Kentucky church votes to ban interracial couples

**troung** · 01 Dec 11,, 18:01

Charming.

Kentucky church votes to ban interracial couples
ReutersReuters – 16 hrs ago
Kentucky church votes to ban interracial couples - Yahoo! News

TOMAHAWK, Ky (Reuters) - A vote to bar interracial couples from a small church in eastern Kentucky has triggered hand-wringing and embarrassment.

Nine members of Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church backed their former pastor, with six opposed, in Sunday's vote to bar interracial couples from church membership and worship activities. Funerals were excluded.

The vote was taken after most of the 40 people who attended Sunday services had left the church in Pike County, near the border with West Virginia. Many members left to avoid the vote.

Most members of the church "didn't want anything to do with this," said longtime church official Dean Harville, whose daughter and her black fiance had drawn pastor Melvin Thompson's ire.

At services earlier this year, Stella Harville, 24, who is working on her master's degree in optical engineering, sang "I Surrender All" with her fiance, Ticha Chikuni, 29, a Zimbabwe native, according to her father. Chikuni, an employee at Georgetown College in Kentucky, played the piano.

"There didn't appear to be any problem," Dean Harville said on Wednesday. "None whatsoever."

But Harville said Thompson told him the couple would not be allowed to sing at the church again. Thompson resigned in August but would not drop the issue.

Thompson told a local radio outlet, "I do not believe in interracial marriages, and I do not believe this (ban) will give our church a black eye at all."

He could not be reached for comment.

The move has drawn scrutiny from the hierarchy of the Freewill Baptist Church, Harville said.

"This kind of thing brands all of us so easily," said Randy Johnson, president of the Pike County Ministerial Association. "That's not who we are. From all the churches I've talked to so far, it's really not anger so much as it is shock."

(Reporting by Lee Mueller, Editing by Andrew Stern)

**bonehead** · 01 Dec 11,, 18:53

Racism and meth is what Kentucky is being known for. They must be so proud. I am rather disappointed that this garbage is happening in a church. Thats not at all what Christianity is about.

**bigross86** · 01 Dec 11,, 21:59

This contrasts highly with what was once the Church's position to try and save as many of the black heathens as possible and introduce them to their version of the one true God. And then they wonder why people have such a dark view on religion

**Parihaka** · 01 Dec 11,, 22:24

Originally Posted by bigross86

This contrasts highly with what was once the Church's position to try and save as many of the black heathens as possible and introduce them to their version of the one true God. And then they wonder why people have such a dark view on religion

Historically to save them and use them as 'servants', not marry them.

**USSWisconsin** · 01 Dec 11,, 22:33

Whats next, is this pastor going to cook meth in the church basement?

**Bigfella** · 01 Dec 11,, 22:45

Originally Posted by bigross86

This contrasts highly with what was once the Church's position to try and save as many of the black heathens as possible and introduce them to their version of the one true God. And then they wonder why people have such a dark view on religion

Like Pari said, saving them was (and is) still all the rage. Marrying them wasn't originally supposed to be on the agenda. I'd be interested to know if this church is involved (even at the funding level) with any of the groups who do missionary work in Africa.

**Tarek Morgen** · 01 Dec 11,, 22:49

Originally Posted by Bigfella

Like Pari said, saving them was (and is) still all the rage. Marrying them wasn't originally supposed to be on the agenda. I'd be interested to know if this church is involved (even at the funding level) with any of the groups who do missionary work in Africa.

But were there not efforts (at least in Australia) to "breed" blacks into "proper" (=white) people by marrying them to selected spouses with fair skin.

**dave lukins** · 01 Dec 11,, 22:59

I didn't think this was legal or happening in this day and age

**bigross86** · 01 Dec 11,, 23:07

Separation of Church and State?

**Parihaka** · 01 Dec 11,, 23:09

Originally Posted by Tarek Morgen

But were there not efforts (at least in Australia) to "breed" blacks into "proper" (=white) people by marrying them to selected spouses with fair skin.

Not quite. The intent was to remove mixed-race children already existing from aboriginal communities.

