Horrible Pastor Advocates Beating the Gay Out of Young Kids

**witchcurlgirl** · May 2nd, 2012, 11:04 AM

There have been some very bizarre and unfortunate arguments made in service of fighting gay marriage, but one pastor in North Carolina has just taken discourse to a dreadful new low. Pastor Sean Harris of Berean Baptist Church in Fayetteville thinks he's come up with a simple solution for preventing gay people from marrying: you just beat the shit out of small children that you suspect might be gay, and then they start acting as God intended them to and don't do crazy things like try to love one another as adults. Yeah, it's almost like he stole the words right out of Jesus's mouth. Naturally, this "plan" has stirred up some serious outrage, and when you hear the special ways in which he phrased it, you too will be heading out to the garage for your pitchfork and flaming torch.

While Pastor Harris probably has a long history of asshattery, these particular remarks—which were originally discovered by Jeremy Hooper of Good As You—were made as part of a sermon urging people to vote next week against Amendment 1, which would add a ban on gay marriage to North Carolina's constitution. Supporters of the amendment have urged religious leaders in the state to preach in favor of it, and so Sean Harris took to his pulpit and really went above and beyond the call of duty by advocating that gayness be cured through child abuse, just as God intended it. Speaking of God, may He give us all strength as we hear what exactly this monster told his congregation. (The full audio is below if you want to listen along.) According to Harris, you've got to get ‘em young:

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.

Ohhh, wow. There are a lot, A LOT of things wrong with this picture—though not the kind of things that you want to upload to YouTube and laugh about. But I think we can all agree that more parents do need send their four-year-old boys outside with very tiny shovels and make them dig very tiny ditches because how else are they going to turn into real men? Admit it, if you look outside right now, all you can see is hundreds of grown men (in pants, obviously!) digging holes in the ground. It's just what men do.

Speaking of acting like a man, Pastor Harris must feel very strongly about "manning up," because after his ditch-digging rant, he continued with this doozy:

Can I make it any clearer? Dads, the second you see your son dropping the limp wrist, you walk over there and crack that wrist. Man up. Give him a good punch. Ok? "You are not going to act like that. You were made by God to be a male and you are going to be a male."

So now we're just straight up advocating child abuse from the pulpit of a church? How very…what's the word I'm looking for? Oh yes, got it: Unchristian. It's been a while since I read the Bible cover to cover, but I feel confident that the answer to the question "What Would Jesus Do?" in this scenario is NOT "punch a small child." In fact, I think Pastor Harris is digging his ditch so deep on this one that in a second he's going to land himself right down in the bowels of hell, but I digress.

If you were worried that this evil genius wasn't going to address how to handle future lesbians, rest easy because he also has plenty of terrible advice in that department:

And when your daughter starts acting too butch you reign her in. And you say, "Oh, no, sweetheart. You can play sports. Play them to the glory of God. But sometimes you are going to act like a girl and walk like a girl and talk like a girl and smell like a girl and that means you are going to be beautiful. You are going to be attractive. You are going to dress yourself up."

Looks like somebody opened up their copy of Stereotypes for Dummies while writing their sermon. Considering that he's advocating beating the boys, it kind of feels like the girls get off easy by only being told they can still play sports as long as they concentrate on dolling themselves up the rest of—ugh, nevermind. Nobody gets off easy because all of these ideas are just 100 percent terrible. So terrible, in fact, that even Harris senses that his audience might be reluctant to embrace them. So he finishes up by addressing that issue:

You say, "Can I take charge like that as a parent?"
Yeah, you can. You are authorized. I just gave you a special dispensation this morning to do that.

And then there is an audible laugh from the audience. Really, people of God? Are you so tickled by the idea of a pastor telling you to go home and beat the crap out of your child that you actually feel compelled to LOL? That is some sick shit. If he were here right now, Jesus definitely would not be running around cracking the "limp wrists" of preschoolers, but he probably would not hesitate to crack the numb skulls of Pastor Sean Harris and his devoted followers. But until our Lord and Savior shows back up to take care of business, the state of North Carolina might want to send a child services worker (or a whole army of them) to the Berean Baptist Church to remind members of its congregation that, in fact, they are not authorized to "take charge" by punching their kid in the face and there's no such thing as "special dispensation" when it comes to abusing children.

Horrible Pastor Advocates Beating the Gay Out of Young Kids

**Mel1973** · May 2nd, 2012, 11:26 AM

oh.mah.gawd.

Can I make it any clearer? Dads, the second you see your son dropping the limp wrist, you walk over there and crack that wrist. Man up. Give him a good punch. Ok? "You are not going to act like that. You were made by God to be a male and you are going to be a male."

And when your daughter starts acting too butch you reign her in. And you say, "Oh, no, sweetheart. You can play sports. Play them to the glory of God. But sometimes you are going to act like a girl and walk like a girl and talk like a girl and smell like a girl and that means you are going to be beautiful. You are going to be attractive. You are going to dress yourself up."

**gas_chick** · May 2nd, 2012, 11:42 AM

I adovate beating this man to death.

**Laurent** · May 2nd, 2012, 11:50 AM

And he's done a 180 and is claiming it was a joke and he misspoke now.

Published: 08:00 AM, Wed May 02, 2012

Berean Baptist pastor disavows advice to punch gay kids as a joke

By Gregory Phillips
Staff writer

A Fayetteville pastor says he was joking when he told parents in a sermon Sunday to hit children who show signs of being gay.

