What?  No arrests?

From past form, we know that there would have been if Christians had done this outside a homosexual organization or meeting

Nearly 1,000 gays, lesbians and their supporters gathered in freezing temperatures and spitting snow at Focus on the Family headquarters Sunday to declare it a “toxic religion zone” and its director James Dobson “a danger to himself and the country.”  “The poison that comes out of that place leads to suffering and death,” said the Rev. Mel White, director of Soulforce, a national gay rights advocacy group that organized the three-hour protest.  “We’re the ones who have to bury the gay teenagers who kill themselves because their parents have been quoting Jim Dobson to them,” White said.  White’s fiery speech kicked off the rally, which drew hundreds from across the country and Colorado to Dobson’s sprawling hilltop campus. The rally came as Dobson’s national profile is rising, a week after he appeared on the nationwide evangelical Christian broadcast, Justice Sunday, condemning U.S. Senate Democrats for opposing seven Bush nominees to federal courts.

Police closed off the street in front of Focus headquarters to accommodate the crowd. Long streams of balloons and creative costumes brought the only swatches of color to the leaden cold day, but weather did not chill demonstrators’ spirits or their message.  “Focus on the Family does not focus on families. They teach from a theology that is morally bankrupt,” said Jacob Reitan, Soulforce’s youth director, who stood between his mother and father. “It teaches mothers and fathers to reject their gay sons and their lesbian daughters, and it has to end. We cannot go on any longer dividing our families.”

Other parents came. Carol and Dean Reyman drove from South Dakota. They said friends and relatives deserted them when their 34-year- old daughter announced she was a lesbian seven years ago.  “We felt alone for the longest time. It shouldn’t make a difference. She’s the same person; yet they look at her differently,” Carol Reyman said.

In a small tent on their property, a dozen Focus on the Family staffers watched, including Tom Minnery, the organization’s vice president for government and public policy.  Minnery said gay activism is actually causing Christians to defend their values more strongly. Citing state constitutional amendments supporting traditional marriage in 13 states last year, he said most Americans don’t believe marriage should be expanded to include gays.  To permit same-sex marriage, Minnery said, “you have to stand against all of civilization, which says that marriage is one man, one woman, and against the totality of social science that says a child does best with a mom and a dad.”

It was not same-sex marriage that occupied the Soulforce speeches Sunday. It was Focus on the Family’s condemnation of homosexuality itself, the damage its position has done to gay and lesbian youths suffering confusion and guilt, and the toll it has taken on their families, speakers said.  White told of a gay man who became Christian and, facing the conflict between faith and sexuality, penned a suicide note to God: “I don’t know how else to fix this.”  “It has to be fixed here, at Focus, which is saying we are beasts, that our agenda is to recruit and molest children, that we are the worst threat this country has ever seen. The polluting, toxic lies are taking lives,” White said ...

Focus on the Family also announced it would be closed to the public Monday, when Soulforce had planned to deliver more than 1,000 letters from families of gays condemning its stance against homosexuality.  “It will not be open to the public to ensure the safety of our staff,” Focus spokeswoman Sonja Swiatkiewicz said.

More here

Posted by jonjayray on Tuesday, May 3, 2005 at 07:17 AM in Marxism & Culture War
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