Westboro Baptist Church protest (PHOTO: group's website)

Westboro Baptist Church protest (PHOTO: group’s website)

Members of the Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church brought their anti-gay and anti-Catholic Church messages to the south side of Racine Sunday, and met a big response from hundreds of counter-protesters.

Members of the group were protesting outside of Saint Lucy’s. Several hundred counter-demonstrators were also on hand, with singing, music, and even loud motorcycles rumbling through to drown out the sounds of the Westboro group.

AUDIO: Tom Karkow reports (:45)

Saint Lucy’s business manager Pat McCloud says they did not ask for that level of support from the community and had planned to ignore the demonstrations. Still he says they couldn’t stop and didn’t want to stop those who planned to come out for counter-demonstrations.

Racine County Board Vice-Chairman Rusty Clark, who attends the church, believes they were targeted because of a Sunday evening service. In his words, “we were convenient.”

The Westboro protesters have scheduled other protests today in Racine, Kenosha and Milwaukee.

WRJN

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