Reverend Fred Phelps died on Mar. 19 at the age of 84. His daughter Shirley Phelps-Roper confirmed the news to the Topeka Capital-Journal. According to reports, Phelps was being treated for an unknown heath problem at Shaynee County facility.
Phelps was known for running the extremely controversial Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas. The church, which is not affiliated with an official Baptist church, was criticized for attacking celebrities, picketing funerals of soldiers and voicing their harsh stance on anti-gay sentiments.
"I can tell you that Fred Phelps is having some health problems," spokesman Steve Drain said in a statement. "He's an old man, and old people get health problems."
Phelps' daughter refused to reveal when or if a funeral would be held for the church founder. There have been reports that people would protest Phelps' funeral. Several members of the family refused to talk to members of the media but Phelps' granddaughter, Megan Phelps, tweeted about the loss of the church leader. Megan and her sister left the church in 2012.
One way or another, he's at peace," she wrote. "There's only heaven or peaceful nothingness. That's what I think. RIP, Gramps. I love you forever."
According to reports, a large majority of the church's followers were extended family members of Phelps and some outsiders who believed in his rigid stance that God was vengeful and would destroy a nation of sinners. The group first began making headlines back in the 1990s for its harsh views on homosexuality. Often times protesters would camp on street corners and outside funerals with signs that read "God Hates F***."
The church was really attacked back in 1998 after picketers protested the funeral of Matthew Shepard, a college student who was reportedly tied to a fence and left to die in Wyoming. Reports claim that Shepard was tortured and killed because he was gay.
Some other funerals Westboro protested included children's TV show host Fred Rogers, Frank Sinatra, Sen. Barry Goldwater, Coretta Scott King and the miners who died in the 2006 Sago Mine disaster in West Virginia. In the 2000s, they began to picket funerals of soldiers claiming that God was killing soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan "to punish the country for its tolerance of gays," the Washington Post writes.
