Westboro Baptist founder Fred Phelps dying

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As Socrates says, nobody does evil willingly: if he knew that his opinion was wrong and stilted, he wouldn’t have had any reason to hold onto it. So we don’t have reason to hate him but actually to pity him because he was so misguided, and so deceived (just as I’m sure that there are many deceptions in my life, of which I am currently ignorant).

Have mercy on us, O God have mercy on us, for laying aside all excuses we sinners offer unto thee our master this supplication: Have mercy on us.
 
Son_of_Niall said:
Read more: nydailynews.com/news/national/westboro-baptist-church-founder-fred-phelps-reportedly-death-article-1.1723451#ixzz2wAFQeS00
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I think those Christians who are near the facility his is dying in, ought to bring signs filled with love and concern & positive hope of forgiveness and stand vigil with prayer. And the same should be done at his funeral, signs filled with love & sympathy for those who loved him.

This would truly be how to “Do unto others ad you’d have then do unto you”. It may fall on deaf ears, but it may also strike hearts towards repentance.
 
Recently I read the book Banished by Lauren Drain, who was excommunicated from WBC some years back - as a Kansan with family ties to Topeka, as well as one who deplores the protests of funerals, which should be private and families respected, I was interested.

amazon.com/Banished-Surviving-Westboro-Baptist-Church/dp/1455512427/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395017214&sr=1-1&keywords=banished+lauren+drain

The book itself, I wouldn’t give the highest rating as a piece of writing - I think Ms. Drain’s experiences are still too raw and unprocessed, and the book would have been better with more time perspective. I’ve also looked at Drain’s Facebook page and seen that in her well-intentioned efforts to fight against the WBC’s brand of hate, she has gone further than I can agree with on supporting gay marriage etc.

Still, none of this is the real point of my post here, which I shall now get to:

In the book, Ms. Drain mentions that Fred Phelps Sr. back in the early years of his life, was a candidate for West Point, and went on a weekend visit, and came back with the hatred of the military and gays for which he is so infamous now.

If her account is true, it’s pretty easy to connect the dots and imagine that probably a gay man at West Point came on to him or worse assaulted him, and that he has never worked through this trauma, probably because of the shame and embarrassment and fear that others would think he “asked for it” or was gay himself, in the world at that time. There was no Oprah or Dr. Phil to go on and spill all back in the day, and even going to a psychiatrist would have been incredibly stigmatizing.

So I have some degree of pity for a very mixed up person, and for those he dragged into his denial along with him. Another good clarification Lauren Drain’s book makes is that though the church is called “Westboro Baptist Church,” the actual theology is a Calvinism that basically says everyone is predestined to hell - except for the members in good standing of the WBC. They’re not even trying to convert people, they’re just gloating that they’re the only ones who’ll be saved. It boggles the mind. 😦
 
3DOCTORS said:
Recently I read the book Banished by Lauren Drain, who was excommunicated from WBC some years back - as a Kansan with family ties to Topeka, as well as one who deplores the protests of funerals, which should be private and families respected, I was interested.

amazon.com/Banished-Surviving-Westboro-Baptist-Church/dp/1455512427/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395017214&sr=1-1&keywords=banished+lauren+drain

The book itself, I wouldn’t give the highest rating as a piece of writing - I think Ms. Drain’s experiences are still too raw and unprocessed, and the book would have been better with more time perspective. I’ve also looked at Drain’s Facebook page and seen that in her well-intentioned efforts to fight against the WBC’s brand of hate, she has gone further than I can agree with on supporting gay marriage etc.

Still, none of this is the real point of my post here, which I shall now get to:

In the book, Ms. Drain mentions that Fred Phelps Sr. back in the early years of his life, was a candidate for West Point, and went on a weekend visit, and came back with the hatred of the military and gays for which he is so infamous now.

If her account is true, it’s pretty easy to connect the dots and imagine that probably a gay man at West Point came on to him or worse assaulted him, and that he has never worked through this trauma, probably because of the shame and embarrassment and fear that others would think he “asked for it” or was gay himself, in the world at that time. There was no Oprah or Dr. Phil to go on and spill all back in the day, and even going to a psychiatrist would have been incredibly stigmatizing.

So I have some degree of pity for a very mixed up person, and for those he dragged into his denial along with him. Another good clarification Lauren Drain’s book makes is that though the church is called “Westboro Baptist Church,” the actual theology is a Calvinism that basically says everyone is predestined to hell - except for the members in good standing of the WBC. They’re not even trying to convert people, they’re just gloating that they’re the only ones who’ll be saved. It boggles the mind. 😦
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If true, it makes a lot of sense.
Word is the family is keeping those other family members, like his son, who were excommunicated from seeing their father.
Swallowed up by the very hate they produced.
 
I’m kind of confused at the term excommunicated used by the son, Nathan. I know for a fact baptists do not use that kind of terminology. Anyone have any other resources that back up the “excommunicated” son’s mentioning of his own father being excommunicated from his on church?

