believes American soldiers are dying at God's hands for defending a country that accepts homosexuality.
“Our job is to cause America to know its abomination,” said Shirley Phelps-Roper, daughter of the Rev. Phelps and attorney for the church.
Trying to block the church's “Thank God for dead soldiers,” “God blew up the troops” and “God hates America” signs will be members of the Patriot Guard Riders.
A California chapter of the 5,000- member motorcycle group plan to escort Gonsalves from the church to the graveside. Members have been doing this at the request of soldier's families across the country, said California ride captain Steve Rieger.
The church, based in Topeka, Kan., sends protesters to soldiers' funerals across the country, spreading its message that God is punishing America through the war and its soldiers for defending a “doomed” country.
ust this Thursday Phelps-Roper traveled to a Minnesota soldier's funeral with several congregation members to protest. Protesters also plan to attend another in Lincoln, Neb. on Saturday and a third funeral in Colorado on Sunday before making their way to Turlock Monday.
Phelps-Roper said the group has been picketing all over the states for 15 years.
For their protests, Phelps-Roper said about 10 members of the church drive or fly to the funeral town, then stand peacefully on a public sidewalk or right-of-way with their picket signs in hand.
But Rieger said the church's protests are much more confrontational.
“They try and instigate stuff,” Rieger said. “They want someone to raise a fist at them.”
Phelps-Roper said the group funds its travel through the members' regular jobs.
“We don't make a merchandise out of the gospel,” she said.
And although Phelps-Roper said she and the others are aware their message is not a welcome one at these funerals, it doesn't phase them.
“I love the fact that they hate what we do,” Phelps-Roper said. “They get so mad they can't think straight.”
The Patriot Guard Riders, made up of mostly retired soldiers, wholly support the church's right to picket, said Rieger.
“We are not an anti-protest group,” Rieger said. “We are there to honor our fallen brother and sister and pay our respects to the family. We just keep our backs to the other group.”
But Phelps-Roper disagrees, stating the riders - who she called the “MoPed Mamas” - got violent with the men in the church's group at one protest in Kentucky.
“So the next time we went we left the guys at home,” she said.
Often bringing some of her 11 children with her to protests, Phelps-Roper said people get especially angry seeing children passing along the churches message. But she says it her job to teach her children - ages 3 to 27 - what God intended.
“I would not dare do otherwise,” Phelps-Roper said. “I know that they are as good as gold.”
Phelps-Roper said there are more than 20 states trying to pass laws that will keep the group from protesting at funerals. When in those states, Phelps-Roper said her groups make signs calling them the Taliban.
“They will tolerate any filthy thing, but they will not tolerate the word of God,” she said. “They flip (God) off on a daily basis and now they are getting what they deserve.”
from The Turlock Journal