Phelps was an ordained Baptist minister, although his church was not affiliated with any mainstream denomination |
The Reverend Fred Phelps Sr, founder of the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas, died on Wednesday evening at 84.
The church, made up mostly of his family, rose to international notoriety with its practice of picketing funerals of fallen US troops.
It claimed their deaths were punishment for America's tolerance of gays.
'Diabolical'
Their signs read "Thank God for dead soldiers" and "Thank God for 9/11" and the like, and bore messages offensive to gay and lesbian people. » | Thursday, March 20, 2014