Anti-LGBT, abortion views at Bonavista church persist in certain groups, says former minister
CBC
A former Pentecostal Church minister is shedding light on how controversial religious views can persist in certain religious communities following a recent open-air church service in Bonavista, N.L., criticizing abortion and the LGBT community.
Katherine Roberts, who now works as a marriage commissioner in central Newfoundland, spent years in the Pentecostal Church and preaching with Victory Churches International. She left the group to tend to her business in the region, but said her departure also gave her time to change and assess her own beliefs.
"I have two kids who are gay … and I raised them in the fundamentalist environment, so my two kids were not free to be who they were. When I faced that moral dilemma that the God that I served and worshipped … did not love my kids … that is what led me to a careful examination of my beliefs," Roberts told The St. John's Morning Show this week.
Roberts's comments come after video surfaced online in August of an open-air service at Grace Pentecostal Church in Bonavista that shows the church's minister criticizing abortion, the LGBT community and the use of alcohol.
Roberts said she wasn't surprised to hear comments of that nature come out of the Pentecostal church, adding they likely come from a strong devotion to the words of the Bible.
"Pentecostalism, fundamentalism, the church that I belonged to, are biblical literalists. They believe the Bible is 100 per cent correct, and everything else is wrong," she said.
"I would bet my bottom dollar that that man believes that he was preaching out of love. But it's a very false sense of love, it's a love if you align with what we believe."
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