Senior Pastor Tom Vineyard on Tuesday, November 15, proudly stood up in front of the Oklahoma City Council and railed against a bill that would, if passed, extend a little bit of equality to a much-maligned minority: LGBT people. The bill passed 7-2, and added “sexual orientation” to Oklahoma City’s anti-discrimination law. But Dr. Tom Vineyard, a Baptist Minister, used the occasion anyway to do as much damage as he possibly could to the LGBT community — no doubt, some of whom are his own congregants.
“Judge John Martaugh, chief magistrate of the New York City Criminal Court stated, ‘Homosexuals account for half the murders in large cities’,” Pastor Vineyard decried. (Of course, we on’t know if that means that gays are murderers or murder victims, but it’s patently false regardless.)
Vineyard also couched his attack with glaring statistics about the health of “homosexuals,” citing strange statistics that would make any normal person blush.
Then, in the midst of the Penn State child sex abuse and rape scandal that has rocked our nation, the good Pastor Vineyard said, “Homosexuals commit more than 33% of all the reported child molestations in the U.S. Many homosexuals openly admit that they are pedophiles because they cannot actually reproduce, they resort to recruiting children.”
Vineyard went on to talk about NAMBLA, and, well, you can hear his entire disgusting screed in this video, all four minutes of it.
So of course I decided I had to check Vineyard’s statement. It wasn’t hard to find his speech nestled away on various right wing message boards and forums. But it also wasn’t hard to find someone else who took the exact same journey to discover and debunk Vineyard’s lies.
Meet Stephanie Zvan, writing at Almost Diamonds. Zvan, in, “A Good Lie for Jesus Is Immortal,” writes,
According to Google, the information comes from New York City Chief Magistrate John “Martaugh.†So it looks like a judge probably did say it, but who is this judge?
Except…essentially all the hits returned under that name are from religious sources providing the same bogus statistic–about 17,000 of them. Hmm. A random sampling suggests that they’re citing a 1992 letter to the editor from anti-gay activist and evangelical Jerry Kaifetz. And Google wants me to look up Judge John Murtagh instead. So I do that.
That’s when I find that Murtagh was chief magistrate until 1960. That’s when I discover that he was an anti-â€pervert†crusader in the early 1950s. That’s when I see he’s the guy who ran Lenny Bruce’s obscenity trial straight into a conviction.
So, what am I left with after my digging? A 1992 claim that a judge who wanted “perverts†out of his city said something (maybe) back in the 1950s without any reference so that we can check it out ourselves, as we might want to do when we find the basics of the claim, like the judge’s name, are incorrect. But that’s what the people who want to be able to discriminate have (i.e., shadows of nothing), so that’s what they give us.
I expect this from the liars for Jesus. The sad part is that I got it from the press as well.
So, some Baptist Minister in Oklahoma City is telling the world lies about gay men, lesbians, and bisexual and transgender Americans, and practically no one even tries to debunk the lies or the man?
For the record, all the “facts” that pastor Vineyard stated — regardless of whom he quoted — are false. Gays aren’t any more likely to be child molesters than straights. Gays aren’t disease-ridden. Gays are, overall, by and large, just average, normal people facing the same problems as everyone else, with the little, teeny, tiny, fact that they face additional challenges because of hate-filled ignorant bigots like pastor Vineyard.
Pastor, the Internet will tell you anything you want to hear. Intelligent people know how to root out lies and false information.
Lying is wrong and evil. Even the Bible says so.
So why are all these men of God lying?
Here’s a little thought: The next time someone lies about gays, demand they prove it.
Oh, and who exactly is Pastor Vineyard? Well, he runs the Windsor Hills Baptist Church, “an independent, fundamental Baptist church,” in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. You can call him (be nice! I mean it!) here: (405) 943-3326.
Shame on you, Pastor Vineyard. And if you try to say, “Oh, I didn’t say it, the Judge did,” well, bunk. You said it. You said it in the middle of a City Council meeting. They may have been another’s words, but you thought enough of them to quote them. You own them. They will now be immortalized and attributed to you til the end of time.
The Pastor’s website also states,
“The preaching that comes from the pulpit of Windsor Hills is Bible-based in its doctrine and encourages each and every listener to live a life that will be pleasing to God and be an example to the world. Young people are encouraged to honor God and their parents with the decisions they make on a day to day basis.”
I guarantee that God is not pleased.
Below you’ll find the Pastor’s letter, which he posted on the Church’s website, and the video of his disgusting comments.
Pastor Tom Vineyard’s Letter To Oklahoma City Council
http://www.scribd.com/embeds/73059152/content?start_page=1&view_mode=list&access_key=key-7rixa3zyzj98iuuqx3i
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