Australia

The policy of removing mixed race Aboriginal children from their parents emerged from an opinion based on Eugenics theory in late 19th and early 20th century Australia that the 'full-blood' tribal Aborigine would be unable to sustain itself, and was doomed to inevitable extinction, as at the time huge numbers of aborigines were in fact dying out, from diseases caught from European settlers.[104] An ideology at the time held that mankind could be divided into a civilizational hierarchy. This notion supposed that Northern Europeans were superior in civilization and that Aborigines were inferior. According to this view, the increasing numbers of mixed-descent children in Australia, labeled as 'half-castes' (or alternatively 'crossbreeds', 'quadroons' and 'octoroons') should develop within their respective communities, white or aboriginal, according to their dominant parentage.[105]

In the first half of the 20th century, this led to policies and legislation that resulted in the removal of children from their tribe.[106] The stated aim was to culturally assimilate mixed-descent people into contemporary Australian society. In all states and territories legislation was passed in the early years of the 20th century which gave Aboriginal protectors guardianship rights over Aborigines up to the age of sixteen or twenty-one. Policemen or other agents of the state (such as Aboriginal Protection Officers), were given the power to locate and transfer babies and children of mixed descent, from their communities into institutions. In these Australian states and territories, half-caste institutions (both government or missionary) were established in the early decades of the 20th century for the reception of these separated children.[107][108] The 2002 movie Rabbit-Proof Fence portrays a fictional story about this system and the harrowing consequences of attempting to overcome it.

In 1922 A.O. Neville was appointed the second Western Australia State Chief Protector of Aborigines. During the next quarter-century, he presided over the now notorious 'Assimilation' policy of removing mixed-race Aboriginal children from their parents. This policy in turn created the Stolen Generations and set in motion a grieving process that has become known as the[who?] concept of trans-generational grief,[citation needed] and would affect many generations to come. In 1936 Neville became the Commissioner for Native Affairs, a post he held until his retirement in 1940.

Neville believed that biological absorption was the key to 'uplifting the Native race'. Speaking before the Moseley Royal Commission, which investigated the administration of Aboriginals in 1934, he defended the policies of forced settlement, removing children from parents, surveillance, discipline and punishment, arguing that "they have to be protected against themselves whether they like it or not. They cannot remain as they are. The sore spot requires the application of the surgeon's knife for the good of the patient, and probably against the patient's will". In his twilight years Neville continued to actively promote his policy. Towards the end of his career, Neville published Australia's Coloured Minority, a text outlining his plan for the biological absorption of aboriginal people into white Australia.[109][110]

'Tainted' blood but better than pure Aboriginal. The same was discussed in New Zealand but never instituted.

**YellowFever** · 01 Dec 11,, 23:11

Originally Posted by dave lukins

I didn't think this was legal or happening in this day and age

It's probably legal as I don't know of any laws that prevent people from being racists. If the policy is practiced,however, they should lose their tax exemption but that's probably the extent of what should happen.

Best case scenario is that now that this has reached the wires, the people that regularly goes to that church are outraged enough - or embarrassed enugh - to stop going and the church simply cease to exist.

**Parihaka** · 01 Dec 11,, 23:14

Originally Posted by YellowFever

Best case scenario is that now that this has reached the wires, the people that regularly goes to that church are outraged enough - or embarrassed enugh - to stop going and the church simply cease to exist.

Or simply man up and be present for a re-vote, rather than leaving to avoid the vote.

**YellowFever** · 01 Dec 11,, 23:19

Originally Posted by Parihaka

Or simply man up and be present for a re-vote, rather than leaving to avoid the vote.

Point taken.

The members that didn't vote helped cause this crap and those that "didn't want anything to do with this" are just as culpable.

**bigross86** · 01 Dec 11,, 23:21

Leaving to avoid a vote is the same as an "abstain" vote in the UN. They wanted nothing to do with this vote, and would probably vote against the motion, but were afraid it would hurt their standing in the community or amongst their friends.

Perhaps the one and only good thing to come from this vote is that at least now that community knows who some of the declared and outspoken racist bastards are. I'm sure there are some of those who left that support the motion but they too abstained to not hurt their standing in the community/with their friends

**Chogy** · 02 Dec 11,, 01:05

People are misunderstanding this, I think.

First of all, this particular Church can have whatever rules they want. They can discriminate all day long, accept only meth cooks, reject anyone under 6' tall, whatever. They are a private organization. The Government cannot force them to do marriage ceremonies.

Further, they don't represent anybody but themselves. They don't represent Christianity, Baptists in general, nor do they represent the people of Kentucky. They represent perhaps 2 dozen bigoted morons.

In cases like this, people vote with their feet. If you don't like what a particular church represents, you try to change it. If that doesn't work, you leave it and find another.