Sean Harris, pastor of Berean Baptist Church on Glensford Drive, said he does not advocate hitting children and wishes he could take back a remark encouraging fathers to punch boys who act effeminately.

But he defended his belief in the need to reinforce traditional gender roles in children.

"If I had to say it again, I would say it differently, no doubt," Harris said Tuesday. "Those weren't planned words, but what I do stand by is that the word of God makes it clear that effeminate behavior is ungodly. I'm not going to compromise on that."

Harris was preaching about marriage ahead of next week's vote on an amendment to the N.C. Constitution that would make marriage between a man and a woman the only legally recognized domestic union in the state. The amendment has drawn national attention in recent weeks.

Harris' comments spread rapidly Tuesday on the Internet after a snippet of his fiery 55-minute sermon was posted to several blogs.

In the clip, Harris berates parents who see boys dressing like girls without "squashing that like a cockroach."

"Can I make it any clearer?" he yells on the recording. "Dads, the second you see that son dropping the limp wrist, you walk over there and crack that wrist. Man up. Give them a good punch. OK?"

Laughter and a few shouts of "Amen" can be heard in response.

The sermon saw Harris urge parents of girls who are "acting too butch" to make them "walk like a girl and talk like a girl, and smell like a girl."

Activists angry

Harris' remarks drew fire from gay rights campaigners.

"I feel like we have our very own Westboro Baptist Church right here in Fayetteville," said Storm Silvermane, president of the Alliance, an advocacy group for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people in the Sandhills.

Silvermane was referencing the church that pickets soldier funerals with signs calling their deaths America's punishment for tolerating homosexuality.

Advocates for children were unimpressed, too.

"We do not condone any violence against children by anyone," said Roberta Humphries, executive director of Fayetteville's Child Advocacy Center.

"We know that children thrive when they grow up in safe, stable, nurturing relationships," said Rosie Allen Ryan, president of the nonprofit Prevent Child Abuse North Carolina. "Unfortunately, this pastor is telling his congregation to harm their children. We know that when children are fearful and feel unsafe, that they're far more likely to suffer emotionally, socially and physically."

Harris said he "would never ever advocate" hitting a child."

Given an opportunity to rephrase his remarks, Harris said "that would be a lengthy conversation. I don't know I could say anything you could capture in five words."

Berean Baptist has a code of parental discipline on its website, supported by biblical references, that endorses spanking but adds that "we reject the idea that bruising is ever the objective when disciplining a child."

The church operates a kindergarten-through-12th-grade school, Berean Baptist Academy, which graduated 18 seniors last year.

Harris said the school has its own discipline policy that he called "completely non-physical in any way, shape or form. A teacher never - I cannot emphasize this enough - a teacher never touches a child, other than to protect the child from harm."

Phone calls, emails

Harris said he polled his pastoral staff and members of the congregation Tuesday after he started getting telephone calls and abusive emails once his comments went viral.

From within the church, Harris said, "the response was, 'Pastor, we know you didn't mean that.' "

"We know when you're saying something seriously and when were supposed to just understand the intent and not the application,' " Harris said.

Harris said in the sermon that same-sex couples are free to live together.

He argued Tuesday that there was "not an ounce of hate being communicated in that," but said in the sermon that such couples live together "in the most sick and ungodly way."

After listening to the sermon Tuesday, a divinity professor at Campbell University called it "one of the most disappointing and un-Christ-like diatribes I have ever heard."

"I would not dishonor the word 'sermon' by identifying it as such," said Tony Cartledge, who teaches Old Testament at Campbell, a Baptist university in Harnett County.

He noted Berean Baptist appears to be an independent congregation.

"We must be careful not to assume that every Baptist, or even everyone who believes homosexual behavior to be sinful, would endorse Harris' over-the-top promotion of beating gay tendencies out of their children," Cartledge said via email. "At the same time, we have to state unequivocally that Harris' position presents a distorted view of scripture that is completely out of keeping with the teachings of Jesus."

FayObserver.com - Berean Baptist pastor disavows advice to punch gay kids as a joke

**Seth82** · May 2nd, 2012, 11:59 AM

yeah that was a really a joke

He meant every word he said

**hustle4alivin** · May 2nd, 2012, 12:10 PM

Originally Posted by Seth82

yeah that was a really a joke

He meant every word he said

Yep. I know of people who would co-sign with his ignorant ass 100%.

No wonder I feel some type of way about certain types of church folks, I swear.

**McJag** · May 2nd, 2012, 02:29 PM

He just makes my skin crawl.

**caramel** · May 2nd, 2012, 03:04 PM

well that advice sounds like it works, sounds to me that he has been gotten the gay beaten out of himself and im sure he is hammering little boys with his dick to prove it.

**OrangeSlice** · May 2nd, 2012, 04:17 PM

Sigh. NC will be the new Florida/Ohio.

**MrsDark** · May 2nd, 2012, 04:33 PM

I watched a clip of this dude. Talk about a self-hating queen. I guess daddy also smacked him in the head a bit too hard when he used to do the same to him.

**Just Kill Me** · May 3rd, 2012, 12:45 AM

What an absolute piece of shit.
Posted from my iPhone

**greysfang** · May 6th, 2012, 12:26 AM

Can we beat the stupid out of him, or at least try? He might end up beaten to death though.

**NVash** · May 7th, 2012, 12:32 PM

Well heres another fine example of a man who makes Christians look bad. I guess it must be ridiculously easy to get a degree to be a preacher these days.