Is he really going to tell us that it meant nothing when Judas kissed Jesus?

As readers probably recall, nut job Pastor Sean Harris' gay-children hating comments at a recent sermon made national headlines and sent Americans into a convulsing rage -- and we're not not just talking about liberals and gays.

It seems even the most faithful and godly can't deal with the North Carolina Baptist preacher. To prove that he sure as hell doesn't speak for all Christians, Faithful America, a faith-based Washington, D.C., nonprofit, has circulated a petition denouncing the pastor's comments encouraging parents to attack and hit their young, effeminate sons. The comments came a week before state voters are to decide whether to ban gay marriage tomorrow.

According to the petition:

"Faithful Christians are appalled by Pastor Sean Harris's hateful tirade urging violence against gay and lesbian youth. Violence and child abuse can never be justified by the teachings of Jesus Christ. All young people, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, should be assured in church that they are beloved children of God."

More >>

North Carolina's worst Christian

Californians have good reason to hang our heads in shame over the fact that the Republican-loving state of Iowa allows gays to get married and we somehow don't. But, hey, at least we aren't living in the gay-hating state of North Carolina, where apparently there is no limit to public homophobia.

The latest news from the Old North State, which is set to vote on a constitutional amendment double-super-banning the gay marriage it's already made illegal, is that some wacko pastor named Sean Harris gave us all a really good reason to dump organized religion when he suggested to his congregation that parents should beat the holy gay out of their homosexual -- or "effeminate" --children.

Here's a snippet of his ungodly speech he delivered to Berean Baptist Church:

"So your little son starts to act a little girlish when he is four years old and instead of squashing that like a cockroach and saying, "Man up, son, get that dress off you and get outside and dig a ditch, because that is what boys do," you get out the camera and you start taking pictures of Johnny acting like a female and then you upload it to YouTube and everybody laughs about it and the next thing you know, this dude, this kid is acting out childhood fantasies that should have been squashed."

More >>

Wait. Didn't Jesus and Judas kiss?

If the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence's Hunky Jesus Contest on Easter just wasn't enough to piss-off the Catholics, next Sunday's world premiere of the documentary Corpus Christi: Playing with Redemption at the Castro Theatre probably will.

The film follows 108 Productions' revival of Terrence Mcnally's play Corpus Christi, a retelling of the story of Jesus with the messiah depicted as a gay man in 1950s Texas. Since the play's New York debut in 1998, it has garnered much protest and controversy.

And for those of you homophobes who are too lazy to leave the house to protest the film, a Catholic group, America Needs Fatima, has made it easy for you. Go to this website, and you will find a form letter protesting the "blasphemous homosexual play." Just type in your own name and hit send, as some 13,000 people so far have done. 

Here's what the letter states:

I strongly protest against the showing of the blasphemous play Corpus Christi,which includes a Christ-like figure who reportedly has sexual relations with his apostles, and of the movie which promotes it, Corpus Christi: Playing with Redemption. The Person of Jesus Christ is Sacred and untouchable. To portray Him as a homosexual, or even to insinuate it, is an unspeakable blasphemy which I reject with all my soul.

More >>

W.W.J.D?

The only thing that might make Good Friday even better for some is a loud protest of the Catholic Church. We'll leave that one to San Francisco's AIDS activists who have made a long list of institutions they plan to shame today, including banks, cops, and Catholics.More >>

Courtesy of SFPD

Occupiers were either planning to sit in the chairs or throw them at cops ... one of the two

The San Francisco Archdiocese made it very clear that it is there to serve God, not the 99 percent. The religious leaders yesterday afternoon ordered police to start rounding up occupiers and arresting them a day after protesters descended on the church's vacant building on Turk Street, pledging to turn the site into a permanent space for the homeless.

