NOM BLOG

Hate messages spray-painted on two CA catholic churches

 

From the California Catholic Daily:

The vandals who spray-painted “Kill the Cathlics” on a wall of Catholic church in Anaheim a week ago apparently traveled about 20 miles to a parish in Irvine to scrawl an identical message on a walkway at St. Thomas More parish.

“An identical phrase (with misspelling) was spray-painted on a wall at Saint Boniface Catholic Church in Anaheim,” the Orange County Register reported in three-paragraph story on Jan. 13. “Both incidents were discovered (last) Tuesday morning.”

While we don't know the motivations of the vandals this time around, we do know Catholic, Mormon (and other religious) places of worship have been targeted in retaliation for their stand on SSM.

For instance, ABC News reported in early 2009 that vandals spray-painted swastikas on a Catholic church in San Francisco's Castro District and, as LifeSiteNews reports, "At least eight Mormon buildings in Salt Lake City, the religion’s headquarters, [were] vandalized with spray-painted epithets criticizing the church’s support of Proposition 8"  in 2008.

There has been a national conversation since the Tuscon shooting about the need to condemn deliberately-hateful rhetoric and overtly-violent actions. The way both sides conduct themselves in the debate over the meaning and definition of marriage should be a part of this conversation.

If words and symbols can hurt, spray painted messages and defamation of publicly property surely harms.

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