Bizarre, Media, Religion, Society, Uncategorized

Is This the Most Racist Pastor in America?

by Charlton “Chuck” Stanley, Weekend Contributor

Since February is Black History Month, it seemed to me that a local story was worth discussing. I first became aware of the story when it appeared in the Johnson City (Tennessee) Press last Tuesday . A little further digging revealed the story originated when a member of the church sent a copy of one of “Brother” Donny Reagan’s sermons to The American Jesus blog. The American Jesus blog is run by the Rev. Zach Hunt, who is currently working on a graduate degree at Yale Divinity School. Zach published a brief story and posted the seventeen minute long sermon on The American Jesus blog last week.

“Brother” Danny Reagan is pastor of the Happy Valley Church of Jesus Christ, located between Johnson City and Elizabethton, TN.  He records and archives all his sermons on the church website. Or at least he did until a couple of days ago. Now look what you get when you click the link.

In the seventeen minute sermon, Reagan rails against interracial marriages and biracial children. He says he doesn’t consider it right for white people and black people to marry. He calls such relationships “hybreeding.” So one might know this neologism is not a slip of the tongue, he says it repeatedly.

“Hybreeding, hybreeding, oh, how terrible, hybreeding. What white woman would want her baby to be mulatto, made by a colored man? Let’s stay the way God made us. I believe it’s right.”

Local media contacted him and he did not back down. He released more statements, and the more he talked, the deeper the hole he digs for himself.  He says the main thing he regrets is that some folks might think his statements reflect badly on his congregation. No kidding!

He added that he would not conduct a marriage for an interracial couple.  He added,

“This doesn’t have anything to do with race, I don’t think it would be right or fruitful.”

He claims to know who sent the video of his sermon to The American Jesus, but has not identified who he suspects sent it or why.

Then something curious happened. The video, which had been posted on several web sites, was deleted by YouTube on a claim of “copyright violation.” Not only the sermon in question, but all his other archived sermons as well. Gone. Deleted. 404 Error.

His archive of recorded sermons had been available online until the past day or so. I didn’t get a chance to view them before they were deleted, but there were a number of responses to the article when it appeared in the Johnson City Press. From the comment section we learn the following factoids:

….he preaches against homosexuality much more than mixed marriages.

He doesn’t think women should vote…. Called women “dogmeat” in one sermon. I thought we were past all of this.

It’s as if we have traveled back 50 years. I can’t bring myself to call him pastor or preacher. Maybe Grand Wizard but not a man of God!

We can thank those who watched the sermons and reported on them before they were deleted. It occurs to me that if he believed so much in what he was saying, he is cowardly for not having the courage to keep them online. Copyright violation, indeed! Can we add hypocrisy to the list of this preacher’s sins?

One thing Mr. Reagan forgot. This is the internet age, and nothing ever truly disappears. His seventeen minute sermon has been excerpted and some of the juiciest parts where he talks about “hybreeding” presented on news programs. Here is the clip from The Young Turks with hosts Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian.

His church is a rather large one, and according to local accounts, about 500 people show up for services every week. That sounds like a large number, but given the fact the tri-cities area of northeast Tennessee has a total metro area population well into six figures, 500 people are not representative of the community at large. It was gratifying that the local populace was outraged, horrified and vocal in their denunciation of the video and its creator. This is a conservative area of a conservative state, but this is racism, not conservatism. And as the comments in the newspaper suggest, he is not only racist, but sexist and homophobic as well.

According to a Gallup poll cited by the Johnson City Press,

“A 2013 Gallup poll showed that 87 percent of Americans approve of interracial marriages, as opposed to just 4 percent in 1958.”

Looks like everyone is out of step but Donny Reagan.

More here:

News Australia.

Gawker

80 thoughts on “Is This the Most Racist Pastor in America?”

  1. Chuck

    Is the taking down of the videos on the Happy Valley Church’s website possibly indicative of a schism developing in this church? Someone mentioned earlier the staff of the church has left but I wonder if this might be the end of this congregation as it is known today.

  3. There is racist, and their is racism.

    Racist is the individual, with his own opinions and actions. Anyone can be a racist.

    Racism is racist attitude coupled with institutional power. It takes a village and its leading idiot like Bro. Danny.

    There is very little if any institutional power backing black racists. There is no black racism. White racism — think voter suppression, the prison-industrial complex, the drug war — is still thriving in white society.

    The vapid comparisons to individual black leaders making legitimate observations and complaints about actual racism is but the thrashing of challenged white privilege.

    So, yeah, in ‘Merica it is a one-way street. And that’s the Truth, truth.

  4. So many logical fallacies, so little time. Defending the indefensible is really hard work.

    “People like Charlton are idiots.” That’s an ad hominem of the first order. If you have no argument, or if your argument is weak, attack the messenger.

    Then we have the straw man, the red herring, and my personal favorite, the Tu quoque fallacy. That can be translated as, “He did it, so it’s OK for my personal bigot to do it too.”

    My mom used to tell me that if little Johnny jumped off the top of the barn, did that make it OK for me to jump off the barn too.

