Kentucky Church Bans Interracial Couples
A small church in Pike County, Kentucky has voted to ban interracial couples from most church activities "to promote greater unity among the church body."
Melvin Thompson, former pastor of Gulnare Freewill Baptist church, proposed the ban after Stella Harville brought her fiance, Ticha Chikuni, to services in June. Harville, who goes by the name Suzie, played the piano while Chikuni sang.
Before stepping down as pastor in August, Thompson told Harville that her fiance could not sing at the church again. Harville is white and Chikuni, a native of Zimbabwe, is black.
Last Sunday, church members voted 9-6 in favor of Thompson's proposed ban. Others attending the church business meeting declined to take a stand on the issue.
"That the Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church does not condone interracial marriage," the resolution states, according to WKYT.
"Parties of such marriages will not be received as members, nor will they be used in worship services and other church functions, with the exception being funerals. All are welcome to our public worship services. This recommendation is not intended to judge the salvation of anyone, but is intended to promote greater unity among the church body and the community we serve."
Harville told The Kentucky Herald-Leader that the decision is an embarrassment to God, the church and the whole community.
"It sure ain't Christian," she explained. "It ain't nothing but the old devil working."
Harville and Chikuni plan to marry in July, but they won't be tying the knot in Pike County.
The U.S. Supreme Court declared anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional in a 1967 decision. By 2005, Stanford University sociologist Michael Rosenfeld determined that 7 percent of all marriages in the U.S. were interracial.
Barefoot, backwater, inbred hillbillys. Nuff said.
Remember Birdcage? How long before said ex-pastor is found dead in an underage black hooker's bed?
“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.”
- Albert Einstein
Well, the rule is:
Don't be caught with a live boy or a dead hooker in your bed.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
All of that moonshine and inbreeding has taken it's toll .
"The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all."
Sure. Jesus hates love and marriage.
me-oww!
Shame on Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church
What ignorance. There is only one race - the human race.
I guess they have the right, as a religious entity, but other churches have the right to condemn them for it. They should not be recognized as worthy to wear the Christian banner by Christian churches.
The Gulnare Freewill Baptist church should be condemned.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
....LMFAO
Is this Pike County's only mega-church?
WWFSMD?
Ya see, by excluding some we achieve greater unity!
When will government of the people, by the politicians, for the corporations perish from this Earth?
Not soon enough!
Same "Americans" who lynched n****rs on Saturday nights and were the first ones at church on Sunday mornings.
Hell is more fun.
far left loon >.<
"Some of those who wear badges, are the same who burn crosses."
-Rage Against the Machine
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
I think you mean "Some of those that work forces, are the same that burn crosses."
Good song, though.
It's been a while since I heard it (like 15 years). Thanks for the correction.
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
Kentucky with our two children at the first chance?
There is a reason it's named "the dark and bloody ground."
"Better." It's what we should ask of ourselves and of our leaders.
"It sure ain't Christian," she explained. "It ain't nothing but the old devil working."
Exactly. Any truly faithful Christian would recognize this as The Wolf in sheep's clothing. The problem is, is that nowadays Evil controls most of the churches and the clergy - the faithful claim to be fighting Satan, but are executing marching orders written by the Devil himself.
If Jesus came back and saw what was being done in his name, he'd never stop throwing up. -- Woody Allen
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
Reminds me of this. Humans can be pretty evil.
"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
You read something like this and you just shake your head in wonder that attitudes like that still exist in this day and age. We're trying to deal with the problems of today such as global warming, homophobia, a new Gilded Age, and this kind of stuff crops up.
I assume that this particular branch has no missionary work going on in Africa, South America or Asia where there might be converts who aren't 100% caucasian bigots. The rest of the Baptist churches have a huge program in Africa for evangelization. I wonder what they have to say about this particular church. (That's a rhetorical question. I realize that they would say the exact same thing.)
Welcome back to 1950, the Republican paradise.
True story. That's why they cheered the assassinations of JFK, MLK, RFK, etc. And didn't care to find out the truth about those assassinations either. Sad.
"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
I believe in Arlen Specter's magic bullet theory as much as I believe in the Easter Bunny.
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
Without the Eisenhower 90% tax rates of course.
And all the good things that came out of the new deal.
But the racism? Ah, good times, good times indeed.
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
More like Mussolini's Italian Fascist paradise.
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
Well praise the lord!
Jesus may love, but many of his followers hate.
BTW, I call all my wingnut in-law christianista's corporate christians now, or fake christians.
When I tell them Jesus was a flaming liberal and they are phony christians; the responses are awesome.
I tell them that "You cannot claim to be a christan and vote for the modern republican party, or the damn bluedogs either."
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
Hypochristians.
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
Nice. Are they hanging nooses from the trees in celebration??
far left loon >.<
course..in the south...To be expected and newt wants to take the US back to 1941...More of the religous right infringement on the rights of the of people!
And I'm sure that pastor would have sworn up and down that his church wasn't bigoted at all. Hypocrites.
"His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow. . . . His feet were like burnished bronze when it has been made to glow in a furnace . . . . " Revelations 1:14-15
Corruption favors the wealthy.
Tax them into the 21st century.
Please revoke his citizenship and cast him adrift at sea.
Seems like the "biblical" thing to do.
But really—these folks want to be Christian—are they aware that a child born of a mortal woman and God is a child of two races?
Just seems like they are confused.
Did the whole congregation live in the same double-wide?
