Making Jesus Real: Burning the Koran and Honoring a Touring Fetus
During a demonstration at the Capitol on Tuesday, anti-abortion activists tore up pages from the Quran, the Muslim holy book, along with a gay pride flag and copies of six U.S. Supreme Court rulings related to religion in public schools, sodomy and abortion. But police confirm that on Tuesday evening, in a parking lot outside the Making Jesus Real Church in Pearl, Mississippi, the Koran indeed went up in flames.
Norma McCorvey, the Jane Roe behind the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion who later became an anti-abortion activist, lit the match, McEwen said. McEwen said the Quran was burned because it condones violence. And as documented by Mike Doughney of BARF.org, they certainly did.
For Muslims, desecrating the Quran or any holy book is the "highest degree of insult," [Imam Shaheed Muhammad of Masjid Muhammad of Jackson] said. Time will tell, of course, but shame and embarrassment just don't seem to be a part of Flip Benham's emotional vocabulary. Which brings us to Frank Pavone of Priests for Life and his traveling fetus.
Abortion protesters hold memorial for fetus at park
Pavone said the fetus was aborted at about 18 weeks. It has been used in demonstrations in New York and Columbus, Ohio, he said, and will be in several more before being buried. Frank Pavone's pickled fetus wasn't called Rebecca when it was fished out of its jar two years ago in Ohio for a similar mock funeral. Then it was referred to as "Baby Mercy." Otherwise, the events were much the same. Then as now -- and as last year, during OSA's Colorado crusade targeting Dr. Warren Hern -- Pavone (below, third from right) was on hand in priestly black, lending a much-needed touch of gravitas to the carnival atmosphere that Flip Benham generates by his very presence. Benham and Dave Daubenmire of Minutemen United lined up small children for the viewing in Columbus, too. Photos: Minutemen United Frank Pavone told a Clarion-Ledger reporter that he received the preserved fetus from an anonymous donor who asked him to give it a "proper burial." But only after a longer-than-proper interval, since this anointed priest continues touring the country with what he claims to believe is the corpse of a child, in a manner more redolent of P.T. Barnum than of the sacraments. And that similarity to the greatest huckster of all time just might be the most significant character trait that Father Frank Pavone and the Reverend Flip Benham have in common.
[Title photo: OSA's Flickr album]
Making Jesus Real: Burning the Koran and Honoring a Touring Fetus | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden)
Making Jesus Real: Burning the Koran and Honoring a Touring Fetus | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden)
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