Yesterday members of our Bozeman council attended a peaceful counter protest as 3 members of the “Westboro Baptist Church” arrived in Bozeman. This group is notorious for their hate speech and using God’s name to pronounce that God kills soldiers because of homosexuality in America. Although the Knights of Columbus and the Catholic Church do not condone sin we believe it was our responsibility to counter Westboro’s hateful argument. It is our belief that Jesus Christ did not come for the righteous but came to bring salvation to the sinner. He did this using a message of hope and love in order that souls might be saved through His acts of Mercy.
We are grateful that members of our community and students of both Montana State University and Bozeman High School attended in a peaceful manner. With crowds nearing 500 people (opposing 3 Westboro members) there was certainly opportunity for problems. Knights members sought only to publicly pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet and ask that the Lord have mercy on us all during this event. We are proud of our members as they remained true to our plan. There were no confrontations between Knights and other protesters. We are also grateful to the community who allowed us to pray without interruption.
We Knights continue to pray for Christ’s Mercy upon the whole world through the Mother of all Nations. We pray that the members of our community understand that Westboro’s distorted view of God is not in line with Christian teachings. Most importantly it is our fervent hope that our community will come to understand the hope and love found in our Catholic faith.
Update: A couple of inspiring stories have come out of this event that we should note for our brothers. It is through these acts of Faith and courage that God inspires others. Several people observed our image of the Virgin Mary and identified her. We even had a couple of Catholics come find us (even a member of the media) and let us know they were Catholic and appreciated our presence. We were able to explain to other members of the community why we were present.
While praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet at Bozeman High School one of our Knights was pulled aside by an emotional young woman. She told the Knight through her tears that she used to be a Catholic. The graphic on her shirt implied she was part of the pro-gay community. Through the faith of Catholic Christians, the intersession of Our Lady, and the Mercy of Christ we will win salvation for the world.
Praise God for great and greater works….See we are all God’s instruments. – Father Leo Proxell