S.F. Episcopal Bishop Disputes Baptist’s View of God and AIDS

SAN FRANCISCO — An Episcopal bishop whose diocese includes the large homosexual population of San Francisco has criticized a leading Baptist cleric who said God created AIDS to express displeasure over the homosexual life style.

“I live in a city that is a sanctuary for homosexuals throughout the country. These people have been disowned by their parents, kicked out of their jobs, and damned by their churches,” William Swing, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of California, said in a letter to the Rev. Charles Stanley.

Stanley, a fundamentalist preacher from Atlanta, is president of the 14 million-member Southern Baptist Convention.

The diocese released a copy of the letter to the press. In it, Swing disputed the view of the Baptist preacher, reported by the San Francisco Examiner on Jan. 17, that God created acquired immune deficiency syndrome to express displeasure with homosexuality.

Swing added, “I do not gamble on wrath, but if I had to choose between the wrath of God and the wrath of moral community leaders as being at the center of the AIDS epidemic, I would bet on the community.”

The Examiner quoted Stanley as saying:

“It is a sinful life style, according to Scripture, and I believe that AIDS is God indicating his displeasure and his attitude toward that form of life style, which we in this country are about to accept.”