#974 - Megan Phelps-Roper

Joe Rogan (0:02)

Three, two, one, yes.

Are we live? Not yet.

Megan Phelps-Roper (0:11)

Pause, hold.

Joe Rogan (0:14)

YouTube.

Some sort of a struggle. Yeah, we're live. Okay, how are you? You're a Wheeler Walker Jr. fan, I see?

Megan Phelps-Roper (0:23)

Um, I, maybe I will be.

Joe Rogan (0:25)

You will? You never heard of him before?

Megan Phelps-Roper (0:27)

I hadn't, I confess.

Joe Rogan (0:29)

That's okay.

So first of all, thank you. Thanks for doing this. I appreciate it.

Megan Phelps-Roper (0:33)

Yeah, no problem.

Joe Rogan (0:34)

What is it like?

I mean, I guess this is the best way to get this started. What is it like being a person that grew up in the Westboro Baptist Church for a person on the outside, for me, when I think of that, I think of like this crazy, hateful, angry environment filled with like really mean people that say horrible things about gay people and all sorts of other folks, but I meet you and you're super nice. You seem so normal.

Megan Phelps-Roper (1:03)

That is the conundrum. So, I mean, a lot of the things, the words that you just used to describe the church, that's definitely not how I experienced it growing up, for the most part.

I mean, my family, outside of when they're not on the picket line, they're incredibly kind and gentle and compassionate and I think the biggest misconception about the church is that they're motivated by hatred.

And in their eyes, it's the definition of loving. What we thought we were doing, what we were doing was loving our neighbor. So the first time that phrase appears in the Bible, it's in the context of when you see your neighbor sinning, you have to rebuke him, not just like watch him wander off on this way to hell. So that was how we saw it. We thought we were warning people and giving them the only hopeful message that could save them from eternity in hell.

Joe Rogan (1:53)

Was there ever any dissent amongst the people that were in the church about how the message is being distributed? Like if you're holding up a sign that says, God hates fags, and a gay guy was being buried at a funeral, and you guys were there protesting with those signs, was there ever anyone inside the organization that was like, hey, this is not the way to do it, these people are suffering and mourning?

Megan Phelps-Roper (2:17)

Not really. I mean, once my grandfather, he was the one who kind of developed that strategy, he thought. So, you know, the examples are for funerals.

If somebody, if they're burying somebody, so a soldier, say, or a gay person, it's an example of the curses of God. So God says, if you obey me, I'll bless you, and if you disobey me, I'll curse you.

Joe Rogan (2:42)

So why soldiers?

Megan Phelps-Roper (2:44)

So several times in the scriptures, it's this connection between the sins of the nation and the punishments. So for instance, in the Book of Judges, it says, they chose new gods, then was war in their gates.

And then in the Books of the Kings, it says, they fell down many slain because the war was of God. And then in the Book of Hosea, it says, they have deeply corrupted themselves, therefore I will remember their iniquity and I will visit their sins, though they bring up their children, yet will I bereave them, that there shall not be a man left. So it's these threatenings, these warnings from God, that if you disobey me, I'm going to curse you. So we would go to these soldiers, these soldiers' funerals to warn the living, to say that if you don't want to be likewise punished, you have to repent, you have to change your ways and obey God.

Joe Rogan (3:37)

Now, people that are also hardcore Christians, that also follow the word of God very closely, but still would see like what you guys were doing at these funerals, holding up these signs, protesting where a soldier who supposedly gave his life for our freedom, right, supposedly they're over there fighting so that we could be safe here, and then you guys are out there with these signs. Like there had to be a lot of people that have like-minded views in Christianity, but still were furious at people.

Megan Phelps-Roper (4:08)

Yeah, absolutely. And from our perspective, we thought that they were substituting their righteousness for the righteousness of God. So they were upset that we were out there giving this message that was 100% biblical from our point of view. And God calls that compassion when He sends His servants with His message. So we thought even though they call themselves Christians, they're ignoring these vast swaths of the Bible that support what we were saying and how we were saying it.