Preacher Frightens Newtown Pride

by Nick Angelucci

A couple of Fridays ago, the Greens Member for Newtown Jenny Leong posted on her Instagram an important update regarding the group Christian Lives Matter.

Her live video message posted whilst she was attending the Global Greens Congress in South Korea, alerted her followers of “really dangerous individuals” that had gathered outside of The Hub in Newtown.

She pleaded for everyone to be safe on King Street as the group causes problems, harm, intimidation, and fear to the local Trans and LGBTI community.

She continued to call the group vile individuals who had no place in our society, and that they were not welcomed in the community.

The next day, the Inner West Mayor Darcy Byrne also posted on his socials alerting his followers that a right-wing Christian organisation held an aggressive gathering at the newly opened Pride Square in Newtown.

He called for the agitators behind the group to “stop seeking to inflame a reaction.” He continued to say that the local community does not need that kind of aggression and that the vast majority of those in the Inner West reject it.

There was even an article from the Star Observer, an independent publication for the LGBTI community, reporting that it was an anti-LGBTQ demonstration with members of the Christian Lives Matter “among other bigoted, far-right groups,” who marched through shouting and preaching in the streets of one of Sydney’s queerest suburbs.

But all these reports were just simply disinformation because the group that did turn up, was led by a Canadian street preacher by the name of David Lynn.

His Christ’s Forgiveness Ministries was on an Australian preaching tour with one of the destinations being at Newtown’s Pride Square. It was certainly a far cry from the last traumatic group of Christian men, who back in early March descended on King Street on a Friday night, tearing along menacingly whilst chanting the Lord’s Prayer.

There are plenty of YouTube videos of this Canadian pastor and his street preaching style, and he did express to his audience during a dialogue with a challenging local, that he has an issue with some members of the LGBT being provocative in schools and “act like strippers in front of kids”, but he further also explained that he does have his freedom of speech to express his opinions.

His entire 5-hour night preaching event at Pride Square, was captured and uploaded for his 461 thousand YouTube subscribers to see, and there was no evidence of violence or hatred by anyone.

It is possible that the LGBT community did not have enough time to organise any counter event, but it does seem to suggest how some of our politicians can themselves incite street confrontations by stoking fear in the community.

Let us hope in future that our politicians check their facts first before jumping on their social media to project their own political spin.