Am I reading this right? Fred phelps “excommunicated” from his own church? Bizarre.
 
Dear Merciful Lord.

Please show your forgiveness and bounty to Fred Phelps, that he may know your ultimate love and see that you bear no relationship to the hatred and fear he has espoused over his lifetime. And I beg of Thee to help his family come to know who you truly are, and not the lord of hatred and enmity they have, in their blindness, imputed unto Thee.
 
DJgang said:
I’m kind of confused at the term excommunicated used by the son, Nathan. I know for a fact baptists do not use that kind of terminology. Anyone have any other resources that back up the “excommunicated” son’s mentioning of his own father being excommunicated from his on church?

Am I reading this right? Fred phelps “excommunicated” from his own church? Bizarre.
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Again, going on what Lauren Drain’s book says, the WBC is not really Baptist at all. Also, when you read a media report, it may use a word such as “excommunicated” that is understood by the general public in a general way, rather than in a way specific to a doctrinal belief of a given religious body. Kind of like when they report that a priest or minister has been “defrocked.” It’s just sort of understood.

And the WBC is just very bizarre in general, so all bets are off. In a cult, the leader has power, and the underlings are often infighting to claim some power for themselves. It’s rather dog-eat-dog competition. So when the leader weakens, there are going to be others vying to claim that position and status. Plus things have revolved around a personality and when that strong personality is no longer the center around which everything orbits, the whole system is thrown into chaos.
 
TK421 said:
…Oh God, may this poor, abandoned creature crawl before the altar of your infinite mercy in his final moments. This man was once a baby who looked around the world you have created with a wonder and newness towards all things. God, our faith is so very weak for men such as this, but what is impossible for man is possible for you. Make all things new, Jesus Christ.
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Amen.

I, too, find this prayer touching and heartfelt. Thanks for this.
 
It’s good to see the Christians in here taking the high road. Good for you all. Since I’m not Christian, I have no burden to play nice and I’ll just say what everyone on here wants to say but feels they shouldn’t.

He’s a hateful, onerous beast of a man and the world can’t be rid of him fast enough. Hopefully his personality cult will die off with him and they’ll vanish into the bowels of historical nothingness.

Good riddance.
 
NoWings said:
It’s good to see the Christians in here taking the high road. Good for you all. Since I’m not Christian, I have no burden to play nice and I’ll just say what everyone on here wants to say but feels they shouldn’t.

He’s a hateful, onerous beast of a man and the world can’t be rid of him fast enough. Hopefully his personality cult will die off with him and they’ll vanish into the bowels of historical nothingness.

Good riddance.
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"everyone on here wants to say but feels they shouldn’t."Not true. It never entered my mind. Not everyone wants to say that. You do, so speak for yourself.
 
As a veteran, I was also angered by his protests at the funerals of our brave young men and women.

But I will pray for him, his Church, and his followers that they come to see and believe in the True God of love.
 
He taught his family to hate. Now that he’s dying, the family he raised has turned on him.
There’s a real lesson here for people to learn about what hate does.
It kills.
It kills the body, it kills the soul, it kills the mind. Hate of any kind, even hate against Fred Phelps himself. Christians of any variety should not dance on his (soon to be) grave, they need to pray for his soul and the souls of those he has left behind.
Phelps’ disregard for human life, given to us by the God he said he worshipped, in picketing funerals is pure evil. Someone here said nobody does evil willingly. That is just not true. Some are so enamoured with the dark corners of thier soul, they will go to any lengths to feed it. I pray he repents before the end. I pray those he leaves behind will abandon this dark path they are on.
 
acacia12 said:
"everyone on here wants to say but feels they shouldn’t."Not true. It never entered my mind. Not everyone wants to say that. You do, so speak for yourself.
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Of course it didn’t enter your mind. You don’t have the man and his toadies traipsing across the UK.

Stop trying to nitpick my statement in some faux Aha! moment. I’m sure that bushmen in the Congo don’t feel that way about him, either. It’s an understood generalization.
 
3DOCTORS said:
Again, going on what Lauren Drain’s book says, the WBC is not really Baptist at all. Also, when you read a media report, it may use a word such as “excommunicated” that is understood by the general public in a general way, rather than in a way specific to a doctrinal belief of a given religious body. Kind of like when they report that a priest or minister has been “defrocked.” It’s just sort of understood.

And the WBC is just very bizarre in general, so all bets are off. In a cult, the leader has power, and the underlings are often infighting to claim some power for themselves. It’s rather dog-eat-dog competition. So when the leader weakens, there are going to be others vying to claim that position and status. Plus things have revolved around a personality and when that strong personality is no longer the center around which everything orbits, the whole system is thrown into chaos.
Click to expand...
Ok, got it. He can’t lead so he’s been thrown out maybe? The son did use the word excommunicated though, maybe they use that word within their cult. Thanks for explaining.
 
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