Texas hate preacher claims being gay is ‘worse than eating Indian food’ – PinkNews
Jonathan Shelley, a pastor for a church considered a hate group by activists. (Screen capture via YouTube)
Anti-LGBTQ+ hate preacher Jonathan Shelley has attacked LGBTQ+ people – again – making wild claims about gay men’s intestines falling out, and saying he’d rather eat eat vomit than be gay.
Shelley of the Stedfast Baptist Church in Watauga, Texas, delivered a sermon that has since been removed from YouTube, asking: “Why is someone a homosexual?”
In the video Shelley said: “What men do with men is defiling their body, hurting their body, they’re hurting each other.”
In a bid to prove that men are “causing themselves all kinds of problems”, he stated: “Their intestines will sometimes just fall out because of the actions that they do.”
Unsure of if that statement was quite enough homophobia, Shelley then decided to compare gay sex to eating Indian food.
Referring to gay sex he said: “Pastor Shelley, you’re gonna have to eat Indian food and ranch dressing every day of your life, or do that one time?
“It’s like, bring on the Indian food.
“What if you, Pastor Shelley, what if you had to eat Indian food and ranch and then vomit it up and then eat it again, or do that one time? It’s like, bring on the vomit.”
In a sermon now removed from YouTube, Christian hate-preacher Jonathan Shelley asked “Why is someone a homosexual?”
His response was a litany of bigotry and lies, including the statement that “their intestines will sometimes just fall out because of the actions that they do.” pic.twitter.com/r4738F2yBS
— Hemant Mehta (@hemantmehta) October 18, 2022
In an attempt to answer his video’s title, Shelley claimed men become gay due to “hating God”, and because they were “molested as children”.
His bigotry continued as he mentioned that it was “impossible” for him to be gay due to being “saved”.
He also touched on gay people “reproducing” through “child molestation” and “preying on children”. This toxic rhetoric has been adopted by right wings, anti-LGBTQ+ campaigners trying to smear queer people as “groomers” of children.
This year New York City mayor Eric Adams led a chorus of criticism against a Queens councilwoman who said drag queens are “grooming” kids.
Shelley’s comments about eating vomit appear to have been lifted directly from a recent hate-filled rant by preacher Steve Anderson.
Anderson, who is the founder of the New Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) movement, said in a recent sermon: “I would rather eat my own vomit out of a bowl with a spoon every day for the rest of my life until I’m 100 years old than to engage in what they do one single time.”
Christian hate-preacher Steven Anderson says he’d rather eat his own vomit “out of a bowl with a spoon every day for the rest of my life until I’m 100” than do anything gay. pic.twitter.com/BakmAjBRDd
— Hemant Mehta (@hemantmehta) October 12, 2022
Shelley’s church is part of the New IFB which is a network of independent churches concentrated in the US.
The churches are connected by their “belief in certain religious doctrines and a shared brand of deeply anti-LGBTQ and antisemitic teachings,” according to ADL.org, a group which campaigns against antisemitism and extremism.
The Southern Poverty Law Centre has previously labelled Shelley’s church an “anti-LGBT hate group” after its pastor, Dillon Awes, said gay people should be “lined up against the wall and shot in the back of the head”.
This recent speech isn’t the first time Shelley has spouted bile about queer people, as earlier this year he told children he can’t wait for LGBTQ+ people to go to Hell.
It follows anti-LGBTQ+ pastor Donnie Romero, who preached at the Stedfast Baptist Church, being forced to step down after it emerged he has been sleeping with prostitutes.
Pinknews has contacted Stedfast Baptist Church and Shelley for comment.