Westboro Baptist Church member who left because of the hate says she ‘still loves her family’
Former Westboro Baptist Church Member Megan Phelps-Roper. (Getty)
Former Westboro Baptist Church member Megan Phelps-Roper, who was shunned by her family after she left the church, has said she “still loves” them.
She left the church, famous for its “God hates fags” and “Thank God for dead soldiers” signs at military funerals, seven years ago.
But she admitted to People that she thinks about her family member that are still in the church every day.
She said: “I grew up being told non-stop how much they loved me. And I still love them so much.”
“Our duty was to declare God’s standards to the world: no adultery, no fornication, no gays, no idolatry,” she continued
“According to Gramps, what we were doing was ‘the definition of love thy neighbor.’
“He would say that we weren’t hating other groups — we were warning them of God’s hatred, giving them an opportunity to repent.”
Rev. Fred Phelps from the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas holds a ‘God Hates Fags’ sign. (Tim Boyle/Getty)
Megan Phelps-Roper left the Westboro Baptist Church when she met her husband on Twitter
Phelps-Roper left the anti-LGBT+ church when she met her now husband on Twitter and he challenged her beliefs.
She realised that “we might not just be wrong about these few issues — that we might be fundamentally mistaken in how we viewed the world… We were just flawed human beings.
“And I knew that I couldn’t keep doing what I’d always done. I could not spend my life tormenting grieving families, no matter how much I loved my own.”
The former Westboro member now does public speaking against the kinds of beliefs she once held, but still has hope for her family.
“They’re extremely intelligent people,” she said.
“They’re not stupid. And they’re not inherently hateful.
“But they’ve been taught that they have to sublimate all of their thoughts and feelings to the Westboro ideology. But I absolutely have hope for them.”
