Volu m e I - Purdue University Calumet

Phelps, the leader of the organization, and his cult-like following have gone as far as picketing the funerals
of soldiers with signs like, “Thank God for I.E.D.s,” “Fag Troops,” and “Thank God for Dead Soldiers.” The
church sees almost every individual in America—aside from its own members (who are mostly part of the
Phelps’ extended family)—as prideful sinners who worship idols, homosexuality, and false Gods, and are
consequently doomed to burn in Hell. Their signs, videos, newsletters, and media appearances are intended
to be outrageously provocative and illicit angry, hateful, and even violent responses.
Even though they are a radical fringe group, the Westboro Baptist Church provides a perfect
example of the dangers of absolutizing individual beliefs as the only true notion and beliefs concerning God.
The church interprets the September 11 attacks and improvised explosive devices as forms of punishment
from God for the sins that America has committed. As acts of God, these punishments must be considered
by the absolutist Westboro Baptists as good. Both common sense and moral assessment attest to the fact
that “nothing that occurred in the destruction of [the September 11 th attacks], the killing of innocent persons
and the suicides of the perpetrators, allows the luminosity of goodness to show forth” (73). Adhering to
absolute truth claims concerning God and ultimacy has a blinding effect on those expressing demonic
religious beliefs, which allows the Westboro Baptists to claim that the September 11 th attacks illuminated
goodness; however, when approached from the moral point of view, these acts are shown to be heinous,
immoral, and completely deplorable.
Religion can certainly be a good of life, yet this need not and is not always the case. Steffen posits
that “[religion] can even be so manipulated as to turn away from goodness” (74). This is evident, albeit in
different ways, in the cases of the Westboro Baptist Church, al-Qaida, and other radical groups that affirm
their beliefs by denying the goodness of the lives of others. For a life-affirming religion, life is to be
respected and cherished, and “is to be regarded as deriving its meaning and value from ultimacy itself” (76).
Religion and one’s own notion of the ultimate are not by definition good or life-affirming. Religion and
ultimacy must always be approached with a moral point of view and be subject to evaluation, assessment,
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