Lawmakers this year may create a protective bubble of privacy for funerals in Colorado, now that an anti-gay church in Kansas has brought its national campaign of military-funeral protests to Colorado.
The family of the notorious Rev. Fred Phelps, which makes up most of the congregation of his Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, recently protested outside the funeral for a fallen Fort Carson soldier in Colorado Springs. They say war deaths are proof that God is punishing the United States for what they see as its over-tolerance of gays.
Their recent demonstration has prompted Rep. Michael Merrifield, D-Manitou Springs, to pursue a bill that would keep them away from funerals in the future, he said.
He wants protesters of any stripe to be kept 300 feet away from any funeral, he said.
“This is, in our lives, one of our most private moments, and we should have the right to do that without being screamed at or jeered,” Merrifield said.
“This will deny (Phelps) the ability to stand in your face when you’re mourning your loved ones. He and his followers can scream and chant, but they’re going to have to do it 300 feet away.”
He intends to introduce the bill next week, he said.
Phelps’ daughter, Shirley Phelps-Roper, said the church will oppose the legislation, as it has opposed similar measures in other states.
“If our signs read ‘God bless America’ … we would not be having this conversation,” she said Thursday. “They want to rid the landscape of someone telling them plainly that it is a curse, from the Lord your God, when your children come home dead in the war.”
Phelps and his followers routinely mount protests across the country – at churches with which they disagree and at military funerals and other events. They protested outside the funeral of murdered University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard. More recently, they protested outside funerals for the men who died in the West Virginia coal-mine explosion this winter, Phelps-Roper said.
They will return to Colorado next week to protest at the Capitol, at the Denver office of U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar and at several area churches, she said.
Merrifield condemned Phelps for his tactics.
“I’ve got to say, he gives the title of reverend a bad name, and my father was a reverend,” Merrifield said.
Staff writer Jim Hughes can be reached at 303-820-1244 or jhughes@denverpost.com.