Corruption favors the wealthy.
.
just the 9 and everyone that thinks it's what buddy christ would do.
me-oww!
"Whatsoever you do, to the least of my brothers..."
Vote GOP and move forward to the 18th Century.
which actually has little to do with this story. US law deals with civil marriage. The anti-marriage equality bigots always want to conflate religious and civil marriage rights. Doing that in this article just adds to the confusion.
Churches are free to be as bigoted as they want to be, and I support their right to do so. I also think others should use their free speech rights to point out the bigotry of those churches.
In a PPP poll earlier this year, almost half of Republicans in Mississippi think interracial marriage should be illegal. This little church in Kentucky has lots of company.
Just don't be making me subsidize bigotry by giving these disgusting cretin holier than thou dirtbag churches tax-free status.
RIGHT ON!!
Tax that shit.
I think they are going to have to remove the word "Freewill" from the title of their church. I wonder what that congregation will do when they find out Jesus might have had brown skin?
As much as I despise what this "church" has chosen to do, they do have the right under the "freedom of association" clause in the 1st Amendment to decide the rules for their organization. Its rather like Bob Jones University and their prohibition against interracial couples dancing together.
Now, do I think such organizations should be tax exempt? No, but then again, I don't think any religious organization, property or institution was meant to be tax exempt, under the Constitution. Taxing an religious organization does not prohibit that organization. It just requires that they share in the sacrifices of the community.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
They also engage in political activity, which should be grounds for taxation.
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
... but I'll say it anyway, it's a slow night:
At 31 so far, there are more comments here than members who voted in this church resolution (15). Actual membership might be greater, they said some abstained, right?
But it is impressive how bad 9 out of 15 people can make a whole state look. The rest of Kentucky is just thanking God for Mississippi right now.
Cracker morons. DAMN, these people are so fucking stupid, it hurts.
What the hell is wrong with these southern idiots? Seriously, get a brain.
"I don't done need one, I got Jesus, yuck yuck."
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
So two people are in love, are in a relationship, and the church promotes unity by banning the one who is of a different race?
Oh...wait...I've heard the Bible bans interracial relationships.
Now...when are they going to ban church members who have pre-marital sex? Or the ones who commit adultery? Yep...won't see that happen.
"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix." -- Judge Leon M. Bazile, 1959
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Almighty+G...
were never meant to come to the Americas....
and the USA is a mistake....
That's why we're having earthquakes in Oklahoma, the Mount St. Helens eruption, the flooding of New Orleans, etc...etc...etc. God is punishing us white folk for not staying in our place.
be the first to thank Leon for spewing that amazingly stooopid quote....as we all know, without stooopid there would be no smart.
Has anyone asked minority leader Mitch McConnell, Baptist from Kentucky, what he thinks, given his wife is ASIAN?
She's Elaine Chao, she's Chinese-American, and former Secretary of Labor under GW Bush.
I also wonder what Rupert Murdoch and his asian wife think about this.
Are the Obama's mixed? He's "half white" ya know. Hmmm... Wonder what they'd say in Kentucky...
far left loon >.<
One thing I love about the Obama family is that they remind me of my own (very mixed) extended family. We're Latino, we're African-American, we're Asian, we're of European descent, Native American, etc. etc.
Maybe I should encourage my mom's side of the family to have our reunion in Kentucky. :P Can't be too much more awkward than when 30 of us all walked into a Denny's in the Central Coast after my Grandpa's wake...
"The greatest tyranny is censoring information in order to be better able to control people." - Cristina Saralegui
... is the same as taxed bigotry. Don't want the nutjobs thinking they're entitled because they pay taxes.
but what is the point of religion again?
Considering the Earth is 6,000 years old, 44 years (less than 1%) ain't all that bad!!!
The Human Genome Project proved it.
You can't ban what doesn't exist.
Seems like Melvin Thompson’s Alzheimer’s just kicked in and he’s back in 1957.
What's the other eight voter's excuse?
another example of good Christians doing the work of the Lord. We like to think that we're beyond all that nasty racism, but we're so not. Don't they have legal grounds to file a law suit? They should, but leave the church anyway. They should be punished by revoking their tax exempt status.
Churches have complete autonomy in whether to accept or reject someone as a member, no matter what the reason.
"Others attending the church business meeting declined to take a stand on the issue." This is what bothers me most about the whole story.
At least when someone's openly bigoted, you know it, and know who to avoid.
I would love for someone to ask Mich McConnell about THAT.
A small church in Pike County, Kentucky has voted to ban interracial couples from most church activities "to promote greater unity among the church body."
"Last Sunday, church members voted 9-6 in favor of Thompson's proposed ban. Others attending the church business meeting declined to take a stand on the issue."
You have three groups in this church now. With one group in favor of the ban the second smaller group against it and a third group, of an unknown number, who can't or won't decide what the correct decision should be. So much for unity. I guess the anti-ban people will be going to a deferent church from now on.
As the church lady would say, isn't that special.
Dear IRS: What about the tax exempt status of this "institution"?
All the children of the world.
Something, something ,something, white
We are precious in his sight.
Jesus loves the little children of the world.
"When you're president -- as opposed the head of a private equity firm -- your job is not simply to maximize profits. Your job is to figure out how everybody in the country has a fair shot." - President Barack Obama
It's legal in Tennessee to marry a first cousin. I wonder if there are any first-cousin couples in that church?
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