Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church coming to Southern Ill. University to picket speech by Matthew Shepard's mother

Matthew Shepard was the unfortunate gay University of Wyoming college student who was brutally murdered by hateful hooligans in 1998.

Matthew's mother Judy is scheduled to speak at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale on December 6. And that vile cretin, Fred Phelps, plans to bring some of his Westboro Baptist Church followers to SIU to picket her appearance there.

Phelps, who is repeatedly denounced by the Southern Baptist Convention and other mainstream Christian groups, advocates the death penalty for gays, as you'll learn in this Phelps flier (which also contains a picketer claiming Matthew Shepard is in Hell).

Phelps first gained his ill-repute for showing up at the funerals of AIDS victims. Lately, he and his "church" have been picketing funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq; Phelps is under the belief that God in punishing America because of our toleration for gay rights here.

Thankfully, counterprotesters usually are there to confront the Westboro Church members, as they did earlier this month in Galesburg, IL.

Hopefully Phelps and his group will be greeted in a similar manner in Carbondale next week.