    And as for the slaves, how about this great piece by Rev.Wintley Phipps explaining the origins of the five-note pentatonic melody for Amazing Grace. Rev. Phipps is an ordained Seventh-Day Adventist minister as well as musician and music teacher:

  5. No doubt religion can be a vehicle of hate, but it is not limited to one segment of society.
    Reverend Wright, Al Sharpton, Black Liberation Theology thrive on that which is vile. Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter to those who view through one lens and there will be no articles written here.

  6. As horrible as what the pastor is saying is, I think the sound of the congregation all shouting “Amen!” after he says each horrible thing is worse.

  8. Have they acquired their AR-15 rifles yet, to fight the enemies of Jesus, and get their white robes all bloody with their enemies?

    “The Lord is a warrior and in Revelation 19 it says when he comes back, he’s coming back as what? A warrior. A mighty warrior leading a mighty army, riding a white horse with a blood-stained white robe … I believe that blood on that robe is the blood of his enemies ’cause he’s coming back as a warrior carrying a sword.

    And I believe now – I’ve checked this out – I believe that sword he’ll be carrying when he comes back is an AR-15.

    Now I want you to think about this: where did the Second Amendment come from? … From the Founding Fathers, it’s in the Constitution. Well, yeah, I know that. But where did the whole concept come from? It came from Jesus when he said to his disciples ‘now, if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.’

    I know, everybody says that was a metaphor. IT WAS NOT A METAPHOR! He was saying in building my kingdom, you’re going to have to fight at times. You won’t build my kingdom with a sword, but you’re going to have to defend yourself. And that was the beginning of the Second Amendment, that’s where the whole thing came from. I can’t prove that historically and David will counsel me when this is over, but I know that’s where it came from.

    And the sword today is an AR-15, so if you don’t have one, go get one. You’re supposed to have one. It’s biblical.”

    (Hypothesis: The Cultural Amygdala – 4), quoting U.S. General preaching at a church).

  9. All this uproar about people being against gay marriage in America and how gays are treated in Russia. But damn…… they light em on fire in Africa!! Not a freakin peep out of the leftwing zealots.

    Btw, I am FOR gay marriage. I just hate hypocrites.

  13. People like Charlton are idiots. Not once did I ever say anything about interracial children.
    However here is some delicious irony in his effort to stamp out racism against blacks and bigotry against gays.

    Matthew 7:5
    Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.

    http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-05222008-112356/unrestricted/ClarenceEBrownIII2008Thesis.pdf

    RACISM IN THE GAY COMMUNITY AND HOMOPHOBIA IN THE BLACK
    COMMUNITY: NEGOTIATING THE GAY BLACK MALE EXPERIENCE

  14. If this guy is an idiot & needs to be called out, how did Obama get to be president listening for 20 years to some pastor who was a Jew-baiter & general anti-semite?

    While nothing Donny says can quite match up with an ordinary diatribe from 50% of our beloved American Imams, Pastor Reagan’s words are a good example of the First Amendment at work. The facts no government can stop Rev. Reagan hardly excuses anyone who steps foot in his church. Each one of those people needs to face up to the fact they are paying the salary of a minister who looks at history and hasn’t learned a GD thing.

    But, is this minister’s imprimatur on racism any different than the Obamas’ minister plying his trade out of an anti-OT church in Chicago? Having spent time in Johnson City, a guy like minister Reagan doesn’t surprise me. It does, however, surprise me at how many people for so long turned a blind eye to Rev. Wright. Is Obama going to give a speech placing Rev. Reagan in a “historical context”, a la Rev. Wright? You remember, glossing over questions such as how the White Man set up Pearl Harbour to allow a war, framed Nelson Mandela, developed & spread the HIV virus to kill off Blacks, how the Jews of today are not the same as those in the OT, etc., etc.

    Rev. Wright was not exactly Duke, Princeton or Yale Divinity material. Nor is his “PhD” from a respected Evangelical seminary such as Fuller, Knox, Dallas, Beeson, etc. He picked up a PhD from a school that pumps out plenty like him, though life is always easier for a “civil rights” based preacher when he can skip 95% of the OT and periodically but regularly drop in a “them Jews” comment.

  15. Internet Providence

    Brother Don preaches
    Church bells await Sunday dawn
    Belfry vacant

  16. I looked at the church’s website, hoping to quickly find information about its governance. Nothing, though it states on the homepage the “Archived Services Are Unavailable At This Time.” http://www.happyvalleychurch.com/ I notice they refer to their congregation as “diverse” and, based on the fact that the Deacons, Staff and Trustees have all but disappeared, they seem to be rallying their support for Pastor Reagan’s style of preaching “what you need to hear and not what you want to hear,” if any, in private.

  17. Charlton’s title instantly reminded me of the article posted at http://www.norfolkchapter.org/A_Less_Wright_Union.html , a not-so-subtle study of the use of rhetoric (and sarcasm) in public speaking, presumably to communicate a message which contradicts the more literal interpretation of the text itself. “Wright” appears 14 times in the address; “Constitution” only three. (Huffington Post referred to it as “Obama’s Race Speech.”)

Comments are closed.