No Place for Gay Hatred, Charles Worley

We at Movieguide have taken a strong stand against Christians being demeaned by programs like GCB, but we realize that there are some churches that deserve to be called on the carpet just as hard as Robert Iger and Disney/ABC (if not harder).

Circulating on the Internet is a video of Pastor Charles Worley of Providence Road Baptist Church in Maiden, NC in which he calls for lesbians and homosexuals to be put in separate internment camps until they die out.

This is absolutely wrong. It smacks of Adolf Hitler. It is NOT REPRESENTATIVE of the attitude of most Christians and is repulsive to Movieguide and The Christian Film & Television Commission.

While we oppose gay marriage and consider homosexuality a sin, we respect lesbians and homosexuals as people God loves. We vehemently oppose hatred of lesbians and homosexuals and are appalled when someone who claims to be the pastor of a church spews such hatred.

We consider it a horrible tragedy that over 600,000 Americans have died of AIDS. Our hearts go out to the friends and families of those lost loved ones. We recognize that many people who consider themselves lesbian or homosexual are valuable contributors to society, just as many of the Jews Hitler had killed of were valuable contributors to European society. As Christians and Americans we stand prepared to guard their right to life.

Worley’s tirade will be used for years to come as evidence that Christians hate gays. In reality, his sermon is no more representative of mainstream Christianity than Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s tirades against whites were.

In a movement of 2.2 billion people who call themselves Christian there will be those that engage in behavior that horribly misrepresents the majority.

Charles Worley has brought shame to Christianity.