By: Scot Bear
Re: Mel White letter to Patty Robertson

 Subj:   OPEN LETTER from MEL WHITE to PAT ROBERTSON
 Date:        96-01-26 04:35:16 EST
 From:     jjy@xnet.com (James Yorton)

 -----  Begin Forwarded Message  -----

 OPEN LETTER FROM MEL WHITE (RevMel@AOL.COM)
 FAXED TODAY TO PAT ROBERTSON

 * Permission granted to circulate, post widely and to publish

 January 25, 1996

          An Open Letter to Pat Robertson from Dr. Mel White

 Dear Pat,

         There is a growing spirit of intolerance in our
 land.  Since the 1600s, when fundamentalist Christians chased
 Roger Williams to Rhode Island and burned 'witches' at the
 stake in Salem, similar cycles of intolerance have littered
 the nation with broken bodies and ruined dreams.  Now, it's
 happening again.  And that's why we're writing you.

       We are convinced that your relentless campaign against
 homosexuality is a primary cause of the growing spirit of
 intolerance towards lesbian, gay,and bisexual Americans.
 We have monitored every 700 Club  broadcast since you came
 to visit me in the Virginia Beach City Jail in March, 1995.
  And though you condemn violence, we are also convinced
 that your false and inflammatory anti-homosexual rhetoric
 leads indirectly to the very violence you condemn.

       On February 5, in Virginia Beach, we will present
 to the media and to the general public a sixty minute video
 tape of blatantly intolerant statements made by you and
 your guests on recent broadcasts of the 700 Club.
  Since you have not responded to our invitations to meet
 with you to  discuss this matter privately, we are asking
 thoughtful Americans to look at this video tape and decide
 for themselves.

      However, you, too, are invited to view and discuss
 the videos with us.
  You or your representative will have the opportunity to
 defend your case in the midst of a frank and open discussion
 of this question: Is Pat Robertson's anti-homosexual campaign
 a primary source of the intolerance being experienced by
 gays, lesbians, and bisexuals in America; and how should
 we respond to his anti-homosexual campaign?

     Following our February 5 discussion, we will be sending
 the video tape of your anti-homosexual remarks, a transcript
 of the tape's contents, and an official petition of complaint
 to the F.C.C. asking commissioners to decide if you should
 be censured for your intolerance.

       In all fifty states, the TV stations and cable systems
 that carry the 700 Club  will receive the video, the transcript,
 and similar petitions of complaint from local clergy and
 lay leaders.  Again, we will ask those managers to decide
 if you should be censored for your intolerance.

      We are also sending video and transcript copies to
 the national media,to editorial writers and publishers,
 to the President, to leaders of the Senate and the House,
 to the Chairs of the National Governor's and the National
 Mayor's Conferences, to the US Council of Catholic Bishops,
 the National Council of Churches, the National Association
 of Evangelicals and to other clergy and lay leaders across
 America. We are asking that each person or organization
 who receives the tape look at it carefully and decide for
 themselves: Should Pat Robertson be censured for his intolerance?

      At this moment, you are threatening lawsuits against
 any local station that airs the P-FLAG ads that demonstrate
 your intolerant anti-homosexual campaign.  Parents, Friends,
 and Families of Lesbians and Gays produced those two public
 service spots because they were alarmed by the growing hate
 crimes against their own children.  They don't blame you
 for those hate crimes.  But they do blame your anti-gay
 rhetoric for helping to create the hostile climate in which
 those hate crimes are committed.

     On that P-FLAG spot you say:  "Homosexuality is an abomination.
 Many of those people involved with Adolf Hitler were Satanists,
 many of them were homosexuals.  The two things seem to go
 together."

      You said those words, Pat, on the 700 Club.  You didn't
 show pictures of the Christian churches in Germany goose-stepping
 with the Third Reich.  You didn't talk about the innocent
 European gays and lesbians who died in Hitler's concentration
 camps.  You didn't tell of the brave homosexuals who fought
 and died to protect your freedom during that bloody world
 war against the Axis Powers.  You were so caught up in half-truth
 and hyperbole that you missed the truth completely. And
 on February 5, we will show that you continue to miss the
 truth in your relentless, irresponsible, and intolerant
 campaign against us.

      If you knew that a factory was pouring toxic pollution
 into your beloved Chesapeake Bay, you would send a TV crew
 to investigate and report immediately.  We are convinced
 that a toxic stream of anti-homosexual intolerance is flowing
 out of your CBN/700 Club  studios in Virginia Beach,helping
 to pollute the nation's moral environment.  Again, we appeal
 to you.
  Hear our case.  Reason with us.  Help us stem that flow.

       You are sincere, Pat, but you are sincerely wrong
 about homosexuality.
  Your intolerant words and actions are harming God's gay
 and lesbian children.  Again, I must quote Jesus's warning:
  "Whoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe
 in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged
 about his neck, and he were cast into the sea."

       Sincerely,   Mel White

 [Mel's email address is: RevMel@aol.com]

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