Initially, S.F. Catholics had instructed police to hold off on messing with occupiers, which gave protesters plenty of time to start prepping for a fight; when police did raid the building, they found the gates had been heavily barricaded along with piles of bricks, chairs, and buckets of paint on the rooftop. "There was concern that these items were going to be used as weapons against police officers," said Sgt. Michael Andraychak.

When police entered the building, occupiers retreated into rooms, many of which had also been barricaded from the inside. Others locked themselves on the second floor, and one person jumped from the roof and was arrested by police upon his landing.
 
More >>

A letter of apology from apocalypse-predicting nonagenarian radio preacher Harold Camping was released yesterday on his Family Radio website. "Yes, we humbly acknowledge we were wrong about the timing," Camping writes, and he even goes so far as to call his prediction "incorrect and sinful." More >>

Last month, SF Weekly published a cover story revealing that two candidates for Catholic sainthood -- including Mother Teresa, founder of the Missionaries of Charity order and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize -- had taken steps to protect convicted pedophile priest Donald McGuire after molestation allegations were lodged against him by a Bay Area family in 1993.

Mother Teresa's implication in the McGuire scandal comes through a typed 1994 letter, never before published, in which she appears to urge the priest's Jesuit superior to return him to active ministry despite the abuse allegation. (McGuire returned to ministry, and molested multiple additional boys before his arrest in 2003.) While the letter is unsigned, it bears a salutation in her characteristic handwriting, and contains strong clues indicating Mother Teresa as the author. For instance, the letter-writer refers by name to the nun's four top deputies, calling them "my assistants."

We just came across a videotaped response to our story that was published by Mary Johnson. A former Missionaries of Charity nun, Johnson left the order after 20 years and has just published a book, An Unquenchable Thirst, detailing her experiences working under Mother Teresa. She read our story and the letter, which we published online.

More >>

Photo courtesy Tyrone Cefalu

Mother Teresa, pictured with Donald McGuire

​We've been getting quite a range of reaction to yesterday's cover story on Mother Teresa's links to convicted pedophile priest Donald McGuire. Documents obtained by SF Weekly indicate that the "Saint of Calcutta" might have urged Jesuit officials to overlook a sex-abuse allegation against McGuire by a Walnut Creek boy in 1993.More >>

Patron saint of predators?

​That's the subject of the latest SF Weekly cover story, which examines Jesuit records suggesting that Mother Teresa of Calcutta, founder of the international Missionaries of Charity order and winner of the 1979 Nobel Peace Prize, asked Catholic Church officials to overlook a sex-abuse accusation made against one of her favorite priests by a teenage boy from the Bay Area.

An unsigned letter in the thousands of pages of church documents turned over to plaintiffs suing the Jesuits over the actions of convicted pedophile and former priest Donald McGuire asks that McGuire be allowed to continue working, despite a 1993 complaint against him by a family from Walnut Creek. As we explain in our story, there are indications throughout the letter that it was written by Mother Teresa, though it cannot be verified absolutely as coming from her hand.

Other letters obtained by SF Weekly also cast a shadow on the reputation of deceased priest John Hardon. Like Mother Teresa, Hardon is now being formally reviewed for sainthood by the Vatican. However, letters he wrote reveal that he had no objection to McGuire reading pornography and taking showers with a boy who traveled with him as his assistant. Hardon's letters also indicate that he personally communicated the sex-abuse allegations against McGuire to Mother Teresa.

More >>

Harold Camping

​A newly contrite Harold Camping told his followers in an audio broadcast last week that he is at a loss to explain why the world didn't end on Oct. 21, as he had so astutely predicted.

It was the third time Camping, president of the Oakland-based Family Radio network, had predicted the Rapture on a specific date -- only to be wrong. Two of those failed forecasts came in the past six months. Camping also wrote a book, 1994?, that erroneously set the date of the apocalypse in the eponymous year.

Most recently, Camping said the world would "probably" end earlier this month. When the world's continued existence proved him wrong, he took to the airwaves last week to offer a muted apology to believers and non-believers alike.

More >>