RWNJ Pastor: Don’t Cry For Rosie O’Donnell’s Ex (TWEETS)

By
Darrell Lucus
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Homophobia runs very deep in some elements of the religious right. In many cases, it can get to the point that basic standards of decency get thrown out of the window in the name of “loving the sinner and hating the sin.”

For instance, Amber Cantorna, now a prominent speaker on the LGBT Christian circuit, was thrown out of her own home after coming out to her family. Her father was an executive with Focus on the Family, and having a lesbian daughter wouldn’t have exactly helped their image. Well, this weekend suggested that the hate may run deeper than that. Apparently when one half of an LGBT couple dies, it’s not Christian to grieve for them.

On Friday, Rosie O’Donnell announced that her second wife, Michelle Rounds, had been found dead at her home in Windermere, Florida of an apparent suicide four days earlier. The first unofficial word that something had happened came on Friday morning, when O’Donnell tweeted a picture from their daughter, Dakota.

Later, O’Donnell issued a statement calling for greater awareness about mental illness. In 2015, Rounds was hospitalized after an apparent overdose.


Now who would have a problem with that? Well, apparently right-wing pastor Jesse Lee Peterson did. Soon after the news of Rounds’ death broke, Peterson tweeted this.

The message was obvious–since Rounds was a lesbian, she brought her ordeal on herself. Needless to say, Twitter wasn’t pleased.

In an attempt to inject some decency back into the proceedings, Twitter user Kenneth Williams tried to say the only thing that should have been said in the face of this tragedy.

Peterson hit the ceiling.

There is so much wrong with this that it’s hard to know where to start. You mean to tell us that despite the love and nurturing that O’Donnell gave Dakota, as well as her four children by her first wife, they weren’t a family? I know of heterosexual couples that don’t have that. And you mean to tell me that single-parent families aren’t real families, Jesse Lee?

There was already ample reason not to think much of Peterson. This is a man who thinks the Fox News sexual harassment scandal is nothing more than an attempted lynching of “white men of power” by liberal “children of the lie.” He also thinks Democratic prayers for Steve Scalise weren’t real because Democrats worship Satan.


But now we know Peterson’s hate runs so deep that he feels he has to kick a grieving family in the teeth. In so doing, he just revealed that he is a small man–both literally and figuratively.

(featured image courtesy Family Equality Council, available under a Creative Commons BY-ND license)

Darrell Lucus
Darrell is a 30-something graduate of the University of North Carolina who considers himself a journalist of the old school. An attempt to turn him into a member of the religious right in college only succeeded in turning him into the religious right's worst nightmare--a charismatic Christian who is an unapologetic liberal. His desire to stand up for those who have been scared into silence only increased when he survived an abusive three-year marriage. You may know him on Daily Kos as Christian Dem in NC. Follow him on Twitter @DarrellLucus or connect with him on Facebook. Click here to buy Darrell a Mello Yello.

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