Jed and Cindy Smock having been coming to the UA Mall to preach for
more than 25 years, but this is the first time they’ve been greeted by
angels.
The Smocks—better known as Brother Jed and Sister
Cindy—are traveling Christian ministers who preach at more than
200 universities every year.
A typical scene: Brother Jed stands by while Sister Cindy holds her
arm out and points to all the students around them. “You are
fornicators!” she shouts.
It’s a fire-and-brimstone show, with the preachers saying the
students are going to hell if they continue to live a life of sex,
drugs and rock ‘n’ roll.
This year, however, Brother Jed and Sister Cindy’s words about
homosexuals, whores and short skirts motivated freshman Kira
Johnson.
The English major was inspired by Matthew Shepard’s funeral in 1998.
The Wyoming college student was murdered for being gay.
Hate-monger/pastor Fred Phelps showed up at his funeral to disparage
the LBGT community. Phelps, however, was greeted by angels:
Shepard-family supporters who dressed like angels and surrounded the
funeral area to protect the family.
While Johnson admits the Smocks aren’t as heinous as Phelps is, she
says she still felt a presence was needed to show Brother Jed and
Sister Cindy—and everyone who watched—that there’s a
different way to counter the Smocks’ rhetoric.
Rather than shouting back, as many students do, Johnson and her
friend Jai Smith turned to fellow members of the Pride Alliance, a UA
student-run LGBT advocacy group.
On Wednesday, March 25, Johnson, Smith and four other students
showed up in angel outfits, rigged by Johnson with some PVC pipe that
fit over the shoulders to support white wings made out of sheets.
Together, the group walked from the Student Union toward the grassy
hill in front of the administration building where the ministers
preached. They did this in complete silence, lining up between the
ministers and the mall, standing in shifts until the ministers were
done.
The reaction—the angel protest has continued each weekday
through our press deadline—has been amazing, Johnson says.
“As a result of the protests, I’ve met a lot of people who’ve come
up to us and thanked us for being here,” she says. “We’ve heard from a
lot of Christian students who were happy to see us, because they don’t
feel like (the Smocks) represent Christianity.”
On the second day, Johnson says they felt they were getting under
Brother Jed’s skin when he announced to the crowd as the angels
descended: “Here come the homos.”
“I had to laugh to myself. I looked down the line and wondered, ‘Who
is he talking about?’ since there were only two gay people there that
day,” Johnson says.
Johnson’s co-organizer, Smith, says the experience has been a great
way to let people know there’s another way to fight back—and that
sometimes, silence is golden. It also falls in line with the Pride
Alliance’s mission.
“This has helped us gain even more visibility this year. My hope is
that we will create a more inclusive environment on campus. … I think
we’ve managed to expand acceptance,” Smith says. “In comparison to
other places, as far as college towns go, this might be one of the more
inclusive, and it’s one reason I decided to stay—but it also has
a long way to go.”
Smith says that each day, the protest has gone well, although a few
hecklers have tried to get the angels to break their silence. On
Thursday, senior Paul Temple stood in front of the angels, walking back
and forth, and trying to start an argument about the flier the angels
were handing out that explains the tie to Shepard.
“It’s a bad idea,” Temple says. “(The Smocks) aren’t for violence
against homosexuals. They are against the sin, not the sinner.”
Not all Christian students agreed with Temple. On Friday, freshman
Stephen Hall stood up and told Brother Jed that his preaching went
against Jesus’ teachings, especially judgments against different
people. While Brother Jed kept on preaching, Hall got cheers and
applause from about 40 students watching the interaction.
“I want to stand up for the God who stood up for me and died on the
cross. This is not that God,” Hall says. “I’ve been a Christian all my
life. (Brother Jed) is a child of God as much as I am, but I think it’s
important to let people here know this isn’t what Jesus is about.”
At one point, Sister Cindy sat near her 14-year-old twin daughters
and ate lunch on a break while her husband continued their work. She
says the family makes their home in Columbia, Mo., and that she and her
daughters flew in to meet up with Brother Jed, who has been on the
recent leg of the tour by himself.
Sister Cindy, when not yelling about fornication, is pretty
approachable. She shrugs off criticism by saying that she and her
husband preach in a way that is entertaining, in an effort to get the
students’ attention and make them think.
“I guess we’re kind of like those Tyler Perry movies, like Madea
Goes to Jail,” she says. “That director’s main message is to get
women off the streets and off alcohol. It’s a similar technique. We
have a message we want to give. To do that, we use drama, satire and
hyperbole, and sometimes we’re vulgar to draw the crowd.”
But that crowd can get nasty sometimes. Sister Cindy agrees,
recalling times when she and her husband have been spat upon, pushed or
hit. Police will sometimes ask the Smocks if they want to press
charges.
“Usually, an apology will do,” Sister Cindy says.
Smith says he saw someone throw a cup of water in Sister Cindy’s
face during one of the early protests.
“It was completely ridiculous. I went up to Brother Jed and said I
was sorry that happened to them. That kind of action is completely
unwarranted and not constructive,” Smith says.
Besides, silence, he’s discovered, may just be the best way to
respond to Brother Jed and Sister Cindy.
This article appears in Apr 2-8, 2009.