Violently Anti-Gay Reverend Scott Lively Springfield Massachusetts Religious Center Masquerading As Free Coffee House Alarms City Officials

Scott Lively, the American evangelical with a well-documented history of anti-gay activity, including championing the current climate of violent homophobia in Africa, is causing concern in Springfield, Massachusetts, where, according to WGGB, he has opened a coffee house, the Holy Grounds coffee house on State Street, one block from Commerce High School. Holy Grounds offers free coffee, because, according to Lively, it is in fact a religious center, the Reverend saying “We have scripture on the wall and our purpose it to attempt to show how biblical values can change things in the city. That’s what it’s all about.” Springfield City Councillor Tim Rooke, however, worries that is not all Lively and his religious center masquerading as a religious center are about, and that Lively has a more nefarious agenda. |I don’t think we need anyone expressing any anti-gay messages or anti-Semitic messages to students who may or may not agree with him,” said Rooke, adding that he is worried about the students “interacting with a gentleman who has very different viewpoints than most of the people in Springfield.” Rooke is also concerned that some students are truant, skipping school, and although Lively says he is not here to act as officer for schools, “What I will do is ask the kids when they come in they are suspended or not. If they say they are not suspended then I’ll encourage them to go back to school.” Lively’s projected fatherly image fails to impress Rooke, who says he wants students to understand the reverend’s contention that the homosexual agenda represents a real threat. “They are at a vulnerable age and someone of the students that were going into the coffee shop who are gay weren’t aware of his past, so the benefit now is they can be a little more educated,” he said.